Читать книгу Priors - Stuart Jackson E. - Страница 7

The day was overcast, threatening rain. A wind blew up Bourke Street, carrying the sounds of the people in the mall. Up Russell Street, outside the cinema, there was group of boys and girls laughing and pushing. Ragged t-shirts and torn jeans, school bags with painted symbols. Closer to the intersection people stood and waited for a bus, outside the newsagency. A woman standing at the confectionery shop, looking at her watch. Waiting for someone. Something. Other corner looked clear. An elderly couple looking at the shoes in the shop window.

And diagonally opposite that, the fast food place. Hungry Jacks. People going in and out all the time, groups, couples, singles, all ages. And then down Russell Street, north, the collection of little shops and restaurants. Nothing out of the usual.

And, of course, everywhere the crowds. Coming and going. North to south and south to north. East to west and back again. Milling at the intersection waiting for the Walk signals to appear, gathering at the pedestrian island for the trams, clogging the pavements, blocking his view, dashing between cars, parked and moving, noisy, chattering, laughing, shouting, screaming, crying.

Bloody normal, really, he thought.

Barron took it all in, then reviewed the scene again. East up Bourke, panning to the right, south up Russell, west down Bourke towards the mall. A tram went clanging past, cutting out the other side of the road and there was a bit of shoving and pushing at Hungry Jacks. North along Russell and back along the pavement to where he stood outside the bookshop. He moved the plastic shopping bag from one hand to the other. Collins Booksellers emblazoned on both sides. He’d bought a copy of Stephen King’s latest paperback and it sat in the bag.

Where was she?

A flash of red out of the corner of his eye and he turned his head slowly. A teenage girl in a baggy red sweater, hand in hand with a tall boy, long straggly hair, worn jeans and bare feet.

He’d checked the files after he had spoken to Green. He opened the Notes files and searched for every reference to Christie. The image on the computer screen flashed between that of a hourglass and that of an electronic link between computers, while the search was done. He scanned through the resultant lengthy list of files with references to Christie, looking at the dates and the case titles. A few he thought worthy of extra checking and he opened them and flicked through the entries. Nothing. Back to the Christie list and another FIND option. In the Windows box he typed in “Turner, Kathy” and then KO. It searched and came back with the message NO RECORDS FOUND. Then “Kathy Turner”. Again, nothing. “Kathy” - nothing. “Turner” - NO RECORDS FOUND.

He specifically located the files on Barry Doyle and ran the same checks again.

NO RECORDS FOUND.

Kathy, but with a “c”.

NO RECORDS FOUND.

If she was who she said was, then her connection with Christie was unrecorded. That meant that she could be dangerous. Either way, he had to follow-up on the lead; he had to meet her - on her terms.

Barron checked the time.

She was ten minutes late.

Ten past one. She checked her watch. How much longer would he wait?

She wore a grey jumper, blue jeans and blue flat-soled shoes. She sat at the bench inside Hungry Jacks with the food in front of her. The wrapper from a hamburger that she had already eaten, and a packet of French fries, half empty. Cold. She sipped at the cold drink and watched the man through the window, directly across the road. Each time he moved his eyes around the intersection she was sure that as they swept across the window of the restaurant, that he would see her and race across the street to confront her. But that was silly. He wasn’t looking for her and didn’t know who Cathy Turner looked like. He was looking for a woman in a red skirt carrying a bag with a big “W” on it.

He was wearing a dark blue blazer and grey slacks and carrying the bookshop bag. There was a niggling thought at the back of her mind that she knew this man. Had seen him somewhere before. She pushed the thought away.

She stared at the man. Sergeant Green. She fixed his features into her memory. Closed her eyes and pictured him and opened them and checked the image. She watched him as he started to pace backwards and forwards, getting impatient, glancing at his watch more often now. The way he held himself, the deliberate steps he took, the practised way he took in everything around him. Yet, if she had not been expecting him, if she had not known who he was and what he would be wearing, she felt she might overlook him. Just another face in the crowd.

One thirty.

She’d finished her drink. She picked absently at the remaining chips. At a table behind her, a child spilled a drink and started crying and her mother shouted at her.

His watch again. For the fiftieth time.

He decided then. And moved.

