Malouf thing than meets the eye.'
He drained his glass. 'You're right there, Cliff. Much more.'
4
Sabatini stretched, easing a back that spent too long rigid in front of a computer screen. 'What happened at Hassan and Associates isn't an isolated incident. The Malouf case has… tentacles. I get whispers that quite a lot of small and medium range businesses are in trouble. There's been a lot of borrowing and shoring up, which is expensive in the current climate. There's also been a fair bit of apparent cyber fraud. Disappearing money. Mostly, it's kept quiet and insurance covers the losses. The firms compensate over and above the lost amount on the proviso that the details don't get out. The servers and the credit company people don't want publicity. The Malouf case made an exception because it was too big to be dealt with in house, as it were, and he turned up dead, but believe me, there's a collection of Malouf types floating about playing games with other people's money.'
'The insurance companies must be getting shitty.'
'Yes, and no. In most cases, in real terms the amounts aren't that big, and the legal insurers lay off against insurers and spread the pain down the line and pretty thin. They know they're being taken advantage of but what can they do? They want to keep the lid on it and stay in business. No one who's ever been broken into, had a car damaged or lost anything has any sympathy for insurance companies. They use the excess clause to cover their arses and they make millions by investing the policy premiums, most of which they never have to pay out on. Insurance is a legal racket.'
'I wouldn't argue with you, but…'
'When you contacted me just now I thought you might have been hired by one of the insurers to investigate, break the code of silence, but unless you're bullshitting me this is all new to you.'
'It is. I started in at a very small scale. I thought it was just a rip-off missing person scam with a twist-the missing party apparently dead. But it seems to be growing hour by hour. How do you know as much as you do?'
'Sealed containers leak.'
'Do you have names for these other embezzlers?'
A waiter cleared our table and asked if we wanted anything else.
'No,' Sabatini said. 'I mean yes.'
'Sir?'
'Sorry. Coffee-long black, please. You, Cliff?'
'The same.'
As the waiter left I leaned across the table as if we had a secret: we didn't, just a question. 'What's behind it all, then? You make it sound like a conspiracy.'
'You said it, not me. That's why I'm talking to you and letting you buy me lunch. If Malouf's still alive and you can grab him, there're two possibilities.'
A guessing game, I thought. 'One is that if I can grab him we might find out what's going on. What's the other possibility?'
Sabatini stroked his beard. 'Malouf was one of the smartest hackers and cyber fraudsters we've seen. If he's alive he'd still be at it. This stuff's an addictive game for someone like him. All this might just be him! And remember, you said I'd get first bite.'
The person I most wanted to talk to next was Gretchen Nordlung but it wasn't the time. I went home. Sabatini had given me references to several other articles he'd written where he skirmished around the question of dodgy financial advisers and managers without getting himself into trouble. We have new libel laws allowing greater freedom for journalists, and judges are awarding lower damages than juries once did, but caution is still the keynote.
It was a familiar scene: I pulled up by my house and the door of a car parked on the opposite side of the street opened and the men who stepped out could only have been police. Not that they wore suits and hats; they favour leather jackets these days and a casual but clean look. Neat beards are in rather than moustaches. I stood by the front gate as they approached, the taller and older of the two showing his warrant card.
'Detective Sergeant Caulfield and DC Manning, Mr Hardy. We'd like a word with you.'
'What about?'
'Could we go inside?'
I looked up at the clear sky. 'Why? It's not raining.'
Caulfield sighed. 'They warned me about you. Here or at the station.'
'Could rain,' I said. 'Come on in.'
We went in and down the hall to the kitchen at the back where I set about making coffee. I spent a fair bit of money on the house a while back, but somehow its essential shabbiness had reasserted itself and it didn't look much different from what it was before the makeover.
Manning leaned back against the sink; Caulfield sat down at the breakfast nook and took out a notebook. The water boiled and I filled the glass jug and set the plunger.
'Black or white?'
'Nothing for us. What's your interest in Stefan Nordlung?'
'Who says I have one?'
'Photographs and footage taken by a bystander at the Spit marina where Nordlung was found dead this morning show you to have been present. You were also caught on a sweep shot taken by a TV news crew when they arrived. All this went to air on the midday news and one of our analysts identified you. So here we are, being nice.'
'Not very nice. You've refused my hospitality.'
Caulfield glanced at Manning. 'This is what they told us about, Ken. He wears you down with this sort of stuff until you lose your temper and do and say things you shouldn't. He's a past master at it, especially when he had a PEA licence, which he doesn't anymore.'
'Years of experience,' I said.
Caulfield closed his notebook and stood. He stacked up to about 185 centimetres, but I'm 188 and these days pushing 90 kilos. Not that it was going to get physical, not like in the days of DS 'Bumper' Flanagan, when physical was the name of the game. But it helps to stand your ground on an equal or better level.
'You're in our books, Hardy. First time we catch you putting your nose into police business you're in serious trouble. You're not licensed to do anything except pick your fucking nose. Any hint of harassment, a speeding violation, a nine thousand dollar deposit in a bank account, any sign of a gun and you're gone.'
'On what sort of charge?'
'Conspiracy's a big net with fine mesh. As witness the judge presently not getting out and about and having a jolly good time on his pension with his pals.'
I nodded. 'Terrorism'll stretch a bit, too.'
Caulfield glanced at Manning. 'That's a thought. All unnecessary if you tell us what you were doing there.'
'Maybe later,' I said. 'Leave me your card.'
Caulfield slapped a card down on the table and they trooped out, not slamming the door. This kind of thing had happened quite a few times since I'd lost my licence. I suppose the cops couldn't be blamed. There were always rogues in the profession; I wasn't the worst but, as Caulfield said, I had a habit of getting under police skins. For tough guys, police skins are thin.
I was upstairs at the computer, working through Sabatini's articles, when he rang.
'You didn't put all your cards on the table,' he said.
'How's that?'
'I saw the news. You were there when they fished Nordlung out.'
'Yes, I was just sticking to our no-names policy.'
'I'm not sure I buy that, but it's blown now. I bet I can guess who hired you.'
'Guess away.'
