Wyatt - 06 - The Fallout (19 page)

So concealment is the issue.

Yes.

They were sitting across from the
R.J.L. Hawke building again, ham sandwiches and cans of mineral water between
them on the grass, talking it through. Seagulls wanted their crusts. Students
sauntered past, the women with books clasped to their chests, the men with no
books at all.

Raymond concentrated, biting his
lower lip. You know when you stole that Picasso?

Wyatt nodded.

The word is you hid in the building
overnight, walked out with it the next day.

Yes.

In 1986 a bent art dealer from
Prahran had hired Wyatt to steal
Weeping Woman
from the National Gallery
on St Kilda Road. His story was that a rich man with a grudge was putting up
the money. The painting was bound for Europe. Wyatt had got the painting out,
concealed as a folio purchased from the Gallerys bookshop, but the job had
gone sour after that and the painting had found its way back to the gallery.

We could do the same, Raymond
said.

Wyatt wanted his nephew to think it
through. But in this case well have on our hands fifteen paintings, some the
size of the top of a kitchen table. For that we need a van, whether we stay on
the premises overnight or not.

Raymond mused glumly for a while. Is
there anything to say the paintings have to stay in their frames?

Youre on the right track.

We roll them up in something.

Yes.

Plumbers, electricians, they carry
stuff around in long PVC cylinders.

Youre getting there, Wyatt said.

Raymond flung a crust to the gulls. How
come we have to go through this rigmarole? If you already know what you want,
how come you dont just tell me and Ill do it.

Im not telling you anything. Youre
arriving at the answers yourself.

Am I a kid? Is this school?
Arsehole.

Wyatt looked away. He was learning
how young Raymond was, after all. He wanted, by asking questions, to encourage
thought. He wanted Raymond to identify problems and offer solutions, to inquire
and speculate. In Wyatts game, working well was at once thinking well,
perceiving well and acting well.

And he couldnt deny that Raymond
had badly unsettled him. That box of photographs, letters and
clippingsamateurish and oddly human and ordinary. It was an aspect of human
nature that Wyatt could not understand. But the boys most damaging bombshell
concerned Steer. Steer was a problem, and, because hed helped Steer to escape,
so was Raymond. Wyatt wondered if, even now, as he sat watching workmen come in
and out of the target building, the police had a firm idea who was behind Steers
escape. When this job was over, hed cut all ties with the boy.

He watched the ducks among the
reeds, watched the students, watched a pigeon settle on the temporary power
cable at the building site. Okay, when would you do it?

Overnight Saturday.

Why?

Not many people around.

And?

The robbery wouldnt be discovered
till the Monday morning.

True. Though we could also go in on
Friday night.

I wouldnt.

Why not?

Raymond indicated the workmen. Those
blokes will be working there the next morning.

Wyatt nodded. On the other hand,
there wont be any students or staff around on Saturday, not when theyd have
to endure drills and hammers and transistor radios all day, and that means
thered be no-one to spot that the paintings were gone. The workmen are
unlikely to notice or care one way or the other.

So theres no reason for anyone to
go into the library storeroom until Monday.

Exactly.

What it boils down to, how do we
get them out, and when? Raymond shrugged. At least we dont have to think
about alarms and cameras.

But we do have to think about
nightwatchmen.

Concealment, Raymond muttered. Conceal
the paintings in the PVC cylinders, conceal who we are.

Yes.

They fell into silence. Eventually
Raymond said, We need to look like we belong.

Clearly.

Silence.

Cleaning staff? Raymond suggested.

Wyatt shook his head. Not in a
building thats still being renovated.

Irritation came quickly over Wyatts
nephew. Chaffey should have thought of all this.

Wyatt sensed that the irritation
owed itself more to the palpable sense of competition and resentment that had
developed between them than to Chaffeys lack of solid information. He said
nothing. If he put things right for the people he dealt with, then hed never
get any work done, thats how he saw it.

Besides, Raymond had to learn: the
job came first. He had to curb his impulses. Wyatt tried to look back along the
years. Had he ever been impatient? Had he ever been young? It sometimes seemed
to him that hed landed on the earth fully formed and always this age, always
this careful. If there had been a time when he was a child, a youth, it was
according to the calendar, not character. He supposed that that was a shame.

Now he did say something. Ray,
ultimately its up to us.

But Raymond wasnt listening. His
eyes were narrow and sharp. When I was at school we had an asbestos scare.

Asbestos?

These blokes came and looked in the
ceilings. Nothing happened, the place was clean, but it scared the shit out of
everyone.

Go on.

Raymond rubbed his hands together,
thinking. Right. Lets say we pose as electricians. We run the risk of meeting
the real ones. If we go in as asbestos inspectors, not only will we be alone in
that, well look as if we belong and everyone will avoid us.

Wyatt turned, smiled a snatched
smile. It was his way of praising Raymond, but Raymond misread it.

So? You do better.

Its good, Ray.

The heat subsided in Raymond. He
turned away, muttering, Lets go get that van.

* * * *

Twenty-eight

Raymond
took them to a multi-level car park in Chadstone. They had the number plates,
from a wrecked Volkswagen gathering dust outside a crash repairers in
Altonanow all they needed was the vehicle.

Check that panel van, Raymond
said, some time later.

A white Falcon, with a roof rack and
windows in the rear compartment. It wasnt a commercial vehicle, but could be
adapted without much trouble. They tailed it to the upper level and watched the
driver, an elderly man, park, lock up and shuffle across to the lift.

