Heroin Annie

by Peter Corris

  I grunted and stacked a few more books. Jenny told me that Selina had been keeping company with Short for nearly two years, sometimes she spent the night at his place, sometimes he stayed at the flat. I got the door into a position where it would open and close and persuaded her not to call the police—Athol Groom was handling that end of it I said. She nodded then she dropped to her knees and started rooting urgently through the mess.

  ‘What're you looking for?’

  ‘The dope’, she said.

  I contemplated walking to Short's place, it was only a step, but the leg was throbbing so I drove. As it turned out, that was lucky. I was fifty yards from the address when I pulled into the kerb to watch something very interesting. Short, whom I recognised from the photograph, despite his white overalls and a pair of heavy industrial goggles pulled up on his head, was loading something into a blue van. He made a trip back into the studio which had a shop front directly on to the street, came out with another bundle and pulled the door closed behind him. He walked past a white Toyota station wagon which had his name and business painted on the side, got into the van and drove off. I followed.

  It was a good, clear day and the traffic moved easily; a secret boyfriend seemed like a promising new factor in the situation, especially one behaving suspiciously. I didn't feel confident though. Leaving the city always made me uneasy and now there was the background buzz of tension from the fight with Cyn. We headed west at an unspectacular pace and the Blue Mountains got closer and the air heated up.

  In Emu Plains we turned off the highway down the Old Bathurst Road and past the prison farm. We travelled five miles towards the mountains until the van turned off down a bumpy dirt track where I couldn't safely follow. I went on a bit and tucked the Falcon away off the road under some trees. I took the Smith & Wesson .38 out from under the dashboard, checked it over, and walked back. Half a mile along the track dropped sharply; at the foot of the hill there was a tree-fringed clearing and the van was pulled up in the middle of it. Short was mounting a camera in a tree on the left. I watched from cover up above the clearing. He fiddled, went into the clearing, went back and then he got a second camera and stuck that in a tree on the other side. Next he took a carbine from the van, checked its-action and hung it over his shoulder. He took out a small box, flicked a switch and counted to ten. His voice boomed out over the grass and set birds fluttering in the trees. He leaned back against the van pulled down his goggles and looked at his watch.

  Ten minutes later a green Holden came over the hill. It pulled up on the edge of the clearing and two men got out; they wore business shirts and ties, and looked bulky and tough. Short's voice crackled out towards them.

  ‘Stop’, he said. ‘Cameras on the right and left, take a look.’ Their eyes swung off and Short unslung his carbine.

  ‘The cameras are filming. There's a third one somewhere else.’ He lifted the rifle. ‘I used one of these in Vietnam. You get the picture?’

  One of the men nodded and held up a manila envelope.

  ‘Right’, Short said. ‘Give it to your mate. You, bring it here.’ He pointed with the rifle to a spot on the ground in front of him.

  The envelope changed hands and the shorter of the two men came forward and held it over the place Short had indicated. He said something which I couldn't hear. Short spoke into the box again: ‘Back on the right hand side of the road, three tenths of a mile back you'll see a kerosene tin. It's in there.’

  The man shook his head; Short fired a quick burst at his feet; he dropped the envelope and jumped away. Short swung the muzzle slowly in an arc in front of him. The noise of the shots was still echoing. ‘… not a trick. Go!’

  They walked back to the Holden, talking intently; they got into the car and drove off. Short stayed where he was, very alert. He ignored the envelope. He waited ten minutes then he relaxed, picked up the envelope and opened it. He let the two or three bundles of notes slide out into his hand, slipped them back and stowed them away in a pocket. Then he uncocked the rifle, put it against the wheel of the van and strolled across to the right-hand camera.

  While he was working I crept down through the trees and sprinted to the van, bent low. He got the first camera down and for an awful second I thought he was going to bring it back to the van, but he put it down and moved across towards the other tree. He was whistling. I reached around for the carbine, worked the action loudly and stood up with it pointed at the middle of his back.

  ‘Short.’

  He stopped whistling and swung around. I moved towards him keeping the rifle pointed at his belly. There was no self-satisfaction now in his high-coloured, handsome face. He lifted the goggles; they pinned back his hair, and I could see that it was retreating high on his temples.

