Murder Song (36 page)

“This afternoon,” he promised. “When I've got my strength back.”

She smiled lazily, satisfied to wait, and went back to her paper. Then she looked at him again over the top of it. “You see this? Those killings you covered, they say they're a hit list.”

“It's a beat-up.” He wondered what she would say if he told her the truth, gave her the other two names to complete the list. But he couldn't do that to her. “You know what the print boys are like, they've got to fill their pages, especially on Sundays. We've heard nothing at the channel.”

She wriggled her shoulders in a mock shiver. “I hate it whenever I read about
real
murder. It's all right in detective novels, it's, I dunno, somehow removed from you—”

“Turn to the social pages. See if the usual free-loaders have got their photos in the news again.”

After lunch he rang Nick Katzka at Channel 15; the news editor worked every second weekend. “Am I on stand-by today?”

“No, you're free, Col. There are the usual weekend press releases by the pollies, nothing of any interest to anybody—I dunno why they bother. There's some good overseas items—a train wreck in
Holland,
a tornado in the States—some nice disaster stuff. See you tomorrow morning.”

“What's on the list for tomorrow?”

“There's the funeral of that singer, what's-her-name, Mardi Jack—there should be some show business faces there. Then there is the funeral of that last cop who was shot, Knoble. They're both being buried out at Botany cemetery. You can cover them both and we'll run „em in the same item.”

He felt that touch of excitement again, the matador's thrill as the bull's horns graze past his belly. “Okay, I'll do those. Anything else?”

“Not at the moment. Oh, wait a minute. There was a cop up here this morning asking about you, a Sergeant Clements from Homicide. What've you been up to? He wanted to know your history, whether you volunteered for certain shifts—”

He looked at his hand holding the phone; the knuckles were white. “Did he ask you not to tell me he was making enquiries?”

“Well, yeah, he did. But you work for us, not them. He wasn't prepared to be specific about anything, so I brushed him off—he got me just as I was getting down to work—”

“Thanks, Nick. It's personal. I lost my temper on a job a week or two ago and said something I shouldn't have.” The lie came smoothly, as if he had rehearsed it. Perhaps he had, subconsciously. He had known that some day, inevitably, there would be questions: from the police or Julie or from that God who, Aunt Elsie had told him, would always be waiting with the final query. “He's probably decided to do something official about it. You know cops, they can be pretty touchy about us in the media.”

He hung up, stood motionless while his mind settled. He had sounded cool enough on the phone; but now he felt shaken and unsteady. For some time he had known there was the possibility of his being discovered; he also knew the thin line that divided possibility from probability. Fate was supposed to laugh at probability, but Fate always had the last laugh anyway. He had just not expected the net to be thrown so soon. Clements might already be on his way here. Nick Katzka might have to feature his chief cameraman as the lead item on tonight's six o'clock news.

He looked about the living-room where he stood. Julie had made a good home for him here. It
was
more than just a comfortable stop-over to somewhere better, though they dreamed of a house and a garden and a pool that they would not have to share with others. He earned $45,000 a year with shift work and overtime and Julie earned $23,000; their mortgage was manageable, they had no other major debt, they owned two cars and every year they could afford a holiday on the Barrier Reef or to Fiji or New Zealand. It was a lot to give up and, for the first time, he wondered if his urge for vengeance had been worth it. But then, of course, when he had first drawn up the hit list there had been no thought that he would ever be caught. That had only come later when the momentum of his excitement had taken hold of him.

He went into the bedroom where Julie was taking a shower. He looked at her vague shape through the frosted glass; he hoped she would never become as shadowy as that in his memory. Suddenly he was angry with himself: he had sacrificed too much for stupid revenge! But it was too late.

He slid back the door of the shower as she turned off the water. “I have to go on a job, up the bush. I'll be away for a couple of days.”

