Shore Leave

by David Whish-Wilson

  Ryan awoke with a cough. He lit his rollie and clapped his hands. ‘All those hours we spent makin gidgees paid off, eh? That looks a nice snug thread. Pass it here.’

  Ryan looked down the unified barrel, examining the hammer position, appeared satisfied that it’d strike the percussion cap of a .303. ‘Nice work, old boy. You got yourself a pistola. Now, to test it.’

  Pascoe was one step ahead. He’d already found an old steel garbage bin. It was home to three red-back spiders, whose silky egg pods were too numerous to count. Pascoe got the hose on them and blasted them out into the pile of grey dirt that was mounded by the back fence. ‘Get me a couple blankets?’ he asked. ‘Let’s make us a silencer.’

  ‘You mean a suppressor?’

  ‘You know what I mean, smart-arse.’

  Pascoe began to smash out the bottom of the bin with the remainder of the iron pole. It was heavy and he felt his chest gurgle and his heartbeat begin to slip before Ryan took his arm. ‘Stupid old bugger. You ain’t dyin here. Not till we’ve had a farewell session.’

  Pascoe watched Ryan’s shoulders rise and fall with the weight of the rod. He was a proud old rooster and hadn’t let himself go.

  ‘There. Done.’ Ryan turned and twisted the bin into the sand pile. He took an old grey army blanket and folded it until it was the circumference of the bin, before packing it around the inside. He did the same with a moth-eaten red blanket. The same with another army blanket.

  Pascoe leaned over and peered inside. Just enough room for the flare-gun barrel.

  ‘Here goes nothin.’

  Pascoe put in a .303 cartridge, pointed it at the ground. It was heavy with the new iron barrel but the shell didn’t fall out, and therefore didn’t need packing.

  ‘Kinda like a reverse musket,’ Ryan added. ‘You’re gonna have to use a rod to get the casings out, each time.’

  ‘Yep.’

  Pascoe had a good listen to the neighbourhood. His hearing was ok, and there were no conversations in the houses on either side. He put the flare gun into the bin and looked to Ryan, who was waiting with a rusty old fire-extinguisher, probably been in the family for fifty years.

  Pascoe held the flare gun with both hands and pressed the trigger. The flash and bang was loud but it was the recoil that took him by surprise, throwing his hands over his head and toppling him backward onto the sand.

  Ryan put down the fire extinguisher, but only so he could laugh better. Pascoe’s ears were ringing. Ryan put his hands on his belly and slapped his thighs, hopping about on the spot and laughing his arse off. Gradually, Pascoe’s hearing returned.

  ‘Ah, you silly old bugger. Funniest thing I seen in ages.’

  Ryan helped him up.

  ‘Least it didn’t blow up in my hand. Not like that mortar you made, remember? Nearly took out a wall at school. You looked like Wile E. Coyote with yer smokin hair, yer singed eyebrows.’

  Ryan slapped Pascoe on the back. ‘Yeah, that was too funny.’

  Pascoe gathered himself and went to the oxygen bottle. He put the mask over his face and took a long draw, the flare gun on the table beside him.

  It was only then that he looked at the neighbour’s fence, saw the young bearded longhair watching him.

  Pascoe held the man’s stare until Ryan noticed and quit sweeping the lathe. ‘Tone, meet Sat Prakash. Satty, meet an old mate of mine –’

  ‘… Tony Smith,’ Pascoe finished.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ Ryan said. ‘Tony Smith.’

  The bearded man nodded, looked to the smoking bin that had acted as a silencer. ‘Sorry, Des, thought I heard a gunshot. Sounded like a forty-four Magnum, my old gun.’

  Des Ryan leaned on the broom. ‘Satty’s a Sannyasin. Follower of the Bhagwan. Mob of them live next door. Feed me sometimes when I’m broke.’

  Pascoe didn’t know much about the Rajneeshees beyond what he’d read in the morning paper, which characterised them as a dangerous sex cult. He didn’t believe any of that – it was the kind of thing that the paper regularly served up to its largely old and conservative readers. Pascoe had been the target of misinformation in the same paper, back when he was free.

