Torn Apart (11 page)

‘Hey, Frankie,' Kennedy yelled.

Szabo looked to where we were standing and waved. Kennedy motioned for him to come up. Szabo spoke to a member of the troop and they moved on. Szabo climbed the fairly steep and muddy slope in a few easy strides.

‘What's up, Col?'

‘Want you to meet an old comrade of mine, Paddy Malloy. We were in 'Nam together.'

Szabo looked at me and at that moment I travelled back mentally twenty years, to when I stared into the yellow, wolfish eyes of Soldier Szabo as he moved in to kill me. The eyes were the same. Szabo drew in a deep breath and balanced himself as if he might go for my throat or my balls. My jacket was open and I knew I could get the pistol quickly if I had to.

Szabo let the breath out slowly. ‘No, he's not,' he said. ‘He's Cliff Hardy, the private detective who killed my father.'

‘Right,' I said.

Kennedy took a step towards me. ‘What the hell's going on?'

I kept my eyes focused on Szabo, who appeared totally relaxed. ‘I'm sorry, Kennedy,' I said. ‘You gave me an opening and I took it. You may as well know, Patrick Malloy's dead. He was shotgunned in my house. We were cousins, lookalikes, and I'm wondering whether this man killed him instead of me.'

Kennedy unclenched the fist he'd been ready to throw at me and fished out his cigarettes. He lit up. ‘I was beginning to wonder about you—not smoking, and you don't move the way Paddy did. Slower.'

‘He was a bit younger and he hadn't had a heart attack. We were friends, if that means anything to you.'

Kennedy blew smoke. ‘I don't understand any of this. Think I'd better report to the Commander.'

‘Don't do that, Col,' Szabo said. ‘I'll sort this out and fill you in later. Why don't you catch up with that mob and debrief them. You know the drill.'

Szabo spoke with a quiet authority, clearly respected by Kennedy, who stamped his barely smoked cigarette butt into the mud, shot me a furious look, and strode away.

Szabo waited until Kennedy was back on the path. Then he pointed to my left shoulder. ‘You won't need the gun. You shouldn't carry that arm a bit stiff the way you do.'

‘I'm out of practice,' I said. ‘Convince me.'

‘I've bashed people and cut them, kicked them and broken limbs, but I've never killed anyone.'

‘You're a known shottie artist.'

‘Was.'

‘You made threats against me in jail.'

He nodded. ‘Some time back. I was a different person then.'

‘You bought a shotgun recently.'

‘You
have
been busy. I don't know what story you told poor Col. He's not the brightest. I'm guessing you said something about wanting to talk to me and he took you at your word on that.'

‘Yes. So?'

He unzipped his jacket. ‘Let me show you something.'

‘Easy.'

He reached inside his shirt and pulled out a silver cross on a chain.

‘I'm the pastor of this flock as well as one of the trainers. I'm a Christian and I wouldn't take revenge on you for killing my father. Revenge is for God. I forgive you, and I hope you forgive yourself.'

‘You bought a shotgun.'

‘Yeah, I did, and a box of fifty shells and I went out into the bush and fired off every last one. Then I took an angle grinder and cut the gun up into little bits, which I dumped. I purged myself of shotguns and violence. People can change, Hardy.'

‘Maybe. I haven't seen it happen all that much.'

‘You can believe me or not, as you choose.'

I did believe him. The gleam in his eyes wasn't from the killer instinct his father had displayed; it was the light of redemption, the glow of the saved. I waved my hand at the bush, the creek, the muddy footprints on the path.

‘So what's all this, onward Christian soldiers?'

‘Your cheap cynicism does you no credit.'

Francis Szabo had picked up some education as well as religion along the way; he had the moral drop on me and I had to acknowledge it.

‘I'm sorry,' I said. ‘That's the second bloody sorry in a few minutes. Not easy, but you can see where I was coming from when I heard certain things about you.'

‘Yes. If you'd inquired a bit more you'd have learned other things and saved yourself a trip.'

We started down towards the path. I slipped and he steadied me. ‘I guess I've been talking to the wrong people,' I said.

He didn't say anything until we were back in the centre of the compound. He guided me towards my car.

‘I'll have a word at the gate and you can go through.'

‘Thanks.'

It was an awkward moment and we both felt it.

I jiggled my keys. ‘I don't know what to say.'

‘Neither do I,' he said. ‘But I'd suggest you take a good look at yourself and the way your life is heading.'

I'd run out of candidates for making me the target and my encounter with Szabo hadn't done anything for my confidence or self-esteem. He was right—I should have asked how old Ben Corbett and Marvis Marshall's information was and tried to get a more up-to-date assessment. I was left with the conclusion that the killer had got the man he wanted. I now knew more about Patrick than before, perhaps more than the police knew.

