The Empty Beach

by Peter Corris

  ‘Time to go.’ We bent and scuttled across to the long, low administration block. The alarm system was an infrared, magic eye job. I located the wiring and traced it to a point where I could work on the circuits. I had to freeze once and crouch behind scanty cover when a big man in nurse’s starched whites came out of the adjacent building for a smoke. Luckily, he smoked fast and didn’t look around. I immobilised the alarm and used a skeleton key on a side door.

  ‘You know what to look for.’ I held Greenway’s arm and hissed in his ear. ‘Be as quick and quiet as you can. Try to shade any light you have to use. I’ll set an alarm off if you need cover. Ignore it. I’ll set off another one if it looks like you’re spotted. That’s when you get out. I’ll meet you by the toilet block.’

  He slipped into the building. I moved around the grounds willing everything to stay quiet. I could hear the soft pounding of the sea; a light wind moved the tops of the trees. Edgy and alert, I heard every bird call and dog bark; a ship hooted far away to the east. Nothing moved in the hospital grounds. I stationed myself by the alarm of one of the buildings near the swimming pool and squinted down to the administration block. Greenway had had about half an hour. A faint light showed in a window that should have been dark. The light moved. I swore.

  My swearing seemed to act as a signal. The male nurse I’d seen before came out of the north wing and checked his watch. He looked around and saw the light. I broke the circuit and the alarm shrilled above me. The nurse came out again, this time with another man I recognised as the rabbit killer expert. I ducked back and moved across to a second building. They ran towards me. I broke another magic eye beam and a second alarm joined in with a high-pitched wail.

  I tried to focus on the door, willing Greenway to come out but he didn’t. I could hear the two men running, not far away now. I was near the swimming pool where there was no cover. If they looked in the right direction they’d see me. I looked down the slope again and saw a red winking light. The high main gate was suddenly caught in the full beam of a patrol car’s headlights. Lights came on around the swimming pool; I was standing at the deep end, plainly visible in dark clothes in the eerie green light.

  ‘Hey, you!’ The rabbit puncher rushed towards me. His name was stencilled on the pocket of his starched uniform shirt—POPE. I ran around the edge of the pool. He came after me, quick and eager. I tripped on something made of metal and he was on me. He had short arms and came in pumping hard, clubbing punches. I ducked under a clumsy haymaker and punched him hard and low. He gasped and let go with a roundhouse swing that would have taken my head off. I rammed him in the groin with my tool bag and he screamed and fell.

  More lights were coming on and I could hear shouts. I still couldn’t see any sign of Greenway. Then I saw what had tripped me—a can of petrol standing beside a motor mower. A plastic oil can sat in the grass catcher. I grabbed the cans, unscrewed their lids and splashed them out into the swimming pool. I heard a groan and a protest from Pope. He was crawling along the edge of the pool towards me.

  ‘Get away!’ I had matches in the tool bag. I groped for them, lit five or six together. The man rolled off to his left as I threw the blazing matches into the pool. There was a roar and a sheet of flame leapt five metres in the air and danced across the lapping water.

  16

  I RAN away from the intense heat and light into the darkness, working my way towards the meeting point with Greenway. There was a lot of noise—men and women shouting and one of the alarms was still ringing. I heard glass break. Ahead I saw a flash of white and a crouched, fast moving figure.

  ‘Greenway?’

  ‘Here.’ He was carrying a bundle of paper, struggling to keep the flapping sheets under control. ‘What the hell did you do?’

  ‘Later. Let’s go!’

  We raced up the slope towards our exit in the fence. I sneaked a look back before we scrambled through: the fire was dying down in the swimming pool; the front gate was open and the patrol car had pulled up in front of Smith’s flat. Lights were on everywhere—in the flat, in the wards and in the administration building.

  We were both panting when we reached the car. Lights showed in some of the houses; shapes moved at windows. No time to hang about. I threw the bag into the car and gunned the motor. Greenway clutched his paper to his chest as we took off fast, the way the old Falcon never would.