  ‘You knocked off for today?’ Ryan asked the bearded man, clearly knowing the answer. ‘Tone, Satty’s a bricklayer. His crew have renovated half the homes on this street, half the neighbourhood.’

  The bearded man looked at Pascoe strangely, then past him to the shape of the adapted flare gun, hidden beneath a hessian sack. ‘I know who you are,’ he said. ‘You were on the front page of the morning paper. Just wanted to get that out the way. You’ve got nothing to worry about. Des trusts us, I hope you will too. Both of you, come over for dinner in a minute, if you’re keen. I’ll put the paper in the chook cage, where it belongs.’

  Pascoe was about to speak but Des cut him off. ‘Sure, mate. That’d be good. I could eat the arse out of a horse.’

  17.

  It was early evening by the time Swann returned from his GP, who’d sent him to Fremantle Hospital for blood tests. Lefroy, his GP, was excited by the diagnosis made on the Vinson – the first case he’d discovered of shooting-caused lead poisoning. He consulted his manuals and made notes and wrote the scripts for the blood tests. Tomorrow, he’d put in a call to a Sydney laboratory to place an order for the chelation therapy medications. The medicine consisted, apparently, of doses of something called dimercaptosuccinic acid, otherwise known as succimer. It’d been used in Australia to treat lead poisoning among children in Broken Hill, after dogs living near the smelter started dying. Lefroy told Swann that he was curious to chart how he responded to the treatment. The average Fremantle home contained hundreds of kilograms of lead in the coats of paint on the walls, and in various plumbing solders and leadlights. It was a public health disaster in the making, he said, and if it was acceptable to Swann, he’d like to record the changing blood levels, with a mind to writing a possible paper.

  Swann didn’t mind at all. He just wanted the medication quickly, and paid for it to be couriered to Lefroy’s office. It was due tomorrow or at the latest on Monday morning.

  Swann sat in the rattan chair on the front porch. Marion had taken the dog for a walk. She would be happy to hear about the diagnosis.

  Swann relaxed his shoulders into the chair, watching the light drain out of the pale blue sky, shadows building in the garden, a hush falling over the street. He thought about following Marion and the dog to the beach, felt like he needed to be with them.

  The doctor had given Swann good news, but he didn’t take any pleasure from it. He’d seen a lot of death over the course of his career, and each new victim brought the ghosts out from the grave-dark rooms of his memory. Swann had felt a spike of pity and anger at the sight of Francine’s violated body, the purpled face and bared teeth, but also a haunting that he knew would shade his thoughts until the person responsible was identified, then taken down.

  In the old days, on nights like this, Swann would reach for the bottle. He felt the familiar need that he focussed on, examined, then pushed away.

  When the phone rang, Swann was eager to answer it. He went inside and took up the phone, walked it out the door.

  Webb sounded tired and frustrated. He told Swann that Cassidy had brought in a forensics team to fingerprint and take samples from the Seaview room that Bernier and Francine had rented for the night. Cassidy and his detectives, together with Webb, had just returned from Francine’s home address, where they failed to find evidence of Bernier’s communicating with her over the past year.

  Swann hung up the phone and stared into the darkening sky, considering what Webb had told him. He felt the old relief at the thought of work, a distraction from the memory of Francine and a movement toward making things right.

  It was possible, he supposed, that Bernier remembered Francine from his last shore leave and sought her out, although according to Kerry he hadn’t entered the brothel. What Kerry’s workers did in their own time was their own business, but for financi
al and safety reasons she discouraged their meeting clients off the clock. It happened, of course, and plenty of prostitutes Swann had known over the years had exited the industry this way, hooking up with a long-term partner.

  But Francine had worked her full shift before knocking off and meeting Bernier at the pub. The probability was that the meeting had been arranged prior to the Vinson’s arrival in port, and there were likely letters and telegrams to give an indication of the nature of their relationship. Even a detail like who the letters were addressed to would speak volumes. If Francine had confided to Charles Bernier her real name, then that suggested a degree of intimacy that would be absent if she kept to Montana. According to Webb, Bernier had no priors for sexual assault or deviancy, although he was double-checking at the level of Bernier’s neighbourhood police jurisdiction. It was possible for a sex offender to slip past the military’s vetting process, especially when, as was the case with Bernier, he’d signed up having been offered a choice by a judge – gaol time or military service – following his arrest in Houston for burglary.

