by Garry Disher
Yes.
Could be a goer.
What can you tell me about the place itself?
They call it The Barn because thats what its like, a huge barn. They sell liquidation gearfurniture, clothes, electrical gear, tools, records and tapes, laid out on these long benches.
Wheres the safe likely to be?
Theres a mezzanine level, offices and that. Up there, Id say.
You think we could hide in the place unnoticed?
Plenty of places, Harbutt said. Toilets, storage rooms, under a bench, even in one of them rubbish bins on wheels.
Where does Thea work?
Harbutt patted his pockets for his cigarettes. Nine to five at their head office in town. She wont be there.
Wyatt watched his friend. I dont want Dern or Thea to know about this.
Harbutt straightened in his chair. Got you.
They fell silent.
Which leaves the safe, Wyatt said. Are you up to it?
Harbutt splayed his fingers. They were more or less steady. Give me a combination, a drill, a stick of gelignite, whatever you like.
I want you to lay off the booze till after the job.
Harbutt nodded.
Good. Well make a dry run. The sale opens tomorrow, so it has to be tonight.
Youre mad, Harbutt said. The nightwatchman.
Its a risk we have to take. There wont be any money on the premises, so hes not likely to be too jumpy. We need to know where to hide when the time comes, what kind of safe it is, the best way out. We can keep out of his way easily enough. If he spots us, well run, thats all.
They separated and met again at The Barn late that afternoon. It sat alone on an immense asphalted field outside Geelong. At one time it had been a supermarket called Super City; the old name was still discernible, painted over on the facia board. The front was all glass, two storeys high and running the length of the building. The glass curved inwards from a shallow channel choked with pansies. A sign said: The Longest Curved Glass Window in the Southern Hemisphere. It was five oclock and several vans and lorries were backed up at the side of the building. A dozen men were carting sofas, refrigerators, sealed cartons and racks of dresses through the side doors.
Wyatt and Harbutt approached the front door. They each carried a clipboard and wore a dustcoat with the word Inspector stitched across the top pocket.
Workplace safety check, Wyatt told the security man at the door.
The man shrugged. It meant nothing to him. The world was full of grey men in dustcoats writing things on clipboards.
Wyatt and Harbutt went inside. Wooden trestle tables groaned under the weight of Taiwanese calculators, Korean batteries, Chinese shoes. Refrigerators and toasters were stacked around the walls. Armchairs and sofa beds littered an area the size of a tennis court in one corner. Sales staff hurried around, pricing goods and pasting large SALE signs on the walls.
At the rear of the building a broad staircase led to a narrow mezzanine level that extended halfway down the length of the building on each side. There were a number of frosted glass doors leading to plasterboard petitioned offices. Under the stairs were toilets and a storeroom.
Wyatt looked around swiftly. It seemed promising. Harbutt, he noticed, was sweating. He hadnt been drinking, the job was making him edgy.
They prowled around the shop floor. By six oclock the last of the goods had been delivered and the sales staff were heading for their cars. The nightwatchman had based himself at the door. He was middle-aged, beer fat and unhealthy looking. All his attention was on the young women as they left the building. He stared after them, rubbing his palms on his thighs. Hed set a bright red canvas directors chair nearby. He looked like a man who intended to get the weight off his feet when the place was empty. Sit in his chair and stare out at the night.
He didnt see Wyatt and Harbutt in the dark rear of the big room. They climbed the stairs, let themselves into the first office. It contained a desk, photocopier and filing cabinet. They settled down to wait. A dim globe at the head of the stairs leaked enough light through the frosted glass for them to see one another. Later, when the nightwatchman was dozing or inattentive, they would check the other offices. From time to time they murmured. Harbutt talked edgily, as though the building bothered him: too big, too isolated, too many sounds of its own. Wyatt let him talk. They wouldnt be heard here and theyd know if the nightwatchman was climbing the stairs. If he did climb them, that ishe had no reason to.
At nine oclock, two things happened. A vehicle pulled up outside, there were voices, a different vehicle drove away.
And lights went on all over the building.
* * * *
Thirteen
Light flooded the tiny office. Wyatt stiffened. He shifted around the wall until the desk screened him from the door. From that position he could see Harbutt clearly. Harbutt was on the floor, his back to the wall, legs straight out. He was slack, fatalistic, as if hed expected the lights. Now he drew up his knees, rested his forehead on them. For a short time, nothing happened. Wyatt watched Harbutt coldly. After a while, Harbutt felt the force of Wyatt there in the room with him, and began to talk. His voice was low, scarcely audible, and what he said was:
Its not easy getting retrenched at my age. It gets to you, eats away at you. I doubt if Ill find another joba bloke like me, Im for the scrap heap. I cant turn pro. Im not like you, I cant put something together and make it work.
Wyatt didnt reply. He might have been listening to Harbutt, or listening to the vast silence outside the door. He had his Colt out.
