Peter Corris - The Coast Road

I fired a shot over his head and he stopped. I moved closer, two hands on the revolver and slightly crouched. At forty metres, a pistol is problematic unless in the hands of an expert, but a sawn-off shotgun is as useless as a toothpick. He didn’t panic. He fired both barrels in my direction and the shot threw up dirt not too far in front of me. He scrambled under some bushes bordering a creek and moved quickly away. I went after him with the gun in my hand, but I was winded and hurting and he had the greater incentive. I stopped and watched him wade across the shallow creek that ran through the golf course. He climbed out, muddy, before smoothly jogging down the ideal running surface of the closely cut fairway.

I limped back to the car with the adrenalin starting to recede, thinking that this had been a very close call. If I hadn’t had the gun in the bag, if I hadn’t had the bag on the front seat, if the passenger door catch hadn’t been dodgy. . The car was undamaged, maybe a few more scratches on the hood where it had run into the lantana. I started the engine, reversed and drove back to the bag. I collected the stuff that had spilled, shoved it inside and headed off. A.38 doesn’t make a very loud report but a shotgun does and I didn’t want to be hanging around if anyone came to investigate.

I made some turns and was on a street leading away from the water and the golf course before I realised that I was driving with no rear vision. I stopped and stripped the tape from the mirror. The street was quiet and I sat for a while letting its peaceful ordinariness soothe me. The brandy bottle had rolled clear of the bag. A few swigs left. I soothed myself some more. My heart rate slowed to near normal and I began to take notice of details. My flannel shirt was dirty and ripped at the shoulder where I’d hit the ground. Another item of expense for Dr Farmer. Also one.38 round…I realised that I wasn’t thinking straight and felt a sudden surge of panic. What if the guy who’d jumped me had backup? Ridiculous. I closed my eyes and counted to ten.

It’s one thing to be threatened, attacked, whatever, because you have something someone else wants or know something someone doesn’t want you to know. When you believe you don’t have or know anything dangerous it makes it harder to know what steps to take. But when you’re being paid, there’s really only one option-backing out completely (tempting after the shotgun episode), isn’t on. Only thing is to go all out to get the dangerous item of knowledge and use it any way you can. My interest in the connection, whatever it was, between Frederick Farmer’s death, the insurance on his land and elements in the Wollongong underworld was at the heart of the matter. And my only way forward was to take a close look at Wendy Jones.

I was back at Waterfall when my mobile rang. Law abiding citizen, and not sure how far Barton of Bellambi’s writ ran, I pulled over to take the call. Reception was good; Purcell, the undercover cop I’d given my mobile number to, came in loud and clear.

‘Where are you, Hardy?’

‘On my way back to Sydney, a bit battered and bruised.’

‘How’s that?’

I told him what had happened and he whistled, an unpleasant noise over the phone. ‘You see him?’

‘Not up close. Bikie, possibly. What’s this call about?’

‘Thought you might appreciate a bit more on Wendy.’

‘All you’ve got. Thanks.’

He read off the registration number of her red BMW. I scrabbled in the glove box detritus for a ballpoint and wrote it down. ‘Okay. Got it.’

‘She’s gone up to gamble. That’s her thing whenever she gets her hands on any money. Look for her at the casino.’

I groaned. ‘Not at Randwick?’

‘Wendy’s a night owl.’

‘Ah, it’d help to know what she looks like.’

‘I’ve got a picture somewhere. You’ll know her. I’ll scan it in. Give me your email address.’

I gave it to him and could hear the clatter of computer keys-your modern undercover guy. ‘Any idea where the money came from?’

‘What’s a Beemer cost these days, even second hand? Twenty grand? More? I wouldn’t know. And a splurge in Sydney? Another ten? It’s a big score from somewhere but I haven’t a clue. Gotta go. Good luck, Hardy.’

I drove on with plenty to think about and an aching body in need of some TLC. Nothing in sight. My phone rang again. This time it was Dr Farmer asking me to call on her at her place in Newtown. Why not? It was on my way and I could show her my ragged shirt as evidence that I’d been out and about on her behalf.

Her house was about half the size of the one Matilda Sharpe-Tarleton lived and worked in, but that didn’t make it small. Those single-storey, narrow-fronted terraces can open up to something spectacular inside and hers did. She met me at the door. She wore a tracksuit and had recently showered so that her hair was still spiky and wet. She looked healthy but troubled. A set of golf clubs rested against the wall halfway down the passage.

‘I played this morning in the comp,’ she said as we moved down towards a big, skylighted area where a lot of money had been spent.

Golf courses weren’t my favourite places at the best of times and particularly not today, but I made a polite response. She had coffee percolating. She poured two mugs full and we sat down under the skylight. The back of the house was all timber and glass and her tiny bricked courtyard was a riot of plants. Wide pine steps ran up to a mezzanine where I’d bet there was a queen-size bed.

I took a swig of coffee. ‘Great house.’

‘We like it. Mr Hardy, I was all set to go off to work when Sue Holland called in here.’

‘Is that unusual?’

‘Very, and thank Christ Tania wasn’t here. You probably gathered that Sue and I had a thing going some time ago. Well, I met Tania and it went wrong and Sue’s been angry and sad and all that. Difficult at times.’

I nodded and worked on the excellent coffee.

‘At first I thought she was going to go over it all again. How she’d loved me and I’d betrayed her and all that. But she didn’t. She was sort of apologetic. She’s accepted an offer on her property at Wombarra.’

That got my attention. ‘I got the impression she loved the place, couldn’t live without it.’

She stared out at her sunlit greenery and I had the feeling she was reliving old memories, some good, some bad. She gulped down coffee and got the focus back. ‘I’d have said the same. She didn’t tell me the figure but she said it was just too much to refuse. She can relocate in the area with money to spare.’

‘Did she say who the offer was from?’

‘Some solicitor or other. I don’t think she mentioned a name. I don’t think Matilda could be behind it. I doubt she’d have the sort of money Sue was talking about or would want to spend it that way.’

‘Does it set you thinking?’

‘You mean would I sell for enough money? No, not if it’s got anything to do with killing my dad.’

‘It could have. It sort of ties in with-’

She cut me off. ‘There’s more. She asked me to tell you that she’s been working on that impression she had of the person hanging around Dad’s place. You remember?’

‘Sure.’

‘She says she now thinks it was a woman. A sort of bulked-up woman. She stressed that this wasn’t some dyke fantasy. You asked her about a vehicle, she says.’

‘Right.’

Elizabeth Farmer pushed her damp hair back from her striking face. ‘I don’t know where all this clarity of recall’s come from, maybe from suddenly becoming rich, but she says she heard a motorbike start up after she’d seen this… person. You don’t look surprised, Mr Hardy.’