by Nick Spill
“Thank you, I think. But I already heard.”
“You did? How?” Catelin caught his pipe as it fell from his mouth.
Alexander finished his Scotch and savored the sharpness at the end, coupled with Catelin’s reaction. “Oh, spy stuff. Sources and rumors.” Alexander shrugged. He had a flashback to Tsara’s termination of their long friendship. He would have to get used to betraying his friends and sources, now that he was a spy. A shiver went through him.
“It does have a bite, doesn’t it?” Catelin observed. “And we will never talk of this again.”
Turn the page for an excerpt from The Jaded Widow,
the final novel of the Jaded trilogy.
Prologue
Auckland February 1977
When the petite blonde thrust the cattle prod into the bartender’s rear for the third time, he emptied his bladder and bowels over her shiny, black, high-heeled shoes. He hung naked from a hook in her late husband’s garage workshop, his hands secured with rope and his wrists dripping with blood. An oily rag was taped in his mouth so he couldn’t scream; a rope was tied around his legs so he couldn’t kick. Michael Donnelly kept his distance, holding the chain that suspended the body.
Known as Babs to her tennis club friends, Barbara Turner was the widow of Terry Turner, the victim of a gigantic explosion on the Southern Motorway a year ago. The police had closed the investigation, ruling that an unregistered truck had accidentally blown up, killing a number of people in a petrol station, including Terry and his henchman, John Eustace, two of the most feared underworld figures in New Zealand. On the same afternoon, the police had suffered the death of five of their officers and a number of others injured in a shootout on the other side of the city with a Maori gang over a truckload of marijuana. There were no survivors from the gang.
“Shit.” Barbara stepped away from the smelly liquid around her. She wore a tight black mini-dress and blouse adorned with a long string of pearls. Her hair had been in a bun but had come loose. Her trademark thick blue eye makeup now ran down her cheeks.
“Take him down. You know what to do.” She stomped her heels and looked at her feet then at her younger brother. “Shit. He ruined my shoes.”
Michael released his grip and the bartender crashed to the floor. The chain made a screeching sound as it wrapped around the bartender’s head. Michael stepped back and checked his brown brogues, his pressed khaki pants and blue shirt, then the lifeless body. He looked out of place in the large garage workshop behind what was now Mrs. Turner’s Used Car Sales Emporium on Great South Road in Ellerslie. He had played center for his Auckland Grammar rugby Second Fifteen and filled out his blue blazer with his wide chest. His eyes had no life: anyone looking into them would see nothing. His ambition and sadism were hidden by his respectable veneer. He looked like a retired rugby player with a broken nose and cauliflower ears, but he was an accountant and played with money, not balls.
The only sound in the garage was the squeak of the hook that rocked back and forth. Fluorescent lights hung from the open-beamed ceiling. Some of the tubes flickered, creating a macabre scene.
He scrapped his shoes on a pile of sawdust nearby. The workshop hadn’t been cleaned in months. Dirty rags littered the floor which was spotted with grease and oil stains. Tools hadn’t been put back in their place but lay scattered over work benches or on the ground. Tool chests were left open, half-empty. There were no vehicles on the three ramps. A lifeless body covered in chains lay on the dirty floor.
Michael turned to his sister. “No trace?”
“No hands or face, right? Our people will know he’s gone. That’s all we need. You know the place under the bridge?”
“Got it.” Michael smiled, pleased he no longer had to defer to John Eustace, who was known as Big John. He had towered over Michael, who wore elevated shoes to reach five feet eight inches. Big John had not kept his dislike for Michael a secret.
Michael ran his own investment firm and was the money manager for his sister’s enterprises, including the legitimate car lot, the laundromats, the massage parlor in Newmarket and the strip club on Karangahape Road called the Gold Club. Neither sibling was new to the late Terry Turner’s legitimate and illegitimate enterprises they inherited. Both had remained in the shadows. And Michael had created a series of companies and trusts to hide the ownership of their businesses, except for the used-car lot they now occupied late at night.