He headed straight for her, not waiting for the Walk signal, weaving through the cars, walking straight to her. She lowered her head, picked at the French fries on the bench in front of her with her right hand, brought her left hand up and rested her forehead on it, hiding her face. She could sense him, only a metre or two away from her, and only separated by the sheet of glass. Her heart was pounding and her hand stopped, halfway to her mouth, chip dangling between fingers, which she was certain, were trembling. Were it not for the shop window she could have reached out and touched him. And he could have reached out and touched her.

But she realised that she was still taking in his image, storing it away. So close. A big man, bigger than she had estimated, now that he was closer. Tall. Six foot? Thin dusty hair and blue eyes. No beard or moustache and a tanned face. Looked to be in reasonable shape. He presented well in the blazer, white shirt and red and blue tie.

He turned to his left and she turned slowly to her right on the stool, following him across the face of the window, turning the corner and heading down Bourke Street. She stood and grabbed her denim shoulder bag. She walked out of the shop and followed him.

She knew this would be one of the hardest parts. This man was a trained policeman. They were used to following people, keeping them under surveillance and remaining unnoticed in the process. And, presumably, they used these same skills in reverse, to identify those who were following them.

She pulled back and let more people fill the space between them.

He reached Swanston Street and turned right and she quickened her step because as he turned the corner he went out of sight. She reached the corner. There were two youths there, one playing the saxophone, the other an electronic keyboard, two hats face up on the pavement in front of them, scattered with silver coins and a couple of five dollar notes. She saw Green and she stopped to listen to the music. She found a dollar coin to drop into one of the hats, giving Green time to stretch out some extra space between them. Then after him again, watching the blue bag swinging in his hand.

She followed him all the way to the AFP offices in La Trobe Street and watched him go inside.

She walked on down the street and then retraced her steps and found a place in front of a small office block that, according to the brass plates outside, housed doctors’ offices. There were cars parked on both sides of the street, but she could still see the entrance to the AFP building and she was almost opposite the entrance to the carpark that was under the building.

She pulled the cellular phone out of her bag and punched in the number.

*******

Barron was both annoyed and worried.

On the way back to his desk, he stopped at the coffee table, grabbed a mug and put a healthy sized spoon of coffee into it, added hot water from the urn and then sugar. He stirred it aimlessly, trying to make sense of what was happening.

All the signs were there - it could very easily unravel.

He desperately needed to tie up all the loose ends on this case with Christie. The woman called Turner was a loose end. He had no idea how she fitted in because there was nothing on file about her. That was dangerous. Like a loose cannon.

And she’d bloody stood him up! Dragged him to a rendezvous in the centre of the city and not turned up. Or had she? Was she there, watching him? Or was she merely the bait and there were others there, watching?

Christ. The edges were fraying. He didn’t need this.

Where was she?

“Dave?”

“Yeah?”

“You had a call, mate. Just missed her.”

“Her?”

“Sounded a bit of all right, too.”

“Anything in a skirt sounds all right to you,” Barron laughed.

“She left a message.”

“What?”

“Something about helping Gino tonight.”

“What?”

“Gino. Don’t you know a Gino?”

“No. Did she leave her name?”

“No. Said she thought you’d be here. And just to tell you about Gino.”

“Are you sure it was for me?”

“That’s what she said.”

“I have no idea what it’s about. Maybe it’s for Greenie. I’ll let him know when I get to Mornington.”

“When you going?”

“Later.”

Barron sat at his desk, switched on the computer, entered his password and checked his electronic mail.

*******

Ron Taylor was having a pretty good day and he’d also managed to stay in the inner city area. He’d just dropped his last passenger at an office in Burke Road, Camberwell and he was heading back towards the city along Toorak Road when the call came in.

“Call for you, Ron,” the dispatcher said. Sam had worked for the taxi company for almost ten years and Taylor knew him well.

“Okay.”

“A lady called Turner. Didn’t catch her first name. Said it was urgent and to call her back. Said you had her number.”

Turner? He was about to question the dispatcher when he remembered.

“Thanks, Sam. See ya.”

