by Peter Corris
‘I’ve got to piss!’
I didn’t say anything.
Guthrie’s marina at Double Bay looked squat and forbidding. The high mounted lights and some barbed wire running along the top of one section offence gave it a Stalag 17 look.
The water was dark and still; the boats ground and clanked at their moorings and only a few were showing lights. There were no wild parties going on, no strolling couples, no yachtsman comfortingly smoking a cigarette on his deck. Parker took the Falcon down a concrete ramp to the marina office, which was closed. There were lights showing in a box-like structure up on the roof of the office building. Parker tapped the horn and Paul Guthrie’s face, pale and agitated, appeared at the window. Parker turned around and held his gun on Tiny while I got out. I stood in the headlights of the car and let Guthrie see me.
‘No names’, I said. ‘How do we get up there?’
He pointed into the shadows and, by straining my eyes, I could see a metal ladder running up the side of the building to the roof. Ten metres or a bit more, a couple of dozen rungs. Eighteen-stone Tiny Spotswood was going to love this.
We hauled him out of the car and prodded him across to the ladder; he baulked at it, but a look at Parker’s hawkish face and the way he handled his. 45 automatic changed his mind. I went up first and it was a stiff climb for the leg muscles; I waited at the top on the flat roof with my heart rate raised and a feeling of distaste for what we were doing. Spotswood’s foot slipped a couple of rungs up and he swore; he kept swearing as he came up, rung by rung, slowly, and breathing as if it was a one-in-two sand dune. Parker came up quickly behind him, and we moved quietly over the roof to where Guthrie held the door of his flat open.
From the elevation, I could see down on the moorings; the lighting on the walkways was widely spaced and there were long areas of deep shadow. There were gaps in the ranks of moored boats, and one section of jetty at which there were none at all. I looked across the water to where Roberta Landy-Drake would be doing her evening’s drinking, but that only made me think of Helen and it was no time for that.
The three of us filed past Guthrie in silence; he was wearing a tracksuit and had one of his boating books in his hand. His hair was spiky and rumpled again. I brought up the rear and closed the door.
‘Spotswood’, I said. ‘I have to talk to him, and you know why.’
Guthrie nodded.
I made sure that Tiny couldn’t see my wink. ‘I want you to go and get a small motor boat or a dinghy or something and bring it to the closest point to here. Put plenty of rope in it and something heavy-metal, you know what I mean.’
‘Yes.’
‘Will I be able to see you from in here?’
‘Yes.’
‘Okay. Take your time.’
I took the book from him and he went out. Tiny heard all this and his huge belly sagged. Then he swore and the urine soaked his trouser leg. Parker jerked his head and Tiny shuffled into the flat. We went through to a small room with a big window looking out over the water. There was a couch and a couple of armchairs by the window, a kitchenette at the end of the room and a door through to a bedroom. I gathered up a newspaper and spread the sheets thickly in one of the chairs. Spotswood got the idea. When he was settled in the chair, Parker sat opposite him on the couch and didn’t say anything.
I went to the kitchenette, looking for a drink. Guthrie had a few cans of light beer in the fridge; I held one up to Parker who shook his head. I opened one for myself and poured some into a plastic mug I found on the sink. I came over and handed the mug to Tiny.
‘You can have yours in a plastic cup because you wet your pants.’ He took the mug and drank it down in one go-he’d have done the same whether it was overproof rum or elderberry wine. I took the cup away and sipped my can.
‘What do youse want?’ His voice was a high register croak.
‘It’s pretty simple, Tiny’, Parker said. ‘You tell us what Liam Catchpole and “Bully” Hayes are up to, or we’ll kill you.’
‘Oh, Jesus.’
‘No help there’, I said. ‘If you tell us we won’t kill you. Of course, if Liam and Hayes knew you talked to us they’d kill you. You’re stuffed either way, but we’ll give you some protection against “Bully”, or at least time to shoot through.’
‘What’s all that shit with the little guy-about the boat?’
‘That little guy is Mr Boats. He knows the currents, the deep water-the lot. Out there even a big, flat slob like you will just vanish if you do it right.’
‘Let me go to the toilet.’
