A Necessary Evil

by Bruce Venables

  ‘We understand, sir,’ Schumacher replied gravely, ‘but he’s onto us, there’s no two ways about it. And that little set-to in your office leads me to believe he’s unstable. He could do or say anything.’

  ‘I will not be held responsible for my son’s death!’ Harold stopped and placed his hands on Schumacher’s deckchair. ‘Do you have children, Derek?’

  ‘No, sir,’ Schumacher replied.

  ‘Then you can’t possibly understand.’ Harold resumed his pacing. ‘I must be absolved of this decision. It is impossible for me to make.’

  ‘Are you saying that you want us to make it for you, sir?’ Spencer asked and looked at Schumacher.

  ‘Yes! That’s it!’ Harold grabbed Ian Spencer’s sleeve. ‘It can’t be my decision. It must be yours.’

  ‘We’ll make the decision, Commissioner,’ Schumacher said reassuringly. ‘You can trust us to do things correctly, for the good of the Force.’ He nodded at Spencer. ‘We’d better be going, Ian.’

  ‘Before you do …’ Harold raised his hand, then scratched his temple, ‘I’ve made a decision in regard to another matter.’ He grinned. ‘A bit of business I’d like you to take care of, boys.’

  ‘What’s that, boss?’ Derek Schumacher looked at his superior. Harold Everard’s grin was manic and his whole demeanour had changed alarmingly in the space of several seconds. The guy’s a real worry, he thought, but what the hell! He’s the Commissioner, for Christ’s sake! And ours is not to reason why. But in Schumacher’s book, Harold Everard was about as nuts as anyone could get, short of being locked up. He was also powerful, dangerous, and extremely generous with money. Three perfect reasons for Schumacher to keep his opinions to himself.

  ‘Jane Smart has two items of evidence which I would dearly love to be in my possession. One is a gun and the other is a statement. I want you to get them for me.’ Harold grinned at his henchmen. ‘She’s held them over my head for years and it’s time I sorted her out. I don’t care what you do to her, I just want those two items delivered to me.’

  Schumacher smiled. That stuck-up bitch. ‘We’ll get them for you sir, don’t worry.’

  ‘I know.’ He patted Schumacher on the shoulder and chuckled. ‘I shouldn’t be telling you how to do your job. I know you’ll come through for me. You always do.’

  ‘We’ll have a little chat with her tonight, sir,’ Schumacher added, ‘and bring the two items to your office tomorrow.’

  The two sergeants left and Harold remained on the balcony looking out over the harbour. He felt a surge of sadness for Shayne, but the matter was out of his hands and that was the way it should be. And as for Jane Smart, the thought of her being tortured by Schumacher and Spencer created a stirring in his groin.

  At the other end of the balcony, a bikini-clad Helen Gorman lay on an inflated rubber mattress pretending to be asleep. In reality she was staring at the sky from behind a pair of sunglasses and shivering with fear, unable to believe what she’d just heard.

  ‘Helen, darling.’

  ‘Mmmm?’ Helen Gorman moaned as if in a half-sleep. Oh no! she thought, please not now!

  ‘Come here, darling,’ Harold purred.

  ‘I’m sorry, Harold, I was asleep.’ She feigned a yawn, ‘What is it, love?’ She sat up and looked around as she heard him turn on the vibrator in his pocket. ‘Oh, have the boys gone?’

  ‘Yes. Now come here, you slut,’ Harold’s voice dripped honey, ‘I have something for you. Something you can never resist.’

  ‘Oh lover,’ she replied in her sexiest voice. ‘Not again? That’s the third time today!’ She moved towards him with her thumbs in her bikini bottom. ‘You’re insatiable!’ she whispered provocatively but, deep inside, her stomach was churning with fear. And loathing.

  John Buck hung up the telephone and leaned back on the couch, stunned. He had smelt the fear in the woman’s voice. It was the terror of a woman cowering alone in a dark place. He’d heard the urgency in her voice as if some dangerous beast was lurking nearby, a beast that could attack at any moment.

  ‘What on earth’s the matter with you?’ Penny asked as she entered from the kitchen. He didn’t answer her. ‘John? I’m talking to you.’ Concern crept into her voice. ‘What’s the matter, honey?’

  ‘Eh?’ he muttered, the voice from the phone still echoing in his mind.

  Penny lay a hand on his arm. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Who was that on the phone?’