He passed through the traffic lights on Williams Road and stopped at the next phone booth he saw. Taylor was a big man - tall and broad across the shoulders. He wore light grey slacks and a light blue open-necked shirt. He walked with a spring in his step and carried himself erect, like a man who keeps fit, despite the years. His hair was black, cropped short, a few strands of grey at the front. His moustache, people told him, made him look like Tom Selleck. His eyes were clear and grey, but for those who bothered to know the man and to see deep into his eyes, they saw something of the pains of the past.

He’d written the number on a piece of paper and slipped it into his wallet. He pulled it out now and dialled the number. He straightened up his shirt and tucked it into his trousers. She answered immediately.

“Miss Turner?” he asked.

She could sense the smile in his voice.

“I’m on La Trobe Street.” She explained the location.

“I know it,” he said. “Ten minutes.” And he hung up.

*******

Taylor parked the taxi in a nearby parking spot and walked up to the small coffee shop she had told him about. She was sitting at a table at the window, sipping a cup of coffee and keeping her eyes on the building across the street.

“The place across the street,” she said as he pulled up a chair.

“Australian Federal Police,” he replied.

“He went in about twenty minutes ago.”

“You can recognise him?”

“Yes.”

“Through a car window?”

“Yes. But we don’t know if he has a car under the building.”

He nodded. “But if he has got a car there and he comes onto the street in it, can you identify him through the windscreen?”

“I think so. I can’t get much closer. Where are you parked?”

“There,” and he pointed. “I’ll wait there for you.” The street did not provide many places for parking and keeping an eye on the building without being seen from the building itself. The street itself was relatively quiet, with little traffic and few pedestrians. Taylor left the coffee shop and she ordered another coffee.

*******

They waited for almost ninety minutes. In that time she realised that if Green did come out in his car, that it would not be easy to identify him. There had been two cars emerge from the underground parking area and she had had to strain to clearly see the faces of the people in them.

He was driving a dark blue Nissan and had the driver’s window down as he waited for the stream of traffic on his right, so that he could turn into the street. She could see him clearly. He drove up the street away from where Taylor had parked his taxi and she hurried from the cafe.

“Blue car,” she said as she slid into the front seat beside Taylor. He already had the engine running.

“Nissan. Saw it. EWP 886.”

He pulled out into the stream of traffic and followed. The Nissan was already a block ahead and Taylor ran a red light to keep it in reach. She looked sideways at him and he said, “I have done this before, you know,” without taking his eyes from the road in front of them.

Green broke away from them at the next set of lights and there was nothing Taylor could do. He waited impatiently for the lights to change and then she saw him smile.

“What is it?”

“Bit of a bottleneck up ahead,” he said. A large removalist’s van was halfway across the road and had stopped the Nissan. “Take your time, buddy,” Taylor muttered. “Take your time.”

The traffic lights changed and the car in front stalled. Taylor hit the horn and the driver in front half-turned in his seat and gave him a sign with two upraised fingers. He re-started the car and they were on their way again.

The removalist’s van was still blocking the road and Taylor stopped in the line of traffic. There were six cars between his taxi and the blue Nissan. He always knew, when she had first explained this to him yesterday, that getting out of the city and keeping in contact with the car - all without drawing attention to themselves - would be the most difficult part of the operation. Traffic lights, policemen, pedestrians, traffic jams. Everything worked to make keeping the tail almost impossible. Professionals used multiple car teams. They couldn’t do that.

At Spencer Street Green turned left. There was more traffic now. Traffic lights at the end of Bourke and again at Collins. On their right the building that had once been the Railway Administration Offices and were now inner city luxury apartments. Ahead of them, at the Flinders Street intersection, the traffic was bunching up. Taylor knew he could lose Green here.

But they got through and they followed the Nissan across the Spencer Street Bridge over the Yarra. They continued down Clarendon Street and through South Melbourne and then south-west, under the bridge that had once carried the trains and which now carried the tram, and along Canterbury Road to St Kilda, then cutting easterly until they got onto St Kilda Road.

St Kilda Road became Brighton Road and then the Nepean Highway, heading south.

“Where’s he going?” she asked, and realised it was a silly question.

“South,” Taylor said, and turned to her and smiled quickly. “Patience,” he added. “Patience.”

