Truth

by Peter Temple

  ‘House locked?’

  ‘Left it locked. Get me bag.’

  Villani opened the cupboard, took her bag from the top shelf.

  ‘Giss,’ she said. ‘Giss.’

  ‘I’m so dumb,’ said Villani, ‘I should join the police. Treasure chest, bullshit. You want your fags, don’t you? Forget it, ma.’

  Her eyes closed in slow motion. ‘Take the keys, Stevie,’ she said, faint. ‘Go around and get me chest.’

  Villani found the keys, put the bag back in the cupboard.

  ‘Do that, then,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry, Rosie. I’ll be back.’

  He stood. Her eyes remained closed.

  ‘Giss a kiss, Stevie,’ she said. ‘Giss a cuddle. Me only good boy. Come too late.’

  Villani felt tears coming, he leaned over and took her shoulders in soft hands, pressed his face to her, kissed her riven cheek beneath the bandage and in himself there was a great resentment and a great feeling of the unfairness in his life.

  On a winter day, in the big break, backs against the demountable, shelter from the ice wind, clever little monkeyface Kel Bryson said:

  They ever find your mum?

  In the car, his mobile rang.

  Colby.

  COLBY LOOKED as if he’d come off the golf course. ‘Searle says it’s pulled, does he?’ he said.

  ‘For tomorrow,’ said Villani. ‘The question is, did Ruskin get it from welfare or Sex Crimes? Or both?’

  Colby opened a file on the desk, flicked to a page, put on thin rimless glasses. ‘I can tell you there’s no Sexual Crimes statement,’ he said. ‘Tell me what abused means.’

  ‘Made her suck me off.’

  Colby showed nothing. ‘You do that?’

  Villani stared at him for a while. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Don’t know what to think.’

  Villani rose, walked down the long room, prints on the walls, he registered every step, chewing the bile in his mouth.

  Colby’s voice, raised but calm. ‘Hey, come back, sunshine.’

  Villani turned, hand on the door handle.

  Colby beckoned, four fingers tight as a bird wing. ‘C’mere, son.’

  Villani hesitated. He went back, he could do no other. They sat, chins down, eyes locked, their history hummed. ‘Christ, this is hard shit,’ said Colby.

  ‘I’ll quit,’ said Villani. ‘Just got some things to finish.’

  ‘How long’s she been on the streets?’

  ‘About a week. But she was hanging out with the scum before. Wagging.’

  ‘Drugs?’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘How old?’

  ‘Fifteen.’

  ‘Just a baby, really.’

  For weeks and weeks, the baby Lizzie had colic, whatever colic was, her night cries entering his dreams, strange stories developing around the insistent sound. They took turns walking her in the dark, the passage, the kitchen, the sitting room, it was many times in a night, you walked her, she stopped crying, you put her down like landing a soap bubble, went back to bed, she made a sound, it became a cry, a skewer in your head, you got up again.

  Sometimes Lizzie slept between feeds. Sometimes he cheated when the cries woke him, nudged Laurie, lied that he’d just had his turn, she rose, no idea of how long she’d been asleep. He said to himself that she’d probably done the same to him, they were both trying to survive. But he knew she wouldn’t, she didn’t know how to lie.

  The difference was that if the phone rang, Laurie didn’t have to go to an in-progress. Could be doped drunk fuckwits had a gun and a brilliant 2am idea, could be hardcore, two, three jobs in a night, take a couple of months off, go north, fishing, whoring. Both lots could kill you.

  Once it rang as he was changing Lizzie’s nappy, gagging on the smell of the yellow puree, first dirty light in the eastern window, everything about him numb, brain, feet, hands, only the nose functioning. Twenty minutes later he had his back against a wall in a lane off Sydney Road, listening to two braindeads come out of the roof, they had lifted a sheet of corrugated iron. Next to him, Xavier Benedict Dance was smiling his dog smile.

  ‘They stop being baby girls earlier now,’ Villani said. ‘They can go from baby girls to fuckpigs in a very short time.’

  ‘Hasn’t escaped me,’ said Colby. ‘But incest, that’s not a barbiestopper, that’s the barbie blows up, kills seven. We have to look at the big picture here…’

  A silence. Colby’s phone rang, a few words, grunts, eyes on the ceiling, goodbye, he stared at Villani.