  ‘I’ve got to find Shayne!’ He picked up the phone receiver and dialled. ‘Come on, Shayne, answer the bloody thing!’ No answer. He replaced the receiver and leapt up, galvanised into action. ‘If he rings here, tell him to meet me at Connor’s Hotel,’ he yelled as he ran into the bedroom and grabbed his service revolver and jacket.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Penny was suddenly frightened.

  ‘Shayne’s in trouble,’ John said as he came back to the hallway. ‘I’ve got to go.’ He opened the front door. ‘He’s not at home and he’s not on duty, but I think I know where he might be. Stay put in case he rings. I’ve got to find him, Pen, he’s in deep shit.’

  She put a hand to her mouth. ‘Please, John! You’re frightening me.’

  ‘I’m sorry love, I’ve got to go!’ He kissed her briefly and left her standing in the hallway.

  Two hours later, John Buck walked into the bar of Connor’s Hotel. He was a worried man. His attempts to find Shayne had proved futile. He’d tried every place he could possibly think of to no avail. John didn’t know what to do.

  ‘I’ve been here for a bloody hour, you dickhead!’ Shayne roared as he came out of the men’s toilet into the back bar. ‘What the fuck’s going on? I rang your place and Penny’s crying over the bloody phone, saying I’m in deep shit about something or other—’

  John Buck grabbed Shayne’s arm. ‘We’ve got to talk, mate,’ he said frantically as he scanned the bar. The place was almost empty. It was Sunday night, but the two or three men drinking at the bar were all cops. And cops can smell trouble a mile off. ‘Let’s go out into the car park. The shit’s hit the fan like you wouldn’t believe,’ he whispered urgently as he dragged Shayne towards the exit.

  ‘Your old man’s put a contract out on you,’ John said as they moved across the car park towards his car.

  ‘He’s fucking what??’

  ‘Schumacher and Spencer discussed it with him this afternoon and he agreed to turn a blind eye while they did what they had to.’

  ‘Who told you this?’

  John shrugged. ‘A sheila. Over the phone. Wouldn’t give her name, but I wouldn’t mind betting it’s the one that lives with your father.’

  ‘Helen Gorman?’

  ‘Yeah,’ John leaned on his car and looked about them cautiously. ‘She was scared shitless, mate.’

  ‘What did she say?’ Shayne asked as he opened the passenger’s door.

  ‘She said she’d heard them talking on the balcony. Probably your old man’s back balcony—that’s what makes me think it was the Gorman woman.’ John got behind the wheel. ‘Schumacher and Spencer want to “knock” you, mate, and your old man apparently told them to do whatever they thought was best.’

  ‘Ha!’ Shayne grunted. ‘I’d never have thought he had it in him. Well,’ he rubbed his hands together and grinned, ‘what are we waiting for? Let’s go and find the bastards!’

  ‘Have you got your gun?’

  ‘I’ve always got my gun!’ Shayne patted his shoulder holster. ‘It’s a dangerous world we live in, John!’ He laughed. ‘Now where do you reckon those lowlifes would be right about now on a Sunday night?’

  John Buck started the car and shot out of the car park. He knew only too well where they’d be. ‘Jane Smart’s house!’ he yelled over the screech of tyres.

  ‘What the fuck would they be doing there?’

  ‘She’s got something your old man wants.’

  Jane Smart floated on a river of pain. Her nose and mouth were burned from the chloroformed gauze they�
��d used to overpower her. When she’d awakened, she found herself splayed naked on the bed, her wrists and ankles tied to the bed posts.

  Schumacher had told Spencer to wait outside and no sooner had he gone than the bastard had started on her. He’d found lubricant in the ensuite bathroom and had fucked her, all the while murmuring how beautiful she was. Then when he’d finished, he’d placed a gag in her mouth and produced a gleaming surgical scalpel.

  ‘First some pain, Jane, and then you explain!’ He’d chuckled and slit her left nipple open. Jane screamed through the gag and bucked in agony.

  He smiled. ‘Get used to it, Jane, my dear, because unless you tell me what I want to know, there’ll be a lot more of the same.’ He leaned over, kissed her eyelids and removed the gag.

  ‘Oh Christ!’ she groaned, gulping in air. ‘You bastard!’

  ‘Now, now.’ Schumacher replaced the gag. ‘That sort of talk won’t get us anywhere.’ He grabbed her right breast in his fist and forced the scalpel point into the centre of her nipple, pushing it deep into her breast. Excruciating pain gripped her and she passed out.

