I need to speak to Loman.
The man barked a laugh. Or whats left of him.
Wyatt was silent. He could hear the other man on the line, his adenoidal breathing.
Then his voice. Burnt to a crisp. Suspicious circumstances, all that. Somebody torched the poor bastard. I guess we can scratch you off our list of suspects.
Wyatt went cold and cut the connection. Forget Melbourneno friends there. There would be something in Geelong for him. He made a final call, to a chemical factory in Corio. A man called Mike Harbutt worked there. He was a fireman but now and then he supplemented his income working for men like Wyatt. Harbutt was a still, silent, apparently nerveless man. He owed no allegiances to anybody and that made him valuable to Wyatt right now.
The switchboard put him on hold. Thirty seconds later a voice growled, Harbutt.
Its Wyatt. Have you got a minute?
Havent had a fire here in five years. Ill be redundant at this rate. Whats on your mind?
I need to know what the word is.
Where are you calling from?
Local, Wyatt said.
Good. Keep it that way. Anywhere else is too hot for you at the moment.
Meaning?
Meaning the cops have got your prints now, off your place on the Peninsula, theyve got a name for you, theyve been giving everyone a hard time while they look for you. Someones going to turn you in if you show up in Melbourne. Either that or theyll shop you to that Sydney crowd thats put a price on your head.
The Outfit.
Thats them.
Where do you stand in all this?
Me? Im growing old gracefully, keeping all my friends.
They were silent and then Harbutt said, About that payroll…
Again Wyatt explained that he didnt have the payroll, hed never had it. No offence, I wouldnt be calling you if I had it.
Ah well, at least the papers and the TV got some mileage out of it. How much do you need?
Im not talking about a loan.
Right, Harbutt said. Then, Im not an ideas man, Wyatt. Im strictly muscle. Give me a sledgehammer, a drill, a stick of dynamite, thats what I do.
But you can put me in touch with someone. Local, someone who doesnt know my face.
After a while, Harbutt said, Theres a bloke I done a couple of smash and grabs for, name of Ray Dern. Hes full of ideas, except most of them never get off the ground. Lack of local talent.
I want you to line up a meeting.
When?
Tonight.
Where?
Wyatt thought about it. He had nothing to worry about from Harbutt, and if the man called Dern didnt know the name Wyatt, or the face, then his motel would be safe enough. He gave Harbutt the details. Six oclock, he said.
He spent the day sleeping. At three oclock he caught a bus into the city centre and found a back street discount shop open. He bought cheap socks, underwear, jeans, shirt, windcheater and a disposable razor. The clothes were dark. They fitted poorly. He had one hundred and six dollars left. Back at the motel he showered, shaved, changed into his new clothes and washed and dried his dirty clothes in the motel laundry. Then he lay on his bed to think and wait.
He wondered what sort of man Dern would turn out to be. If Harbutt knew him, maybe that made him all right. Wyatt knew that the career criminals like himself were fast disappearing. There was no room for them. He put it down to drugs, the movement of money by electronic means, advances in security technology. The purely cash jobs were drying up. These days, armed robbery was virtually unproductive in terms of risk and profit.
Then there was a knock on the door and Harbutt and another man filed in and they had a woman with them.
Three
She hung back, letting Harbutt enter first, then slipped through the door and to one side. It was a display of meekness that Wyatt knew owed more to the man behind her than to personality. Wyatt had once spent a few days with her and there hadnt been much meekness in evidence then, so it had to be the man. Dern was fiftyish, a tall, benign, wise father-figure with a large, sensual, comfortable body. He beamed, and stuck out a broad tanned hand at Wyatt.
Mr Lake. Good to make your acquaintance. Id like you to meet Thea.
Thea bobbed, smiled quickly, shook Wyatts hand. When hed known her shed been calling herself Maxine. She looked at him levelly, a sallow, mocking blonde in a tight skirt. Then the nail on her ring finger dug warningly into his palm. It was a way of saying that she wouldnt reveal his identity if he wouldnt reveal hers.
Thea, Wyatt said, and she released his hand.
He leaned against the wall and asked them to sit. Harbutt chose the only chair in the room, Dern and the woman sat close together on the bed. When they were settled, Dern looked brightly around at everyone. He was a professional beamer, proud of his tangle of black hair and the young woman next to him. He wore a costly casual suit, the flowery tie tugged loose from the collar, and slim-line Italian shoes. Lets start from the beginning, shall we? he said. The voice was deep-chested, pleased with itself.
Harbutt leaned forward in the chair. I told Lake here that you had a couple of jobs in mind that required a good pro.
Indeed I have.
Wyatt didnt like the man, his air of satisfaction. Then he thought about the hundred and six dollars in his pocket and said, What sort of jobs?
Dern blinked, as though there should have been a few minutes devoted to small talk and other niceties first. Right you are. He counted on his stubby fingers. One, a weekend warehouse sale. Two, a racehorse. Three, a private art collection. I need someone who can work out the angles, bypass security, do a clean job, etcetera, etcetera.
Wyatt looked at the woman. Whats Theas role in this?
A rich, avuncular chuckle later, Dern said, She put me onto the first job. My little kitten here just happens to work for a crowd that specialises in your blockbuster style of three-day warehouse clearance sale.
The kitten simpered at Dern, then glanced expressionlessly at Wyatt as Dern went on: To cut costs they only employ one guard and the takes not collected by armoured car at the end of each day but after closing time on day three. Could be a couple of hundred grand in the safe by then. We simply go in before the armoured car gets there.
Wyatt folded his arms and rested his back against the wall. Half of the two hundred thousand will be in cheques and charge-card slips.
Doubt flickered in Derns face, but the optimism won out. Still, even a hundred grand is a tidy sum.
Split four ways, its twenty-five thousand each. You said a warehouse. Wed have to seal the place. What are we looking atfour doors, six, ten? Do we know what kind of safe it is? And so on. Is all that worth twenty-five grand each?
Thea flushed, as though hed attacked her, not the idea. She was pretty in a soft, undefined way, but it was spoiled by a perpetual sourness under the beauty. Wyatt knew that she collected and harboured injustices, and now shed just found another one. He put some conciliation into his face and voice and said to her, It shows an instinct for the type of score that can pay off, though. Im not discounting it totally.
She smiled at him. Dern saw it and narrowed his eyes, as if hed picked up a current running between them.