Oz, the bartender, had arrived from Sydney three months ago. The Gold Club’s manager, Peter Green, hired him right off the boat: Oz was a fast and skilled barman, could mix drinks and serve more people than anyone else in the club, and he didn’t annoy the strippers.
He had taken a week off work recently. A bad case of flu, he claimed when he phoned in sick. Over that week the receipts from the two cash registers at the club’s long bar showed a doubling of income when Michael tallied all the earnings and compared them to the previous weeks. Michael went to investigate and worked out that the second cash register was used only by Oz, who must have pocketed the cash.
So Michael and Barbara made a surprise visit to Oz’s flat in Grey Lynn. When he opened his front door Barbara didn’t wait for an invitation but marched in. When Oz complained, Michael punched him in the stomach, hard. Fast with his fists and legs, he was overcompensating for his size—and for being John Eustace’s replacement in his sister’s eyes. He secured Oz’s hands behind his back with rope and threw him into the back of his Jaguar XJ6. Barbara took her time getting back into the car. She held up a fistful of twenties and looked in the rear-view mirror. “How much did you steal?” she shouted as she drove away.
Oz mumbled. His face was pressed into the backseat as Michael twisted his wrist and arm.
“I reckon he stole about $200 a night. He worked for us, what? Three months. So that’s about $20,000. What did you do with the money?” Michael gave the bartender’s arm an extra twist.
“I’m sorry,” Oz mumbled, then started to sob.
“Shit! Don’t let him ruin the leather, Michael. This is a fucking new car.”
• • •
“Maybe he can float back to Aussie where he came from,” Barbara said as she left the workshop. “Knew we should’ve checked him out further. Probably fled Sydney for doing the same thing.”
Michael went to the back where there was a locker room to change into Wellington boots and overalls, gather a few sharp tools and a handful of large plastic bags. Oz had confessed to spending the stolen cash on heroin. The money had gone to a drug dealer Michael supplied, an irony lost on the siblings.
• • •
Michael dumped the bags into the trunk and looked at the moonless sky. He could feel drops on his face. By the time he had turned into Karangahape Road it was teeming with rain. He drove past the Gold Club. The liquor license allowed it to stay open till 3 A.M. but at 3.30 it still looked open.
At Jervois Road he turned right down the hill. His wipers could not keep his windscreen clear. He stopped at the bottom of Curran Street, which ran underneath the Auckland Harbor Bridge, and turned off his lights. Despite the hour he could hear the occasional sound of traffic overhead. The tide was going out as he opened the trunk and carefully pulled out two black plastic bags. He carried them onto the rocks, using a concrete slab for balance. At the water’s edge he opened up the smaller one and threw the contents into the water. Crabs and fish would eat the fingers before daybreak. He opened the other plastic bag and threw it as far as he could into the water, like one of his long rugby passes. There was just enough light for him to see it sink. Before he climbed back over the rocks he saw headlights approaching. He kept still, as he knew any movement might show in the driver’s peripheral vision. He should be invisible in the rocks with the rain coming down. The car passed slowly, and Michael resisted the temptation to peek over the wall and see if it was a police car. He was glad he had shut the trunk and the lights were off. When he sensed the car had gone he peered over the wall and saw he was alone
again.
The larger bag was more difficult to handle as he dragged it out of the trunk. He lost his footing a couple of times on the slippery rocks before he managed to get the bag into the water. He found his footing and pushed the bag deeper until it picked up the current. He watched until it was lost in darkness. The rain was now a sheet of water as he climbed back onto the pavement.
He looked at the huge steel girders of the harbor bridge. Rain was hitting him vertically as he scanned the dark water, the empty road, the noise of the wind and cars above. He let the rain wash over his face and opened his mouth to taste the water. He took deep breaths and could savor the air, the smell of the saltwater. He felt so alive and in control. It was a feeling he had never experienced before, far more powerful than smoking marijuana with his sister or his favorite girl at the Flamingo Paradise.
