Peter Temple: Dead Point

I opened the paper at the page. The first item in a single-column collection of briefs had the headline: Body in garage.

The story said: A man was yesterday found dead in a car in a garage in Rintail Street, Abbotsford. Police identified him as Robert Gregory Colburne, 26, a casual barman.

The story went on to say that police were treating the death as accidental but were keen to talk to anyone who had seen Colburne recently.

‘There endeth the lesson,’ said Wootton, cold as the widow’s lips. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have matters to attend to. People depend upon my understanding the concept of urgency.’

I saw no reason to prolong this encounter or to say goodbye. Time would heal. Or not. At the door, turning the big fluted brass knob, I heard Wootton clear his throat.

‘In his own vehicle,’ he said, ‘in his own garage.’

I continued on my way. As I passed Mrs Davenport in the anteroom, her nostrils contracted fractionally. ‘This has been prepared for you, Mr Irish,’ she said.

I stopped. She held out a hand, pearl-coloured nails, perfect ovals, and young hands, hands far too young. What secrets had this woman learned during her long stint in the pay of a specialist in sexually transmitted diseases? I shuddered inwardly, took the envelope she was offering and left the premises.

On the tram, enjoying the presence of a few teenage drug dealers heading for Fitzroy, I opened Mrs Davenport’s envelope: a cheque for three days’ work at the usual rate.

Out loud, I said, ‘Cyril, oh Cyril.’

One of the adolescent drugporteurs not on his mobile heard my utterance, misunderstood completely, turned, made the selling signal.

I gave him the look and the continental flicking fuck-off sign. Although he was probably untravelled, he got the message.

As I had received Cyril Wootton’s message. That he behaved honourably even when I did not.

Detective Sergeant Warren Bowman had the good-humoured manner of a man in sales, not any old sales, specialised sales, motor spares or plumbing supplies or bearings, some secure line of work where the pros know stock numbers off by heart and the customers expect them to say things like ‘Almost got me there, mate’ and ‘We have the technology’.

‘They’re sayin it’s an ordinary OD,’ he said.

We were sitting in the Studebaker Lark just off St Kilda Road, the day turned irritable, periods of sunshine, sudden snarls of rain. Detective Sergeant Bowman was speaking to me courtesy of another policeman, Senior Sergeant Barry Tregear, someone I’d known since I was a boy sent to fight abroad for my country. At the request of some other country, the way it had always been for Australia.

‘Family doesn’t want to know that,’ I said, lying.

Warren turned his long head and appraised me. He had bushy black eyebrows that he brought together and parted: quick, slow, slow, quick, an eyebrow Morse code.

‘Yeah, well, not always your best judge,’ he said, dot, dot, dash. ‘The family.’

‘No. Funny place to OD.’

Dot, dash. ‘Well, they don’t set out to OD.’

‘Shooting up in his garage? Be more comfortable in his unit.’

Dash, dot. ‘No knowin. It’s like suicide. Go a long way, some of em. Mountains, some, they like to go to high places. But there’s others want to creep away. Toppin’s a bit like hide and seek, know what I mean? Some kids always go for the wardrobe.’

Expertise in dark matters. Warren knew these stock numbers.

A couple walked by, young, handsome in black clothing, arguing, heads flicking, spurts of words. He stopped, she stopped, he raised a hand, inquiring. She knocked it away in contempt, walked. The man waited for a few seconds, turned and came back towards us, jaw moving, small chewing movements.

‘He’s bin screwin around,’ said Warren. ‘Some blokes got no idea when they’re lucky.’ There was a stain of resentment on his tone.

‘So Robbie went into his garage, locked the door, got into his car, shot up, that’s it?’

He nodded.

‘The fit’s there?’

A nod.

‘Tracks?’

‘Yeah. User.’

‘User ODs alone in his Porsche parked in his garage. That would be unusual, wouldn’t it?’

Warren shifted in his seat, looked at me, dash, dot, dash, took his lower lip between thumb and forefinger, gave it a tug. ‘I’m in the box here, am I?’

You forget that people are doing you a favour, at some risk to their careers.

‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘Get carried away.’

He kept looking at me, a long dash.

The angry young woman in black was coming back, in a hurry, full of regret, hoping to catch the man. Her calf-length coat was unbuttoned and it flapped open at every stride, long legs flashing, pale legs.

‘Jesus, women,’ said Warren, tone pure resentment now. ‘Fucking looks, all the bastard’s got is looks.’

‘For some things,’ I said, ‘all you need is looks. The key to the garage, he have that on him?’

He said nothing.

I looked upon the empty winter street, trees penand-ink lines against the sky, first hint of closure now, the imperceptible dimming of the light that some part of the cortex recognises.

Nothing more to be gained from this encounter. I said my thanks. Warren didn’t seem eager to leave the comfort of the old, squat American V-8 beast.

I said, ‘Warren, Robbie, any form?’

He shook his head.

‘A person of interest?’

He didn’t congratulate me on my intelligence, opened his door. ‘Thought you’d never ask,’ he said. ‘As I understand it, definitely. The car that attended, they called in, next thing two drug squad heavies are there, the uniform boys are back on the road.’

I said, ‘I’m not cross-examining here but are you still saying they actually believe this bloke’s an OD?’

Warren turned to me, a shrug, his eyebrows went dot, dash, dot, dash above the friendly salesman’s eyes. ‘Believe?’ he said. ‘I dunno what they believe. Believe in a Big Mac and large fries. They say there’s nothin says anythin else. What they believe I haven’t got a clue, mate.’

‘Any chance of a snap of the bloke?’ Cyril didn’t have one.

He sighed. ‘I’ll see. Duty calls. Cheers.’

I watched him go. He crossed the street, walked down some distance, crossed back and went to his car. He didn’t drive off immediately, waited a while. A cautious man. Still, there was every reason to be cautious if the drug squad was involved in the matter of Robbie Colburne.

The Prince of Prussia was busy for a Thursday evening, any evening, at least twelve customers. To the left of the street door, a table of young people in black and shades of grey lowered the average age of the patrons by about 25 years. As I came in the person nearest to me, a cropped-haired blonde, said, ‘I mean, he’s too exhausted for sex and then I get up to pee, it’s like 2.30 a.m., he’s on the net perving at this bondage porn. Extreme bondage. It’s his net-pal in Canada tied up like a salami. How gross is that?’

‘Well, the net’s essentially a passive medium,’ said the woman next to her.

‘This was active,’ said the blonde. ‘He was interacting. I know interacting when I see it.’

I didn’t move, looked around the room. The Fitzroy Youth Club were in position at the far end of the bar, within easy reach of the door marked GENTS.

At the black and grey table, a shaven-headed man, scalp the colour of the underside of an old tortoise, said, ‘I can tell you guys worse.’

I couldn’t go without knowing worse, couldn’t move.

‘I had this partner,’ said the man, fat finger pushing at his round dark glasses, ‘he comes home, he’s faceless, right, he’s with this Arab taxi driver and he goes: “Meet Ahmed or whatever, he’s your co-driver for the night.”’