The Autumn Murders

by Robert Gott

  Guy had enough cash in his wallet to secure a room at King’s Hotel for several nights. He didn’t choose the most expensive room. The room he left his suitcase in was sparsely furnished and smelled of stale cigarette smoke. He had to share a bathroom and toilet with the other rooms on his floor, but these facilities were spotlessly clean. They were certainly a step up from the stinking pit toilets in Papua New Guinea.

  As it was Saturday afternoon, Guy assumed that Joe wouldn’t be working. Unless he’d started stepping out with a girl, in which case he might be at the pictures, Guy guessed that Joe was probably at his flat in Princes Hill. Joe had been the first of Guy’s university friends to buy his own place. The house Joe had inherited when his father had died was far too big for a young man with no interest in gardening or maintenance. It had been Guy who’d encouraged him to sell it and buy the flat in Princes Hill. It was a spacious two-bedroom flat in a block of four. The block’s name, Rosh Pinah, was Jewish and seemed like a good omen. Guy could never remember quite what it meant. The house had sold for a tidy sum, and Joe had bought the flat outright for £750. The profit from the house sale, along with a considerable inheritance had meant that Joe could afford the luxury of esoteric studies at Melbourne University, without the pressing need to work. The war, of course, had changed all that. To everyone’s amazement, Joe Sable had become a policeman.

  Guy hadn’t seen Joe for about two years and as neither of them was an assiduous letter writer, he hadn’t heard from him either. He was confident, though, that when Joe answered the knock on his door to find Guy Kirkham standing there, he’d be thrilled. Their friendship ran deep. It was more than a shared love of art and books. They could speak easily to each other about their families, their ambitions, and their politics. Guy knew all about Joe’s unreliable heart. Indeed, Guy was the only one of Joe’s friends and acquaintances who knew of this physical weakness, and that Joe found it shameful. The only thing they didn’t speak about was religion, and not because it was a sensitive topic. It was simply that neither of them considered it a subject worthy of discussion. Their respective faiths were of no consequence to either of them. Once, after too much wine, Guy told Joe that his mother had christened him ‘Guy’ because one of her great heroes was Guy Fawkes, in her opinion a Catholic martyr, who ought to have been canonised centuries ago.

  Guy walked up to Princes Hill. Walking cleared his head, and when he walked his thoughts turned to the novel he wanted to write. He’d told no one about this ambition. The story had come to him one night in New Guinea, and ever since then he’d turned it over and over in his head. He hadn’t yet put a word down on paper. He was eager to talk to Joe about it. Joe would understand this compulsion.

  The time passed quickly as Guy moved his characters about and listened to their conversations. He turned into Pigdon Street and walked towards Arnold Street where Rosh Pinah stood on the corner.

  He stared in disbelief at its ruin.

  Two of the flats, one of which was Joe’s, had been gutted by fire, and the remaining two had been so damaged that they were uninhabitable. Rosh Pinah was awaiting demolition. Guy was gripped by a fear that Joe had died in this fire. He sat on the edge of the gutter and breathed deeply. He thought he was going to be sick. Instead, he slipped into sleep.

  He woke to a hand shaking him by the shoulder. There was an elderly woman kneeling beside him, and she was asking if he was all right. He sat up, groggy and aware that his cheek was bleeding. He must have hit the ground hard. There was no sign of vomit, so at least he hadn’t been sick.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘It’s just the heat, I think. I must have passed out.’

  ‘You passed out all right. I saw you from my window. You just keeled over. I thought you must be drunk. We get a few drunks passing through here. Mostly Yanks, and you don’t dress like a Yank, so I thought I better come out and check. I couldn’t smell any alcohol on you, so I felt your pulse. I was a nurse once upon a time. Your pulse was strong, and you were breathing normally, so I thought, well, he’s fainted, hasn’t he?’

  Guy didn’t take in anything the woman said, and if she’d walked away, he wouldn’t have been able to describe her features. She was a voice, a form, and a faint smell of soap.

  ‘That cheek needs to be cleaned,’ she said. ‘Come along. Hop up, and I’ll take you inside. You could do with a glass of water, too. Perry’s the name. Mrs Perry, and Mr Perry is inside, so it’s all right and proper.’