The smart course might be to turn that information over to the police. Then again, that might not be so smart. They might think I was trying to deal myself out of the drug importation charge. These thoughts ran through my head as I made my chastened way back to Sydney. It was the sort of stalemate I'd reached many times before. In the early days I made the mistake of talking it over with Cyn.

‘Stop beating your head against a brick wall,' she said. ‘Drop it. Move on.'

I never did, and wouldn't now. I still had my conduit to the workings of the police service—Frank Parker, who'd retired as an Assistant Commissioner but was still on their books as an adviser and consultant. I'd overworked and strained the relationship when I was a busy PEA, but I'd also done him some good turns along the way (quite apart from introducing him to his wife), and we'd both mellowed in recent times. I thought I could count on Frank to at least tell me how the police inquiry was progressing. I could take my cue from that.

The first thing I did was to return the pistol and ammunition to Ben Corbett. He'd sell it to someone else before you could turn around, but that wasn't my problem. If a criminal wants a gun he'll get one, and no law will stop him, or her. Corbett examined the weapon carefully.

‘Not fired.'

‘Never sniffed the air.'

‘Two hundred back.'

‘That's a bit light on, even for you.'

‘Because I'm charging you for some information you'll be interested in.'

‘Go on.'

He handed me the two notes. ‘Deal?'

‘Why not?'

‘I've got this mate who's a fuckin' ballistics expert. He runs this little show and the cops put work his way. What's it called, that?'

‘Outsourcing.'

‘Right. Anyway, we chew the fat and he tells me about examining these shotgun pellets taken from a bloke killed in Glebe recently. I read the papers. That'd be the hit that went down at your place, right?'

I nodded.

‘I'm thinking you wanted the .38 to go after the guy who did the job but you didn't find him. So this information might be worth something to you.'

‘Good thinking, Ben.'

‘Not as dumb as what you thought, eh? He says the pellets were self-loaded. That's unusual, but what's weirder is that they were treated with some kind of poison. Get the idea? You hit some fucker at the end of the range and don't kill him, but the poison gets him anyway. Cute, eh?'

‘Yes. What else? I can see you're dying to tell me.'

‘My mate reckons there's a particular mob that went in for this trick—blokes who fought in them African wars a while back. Not army, what're they called?'

‘Mercenaries.'

‘Good money, they say. Tax free. Should have had a go at it myself.'

‘You have to kill women and children and burn villages.'

‘Whoopee!'

I'd switched off my mobile for the trip north. I turned it on when I got home and there was a message from Sheila to say that she'd visit that evening if I confirmed. I did. I wanted to see her, not only for the shared pleasure, but because I wanted to get every scrap of information she had about Patrick. Someone out there hated him enough to make absolutely sure of killing him and the reason had to lie somewhere in his past. It was going to be a tricky balancing act—loving and interrogating—and I rehearsed some of the questions I'd put as I cleaned myself up.

I went out for wine and bread and cheese and enjoyed the feeling of not having to watch my back. I could return the Camry, but I'd still keep my communications secure from the police, at least until I'd spoken to Frank.

Sheila arrived about 10 pm. I hadn't eaten since breakfast and neither had she, so, after the usual enthusiastic preliminaries, we got stuck into the food and the wine.

I decided to start by telling her about the parcel from London and the steroids and how I was facing a charge of importing them.

She put down her glass. ‘You didn't tell me about a parcel coming from London.'

‘That was when I didn't know what you were up to.'

‘Now you do?'

‘I hope so.'

‘Why are you telling me this now?'

‘Because I'm sure now Patrick was the target, not me, and I still want to find out who killed him. I need to know every scrap of information about him.'

‘Why are you so sure?'

I told her about the trip north and the result. How I came back with my tail between my legs. Then I told her about the poisoned shot pellets. She finished her wine and held out her glass for more. She'd had one go at the bread and cheese compared with my three or four. More than most, Sheila was someone who could discipline herself.

‘Are you in serious trouble over the steroids?'

‘Hard to say. Depends on the cops. I'm hoping to get a line on their attitude to me and their investigation of Patrick's murder. I'm not in good standing with the police, but I've got one friend with contacts.'

‘You must wish Paddy'd never turned up.'

I looked at her. She was tired with lines showing around her eyes and mouth under her fresh makeup. Her hair was caught in some kind of bun with a few strands coming loose. She was wearing her suit again with a blouse not as crisp as before. I felt protective and lustful—a potent combination. I pushed the plates aside, reached for her and pulled her close.

