Beware of the Dog (10 page)

‘Don't kid yourself. It's early days in that investigation. If we come up with something against you Hardy, you'll wish you'd taken up bee-keeping.'

Willis wasn't as jaded as he looked. He began to get worked up and I wondered what lay behind his attitude. He'd been with me for almost two hours—maybe he found it hard to go that long without a drink. Maybe he didn't have private health insurance the way I had to have, and resented my quiet room and leafy view. And there
were
young nurses. I wished one would come in now and usher him away. No such luck.

‘I was embarrassed,' I said. ‘It's embarrassing to have your gun lifted.'

Willis snorted. ‘Especially by a woman.'

‘By anyone.'

‘And you're not embarrassed now? You can talk to me about it?'

I lifted my bandaged hands up above the blanket. The action hurt. ‘They tell me I nearly died. It puts things into perspective.'

Willis scowled. ‘Fuckin' smartarse private eyes,' he said.

I twigged then. He was expressing the police force's anger over the publicity given to the case of two PEAs who'd been charged with bribing police officers, conspiracy to murder and conspiring to pervert the
course of justice. The case had been in the news when I'd made my trip to the mountains, but that was almost two weeks ago. Glen and I had talked about it in the early stages, but there must have been later developments which we hadn't discussed.

‘Brewster and Loggins,' I said. ‘What happened to them?'

Willis nodded. Some of the energy seemed to drain from him. ‘Loggins jumped bail. He's probably in Spain by now with that fuckin' …'

‘Ray Brewster?'

‘Offed himself. Took a uniformed man with him and left a letter.'

There's nothing the police dislike more than suicide letters and dying declarations. They have a dramatic impact that is almost impossible to refute. I wondered what Brewster had said. I'd met him once—a big man, ex-cop, which made it worse, slow-witted and violent. He'd resigned from the force when it was obvious that he was on the take. The granting of a PEA licence had been his price for keeping quiet about everyone else who was doing the same. An old story. Old pigeons coming home to an old roost.

‘I've got nothing further to volunteer about the Wilberforce matter,' I said. ‘Beyond this—I have a client whose interests I am pledged to protect.'

‘Get off the soapbox, you …'

There was a knock at the door and Constable Booth entered carrying a sheaf of papers. She gave two sets to me and one to Willis as if she was unaware of the tension in the room. She wasn't, though. She clicked a ballpoint pen with perfect timing and handed it to me.

‘A signature at the foot of two copies, please,
Mr Hardy. Sergeant Willis will witness. There are two passages which are a little obscure. I've tagged them. Perhaps you'd be good enough to make corrections and initial the two copies at those points.' 

‘Happy to,' I said.

I flicked through the pages slowly, trying not to let Willis see how much the movement hurt me, making the amendments and initialling, watching him do a slow burn. When we'd finished, Constable Booth executed a smart turn and marched from the room. Like me, she seemed to find the situation slightly ridiculous. I put my spare copy of the statement on the bedside cabinet, along with the water carafe, the as-yet-unopened paperbacks and untouched grapes.

Willis heaved himself up from his chair. ‘Be careful,' he said.

There had never been any question of skin grafts or plastic surgery. The burns, though severe, hadn't been the problem, nor the smoke inhalation. The thing that had laid me low was the pneumonia that had developed as a result of my severe cold plus the exertion, trauma and exposure. I'd lain half-naked in cold mud for some time before the rescuers had arrived. Antibiotics had knocked out the infection but, after twelve days in the hospital, I exhibited an allergic reaction to one of the drugs and I went down again into a weakened state that had me sleeping around the clock and having disturbing dreams. I emerged from this bout clear-headed and alert, but very weak physically.

Glen took me home to Glebe and stayed with me there. In one of my dreams I saw Sir Phillip Wilberforce
stretched out on a morgue slab. I asked Glen for the latest on him.

‘He pulled through,' she said. ‘But he suffered some kind of stroke. I understand he's shaky all down one side, poor old bugger. He's at home though. D'you want to send him a card?'