“Oh damn!” She stood glistening and dripping, her body still faintly tanned from last summer; her dark hair, cut short, lay flat and wet on her well-shaped head like a boy's. She had never looked more desirable, he thought with great sadness. “I thought we could've gone to a movie and then come home and . . .”

He put his arms round her and lifted her out of the shower and kissed her fiercely. Then he let her go. “No, don't let's get started again . . . I've got to be at the channel in half an hour.”

“Where are you going?”

It was harder to lie to her now, but he managed to grab a town out of the air: “Boggabilla. There's been another Aboriginal riot.” Blame the Abos for anything: they were always good for a story, even to one's wife. “I'll be back tomorrow night, Tuesday at the latest.”

She wrapped a terry-towelling gown round her. “I'll pack for you. What do you want?”

A flak jacket, a getaway jet, 50,000 dollars . . . “A couple of shirts, underwear, my blue sweater and my corduroys. I'll wear my jeans and my anorak. Do you have any money?”

“
About seventy or eighty dollars, I think.”

“Lend it to me. I'll draw some more on my bank card.”

“Why do you need so much? You'll be on expenses, won't you?”

He had slipped up; he was finding it harder and harder to lie to her. He wanted to spill out the truth to her; but there was still the faint hope deep within him that she might never need to know. She was the one thing in the world he wanted to protect, “Sure, you're right. Hurry up and pack, will you?”

When she had gone out of the bathroom he looked at himself in the mirror. The beard would have to go. He had worn it now for ten years; he would be another man without it. It had not been grown as a disguise; now, he realized, he would be disguised without it. He took out his razor, shaving brush, trimming scissors and put them in his toilet kit. Then he looked in the mirror again and said goodbye to Colin Malloy.

Ten minutes later he said goodbye to Julie at the front door. He tried to make it as casual as possible, as just a repeat of dozens of other farewells he had made when he had left for trips out of town. She was still wearing only the terry-towelling robe, but he did not attempt to feel beneath it. He was saying goodbye to more than her sex.

“Be careful,” she said and it seemed to him that she had never before said that to him. Or was his ear too imaginative?

He kissed her, tasting her, storing up another memory. “Don't let any strange men in while I'm away.”

Carrying his camera equipment and the telescope, he went down to the garage. He put the camera gear and the telescope in the back of the Nissan Patrol, then he unlocked the steel box bolted to the garage floor. He took out the gun-case and three packets of ammunition; he looked at the three remaining boxes and decided to leave them where they were. He was not planning any siege, with himself either inside or outside the circle.

He backed the Nissan out of the garage, paused at the end of the short driveway and looked up at the flat on the sixth floor. Julie was on the verandah; she waved to him and blew him a kiss. He drove
away
up the quiet suburban street, feeling sick and sad, something he had never been prepared for. Except, of course, for that day twenty-three years ago when he had walked out of the police academy. But then he had been as angry as he had been sick and sad.

IV

Malone and Clements stood on either side of the flat's front door. In answer to the ringing of the bell, the door was opened. Julie Malloy, in sweater and slacks, stood behind the security grille door.

Malone turned side on, held his Smith & Wesson .38 out of sight. “I'm Inspector Malone, this is Sergeant Clements.” He held up his badge. “Is your husband home, Mrs. Malloy?”

Julie shook her head. “No, he's not home. What do you want?”

“Just to talk to your husband. Where is he?”

“He left this afternoon for Boggabilla. He's gone up there on a job.”

“May we come in and use your phone, Mrs. Malloy?”

She hesitated, then she opened the security door. “I don't like being on my own, but it happens a lot, my husband working the hours he does—”

“My wife feels the same way,” said Malone sympathetically.

In the living room Julie had crossed to switch off the television set in one corner. “I always look at the SBS world news. Channel 15 would fire Colin if they knew it's one of his favourite programmes, too.” She looked more closely at Malone. “We met the other night, but I recognize you now. My husband has filmed you a couple of times. I always remember his clips in the news. Family pride, I suppose,” she said with a pleasant smile. “There's the phone.”