When the man was gone, Raymond
approached the drivers door with a tyre iron. He levered a gap between the
door frame and the pillar, then slid a loop of stiff plastic binding tape
behind the glass. Wyatt looked intently both ways along the sloping ramp.
Wednesday, early afternoon. They needed to be in the campus grounds by four on
Friday, giving them two days in which to alter the van.

He turned back, just as Raymond
caught the latch with the plastic hook and pulled upwards. There was a click. You
little beauty.

Raymond slipped behind the wheel.
Wyatt had stiffened, expecting an alarm, but there was silence. Raymond broke
it. Suddenly all elbows and clenched teeth, he wrenched at the ignition with
the tyre iron, splintering the plastic casing and laying bare the electronics
behind it. He fired up the motor, grinning at Wyatt from amidst the wreckage. Piece
of cake.

And obvious to anyone who takes a
gander through the window, Wyatt said. Wait there.

He went to the front of the van and
then to the rear, hooking the stolen plates over the originals. He ran his hand
inside the rear wheel arch. The box was small, metal, with a sliding lid and a
magnetised base. The elderly mans spare house and van keys nestled inside the
box and Wyatt dropped them in his nephews lap as he slid into the passenger
seat. He said nothing, just buckled his seat belt, but his silence was hard and
cold.

Raymond stared at the keys. There
was always a smile close to the surface and it broke out over his sulky face
now. Ahh, he scoffed, more fun this way.

That afternoon they repaired the
ignition lock and took the panel van to be resprayed green at a place in
Richmond$999 of Wyatts dwindling reserves. On Thursday they stencilled the
sides of the van with the words Asbestos Removal Services, and filled the
rear compartment with empty boxes, a stepladder and several lengths of PVC
tubing.

They went in on Friday afternoon at
4 oclock. They wore overalls and Wyatt carried a clipboard and an aluminium
document case. They parked the van inside the enclosure as though they belonged
to the place, got out, and asked around for the foreman.

Thats me.

He was a large, loosely built man
with a face mapped by broken capillaries. Friday, four oclock. Wyatt was
betting that all the man wanted to do was knock off and head for the pub.

EPA sent us, he said, flashing his
clipboard.

The foreman was looking in alarm at
the van. Didnt know we was working around asbestos. Bastards didnt tell us
that.

You may not be. This is routine,
thats all.

I mean, fuck, you been inside the
place? Blokes have been breathing dust for days.

Theres dust and theres dust,
Wyatt said.

The foreman looked at his watch. Its
nearly knocking-off time. Im out of here in ten minutes myself. Locking the
gate and Im gone.

I understand.

So you cant park your van here. Im
locking up.

Thats all right, Raymond said. Well
leave it overnight, catch a bus home.

His wife, Wyatt explained. She
doesnt want the van parked out the front of the house. Nor does mine. Cant
say I blame them.

The foreman licked dry lips. Do
what you like. Its no skin off my nose.

The vans clean, Wyatt said. No
contamination. Its just the idea that gets to people.

You can say that again.

Men began to stream from the work
site. The foreman forgot about Wyatt and Raymond, and under the cover of men
shouting, stripping off their overalls and cleaning brushes and rolling up
flex, they loaded their arms with lengths of PVC tubing and entered the
building.

According to the floor plans
supplied by Chaffey, the departmental library was on the first floor. They went
up the stairs, whistling, ready to discuss the football if they encountered
anyone, and found the first floor deserted and quiet, heavy with the smell of
paint, plaster and sealant. They drew on latex gloves and made their way into
the gloom, Wyatt counting the doors.

This one.

He tried the handle. It was locked.
He took a set of picks from his overalls and leaned over the lock. Holding the
tension pick at an angle, he teased with the raking pick, turning the tumblers.
When it was done he breathed out, straightened and pushed open the door.

They went in, locking the door
behind them. It was close and comfortable in the library. The carpet was thick,
the shelves crammed with textbooks, folios and theses. A few small desks, a
table and chairs, a sofa. Somewhere to sleep, Wyatt murmured.

Together?

One sleeps, one keeps watch.

Lighten up. I was only joking.

There was more light here than in
the corridor. The outside wall was mostly glass, and let in the lowering sun.

Wyatt crossed the room to a door set
into the end wall, between two bookcases. He heard a rustle and scrape behind
him and dropped to the floor.

Quit that.

Raymond was in the act of closing
the curtains. Well be seen.

Well be seen from outside drawing
the curtains when this room should be empty, Wyatt said.

Now we cant turn the lights on.

The powers been disconnected,
remember?

Raymond flung himself onto a sofa. You
talk to me like I was a kid in school. Fucking well tell me what to do, then.

Wyatt felt complicated emotions for
his nephew, composed of love, hate and frustration. But some of the fire had
gone out of Raymond, leaving him edgy and cautious, and that was a good thing
as far as Wyatt was concerned. Keeping his voice mild, he clicked open the
aluminium case and said, We work by natural light, therell be a moon tonight,
plus these. He indicated a pair of torches, their lenses all but taped over. They
give a narrow band. Just dont flash them toward the window.

Raymond shrugged. It was a shrug of
tiredness, of a short, spluttering fuse. One thing Ive learned, I work better
alone.

Come on, son, help me with the
storeroom lock.

Son was as close to love as Wyatt
could get, but saw by the twist of his nephews face that hed chosen the wrong
word.

Time for that later. He opened the
storeroom door and they went in. If you hold one of the torches, Ill start
sorting.