‘No.’ Parker said. ‘Don’t waste our time, Tiny. If you don’t tell us we’ll just tidy you up and go about it another way.’
The way he said it made me wonder whether Parker had ever done this sort of thing before and if he really meant it. Tiny caught the same note in the words but there was some hardness and defiance left in him, as well as the fear.
‘Bullshit.’
‘Have it your own way.’ Parker gestured to me. ‘Is he there yet?’
I looked out the window. Guthrie was sitting in a dinghy with a big Thompson outboard attached. He was only about fifteen metres from where I stood and I could see two big coils of rope and a heavy metal grill-like the cover of a street drain-in the boat with him.
‘He’s there’, I said.
‘Right.’ Parker grabbed the front of Tiny’s shirt and ripped a section out of it. He wadded it up and motioned Spotswood to stand. When he was up Parker chopped him savagely on the side of the neck; Tiny’s mouth opened to yell and Parker rammed the material into it. He twisted his fat arm up behind him and rammed him in the spine with his gun. Spotswood moved stiffly the way Parker turned him. We all stood at the window and looked down on Guthrie. He was wearing a knitted cap on his head, pulled down low and in his dark tracksuit and with the oars resting easily across his legs he looked like the man for the job. His tired, worry-filled eyes looked up at us emptily. Spotswood shook his head violently and tore the gag out with his free hand.
‘All right, all right, I’ll tell you what I know.’ He tried to turn around, but Parker kept him the way he was, looking down at the boat in the water. ‘Well, “Bully”, he’s from Queensland, and…’
‘We don’t want the bloody encyclopedia’, Parker snarled, ‘and I know enough about it to tell if you’re lying. I’ll make it easier for you. Who is Hayes supposed to hit?’
‘Collinson.’
I opened my mouth but Parker motioned me to shut it. ‘In Australia, is he?’
‘Yeah.’
I waved down to Guthrie to indicate that he could finish the charade with the boat-if that was what it had been. I gave him a thumbs up, too. Parker eased back on Tiny and let him come around and sit down again. I gave him the half-full can of beer and he drained it.
‘What’re Liam and Dottie doing?’
‘They’re helping “Bully” flush this Collinson.’
Parker and I both spoke at once; I backed off and let him in first.
‘What d’you know about a cop named Parker?’
‘Bugger all. I heard he was getting close to Collinson and people wanted him stopped. That’s all.’
It was my turn. ‘The Guthrie kid, where’s he fit in?’
‘He’s Collinson’s kid. Hayes found that out somehow. Liam’s been trying to use him to get to Collinson. The kid’s fuckin’ Dottie; he’s been on some jobs. Liam’s working on him.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Look, I don’t fuckin’ know, do I? They reckon on using the kid to get to Collinson. I dunno how.’
‘What about the other Guthrie kid-the one in Brisbane?’
‘Don’t know nothin’ about that. Could I have another drink? Shit, that’s all I know.’
I got out the photograph of the man I knew as Peter Keegan and showed it to Spotswood.
‘Is this Collinson?’
The question itself seemed to alarm him and he looked at the picture as if he was stari
ng into the face of the gorgon. ‘Jesus’, he breathed. ‘I dunno. But if it is what you’ve got there’s worth a fuckin’ mint. There’s no pictures of Collinson-none at all.’
‘That’s right’, Parker said. ‘Let’s have a look at that. You watch Tiny in case he decides he’s bullet-proof.’
I watched him but there didn’t seem to be much point in it. His mind was on other things and other places. I went back to the fridge and opened another can.
‘You got a name to go with this?’ Parker said.
‘Yeah…’
‘Keep it to yourself for now. We’ve got the connection between your business and mine, though.’
‘Looks that way-but it’s getting complicated. I’ll need to think it out.’
‘We’ll have to park Tiny somewhere’, Parker said. ‘Any ideas?’
‘Whaddya mean?’ Spotswood yelped. ‘I told youse what I know. I won’t talk to nobody!’
‘I know you mean well, Tiny’, I said. ‘But you’re dumb and Liam isn’t. He’d have it out of you in no time. You wouldn’t have time to get your first schooner down.’