  The mystery was why, if Bernier was the killer, he’d allowed himself to be seen. Why had he rented a room across the road from Francine’s workplace, if his intention was to hurt her? If Bernier had indeed murdered Francine, this suggested to Swann that the crime wasn’t planned, and that instead he’d killed her, panicked and run.

  Swann continued to think about Francine McGregor while he showered and changed. His thoughts turned, as they always did, to what her final moments had been like. He had interviewed rape victims and had seen first-hand the trauma that would never leave them. It wasn’t hard to imagine his daughters in Francine’s position, or to maintain the desire to hunt down the man who’d taken Francine’s life. Swann pocketed his keys and stepped into the night.

  18.

  It only took one line of crank for Devon Smith to get his head up. He swiped the mirror with his index finger and put it to his tongue. His father had worked as a speed cook back in the day and this Australian shit tasted like caviar compared to his father’s crank that burned the nose and was dangerous near a flame.

  One of the things about being on the Vinson was the strict no-drugs policy. They hadn’t introduced drug testing yet, but it was coming. Up on the deck you occasionally smelt weed when the blacks played basketball while their boom boxes pumped Niggaz Wit Attitude, Public Enemy or Grandmaster Flash. Smith couldn’t help it – he loved that shit, especially NWA, wished more white bands carried that loading of malice and cool. Devon Smith liked to whistle and sing, and once, in the galley, Marcus and Lenny caught him belting out ‘Fuck the Police’ over the ceramic clanking of the industrial dishwasher. He never saw them laugh harder or longer, slapping their thighs like old minstrels, picking up the lyrics where Devon left off, Marcus beatboxing while Lenny sang – Devon the kinda vanilla ice nigger that built to last, fuck with him he put his own damn foot up his ass. Then more slapping and wheezing laughter, fist bumping and wiping tears.

  Fuck them, and the police.

  Devon had five large in his pocket. That was half what he was owed, but it was still three grand profit. Not enough for him to avoid the ridicule of his father for failing to bluff the biker, but there it was, in his pocket.

  And now here he was, taking care of business, in an ordinary-looking office with titty calendars and filing cabinets, with his head up and a glass of Jack in his hand. Devon knew what they were doing, leaving him alone with a gram packet and a freshly cracked bottle while they deliberated outside – testing him to see whether he would show restraint. He could hear their murmuring behind the sounds of AC/DC’s ‘Hells Bells’, a hastily convened meeting of the governing council. Devon had assumed that Barry Brown was the bikers’ sergeant-at-arms, but he was just another gang member, older than the rest. It made sense, Devon supposed. You send an older biker to make the deal, someone whose kids have left home, who’s probably single and can do the time easily if caught, whose family won’t need supporting from the club coffers.

  Devon hadn’t met the club president or the sergeant-at-arms. Barry Brown had forced Devon to crawl into the front seat floorpan of the Monaro for the drive to the clubhouse, told him it was either that or the boot. Devon didn’t know what a boot was, thought he’d meant a literal kick in the ass, until Brown pointed to the trunk. After a long and silent drive, Barry Brown honked his horn and Devon heard iron gates clank open. It occurred to him in a moment of fear that nobody knew that he was there. He could go missing, and nobody would find him.

  Depending on what happened next.

  Devon cut out another line onto the mirror and used the razor to pat the packet so that it still looked full. He put the crank up his nose and sipped on the Jack and it was only when he rolled his head to look at the ceiling that he noticed the black eye of a surveillance camera staring down at him. He smirked and shook his head. He should, he supposed, feel heartened that they were so careful. If given the go-ahead, he was about to commit a crime that would see him locked up for a very long time. The Aussie bikers were careful, and so he needed to be careful, but it was hard with the speed now surging through his body, tingling his balls and making him feel happier than he’d felt in months. Devon wiped his nose and closed up the packet, capped the bottle, waited for them to come. He kept his hands steady and his face blank, occasionally sipping from the glass, lighting a cigarette while staring at the tanned curves of the calendar biker chick, sat astride a Harley with her ass reared in the air.