  We travelled a few minutes in silence. The eye I’d damaged a few years back that sometimes gave me trouble when I was under stress was aching now and watering. I slowed down. ‘There’s a flask of rum in the tool bag,’ I said. ‘Let’s have a drink.’

  Greenway gave me first swig and then took one himself. ‘We did it!’ he said. ‘What was burning?’

  ‘The swimming pool. You don’t think I’d set fire to a hospital, do you? Did you find out what we wanted?’

  ‘Some of it. I haven’t exactly had time to analyse it thoroughly …’ He giggled and took another drink.

  ‘Okay. We don’t want you going into shock. Calm down.’ I could feel him glaring at me as I drove and I realised that the sarcasm was my expression of relief. I reached across for the rum. ‘We’ll stop somewhere soon and take a look. You did pretty well.’

  He was glad to be mollified. ‘So did you. Some diversion.’

  ‘Yeah. I hope nobody got hurt. Have another small swig.’

  We stopped at a take-away chicken place wedged in between the car yards in Kirrawee. I bought some chicken and Coca Cola and took it to one of the two tables. The tired-looking girl serving eyed me suspiciously. She pushed back her orange-dyed hair and rested her hip against the counter. ‘How long youse goin’ to be?’

  ‘Why?’ I said.

  ‘I’m closin’ up in twenny minutes.’

  ‘That’s long enough.’ I realised I was hungry. I ate the chicken and sipped the Coca Cola, after I’d put rum in it. Greenway was sorting papers. He ate some chicken; he had natural good manners and was careful not to get grease on the sheets. ‘What did you get?’

  ‘The patients are or were, Michael McCleod, Renee Riatoli, Eddy Forster and John O’Brien.’

  ‘Why were they there?’

  ‘Drugs.’

  ‘What? Drugs!’ The girl looked sharply at us and checked her watch. I dropped my voice. ‘Drug problems and they were operated on?’

  ‘That’s what it looks like. There’s a lot of psychology stuff—depression and all that, but when you boil it down …’

  ‘Shit! Where are they now?’

  He shrugged. ‘Don’t know. I didn’t have much time and getting into some of the files was complicated. They sort of … exited the filing system. The codes’re a bit difficult to follow. I printed some of it out. I tell you, the printer sounded like a machine gun in there.’

  ‘What about the staff and the money angle?’

  ‘Nothing on the money. It’d have taken all night to get into that. The staff stuff’s strange, man. It’s as if files are being kept on them too, like the patients. Some of it’s stuff they wouldn’t like everyone to know. Kinky …’

  ‘Spare me. Is there a doctor with “K” in his name?’

  ‘Several. Some of the files are hard copy, I mean paper. The personnel stuff has photographs, good ones.’

  ‘That’d be in filing cabinets. How’d you handle that?’

  ‘In for a penny in for a pound. I jemmied them with a metal ruler. I took a chance and used the Xerox machine.’

  ‘That must’ve been the light I saw.’

  ‘There was no way to shield it.’

  Greenway drank, and ate some more chicken; he licked his fingers and I noticed that his hands were steady. He’d handled himself very coolly throughout. ‘It doesn’t matter now,’ I said. ‘Let’s see the pictures.’

  He arranged them on the table. I glanced at the seven faces quickly and then examined each in turn closely. I held up the third. Greenway nodded.

  ‘Dr Bruce Krey. He fits physically. Bald, see. No moustache but look at h
is shoulders. And his personal file’s a beauty. He’s had a fair bit of treatment over the years. Boy, does he have problems. I copied a fair bit of his file, didn’t bother with the others. Hardy?’

  I was scarcely listening. The face was that of the doctor who’d examined me as I was regaining consciousness at the hospital on day one. His bald head had been covered then by some kind of cap. I’d misheard his name as ‘Grey’.

  Greenway was looking pleased with himself. ‘Here’s the trump card. Shit, where is it?’ He shuffled the papers frantically.

  ‘Closin’ time,’ the girl called.

  ‘Christ, I can’t find it!’

  I stood and collected the papers. ‘Take it easy. It’ll be there. This kid’s shagged, she wants to knock off.’ I left two dollars under the chicken tray and the girl gave me a smile as we went out the door. In the car I used a torch to help Greenway locate what he wanted. A single photocopy sheet.

