The Empty Beach

by Peter Corris

  I phoned Greenway again and this time he answered in a harsh, broken whisper.

  ‘What’s wrong with you?’ I said.

  ‘Can you get over to my place, Hardy?’ he rasped. ‘He was here. He drugged me and he’s taken the fucking photographs.’

  13

  I’D had enough for one day. I got Greenway calmed down, established that he wasn’t injured and told him that we had some other leads.

  ‘What leads?’

  ‘I’ve got the diary.’

  ‘Jesus, that’s great! Bring it over.’

  ‘Forget it. I’ve got fifteen years on you and I need some sleep.’

  ‘Sleep! I couldn’t sleep.’

  ‘Yes, you can. Take a long walk. Take a pill. I’ll be over in the morning.’

  ‘No, Hardy, you can’t …’

  ‘I can. Listen, if your brain needs something to work on try this.’ I read him off my list of initials. ‘Chew on them. See if they mean anything to you.’

  I finally got him off the line. I checked the doors and windows, wedged a chair in against the back door that won’t lock properly, and went to bed. My neck was still sore from the rabbit punch and my hand ached from the blow I’d given Paleface. They were the physical sufferings; I was still feeling bad about Annie. A lot of people had let her down and maybe I was one of them. Maybe I should have stayed with her. Bad thoughts. I had her diary under my pillow along with the.38 but it didn’t give me any bad dreams. I slept heavily, no dreams at all.

  Greenway answered the door looking like a man who hadn’t slept for a week. His hair was tousled, his stubble was long and his eyes were red. He smelt bad too.

  ‘Go and have a shower,’ I said. ‘I’ll make some coffee. I can’t talk to anyone who looks that bad, you remind me of myself when I was twenty-five.’

  Greenway grinned. ‘Well, you made it to fifty.’

  ‘I’m not … You stink, and change your shirt.’

  I made instant coffee in the kitchenette and prowled around the small flat. Greenway had spent some of his sleepless night cleaning up and the place didn’t look too bad. There was a slight smell in the bedroom and I located the source—a thick gauze pad which had been soaked in ether. Greenway had put it in a plastic bag the way he’d seen it done in the movies. I also located a large manilla envelope which had been sealed with masking tape and torn open. I had exhibits one and two on the table with the coffee when he came out, showered and shaved and in a clean T-shirt. He nodded and put three spoonsful of sugar in his coffee.

  ‘He was waiting for me.’

  ‘You put up much of a fight?’

  ‘Not much. God, he was strong and I was a bit pissed. I had a few on the way home. The photos were made into the bed, at the bottom. I thought it was pretty smart but he must’ve found them in no time.’

  ‘How long were you out to it?’

  ‘Not long. Half an hour, bit less.’

  ‘Nothing else taken or disturbed?’

  He shook his head and drank some of his coffee syrup. ‘Have you got the diary with you?’

  ‘Let’s stay with this for a minute. You didn’t get a look at him, sense anything, smell anything?’

  ‘No. All I smelled was the ether. All I can tell you about him was that he must be heavy and strong. I’ve seldom …’

  ‘What?’

  He waved his hand in one of his rare theatrical gestures. ‘Well, I’ve been in close contact with a few men, if you see what I mean. Not many as strong as this guy.’

  ‘Okay. Did you notice anything when you got home?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Lights on, doors open, cars parked?’

  He drank some more coffee and made an effort to remember. ‘N … no. There was a car across the road I don’t remember seeing before. I noticed because it was so clean.’

  ‘What kind?’

  ‘I don’t know about cars. No idea.’

  ‘What colour?’

  ‘White.’

  I grunted. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Don’t think so. Oh, hold on.’ He lifted his hand and brushed it against his ear. ‘I felt something before I went under. Something against my ear. Hair. I’d say he had a moustache. There’s something else too … but I can’t quite get it.’

  ‘That’s good enough.’

  ‘How is it good?’

