Salt and Blood

by Peter Corris

  A kid with a batch of newspapers came in and I bought the morning paper, ran my eye over the headlines, flicked to the editorial page and read the leader and a couple of letters and then settled into the sports section. Kostya Tszyu was scheduled to meet someone I’d never heard of to defend his unified super-lightweight title. I remembered seeing him fight at the Parramatta football stadium a few years back and hearing the fans yelling, ‘Zoo, Zoo, Zoo’ and thinking Australia isn’t such a bad place when it can take a little Russian with a pigtail to its heart. But that was before the Tampa and the World Trade Center and all the other political horrors. I read through the news where everything in the sports I was interested in—boxing, tennis, athletics—was normal. But nothing felt normal about what I was doing and the people I was doing it with and for.

  A call to the hospital told me that I could collect Ms Withers at 10.30 a.m., and that Superintendent Sherrin had arranged for me to park in the staff car park near the entrance. I was in a state of high confusion. If Rod’s killer was a cop he could’ve ID’d me from the car registration when I’d collected Rod but deemed me to be just a hireling. That’d change if the card I’d given Craig had come into his hands. If he had me tagged and was interested, was it wise for me to be transporting Glen? Did the killer have any reason to feel insecure? If he’d killed Craig because of his association with me, he must have some qualms. If he knew Glen was investigating Harkness—easy enough for a cop to find out because she’d worked through Missing Persons—he could conclude that she’d put things together, like the lovers of Juliet Harkness and Lucille Hammond. Too many assumptions, I decided. I drove to Randwick and parked inside the hospital grounds, glad I didn’t have to contend with patients, visitors and students from the University of New South Wales whose cars were filling the available spaces outside.

  I went to the administration block and presented my ID. Despite deciding to behave as if we had a clear run I found myself examining other people in the waiting room. I shook my head and told myself I was paranoid. Clock a well-built man in suit with a groomed moustache and there’s something to think about. Otherwise, forget it.

  Glen came through a perspex door into the reception area. She was wearing a dark dress and medium heels. She had makeup on and her hair had been washed and brushed into shape. She had a gold chain around her neck and wore earrings, something I’d never seen her do before. She gave me a smile and a small wave and I approached the clerk, a young Asian guy, handling the exiting patients with her.

  ‘Hi,’ she said as she handed over her papers. ‘You’re supposed to present your ID.’

  I nodded, passed my driver’s licence to the clerk and tried not to look as if I was checking her over. But I was. Under the makeup she was pale and her quick smile looked painted on. Still, she was moving with something like her usual athletic grace and she gave the plastic bag she was carrying a jaunty swing.

  ‘Thank you, Ms Withers, Mr Hardy,’ the clerk said after he tapped some keys and handed Glen a printout sheet and returned my licence.

  ‘Thank you,’ Glen said and her voice was a little louder than it needed to be.

  I took her arm and felt her flinch and then relax as if she was resigning herself to something unpleasant. We walked out of the hospital into the grey, windy day and I wished it could have been bright and sunny for her to welcome her back to the land of the living.

  ‘Shitty day,’ she said.

  ‘Could be worse. Could be raining.’

  Just as I spoke a couple of drops fell and then a few more and the wind dropped and the rain started to fall just a little harder as if it was picking up the beat. We both laughed and the dark mood was broken. I pointed to the car park.

  ‘Kevin got me a spot. Lucky.’

  ‘That’d be right,’ Glen said. ‘The man thinks of everything.’

  We were only slightly wet when we got to the car. Glen slung her plastic bag over the back and settled into the battered vinyl bench seat. ‘Why don’t you get rid of this old bomb?’

  ‘It goes.’

  She laughed. ‘And it leaks.’ A drop of moisture appeared on the dashboard in front of her and she prodded it with a painted fingernail. Another first for Glen in my experience—painted nails. The rain hammered on the roof and we sat there for a few minutes by unspoken mutual consent listening to the sound and watching the world getting hosed down.

  ‘You hate the rain, don’t you, Cliff?’

  ‘I used to. As I get older I’m coming to accept it.’