  ‘It was on the boss’s desk,’ he said. ‘Look. Krey resigned today.’

  17

  KREY’S address was given in his file—25 Seventh Street, Jannali. I checked the directory, started the car and headed back up the Princes Highway. Greenway didn’t speak and I was happy to be left with my own thoughts. The intelligence that Krey was our man posed a lot of questions. ‘Dr K.’ was one of Annie’s good guys—he’d helped her get out of Southwood. So why was he an apparent instrument of her death? And why had he hired Greenway to do something that made no sense, especially when he was on the spot in the hospital himself? Just knowing Krey was a source of trouble took us no closer to knowing what the real trouble was and what had killed Annie.

  Greenway coughed. ‘I don’t want to look nerdish or anything, but isn’t it something for the police?’

  I concentrated on not missing the turn-off. My eye was still watering and I dabbed at it. ‘How would you like to explain what we did at the hospital?’

  ‘We’re investigating a crime, a series of crimes.’

  ‘What crimes?’

  ‘Murder for one and …’

  ‘Accidental death.’

  ‘Assault.’

  ‘On who?’

  ‘Me.’

  I laughed. ‘You’re a bisexual out-of-work actor playing at being a detective. You’ve never even met your client. You’ve got no protection. Are you bonded?’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Insured against damage you might cause, losses that might be sustained through your actions.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I’m told this hospital has million dollar lawyers, the kind that own racehorses. You’d be so up to your balls in writs you’d forget what this was all about.’

  He rubbed his hand across his face. ‘Yes,’ he said wearily. ‘You’re right. What is it all about, anyway?’

  I made the turn. ‘We’ll go and ask Dr Krey. Let’s hope he’s home.’

  The road into Jannali wound around the natural features of the landscape. There seemed to be a lot of roadworks going on devoted to changing those features. The suburb was quiet, like a country town all closed down for the night. I drove through unfamiliar streets with big houses contending for the high ground to the down-market section where the planners seemed to have run out of names. I wondered what it would be like to have as your address No. 1 First Street, or No. 2 Second Street for that matter. Seventh Street was undistinguishable from the others—widely spaced fibro bungalows on standard sized blocks. It was short and dark; several of the street lights were out of commission.

  ‘Not much for a doctor,’ Greenway said. ‘Looks like the sort of place they dump defectors in—where nothing happens and nobody goes.’

  He was right; the street wore an air of uniformity and dullness that didn’t seem to fit with the personality of Dr Krey as I remembered him. I recalled the vein bulging in his forehead and the sense of pressure building up in him like an overheated boiler. I imagined him living in a penthouse or a slum, not low-rent suburbia. I drove slowly past the house; no lights were showing but the tail end of a big white car protruded from the driveway on to the wide grassy strip—the street had no footpath.

  Greenway leaned across me and squinted into the gloom. ‘Could be a Volvo.’

  ‘It is.’ I drove on to the end of the street and parked. Most of the houses had garages or carports but there were a few cars on the grass strip—kids’ bombs mostly but a few sedate sedans like mine.

  I dabbed at my eye, found a torch in the tool bag and got out of the car. ‘You wait here.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Shut up! D’you want people calling the cops? This is a nervous neighbourhood. You have to stay here to guard the documents and to give me a warning if anyone comes. Two honks, okay?’

  ‘Bullshit, no one’ll come.’

  ‘Just do as I say.’

  I closed the car door quietly and walked along the grass. Although my footsteps were silent a few dogs growled in the backyards and some lights indicated late night movie watchers but I had the street to myself. I examined the car at No. 20. The Volvo was heavily laden with boxes, bundles and cases. Dr Krey was planning a trip. I moved cautiously towards the house. I could see now that there was a light at the back. I went into the garage and used my torch to locate its back door. This opened on to a bare patch with a trellis gate through to the backyard. No dog.