He had to concentrate on the driving because the Nepean was awash with cars. It was busy at the best of times, but the traffic changed, slowed and then reached the maximum of 80, bunched and made it difficult for him to keep up with the Nissan. And lots of lights. And big trucks that blocked his view. He had visions of seeing Green on a side road as they sped by, trapped on the highway until the next exit.

After Mordialloc the nature of the Highway changed, narrower, running almost totally straight and flat, and only a block back from the Bay. They couldn’t see the water. The traffic had thinned out, but the changes in the road and flow still required Taylor to concentrate heavily.

They were silent as they drove along. He snatched glances at her and each time her eyes were staring ahead, her head moving slightly when the Nissan overtook another car and she temporarily lost sight of it. Her hands were clenched in her lap.

Two nights ago he’d asked her: “He’s important, is he? Christie?”

She ‘d looked at him, determination in her eyes and said, simply, “Yes. Very important.”

And he’d agreed to help her. He’d poured himself a scotch and they’d talked until two in the morning. Until they were happy with what had to be done.

They slowed down for the trip through Frankston, shops, pedestrians, slower traffic and then the Nissan turned left and joined the Frankston - Flinders Road. Mornington Peninsula, Taylor thought.

He’d balked at mention of the gun, but she’d insisted.

“There’s no other way,” she’d said, and he’d nodded.

The following day he’d spent an hour at home when he knew he was to be alone. He took the polished wooden box out of the locked cabinet in his study and sat in the garage to check the two pistols that the box held. Two Sig-Sauer P220s. They’d both originally been 7.65mm calibre pistols, but he’d converted both while in Vietnam to 9mm Parabellum. He stripped them down and checked the parts, and re-assembled them. He’d loaded both with nine round magazines. Then he’d wrapped both of them, together with two spare loaded magazines and one silencer, in a towel and into the small leather carry bag. He’d kept the bag under the front seat of the cab ever since. And it was there now.

They crossed the Mornington Peninsula Freeway and the amount of traffic dropped dramatically.

“This is going to be harder,” he said, watching the Nissan as the gap in front of him drew wider.

“You’ll lose him,” she said.

“It’s either that or alert him to the fact that he is being followed. Which do you want?” He knew it wasn’t a fair question. Quickly, he added, “I’ll try my best to keep him in sight, but I can’t get too close to him. He’ll ...”

“To the left! He’s turned off!”

“I see,” he said calmly.

He didn’t know the area too well. Names on the signposts were familiar - Somerville, Hastings, Balnarring - but he’d lost his sense of direction. Were they heading south still, or had Green doubled back somehow? Had he noticed the car behind him?

Overhead the clouds gathered, thick and black. On the horizon a narrow strip of light between clouds and the ground. It was getting dark.

And then they lost Green.

“He turned here, I know he did.”

“I saw him, too,” she said, frustration in her voice.

The road stretched out ahead of them, long, flat, and straight. Empty.

Taylor put his foot on the accelerator and sped down the road, slowing as the reached the first intersection. They both looked down it. Nothing. He sped on to the next one. Nothing. They could not make out where the next intersection was.

“If we can’t see it now, he couldn’t have got to it before we came onto this road.”

“Which means he turned off onto one of these two roads.”

“Which?”

They looked at each other and Taylor said, “The first one.”

She nodded and he turned the car. They’d lost maybe two minutes. He reached the intersection and turned. Again, nothing on the road in front of them. He accelerated.

“Got him,” Taylor said.

“What? Where?”

“Back there.”

He drove on, giving no sign of stopping.

“Where are you going? We’ve got to ...”

“It’s okay.”

Taylor turned at the next road and pulled over to one side.

“There was a driveway back there. My side of the road. There was a great line of trees alongside the road.”

“I remember it,” she said.

“There was a driveway in the middle of the line of trees and our Mr Green had driven in and was locking the gate that covered the driveway. Come on, we’ll drive back.” He turned the taxi. “I want you to study as much of the place as you can. We’ll only be able to drive past once. Any more and we could draw too much attention. Okay?”

“Okay.”

The line of trees was obvious alongside the road ahead of them. Thick, tall trees that also formed a boundary running a long way back from the road, until it merged into a large shed or garage on another, adjoining property. The trees were so closely together that it was impossible to see what was behind them. And nothing showed above them.

