Peter Corris - The Marvellous Boy

The man in the photograph was in the room, a briefcase was on the floor and he was moving towards me with his fists clenched as I pulled free of his wife. She clung and he got one punch in, a hard swing which I took on the shoulder moving away. He was taller and wider than he looked in the picture, but musclebound. He was slow and I ducked his next swing and slammed him in the ribs. A one-punch fighter who didn’t seem to know what to do after that, he lowered his head and blundered forward and I clipped him hard on the ear and let him fall over my foot. He went down heavily and lost his wind. He started to get up and I put my foot on his chest and thumped him down. I was lucky he wasn’t a Famechon. I was in no condition to handle anything fancy.

Bettina had stood stock still, breathing heavily. I’d kept a side eye on her in case she decided to take part but she seemed frozen. Selby levered himself up from the floor, I guessed that the flab on him was old weight-lifting muscle. He’d still be dangerous if he could use the weight. I tensed myself but he swung around and belted Bettina across the face. She doubled over and just made it to a chair. She sat and started to giggle. Selby jabbed a finger at me.

‘Get out,’ he gasped, ‘before I call the police.’

I collected my jacket and tobacco and moved towards the door. He rubbed at his ear; I picked up his briefcase and flicked it at him, hard. It took him in the chest and he staggered back. Cheap stuff.

Bettina giggled again and let her head drop; the hair hung across her face like a curtain of blood.

It hadn’t been my proudest hour. Mrs Selby hadn’t passed the sobriety and steadiness test but she wasn’t a complete ruin. There was a strength about her, eroded by the booze and other things, but still present. She might be capable of obliterating a child from her life, then again that act might have something to do with the drinking. But Richard looked like the candidate for that role — a hell of a good timer when he was up and a real bastard when he was down. Bettina had no time for mum and dad, that was clear — appeals to uncover the lost grandson would cut no ice with her for the best of reasons. Weighing it all up, as much as the aggressive traffic would let me, I concluded that I hadn’t learned a damn thing, hadn’t earned a cent of the money in my pocket. The way to start earning it was to find Henry Brain.

The traffic was heavy all the way back to the city and beyond. I picked up Bridge Road and slogged down through Glebe to Leichhardt which has some nice places and some not-so-nice. Logan’s address was somewhere in between, veering towards the non-nice. It was a big three-storey terrace with a deep, overgrown garden in front. The place was divided into flatettes and a roughly painted notice on the gate told me that Logan was upstairs front in flat three. The walls had been painted within the last five years, the floor had been cleaned within the last month and the stair carpet was anchored on most steps. I went up; the bright day died on the first landing and a boarding house gloom took over.

I knocked at a plywood door with 3 painted on it. Paint had dribbled down six inches from the tail of the figure. Someone inside swore softly; bedsprings creaked, paper rustled and a drawer opened and closed. I waited. Bare feet squeaked on the floor inside. I had ten dollars in my hand and held it in front of his face when he opened the door. He grinned and grabbed. I whisked it away.

‘Albert Logan?’

‘That’s me, mate. You can leave the money.’

‘I might if I hear what I want to hear.’

‘I’ll try to oblige.’ He held the door open and I went in. It wasn’t much. Fifteen dollars a week tops. Albie must have been saving his tips. There was the usual mahogany veneer furniture and anonymous lino. There was an old, lumpy looking department store bed with a pair of fifty dollar shoes peeking coyly out. The mirror on the dresser was streaked, the doors leading to the balcony had grimy glass panels — Albie wasn’t spending anything on front. He sank back onto the bed and pulled cigarettes towards him.

‘Smoke?’ he held out the packet.

I shook my head and sniffed the air. Albie watched me like a fire spotter watching a pine forest. The sweet smell of marijuana hung on the air like a promise. Albie lit up and blew smoke around ostentatiously.

‘If you’re on a bust you’re wasting your time.’

‘Why?’

‘Protection,’ he blew a shaky smoke ring. ‘I’ve got protection. You check around, Slim, you’ll find out.’

I sat in a tired armchair. ‘I’m not on a bust. You can cut heroin with ground-down toenail for all I care. I want some information.’

‘Tough guy,’ he sneered.

‘Don’t push me,’ I said. ‘I’ve had a hard day in the suburbs. I might throw you off the balcony just to hear the glass break.’

It wasn’t much to say and didn’t look so hard to do. He was more like a jockey than a driver or a steward, not more than five two and the ball of muscle he’d once been was getting a coating of fat. Still, he could be right for those trades; drivers and stewards work in confined spaces and extra inches get in the way. His hair was thinning across a pink scalp and dark stubble was bristling on his pale cheeks — a night person who slept while the sun shone. I smoothed out the ten dollars.

‘You used to work for the Chattertons, driving.’

‘Right, no sweat there Slim. I left that job clean as a whistle.’

‘Who said you didn’t? Put your guilty conscience away, it craps me. Do you remember a tramp coming to see the old lady, a few years back?’

He drew the cigarette down to the filter and squashed it out in a saucer. ‘I remember him. What a wreck! You could have bottled his breath.’

‘What did he say to you?’

‘Not much. He wanted to see the lady.’

‘Why’d you give him a hearing?’

He scratched his jaw, remembering. ‘Well, it was like this. I was surprised to see a tramp up there. But that’s not all. He got out of a cab and I saw him flash some money. He told the cabbie to wait.’

‘Did the cab wait?’

‘You bet it did. He had a roll like this.’ He made a circle of his thumbs and forefingers. ‘Well, I’m stretching it a bit but he had some dough, I can tell you.’

‘What sort of cab was it?’

‘City.’

‘You’re very sure.’

‘Look, it was very unusual, I can see it like yesterday.’

‘Did you see the driver?’

‘I did, yeah.’

‘Remember him like yesterday?’

‘When do we start talking money? I think I can help if you’re trying to find that guy. That’s it isn’t it?’

‘That’s it. What’ve you got?’

‘Five’ll get you a whiff of it.’

I pulled out my wallet, peeled off five dollars and gave it to him.

‘Thanks.’ He put it under the pillow. ‘You asked the wrong question Slim.’

‘What question?’

‘Him. You shoulda said her.’

‘Who?’

‘The cabbie was a her — blonde, that’s all I saw.’

‘Good, go on!’

‘Well, like I said, he had money, new tens, I got one…’

‘So I heard, and…?’

He’d shot his bolt. He groped around for something to say. ‘Ah, let’s see, he talked pretty good — educated, you know? But the grog had got to his voice.’ He did a fair imitation of a meths drinker’s croak on the last words.

I was depressed by what I was doing and hearing. The room depressed me. I wanted to be eating and drinking somewhere light and airy with someone young and optimistic. It made me impatient that I didn’t know anyone like that.

‘You’ll be tap-dancing in a minute,’ I snarled. ‘Cut out the shit. Did he say anything important? Give you any idea where he lived?’