Alex Palmer - The Labyrinth of Drowning

‘Eddie set me up,’ Harrigan said.

‘If they were coming after you, why shoot him?’

‘I guess he’d proved he was unreliable. Probably it was two birds with one stone.’

‘Why were you meeting Eddie Grippo in the first place?’ Clive asked.

‘He’s an informant. I’d asked him to keep his ear to the ground for me. I wanted to know if any of the Ponticellis were coming after me or my family. He rang to say he had some information and we set up a meet.’

‘Did they really want to kill you?’ one of the police officers asked. ‘Why not shoot straightaway, the way they did Eddie?’

‘It happened pretty quickly,’ Harrigan said. ‘It’s true they didn’t fire at me immediately. But I wasn’t where they were expecting me to be and I had my gun out. Maybe this was a snatch, I don’t know. I certainly think they’d planned on killing me in the long run.’

‘Why did you have your gun out?’

‘Eddie lost his nerve. I knew something was going down. I’d only just taken it out.’

The two police officers glanced at each other, then Clive, and kept on. Harrigan knew that they needed to act on this intelligence as soon as possible. The gunman who’d got away would already have told the Ponticellis that the hit had failed. Eddie had been sent to keep him talking until the boys turned up. They already knew Eddie was unreliable and good at playing both sides against each other. If there was any chance he’d spilled his guts to Harrigan, they wouldn’t wait around. They’d go undercover as soon as possible. Yet there was nothing in this police interview that suggested any kind of urgency. The opposite: there was frustration in the officers’ expressions; suppressed anger and tension between them and Orion. Harrigan decided it was time to talk about Griffin some more.

‘He’s a player, an important one. You need to investigate him at depth.’

There was no response, just a nod, a quick glance between the interviewing officers, then onto another subject.

‘I think we should talk about him some more,’ Harrigan persisted.

‘Later,’ Clive said from the sidelines.

‘No, he’s important.’

‘No one will say another word about Joel Griffin as of now,’ Clive ordered.

Stymied, all three of them. The hands-off order Clive had slapped on him was in play for the police as well. In the past, Harrigan had encountered these directives himself. There was nothing you could do but wait until they were lifted.

At least the police thanked him for what he had to tell them. Once they’d finished, Clive cleared the room of everyone except himself and the third man who still hadn’t told Harrigan his name.

‘What were you doing here today?’ Clive asked.

‘You just heard me tell those two officers. Why were you here?’

‘Our operatives were following Mick Brasi. They weren’t expecting to find you here. I’ve already told you, I don’t want a wild card involving himself in a very delicately balanced operation.’

‘Why would I have any reason to believe that my meeting with Eddie Grippo could have anything to do with your operation?’ Harrigan asked.

‘I thought I’d given you the message loud and clear. Whatever private investigations you’re involved in, you are to stop immediately.’

‘I asked you before. Where’s my wife?’

‘I’ve told you. Working. What has she told you about this?’

‘Nothing,’ Harrigan said, and, on seeing the unguarded satisfaction on Clive’s face, successfully hid the intense anger he felt. Years of practice came to his aid.

‘I’m asking you to go home and wait until she comes home this evening. If you don’t do that, I’ll arrest you.’

‘For what?’

‘Obstructing an Orion operation. If pursued, it carries a maximum sentence of seven years.’

‘You could tell me what’s going on so I know Grace is safe,’ Harrigan said. ‘What about doing that? Wouldn’t that solve a lot of problems? It would take a lot of pressure off her.’

‘You’re not in a position to be told classified information.’

‘I’ve got a top-secret security clearance. You gave it to me. If I, my wife or my daughter or my son are in any danger, then don’t we have a right to information that could assist us in protecting ourselves?’

‘ We’re protecting you. You don’t need to do anything.’

‘You’ve just told the police the same thing, haven’t you? You’ve told them not to act on the information I’ve given them until you give the all clear. Why? What are you waiting for? That directive could seriously undermine their operation.’

‘If you say another word, I’ll arrest you. This interview is over.’

Harrigan looked him in the eyes. You cheap little tyrant . Hopefully the message got across unspoken.

‘See you, mate,’ he said, and walked out without looking back.

Outside in his car, he asked himself what he was doing. Would it make things worse or better if he went ahead with his check of Amelie Santos’s surgery? He didn’t trust Clive. It was too powerful a feeling to be ignored. He didn’t trust Clive and he didn’t trust him with Grace’s safety. His instinct told him to rely on himself. He couldn’t sit home and wait, wondering what might be happening to her; if he did, he would go mad. He’d always had to know the worst of what was on offer. Find it out, look it in the face. It was the only way to deal with it.

He drove away, too deep in his thoughts to do more than pay just enough attention to the traffic, making the long trip to northern Sydney.

Narelle had a better gift for subterfuge than Grace had expected. Perhaps it excited her. Dressed in a dark blue, mass market tracksuit with the hood up, she appeared anonymously from the entrance to the mall and slipped into the passenger seat beside Grace.

‘Leave your hood up,’ Grace said, and pulled away quickly.

Narelle fastened her seatbelt. She was carrying a small leather bag. She took a packet of cigarettes out of it and lit one.

‘Put that out!’

Narelle ignored her, an expression of untroubled bliss on her face as she stared straight ahead. Grace brought the car to a halt, reached over, snatched the cigarette out of her mouth and threw it away.

‘Keep smoking and you can get out and walk! Do you understand that?’

With a sudden violence, Narelle opened the door and threw her cigarettes out, then slammed the door shut again, hard and angrily. Grace restarted the car and drove on.

‘What did you tell your parents about what you were doing?’ she asked.

Narelle didn’t reply. She was sulking.

‘You have to answer my question, Narelle. I need to know what you’ve told your parents.’

Narelle shrugged and curled up in her seat, staring out of the window.

‘A question you really have to answer. Did you bring your ID with you?’

‘It’s in the bag.’

‘What about your phone?’

‘I left it behind! Like you wanted. I brought my iPod.’

‘Fine.’ At least they wouldn’t have to talk to each other.

They drove in silence. Grace took them out onto the feeder roads heading north across the western part of Sydney. She was under a communications blackout but every word spoken in the car was being listened to. The phone was for emergency use only. After a while, Narelle pushed her hood back and shook out her glossy black hair. She had made up her face, again replicating the look of Gong Li. Grace wondered if she’d put on special underwear before she’d dressed herself in her tracksuit. She thought about asking her to put her hood back up and decided not to bother.

‘When are we going to get there?’ Narelle asked.