  Five times she’d fainted in the next half-hour and between times he’d systematically mutilated her, slowly but surely depriving her of her womanhood and softly repeating the same question. ‘Where’s the gun and the statement?’ Until finally, she’d whispered the answer.

  She was aware she was dying. Her bed was awash with her own blood. She was cold and alone. The men who’d hurt her had gone and people were calling to her. Old friends and acquaintances drifted through her mind, telling her the pain would soon be gone. But every now and then a face would appear telling her to hold on. It was George Everard. Jane was so happy to see him. She wanted to enfold herself in his arms. George would ease her pain. George would look after her forever.

  She roused herself again, struggling back to reality and the pain. The excruciating pain. Hold on, George was telling her. Hold on for as long as you can. She would do it for George.

  With guns drawn, Shayne and John moved slowly through Jane’s house. All the lights were on and the main security gates had been open when they’d arrived.

  Shayne moved through the hallway, his eyes sharply focussed beyond the gunsights of his service revolver which he held in his outstretched hands, ready to fire.

  John did the same. He swung his body around a doorway leading into the kitchen and his gunsights swept the room. He darted into a corridor once again, seeking an enemy over his sights. Down to the master bedroom. The door was ajar. He rammed it open with his foot and stepped inside. His gunsights gleamed upon a background of red and white. Oh, Jesus Christ! No!

  Jane’s mind screamed. They’re back! Oh, please, no! No more. I told you what you wanted to know! Hold on, Jane, George whispered. Hold on.

  ‘Shayne!’ John roared. ‘Shayne! In the bedroom!’ He rushed to Jane’s side and was overcome by what he saw. ‘Oh, Jane. Oh, Jane.’ He couldn’t touch her, but he had to. He watched his hand move to her throat and feel for a carotid pulse. ‘Oh, Jane! Oh shit, oh shit no.’ The pulse was there, but it was rapid and very weak. ‘She’s dying!’ he heard himself yell as Shayne burst into the room.

  Hold on, Jane, George whispered to her. He was smiling. Through a blurred vision, George moved closer to her. He looked so young.

  ‘Hang on, Jane!’ Shayne whispered. ‘Ring an ambulance, John!’

  ‘George??’

  ‘It’s Shayne. Hang on, love.’ He began ripping what clean sheets and linen he could find and applying them to her wounds, trying beyond hope to staunch the bloodflow. Christ alive! he thought, they’ve slaughtered her.

  ‘Who did this, Jane?’ a voice asked and John Buck’s lovely face appeared next to George’s. No, it wasn’t George, it was Shayne. ‘Was it Schumacher and Spencer?’ The mention of her killers made her groan as the pain returned and then George’s face appeared between the two boys. He smiled. Tell them, Janey, he whispered. Tell them and we’ll go home.

  ‘Yes. Home,’ she whispered through bloodied lips. ‘Home.’

  ‘What was that, Jane?’ Shayne asked.

  ‘They hurt me. I told them.’

  ‘We’ll get the bastards, Jane.’ Shayne squeezed her bloody hand and stroked her wet, matted hair.

  Tell them, Janey my girl, George smiled, and the pain will go away forever. ‘Lucky,’ she whispered.

  ‘Lucky? Lucky we found you,’ John Buck said softly. ‘The ambulance will be here any minute.’

  ‘Lucky,’ Jane shook her head weakly. ‘Lucky Norris.’

  John looked at Shayne. He hadn’t heard what she’d said.

  ‘Lucky Norris,’ Shayne whispered, ‘the newspaper editor?’

  Jane’s mouth was still moving, her words barely audible. ‘… the papers,’ Shane heard her say. Then something that sounded like ‘the box’. Then, ‘the gun’.

  Through her pain, Jane heard the far-off wail of an ambulance. The boys’ faces began to fade and then there was only George. He reached out his arms and she felt them enfold her. Forever.

  ‘Jane!’ John shook her. ‘Jane, come back!’ He dragged her to the marble floor to begin cardiac massage, but Shayne stopped him.

  ‘Forget it, Johnno,’ he whispered. ‘She’s gone, mate.’

  They heard footsteps running through the house as they stared down at her mutilated body.

  ‘Jesus fucking wept!’ The ambulance officers stopped at the bedroom door and stared with them.