Dripping wet, he climbed into his Jag and wiped the water off his face. He drove under the bridge, followed the road to the roundabout, turned right by the boathouse, and headed back to the city along Westhaven Drive. He switched his lights on after he saw there were no cars ahead. He prayed the worn and soaked overalls he wore would not stain the cream-colored leather seat of his Jag. Barbara would get upset.
With his wipers at full speed, he thought about his sister and what she would be doing now. Since Terry was killed she hadn’t had a boyfriend. When he was fourteen and Barbara sixteen, she had seduced him one night when their parents were out. They had continued this secret affair for several months until she broke it off and found an older, unrelated boyfriend. Michael was furious and jealous at the time. But then he was no longer a fourteen-year-old virgin, had experience in how to please a woman and a huge boost in confidence. He wondered if he could ever regain that sense of intimacy with his sister, but discounted the idea as a fantasy not worth considering. He knew this little secret would always bind them.
With Big John no longer visiting their key businesses, Michael had seen a dramatic fall in revenue. On his sister’s insistence, he reluctantly started to visit the strip club, the massage parlor and the other cash businesses they ran. He had to drop in unannounced late at night, which entailed a change of habit for him. He liked to get up early, go for a run, have breakfast and then head to his office in Newmarket and start his work day, looking over figures, his investments, and the companies he controlled. He was not used to dealing with people who were not smart, used drugs, did not respect themselves, and operated in the hours of darkness.
Once he had gotten used to his new hours he started to be hands-on in a way the women at the Flamingo Paradise and the Gold Club came to fear. Big John Eustace had been a sadistic enforcer, but he knew the value of his property and never went too far in his perverted pleasures and violent outbursts. Terry Turner was a shrewd businessman and did not take kindly to tampered merchandise and ruined investments, as he had once explained to Big John in the presence of his sister’s small and annoying brother.
1
Alexander borrowed the small white government van from the National Art Gallery where he was the exhibitions curator. He was in the suburb of Ngaio and parked on Kenya Street facing back into town, a mile away from the house he was going to visit. In a tracksuit, he looked like he was going for a late-night jog. With his six-foot three-inch frame he took long strides and kept an easy pace as he turned right onto Crofton Road. There were no vehicles on the road, no pedestrians out this late. He struggled to run up the hill and had to stop to gain his breath. Too busy at work, he had not worked out in months. He turned the bend and came to a long driveway almost hidden with trees and shrubs. Then he saw the trade unionist’s house: there were no outside lights on. He walked towards the front door.
At the steps, he stopped to listen. His breathing had returned to normal. The house was dark, silent. He put on leather gloves. As instructed, he found the front-door key under the second flowerpot to the left. He slipped the key into the lock and carefully opened the door and eased his way inside, keeping the door slightly ajar and the key in the outside lock for a quick exit. He stepped inside and stopped when a small white Scottish terrier came running up to him, growling.
Alexander eased his body down to the carpet and put his right hand out. The dog stopped, looked at the tall stranger and slowly walked up to his fingers. Was the dog going to bite him or bark? Either way he would run, and the dog would probably chase him down the street. He hadn’t been briefed about the dog, and his three previous trips to surveil the neighborhood had failed to identify any pets, other than the exotic tropical fish he knew to be in the large illuminated aquarium in the living room.
Alexander stroked the dog behind its ears and it rolled over. He rubbed its stomach and waited for the dog to respond. He kept one eye on the corridor that led to the bedrooms. If his new best friend behaved, he would have time to complete his mission.
