Peter Corris - Burn and Other Stories

I wrote ‘Fiona Hathaway, 19.’ on my notepad. ‘What’s his name, this person.’

He sniffed and got the words out with difficulty. ‘Alberto de Sousa. I imagine you know the foreign enclaves of Sydney pretty well, Mr Hardy?’

I put my pen down and shrugged. ‘Not really. Vietnamese in Cabramatta, Lebanese in Newtown, Italians in Leichhardt.’

‘Portuguese?’

‘You got me.’

‘In Marrickville, specifically Petersham. A section of New Canterbury Road has nothing but Portuguese shops-butchers, real estate agents, fruiterers, videos. Everything!’

I had a vague idea of where he meant and an impression that he was exaggerating. I looked at him across my scarred desk and said nothing. A lot was going to depend on what he said next.

Mr Hathaway leaned forward and lines of concern furrowed his face. ‘I’m a widower, Mr Hardy, and Fiona is my only child. I love her very much. I don’t want her ruining her life over a worthless criminal.’

That hooked me. The man had problems. I told him my rates and he barely listened. I opened a file on him. He was fifty-nine years old, a retired electrical engineer with investments. ‘I have a heart disorder,’ he said. ‘Irregular rhythms. It’s an electrical problem, the doctors tell me.’

I thought he might smile at the irony of that but he didn’t. Mr Hathaway was heavy going. He went on to tell me that his daughter had met Alberto de Sousa when he had delivered a load of party liquor to the legal firm where Fiona worked as a secretary.

‘His family has a bottle shop in Petersham. A restaurant too, I believe.’

‘Both good earners,’ I said. ‘In the right locations and properly run.’

He ignored me. ‘They aren’t even Europeans.’

Back onto that. It was hard not to be testy. ‘Portugal’s in Europe. Last I heard.’

‘The de Sousas are from Madeira. D’you know where that is?’

‘I’d be guessing,’ I said. ‘Off the coast of Spain?’

‘Off the coast of Africa!’ he hissed. ‘They’re no better than niggers.’

He took his chequebook out of his pocket as he spoke. I thought of the rent on this office, the mortgage in Glebe, the Bankcard. ‘You said something about Mr de Sousa being a criminal.’

You don’t become a private investigator to inflate your ego or get a rosy view of human nature. Hathaway told me that he’d hired Richard Maxwell two weeks before to do the job he was now offering me. The reason? Maxwell was English. I knew him. In the Private Enquiry Agent fraternity he was known as ‘that poofter Pommy pisspot’. Prejudice, it’s everywhere.

‘Mr Maxwell became ill,’ Hathaway said. ‘He’s hospitalised, in fact, and he had to give up the case. But he did tell me that Alberto de Sousa has a criminal record and that he is involved in criminal activities.’

‘What else did he tell you?’

Mr Hathaway had a knack of saying the right thing just often enough. ‘Nothing relevant,’ he said. ‘He’s a very sick man, I gather. But he did recommend you.’

Hathaway wanted me to accumulate evidence on Alberto de Sousa’s criminality which he could either present to the police or put before his daughter, depending on the seriousness. A psychologist would probably have told him his plan wouldn’t work. Nothing stimulates the young as much as persecution by the old. But I was a detective, not a psychologist. I had the skills for the job and I needed the work.

I got a few more details, deposited Hathaway’s cheque and set out to find Richard Maxwell. He had a flat in Surrey Street, Darlinghurst, but he operated mostly out of a pub on the corner of Liverpool and Palmer Streets. This put him just a few doors from a gay brothel and a church. Maxwell was known to frequent both. At the pub I got the information I expected: Dick was in a Potts Point detox clinic. It was early December, too hot and sticky for walking but that was still better than driving through the heavy traffic, breathing carbon monoxide and pushing up the blood pressure. I crossed William Street, made my way through Woolloomooloo and walked beside the water to the McElhone steps which I went up very slowly, keeping in the shade. As I climbed, I tried to recall everything I knew about Portugal. I ran out long before I reached the top- sweet wine, Prince Henry the Navigator, Vasco da Gama-that was about it.

The clinic was in a three-storey brick building which had once been a block of flats. Two streets back from Woolloomooloo Bay, the clinic’s upper floor would afford a view of the water on two sides-maybe that was where you got to when you’d been clean for a month. If so, Dick Maxwell had a way to go. I found him watching TV in a ground-floor room. Despite the warmth of the day, he was wearing pyjamas, a dressing gown and slippers, and he looked about seventy, although he was only a few years older than me.

‘Stay away from the gin, dear boy,’ he said after I’d sat down next to him and used the remote control to mute the TV. There were two other men in the room but they didn’t object to the loss of sound. They were gazing at the moving images, smoking and trying to think of reasons for staying alive without alcohol.

‘Is that right, Dick?’ I said. ‘I’m safe then. A gin-and-tonic once in a while. That’s my limit.’

Maxwell nodded seriously. ‘Harmless, that. I drink it like water. Brush my teeth with it. That’s why I’m here in this far-from-stimulating company.’

He was a ruin-all broken veins, sagging skin and bloated features. He was alcoholic, homosexual and English. I wondered how Henry Hathaway had reacted to the combination. I brought the name up and stated my business.

‘Ah, yes,’ Maxwell said. ‘A professional referral.’

I gave him a twenty-dollar note and showed him that I had several others to hand.

He pocketed it. ‘Shoot,’ he said, ‘metaphorically.’

‘You told Hathaway this de Sousa had a criminal record. Expand on that.’

‘Juvenile stuff,’ Maxwell said. ‘Graffiti, joy-riding — fines, bonds, a community work-order.’

I gave him another twenty. ‘You also said he was still involved in criminal activity.’

Maxwell nodded. ‘I watched the young chap for a few days. Rather a pleasure, if you follow me. He’s up to something-clandestine meetings with other young blades, phone calls from public boxes, you know the form, Clifford.’

Twenty again. ‘Any idea what it’s all about?’

Maxwell shrugged. ‘No. I’m afraid I started to turn Hathaway’s retainer into clear liquid rather early in the piece. He might steal the whole of his father’s stock-and that’s a great deal of booze, let me tell you. Or they could be planning to knock over the Petersham RSL club one fine Saturday night. That’d be a nice score.’

‘Did you put in any work on the daughter?’

Maxwell rolled his eyes. ‘Scarcely. An insipid-looking little blonde piece. Possibly quite tough underneath. But not a patch on Alberto.’

I gave him another twenty and wished him a speedy recovery.

‘Don’t mock, dear boy. The only cure is sobriety and as Oscar said, that’s not a cure, it’s a calamity.’

I walked back to St Peter’s Lane, collected my Falcon and drove to Petersham. The block-and-a-half of shops along New Canterbury Road did feature a fair number of Portuguese establishments, but not a majority. There were a few more around the comer in Regent Street, along with a Chinese laundry and a Commonwealth Bank. Interesting, but it didn’t exactly amount to little Lisbon. The de Sousa liquor store was a big barn of a place with a laneway on one side and a restaurant on the other. I found a semi-legal parking place near the post office and walked back. It was late afternoon on a Friday and the grog shop was busy. The stock was impressive and there were pallet-loads of wine and spirits on special. I grabbed a couple of bottles of Jacobs Creek riesling at a lower price than I’d seen for years.