  ‘So where’s she now?’

  ‘No idea.’

  ‘Tell me again it’s bullshit.’

  ‘Don’t believe me?’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Fuck you.’

  ‘Definite negative. I can probably arrange to squeeze the welfare attack-bitch kennel but we need Ruskin permanently squirrelled. Reckon your missus can talk sense into the girl?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Okay, we’ll find her. Stay nice with Searle. I don’t know why he’s doing this.’

  Villani nodded. If only he could put his head back against the chair and go to sleep, someone else in charge, feel the way he felt when the Kenworth came through the gate on a Friday night, he saw Bob’s sharp face, the downturned smile, the raised thumb. It was as if angels had lifted a bag of lead sinkers from his shoulders.

  ‘There’s something else,’ said Colby. ‘Mr Barry tells me the popular belief is that you talked about Stuart Koenig to Ms Anna Markham while fucking her. Do that?’

  ‘I did not.’

  ‘That’s the talking, not the fucking?’

  ‘Who’s surveilling her building? Or her?’

  ‘How would I know? Who would tell me? Ask your mate Dance.’

  ‘Crucible?’

  ‘I have no fucking idea. What I have an idea about is Greg Quirk. Payback time, son. These babies get back in, new inquest. DiPalma wants to screw you till your earwax melts and you go to jail for twenty years and then the real fun begins. I, of course, remain confident that you and Dancer and fucking Vickery weren’t making stuff up the first time around.’

  Villani stared at Colby. He seemed less lined around the eyes, forehead smoother. Surely not?

  ‘This Prosilio hooker,’ Colby said. ‘I understood that was in the vault.’

  ‘It’s open, in progress.’

  ‘Yeah. But in the vault.’

  ‘Forgotten about the vault, boss.’

  ‘Stephen, only a brain-dead cunt forgets about the vault. With me?’

  ‘Yes, boss.’

  ‘And you should now personally beseech the blessed virgin several hours nightly for the voters to shaft these arses. And in the day you keep your hands out of your pockets and do nothing to offend the squatters.’

  Koenig was there when the girl was killed. Villani knew it in his bone marrow. Never mind him being at home in Portsea. He wasn’t there. He was in Kew. How often had Koenig’s wife lied for him? Bricknell rang him and he went to Prosilio, parked underground. One girl each.

  HE TOOK the fire stairs, millions of them, doors to push, he paced himself and as he went he thought about what the job had meant to him and remembered the moment when he sat back in Singo’s chair and thought: Stephen Villani, head of Homicide and he deserves to be.

  Bob had no pride in him being boss of Homicide. Cop job, that’s all it was. Far beneath foreman, shift boss, night supervisor of anything. But the best his second-best son could do. Second-best until Luke arrived, then third-best. Just a useful body, a cook, guard dog, washer and ironer of clothes, homework checker, reading and spelling tutor, feeder of dogs and horses, mucker-out in chief, track rider, tree planter and waterer.

  You’re not the doctor, boy, you’re the fucking copper.

  Mark.

  Mark was Bob’s achievement in life, the proof that his sperm carried cleverness. He saw no wrong in Mark, he would hear no evil about Mark, he exempted Mark from anything Mark didn
’t want to do.

  He did crossword puzzles with Mark.

  Bob never once asked Villani a crossword question. Never.

  And then Luke, the bastard by the Darwin whore. The cheeky one, the one who had no fear of his father, demanded affection from him like a puppy, hung onto him, crawled up his legs into his lap, ate off his plate, found sweets in his pockets, fell asleep on him in an instant, safe, safe and home at last. Bob carried him to his bed like some precious newborn, tucked him in, Villani saw that from the door, the tucks, the kiss.

  And then, come Monday, it would be his job to see to the whining little shit.

  On his desk, a note from Dove about the Preston excavations:

  Young female, dead at least three months. Also remains of male, age forty-plus, pictures of rings on little fingers supplied by forensic suggest Hellhound. Armed Crime say strong possibility is Artie Macphillamy, 43, not seen for 18 months since involved in pub fight with Kenny Hanlon and others.

  He rang Dance.

  ‘I hear you’ve left home,’ said Dance.

  ‘Where’d you hear that?’

  ‘The most expensive intelligence-gathering operation in police history at my disposal, where do you think I’d hear it? One of my blokes was in a pub.’