  The house was quiet and I had a feeling that it was empty, the way you get a feeling after a few rings that no one is going to answer the phone. I’ve had the feeling often; sometimes I’ve been right and sometimes wrong. I had it once and walked in on three dead bodies. I tried the back door and it opened easily and quietly. That took me into a porch; the door to the kitchen was open. One light burned and the stove was warm. There was an oil heater with a red light glowing in the dark living room. I looked quickly into the two bedrooms, using the torch. Both empty and more or less stripped. One had been used as a study but all that was left were some newspapers. I stood in the front room smelling loneliness, frustration and fear. I moved the torch beam around carefully and saw something on the ledge above the built-in electric fire. I touched it and felt hard bristles and a soft backing—a false moustache.

  Two honks sounded from the street. I switched off the torch and went to the window. Through the gap beside the blind I saw a burly man approach the house. He rested his hand proprietorially on the Volvo as he eased past it. Krey. He walked towards the front of the house. I took the .38 from my belt and held it at my side. I heard Krey’s footsteps on the path.

  Two honks again, longer this time and louder. More company.

  18

  I COULDN’T see Krey now, he was too close to the house, but I saw his visitor—he wasn’t wearing his uniform whites anymore but, even in the badly lit street, I couldn’t mistake him—Pope, the rabbit killer. He seemed not to notice the car horn; he stood behind the Volvo, lifted his arm and levelled a pistol at Krey’s back.

  I whipped up the blind and smashed the window. I yelled something and brought my gun out. Pope swore and fired. The bullet whanged into the door. I stuck my head out trying to get a better look and saw Krey crouched behind a bush near the front door. Pope’s attention was divided between his target and me.

  ‘Pope!’ I pointed the .38 at him. ‘Drop the gun.’

  Pope hesitated. There were two sharp reports; the windscreen of the Volvo shattered and Pope screamed and reeled back. His gun flew in the air and he collapsed in a heap. Krey remained in a crouch; he held Greenway’s short-barrelled Nomad, still pointing it at the car.

  ‘Dr Krey, put the gun down.’ It’s hard to achieve much authority speaking through a broken window and Krey ignored me. I moved across the room, through the passage and opened the front door. He was crouched four or five metres away now; he’d jumped like a rabbit towards the corner of the garage. His eyes were wide and staring; he saw me step from the house and he raised the gun.

  ‘Don’t shoot,’ I said. ‘No more shooting.’

  Greenway appe
ared beside the car. ‘He’s got my gun.’ He looked down. ‘This man’s dead, I think.’ Krey moaned and moved the gun.

  ‘Doctor, stay calm. I’m a witness. Self defence.’ Krey raised the gun and rested it with the muzzle on his right temple.

  ‘No, Krey. Don’t!’

  He stood stiffly and moved into the shadows, just inside the garage. The shots had brought people to their doors and gates. Noise was building in the street. Someone ran across the road and bent over Pope.

  ‘Greenway,’ I said. ‘Try to keep those people back. Tell someone to call the police.’ I tried to keep my voice low and unalarming but I could hear Krey moving, shuffling back further into the darkness. ‘I’m going to try to talk to him.’

  ‘Don’t come in!’ The voice was sharp and clear.

  ‘I won’t, doctor, don’t worry. There’ll be some people to help here soon.’

  ‘I’m beyond help, Hardy.’

  ‘That’s not true. Tell me about it. You hired Greenway, did you?’

  He laughed softly. ‘You’ve got a pretty good therapist’s voice, Hardy, but it won’t do any good. Yes, I hired him. I knew something rotten was going on at Southwood.’

  ‘Operating on drug abuse patients?’

  ‘Yes. Smith—trying to make a name for himself, going after American research grants. Barbaric!’

  ‘Easy. Why didn’t you make a report, go through the proper channels?’

  He didn’t reply and I edged forward to the corner of the garage. ‘I can hear you,’ he snapped. ‘Stay there! No one would believe me. I’ve got a record of … instability.’

  ‘What about Greenway?’

  ‘It wasn’t a very clever thing to do. I hired him to cause trouble. I thought Smith might make some sort of mistake.’

  ‘You were acting when you and Smith interviewed me? After Pope had knocked me out.’

  ‘Acting? Yes, yes.’