As they drove past the fence was clearer to see. It was metal mesh, maybe three metres high, topped with a line of barbed wire, and it was almost totally screened by the trees and bushes either side of it. The gates were shorter by maybe a metre and held together by a long and thick chain and heavy padlock. A simple metal plate to one side of the gate said DRUMMOYNE HOUSE, and Private Property. As they drove past, she turned and looked down the other boundary of the property. It was the same as the other side - thick high trees that gave away nothing.

“Well?”

“We’ve got nothing else to go on,” she answered.

“Then let’s try it tonight.”

Taylor re-traced some of their tracks, and then headed for Hastings, situated on the eastern side of the Peninsula and overlooking Westernport Bay. They walked along the foreshore and onto the jetty. There was lightning over French Island and beyond, and it was coming their way.

“Could be useful weather,” Taylor said. He sensed her tension; it wasn’t bad to be on edge. It got you thinking about things and made you more careful. He felt the knotted ball in his own stomach and the tightness across his shoulders. It reminded him of Vietnam; the waiting, the anticipation, the fear.

She felt a small drop of rain on her face and she wiped it away.

They walked back to the hotel and had a hot meal and Taylor tried to talk to her about other things.

At eleven o’clock they were travelling across the Peninsula again, heading west. On a long stretch of road, Taylor pulled the car off the road. He turned off all the lights and they got out. The wind gusted through the trees overhead and threw leaves across the face of the moon as it peeped through a narrow crack in the clouds. Behind them the long grass scuttled to and fro.

Then the moon was gone and the only light they had was that that came from the open boot of the taxi where Taylor had packed their change of clothes. Afterwards, Taylor drew the small leather bag from under the driver’s seat and beckoned her to join him at the bonnet of the car. He handed her one of the pistols. In the dim light he watched her eject the magazine and check the action and then slide the magazine back in. She weighed it in her hand, nearly a kilo in weight. He smiled and handed her the spare magazine. She slid the first cartridge out, and the second, and then re-loaded them. She stuffed the magazine into the pocket of her jeans.

“Silencer?” he asked.

“You,” she said.

It started to rain. A short sharp crack of thunder made her jump.

They got back into the car and waited.

*******

“And what’s Barry Doyle’s wife’s name?”

“Gloria.”

“You know that.”

He nodded.

“Did you talk to her?”

“Yes.”

“When.”

“I don’t remember the time.”

“How can you remember Barry’s ...”

“Hold on. What did you talk to Gloria about?”

“About Barry.”

“About his suicide?”

“No.”

“About his time in Tasmania?”

“Yes.”

“This is bloody painful,” Green said to Barron in a lowered voice, but one which, Green knew, Christie could hear.

Christie sat in the wooden chair, dressed in jeans and casual shirt, his arms resting on the table. He watched both Barron and Green across the table from him and Barron looked into Christie’s eyes to see if there was recognition. Can you see a memory? he thought.

They’d been going for almost two hours. They’d asked Christie the same questions that they’d asked him yesterday and they kept asking them. He looked at them with virtually no emotion on his face and he answered the questions with as few words as he could, calmly. At times, Barron saw, he would furrow his brow, as if a word or a question had matched with something in his mind. At those times there was recognition, and Barron’s pulse would quicken. A chance to see around a barrier in Christie’s mind.

Barron never knew what he was likely to say.

The doctor had been quite specific - no guarantee of success, no time period that fell due, and, if the memories did start to return, no indication whatsoever as to how it would happen. Perhaps a chance word or name, perhaps an image, a sound or a touch would be enough to trigger the process. And the memories may come back totally, or in part, or in a random sequence.

Christ, it was like sitting on a time bomb. Each talk with him was like exposing the fuse and lighting it. Would it go off this time? What would happen?

“Hunt,” Barron said.

Christie looked at him, puzzled.

“What?”

“Hunt. Dennis Hunt. Do you remember him?”

“From Tasmania?”

And every now and again some question that seemed to suggest that there was something ticking away down there. The logic, the associations, the way you thought that perhaps you never forgot.

“Yes. He was a friend of Barry’s. He was killed in a traffic accident.”

“No.”