‘No.’
‘Yes.’ Parker handed me back the photo and looked at Tiny as if he was wrapping around a parcel-something to discard. ‘Let’s go and have a talk to your Mr Boats, he might have some ideas.’
I doubted that and reluctant wasn’t the word for Tiny, but Parker had a hardness to him that carried all before it. We went out of the flat. Nails had lifted on the surface of the roof, and we had to pick up our feet. We went across to the top of the ladder, and Parker motioned me to go down first. I turned, went down backwards and was half-way when I heard the shout and the high-pitched scream. I flattened myself to the ladder, braced and gripped hard, as Spotswood’s body flopped heavily past me. My face was digging into the wall when he hit the cement with a noise like wood splitting. I went down fast and heard Parker coming after me.
Tiny was lying face up; there was brain pulp on the cement; blood and other matter. His eyes were open and his jaw hung slackly like Jess Willard’s after Dempsey finished with him at Toledo. I noticed that he had only a dozen or so teeth in his head. The big body was spread and relaxed; the urine stain was a wide, dark stripe down the inside of his trouser legs.
‘What happened?’ I said.
Parker stood beside me; his skin was pale under the blue beard and his mouth was drawn into a hard line. ‘Caught his foot on one of the nails, he bloody near took me with him. Shit, this is a mess!’ He patted his pocket, feeling for the cigarettes he no longer used. ‘Not that he was any bloody loss. He saw a few off himself.’
I stared at him, wondering. But it didn’t seem like the sort of thing Parker would do. To the law though, it wouldn’t make much difference-by abducting Spotswood we’d put ourselves in jeopardy.
‘What’s this Guthrie like?’ Parker snapped.
‘You saw him. He’s good. This is bad, Frank.’
‘It could be worse; he was drunk, he fell, he’s dead. Who’s going to care? You reckon Guthrie could sit pat?’
Paul Guthrie had asked for action and now he had his share; I was sure he wanted to see the whole thing through. This was pretty rough, but I remembered his anguish at his perception that his family was under threat.
‘I think I can square him’, I said. ‘But I’m going to have to let him in on a few things. I’ll also have to tell him who you are.’
‘Here he comes’, Parker said. ‘Go ahead.’
Down the walkway, Guthrie was hurrying out of the shadows towards us.
‘Listen’, Parker hissed. ‘You can’t tell him about Collinson. I want to flush him out as much as “Bully” Hayes does.’
14
Guthrie looked down at Tiny Spotswood’s body. He swallowed hard, pulled off the knitted cap, and ran his hand through his hair.
‘He fell’, I said. ‘I’m sorry to involve you in this, Mr Guthrie.’
‘I asked you to’, he said. ‘Did this man have anything to do with what happened to Ray and Chris?’
‘Not directly. I can’t say that. But the people he’s associated with are at the centre of it. He knew something about it.’ I turned towards Parker. ‘This is Frank Parker. Mr Guthrie. He’s after Catchpole for a different reason. Our paths have sort of crossed.’
Parker and Guthrie nodded at each other, warily.
‘We’re going to have to ask you for more help, Mr Guthrie’, Parker said quietly. ‘Looks very quiet tonight. Is anyone likely to have seer us here?’
Guthrie shook his head. ‘No, very dead tonight.’ He suddenly heard what he’d said and looked down at the corpse again. He clamped his jaw tight and looked up at. me. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘Something pretty hard’, Parker said. ‘Just do nothing. If someone finds him tonight, just act as you would if you’d never seen him or us. If it works out that you find him in the morning, just do the same. You don’t know anything. Can you do it?’
Guthrie looked at Parker as if he was a horse in the yearling ring. He grabbed my arm and moved me away. ‘Hang on, I want a private word with Hardy.’
He drew me away into the shadows.
‘Who is he?’
‘He’s a cop. Or was. This Catchpole business has cost him his job and his reputation. He’s out to get Catchpole and some others. He’s a good cop-and an honest one.’
Guthrie pondered it, then nodded. ‘That’ll do me. If you say he’s okay I’ll take a chance on him.’