  ‘That’d be right. Question for you, I want a straight answer.’

  ‘When did you not? Professional? Personal?’

  ‘Both.’

  ‘I find the phone so impersonal,’ said Dance. ‘Take a walk down Bromby Street, I’ll come along in, ah, ten minutes. I take it you’re at work.’

  Villani went out, sat on Dove’s desk. He was on the phone, finished the call.

  ‘What was his name? Birdy?’

  ‘Maggie,’ said Dove. ‘No phones in the name. Got his rego, put out a KALOF.’

  ‘Thousands of ancients on the road,’ said Villani. ‘Sitting in the caravan park looking at other ancients, the wife’s inside wiping surfaces, ironing, wearing a housecoat and an apron. That’s the reward for a lifetime’s work.’

  ‘Koenig,’ said Dove. ‘I reckon he wasn’t at Portsea.’

  They were alike, their minds worked in the same strange cop way. ‘You reckon, do you? What about Bricknell?’

  ‘Koenig and Bricknell,’ said Dove. ‘I think we should try to shake Bricknell, boss.’

  ‘Shaking Koenig was so productive,’ said Villani. ‘Give me something more than phone calls, son.’

  He took a smoke off Dove, stole his lighter, went down to the street. The heat pressed on him, it was too hot to smoke. He crossed the avenue and walked down Bromby Street. An Audi pulled up ahead of him, unlawful park. When he reached it, Dance bent his head, looked at him. Villani got in, chilled air, silent engine.

  ‘Nice car,’ said Villani. He lit the cigarette.

  ‘So what’s this?’ said Dance.

  ‘Minter Street, Southbank. A building called Exeter Place. Dogs on it. Yours?’

  ‘Minter Street,’ said Dance, thoughtful. ‘You have no idea how many people of interest live in Minter Street. They have gathered there, driven by some primitive drug-scum herding instinct.’

  ‘Yes or no?’

  ‘Yes. So if you don’t want to be logged entering and leaving Exeter Place, with or without Ms Markham, don’t go there. I’m not doctoring logs for you or anyone else.’

  ‘How’d fucking Searle see them?’

  ‘Gillam asked for them. For all I know he passed them around at a Rotary Club lunch, taped them to a hooker’s thigh.’

  Villani said, ‘The story is I leaked the Koenig material to Ms Markham. DiPalma’s made it known I’m dead and Quirk’s coming back.’

  Down his nose, Dance was watching three girls going by, bare, sweaty brown shoulders, midriffs, legs. They were arguing about something, not serious, extravagant gestures, pulling faces, big made-up eyes. He turned his killer-priest’s face to Villani as if averting his gaze from sin.

  ‘Well, Stevo,’ he said, ‘I hear that. There’s two possibilities. These tools get back in and try it on. Two, they don’t get back and the other lot does it for them. We have to hope the first doesn’t happen and plan for the second.’

  ‘Don’t know what hoping can do.’

  ‘You hope and also give things a shove.’

  Dance was looking at Villani in a way that said: Don’t ask.

  ‘On election night,’ he said, ‘if it’s necessary, someone will tell the squatter’s wife that Quirk is baggage they don’t want, that people in the job will make sure they pay a terrible price for revisiting Greg.’

  ‘Price like what?’ said Villani. He knew.

  ‘The crypts will be unsealed, the vaults will be unlocked, the dead will walk. For openers, pictures of party icon shagging fifteen-year-old twink.’

  Fifteen-year-old. Lizzie’s age. Villani said, ‘There’s something else. My little girl’s accused…’

  Dance raised a hand. ‘Heard about that. Vick’ll get her found, we’ll work something out.’

  He took a small player out of his shirt pocket, thumbed it, showed it: grainy picture, two men in evening dress, bow ties. One bent his head to the counter. He lifted his head, put a knuckle to his nose, sniffed. The hidden camera caught an Aren’t-I-a-clever-dog look.

  ‘When shove comes, Mr Barry will do what’s right or he gets the hot shot.’

  It came to Villani that Dance was much, much more dangerous than he had ever thought.

  ‘Bob’d be in that pub up there now, wouldn’t he?’ said Dance. ‘Wait it out in the beer cellar. Too smart for the defend-your-property shit.’