“Fuck you, you bastard!” Green shouted and slammed his fist onto the table. Both Barron and Christie jumped. “You don’t fool me with this stupid act! All we want to know is why the hell you killed ... why you butchered that woman!”

“Geoff!” Barron said, reaching out across the table to grab Green’s arm.

“You sick prick!” Green spat, and he was on his feet, wrenching his arm free of Barron’s grasp, knocking the chair to the floor behind him. He took three long and quick steps that brought him around the table and as Christie was getting to his feet, he grabbed Christie by the front of his shirt and hoisted him upwards.

“Geoff!”

Barron saw no fear in Christie’s eyes, and his arms moved quickly, to try and block Green’s move, but he was too slow. He lunged across the table at them, but Green pulled Christie towards the wall of the room.

Christie seemed to gather his thoughts and he swung round with a clenched fist and caught Green on the side of the face. Instead of stopping him, he roared louder and slammed Christie’s back into the wall. Barron could hear the breath forced out of his body.

“You murdering bastard,” Green screamed, punching Christie in the stomach and bringing an elbow down the side of Christie’s face as he doubled over in pain. Barron ran round the table and caught Green’s left hand before he was able to hit Christie again.

“Stop it, Geoff! Enough!”

“Let go! This cunt doesn’t deserve ...” and he pulled free and used the momentum of the move to slam his fist into Christie’s face and bang his head into the wall. Before Christie could move Green was in close, raining blows into his stomach and the side of his body, then one quick step back, bringing the elbow up into Christie’s face, a punch swinging from the left followed by another from the right. Blood, from a cut above one eye, spat across the wall as Christie’s head was twisted first one way and then another. Green was caught up in the moment. Christie screamed, but Green hit in the mouth again and the scream died.

Christie’s legs buckled and his head slumped forward on his chest and his body slid down the wall. Blood was running from his nose and a cut on the side of his mouth.

Green continued to rain punches on him as he drifted down to the floor. Christie’s shirt was splattered red with his blood. He screamed again as a blow from Green caught him above the kidneys. Christie reached the floor and Green kicked him.

“What’s going on?” a voice shouted from outside the room.

Green looked quickly over his shoulder and kicked Christie again.

A loud knock at the door.

Barron grabbed Green and pulled him back, stumbling as he squirmed to free himself and they bumped into the table. The door slammed open and Malone ran into the room.

“What the hell is going on?” he shouted.

Barron gained his balance, shook free one arm and slapped Green once, across the face and Green was suddenly still.

“What the hell did you do that ...”

“Shut up!”

“My God,” Malone was saying.

“But, you can’t ...”

“Shut up, damn it!”

Green looked into Barron’s face with surprise, his arms dangled by his side, fists clenched. He was sullen and quiet.

“Geoff?” Malone said.

“You shut up too,” Barron snapped at Malone. And to Green, “Get out of this room. Go downstairs. Wait for me there.”

Green looked like he was going to say something. His chest heaved and he sighed, audibly. He turned and left the room, leaving the door wide open.

“You go with him,” Barron said to Malone.

“But ...”

“Do it. I’ll be okay.”

“And Christie?”

“I’ll take care of him. Go after him.”

Malone looked at Christie lying still on the floor and then back to Barron.

“Do I have to order you?”

“No. I’m gone,” Malone said.

Barron stared after him for a while and then turned to Christie. He squatted beside him and slowly helped him to his feet and then held him there, pinning him to the wall so that he would not fall again. He brought his face in close to Christie’s.

“I should have let him kill you,” Barron said quietly. He stared into Christie’s eyes, hardly three inches from his own. “I don’t care if you never speak again. Don’t care if you never know who I am or who you are. We’ve got enough to put you away for a long, long time.” Christie looked at Barron and brought one hand up to touch the cut near his eye. “But I think that’s too good for you, James Christie. Just give me an opportunity, just one, and I’ll make sure you never get to court.”

Christie’s head lolled forward and Barron grabbed his hair and yanked his head up.

“Hear me, you fucker!” he hissed. “You mutilated that woman and you deserve only one thing - to go in exactly the same way.”

Christie looked at Barron. His tongue licked at the blood on his lips and as Barron let him go he slid back to the floor and stayed there.