I told him about de Vries and his connection with Carmel Wise. I described Scott as my ‘assistant’ which brought a laugh from Drew. He seemed careless and uninterested but in fact he was looking keenly at everything. It was him who spotted the gun with the silencer in the gutter. He bent and examined it.
‘Kelly’s,’ I said. ‘He used it on de Vries. Then it jammed before he could do me.’
‘Pity,’ Drew said. ‘You got a gun?’
I took it from the holster and gave it to him. ‘There’ll be one bullet in Kelly somewhere. One or two others in the room upstairs.’
‘One or two?’ Drew said.
‘I’m not in the best condition for shooting.’ I touched the eye pad. The pain had subsided to a dull ache. I had the drops in my pocket and the painkillers but I wouldn’t give Drew the satisfaction.
‘You did all right,’ he said. ‘Wait here. I’ll take a look upstairs.’
Scott and I leaned against a car parked outside number 3. He smoked and I used the eyedrops. There were no lights on in the ground level of the house. Glass from the broken window littered the lawn. Gradually, lights went out in the houses. The ambulance and police lights stopped blinking and the street became quieter, except at the top where a team was working to raise Kelly’s body.
‘Wouldn’t mind a drink,’ Scott said.
‘Me too. We’ll probably get some coffee from the coppers.’
‘Eh?’
‘I thought you watched TV. Statements, mate. Waiting around for the police to fill in forms. That’s what this job is all about.’
‘You told me it was about visiting people and look what happened.’
‘Busy night,’ I said. De Vries’ body was carried on a stretcher by two bearers who struggled on the steep stairs. Drew came after them. Galvani stared at the covered shape on the stretcher. Blood had already soaked through the blanket where the head would be. He turned away while they loaded the stretcher into the ambulance. Then he lit another cigarette and yawned.
‘I’m tired.’
‘Forget it,’ I said. ‘The night is young. Isn’t it, Drew?’
22
Galvani and I travelled to the city in the taxi. I told him to turn the meter on but he wouldn’t. His driving was just as good as it had been before. Mercer showed up at Headquarters to grab some of the action. Drew organised some coffee for Galvani and me and some more cigarettes. Everyone did nothing for a while, then we gave our statements to a stenographer. I read mine over and signed it. Scott did the same.
‘Are you going to call Helen?’ he said.
I shook my head. ‘She’s at a friend’s place. I’ll tell her all about it tomorrow.’
‘It is tomorrow.’
We were in a bare room with a couple of chairs and a table, a blackboard on an easel and harsh fluorescent light. The diagram on the blackboard looked like a stakeout but it could have been the plans for the Commissioner’s new office. Mercer wandered in with the statements in his hand. He perched on the table and looked at me. I took two more pain-killers with the dregs of my coffee.
‘Big names, Hardy,’ he said. ‘And big guesses. If all this is right how’d the… what d’you call them, targets, know it was Wise who sent the stuff?’
‘She was so good that she might just as well have signed her name on it. Do you reckon people like Porter and Gabriani can’t find out who the hot filmmakers around town are?’
He grunted. ‘But no proof.’
‘That’s right. What does the other guy say?’
‘Nothing, except to ask me to get his lawyer-Richard Riddell.’
The name had been in the papers. ‘That’s Carmody’s lawyer.’
He nodded. ‘And Monty Porter’s. That doesn’t get us anywhere.’
‘Will you contact Riddell?’
‘In the morning. I’m working on a charge. It’s a little tricky.’
‘What’ve you got on the late Kelly?’
‘A bit. Enzedder, a pro. They tell me he looked a lot like you. Some relation?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘Wouldn’t surprise me. Well, I suppose you and your mate…’
He broke off as the door opened abruptly and a uniformed constable stuck his head in. ‘Sergeant.’
‘What?’
The Constable beckoned Mercer over and whispered to him. Mercer nodded and closed the door. ‘More fun and games,’ he said.
‘Let me guess. Somebody called at the Greenwich Apartments tonight and took away all the movies.’
Mercer smiled. ‘Wrong. Somebody torched the whole place. Want to take a look?’
I thanked Galvani again, told him to go home and that I’d see him again soon. ‘If you’re serious about the security business I’ll write you a reference,’ I said.
‘Sure, Well, it was interesting.’
‘We’ll have a drink. I owe you money too.’
‘You don’t.’
‘I’ll bill the client, so I’ll have to pay you.’
We shook hands and he left.
Drew drove and Mercer and I sat in the car and didn’t say anything. There were still a few optimistic and strong-legged girls on the beat up William Street, but the traffic was light and the city noise had settled into its 24 -hour, 365-day-a-year hum. I ran the whole business over in my mind for missed opportunities and bad luck. I should have checked carefully to see whether I was being followed-not driving and only having one eye were no excuse. If I could’ve had a clear go at de Vries, things would have been different. I thought back to the Greenwich Apartment flat where I’d played a bit of The Running Man. I closed my eyes and saw the action-the figures on the boat, heads together. I don’t have great recall of movies but I’d suffered this one twice and knew it pretty well. The scene I ‘d played didn’t belong in the movie. I’d seen some of Carmel Wise’s work without knowing it.
‘How long had de Vries been screwing the video girl?’ Mercer said.
‘That’s a stupid name for her.’
‘Fits doesn’t it? One way or another. How long?’
‘I don’t know. A couple of months. Why?’
‘His wife took it bad.’
The fire was still burning when we got there. The upper floors had been scorched more than set ablaze but the ground floor was a blackened, shattered ruin. Tongues of flame still licked at the ivy, ran along a dry branch and then flickered out. The firemen were playing water on the walls and keeping an eye on the adjacent buildings.
We walked up as close to the entrance as we could but the heat kept us back twenty feet or more. Smoke billowed out of flat one-dense, stinking clouds of it and there were popping noises and sharp cracks as if fireworks were going off.
Mercer stepped across to talk to the fireman who seemed to be doing the most shouting and the least work. I went with him.
‘Police,’ Mercer said.
‘Yes?’
‘Deliberate?’
The man snorted. He was stocky and red-faced naturally; in the glow from the fire he seemed to be alight