The other union job had been easier. His boss Richard Catelin, the Permanent Under-Secretary for the Department of Internal Affairs, had given him a file with a photo of Dougie McLeish, the charismatic secretary of the Trades Council, and a photo of his famous 1956 Chevrolet Bel Air. McLeish always drove his shiny red car to government meetings. In the file was a photograph from the Dominion newspaper of McLeish by his vintage car, beaming his wide worker’s smile. McLeish was to appear at a critical meeting the next day with the Prime Minister: if the talks failed, the Seamen’s Union, the Drivers’ Union and the Harbor Board Workers had planned a mass march from the Inter-Island Terminal to Parliament. Alexander had crept up to the car parked in McLeish’s driveway. At 2 A.M. all the houses on the street were dark. Wearing leather gloves, he knelt down by the left rear bumper and turned the metal knob at the top of the tail light. He had been briefed on how to open the hidden fuel cap. It wouldn’t budge. He had to use both hands to force it to turn before he could pull back the light fitting and find the fuel cap. The hinge made a loud squeak and he thought it would wake up the neighborhood. He kept very still and only his eyes moved to see if any curtains moved. He held his breath. When he realized no one had heard him, he went back to examining the open tail light. He was relieved there was no lock on the fuel cap as he twisted the cap off and placed it in his pocket. He took a plastic funnel from his jacket with his other hand and started to pour water from a large plastic bottle he produced from his other jacket pocket. Once emptied, he replaced the bottle with another and poured that into the tank. A car cruised past, and Alexander froze. He wondered if it was the police but didn’t look. Once the street sounded deserted again, he took his last water bottle out of his jacket and poured it into the tank. He put the bottles and funnel back inside his jacket, secured the cap and closed the tail light without the hinge making a sound. He backed out of the driveway on his knees before he got to the street. No curtains moved, no lights went on, no dogs barked. He stood up and walked to his white van he had parked around the corner. He drove to his apartment in Thorndon after throwing the funnel and water bottles into a garbage bin in the city.
Next morning McLeish’s prized car stalled at the end of his street. The photographer, hoping to get a shot of McLeish driving from his house, instead caught him kicking his tires and pulling at his hair. That was the photo on the Dominion’s front page that mirrored the unions’ frustration with the National government’s position on no new wage increases. The talks were a failure and the unions marched on Parliament.
Now the Scottish terrier rolled over and went to check its water bowl in the kitchen allowing Alexander to ease up to the large aquarium that separated the living room from the open kitchen. He took a bottle out of his jacket, undid the cap, and made a small gap at the top of the metal cover to the aquarium so he could to pour its contents into the tropical water.
A gust of wind blew the front door open then it slammed shut. The dog jumped and started to bark. Alexander heard noises from a bedroom, someone was getting out of bed. He eased the metal top back into position and, gripping the bottle, made himself as small as possible beh
ind the aquarium. Heavy footsteps came down the corridor in slippers that made a slapping sound. If the man turned on the lights and searched the house Alexander planned to leap up, push him over, grab the door and run as fast as he could. He heard the dog greet its owner and footsteps to the front door. Then a grunt. A light went on in the hallway. If the heavy man found the outdoor key in the front door, he was screwed.
Notes
The Tear of Tane: Henry Lotus told Dr. Mel Johnson this story in The Jaded Kiwi:
“Once upon a time, before Maori came here, Tane was the god of the forest. But the forest was in danger. Bugs were eating the roots of the trees, and unless something was done, the forest would die. Tane called all the birds together and asked for their help. The kiwi was a bird of paradise and lived in the treetops. It was the most beautiful bird in the forest and very proud. When Tane told all the birds what was happening, none of them wanted to help save the forest. Tane was in despair. None of the birds would volunteer or even offer a suggestion. There was silence in the forest.”
“Well?” Mel asked.
“I’m pausing for dramatic effect. So, seeing none of the other birds were going to do anything, the kiwi stepped forward and said he would go and live in the undergrowth and eat all the bugs and save the forest. So the kiwi became a fat, flightless bird eating bugs at night. It lost all its bright colorful feathers. Tane was so moved by what the kiwi did, he shed a tear. Tane had never cried before. The tear fell to the ground and turned to greenstone and was lost for hundreds of years until a Ngapuhi, a tohunga, found a piece of pounamu on the forest floor. It was black and covered in moss. No one would have recognized it. But the tohunga picked it up and knew it was the Tear of Tane. He cleaned it and put it around his neck. And with the power the pendant gave him, he was able to guide his leaders to victories over other threatening tribes until the Ngapuhi were feared and respected throughout Aotearoa.”