Malone glanced at Clements. “Go out and tell the fellers to go back to their vehicles, Russ. Tell „em to wait.”

Clements paused at the door. “Mrs. Malloy, what sort of car would your husband be driving?”

“He'd have driven our Nissan Patrol up to the channel. But from there they'd have gone in one of the news trucks.” She frowned, all at once looked worried and irritated. “What's going on? What other
men
outside? What are they doing there?”

Clements ignored the question. “Where does he keep the Nissan?”

“Down in our garage, Number 11. What
is
this, for God's sake?”

Malone said, “We'll explain in a minute, Mrs. Malloy. Would you give Sergeant Clements the key to your garage, please?”

For a moment it looked as if she would refuse; then she went to a side-table, opened a drawer and took out a key. She tossed it almost angrily at Clements. “There'd better be a good explanation for all this!”

Clements nodded at Malone. “The Inspector will explain.”

When Clements had left the flat, Malone picked up the phone. “What's Channel 15's number, Mrs. Malloy?”

She raised her eyebrows; rather prettily, he thought. Very soon he was going to surprise her even more and he was not looking forward to it. “You're going to call the channel?”

“Yes. Who's your husband's boss?”

“Inspector, I'm not going to tell you any more until you—”

“Mrs. Malloy,” he said patiently, “I'm trying to save you any hurt. If your husband's boss contradicts what I've heard, I'll apologize and walk out of here—”

“Bloody police! You—” He stared at her impassively; he had heard it all before and she knew that he had. Sourly she said, “His name's Nick Katzka. I don't know if he'll still be there—”

Katzka was; but he sounded impatient, as if he had been caught on his way out the door. “What? Send Col Malloy up to—
where?
Boggabilla, for Chrissake. Why the hell would I send him there? He's not due in till tomorrow morning—”

“Mr. Katzka, Sergeant Clements came to ask you a few questions this morning. Did you tell Mr. Malloy we were enquiring after him?”

“Yeah, well . . . Yeah, I did—”

“Thanks, Mr. Katzka. Some day we may be able to do you a favour, too.”

He
hung up and Julie Malloy came at him as if she were going to throw herself at him. “Why are you making enquiries about my husband?”

“Let's sit down, Mrs. Malloy. You're not going to like what I'm going to tell you and I'm not going to like telling you.”

“Tell me what?” Her voice suddenly faltered.

He told her, as gently as he could. There are aspects of innocence that leave some people totally vulnerable; they have a profound belief in the goodness of human nature that denies any disillusion that may coat their perceptions. They are fools, many of them know it, but they would not want to be any other way and they are to be admired for it. Malone never scorned them; if there were no fools, who would recognize a wise man? But one's admiration, or anyway patience with them, cannot stop one from, however unwillingly, punishing them for their innocence.

“I'm sorry, but I'm certain that what I'm telling you is the truth. Your husband is Frank Blizzard and he's killed five people and is now planning to kill me and another man.”

“You've already said that,” she said automatically; she was chiding him for repeating himself, as if one insult was enough. “I don't believe any of it . . .” But she did, every word of it. The belief was plain on her no longer pretty face. “How could I have not known he was like—like
that
?”

“I can't explain it,” he said, not wishing to; that way there might lie more hurt. “I've arrested God knows how many men—and women, too—whose families never suspected what they were really like. We all hide something. Some of us just do it better than others.”

“But why would he hate you so much, just because you had him expelled from the police academy?”

“Perhaps you should ask him that when we bring him in.”

She sat silent for a while and he made no attempt to disturb her further; he had already done that to a degree he had hoped to avoid. She was completely in love with Malloy (or Blizzard); it would have been easier had she had her own doubts about him. At last she said, “He
has
been acting strangely. But I put it down to his moods—he could have moods that I never understood.”

“
Were you happy together? Most of the time?”