  ‘Surprise’, I said.

  ‘Smart’, he said. ‘I suppose you want the money?’

  ‘I might’, I said. ‘But I really want the girl.’

  ‘What girl?’ He took a few steps and I moved the gun.

  ‘Easy.’

  He ignored me and kept coming. ‘What girl?’ he shouted. Despite the gun I'd lost the authority and stepped back. I said ‘Selina’, and he swerved to one side and swung a long, looping punch at my ribs. A gun you're not going to use is useless; I dropped it and tried to punch him in the belly, but he moved and I hit his shoulder. We circled and shaped up like schoolboys; he rushed me and tried to tear my head off with a swinging right. I stepped under that and got him quick and hard in the ribs. He tried to kick but then I grabbed his leg and flipped him over. While he was wondering what to try next I got out the .38 and pointed it at his knee.

  ‘Behave yourself, or I'll cripple you.’

  He nodded and sagged back on the ground. ‘Don't hurt Selina’, he said.

  ‘We're not communicating.’ I moved the gun a fraction in conciliation. ‘Selina was abducted this morning. I've been hired by her agent to find her. Do you know what I'm talking about?’

  He sat up a bit straighter, but all the combat toughness had left him; he was pale and the hand he put up to pull off the goggles was shaking.

  ‘I don't know’, he said.

  ‘You know something, sonny. This is a nice, quiet spot. Something nasty could happen to you here, and there's enough evidence about for me to fix it any way I like. D'you see what I mean?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Right. Now this was a pay-off you set up here. You're a photographer, I assume you were selling pictures, right?’

  Another nod.

  ‘You did a good job.’ I squinted along the line of the .38. ‘Who was in the pictures.’

  ‘Xavier Carlton.’

  ‘Jesus Christ.’ Carlton was a big-time businessman and sportsman with criminal and political associations, which every journalist in Sydney knew and kept quiet about. He was also a pillar of the Church. ‘Who else?’

  ‘A girl.’

  ‘Selina. You bastard. How much?’

  ‘Thirty thousand.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Prints, negs, the lot.’

  I had no time for Carlton, he was a corrupt and vicious hypocrite but blackmailers are a low breed too, and this one had put his supposed girlfriend right in the shit. It was hard to understand.

  ‘How did you set it up?’

  He spoke slowly and carefully, editing as he went along. ‘Carlton was celebrating his Golden Slipper win, we latched on to him. He got amorous and I got some pictures.’

  I was sure he was lying; the careful preparations I'd seen suggested that he would have planned his move in detail—maybe down to dropping Carlton a hint or putting something in his champagne.

  ‘You realise what you've done to the girl don't you?’

  He looked away from me. ‘I put a note in with the film telling him she knew nothing about it. That's the truth,’

  I snorted. ‘Carlton wouldn't give a fuck. He's grabbed her and he'll break bits off her.’

  ‘She was supposed to be going away. I thought …’ />
  ‘That he'd cool off? You picked the wrong boy. Carlton's crazy, he won't take this. He'll grill Selina till she tells him about you and he'll come after you.’

  ‘I was planning to get her away somewhere safe when I got through here. I thought she'd be okay at work today.’

  ‘You must have sent Carlton a sample. You might just have well cut her throat.’

  ‘Oh God, what can I do?’

  I was thinking fast. How to get to Carlton? He'd committed himself by taking the girl and his natural inclination would be to clean up. He wouldn't take his money back and go home. What did we have? I looked at my gun and then at his gun and then at the cameras.

  ‘How good will those pictures be?’

  ‘The best.’

  ‘Get up.’ I moved back, took up the carbine and pulled out the magazine while he stood irresolutely brushing dirt off his coveralls. I tucked the .38 away.

  ‘Do you think you can take me?’ I said.

  ‘Maybe. Someone did recently. It depends on the circumstances.’

  ‘It always does. I don't think you can, but we haven't got the time to find out. Frankly, you make me sick, but do as I say, don't argue, don't think and we might get her back. What do you say?’

  He got up smoothly; he moved well. ‘Yes. I'll do whatever you say.’