  Guy allowed himself to be helped to his feet. Mrs Perry must have been well over sixty. She was a strong woman, dressed to do housework. Her grey hair was constrained by a scarf, and her clothes obscured by an apron. She put her hand on Guy’s arm and led him into the house that sat opposite Rosh Pinah. The air inside was stuffy, and the only sound was the peculiar rasping of someone’s laboured breathing.

  ‘Mr Perry was hit by the gas in 1917. Just lately he’s gone downhill.’

  She was matter-of-fact and indicated the bedroom from which the frightful sound emanated.

  ‘We’re doing the best we can. Now, let’s get you cleaned up.’

  While she went to the bathroom to get some disinfectant and some cloth, Guy approached the bedroom. The door was ajar. The curtains were open, and the room was flooded with light. A man lay on the bed, in just his pyjama bottoms. There was a strong smell of sweat. The man’s eyes were open, and he managed a smile as his chest rose and fell like broken bellows. Guy walked to the bedside.

  ‘I’m Guy Kirkham. Private Guy Kirkham. I fell over outside.’

  This seemed an absurd thing to say, but Mr Perry nodded as if it made perfect sense. Mrs Perry entered the bedroom.

  ‘Private Kirkham, is it?’

  ‘Yes. I’m on leave. From New Guinea.’

  ‘Sit on the edge of the bed, Private Kirkham. I’ll clean you up here. Paul won’t mind a bit, will you dear?’

  For a moment Paul Perry’s breathing eased, but a coughing fit returned it to its ghastly rhythm. Mrs Perry swabbed Guy’s cheek and declared that a bit of gravel rash never hurt anyone.

  ‘What were you doing, if you don’t mind my asking?’

  ‘I’d come to see a friend of mine. Joe Sable. He lived in Rosh Pinah. What happened?’

  ‘Oh, that was terrible. The fire brigade took forever to come. They were all out fighting the bushfires. By the time they got here, well, it was all too late. The poor man died.’

  ‘Joe died?’

  Mrs Perry saw the terror in Guy’s face.

  ‘No, no. Not Mr Sable. His neighbour, the teacher, he died in the fire. We thought our place was going to go up as well. We had to go out into the street, didn’t we, Paul? And Paul was that sick, but we had to go outside.’

  ‘How did it start?’

  ‘Apparently it started in Mr Sable’s flat. A cigarette maybe. Young men are so careless.’

  ‘Joe doesn’t smoke.’

  ‘Oh well, I don’t know how it started then. I didn’t mean to blame Mr Sable. He’s a very nice young man. Always polite. Always asks after Paul, and if there’s anything he can do. He’s a detective you know. That made me feel that little bit safer knowing there was a detective across the road. I suppose that’s silly, isn’t it, but there it is.’

  Mr Perry’s breathing eased again, and he dozed. Mrs Perry signalled to Guy that they should leave the bedroom. He followed her to the front room.

  ‘I’ll get you that water.’

  There was a large, framed photograph sitting on an easel in a corner of the room. Guy had seen dozens of similar photographs in his friends’ houses. This one was of Paul Perry, in full uniform — the Light Horse — taken in a studio. Every soldier who could afford it had taken himself off to a studio in 1914 and had his photograph taken. Every young man looked handsome in these photographs, Paul Perry especially so, or perhaps Guy was just acutely aware of the contrast between this beautiful soldier a
nd the poor, broken, wracked bastard in the bedroom. When Mrs Perry came back into the room with a jug of water and a glass, Guy’s eyes betrayed him as tears stung them.

  ‘Sit down, Private Kirkham.’

  ‘My name is Guy.’

  ‘Guy.’

  Guy wasn’t embarrassed by his tears, and he didn’t automatically apologise for them. He drank some water, and Mrs Perry waited for him to speak.

  ‘We are a dreadful species, Mrs Perry.’

  ‘Once upon a time, I would have said that the world is full of good people — and there are good people, of course there are — but when I listen to Paul trying to take a breath, I find no consolation in the goodness of others. Someone else’s kindness doesn’t stop my husband’s agony.’

