Peter Corris: Lugarno

She was close to tears and from experience I knew that a crying jag would jolt her out of this confessional, recriminatory mood. I got up and sat next to her on the couch. I clinked my glass against hers.

‘Drink up, girl. You’ve got them beat. They can’t touch you. What did Ramsay say?’

She gave me a brave smile. ‘You’re nice and you’re right. They can’t get to me with their blackmail and their drugs.’

‘Drugs, too?’

‘Oh, yes. They’re very bad, those people. They get the women hooked on drugs and then they can do anything they like with them.’

‘What people, Regina?’

She slumped against me but not amorously. The gin was getting to her motor centres and she was starting to drift to another time and another place. She hummed a tune and then murmured the words, ‘Lloyd George knew my father, Father knew Lloyd George. Know that one?’

‘Yes.’ I hummed along.

‘Not Lloyd George, Lord George. They’re the people. Not nice. Not nice boys even. Not like Randall’s boys. Nice boys.’

‘Are you saying Ramsay’s with the Lord George Agency?’

That I knew about her recreational activities didn’t seem to surprise her by this time. She was past making judgements. Anything can connect with anything else when you’re in that state. Pressed hard against me, she shook her head violently and I got a whiff of gin and perfume and sweat.

‘No! No! He wouldn’t. She tried to entice him into joining them but he heard things. He saw things in her house and he got out. He came to me. He’s a lovely boy.’

It was about the last way I’d describe Ramsay Hewitt, but Regina Kipps was in a maudlin world of her own. She pushed away from me, reached her glass and knocked the contents back as if she knew the effect it’d have and wanted it.

I eased away on the couch. ‘Regina, I have to go.’

‘S’all right. Everybody’s gotta go. Know that one? Everybody’s gotta go. Rolling Stones. Great music, Stones. Hubby didn’t think so but hubby’s dead. Mick’s still alive. Good old Mick.’

She was slipping fast. I took the glass from her hand and put it on the table. ‘Where’s Ramsay now? Who’s he with?’

‘University,’ she said. ‘That university bitch. He’ll steal from ‘er. He’ll break ‘er heart. Bad boy.’

She slid sideways and her eyes fluttered, then closed. I put a cushion under her head and lifted her feet onto the couch. She wore silver ankle-strap sandals with very high heels. I undid them and put them aside. She looked comfortable enough but sad as a child’s coffin in her red silk robe on the tiger skin couch.

I did a quick recce of the house to make sure there was no gas leaking, no hot plates burning, no coffee maker simmering. I finished my drink and touched her on the top of her blonded head on my way out. She didn’t move.

Finding Ramsay Hewitt now became a matter of urgency. My two cases had merged. Surprising, but not entirely — the escort business unites the most unlikely partners across social and gender barriers and if you apply that ‘six degrees of separation’ stuff you’d come up with some amazing connections. I had to find Ramsay and grill him for what he knew about the Lord George operation because it looked as if blackmail and drugs were the forces that could make some sense of the murders of Jason and Samantha. To say I watched my back as I drove home from Concord would be an understatement. I’d seen the lengths the Lord George people would go to deter me from taking an interest in them and the stakes were higher now. I had to hope they didn’t know that and so far, so good.

When I reached Glebe I decided not to go home. The police might be there, wanting to press me for more of the information that they must know I held or maybe Mr Stivens had been taken off the leash. I booked into the Rooftop Motel where they know me and where they close the gates on the car park fairly early. If s a good hidey-hole and you can have a swim in the pool on the roof when you’re in the mood. No mini-bar though. I bought two packets of crisps from the machine and settled down with them and several coffee sachets and the little containers of long-life milk.

I unshipped my notebook and got to work on the diagram with the arrows and dotted lines and just before fatigue got me I reckoned I’d worked it out. I saw it so clearly that I thought there was no need to write it down. I put the air-conditioning on low, stripped off and slept in my boxer shorts. It’s a glamorous life.

I woke up at first light and had a cup of instant coffee and the complimentary biscuits for breakfast. I showered and shaved with the tackle I keep in the car and rang Viv Garner, an early riser.

‘Viv, it’s Cliff. I want you to do something for me.’

‘You always do. I have to tell you those coppers at Hurstville didn’t like the story too much.’

‘Doesn’t matter. They hauled me in anyway. I need to know the address of the faculty secretary in the Law School.’

‘Come on, Cliff. I can’t…’

‘You have to. It’s important. The guy I’m looking for has taken up with her but he’s involved in some pretty sticky stuff. I have to talk to him. I won’t let on how I got the address.’

‘Shit. All right. I’ll get it off the computer and ring you back.’

‘Make it quick, Viv and I’m not at home.’ I gave him the motel and room numbers.

‘That’s the Rooftop. What’re you doing there?’

‘Long story.’

‘The police want you?’

‘Possibly. I have to get this sorted first.’

He rang back in a couple of minutes. ‘Gwendolyn Carroll, 13 Sheedy Street, Lane Cove. She’s filling in for the secretary who’s sick. Ah.. she’s got most of a degree herself. Part-timer. She does a bit of research assistanting too. Ambitious.’

‘Busy woman, fitting in blond toy boys as well.’

‘Word is she has a private income of some kind and property. I don’t like her but I sort of respect her. Bear that in mind.’

I said I would and I checked out just as the news theme came on the ABC radio for seven a.m. I resisted the impulse to cruise past my house and headed for Lane Cove. Along the way I stopped for petrol and rang Price at home and on his mobile and got no answer. Looked like I’d have to learn Junie’s number to keep in touch with my client. I rang Danni and she picked up straight away.

‘It’s Hardy, Danni. Are you still in Hunters Hill?’

‘Why?’

‘Look, I know you’ve talked to your father and tried to settle things down.’

‘Yeah. Did you know the cops found my stash at home and want to talk to me?’

‘No. What did Marty say about that?’

‘He said he told them he didn’t know where I was.’

‘OK, well, that shows he’s on your side.’

‘Are you?’

‘I am. I’ve got some stuff on why Jason and Samantha were killed. Maybe. I’m working on it. If it comes out all right I don’t think anyone’s going to worry about your bit of dope.’

‘I told Dad I thought you were OK.’

‘He told me. Thanks. Just keep cool, Danni, wherever you are.’

‘Hunters Hill,’ she said and cut the call.

Going against the traffic flow I made it to Lane Cove in twenty minutes. Gwendolyn Carroll’s house was in a street off River Road in a bushy location where the houses would fetch three quarters of a million or more depending on the view. Hers was one of the more modest ones, maybe struggling to get much over the half million mark, but comfortable enough on a decent sized sloping block with a well-established native garden. The house was a white stucco job with a tile roof and plenty of windows. It looked as if it could do with a bit of work; a creeper of some kind was sneaking up towards the chimney and TV aerial and satellite dish. Something was sprouting in the guttering. Whatever else he was doing, Ramsay wasn’t rolling up his sleeves and getting stuck into his ladyfriends’ gardens.