  ‘Get the cameras. Let's move.’

  We drove back to the road and switched to my car. On the drive back to Sydney, Short told me that he'd set up the blackmail because he needed capital for his business, and money to cover gambling debts. He said he loved Selina. I didn't respond; he could've told me my name and I'd still want to check.

  I hung around in Short's studio, which had a water bed and a lot of tedious albums of photographs, while he worked in his darkroom. He produced blow-ups of the faces of the two couriers and a couple of full length shots. He was right, they were good photographs.

  Bill Abrahams is an ex-cop who drinks. He got shot and was invalided out of the force on a pension which keeps him alive and drunk in a room in Glebe. When he's not too drunk he can remember the face of every crim he's ever seen and after twenty-five years as a cop, that's a lot of crims. I bought a dozen cans and carted them and Short up the stairs to Bill's room. I banged on the door.

  ‘Who is it?’ Bill growled; he was capable of not opening the door if he was in the mood.

  ‘Tooheys’, I said.

  He opened up and I handed in the beer. ‘They're cold’, I said.

  Bill took the beer and had a finger in the ring-pull of a can faster than Griffo catching flies.

  ‘C'mon in, Cliff. Good to see you. Have one?’ like all serious drinkers, Bill took a very proprietorial attitude to alcohol. We went in and I introduced Short. We sat around the laminex table by the window and opened cans. Short gulped his down and Bill looked keenly at him as he set him up with another.

  ‘You're scared of somethin' ’, he said.

  ‘He's scared of Xavier Carlton’, I said. ‘He's gone and got himself in a bit deep and we're looking for a way out. How's the memory, Bill?’

  He opened his second can. ‘Good as ever. It's all I've got left, sometimes I wish it wasn't so bloody good.’

  ‘I want you to take a look at these.’ I spoke quickly and motioned to Short to pull out the pictures; the danger with Bill is that as the alcohol level rises so does the water mark of his memories, and if they overflow the bank you never get to the point. ‘Anything you know about these blokes, anything.’

  Short spread the prints on the table; Bill hauled out his specs and examined the photo of the taller man who was holding the envelope. He stared hard at the image and then shook his head. ‘Don't know him.’

  I opened another can; Bill looked at the picture of the man who'd jumped back after dropping the envelope.

  ‘Mustard Cleary’, he said.

  I let out a sour, beery breath. ‘And what do you know?’

  ‘All bad. Stand-over man. Did some banks.’

  ‘Killer?’

  ‘Could be. Did your mate here back him down?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘He won't like that at all. I wouldn't go near him without a gun, Cliff, even then …’ He waved the beer can pessimistically.

  ‘Where can I find him, Bill?’ I got out a ten dollar note and put it under one of the empty cans. Short was looking at the pictures with an expression which was hard to interpret; he didn't look afraid, maybe it was shame.

  ‘Mustard's a Pom originally’, Bill said. ‘There was a pub he used to call his local. Where was it?’ He drained his can and pulled another automatically. ‘Ultimo. The Wattletree, know it?’

  ‘I know it. A bloodhouse.’

  ‘Certainly, that's Mustard's style. ‘Course this is a few years back, could be a poofter palace now for all I know.’

  ‘I don't think so.’ I thanked Bill and we left him to the rest of the cans and his memories. On the drive to Ultimo Short said that it was a pity we'd left the Ml in his van, and I was inclined to agree. It was near enough to 7pm, Thursday night, when we got to the pub—pension and pay night and the place was swimming along merrily on a tide of beer. The sight of a couple of women at the bar reminded me that I was going to miss my appointment with Cyn. I told Short to buy us drinks and look out for Cleary while I made a phone call.

  ‘Cyn? I'm sorry, it's unavoidable. I …’

  ‘It doesn't matter, Cliff.’ She sounded weary rather than angry and I took heart.

  ‘I should be able to to wind it up tonight, or maybe tomorrow. There'll be a good fee.’ The door to the public bar swung open and a wave of noise flowed out. I kicked it closed. ‘Cyn…’

  ‘It doesn't matter’, she said again and hung up.