You were right to drop us, Harbutts muffled voice went on. Derns not solid enough. Anyone can see that. Theas got a vicious streak. She doesnt like to be crossed.
The building sat silent and brightly lit on the dark plain. Presently Wyatt said, Youd better tell me what happened.
Harbutt shifted his rump to get comfortable. After you shot through the other night, Dern kicked Thea out of his car and said he was finished with her. I gave her a lift home. You know what shes like, Wyatt. One thing led to another. I mustve been crazy. I mean, it shouldve been clear as the nose on my face it wasnt me she was interested in. She thought Id lead her to you, I suppose.
You told her about tonight?
Its getting sacked like that, mate. It was a shock. I was never that good at putting money away. My redundancys already eaten up with the mortgage. He looked directly at Wyatt for the first time. Theres a price on your head, twenty grand, did you know that?
You and Thea shopped me to the Outfit?
Harbutt nodded.
And our nightwatchmans been bribed to go and get himself a cup of coffee for the next hour or two?
Harbutt nodded again. And thats all I know about it, I swear. I dont know if theres one gun out there or a dozen.
Not a dozen, Wyatt thought. The Outfit was Sydney based, weak in Melbourne, so they wouldnt have organised that many guns. They would have sent a local, maybe two. He slid along the floor and eased open the door to the corridor.
They were waiting for him. A shot rang out and the frosted glass splintered above his head. He rolled, putting distance between himself and the door.
The position was bad, as though hed treed himself. The only way out was down the stairs, where hed make an easy target. His only cover was the waist-high safety barrier that ran around the edge of the mezzanine level corridor. He crouched behind it, conscious that it was plasterboard and wouldnt save him from a lucky or a careful shot.
He chanced a look over the rail and ducked again, twisting to his right. There was another shot and plaster shards sprinkled his face. Then a series of shots had him flat to the floor and moving back through the open door again into the office. Now he knew where the gunman wason the mezzanine floor, facing him from the corridor on the opposite side of the building. And it was an automatic rifle. His Colt could not match it for range, velocity or accuracy.
Wyatt rested a moment, thinking it through. He was alone in this. Harbut
t was still on the floor, head buried in his arms, rocking his upper body. If there were two guns outside, the second one covering the stairs from the bottom, there was no way out. If the gun opposite was the only one, there was a chance. The rail around the mezzanine was an equaliser. Wyatt couldnt be seen, but nor could the man opposite him. With time, the other man might get off a lucky shot. Or hed remember what hed come here for and move around to this part of the mezzanine and force a confrontation.
Wyatt could wait, it was what he was good at, but he decided to push matters. The office photocopier sat on an open-shelved cabinet crammed with paper, pens and toner cartridges. There was also a bottle of methylated spirits. He broke open four packs of A4 paper and poured the methylated spirits over them, fanning the edges with his thumb to allow penetration. He soaked several cleaning rags with the fluid, and his dustcoat. Finally he searched the desk. He found a Bic lighter in the drawer. He tested it, turning the flame to high.
Still keeping low, he carried everything out into the corridor and weighed up the next stage. He needed to cut down on the amount of light that framed him and he needed to distract the gunman.
Leaning back, he sighted the Colt and squeezed off a shot. The corridor light went out, glass flakes falling to the floor. He sighted again and shot out the light at the head of the stairs. He chanced a third shot, smashing the closest of the three main lights in the hall. It didnt give him darkness but he was harder to see now, here above the remaining lights suspended over the shop floor below.
Without pausing he rested the Colt on the rail and snapped off four shots at the man opposite him. He heard them pass through the plaster and heard the soft thump of someone rolling for cover.
Wyatt judged that he had about five seconds before the gunman felt secure enough to return the volley. He lit the rags and the dustcoat, and flung them over the rail. Then he lit the paper bundles, watched the flames take hold, and scattered them onto the furniture below.
The rifle opened up again, so he scooted back along the corridor toward the stairs. Four shots, then silence.
Nothing happened for a while. Wyatt slid the spare clip into the Colt and waited. There were foam rubber sofas and vinyl armchairs directly beneath him. He knew they would burn readily, producing plenty of smoke, but it would take some time for them to catch.
Thats if hed got lucky with his aim.
Wyatt noticed the smell first, acrid and poisonous. He heard crackling then as the flames caught, and the smoke, when it reached him, was thick and black.
Then the alarms went off and sprinklers came on.
Water drenched everythingthe offices, corridors, the big display floor below.
Wyatt moved. He ran half-crouched down the corridor. As he rounded the corner and crossed the space toward the head of the stairs, a shape confronted him in the gloom, elastic and dark. He ducked, got off a shot. The shot went high. There was no answering shot. Instead, he saw the black figure hurl the rifle at him, butt first. It spun end over end and then he was tangled in it. He fell. The Outfit gun disappeared down the stairs and in those seconds, in the obscuring blackness, Wyatt formed one impression: the Outfit gun was a woman and she was hard and quick-looking, like a coiled black spring.