  The door opened and Barry Brown indicated that Devon should follow. His eyes scanned the desk and cabinets to see if anything had been disturbed. The bar room had been noisy with Nongs members when they’d entered, patched men in leather and prospects in denim, but now it was cleared of all but five men, seated at a table underneath a fluorescent light. Barry Brown dabbed his toe at the one empty chair and went over to the bar, began to pull bottles out of a misted fridge.

  The smallest of the five men cleared his throat, put a half-smoked cigar into the ashtray. He had a scraggly red goatee and fierce green eyes. His ginger hair was cropped on top and long at the back. He had Asian tattoos of goldfish, samurai warriors and slant-eyed demons up his bare arms. When he smiled, his teeth were surprisingly white and even.

  ‘My name is Gus Riley. Club president. We talked about your offer, but want to hear it from you. How you plan on getting the weapons off ship without being detected.’

  The four other men smoked and watched Devon through slitted eyes, reading his weakness as though it was a sign hanging from his neck. Stone-cold killers, each of them. No tension in their bodies. No need to put on an act.

  Devon had known plenty like them. He had always feared his father, sure enough, but alongside hard men, his father seemed a yappy dog. Devon had turned out no different, but still believed that his association with outlaws meant that it was only a matter of time before some of that gravitas was passed to him. He just had to show them.

  ‘I got a buddy. He’s in the bunk next to mine. Three gradings higher than me. He’s just a storeman, but he secures the rooms where the ordinance and weaponry is kept. It’s a big room near the top deck. Got the marines’ stuff there. Even stuff for resupplying submarines. Like a supermarket, he reckons. Everything got to be combat ready, in case.’

  ‘Have you been in there, yourself?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  The redhead smiled at that. Took up his cigar and flicked open a zippo, put fire to the stub end, huffed himself a shroud of grey smoke. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I got a way to get whatever I want. I got a plan to get it off, too. I just need to pay my buddy his cut, up front.’

  ‘That ain’t gonna happen, son. Nothin to stop you takin our money and hiding on the carrier – nothing we can do to get you off it. And I don’t wanna know anything about your … buddy, or what your arrangement is. You got to grease the wheels, you pay it out of your end. The five K in your pocket, for starters. I just want to know that you can delive
r, and how you plan on getting it to us.’

  Despite his best attempts to mirror the men around him, Devon sensed the tension in his shoulders, his hands wringing like a little boy under the table. Hated the sound of his reedy voice, too. He pulled his hands apart, set his shoulders and leaned forward. ‘You want to hear my plan? Well, this is what I figure on doin …’

  19.

  ‘Is this him?’

  Swann showed the photo of Bernier to the squat, muscled man with a shark tattoo across his bare chest; teeth to tail, shoulder to shoulder. He was a scallop-trawler fisherman from Carnarvon on two weeks leave, renting a room at the Seaview. His shoulders were tanned and his face was burned. His long brown hair was sun-bleached at its tips.

  ‘Yeah, that’s him. No doubt. I ran into him comin out of the dunny. Not used to lockin it. He called me sir. Never been called sir before.’

  ‘What time was that?’

  This was more difficult for the fisherman. He was down for a spree. Swann could see the heroin in his eyes, hear it in the flatness of his drawl. He stank of mildewed sheets and stale bourbon.

  ‘Dunno mate. Reckon it was well after midnight. Early hours. He was all dressed up. Smelt like a flower shop. Had one of them negro combs stickin in his hair. Was brushin it while he walked into the dunny. Last time I saw him.’

  ‘The fight yesterday, that brought the coppers. Were you here when it happened?’

  ‘Sure I was. I’m in town, I don’t leave this place. Got everythin I need right here. I keep to meself though. Heard the crunch of some blokes goin at it, bashin into the walls while they wrestled. Just cracked the door to take a look. Fists, kicks, one of ’em nearly went over the balcony.’