Death by the Book (14 page)

‘So why’d he pull the knife?’ he asked, eyes bright with conspiracy. ‘You get nervous, try and pull out of the deal? Ran down here to stop him sending it all up in flames?’ He glanced around the shop. ‘Just love the books too much, huh?’

‘What are you talking about?’ Jack tried to contain a worried look but it tightened the muscles in his face.

Peterson did not seem to notice. ‘Brandt must have shown you a few tricks. His businesses burn down every month.’

‘Yeah, that’s it,’ said Jack, without looking at him. He let go the door and walked back to the counter. Peterson stepped outside. The door closed with a soft thud. Jack looked up and saw the detective through the glass, grinning and waving goodbye.

He smiled back, whispering through his teeth: ‘Fuck you, Geoff.’

Lunchtime in Double Bay. The sun was sharp and the cold air whipped canvas awnings in violent gusts. Traffic lights shook like TV antennas. Jack got off the bus and cut through Knox Street on the way to Cumberland Gardens, feeling the blood turn blue in his veins. Nobody braved the outside tables: inside, old ladies with grey bouffant hairdos and their forty-five-year-old
daughters with not much to do complained and wondered if the council could do something about the wind.

Apart from that, the place was empty. Jack walked briskly. He turned down Bay Street and wondered if Annabelle would be at the house.

In his bag were the Kass books he had been able to find since delivering the first lot exactly a week ago. Jack was still in two minds about whether he should hand them over. A lot had happened in the last seven days. The books might be his only bargaining power: though for what, he had no idea. It would all depend on what Kasprowicz had to say for himself.

The long green gate was open. Jack walked through, noticing again how shabby the front yard looked. Annabelle’s Audi was parked in the carport. He went up the three front steps to the house, crossed the verandah and knocked.

After a few moments, she opened it, trailing a white cloth napkin in her hand. ‘Well, Mr Susko. This is a surprise. Are you collecting for a charity?’

Jack smiled. She was dressed in an oversized black jumper stretching down to her thighs and light grey tights: on her feet, thick white socks. She looked warm and very comfortable. Her hair was loose and tucked in behind her ears. No jewellery, no make-up, clear skin, smooth complexion: the effect was almost rude. The kind of woman who started wars and religious cults.

‘Nice beanie,’ she said. ‘Did your mother knit it?’

‘In case of Sydney blizzards.’

She looked Jack up and down, grinned. ‘Yes, I can see it now. Bit of a mummy’s boy.’

‘I visit every Christmas.’

‘What else could a mother want?’ Annabelle stepped aside. ‘Come in. You’ve just caught me having my lunch.’

Pity it wasn’t a bath
. Jack walked through. He waited for her to close the door and then followed her down the hall, into the kitchen.

‘Your father not here?’ he asked, watching her walk and listening to the soft, padded sound of her feet on the hall runner.

‘No. Did you want to see him?’

‘We had an appointment for one o’clock.’

‘He’s in Hong Kong on business. Don’t think he’ll get here in time.’

‘Right.’ Jack thought about getting angry, but the feeling had nothing to grab. Other feelings were grabbing hold of other things.

Annabelle dropped her napkin onto the kitchen table. ‘Are you hungry?’ she said, turning to Jack. ‘I made too much.’

Jack noticed a bottle of Semillon, about one-third full, standing guard beside a green salad. Looked like Annabelle had opened her innings already.

‘Thanks, I’m fine. Don’t let me stop you.’

‘I’ve had enough. Wine? Or Scotch, maybe? It’s after twelve.’

‘I’ll have what you’re having.’

‘Easy.’ She reached up to a cupboard, opened it and removed a bottle of Scotch and two glasses. Jack watched her pour generous portions. He put his bag down beside a chair and then removed his beanie, coat and scarf.

‘So, more developments?’ she said, turning around with
the glasses. She walked over, handed one to Jack. ‘I suppose you’ve been talking to Celia again?’

He noticed the edge in her tone. ‘This afternoon, actually. I’m meeting her father, too. Hopefully he’ll be there.’

‘Ah, the dark poet.’

Jack smiled. He leaned back against one of the dining chairs. ‘So what’s big Hammond got against him?’

‘What hasn’t he got against him.’ Annabelle sipped her drink. She tilted her head slightly to the side and gave Jack a questioning look. ‘Do you mind if I ask what happened to your face?’

‘I was hoping your old man might be able to tell me.’

‘What do you mean?’

Jack knew the concern on Annabelle’s face was not for him. But the chance that it was, even just a little, nudged him in the ribs. He wanted to tell her what had happened. Even as he told himself to be wary, to read and consider the situation, the angles, he knew he would tell her. Given the chance, Jack realised he would always want to tell her, anything and everything.

‘Somebody broke into my shop. They were trying to burn a couple of uncle Edward’s books.’

‘I don’t understand. In your shop?’

‘In my rubbish bin. Set-up job gone wrong. I turned up when I wasn’t supposed to.’

Annabelle Kasprowicz looked out through the glass doors into the rear yard and frowned. Outside, the wind had tipped over a striped deckchair. ‘You think my father had something to do with it?’

‘Maybe.’ Jack looked down and swirled the glass in his
hands. ‘He denied it on the phone.’

‘That’s why you wanted to speak with him?’

‘Yes. Nice of him to tell me about Hong Kong.’

‘It was out of the blue. I made the appointment for him.’ Annabelle ran a hand through her hair, thinking. Her eyes darted along the grooves between the terracotta tiles on the floor. Jack was disappointed she had lost interest in his face. ‘Couldn’t be helped,’ she said, more to herself.