  Guy bowed his head. He had nothing to say, and silence was better than trite expressions of sympathy, which Mrs Perry wouldn’t have wanted to hear.

  ‘Can you tell me what happened to Joe Sable, Mrs Perry? Do you know where I can find him?’

  ‘No, I’m sorry. I know he’s alive. I saw him the day after the fire. He’d been in a fight, I think, some time before the fire. Oh, he was a sight, all bruised and bandaged. I didn’t ask him what had happened. It was none of my business. If he’d wanted to tell me, he would have. I imagine you’ll catch him at work, Guy. That’s a lovely name. Guy. I believe he works at police headquarters in Russell Street.’

  Guy had an urge to ask Mrs Perry if he could stay the night with her and Paul. It was ridiculous, and he didn’t ask. It was just that he couldn’t face the idea of walking back to King’s Hotel and sitting alone in his room. He had no choice, though. He thanked Mrs Perry for the water and her ministrations and stepped back out into Pigdon Street. As he passed the front window, he saw Mrs Perry standing in front of the photograph. There was no expression on her face, no expression at all.

  GEORGE STARLING SAT in a wicker chair in Maria Pluschow’s backyard. He was shirtless, with his face turned to the last of the Saturday afternoon sun. He’d come to enjoy the sun on his skin. It felt elemental and restorative. He hadn’t embraced the nakenkultur of that effete Mitchell Magill and his idiot friends, but he was sure the sun was helping his face to heal.

  Maria Pluschow watched Starling from her kitchen window. Blondi was beside him, and from time to time, Starling would idly drop his hand and stroke the dog’s head. Maria’s heart swelled at the sight of this, and she was convinced that she and Starling had begun a journey together that would lead to greatness. This was her reward for embracing what was demonstrably the true religion. More ancient than the worship of the Jew Jesus, the worship of Odin and the pantheon of Nordic gods had ignited in her a fervour that was close to ecstatic.

  She made a pot of tea and took it and two cups out to where Starling sat. She moved a chair to be near him. They drank the tea in silence, and Maria began to intone one of the prayers she’d memorised from Rud Mills’s book.

  Starling turned his head to look at her. With the sun full on her face, she looked older than he’d noticed before. Lines were beginning to form around her lips, and two deep lines were etched between her brows. She wore no make-up, and her braided hair couldn’t disguise the fact that she was a farm woman, educated certainly, but like every other woman Starling had known, she was dull-witted. The prayer, delivered in her flat, ugly voice, struck Starling as absurd and childish. He’d been drunk last night and susceptible to Hardy Truscott’s blather. He’d flicked through the book Truscott had left and had found nothing in it that interested him. The idea of worshipping Odin, which had seemed so plausible and consoling last night, now seemed idiotic and infantile. It embarrassed him to recall how enthusiastic he’d been about it.

  Now, the sight of Maria’s lips, moving as she prayed, stirred in him the familiar friend that if allowed to grow unchecked, would flower into the pure ecstasy of rage. He closed his eyes and settled it down. He needed Maria Pluschow, and she’d been good to him. She was a fool — well, she was a woman — and she’d swallowed Truscott’s guff whole. The only thing he had in common with Truscott was his understanding of the fact that the Jews controlled America, and Australia too, of course. Lighting a bonfire and dancing around it — which was a ritual described in the book — wasn’t going to redress that, and neither were prayers uttered in the backyard of a house on the road between Port Fairy and Warrnambool.

  Truscott was under the impression that he’d found a pupil. Starling decided, as he sat there in the sun, that he would test Truscott’s mettle, and he’d test Maria Pluschow’s, too, while he was at it. He had no intention of following them. He’d offer them the chance of following him.

  He reached down and stroked the dog’s head, and as he did so he remembered Ptolemy Jones telling him that SS officers were each given a dog to train and bond with, and that, as a test of their pitiless loyalty, they were required to shoot it on command. Jones had thought this an admirable way of separating the weak from the strong. Blondi yawned. Maria looked at Starling and smiled. He smiled back at her.

  SERGEANT BOB O’DOWD told Sergeant Joe Sable that he wished to make a statement in relation to the death of Peter Lillee, and that he wanted to make that statement to Inspector Lambert. It was Saturday afternoon, but Joe had no hesitation in telephoning the inspector at Tom Mackenzie’s house. This wasn’t something that could wait until Monday morning. O’Dowd couldn’t be given time to change his mind.