He got to his feet. He didnt go after her. She would be out the door and away before he got there. The fact that she hadnt stayed to finish the job indicated that she was alone, her clip was empty and she wanted to disappear before cops and firemen arrived.
So did Wyatt. But he allowed himself a moment for what he had to do next. Harbutt was coughing. The fire had roused him from his blues and he came out of the office, a handkerchief over his nose. His eyes were streaming. He stopped when he saw Wyatt. You got him?
Wyatt shook his head. Cleared off.
Im glad youre okay, Harbutt said. Then he saw the big Colt. A kind of sadness settled in him. You know youve got nothing to worry about from me.
Wyatt raised the muzzle. Thats right, he said.
* * * *
Fourteen
Wyatt spent the next five days aboard a rotting barge, existing on tinned beans and peaches. The world had become a place full of holes, corners and darkness. There was no-one he could turn to and he mistrusted the daylight. The money in his pocket had been meanly acquired and it would not see him beyond the next week. His pistol, tied to an inglorious killing, lay rusting on the bottom of the Barwon River. If they came to get him now, he had only his fists to face them with. And alone, in hiding, he began to feel eyes at his back.
On the fifth night he moved. Any earlier and hed have been trapped inside the police search radius or stopped on an exit road. After five days and no sightings, the search would have been called off. Slipped through the cordon.
Thankful of the darkness and the water, he went by boat this time, casting free in a motor cruiser and heading it out into the bay. The sea was calm and nothing showed on the radar. He sipped scotch and ate from a tin of sardines hed found stored in the galley. It was an expensive boat, well fitted out, but by morning it would be a chain around his neck.
He had to leave the state. Hed been offered a way, and had turned it down. Brisbane. Mostyn had said the client was a woman in Brisbane. Stolle himself had said it. The whole deal sounded too odd to be a trap. The general style of the people who didnt like Wyatt was to come at him with a gun, not try an elaborate ruse. Nothing about Stolle said that he was a hired gun. He hadnt been armed; his ID said he was a private investigator. Stolle had also mentioned flying. That meant airports and people, hardly the conditions for an ambush. Finally, there was that five thousand dollars. Wyatt took in everything the boat had to offer and saw only one thing that could help him now.
He had to call twice on the cellular phone before relays picked up his signal. It was one oclock in the morning and Stolles voice was thick with sleep and irritation. What? he said flatly.
You said five thousand.
Stolle came awake then. Thats right.
Is this line secure?
I ran a check only yesterday.
What about the room?
Its clean.
Wyatt was silent, wondering how to play this.
Say whats on your mind, Stolle said.
Im interested in your offer.
Good man. Ill be in my office at eight.
Things have happened, Wyatt said. I want you to collect me now.
Stolle didnt query or demur. Where?
Carrum. The Nepean Highway crosses a channel there. Park your car somewhere, wait for me on the bridge. If I see anything I dont like, thats it, Im gone.
They settled on 3 am and Wyatt broke the connection. He checked the fuel gauge: plenty to get him across the bay. By two-thirty he was throttling back a few hundred metres from the Chelsea foreshore. He could see streetlights and occasional headlights. By day Carrum and Chelsea were parts of an endless strip of sunblighted, low-cost houses and shopfronts. Wyatt knew and hated the area but right now it had the advantage of a marina where he could moor the boat without drawing attention to himself.
Thirty minutes later he was on dry land and watching the bridge. At five minutes to three a battered white Toyota van crept across the bridge. The words Food Delivery Vehicle were stencilled on it and the rear windows had a blackness about them that had nothing to do with the night. If Stolle used it as his surveillance vehicle, it was a good one.
Wyatt waited. He saw the van draw off the road and into a parking bay. Stolle got out and walked to the centre of the bridge. He did not look around and he gave no sign that he was nervous or had brought backup along. Wyatt let ten minutes and a handful of late cruising taxis and panel vans go by, then stepped out of his cover and onto the bridge.
Stolle swung around at his approach. This had better be on the level. I didnt come here to be thumped and robbed again.
Shut up, Wyatt said. I hope you didnt bring those two clowns along with you.
Mostyns off the case and Whitney cleared out on me.
Wya
tt said, Good, and walked off without waiting. Stolle caught up with him next to the van. Where to?
Your place.
Stolle said nothing to that. He unlocked the van, got in, opened the passenger door for Wyatt. He drove in silence back along the Nepean toward the city. At St Kilda Junction he headed north along Punt Road and right into the cramped streets of renovated workers cottages in Prahran. A minute later he picked up a small electronic device, pushed a button, and light spilled onto the cobblestones from a garage door in an alley ahead of them. Stolle drove in, pushed the button again. The garage door clanged, sealing them off from the night.
