Peter Temple - Dead Point

‘I’ve said that. Can’t say it any better.’ No Irish charm in the tone now.

‘And the thirteen calls?’

He held up his hands. ‘I’ve told you, they’re business phones, lots of people use them, a dozen or more.’

‘So someone else in the business would know him?’

‘Possibly. Or they might be bloody nuisance calls, man might be sellin somethin, who knows? And you haven’t answered the question. Who is the fella?’

‘Don’t know. Friend of Robbie’s perhaps.’

‘The picture. Where’d you get that?’

‘Someone sent it to me,’ I said, standing up. ‘I won’t waste any more of your time. Wonderful coffee. And the biscuits.’

Doyle didn’t rise. ‘And the calls,’ he said. ‘Where’d you get that from?’

‘They sent me his phone bill with the picture.’

‘So you do know his name?’

‘It was a photocopy. No name on the pages.’

Doyle stood up. I had the sense that he was composing himself. He smiled the Irish boyo smile. ‘Well Jack,’ he said, ‘it’ll be hard for me to find out who he spoke to if I don’t know his name. Would y’like to leave the photo? I can show it around?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m pretty much done with this matter.’ I took a chance. ‘Robbie did more than work in Down the Pub, didn’t he?’

A moment’s uncertainty, the hint of a smile. ‘More?’ Pause. ‘He had a few shifts in the Snug, if that’s what you mean?’

I couldn’t show my ignorance, nodded. ‘Yes. Who would he serve? In the Snug?’

‘It’s admittance by invitation. Our special guests, people…’ He realised I was fishing. ‘Well, if that’s all,’ he said. ‘Always happy to try to help.’

Doyle escorted me to the door into Down the Pub and said goodbye without shaking hands, no more invitations to share in the life of the pub, drink the pinot, cook from the cookbook, no more pats or jovial remarks.

Driving back, I thought about my handling of the interview. Not good. But I was sure of one thing now: Xavier Doyle could tell me lots more about Robbie/Marco. Perhaps he could even tell me how the Federal Police knew about my dealings with Mr Justice Loder. At the first lights, I got out my list of things to do, found the address and set course.

Alan Bergh had also made five calls to a mobile registered to a Kirstin Deane, whose work address was a women’s clothing shop called Anouk in Greville Street, Prahran.

The narrow street was busy, a fashionable crowd on this side of the river, blonded women everywhere, tanned and tucked, fat sucked away and burnt off, eyeing themselves in shop windows, looking at younger specimens with hatred. I lucked on a park in Anouk’s block, slid the old Stud in between an Audi and a Mercedes four-wheel drive.

Anouk’s was not overstocked with merchandise. The window display was one dress, a mere twirl of fabric, barely enough to clothe six foot of lamp pole. Inside, two more garments were on display, a cloak-like creation of black velvet, and something that resembled a silk apron. Surely this could only be worn over clothing or in the privacy of the home? Against the left-hand wall, box shelves each held one item, shirts perhaps or cashmere sweaters.

A young woman was on the telephone, seated behind a minimalist counter, no more than three pieces of thick plexiglass on which stood several electronic devices. She was mostly leg, skeletal, high cheekbones, much forehead under much hair, and her eyes and eyebrows and mouth were works of art.

I waited. Her eyes were fixed on a mirror across the room and never moved in my direction. She was talking without pause in a flat, grating monotone, words seemingly joined and undecipherable. After a while, I got between her and the mirror, blocked her view of herself.

Then she looked at me. She said a few words to the phone and put it down.

‘Help you,’ she said, not a question.

‘I’m looking for Kirstin Deane.’

‘Yeah.’

She knew I wasn’t in the market for a silk apron or anything else she was selling. This was not going to be easy.

‘It’s about someone you know. Alan Bergh.’

Silence. She looked at the street.

‘Alan Bergh. You know him.’

Her head jerked back. ‘I don’t know him.’

‘He’s dead,’ I said. ‘Shot dead. In a carpark. Know that?’

Kirstin frowned, pulled her eyebrow creations together, a little untidiness of skin appearing between them, an imperfection on a face as tight as a kite in a high wind.

‘I’ve had it with you lot,’ she said.

‘He phoned you often,’ I said. ‘Your dead friend Alan.’

She took a deep breath, she still had lung capacity, her emaciated upper body expanded, she opened her mouth and breathed out like a steam train.

‘Not my fucking friend,’ she said, some life in the voice now. ‘I said I don’t know who the fuck Alan is. I’m the messenger girl. And I don’t wanna know any more of this cop shit, right? Right? I’m finished with Mick, wish I’d never seen the prick in my life and I’ll kill him if he ever-’

I held up my right hand. ‘Settle down.’

Kirstin’s eyes vanished, became slits. ‘Don’t you fucking tell me to settle down, I’ll-’

‘Taking messages can get you into deep trouble,’ I said, now a kite myself, out on the winds. ‘When someone says he doesn’t know about the messages, never got a message from you, you’re in trouble. Who’d you give the messages to, Kirstin?’

She closed her eyes, punched the plastic counter top repeatedly with both long-fingered fists, symbolically beating someone. ‘Tell Olsen I’ll kill him. He’s not landing me with his shit. You people, you call yourselves ethics squad or fucking whatever, you’re trying to cover something up for the cunt, aren’t you. Well, forget that, detective whatever the fuck you are. Whofuckingever. Piss off.’

I did, left without a murmur, like a poor person given too much money by a bank machine.

A name. Mick Olsen. A cop called Mick Olsen.

Alan Bergh left messages for Mick Olsen with the engaging Kirstin Deane, super-salesperson. Who thought I was from ethical standards or whatever name it now had, the old police internal affairs section, the dog investigating its own balls someone once said of it, unkindly.

I would have to ask Senior Sergeant Barry Tregear about Mick Olsen.

At the office, the answering machine held three messages: my sister, curt but with a hint of forgiveness, Cam, equally brief but with no hint of anything, and one that said:

Re your accommodation inquiry, please ring at your convenience.

The D.J. Olivier code.

I went to the window. McCoy was at home, lights on in the alleged studio. I crossed the street and knocked. He came to the door wearing a knitted blanket with a hole for his head. Beneath it, his massive legs were bare save for their covering of beard-like hair and his feet looked like parcels badly wrapped with lengths of horse harness.

‘So,’ he said. ‘Don’t think I didn’t see you spying on me yesterday.’

‘Watching that innocent young thing enter this house of horrors,’ I said, ‘I considered calling the police. I need your phone.’

‘She wanted to learn from a master’s hand,’ he said, leading the way into the studio.

‘No chance of that here.’

I stopped at an unfinished canvas of monumental size and awfulness. ‘What an inspired way to recycle fowl manure and horse hair,’ I said.

‘That’ll fetch ten grand,’ said McCoy. ‘Gissa name for it.’

‘Stick some chicken bones on it and call it Century of Bones.’

‘Century of Bones,’ said the hulking fraud approvingly. ‘Gotta ring to that. Century of Bones. You can have the call on the house.’