  I told him about the man with the heavy moustache and the white Volvo who’d been let into my house by Annie. He opened his eyes in surprise and then winced as too much Bondi sunlight hit them. I handed him the diary. ‘Did those initials mean anything to you?’

  ‘I heard Annie talk about someone she called Obie, could’ve been this O’B., but I don’t know.’

  ‘First name?’

  ‘No idea. Sorry. She said he was very smart, smarter than me. Something bad happened to him but I don’t know what.’

  ‘Read the entries for the time she was in hospital. You’d better not look at what she wrote after you dropped her. You might think less well of yourself.’

  While he read I phoned Frank Parker in Homicide for information on Annie Parker. He got a summary of the medical examiner’s report and proceeded to be cautious.

  ‘What d’you want to know?’

  ‘Cause of death.’

  ‘Narcotics overdose. Death through respiratory and cardiac failure.’

  ‘Heroin?’

  ‘No, morphine. How would you classify this death, Cliff?’

  ‘Probably an accident.’

  ‘I don’t think we have a category “accident—probably”; what about something more definite?’

  ‘Accident then.’

  ‘Nothing in it for me?’

  ‘Don’t think so.’ Frank said something about Hilde and his baby son which I didn’t hear because I wasn’t listening. My mind was running somewhere else. Morphine and ether. A white Volvo. Sounded like a doctor to me. ‘Hold on, Frank. Maybe you might be interested in this. I can’t tell you much now …’

  ‘But you want me to tell you something.’

  ‘Right. The Southwood Hospital in Sutherland. Might you have something on it?’

  ‘We might. I might have time to look. You might call me, eh?’

  ‘Thanks, Frank. Good about Hilde and the kid.’

  ‘I told you they had measles, you prick.’

  I squeezed out of that somehow. When I put the phone down Greenway was closing the diary. He got a crumpled, much-used tissue out of his pocket and wiped his eyes. ‘Shit,’ he said.

  ‘Are you talking about yourself?’

  ‘You didn’t do such a great job either.’

  ‘Right. I feel like making some kind of amends, what about you?’

  ‘What can we do?’

  ‘We can break about five laws and take a look at the records of Southwood Hospital.’

  14

  GREENWAY made more coffee and we drank that and then started on beer. I gave him my doctor theory and we looked through Annie’s diary for medicos. We came upon ‘Dr Charley’, the druggies’ friend, whom Greenway knew.

  ‘Not him,’ he said. ‘He’s out of his brain himself most of the time.’

  We got ‘Dr S.’ and ‘Dr K.’ from the diary. S. would be Smith whom I’d met. K. meant nothing to either of us. Greenway began prowling the room restlessly. ‘How about checking the registration records to see if a doctor at the hospital has a white Volvo?’ he said.

  ‘That’d be harder than you think. Most doctors are incorporated these days, their cars are registered to their companies. Or they lease them. It’d be easier to go and look in the car park.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Yeah, maybe, but would you go to work in a car you’d used the way that Volvo was used yesterday? I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Hey!’ He dug around in a pile of newspapers on a chair, bent and looked on the floor. ‘Shit!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He took my gun!’

  ‘Great! Well, it could be worse. It only had one shel
l in it.’

  ‘No. I loaded the full clip at home yesterday.’

  I shook my head. ‘Well, it’s not so bad. We’re looking for a strong, bald doctor with a white Volvo, a fully loaded Browning Nomad and a thick moustache.’

  Greenway shook his head slowly. I looked at him enquiringly. ‘I dunno about the moustache. I’ve remembered what I was trying to recall before. From acting—I smelled that spirit gum you use to stick on false beards and moustaches.’

  I gave him a small round of applause. ‘Terrific recall. And I’ve just thought of something else.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It could’ve been used to stick down a bald wig.’ We both laughed.

  Greenway was exhausted from his long day and sleepless night. He sank lower in his chair and his eyes kept closing and I had to tell him to go to bed.

  ‘What’re you going to do?’

  ‘Make telephone calls. Really run up a bill. We’re still using this bastard’s money, aren’t we?’

  He yawned. ‘Suppose so. Okay, I’ll snatch an hour.’

