lived in Castlecrag or similar places. Bellevue Hill was the same sort of location after all. But a lot of those high, mediaeval forts were stormed and taken, if memory served me right. Safety is an illusion.
I still wasn’t fully recovered from my hectic night. I took a couple of aspirin with the swallows of beer for my aching head, and the sun came out again and heated up the car and I dozed off.
I woke up with that panicky feeling of not knowing where I was, or even who. Comprehension came back in a rush as I stared down at the water and the, from this distance, fragile-looking boats: men were dead, men had vanished and I was investigating how and why. Maybe other men were under threat and here I was, sleeping in the afternoon. On the client’s time. It occurred to me that the Glovers, Barclays and others could probably afford the investigation better than Louise Madden. But they probably wouldn’t want to pay me to sleep. The way things were going, billing Ms Madden was going to be tricky. That led to thoughts of Cy Sackville and my court appearance. Maybe I should call him off and save some money. But Cy would be disappointed. Maybe we could sue the state for public mischief?
“And kiss your arse goodbye,” I said aloud. I started the car and drove to Northbridge.
14
It had been some years since I’d been to Paul and Pat Guthrie’s house, but I found it without difficulty. The big peppercorn tree in front was unmistakable. Guthrie’s block was wide and long with a deep water frontage. Pretty flash, but after the place Louise Madden had been land-scaping it looked modest. There were the usual couple of cars parked in the driveway, and the untidiness of the garden, giving the place a sort of weekender feel, was another thing I remembered and liked. A couple of dogs ran out and barked at me as I approached the house. Paul Guthrie wandered out onto the high deck that ran around three sides of the house to see what the dogs were barking at. When he saw me he raised a hand in a vaguely naval salute and beckoned me forward.
I skirted the barbecue pit and the swimming pool, which had a heavy plastic cover over it. Guthrie came down a set of wooden steps from the deck. He must have been close to seventy but he moved like a man twenty years younger. His handshake was firm without being competitive. When you’ve pulled oars for as long and as hard as he had, you don’t need to show off your strength. Guthrie had been an Olympic sculler, and the strength and springiness needed for that tough event were still in him.
“Cliff,” he said, “it’s great to see you.”
“Same here, Paul.”
“What happened to your head?”
“The usual. How’s life?”
Another man might have taken a quick look around his possessions before answering; not Guthrie. “Pat’s in the pink,” he said. “The boys are fine. Two grandchildren, like I told you, and I can still row a boat. How would it be?”
“You’re a lucky man, Paul.”
“I know. Come inside and have a drink and tell me what you’re up to.”
We went into the house at ground level and down the wide passage to Guthrie’s den, which housed his sporting trophies and family mementos-more of the latter than the former. He saw me settled in an armchair, went out whistling and came back with two cans of light beer.
“Cheers,” he said. “I suppose you got those head wounds on that gambling boat, the Pavarotti?”
“Right. Ray was a big help there.”
“Looks like you should’ve taken him along with you.”
“Maybe. I hope he can help me some more.” I touched the scratches. “But no rough stuff involved.”
Guthrie nodded and waited. He was a discreet, experienced level-headed man, and there seemed no reason not to tell him about the Madden case. It sometimes helps to talk to an objective onlooker anyway. I gave it to him chapter and verse, and he listened in silence, sipping on his beer.
“Interesting,” he said when I’d finished. “And you want to go and have a look in the water under the bridge?”
“Not me. Someone who knows how to handle himself in that situation. I thought Ray might know someone, be able to help with a boat and so on.”
“He will. And he’ll do the dive himself. He’s an expert, and he’s always felt that he owes you a big favour.”
I waved that away, or tried to. “I don’t want him to feel like that. I just want to hire him to do a job. Perhaps you can help me to get it on that sort of footing, Paul?”
“I’ll try. When would you want to do this?”
“Tonight.”
He broke into harsh, deep-chested laughter. “Jesus, Hardy, you’re the limit. I should’ve known. Pat did. I said some-thing about having you stay over for a night and go out on the harbour and she said, ‘He’ll be off chasing someone’.”
I was saved from having to reply by the simultaneous arrival of Ray Guthrie and his mother. There was just enough light outside for me to see the little Honda and the Holden Jackaroo pulling up side by side in the driveway.
Pat Guthrie was a small, dark woman with a trim figure and a worried look which gave way very attractively to merriment. She came across the grass and into the den, kissed her husband and pointed a mock finger-pistol at me. “Hullo, Cliff. You haven’t changed much. A bit thinner, are you? Good to see you.”
“You too, Pat. You look well.”
She nodded in Guthrie’s direction. “We are. Has he shown you the snaps of the grandchildren yet?”
“Pat,” Guthrie protested, “I’m not that doting, am I?”
“Just doting enough. Want another beer? Dinner’ll be a while.”
Guthrie patted his taut waistline and refused. I accepted; Pat smiled and left, and it was Ray Guthrie who brought in the can. I hadn’t seen Ray since he and his girlfriend, Jess Polansky, had left Helen Broadway’s flat in Elizabeth Bay. This was after I’d helped to send Ray’s real father to gaol and shown him that his stepfather was the best friend he had in the world. Ray had broadened a bit, but the bulk looked to be due to hard work more than self-indulgence. He was weatherbeaten but not careworn. He looked happy. He shoved the beer at me, and we shook hands.
“How’s Jess?” I said.
“Just great. Sends her best. She coul0dn’t come, one of the kids is crook…”
“What?” Paul Guthrie almost jumped from his chair.
“Take it easy, Paul,” Ray said. “It’s nothing. She just needs her mum tonight.”
“All right, but keep an eye on her.”
Ray drank some beer and looked at his stepfather with affection. “You know, Cliff, he’d send to New York for the best fingernail man if one of them had some-thing wrong with a fingernail.”
Too much fond family feeling embarrasses me after a while. I hid the discomfort behind my can and an interest in the view from the window. The last of the daylight flickered out over the water The lights on the moored boats in Middle Harbour and the glow in the sky across the water above Seaforth began to provide the sort of nightscape that justifies the mortgages. Paul Guthrie and his stepson were on such good terms that their casual talk was easy to drop in and out of. Pat came in and sat with a dry sherry for a while, and then she and Paul went off to put the finishing touches on the dinner.
“So,” Ray said, “I told you how to get to the Pavarotti and you got bashed up?”
“Finished the job, though. It was useful information.” I looked at Ray’s solid, jeans-and-windbreaker-covered figure. “I could’ve used you along at a couple of points, I admit.”
“Try me now. What’re you after?”
“Did Paul give you a hint?”
Ray shook his head. “Mister Discretion, Paul. I’ve come to realise that a good stepfather is better than a real father in a way. He can move aside, let you grow up. Both Chris and me have benefited.”
I nodded. Chris was Ray’s brother, who’d also struck trouble a few years back. Now he was graduate in