‘It doesn’t have to be a life-long pledge. If things got really sticky for you, of course you could talk freely-and we’d back you up. But we need some time now, and some secrecy. A session down at police headquarters could blow the whole thing.’
‘Why?’
‘Not secure.’
‘You can’t trust the police?’
‘Hard to-not all of them, anyway. I trust Parker, though.’
‘Your job is to protect my boy. Is that the way you see it?’
‘Yes.’
‘You know, Hardy, a few months ago I would have described myself as the happiest man in Sydney. Now, I feel my life is turning to shit. My boys… Pat going off like that. A man with his brains all over my
… Turning to shit. I’m hoping to pull something out of it, though. I won’t get it all back, I know that. But I want to salvage something. Do you think I’ve got a chance?’
I thought of Pat Guthrie’s graceful walk, the sea poems on Ray’s spick-and-span boat, the neat, purposeful half of Chris’s room. Those things felt solid, despite all the surrounding disarray. ‘Yes’, I said, ‘I think you’ve got a good chance.’
‘Protect my boy. I’ll back you up here. Don’t worry.’
Parker was looking edgy while this was going on. Guthrie moved resolutely back towards him. I nodded to Parker and he and Guthrie exchanged respectful nods.
We asked Guthrie to remove any traces of our presence in the flat. I suggested that he might care to go up to Queensland soon and he said he’d think about it. He turned away from us and from the broken thing on the cement, and climbed the ladder. He went up easily, sure-footed and neat in his movements. Parker and I watched him until we heard the door to the flat close. Parker let out a slow breath that whistled through his teeth.
“What did you tell him?’
‘Relax, Frank. I didn’t even hint that you want to use his kid for bait.’
We both showed the strain on the drive back to Glebe. I was feeling some relief, some apprehension at the conflict coming up between us, some guilt. Why would he tell me not to name names in front of Spotswood if he meant to knock him off? I thought. There was some comfort in that.
I drove badly, skidding on the wet roads and misjudging the turns. Parker was sitting stiffly; he swore when I hit a pothole.
‘Sorry’, I said.
He didn’t speak, but took his hand out of his jacket pocket with the piece of Spotswood’s shirt he’d used as a gag in it. I looked quickly sideways at him; he was chew
ing at his lower lip, really digging the teeth in.
‘Come on, Frank. You’ve seen it before.’
‘Yeah, I’ve seen it before. I’ve seen them pushed-I’m wondering if there’s any difference.’
It was late when we got back, but Hilde was still up, waiting for Frank. She gave him a kiss and he grabbed and hugged her and they nuzzled each other without caring whether I was there taking pictures or not. I left them in the front of the house and went to make coffee and get out the scotch, what there was left of it.
Hilde came out first and stood in the doorway; she was wearing a white overall and a red tee-shirt; her pale face was slightly pink where it had been rubbed by Frank’s beard.
‘What kind of a session is this going to be, stone-face?’ she said.
‘A hard one.’
‘I think I’ll go to bed.’
‘If we need the woman’s point of view we’ll call you.’
She came into the kitchen, stepped up and kissed me on the cheek-my first such salute from her, or maybe the second. There were no smells of oily water, stale urine and death about her; she smelled of shampoo and toothpaste. ‘Don’t be a shit, Cliff, she said. ‘It doesn’t suit you.’
She went out and they did some wrestling on the stairs; then Parker walked in, looking like a policeman. He took in my coffee-making sourly, pulled out the piece of cloth, went across to the sink and burnt it. The dark wisp of smoke curled up to the roof like a votive offering.
‘Sit down, Frank, and have a drink. We’ve got a problem- call it a conflict of interests.’
He lowered himself into a chair and stuck out his long legs-they stretched halfway across the kitchen. I poured the coffee and we both added some whisky to our cups.
‘Keegan’, I said. ‘I know the soldier in the photo as Keegan. He’s Guthrie’s wife’s first husband-if you can follow that this late.’
He sipped his coffee and seemed to fight for a civil response. ‘That’s one of Collinson’s aka’s-an early one. Let me tell you about Collinson first. To be fair about this you have to have the full picture on him.’
‘Okay.’ I drank some laced coffee.
