Peter Corris - Matrimonial Causes

‘You’re in a shitty mood, Hardy. It’s no way to be. Relax.’

I didn’t want to play by Loggins’ rules and I didn’t know what Gallagher’s rules were. Either way I was taking orders, not controlling things, and I didn’t like the feeling. Gallagher’s suave, calm manner was beginning to annoy me. I drove into Ultimo and pulled up outside the Sydney News building. That shook him.

‘Jesus Christ! ‘What’re we doing here?’

‘I’m thinking of a whole new approach,’ I said. ‘I know a few people in there. I’m thinking about walking in and giving one of them the whole story, lock, stock and barrel. It might be a way out for me.’

‘What d’you mean, the whole story?’

‘Everything. Including what went on in that meeting just now and including the way you’re having such fun playing it so close to your bloody chest. You can come in if you like, supply a few good quotes.’

He loosened his tie, the first sign of uncertainty. I was well ahead of him there-I wasn’t wearing one. He took out a Marlboro and tapped it on the box. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

‘That’s a start. Is all this knighthood business on the up-and-up?’

He lit the cigarette. ‘It is and there might be more than one knighthood involved.’

‘Good stuff for the story.’

‘Get serious, Hardy. What do you want?’

‘I want to know if we’re going after Chalky Teacher or not.’

‘Of course we are.’

‘When? Now?’

Gallagher looked at his watch. ‘It’s up to you. The bloke I want to see knows where Teacher is going to eat lunch today. Would you rather go up against him before or after he’s eaten?’

‘He doesn’t drink, so it doesn’t matter. Before. Where do we find this bloke?’

‘Coogee. Let’s get going or Chalky’ll be well into his steak and chips.’

I started the engine and moved off. Gallagher felt around his seat and I asked him what he was doing.

‘No seat belts in this crate?’

‘No. There’s so much rust in the chassis I doubt they’d hold.’

‘Shit. Why’d you drive a car like this? The suspension’s shot, too.’

‘Going to issue me an unroadworthy notice?’

‘Someone should. Seat belts’re compulsory now. Haven’t you heard-”Belt Up and Live”? Interesting game, advertising. I nearly went into it myself.’

I turned out of Cleveland Street into Anzac Parade and moved to the centre lane, ready to go left at Alison Road. Gallagher squashed his butt out in the flimsy ashtray and brushed carefully at his neat suit. I couldn’t judge his mood-it varied somewhere between relaxed and excited. He lit another cigarette, the first time I’d seen him smoke two that close together. He offered me the packet and I refused.

‘You like those rollies?’

‘Helps me keep it down. I can’t smoke when I’m driving in the city. And it gives me something to do with my hands. You can take five minutes to roll a smoke if you want to. Why did you join the force, Ian? More money in law… or advertising.’

‘There’s more to life than money.’

‘True.’ I swung left into Alison Road. We went past the Thoroughbred Motel where Cyn and I had spent a memorable night in our courtship after I had got back from an interstate trip. Cyn was still a student then. Suddenly, I missed her and wanted to tap into the well of experience and feeling and talk we’d built up over the years. We rolled on eastwards. Just past the racecourse Gallagher stabbed a finger at the footpath.

‘Stop here. I have to make a call.’

He got out and used a phone box on the footpath. I watched as he felt in his pockets, dropped his money in and dialled-the perfect public servant. I was uneasy, though. He was slipping back into his secretive mode. Who was he calling, and why? Would he tell me? I’d have liked to make a call or two myself-to Vernon Morris maybe, or to Virginia Shaw or Joan Dare. But then Gallagher was back in the car, all toothy grins and confidence.

‘Hoadley Street, Coogee,’ he said. ‘Number 10. Just for a tick-then we’ll know where we’re really going.’

I started the car and revved it more than I needed to. The irritation was back. ‘Your informant is what-male or female? Animal, vegetable or mineral?’

Gallagher didn’t reply, which was probably to his credit. I drove on towards Coogee, feeling the pangs of hunger, stabs of pain from my disturbed tooth and deeper concerns. I tried to tell myself that two big tough men would be more than a match for one little tough man. But I couldn’t quite believe it.

The place Gallagher directed me to resembled a fortress. It was at the end of a no through road and occupied three sizeable blocks. There was a tennis court at the back, but substantial wire fences seemed to run around the whole perimeter apart from the front, where big metal gates were set in a brick fence six feet high. The house was a cream brick, two-storey job with white columns and bay windows. Cyn would have had it dynamited. There was a three-car garage at the end of a wide concrete drive that shone white under the morning sun. Gallagher got out, spoke into an intercom attached to the gates and waved me inside as they swung open.

There was going to be oil from my leaking gearbox and rubber from my battered tyres on the drive, but I supposed they had some way of dealing with that. I got out of the car and joined Gallagher on the path that led to the front door, a series of round sandstone slices set in a glossy lawn.

‘Your fizzes live well,’ I said.

‘He’s not my fizz.’

The door opened before we reached it and a small man in faded jeans, sneakers and a black T-shirt nodded to Gallagher.

We walked through the house, not an interesting walk but a long one. It was all deep carpet and chandeliers and attempts at good taste that missed by a mile. We went out through glass doors to a patio overlooking the tennis court and swimming pool. Not such a good view of the sea, but you can’t have everything. Two men were sitting at a table under a sun umbrella. Both wore business shirts and ties. One had a pistol in a shoulder holster. The unarmed man, a chunky type with a high colour and curling grey hair, stood up as he saw Gallagher. His eyes swept over me appraisingly, no doubt arriving at the conclusion that I didn’t have a tennis court or a swimming pool.

‘This him, Ian?’ he said. His voice was deep with a trace of Irish in it. He was a well-used thirty or a well-preserved fifty, it was hard to tell.

‘Yes,’ Gallagher said.

That was when the small guy in the casuals gripped me in a hold that I’d been taught in the army but never perfected. It paralysed both my arms between shoulder and elbow. I got set to kick someone or something but Gallagher had got his gun out, moved around and pointed it at my right knee.

‘Just keep still, Cliff,’ he said. ‘He’s got a. 38 on his left hip, Chalky. Better get it.’

By then I was too amazed to do anything. I felt the grip relax but still couldn’t move my arms. Then the weight of the gun left me and I was tasting something bitter in my mouth.

‘Nice gun,’ Teacher said. His voice was gravelly and I’d heard it before-in St Peters Lane. He spun the chamber and cocked the revolver. Then he put the muzzle at the point of my jaw, not far from my bad tooth.

‘Let’s keep it sophisticated,’ the man in charge said. ‘My name is Henry Wilton, Hardy. I’m sure you’ve heard of me.’

Of course I had. Wilson amp; Wilton and Associates was a medium-sized private inquiry firm, based in Sydney but with at least one interstate branch. The name Wilton, as Teacher’s employer, had almost rung a bell with Joan Dare and should have rung one with me, connecting up with the talk of there being other private detectives involved in the Meadowbank et al divorces. Too late now. Wilton could see how my mind was working. He chuckled and sat back down. ‘Chalky works for my father. He likes horses. He also works for me because he likes money and other things.’