through, you’ll stay with it won’t you? Bryn’s dangerous, he’s got to be put away, and the bomb…!”
“I’ll stay with it,” I said. “I was hoping you’d want me to.”
“You should have known.”
I nodded and we did some more quiet sitting. After a while her eyelids flickered and she said she was tired. It was partly that and partly the dope they were giving her. I got up from the bed but she motioned mc closer, she patted her chest with one hand.
“Touch me here, Cliff.”
I did, she felt warm and firm. She reached up with both hands, grabbed my hands and pressed them hard against her breasts, her face contorted.
“Cliff, the pale one, he was going to…to do something there next.”
I felt a rush of atavistic rage. I gently freed my hands, smoothed her hair and kissed her forehead.
“Don’t worry love,” I said harshly, “it’ll be all right, it’ll be over soon.”
I promised to call the hospital twice a day and to visit whenever I could. She smiled and nodded and slid down into a deep sleep that the dope was calling her to.
16
When I left the hospital I intended to finish yesterday’s job by checking on the residence of Mr Walter Chalmers, but sitting in the car with the engine running and the street directory beside me, I changed my mind. It suddenly seemed a hundred times more important to track down Bryn and his inquisitorial mate. Bryn was my starting point for this twisting, turning affair and it seemed like the right moment to check back to the beginning. And I was looking forward to a meeting with the man with the cigarette butts and the razor blades. I turned off the engine and reflected. Men like Bryn, with money like his, have houses scattered about the countryside — mood houses, hobby houses. I’d known one millionaire who kept a $50 000 hunting lodge on land which cost him $5000 a year to lease because he liked to go deer shooting about once every three years. He got shot to death up there on one of his rare visits but that’s another story. It was a sure bet that Bryn had hideouts on the sea and in the mountains, but they wouldn’t be public knowledge. How to find out about them? Easy. Susan Gutteridge, the lady on the mend. I tried to remember whether I’d mentioned a particular diabetes doctor or not and decided I hadn’t. But there was no doubt as to who was the best diabetes man in Australia, Dr Alfred Pincus. He charged like the six hundred, but there was more information about diabetes in that polished, clever dome of his than in a shelf of textbooks. I’d seen him on the subject on television and he was so interesting about it he almost made you wish you were a sufferer. Susan Gutteridge would contact him as sure as her bank balance was in the black.
I walked back to the hospital lobby and looked Pincus up in the directory. His rooms were in Macquarie Street naturally, a half mile away. I went back and locked the car. This was as close as I could expect to park to the address anyway. I tramped down the street which was lined with coffee bars and chemist shops the way streets around hospitals and medical offices are. I found the three storey sandstone building which Pincus shared with a dozen or so other top-flight men on top of the hill which gave it a commanding view of the water. The brass nameplates told me that several of Pincus’ co-occupants were knights. The lift was ancient like the one in the police building, but it had been better serviced and it slid up its cable like a python up a tree. I got out at the second floor and fronted up to a door which had Pincus’ name and degrees and memberships of this and that engraved on it in a prince’s ransom of gold leaf. I pushed the door open and looked straight into the eyes of the secretary. She was worth a look, a Semite with raven dark hair and a pale golden face like the image on a Mesopotamian coin. Her nose jutted and her brow sloped back to where the sleek mane of her hair began. Her voice was deep and sweet coming up from well below a pair of heavy, firm breasts.
“Are you Mr Lawrence?”
“No,” I said, “I’m Hardy, who’s Lawrence?”
She smiled to show she understood but withheld approval. “He telephoned, he’s been referred to Dr Pincus. Have you been referred?”
“No, I don’t want to see the doctor, at least, not yet. I want some information.” She picked up a pencil and tapped it against her big, strong white teeth. “About what?” she said.
“I want to know whether a Miss Susan Gutteridge has contacted Dr Pincus and whether she gave her address.” There’d been no number listed for her in the directory.
“I can’t possibly tell you that.”
“Then she has contacted him?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You as good as did. Look, I referred her to Dr Pincus. She was having trouble with her diabetes, I knew he was good, the best.”
She unbent a little. “I still can’t help you, Mr Hardy,” she said, “I can’t give out information about patients.”
I took out my wallet and showed her my card. I found Bryn’s cheque with his name stencilled on it to establish my connection with the family. She was inclined to help but a tough professionalism held her back. I noticed a copy of The News tucked into a basket beside her chair.
“Look, Miss…?”
“Steiner, Mrs.”
“Mrs Steiner, this is a serious business, it’s connected with things that happened last night. The story’s in your paper. I’m mentioned. Take a look.”
She pulled out the paper and ran her eyes over the story. She looked up at me with huge dark eyes that seemed to invite you in for a swim.
“I haven’t time to explain,” I said. “Miss Gutteridge was at that place last night, I saw her. I advised her to see the best diabetes man in Sydney and now I need to see her again. I don’t know where she lives.”
She gave a convinced nod. “I believe you Mr Hardy.” She flicked over the pages of an appointment book. Pincus looked to be booked solid until the end of the century. “Miss Gutteridge has an appointment for tomorrow,” she said, “she gave her address as 276 Cypress Drive, Vaucluse. She called from a private phone so I assume she was at home.”
I thanked her and took back my licence folder. I gave her a smile and a half-bow as I left, but she was too busy re-reading the story in the paper to notice.
I went back to the car and drove out to Vaucluse again. Life went on out there as it always would, the traffic flowed smoothly as traffic does in places where no one has to get anywhere at a particular time. Cypress Drive was a notch down from Bryn’s lofty eminence, but it was still nothing to be ashamed of. The house was on a rise and the grass, shrubs and trees had never lacked fertiliser. A concrete driveway led up to the house like a stairway to paradise. There was no way the Falcon could have coped with the grade, so I parked it outside the wrought iron gates and took my exercise for the day — keeping my promise to myself to do more walking.
I was short of breath and sweating when I reached the top of the drive. The house had too many arches and white-painted, sculptured pillars and railings. It looked like a wedding cake by a baker who’d let his passion for decoration run away with him. I sat on a set of marble steps to catch my breath and then went up two more flights of marble to the door. The bell was the eye of a tightly curled, plaster moulded snake. I shuddered and pushed it waiting to hear the William Tell Overture inside. In fact a few clear, plain notes sounded inside. It was loud and audible even through a house of twenty squares, but it got no response. I tried again with the same result. I pushed at the door but it didn’t give an inch. I went down the steps and around the house on the right side; pebble-strewn garden beds bordered the house from front to back and the windows were at least fifteen feet from the ground all around. There was a slight look of neglect about the lawn edges and shrubs as if they were feeling embarrassed to be caught in such a state.
The back door of the house was reached by a railed set of concrete steps that lead to a tiled patio, but the garage took my attention first. It would hold four cars but there were signs of frequent occupation — tyre marks and oil stains — in only two of the bays. A third bay had a very slight tyre mark and a small grease spot. Above the garage was a long, low structure which looked like quarters for the staff.
I went up the steps to the flat and pushed the door open. I stepped straight into a neat kitchen and