  Within ten minutes he was sleeping deeply, looked like he’d be out for six hours at least. I left a note in case I was wrong and drove to my office in St Peter’s Lane. That was a waste of petrol and effort. Nothing there needing attention. No lonely clients with Rita Hayworth legs. Even Primo Tomasetti the tattooist, with whom I could usually waste some time, was on holidays and his establishment was closed. I knew why I was there of course—to check the mail and the answering machine for messages from Helen. I didn’t know whether I wanted a message or not, but there was nothing.

  Back in Bondi, I bought a late lunch—two big salad sandwiches—and a six pack in Campbell Parade and ate one sandwich and drank one can sitting on the grass and looking out to sea. It was fine and warm with a clear sky and a pollution-clearing breeze. When I was young I’d come here to surf. Now they came to score—and surf, probably. It was confusing. I examined the big painting on a signboard which showed what the redevelopment of the foreshore would look like—park, playground, pavilion. It didn’t look any different which was fine by me; I like Bondi the way it is.

  Greenway was still asleep. I’d shaken the cans a bit and the one I opened in the kitchen sprayed. I swore and dropped another can. Greenway woke up and came stumbling into the kitchen. I handed him the frothing can.

  ‘Brunch,’ I said.

  ‘Great.’ He lifted the dripping can and took a long pull. I examined him while he was drinking; he was tanned and lean, almost thin but not unhealthy looking. I pointed to the sandwich on the kitchen table and he fell on it. If he was carrying the AIDS germ it hadn’t done any damage yet to his appetite or powers of recovery.

  He munched and spoke around the lettuce and carrot. ‘Well, what now?’

  ‘You go to the clinic where you met Annie. Ask around. See if anyone was asking for her, or you. Try your description of your assailant on people.’

  ‘Description? Assailant?’

  ‘Improvise. Do your best. Wouldn’t be a computer buff, would you? I looked around but you don’t seem to have equipped yourself with a PC yet.’

  ‘I know a bit about them,’ he said huffily. ‘I can get by. Why?’

  ‘The hospital’s records are all on computer. It occurred to me the safe way to do it would be to break into the system. We could sit in comfort while a hacker found out all we wanted to know.’

  He snorted. ‘That’s in the movies. It’s more complicated than that. You have to know the codes. You’d have to work on the hospital’s system first. Comes to the same thing—a break in.’

  I opened a can carefully and waited for the foam to rise gently through the hole. ‘I feared as much. The old ways are always best,’ I said.

  Greenway left and I phoned Ian Sangster who is my friend and personal physician, also sometime tennis partner and drinking companion. I asked him what he knew about Southwood Hospital.

  ‘Not a lot. Nothing really good.’

  ‘Anything really bad?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How hard would it be to identify a doctor who works or worked there just from his initial?’

  ‘First or last initial?’

  ‘Don’t know.’

  ‘Jesus Christ, Cliff! What’re you playing at? There’s some very disturbed people at Southwood.’

  ‘How hard, Ian?’

  ‘Bloody near impossible. One of the things about the place that’s not quite … you know, kosher, is the turnover of medical staff. Pretty big.’

  ‘Who’s the money behind it?’

  ‘I’ve heard rumours but I’d rather not say—not over the phone to a person of dubious reputation.’

  I was going to tell him that I wasn’t using my own phone and then I remembered that Greenway fell into the same category, sort of. I thanked him and hung up. The day was wearing on; I had a choice between another beer and a walk. I took the walk, trying to get out of the lengthening shadows into the afternoon sun. I thought about women—Helen and Annie and Cyn and others. All different, all difficult, all more interesting to think about than men.

  I called Frank from a public phone.

  ‘What’s all that noise behind you?’ he said.

  ‘From the street. I’m using a public phone for security. No private phone is safe in the late eighties.’

  ‘Bullshit. Still, might be just as well.’

  ‘What’ve you got on the hospital?’

  ‘Nothing solid. The word is some of the staff need rehabilitating as much as the patients.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Southwood has been known to give people a second chance.’