  Her head jerked and she was looking directly at me. ‘Dumb thing to do, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Desperate, anyway.’

  She relaxed. ‘Yeah. I couldn’t see any reason to make it to tomorrow because I thought tomorrow’d be worse than today and the day after that’d be worse still.’

  ‘And now?’

  ‘I think that’s being a bit over-dramatic, taking myself too seriously. I mean, what do I really matter in the scheme of things? It’s a big world, lots going on. Best to hang around and watch it. What d’you reckon?’

  I started the car and was relieved to hear it fire up. No water in the distributor. Not yet. ‘It sounds like a workable position. Might need a bit of shoring up here and there.’

  ‘Mm. In a way I envy women with kids. I’ve known a few who’d have offed themselves long ago if it wasn’t for the kids. I don’t know what keeps fucked-up blokes afloat.’

  I negotiated my way out of the car park, hoping the wipers would maintain their rhythm. ‘Stubbornness mostly,’ I said. ‘Fear of one kind or another. Do you want to go straight home or what?’

  I pulled out onto the street and joined the line of cautious traffic. She sat quite still, staring through the windscreen and it was some time before she spoke. ‘Kevin said you’ve got a lead on who killed Rodney.’

  ‘Could be.’

  ‘Can I come back to your place?’

  ‘Not a good idea, Glen.’

  ‘Okay. Your girlfriend. I understand. Right. Home then to my groovy Paddington pad.’ She dropped her head and began to weep quietly.

  Glen pulled herself together with an effort when we got to her house. She made coffee, checked her mail, did some tidying and cleaning, kept busy. I chatted to her, helped out here and there and tried not to think about Rod Harkness or Kevin Sherrin or Mitchell Sexton. I noticed that Glen kept glancing at her watch. We listened to the ABC news at noon and then left ‘The World Today’ on, turned down low.

  ‘That’s a relief,’ Glen said.

  ‘What is?’

  ‘Getting past midday without a drink. It’s downhill all the way now till six o’clock. Then it hits hard again.’

  ‘You shouldn’t wear a watch. Should turn the clocks to the wall.’

  She laughed. ‘Don’t worry. An alkie knows exactly what time it is, watch or no watch.’ She found a bottle of mineral water in the fridge and poured two glasses. Put not quite stale buns on a plate with some cheese and sliced tomatoes, and told me to sit down at the tiny kitchen table. ‘Okay, Cliff,’ she said. ‘Tell me what the fuck you and Kevin are up to.’

  I looked at her astonished. ‘He hasn’t told you?’

  ‘I’m too fragile to be told anything, aren’t I?’ She parodied Sherrin’s bass voice: “‘Don’t worry, love. I’ve asked Hardy to look after you tomorrow …” Bullshit!’

  To give myself time to think, I drank some mineral water, sliced open a bun and put cheese and tomato in it.

  ‘If you start eating that I’ll throw this knife at you.’

  ‘Okay. He’s overprotective but he’s actually got your best interests at heart. I’m sure of it.’

  ‘Fuckin’ tell me.’

  So I told her in detail, leaving nothing out. She listened without interrupting, except to express surprise at the connection between Sexton and the two women. It took a while and by the time I’d finished I’d drunk the mineral water and was hungry so I took a bite out of the bun.

  ‘Why?’ she said.

>   I had to talk around the food. ‘He thinks you feel guilty about what happened to Harkness. If we can nail the killer it might help.’

  She snorted. ‘That’s pretty crude psychology. What does your girlfriend think about that?’

  I’d managed not to think about Jerry and now I had to. I swallowed and lost my appetite. ‘She’s pissed off. Told me to give it all to the police. Hung up on me last time we spoke.’

  ‘Sensible woman. Poor Cliff.’

  ‘Poor Rod. Poor Craig, maybe.’

  Glen played with her glass and prodded at the food with the knife she’d threatened to throw. ‘I’ve never heard of this Sexton, so he obviously hasn’t got to the top. Still, he could be someone very senior somewhere. It’s a big organisation. You should’ve asked Parker about him.’

  ‘Kevin’s looking into it, as I said. He’s got the facilities.’