‘If I hadn't met him, I wouldn't have met you.'

That ended the eating and drinking and the discussion. We went upstairs.

Sheila didn't rush away in the morning as she had before. We took our time getting up, showering, dressing and having breakfast. She saw me taking my meds and grimacing at the sweet taste of the aspirin.

‘Rest of your life, eh?'

‘However long that may be.'

‘I'd back you in for eighty, Cliff.'

She said she didn't have any meetings to do with the film for a few days, but that she was reading the script and doing research on the sort of woman her character was—the criminal matriarch.

‘A few of them about,' she said. ‘You could be useful here. Ever run into one of them?'

‘Thankfully no. I remember what Frank Parker, the cop friend I mentioned, said when he had dealings with Kitty “Cat Woman” Saunders.'

‘I've read about her. She was a piece of work. Hang on, I'll jot this down.'

‘He said, “If you ever meet one of these women run a mile, because she'll do you harm”.'

She scribbled in a tiny notebook. ‘That's good. I'd like to meet this guy.'

‘You will. Can you answer a few more questions about Patrick?'

She sighed. ‘I guess so. Will he always be in the room?'

‘No. That's partly why I'm doing this, I realise. I want to kind of exorcise him. He was in Vietnam, right? D'you think he ever suffered the post traumatic stuff—the nightmares, the jumping at shadows . . .'

She took a long time to answer and I saw that the memories were painful.

‘Sorry,' I said, ‘if it's too hard don't—'

‘It's okay. I got over it, just a bit hard to go back to all the pain now that things are looking up and we're . . . Well, I got pregnant and Paddy went off his head. He said he'd walked through clouds of agent orange and any child of his would be lucky to be born with only one head . . .'

She burst into tears and I comforted her as best I could. After some sniffing and nose-blowing she recovered. ‘He made me have an abortion, and he went straight out and had a vasectomy. Is that the sort of thing you mean?'

I wanted to ask about his dealings with the mercenary brigade, whatever it was, but I'd pushed her far enough. She went to the bathroom and repaired her makeup while I tidied away the breakfast things thinking that I was hitting more faults than aces lately. I reproached myself—sports metaphors are too easy. I was getting involved with this woman and wounding her in the process. She came back, smelling of too much perfume. We kissed and she left. A shaky parting.

I returned the Camry, collected the Falcon and drove to Paddington to see Frank. The drive took longer than it should have because the Pope was in town for a few days with a couple of hundred thousand of his admirers and the traffic patterns had been changed to make them even more unfriendly than they already were. I'd rung and Frank was expecting me, meaning he had a couple of bottles of Heineken to hand.

We sat by the pool in a patch of sunshine.

‘His Holiness brought good weather,' Frank said as he lifted the caps.

‘He did; hope he leaves it behind him when he goes.'

‘I can read you like a book, Cliff. Who is she?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘You get a certain look when you're on with someone.'

‘Shit, not smug and self-satisfied I hope.'

‘No. Sort of pleased and grateful.'

‘That'd be right.'

The beer was going down well. I filled Frank in on all the developments, including my relationship with Sheila, but with a certain amount of editing—about the .38 for example. There was still enough of the straight-as-a-die cop about him for that information to have pissed him off. When I told him about the poisoned pellets, without mentioning the extra bit of knowledge I had on that, he nearly choked on his beer.

‘How the hell do you know that?'

‘Outsourcing is another word for leaking.'

‘You're right. So Frankie Szabo's born again. D'you believe that?'

‘I believe it for now. He didn't kill Patrick. Whether it'll hold when the born-again thrill wears off's another question. They find it hard to hack the normal.'

‘Like you. You should leave this alone, Cliff. There's some good people working on it.'

I shook my head. ‘Time's passing. You know how it is; the longer it takes the harder it gets. I need to know if they're making any progress. I need to know how hard they're trying. They've got Patrick pegged as a steroids importer. That lowers their interest. Serves him right.'

‘It's you facing that charge.'

‘That's bullshit. You know it and they must know it.'

‘I dunno. You liked this bloke. You might have done him a favour.'

‘I didn't like him
that
much. Just tell me this, is that the line they're working on—the steroids?'

He shrugged. ‘As far as I know. If you've got another line, Cliff, you should talk to them. You've got no standing, no protection.'

‘When did I ever have?'

‘You had more than you knew. One tip. I know how you work; you're not a complete cowboy. Ian Welsh's a good man. If you get in too deep contact him.'

‘Will you be talking to him?'

‘All depends. It's a strange world we live in.'

‘You're right,' I said. ‘Three hundred thousand people at Randwick racecourse, and not a horse in sight.'