  ‘No,’ Villani said ‘He’s got a firetruck and a bulldozer and he’s got Gordie and he’s going nowhere.’

  Dance looked at him for a while. ‘Well, you make a stand somewhere, don’t you,’ he said. ‘Choose your friends, choose your fight.’

  He opened the box between the seats and took out a mobile.

  ‘Call you, give you a number.’

  Villani took it and went into the day. The wind was in the north now, coming from a burning hot, stone-dry place.

  THE PAGE lay on his desk. He looked at it again.

  Received 02.49: WHAT?

  Sent 02.50: SOON.

  Received 03.01: ?????

  Sent 03.04: GOING IN.

  Sent 03.22: OTU BANZAI OK

  Kidd and Larter near the house in Oakleigh.

  Someone waiting for a message from them. Someone also close by. An impatient person, two messages in ten minutes. Who?

  What were the two men waiting for? Had the lights gone out in the house? Did they want to be sure the Ribarics and Vern Hudson were asleep?

  Four minutes past three: the decision to move. GOING IN.

  Just shadows moving. At the back door. One kick, take the latch and the screws out of the woodwork. They were professionals.

  03.22: Job done. Hudson dead, the Ribarics tied to the steel shed pillars with tape, their mouths would be taped too.

  Time to call the impatient person waiting. The man with the knife. This wasn’t an ordinary run-through, this wasn’t ordinary payback. It was far, far beyond payback. This was a desire to inflict terrible things on the brothers.

  OTU BANZAI OK.

  Over to you. Banzai. OK.

  Why OK?

  Villani closed his eyes, no energy in him. His last Saturday in the job. You could survive a lot of things but not child sex-charges. Crime commissioner. That prospect hadn’t lasted long.

  Why OK?

  Why hadn’t he been suspended? Why hadn’t Gillam issued the instruction? What were they waiting for? Was it a matter of timing? Did they want him to resign like Koenig?

  She says a Father Donald, he came. He’d kissed the Holy Father’s ring, and he asked her a lot of questions and he said she’d be at God’s right hand for telling Father Cusack about the evil. Pretty much a booked seat. Specially blessed. Yeah.

  Villani felt a coldness on his face, as if the room had its own weather, a cool change from
the south-west, from Singo’s box of junk.

  The evil. Telling Father Cusack. Who told Father Donald. What about the confidentiality of confession? Could priests swap confessions with each other? Perhaps in their own confessions they could say things to their confessors, who could in turn…

  No.

  The evil. What story of evil could Valerie Crossley tell Father Cusack? A story she’d waited to tell until she saw her own death.

  The thought came to him. He dismissed it. It came back. He got up, the thrumming in his body, he went to find Birkerts. He was half-hidden behind folders.

  ‘A moment of your precious time,’ said Villani. ‘Where were the Ribarics in 1994?’

  ‘Thought I heard someone say we didn’t need any more Ribaric family history?’

  ‘My mood’s changed. Experiencing mood swings.’

  Birkerts sighed. ‘I’ll ask the custodian of the Rib family history. Like you, he forgets nothing. I think it’s an illness.’

  Villani went back to his desk, couldn’t resume drowsing, stood up, saw the file Burgess had brought: the girl on the snow road. He went out. Dove was on the phone, put his hand over the mouthpiece.

  ‘Read this,’ said Villani. ‘My eyes hurt.’

  The weekend switch operator’s hand up, the phone sign.

  ‘Boss,’ said Tomasic, ‘in 1994, the Ribs were in Geelong.’

  Relief. Not losing it yet.

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Six months suspended in the Geelong Magistrates’ Court in March 1994. Assault.’

  ‘Dig it out, Tom, the details. Matter of urgency.’

  ‘System’s giving lots of shit, boss. Just goes blank.’

  ‘We all just go blank. Talk to the cops there, must be some cunt remembers. And Father Donald. I want Father Donald. If you have to ask the Pope.’

  He went to Birkerts. ‘Little excursion to Geelong. Pass the time.’

  Birkerts didn’t look up. ‘Rather pass razorblades. In connection with what urgent matter, inspector?’

  ‘Metallic. Oakleigh.’

  ‘Irresistible. Saddle up and ride.’

  IT TOOK almost an hour to find anyone connected with St Anselm’s Parish and then it was done only by ringing Tomasic.