‘So you earn your keep then?’

Annabelle reached for a packet of cigarettes, lit up, tossed a cheap blue lighter onto the bench. She scratched the corner of her mouth with her little finger, pensive. ‘Why would he try to set you up? He’d only be setting himself up, wouldn’t he?’

‘Maybe,’ said Jack. He had already thought of that and knew deep down that Kasprowicz probably had nothing to do with it. But the break-in was connected to something: to Hammond Kasprowicz, to this family. And now to Jack. A knife in the guts made him practically a relation.

‘Why does he want them in the first place?’ he asked, firmly, remembering his anger. ‘Why would he be burning them and sending them to his brother?’

Annabelle gave Jack a startled look. ‘You don’t know that for certain.’

‘I’ve seen the note.’

‘So what? That’s not proof. And those ashes could be burnt newspapers for all you know.’ She moved to the other side of the island bench, away from Jack. ‘I told you not to believe anything Celia Mitten said.’

‘You believed it the other night.’

Annabelle looked away.

‘Why don’t you give me something then?’ asked Jack, with more force than he had intended. ‘One little idea. Preferably true.’

Annabelle dragged on her cigarette, blew out a quick blue breath. ‘I would if I had one.’

‘Tell me what happened between your father and Kass. Why did he take all the money?’

‘Because.’

Jack waited for an answer.

Annabelle poured more Scotch into her glass. With her back to him, she said: ‘Edward Kass had an affair with my mother.’

One of the halogen lights in the ceiling died, softly, like a candle being snuffed out. Annabelle turned around and stared meaningfully at Jack. ‘That enough?’

He had suspected the possibility, but hearing it surprised him. Now that it was clear, all of his assumptions shifted around a little, suddenly uncomfortable and awkward, like distant relatives at a wake. Durst flashed in his mind like a hazard light.

‘Runs in the family, then?’ said Jack.

‘What?’

‘Playing around. Six-figure imaginations and you guys still go for the one-dollar thrills.’

‘Excuse me?’ Annabelle straightened up.

A little blood rushed to Jack’s head. Who was he getting angry at? He looked at Annabelle, tried to see what her face revealed, but could not afford the entrance ticket. Truth was, Jack was the only one-dollar thrill round at Cumberland Gardens.

‘Celia must be a chip off the old block,’ he said, fiddling
with the lighter in his pocket. ‘I saw your ex-husband leaving the sparkle shop the other day. Or are they just good friends?’

Annabelle opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She stood frozen, her lips slightly parted, soft and full. Jack almost went over and laid one on her. But as her face darkened, he realised now was probably not a good time.

‘I’ve got to send some faxes,’ she said. She crushed her half-smoked cigarette in an ashtray. Glass in hand, she walked out of the kitchen.

Jack looked around. The house was silent. A strange feeling overcame him: it was as if he were looking at himself through the window. Standing there, in somebody’s house, somebody he did not know. As though he had broken in, but now had no idea what he wanted.

He walked out into another hallway. From a nearby room on his left he could hear the beeping of office equipment. The door to the room was open. He went over and stood at the entrance. Annabelle was flicking through a small pile of paper.

Kasprowicz’s study: a warm cocoon of timber, leather and books. A gas heater burnt red through fake logs. There was a chess board set up on a small table in front of it, a couple of deep sofa chairs on either side, perfectly aligned. Jack scanned the bookshelves, thick with brown, black and maroon spines, all carefully lined up, every edge flush with its neighbour. He wondered if they had ever been taken down. White lace curtains filtered damp light in through a tall bay window, just behind a dark-stained desk that looked big enough to live in.

Annabelle sat behind the desk in her father’s thickly
padded, green leather chair. She was turned to her left, feeding a page through the fax machine. Her eyes were wet but her expression gave nothing away.

‘Kass went to hospital the other night,’ said Jack. ‘After getting more ashes in the mail. Thought he was having a heart attack.’ He walked into the study, half-closing the door behind him.

‘We’ve all got to go sometime.’

‘True. But we don’t need help to get there.’

‘Everybody needs help.’

Annabelle stood up. As she reached for her glass of Scotch, Jack grabbed her wrist and drew her to him. She did not resist.

13

J
ACK
S
USKO HAD NEVER FUCKED
in a four-thousand-dollar leather chair before. Not with the wind whipping cold rain against the window outside and the mid-afternoon light discreet and a fake-log fireplace keeping his kidneys warm. He guessed it was just one of those days and decided not to think about it too much. Better to wallow in the after-glow. To think was to let the future in and Jack was in no hurry to get there any time soon.

So he went through everything again in his mind, tried to separate events into distinct moments: stretch them out, prolong the pleasure. They had kissed hungrily. They had ripped each other’s clothing off. Jack had even forgotten about his ten-odd stitches, until he lifted his arms as
Annabelle pulled off his shirt and felt a hot tightness there and groaned with the pain. She had kissed around the wound, her warm hands against his hips. ‘You’d better sit back,’ she had said. ‘Let me take care of everything.’

Jack turned and watched a naked Annabelle Kasprowicz walk back into her father’s study, a bottle of Scotch in one hand and a pack of cigarettes in the other. He made a mental note to sacrifice a small animal to the God of Afternoon Delight when he got home. Maybe Lois could nab him something suitable out in the rear yard.

He sat in one of the sofa chairs beside the small chess table, directly in front of the gas heater, warming his feet. He was wearing his jeans now, unbuttoned over the knife-cut, but nothing else. Annabelle poured some drinks: he stretched his legs before him and sank deeper into the plush velour padding of the chair. She handed him a Scotch and then searched around the floor for her clothes.