  ‘I see. Anything known about the financial setup?’

  His voice seemed to drop but it might have been my imagination. ‘Various sources. But a large medical practice with numerous … branches, is not unconnected.’

  ‘That’s interesting.’

  ‘Watch your step, Cliff. They’ve got lawyers …’

  ‘I’d never do anything against the law, Frank. You know that.’

  15

  DRIVING south with Greenway the second time was a very different experience from the first. He was alert, anxious to talk, and he seemed to think we had a good deal to talk about. First, he had to tell me about the success of his mission to the clinic.

  ‘I’m sure it’s the same guy,’ he said. ‘Thickset, bald, asking about Annie.’ He consulted his notebook. ‘Time’s a bit vague—a few weeks ago maybe.’

  ‘Doctor? White Volvo?’

  ‘Not known.’

  ‘Cut it out. You’re right though, it sounds like a piece of the puzzle.’

  I’d seen one of the hospital’s computer terminals and he questioned me closely about it. Had I the make of computer and the model? Was there a printer attached? Did I see a photocopier? I wasn’t much help. With regard to Smith’s office I mostly remembered my aching head and the single malt.

  He rubbed at some dirt on the windscreen. ‘Not very observant, are you?’

  ‘At least I didn’t get my gun stolen.’ It was a silly reply but it shut him up long enough for me to brief him on what we needed from the records: names corresponding to the initials in Annie’s diary and everything to do with them; a ‘Dr K.’ if possible; evidence on the hospital’s finances; drug irregularities.

  Greenway nodded. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Yeah. Anything that seems relevant.’

  I questioned him about the hospital’s security arrangements which he’d observed on a preliminary visit, before he roped me in.

  ‘I didn’t see any patrols or anything like that. I don’t think there’s a resident security man. I think some kind of security service paid a couple of calls.’

  ‘You think?’

  ‘They did. Once or twice. I was pretty tired.’

  ‘That means a good alarm system. Could be tricky. How many patients and live-in staff, would you say?’

  He thought about it for a kilometre or so. ‘Thirty-fi
ve patients, round about. The administrator’s got a flat in the grounds and there’re nurses on duty around the clock.’

  ‘Male nurses?’

  ‘I think … yes, I saw one.’

  ‘There’s your night-time security man. We’ll have to handle him somehow. Any ideas, Greenway?’

  ‘Call me Gareth.’

  ‘I can’t call anyone Gareth. How about Greenie?’

  ‘Jesus. Well, what about a diversion?’

  ‘You’re learning.’

  It was a dark night, no moon and Southwood Hospital didn’t go in for floodlighting. There were lights on some of the buildings and along sections of path that were used at night, but most of the place was in deep darkness. I drove past the front entrance and up a side street looking for high ground. We found it in a quiet street on the south side of the hospital. We sat in the car and pooled our knowledge about the layout.

  ‘How do we do it?’ Greenwood’s voice almost broke. He was nervous. I didn’t feel a hundred per cent confident myself.

  ‘We can go through the fence. It wasn’t wired before, no reason to think it would be now. I assume the buildings have alarms—doors and windows and such.’

  ‘You could set off an alarm in one of the buildings while I go for the administration building.’

  ‘I could. With a bit of luck I can disconnect the alarm before you go in. I’ve got the tools. If it’s not too complicated.’

  ‘That’s it then.’

  ‘You’ll need some time. We might need something to keep them busy for a while.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Let’s not think too far ahead. We can’t anticipate what might happen.’

  I got my burglar kit, packed into a soft airline bag, from the back of the car and checked the items. Metal things that might clink were wrapped. We cut the fence and moved down the slopes carefully, skirting the pools of light, until we reached the main buildings. It was after ten, late for a hospital where activity begins early. We checked Smith’s flat; a light was on and classical music was playing softly. We waited until the music stopped and the light went out. It was quiet in the wards; from a hiding place behind bushes near the spot where our charge of a couple of days back had ended, we could see dim lights, some movement, but the hatches were battened down.