I was sitting in a deck chair in the back courtyard, soaking up winter sun. ‘I want to see him,' I said.

‘Why?'

‘Remember he's my client, too. Hired me to find his daughter, Paula.'

‘Isn't that a conflict of interest? You're working for the Lamberte woman.'

I shook my head. ‘The regulations are vague on this point. Hardy handles heavy case load.'

Glen grinned. ‘Fucks up all round.'

‘But soldiers on.'

We looked at each other. Glen had taken leave and we'd spent a week together, every night and a lot of the daytime. It was the longest time we'd put in like that apart from holiday breaks. It had worked well—a little gentle sex, taking care not to disturb my dressings and open my wounds; quiet walks, light meals, reading and watching TV together. We were closer than we'd ever been, each anticipating the other's wishes, responding to allusions, taking the hints. Great, and as artificial as a politician's smile.

‘You're not ready,' she said.

‘I'm not planning to climb any mountains. I just want to move around a little. Talk to a few people.'

‘About what? I thought you didn't have any leads to follow.'

‘Why did you think that?'

‘I just … never mind.'

This was more like our usual style, slightly combative but mutually respectful, resolving itself in bed or being dissipated by work. We had both recognised that we worked different sides of the street. It made for a certain kind of tension that, I realised clearly then, I liked. I wasn't sure that Glen liked it as much.

I reached forward to touch her. We were sitting about a metre apart and it felt like a kilometre or two. She didn't pull away, but the movement stretched the healed skin on my shoulders and made me wince. ‘Look, love,' I said, ‘I don't believe those two died by accident.'

‘Your former client is being looked for. If you've got any information you should volunteer it.'

‘I haven't, but maybe if I just sniff around.'

‘Bullshit. And what did you say was your unstated motto: no dough, no show, wasn't that it?'

‘All right, but the Wilberforce thing is different. She took my gun, for Christ's sake. I feel like a bloody idiot.'

‘Male pride. Terrific way to run a business.'

‘The old man …'

‘Probably doesn't remember who you are. Leave it be, Cliff.'

‘And do what? Walk all the way to the library on my own? Read the TV guide? Pick a few winners and plan what to have for dinner?'

‘Look at you. You can hardly move without something hurting.'

‘I want to find Paula Wilberforce. I
have
to. It's important.'

‘More important than your health? More important than me?'

‘Shit.'

The cat wandered out of the house, stood on the warm bricks and stretched itself. It mewed and curled up in a corner. We both looked at it and laughed.

I started by getting myself fit enough to do more than get out of bed and feed the cat—long walks in the warm part of the day with my shirt off, up and down the Wigram Road hill several times a day, plenty of protein and sleep. After a week of that I felt well enough to reclaim my car from the Chatswood police compound. The cops were barely civil, compliant rather than cooperative. My profession still wasn't popular with the custodians of the law. They slapped me with a towing charge, a fee for holding the vehicle and an unroadworthy notice. With the taxi fare from Glebe, it was turning out to be an expensive morning. They gave me the notice before I saw the car.

‘What's this?' I said.

‘Can read, can't you?' the senior constable said. ‘One bald tyre, defective wiper, broken tail-light.'

‘How can you tell the wiper's defective unless you turn on the ignition? And the tail-light wasn't broken when I left it.'

‘On your way, Mr Hardy,' the senior said. ‘And don't get stopped between here and home with the vehicle in that condition.'

‘No wonder you're so popular,' I said.

‘Just be sure the cheques you write to the Police Department and the Road Traffic Authority don't bounce.'

I let him feel like a winner as he scratched his second chin. The Falcon's engine purred immediately into life and the wipers worked fine. ‘Like being with the cops, do you?' I said. ‘Be careful or I'll trade you in.'

More out of curiosity than anything else, I drove to Lindfield. The For Sale sign had been taken down and work had been done in the garden. New owners were putting their stamp on the place. A Mitsubishi Colt was parked in the driveway and a security screen had been installed across the front door. I wondered who had bought the house, who had got the money and what had happened to the broken easel and the paintings. On past experience, Climpson & Carter were unlikely to enlighten me.