  Suddenly Shayne stood up. ‘Come on, Johnno, let’s get moving. There’ll be uniforms everywhere soon.’ He made for the door.

  ‘Just a minute,’ one of the ambulance officers interrupted. ‘Who are you blokes? You can’t just leave.’

  John Buck turned at the doorway and threw his police identification wallet on the bed. ‘When they get here, show them this,’ he growled, ‘and tell them Schumacher and Spencer did that!’ He pointed to the bloodied corpse.

  ‘Who are Schumacher and Spencer?’

  ‘They’re cops.’

  The foyer guard at the newspaper offices knew instantly that he was a cop. It was the air of authority about him and the arrogant way he’d pushed through the double doors.

  ‘Can I help you, sir?’

  ‘I want to see the editor, Mr Norris,’ the man snapped.

  ‘I’m afraid you’ve missed him by a long shot. He doesn’t hang around long on Sundays any more, unless there’s a press stopper in the wind—that’s a big story breaking.’ The old guard prided himself on his ability to talk ‘news-speak’. ‘He was here earlier, but it’s a pretty slow news day today, as they say in the trade, and he went home.’

  ‘Where does he live?’ Ian Spencer showed the guard his I.D.

  ‘I know what you are.’

  ‘Well, tell me where he fucking well lives!’

  As John drove out of Jane Smart’s street, two police cars, their lights and sirens activated, flew past and turned into Jane’s driveway.

  ‘What now?’ John asked as he turned into New South Head Road in Double Bay and headed for the city.

  ‘A gun and a box and papers—that’s what she said. Lucky Norris must have them. We have to find Lucky.’

  ‘Providing those bastards don’t find him first.’ John’s face was grim.

  ‘Why should they?’

  ‘Jane told them!’

  ‘Shit! How do you know?’

  ‘“I told them, they hurt me”! That’s what she said. She told them where the gun and statement are!’

  ‘Damn it!’ Shayne turned and looked at his friend. ‘Do a U-turn.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do a U-turn! We’re taking a punt.’

  John spun the wheel into a 180 turn across New South Head Road and headed east. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘It’s Sunday night, so we forget the newspaper offices. My bet is Norris will be at home. I know his house, it’s in North Bondi. It’s a big new joint in Ramsgate Avenue.’

  ‘I hope for Norri
s’ sake you’re right.’

  ‘A bloke doesn’t get a nickname like Lucky for nothing.’

  Lucky Norris lay on the floor of his library feigning unconsciousness. Blood seeped from a cut on his forehead where Spencer had hit him with a revolver barrel.

  He could hear Spencer rifling through his bookshelves. ‘New South Wales Law Reports!’ Spencer muttered. ‘New South Wales Law fucking Reports! There’s hundreds of them! Shit!’

  Lucky Norris had been surprised by the visit from Spencer. He knew the man was a police officer and had suspected nothing when Spencer had presented himself at the door. Lucky had invited him into the library where he’d been working and offered him a cup of tea. Then he’d found himself staring down the barrel of a .38 revolver.

  ‘What on earth are you doing?’ he asked.

  ‘I’ve got no time to waste, Norris,’ Spencer barked. ‘You have a statement which was given to you some years ago by Jane Smart. I want it. Right now!’

  Lucky Norris knew in that instant that he was going to die. He tried stalling. He said he had no idea what Spencer was talking about and demanded an explanation. That’s when Spencer hit him. An open slap across the mouth was all it was, but it felled him as if it had been a punch.

  ‘Don’t fuck me around, Norris!’ Spencer snarled. Lucky knew he had no option, so he told Spencer he had the statement.

  ‘Where the fuck is it then?’

  ‘I haven’t checked on it for years,’ Lucky said, getting to his feet. His mind was racing as he wondered how the hell could he buy himself some time. ‘It’s in one of the New South Wales Law Report Gazettes on the shelf. I really can’t remember which one.’

  ‘Arsehole!’ Spencer roared and hit him across the forehead with his pistol.

  Now Lucky Norris lay in a pool of his own blood and wearily wondered if there was any point in calling out for help. It was a ridiculous notion which made him feel sad and very old. In his heyday, Lucky would have taken the gun off the bastard and rammed it down his throat, but now he was too old to fight and too weak to call out. And he knew that when Spencer finally finished wrecking his bookshelves and came up empty-handed, his time would be up.