  I dialled again and the phone rang and rang. Back in the bar, Short had set up two Scotches, doubles, which was all wrong for comradely drinking in this sort of pub. I put the Scotch down quickly and ordered a middy. I hadn't eaten all day and the whisky on top of the beer hit me and made me incautious. I asked the barman if Mustard Cleary had been in lately.

  ‘In earlier’, he said. ‘In a bloody bad mood, too.’

  I forced a laugh. ‘Well, you know Mustard. Wouldn't know where he is now, would you?’ The barman looked me over: I'm too thin and my clothes are too cheap to be a policeman, and Short was still wearing his coveralls. He didn't quite know how to place us so he hedged his bet.

  ‘Marty might know.’ He jerked his head at a stocky man who was built like a bull; he had a bristling ginger air-force moustache and was wearing clean, starched and ironed khaki shirt and pants. He looked up when he heard his name, and I negotiated the distance between us carrying my beer and fumbling for my makings. I reached him, pulled the tobacco out and rolled one.

  ‘Looking for Mustard Cleary’, I said. ‘Smoke?’ I pushed the makings across and he took them.

  ‘What for?’

  Short had come up behind me. ‘My mate and I have a delivery to make. He said to meet him here, we're a bit late.’

  He rolled a thin cigarette. ‘Didn't mention it to me.’

  ‘Well, it hasn't gone too smoothly. I understand he's a bit mad about it. Anyway, he'll be happy to see us, but I want to get on with it.’

  ‘What is it?’

  I shook my head and ordered three beers. I lit both cigarettes and put the match away in the box, the way a con does. I was wondering how to get him out in the lane when he made up his mind suddenly.

  ‘I can't tell you where Mustard lives because I don't know you. I can tell you where you might find him though.’

  I drank some beer and tried to keep it casual. ‘That'll do, where?’

  ‘Said he was going fishing, didn't make much sense to me the mood he was in, but that's what he said. Mustard keeps this boat down off the lighters in Blackwattle Bay. Know the place?’

  ‘I know it. Thanks.’

  ‘Tell him I'll have a snapper, moody bastard.’

  He turned back to his beer and we walked out. I looked i
nto the bar through a window: Marty was lowering the middy I'd bought him and smoking my tobacco; he looked up at the TV set and didn't seem to be thinking of going anywhere. I headed for the car fast and Short followed me.

  ‘I don't get it’, he said. ‘What's going on?’

  I gunned the Falcon's engine and swung out into the traffic. ‘What does the harbour mean to you, Short?’

  ‘Shit, I don't know. Boats, the Opera House, the Bridge.’

  ‘Me too, but to people like Carlton and Cleary it means a good place to put bodies.’

  Short groaned and I turned off Bridge Road up the back way to Glebe, the way the taxi drivers go.

  ‘You mean she's dead?’ he said quietly.

  ‘Not necessarily.’

  ‘Then what's the idea?’

  I could hear his harsh breathing and feel his agitation; the Rafferty's rules style of the real hard men were becoming clear to him, and he must have seen his own little coup was a panto by comparison. I didn't feel like easing up on him.

  ‘Ever hear of drowning? The lungs fill up with water and life stops. Happens every day and it's hard to prove that one person drowned another.’

  ‘Christ’, he said. ‘Hurry.’

  The way he said it reminded me that he'd been in Vietnam. I turned at the cosmetics factory, cut the engines and the lights and let the car roll down to the back of the blocks of flats near the water. Short was out of the car before me.

  ‘How do we get down to the water?’ he asked.

  ‘There's usually a right of way.’ I pointed to a gap between two blocks of flats. ‘Have a look along there, I'll look up here.’ He scooted off and I moved up towards the end of one block. I turned back when I heard a low whistle; he'd found the right of way—an overgrown brick path with a derelict handrail that led down to the water. We stumbled down the path and across a stretch of grass to the half acre or so of lighter platforms linked together like chain mail. An outside light from the flats cut through the gloom but the end of the lighters and their far edges were in darkness. Dark, lumpy shapes stood up here and there, piles of boxes and other debris—cover. Across the water the container terminal was working; the machinery ground and grated and there was an occasional crash as a heavy load touched down hard.