  ‘Kevin isn’t subtle, Cliff. He’s very likely to advertise what he’s doing. What then?’

  I shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Tell you this, though. It was you turning up Sexton’s name in connection with the wife that gave us the lead. I mean when it cross-referenced with the sister’s lover.’

  Neither of us was going to eat the food. She dumped it in the kitchen tidy and stacked the plates. ‘Big deal,’ she said. ‘Call Parker. I’m going to have a nap.’

  She left the kitchen and I heard one of the doors off the passage close firmly. I got up and went to the back of the house and sat in an easy chair. The light was dim and the rain on the tin roof was steady. I took out my mobile and thought about calling Frank. Hughes had advised it and so had Glen. A good move, no doubt. Then I thought about calling Jerry. Bad time. She’d either be with a client or taking a break. And what would I say? Nothing had changed. I didn’t call her either. The glassed-in back room was warm and the rain on the roof was lulling. So was the low murmur of radio voices. My head fell back and I dropped off into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  I jerked awake to a quieter world. The rain had stopped and a beam of light had penetrated the glass and bounced back at me from a glass-topped table. My dry mouth told me I’d been asleep for more than a few minutes. My watch told me it was a bit over an hour.

  ‘Glen?’

  I hauled myself out of the chair and went down the passage. The bedroom door was open and I blundered in. The pillow held the imprint of her head but she wasn’t there.

  28

  The space between Glen’s house and the street was enough to sit in, just. I took a look there without optimism. I prowled back through the house trying to get an idea of where she might have gone. Her handbag was missing and there were coats and jackets thrown over a chair in the bedroom suggesting she’d taken a coat. The other room was a study cum office. No computer. At least that was encouraging; she wasn’t likely to have taken her computer if she’d gone off to drink, unless she intended to hock it and I couldn’t see that. I pressed the redial button on the phone, but the last call had been to the hospital, obviously made by Sherrin.

  I cursed myself for falling asleep and rang the contact number Sherrin had given me. He wasn’t available and I left the message for him to ring back urgently. I paced up and down by the phone, heated coffee in the microwave, drank it and felt a deep need for something stronger. I opened cupboards and thought about all the likely hiding places. My mother had been ordered off the grog many times in her life and had managed dry spells from time to time. But she always had a back-up bottle somewhere and I wondered if Glen was the same. Eventually I found it in one of my mother’s old hidey-holes—a bottle of Hennessy brandy inside a knee-high boot with several pairs of tights stuffed down on top of it.

  I took it back to the kitchen, heated more coffee and spiked it strongly. I’d taken one tongue-scorching drink when the phone rang.

  ‘Hardy? Bit eager aren’t you?’

  ‘No, Glen’s gone.’

  ‘Fuck. How?’

  ‘Does it matter? She’s skipped. I think she’s taken a coat and she’s got her handbag and computer. Any ideas?’

  ‘Just that you’ve fucked up.’

  ‘Doesn’t help. She seemed pretty steady. I told her everything—about Sexton and all.’

  ‘Oh, brilliant.’

  ‘Listen, if you treat her like a wreck she’ll behave like one.’

  ‘Jesus, Hardy. What I’d like to do to you. Okay, okay, let me think. You say she’s taken her laptop?’

  ‘If it was in the study, yes.’

  ‘And you told her about Sexton and the two women and him being a policeman?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Well, I know what she’s doing. Pretty much what I did. She’s holed up somewhere with a phone connection. Hacking into files trying to locate the bastard. If I can do it, she can.’

  The spiked coffee had cooled and I had another long drink. I felt I was losing my grip on everything and all of us were heading for something bad. I wasn’t sure that the brandy would help but I gave it another try. ‘And have you found him?’

  There was an ominous silence at the other end and I could almost hear Sherrin’s thought processes ticking over antagonistically. I couldn’t blame him. ‘Hardy,’ he said. ‘I’m not sure I want you in on this anymore.’

  I didn’t say anything.

  ‘Fuck it. I need to know something only you can tell me.’

  His voice was a strained, thin version of its usual rich tone. The stress was eating him alive, but I had to take advantage of any edge I had, although I had no idea what it might be. ‘If you’ve located Sexton and can get to him I want to be in on it whatever happens.’

