kitchen.
‘I don’t eat lunch’, he said. ‘How about you?’
‘Don’t care. How about some coffee?’
‘Right. Can you get through to six without a drink?’
‘If I have to.’
He laughed. ‘Same here. But I’m doing it. Worst possible thing for a man in my situation would be to go on the grog. I haven’t done anything about your enquiry yet. Anything new?’
The kitchen was small compared to the one in Helen’s flat; it was more modern but, oddly, less practical. There seemed to be gaps in the equipment, and a shortage of spoons and crockery which reflected the departure of Nola. The bathroom had a spartan, austere air, and it looked as if the rest of the house would rapidly get that way too. Frank made coffee in a twelve-cup filter machine, and he did it neatly and efficiently, as if he enjoyed it. All Parker’s work that I had seen was neat and efficient.
He poured two big mugs, set the milk and sugar down on the table and eased down into a chair.
‘Pretty fair work-out’, he said.
I put my photographs on the surface and swivelled them around to face him.
‘That’s young Guthrie’, I said. ‘You’d know Catchpole and Dottie Williams-question is, who’s the other joker?’
He sipped his coffee and studied the pictures carefully. The coffee was strong, but a touch bitter. I wouldn’t have minded some lunch-you can’t be too careful about getting a low blood sugar level.
‘He looks familiar, but I just don’t know. He’s a cop, wouldn’t you say? Or was.’
I hadn’t considered the ‘was’ angle. ‘That was my impression. I didn’t speak to him, mind.’
‘I’m not surprised. He doesn’t look as if he’d go in for the small talk all that much. Where was this, by the way?’
I told him about the events of the night before, editing slightly. Parker was smart enough to do his own filling in. My account upset him: I’d seen an academic learn that one of his students was a spook and a union leader find out that his right-hand man was in the pay of the bosses. Frank’s reaction to my tale of the two police types in the Cross affected him the same way.
‘You didn’t hear anything, I suppose?’
‘Shit, no. I kept my distance.’
‘Wise. You should know what to look for; did you pick up anything at all from the way they acted?’
‘The dark guy’s the boss. There’s something on between Dottie and the kid-she was feeling his bum.’
‘Brilliant. Can I keep one of these?’ He took one of each photograph.
‘Sure. Look, this might be indelicate, but I’m on good expenses for this job and…’
‘You wound me, Hardy. You wound me deeply.’
8
We left it that Frank would get in touch with me as soon as he had anything useful. I told him I’d have a word with Tickener about a former senior police officer prepared to make revelations. I couldn’t tell whether or not Parker was serious about that; it would have gone against at least one of his prejudices-a belief that all journalists were frustrated somethings-else; and therefore untrustworthy. The tennis, the lunch-skipping and the abstinence suggested to me that Parker had action in mind rather than talk.
When I got back to Glebe it was after four o’clock, much closer to six than twelve and, therefore, by that logic, time for a drink. I changed my underwear and socks and tucked the denim shirt into my pants-a complete re- vamping of the wardrobe for me. The gun was in a clip under the dashboard of the Falcon. I was working on a big white wine and soda, sucking at the ice, when the phone rang. Helen Broadway, I thought, no, not yet.
“Hardy? This is Paul Guthrie.’
‘Yes, Mr Guthrie?’
‘Ray’s been here. Everything’s a shambles. Could you come over?’
‘Where’s here?’
‘Northbridge; you’ve got the address!’
‘I’m coming. Anyone hurt?’
His voice was a bitter rasp. ‘Physically, no.’
I gulped down the rest of the drink and hurried out to the car. It wasn’t a good time of day to negotiate the approaches to the Harbour Bridge, the bridge itself or the exits, and the going was slow. The traffic stayed sluggish on the other side and it wasn’t familiar territory to me. I had to jockey for the correct lane and I’d forgotten that the Cammeray bridge goes over parkland, and not water. But I found the turn-off and followed the golf course boundary into the heart of the suburb.
As I passed the big houses with the occasional private tennis court and the almost obligatory boat in the drive, I tried to interpret the message in Guthrie’s voice. All I got was a distress signal.
The houses got bigger as I approached Guthrie’s address; the driveways got wider and the gardens began to resemble private parks. As befitted a man who had made his pile, Guthrie had a house in the prime position. It was at the end of a point and had a water frontage-that’s where the house would be seen to best advantage, from the water. The non-aquatic entrance was at the back where a wide, gravel drive swept in under old peppercorn trees to a shaded yard as big as a three-hole golf course. I parked with the other cars-a Fairmont and a VW Passat-and went up the railway sleeper steps to a bricked patio that held a lot of outdoor furniture and a big barbecue. The swimming pool was away in a corner near the tennis court.
Guthrie had the door open for me before I reached it. We shook hands and went down a short passage to a sunroom with cane chairs and a rug over polished boards. Guthrie was wearing old slacks, sneakers and a tennis shirt. His short hair, usually brushed flat, was sticking up; there were deep pouches under his eyes.
‘D’you want a drink or something? Thanks for coming.’
‘That’s okay. No, no drink. Just tell me what happened.’
‘Ray came storming in here a few hours back. Right out of the blue. He’d been up to Newport, and he was raving about his stuff on the Satisfaction being disturbed. Furious about the photos you took.’
‘What did you say?’
‘He didn’t give me a chance to think. I lied-said I didn’t know anything about it. I said I’d looked through his things, but that was all. He got me so angry I didn’t mind lying. That boy’s in trouble.’
‘How did he behave, was he violent or anything?’
‘Seemed on the brink of it the whole time-crashing and banging. He called me for everything then he sounded off at his mother and that got me going. She was shocked, just by the look of him.’
‘How’s that?’
He ran his hands through his hair which produced the sticking-up effect. ‘He’d been drinking. Wasn’t drunk, but affected by it. I never knew Ray to have more than a couple of drinks. He seems to have got older all of a sudden. It’s funny thing, as your kids get older you just adapt to it on a day-to-day basis. Bit of a jolt when you get it in a lump. And that bloody moustache…’
‘What did he say to his mother?’
‘I didn’t hear much of it. I tried to calm him down, but she asked me to leave them alone for a bit while she tried to talk some sense into him. I don’t know what he said but pretty-soon he’s shouting and stalking out of the house like a lunatic and she’s in her room crying. God, I wish Chris was here; he’d show some sanity!’
Guthrie looked like a man out of his depth, or like someone called on to do something foreign to his nature. It sounded as if he’d lost his temper pretty quickly: I tried to imagine a confrontation between the neat, compact little man and the moustachioed individual I’d seen the night before. It seemed like a bad mix of characters and styles.
‘Did he see Jess when he was up at Newport?’ I asked.
‘Don’t know. If he did, he didn’t say. Is it too soon to ask you what you’ve been doing?’
I gave him a quick report and showed him the photos. He put on a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles to allow him to study the picture of the dark man more closely. He shook his head and handed it back.
