‘All Parker wants is his job back. He’s not interested in being a hero. Just let me nut this out… If Collinson’s dead, the people who put the screws on Parker because he might just have got Collinson alive and talking, well, they can relax and go to bed. They’d be the ones who hired you.’
Hayes nodded. ‘I suppose so. I don’t give a fuck. I’ve got guarantees and safeguards, that’s all I care about.’
‘If Parker can pick up a few crumbs from this, he’d be sweet. He’s an honest cop, but he’s not a crusader.’
‘Honest cop’, Catchpole sneered, and did some more knife work. The scotch bottle was still on the table. I took two steps across the room, picked it up and slammed it down on Catchpole’s fingers. He yelped, and the knife skittered away.
‘Shit in your own nest, Catchpole.’
He jumped up and faced me, but there was no fight in him, really. His eyes darted around, and I realised what he was doing-looking for Tiny. Hayes moved across and took the bottle from my hand. Catchpole subsided, and Dottie Williams lit her sixth or seventh cigarette. Hayes got a glass from the sink and poured himself a measure of scotch and tossed it down. The phone rang; Williams, who was sitting nearest to it, jumped. The phone kept ringing.
I looked at it; we all looked at it. Hayes nodded at me to answer it and gestured at Catchpole to get out of the way. Hayes stuck his ear down close to hear-whatever move he made, the automatic was never vulnerable to attack, and he let nothing get between it and me.
‘Mr Hardy?’
‘Yes. Who’s this?’
‘It’s Jess Polansky, Mr Hardy. Ray Guthrie’s girlfriend?’
‘Yes, Jess. What’s up?’
‘It’s Ray. He’s just gone. I’m scared. He’s crazy… wild…’
‘You’re all right? Not hurt?’
‘No.’
‘Okay, calm down. Tell me what happened.’
Hayes snapped his fingers at Williams; she poured him another drink and passed it across. I could have done with one myself.
‘He came up to Newport. He just dragged me out of the office, pulling me and shouting. He said Chris was dead. He called his father
… everything… every word. Said he was going to kill him.’ She paused. ‘He wrecked the Guthrie’s boat.’
‘What boat?’
‘They’ve got a sort of houseboat up here, almost that. He went down into the living quarters and ripped everything up. He was shouting and swearing.’
‘What? Shouting what?’
‘I don’t know. He kept saying there must be something. He was looking for something.’
‘Did he find it?’
‘He found something in with his mother’s things. Some papers. He just left the mess, and me. He just left.’ Sobbing, deep and convulsive, came over the wire.
‘Jess! Jess! Listen! Do you know where he was going? Did he say?’
‘No. No. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know where Mr Guthrie is
…’
I clamped my hand over the receiver and looked at Hayes. ‘I think I know where he’s going. I think I know where Collinson is. I know what the kid found. Can we do a deal?’
‘Collinson’s mine.’
I nodded. ‘The kid’s out of it?’
‘All right. Get rid of her!’
I gave Helen Broadway’s number to Jess, and told her to keep calling it until she got through. Helen would help her, I said. Jess calmed down, repeated the number a couple of times which seemed to soothe her and said she’d do it.
I hung up, got up from the table and poured myself a drink.
‘What the fuck was all that about?’ Dottie put her foot on another butt on the floor.
‘Hardy’s going to take us to Collinson. Wouldn’t care to give us the address, Hardy?’ Hayes took a length of paper towel and blotted those sweat beads.
I shook my head. ‘I want to see to the kid. I want to see Collinson dead, if that’s the way it has to be.’
‘I don’t trust the cunt’, Catchpole said.
‘Don’t be bloody stupid!’ Hayes wadded the paper towel and threw it at the open tidy bin. He missed. ‘We’re not talking about trust here, we’re talking business. Still, you’ll have to give me a bit more, Hardy. Convince me you know where Collinson is.’
It was the right question for him to ask.
‘I know where you got the information about Collinson’s kids’, I said. ‘From a guy named Wally Bigelow, used to be a private detective.’
‘That’s right’, Hayes said.
‘What happened to Wally?’
‘He dropped dead. I was about to put some pressure on him to give out a bit more. He sold me some of it, but not enough. Bloody old pisspot. Died of fright.’
‘He didn’t know any more. Twenty years ago he was partners with a private detective named Phillips. Collinson’s wife hired Phillips to check on her husband. Collinson went by another name then. He’d begun to organise himself, be Mr Anonymous, but he wasn’t quite there. I’ve talked to Phillips.’
‘So we could talk to Phillips’, Williams said.
‘No’, I lied. ‘I’ve tucked him away. You can’t get to him.’
‘What’d this Phillips have to say?’ Hayes was calm, weighing his words.
‘He reckoned Collinson had a place to hide in. A perfect place, it sounds.’
‘When was this?’ Catchpole said.
‘Nearly twenty years ago.’
‘Shit! Twenty years! Everything’s different!’
‘I wouldn’t say that. You’re just as slimy as you were then.’
‘Knock it off, Hayes snarled. ‘It is a long time, Hardy.’ He looked dubious, and convincing him was the key to the whole thing. I had one more card to play. ‘I’ve got what seems to be the only known photograph of Collinson’, I said. ‘Put that bloody gun away, look reasonable and I’ll let you see it. The Guthrie kid in Brisbane’s going to be all right. I got him to the hospital, so I’m in good there. If I walk away with the other one, I’m on a bonus. I want a deal as much as you, Hayes.’
The idea of the photograph excited him-police training maybe-and the money talk was a clincher. He understood that sort of motive. Dealing with him was like trying to walk on a slippery, sloping roof, but I had as much duplicity as he did, and neither of us had handholds. He put the automatic on the table.
‘We’re dealing. Let’s see the picture.’
I got out the old photograph and passed it to him. He examined it like a violinist with a Stradivarius.
‘Well, I’m buggered.’
Dottie Williams leaned over and looked. ‘Looks like the picture the kid talked about. Said he had it, then he couldn’t come up with it. Said it’d been pinched.’
‘How’d you get to him, Hayes? The kid, how’d you get to him?’
Hayes grinned. ‘Dottie got to him.’
‘He was as green as grass’, she said. ‘The first hand job I gave him blew his mind.’ On closer inspection the pale-red aureole of her hair was a dyed, teased fake; her clothes reeked of tobacco, kissing her would be like licking an ashtray. But maybe I was getting discriminating as I got older. Liam Catchpole broke in with a typical contribution.
‘Who needs Hardy?’ he said. ‘Let’s get what he knows out of him and go and do the job. Fuck Hardy! Fuck the kid.’