The drive back to Glebe didn't phase me. I found I could put my own seat-belt on and everything. I celebrated by skipping the Wigram Road hike and having a couple of glasses of wine with lunch. Then I phoned Sir Phillip Wilberforce.

‘Yes?' an old, cracked voice said carefully. It sounded as if he'd suddenly aged twenty years.

‘Sir Phillip, this is Cliff Hardy. Do you …'

‘Remember you? Of course I do. I haven't gone gaga, despite what they're trying to say. I've been hoping you'd call. We have things to talk about.'

This was better than I'd hoped for. It sounded as if I was still on the payroll. ‘Has there been any word of your daughter?'

‘Daughter,' he spoke slowly, dragging the word out.

‘No. No. Can you come to see me?'

I said I could but I needed another day to collect something which I hoped I could find.

‘You're being cryptic, your privilege, I suppose. What?'

‘A photograph. I hope you can identify the subject and the photographer.'

‘Intriguing. Well, tomorrow then?'

‘Tomorrow evening. Have you got someone looking after you?'

‘Yes, damn and blast her. I'll tell her you're coming and with a bit of luck she'll let you in. Do you need any money?'

I said I didn't and he seemed not to care, one way or the other. The best kind of client. I rang off and rang Verity Lamberte's home and business numbers—no answer at the one, no information at the other, as expected. Glen had gone to Goulburn again but before she left she'd ascertained that the Land Cruiser was being held by the police in Katoomba and that there was no obstruction to my going and getting it. Like the good bloke he was, Terry Reeves hadn't made a peep. I rang him and told him I'd have the vehicle back tomorrow.

‘No worries. How's things, Cliff?'

A question you normally answer without a thought. I couldn't do it. I said something meaningless, maybe cryptic again. Terry sounded puzzled.

The next day I caught the 8.03 to the Blue Mountains.
Rabbit at Rest
was one of the paperbacks Glen had bought me and I was working slowly through it. It was a good book to read when you were on the
right side of fifty and didn't look like dying just yet. The book held my attention, but I looked up from time to time to observe the passengers coming and going, boarding and alighting. It was good to feel like part of the moving scene again, not confined within walls. To be out there in the world where something interesting might happen. On the train, nothing did, except that Rabbit's son came back from the drug rehabilitation program as a born-again Christian. Not for the first time, I was glad I hadn't had any kids.

I was in Katoomba shortly after ten. In the city it had been overcast and gloomy but the day was clear and bright in the mountains. And cold. I'd come prepared for it in a thick shirt and heavy sweater but the cold cut through the layers of cotton and wool and I could feel the places where I'd been burned and lacerated stiffening. I walked up the steep main street to the police station thinking that it was a different world up here—Sydney belonged to the ocean, the mountains belonged to the enormous country behind them. Dangerous thoughts, these, they tend to make you feel that human beings have no place on the continent at all.

The reception I got from the Katoomba cops couldn't have been more different from that in Sydney. Here, I was something of a hero—the man who'd dragged the woman from the inferno and might have saved her life if help had arrived in time. No fault of his. Some city cops had been up, asking around and making themselves unpopular. Nobody gave a shit about the Loggins and Brewster case up here. There was no question of charges for bringing the Cruiser in or housing it. They told me they'd started
it up every few days or so and that it was running fine. I thanked them, produced my ID, accepted their good wishes for my recovery from my injuries, and that was virtually that. I started the Cruiser and drove it out of the police car park.

A hundred metres down the road I pulled over to the kerb. I got out and opened the back of the truck. There were all the things I had hastily thrown together that morning four weeks ago—the bedroll, sleeping bag, thermos. There was no sign of the leather jacket. I was sure I'd left it in the back. I yanked open the back door and looked on the seat. The newspaper I'd bought was there along with the binoculars, which must have been taken from where I'd been observing the house. They were back in their case, safely tucked away. No whisky, that'd have been too much to ask, but where was the jacket? I swore and searched again but it wasn't in the Land Cruiser.