  O’Dowd drove Joe to Russell Street. He didn’t say much, and Joe didn’t make small talk. What do you say to a man whose life is about to change forever? Joe had little respect for O’Dowd, but he had some empathy with how he must be feeling. Joe knew what it was like to make a statement about a fellow officer.

  At Russell Street, Joe and O’Dowd waited in Inspector Lambert’s office.

  ‘What were you doing at Lillee’s house?’ O’Dowd asked. There wasn’t any real conviction behind the question. The silence had finally made O’Dowd uncomfortable.

  ‘I was doing my job.’

  O’Dowd nodded, having no further interest in the matter. Sable had been assigned to the investigation, so of course he was at the Lillee house. If O’Dowd had been able to think clearly at this moment, he would have wondered at his run of bad luck, but his mind was a soup of worry and regret. And chief among his regrets was his involvement with Ron Dunnart. Perhaps, though, all this was a blessing. He’d be reprimanded for going along with Dunnart’s nasty blackmailing scheme, but as nothing had come of it, he could abase himself before Lambert and demonstrate his penitent’s credentials by stitching up Dunnart. O’Dowd knew, he just knew, that Dunnart had killed Lillee, and he knew, too, that it hadn’t been an accident. Dunnart didn’t get involved in accidents.

  There was a problem. There was no firm evidence of foul play — no bruising and no wounds. Somewhere in the notes, someone had speculated that the body might have been brought to that spot in a boat, which might explain the minimal disturbance around it. ‘I don’t know’, wouldn’t be a satisfactory answer to Lambert’s inevitable question, ‘How did Dunnart kill Peter Lillee?’ O’Dowd needed Dunnart to be taken into custody, and to ensure that this happened, he was going to have to play a dangerous game and lie. Having set his foot on this path, he couldn’t now withdraw it, and O’Dowd knew that if he accused Dunnart of murder, and the accusation was so flimsy that Dunnart would remain at liberty, he, O’Dowd, would end up as dead as Peter Lillee. What he needed was a powerful and convincing lie, and it was as Inspector Lambert entered the office and took off his hat that O’Dowd thought he’d found it.

  Inspector Lambert listened to O’Dowd and left the note-taking to Sergeant Sable.

  ‘I am prepared to make a statement, sir.’

  ‘Why, Bob? Why are you doing this?’

  ‘Because I’m not a bad man, Inspector. I’m not a good man, either, but I’m not a murderer, and I’m not going to stand by and let Ron Dunnart get away with
it.’

  ‘I thought the two of you rubbed along pretty well.’

  ‘Dunnart thought that, too, sir, but it was all an act, and he didn’t realise that I saw right through him. He thought I was dumb. He was wrong.’

  ‘You’ve worked together on several cases, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes sir. Dunnart was always in charge of course, or thought he was. I just want a quiet life. I just want to do my job and go home to my wife. The job has never been enough for Ron. I’ve known about some of the things he gets up to, but he’s never involved me in any of them.’

  ‘What sort of things?’

  ‘Blackmail is his main thing. He calls it a nice little earner. He squeezes small-time crims, pimps, prostitutes, but his best source of extra cash is fairies. I don’t know how it works exactly. He’s never trusted me enough to tell me that.’

  ‘But he trusted you enough to tell you he was blackmailing these people?’

  ‘No. Not until recently. I’m a Mason, you see, and Ron Dunnart hates Masons. I was surprised that he wanted anything to do with me at all. I suppose he thought I was weak and that I’d do his bidding like an obedient dog. In some ways, he was right.’

  Lambert was watching O’Dowd closely and listening for the false notes in what he was saying. He took the self-serving and self-pitying tone for granted. Owning up to being weak wasn’t going to be enough to convince him that O’Dowd was telling the truth.

  ‘When did he take you fully into his confidence?’

  ‘It was when those two fairies were murdered.’

  ‘Those men have names, Sergeant.’

  ‘I don’t remember their names.’

  ‘Even though you worked on, and are ostensibly still working on, this case?’