Peter Corris - Torn Apart

Spiegelman stirred his cup. 'Well…'

'Don't play games with him, Harvey. When I heard Paddy was dead-'

'How did you hear?'

'From the police, of course. I don't use the name anymore but they knew how to find me. They've got us all pegged.'

I nodded. 'Right.'

'And I'll tell you something-television and crime fiction's got it all wrong. They didn't treat me as a suspect. Anyway, I got straight on to that company of his and asked a few questions. They told me nothing really, but your name came up and I remembered that you were mentioned in the paper. I wanted to know if you thought you were in line for some of his money. Is that plain enough for you?'

'That's very plain,' I said. 'And I can give you a plain answer. I don't give a stuff about his money. I'm only interested in finding out who killed him. Plain enough?'

She surprised me then with a smile that seemed to have genuine warmth in it. She put her hand on my arm, almost stroking the sleeve of my jacket. 'We're getting off on the wrong foot here, Cliff. I admit I thought you were going to turn out to be one of his rough mates from his army and drinking days. They used to show up and leech on him. But I can see that you're not like that.'

She was a chameleon. The brittle, hard-boiled manner dropped away and was replaced by something altogether more sympathetic, almost likeable.

'Of course I want to know who did such a terrible thing,' she said, 'but I won't lie to you. Paddy treated me very badly, and he virtually robbed me. We had a house and other assets in common and when he left he managed to take them all out from under me. He was clever in the way he set everything up in his favour, under his control. He owed me and I want… compensation. You have to believe me.'

'I don't have to,' I said. 'None of that sounds like the Patrick I knew.'

'How long did you know him?'

She had me there. 'A matter of weeks.'

'Enough said. He had that Irish charm, a way with him, as they say.'

She had her own charm and was turning it on now, full bore. Spiegelman appeared to be taking no more than a polite interest at this point and I had to wonder what his role really was. He clicked his own lighter for Sheila as she produced another cigarette and there was no doubt; the gesture was intimate and devoted, almost embarrassing to watch.

'You weren't at the funeral,' I said.

'I didn't know about it.'

'However you look at it,' I said, 'it comes down to legalities. Is there a will? Were you divorced? Comes down to sets of papers. Have you got any?'

'I have a marriage certificate. Have you got anything?'

I couldn't help thinking of the package Patrick had posted from London. Surely not. I shrugged. 'This is of almost no interest to me. Can you throw any light on who might have wanted to kill Patrick? Kill him in that… emphatic way?'

'Just a minute, Hardy,' Spiegelman said. 'What are you implying?'

'Nothing,' I said. 'I'm sorry, but I don't think we can be of any use to each other. I'll pay for the coffee and be on my way. In time there'll be a niche for Patrick's ashes at Rookwood if you're interested, Sheila. I believe they keep them for a certain number of years and then dispose of them if no one claims them.'

She killed her cigarette in her coffee cup and stood. She was almost as tall as me. She blew smoke past my shoulder.

'Fuck you,' she said.

It was all getting a bit strange, out of shape. I caught a bus back to Glebe as the afternoon light died. All very well what I'd told Hank about drawing conclusions from information gained, but what if the information was highly suspect to begin with? It was Friday night with the traffic heavy and the bus losing and taking on passengers at every stop. Something was nagging at me and by the time we made the turn into Glebe Point Road I had it. The name Harvey Spiegelman rang a bell. Only faintly, but it was there. Something to follow up.

Sheila Malloy, if that's who she really was, presented a problem. I'd met women I'd found difficult to believe many times before, but she was a mixture. Her frankness about her interest in Patrick's death was one thing; her denial of their divorce was another. She used the name Paddy naturally, convincingly, but her picture of the man was very different from mine. People can change over time, but Sheila appeared to be able to change from one minute to the next.

I stopped at the Toxteth for a drink and ordered a Jamesons, Patrick's favourite tipple. I was thinking I preferred scotch when a man dropped into the chair next to mine.

'On the hard stuff, eh, Cliff?'

I knew him but couldn't immediately put a name to the face. He raised his own glass and it came to me.

'Gidday, Sammy. Good to see you again.'

Sammy Starling nodded. 'As Keef says, it's good to see you-good to see anyone.'

Sammy had been out of circulation for almost seven years, serving a sentence for manslaughter. He'd been a private detective and a good one, but a gambling problem had forced him to cross the line and become a standover man, working for gamblers. One night he went too far and the man he was putting extreme physical pressure on died. Sammy hadn't completely lost his moral bearings and he turned himself in. It was more than his life was worth to name the people he'd been working for, though that would have earned him a lesser sentence, so he served nearly the whole term. I'd put some work his way before he went off the rails, and given a character reference when he was up on the charge.

'I heard you were out,' I said, 'but I thought you were an eastern suburbs type.'

'I am. Give me Bondi any day; but I've been hanging around here hoping to see you.'

'I'm out of the business, Sammy.'

'I know that. But you always played square with me and stood up when I was in the shit, so I want to return the favour.'

I finished the whiskey and held out my glass. 'Buy me a drink and we'll call it quits.'

He dropped his voice and looked around to be sure he couldn't be overheard. 'This is serious. Do you remember Soldier Szabo?'

I nodded. Szabo was a hardcore crim who'd come after me and I'd shot and killed him in the living room of my house. Even after scrubbing at it and years of wear and tear, there was still a faint stain on the carpet where he'd bled. He was a vicious murderer and I felt no remorse, just the natural empty, stomach-churning reaction at the time.

Sammy leaned closer. 'He had a son named Frank. He was in Bathurst with me, doing time for armed robbery. He got high on ice one day and said he was going to kill the man who killed his father.'

'When was this?'

'About a year ago, bit less. I didn't think too much about it because they all go around making threats, especially when they're high, but when I heard about that bloke being killed at your place I thought I should tell you.'

I got up and bought two drinks. Sammy never drank anything but scotch and ice so I didn't have to ask. I sat down and looked at him. He was ten years younger than me and medium-sized. A welterweight, say. For someone who'd been inside for so long he looked more lined, greyer, but pretty good-he must have worked out and kept a limit on the starches.

'He's out, is he?'

'A month ago, maybe two months.'

'What's he like?'

'An animal, and a crack-head. And, Cliff, his weapon of choice was a sawn-off automatic shotgun.'

I'd spent a part of the previous year overseas, leaving the house in the care of a friend who'd carried out some renovations. The security system Hank Bachelor had finally persuaded me to install had malfunctioned and I hadn't got around to having it repaired. Out of the private eye business, I hadn't seen it as a priority and I had to accept that my neglect had contributed to Patrick's death. His agile killer had come in from the poorly protected back over a high fence.