  ‘I’ve got him.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘He’s a DI at North Manly. Gun club president. Worked drugs for years. Lives at Seaforth. I’ve got the address and the phone number.’

  ‘Give them to me now and I’ll tell you what you want to know.’ Whatever the hell it is, I thought.

  ‘You’re a bastard, Hardy.’

  ‘I know,’ I said.

  He rattled off the address and phone number and I scribbled them down on the phone table notepad. ‘Okay. Shoot.’

  His laugh was a short bark. ‘Appropriate, that. Glen’s got a Beretta. She keeps it in a drawer in the desk in the study. Go and look. Tell me it’s still there.’

  I’d already looked in the desk drawers in my hunt for the booze but I didn’t need to tell Sherrin that. I put the phone down and drank some more coffee. After about the right time lapse I picked up the receiver.

  ‘No gun,’ I said.

  ‘Shit. This is crazy. She’s making a run at him herself.’

  ‘How hard was it for you to come up with the information? How long will it take her?’

  ‘Hard to say. It took me a while. But I guess she knows her way around those files and knows what to do if she gets stuck. It’s not super-secure information.’

  ‘She was worried that you might advertise your interest in Sexton. How likely’s that for either of you?’

  He was too upset to be insulted. ‘Not likely.’

  ‘Have you got any idea where she might go to do that kind of work? A friend? A motel?’

  ‘Fuck. You’d be more likely to know that sort of thing than me. Maybe she went to your place. Maybe she’s still got a key.’

  ‘I don’t think so. We have to assume she’s gone after him. North Manly or Seaforth. You’re official. You take Manly, I’ll take his house. Maybe we can stop her.’

  ‘I don’t know …’ Indecisiveness was in every syllable. ‘I should report it officially. Get help.’

  ‘There’s no time,’ I said. ‘Think how long that’d take. Reckon you could explain it and get things moving inside an hour?’

  ‘No. You’re right. I’m on my way. Give me your mobile number again. Christ, I hope we’re in time.’

  I gave him the mobile number, checked that I still had his card, swilled the rest of the coffee, grabbed the brandy and bolted. During the drive I was thinking that what could be sh
aping up was the worst of situations—one dangerous person confronted with another who was desperate and unstable. An explosive mixture. I rang the Seaforth house as I drove but got no answer. I assumed Sherrin was ringing the station at North Manly. Tougher assignment. I should have told him she hadn’t gone for the brandy. Given him something.

  The bleak day hadn’t improved but it hadn’t got worse; visibility was poor and the road surface was slick. The drivers were the usual mixture of good, bad and insane, making progress slow. We inched across the Spit Bridge where a kind of mist hung over the road and the water. Mid-afternoon, but the light was dropping as darker clouds moved in from the east. I located Sexton’s street in the Gregory’s and turned into it thinking how chaotic and improvised all this was. Did Sexton have a family? How had Glen been travelling? I realised I was in the wrong street, similar name, when the mobile rang.

  ‘Hardy? They tell me DI Sexton left the station a short time ago in the company of a woman. Where the fuck are you?’

  ‘Almost there. Anything else?’

  ‘No. Get there!’

  I re-checked the directory and found the street.

  I’d been in the Court not the Avenue. I skidded around the corners as the rain fell heavily and the harbour mist rolled in. I got to the right street, entered it and saw a car pull into a driveway halfway along, about where the right number would be. I gunned the motor and reached the house in time to see a tall man escort a woman in a light coat up the steps and into the house.

  The adrenalin was pumping but I forced myself to drive past and stop. Not a bull-at-a-gate time. I tried to recreate the scene in my mind. I’d only glimpsed them through some shrubbery, but the body language had been clear enough—the man forceful, aggressive, the woman, resistant, impelled. The glimpse had been enough to confirm that Sexton answered Craig’s description of the man who’d broken into the Bondi flat, if confirmation was needed. It wasn’t hard to guess what had happened. Glen had made a head-on run at Sexton and he’d come out on top. Now she was under the control of a torturer and murderer. Great work, Hardy. Great work, Sherrin.