Only the Dead (10 page)

T
UESDAY
, 14 F
EBRUARY
, 12.10
P.M
.

B
ackground checks.

Hale constructed a piecemeal Leland Earle history via Google.
Herald
archives yielded good information: Earle was doing time for robbery, and assault on a police officer. Six years, non-parole. He was no cub scout.

Hale called the prison direct and spoke to the senior Department of Corrections supervisor at general populace, and requested an interview. Ex-cop status won him leniency: fifteen minutes with Mr Earle, alone.

He arrived a little after one. He left his pocket contents in a locker at reception, and a corrections officer led him up to meet the guy he’d spoken to on the phone. The officer’s name was Kenzie. He was heavy and fiftyish with wide, Irish-looking features. He hiked his belt with his thumbs as he stood up and came round his desk to shake hands. Judicious combing partially disguised a wide bald spot.

‘Can’t say he’s awful happy about having to talk to you.’

‘I’m not exactly thrilled either.’

‘Normally we wouldn’t be so snappy about setting this up for you. But I’m an ex-cop myself, matter of fact.’

He shot Hale a wink.

He was led to an interview room. A wire mesh window
showed a man he assumed to be Leland Earle seated at a small table. An empty chair sat opposite.

‘You just holler if you need anything,’ Kenzie said. ‘There’ll be a couple of fellas standing right out here.’

Hale thanked him. An officer unlocked the door, and he went in. Earle didn’t seem to register the arrival. His gaze was static, head canted sideways, like a mannequin in storage. He was mid-thirties, shaven head branded with
WHITEPOWER
in harsh Gothic stencil, letters edged scarlet for emphasis. He wore a white singlet and an unzipped orange jumpsuit, the top half bunched at his lower back. Empty arms cast limp to the floor.

Hale scraped the spare chair back and sat down. Earle’s gaze was somewhere beyond the far wall. Hale turned his chair sideways and stretched his legs out and crossed his ankles. He appraised Earle openly. The man had some bulk: long hours pumping exercise yard iron had left his chest and biceps looking barely contained. Purple slugs of vein lay fatly beneath taut skin. A thin arc of scar contoured his left cheek, rail ties of sutures still present.

The long-range stare drew in closer to home. ‘The hell you looking at, gay boy?’

‘What’d you do to your face?’

Earle smirked. ‘How you think I might’ve got it?’

‘Painfully.’

‘Yeah, painfully.’ He mimed a lasso. ‘Padlock on the end of a bit of rope.’

Hale didn’t answer.

The smirk again. ‘What you after? You a cop or something?’

Hale didn’t reply. He just sat and held eye contact.

Earle grew uneasy. ‘Did you not hear my question?’

‘I wanted to ask you about the fight club robbery on the third of January this year.’

The gaze zoned back to long distance. A gentle back-and-forth shuffle of his focus, like watching a far-off ballgame. ‘It was down in Otara.’

‘That’s right.’

‘You’re not going to find anyone who tells you jack shit.’

‘That’s why I came to see you first.’

Earle spread his arms. ‘Why would I know anything about fight clubs?’

‘I don’t know. The police interviewed you after it happened; I thought maybe you could just tell me what you told them.’

A triumphant look: ‘So you’re not a cop, then.’

‘No.’

‘So who are you?’

‘I’m an ex-cop.’

‘What’s your name?’

‘John Hale.’

Earle’s head tilted back. ‘Not the John Hale worked Manukau Patrol ’bout ten years ago?’

‘That would be me.’

Earle nodded. ‘Yeah. Got a couple of friends who crossed your line one time or another. Remember at New Year’s drinks one year, someone said we’d all be better off if you were dead, and I toasted it at the time without knowing who you were, so I’m glad I can put a face to the name, you know?’ He laughed.

‘What did the police ask you?’

‘Why should I tell you?’

‘I can put in a good word for you.’

‘You’ve got that sort of cred, do you?’

‘You’ve got nothing to lose by finding out.’

Earle thought about it. Garbled prison noise reached them faintly. ‘They were asking me about this guy I used to know called Glyn Giles.’

‘Used to know?’

‘Still know. I haven’t seen him in a long time.’

‘What did they want to know about him?’

Earle shrugged. ‘Can’t remember.’

‘You have anything at all you’d like to tell me?’

The guy smiled, almost playfully. ‘About what?’

‘About the robberies.’

‘I know whoever did it pissed off the wrong people. There’s a ransom out, or a contract, whatever you want to call it.’

‘For what?’

‘Guess.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Money for finding the guys who did those robberies. A dead-or-alive type thing.’

‘How much is it?’

Shrug.

Hale said, ‘Who issued it?’

‘Beats me.’ He gave a little smile, like the reality was contrary.

‘You look like you’re lying.’

He shook his head. ‘Everybody wants them found.’

‘Who’s everybody?’

‘I don’t know. Like a few different parties. I heard some guys in the chemical trade want to track them down.’

‘The chemical trade.’

Earle smiled. ‘Euphemism. They pissed off some drug dealer somehow, and now the dealer wants to know where they are. Don’t ask me for more, that’s just what I heard.’

‘I’m sure you could elaborate a little more.’

‘Not really. This is all just gossip. I’m passing it on out of the goodness of my heart.’

‘Who’s this dealer?’

No answer.

‘Did this dealer issue the contract?’

‘Dunno. Squeeze someone else.’

Hale said, ‘A young girl was hit in the head with a hammer.’

‘Yeah, yeah, I know. They showed me a photo. But at the end of the day, I don’t know her. I don’t really give a shit.’

‘I’m disappointed that’s your position.’

‘Yeah, well, I’m disappointed that good guys I know have done hard time just because they met you.’ The sanctimonious inmate look: incarcerated, but still privy to the truth of the world.

Hale smiled at him. He drew his chair in tight to the table and steepled his fingers in front of his face.

‘What’s so funny, dickweed?’

Hale shrugged. ‘I never met a fascist I didn’t want to suffocate.’

Earle shimmied himself closer. A brief flash of definition in his shoulders as he pulled his chair in. ‘I’m going to send up a little prayer,’ he said. ‘Here goes: I pray that the next time you see my face, you’ll be drawing your last breath at the same time.’

Hale smiled again. ‘I look forward to it.’

Their faces were a foot apart. Earle snapped forward suddenly from the waist, lining up a head-butt. Hale leaned sideways in his chair and slipped outside the line. He popped Earle a single right-hand jab. Open fist, the heel of his hand. The blow caught Earle flush on the brow. He fell back in his chair, eyes shock-glazed.

Hale stood up. Earle flinched, stayed seated. Nothing like a darn good fright to keep them docile. Hale checked the door: no worried faces at the little window. Moral tuition was best unobserved.

‘Good prison lesson for you,’ Hale said. ‘Watch your mouth.’

He resisted the urge to flex the impact out of his forearm. He slid his chair in then stepped to the door and knocked gently to be let out.

T
UESDAY
, 14 F
EBRUARY
, 1.29
P.M
.

I
t was a West Auckland address: single level, brick, a gentle sag in the street-facing guttering. A low hedge fronted patchy lawn scarred by tyre swaths. Duvall was disappointed. Part of him thought she might have gone a little more high class. A central city suite, in preference to the suburbs.

Then again, he hadn’t turned out any different.

The door was protected by a two-sided shelter of corrugated plastic on timber framing. He knocked. He’d drafted a greeting on the way over: an apologetic icebreaker that steered clear of full-blown pathetic. Ultimately, wasted rehearsal: the anxious doorstep wait obliterated recall.

A little boy answered. His little boy? Surely not. A tiptoe stretch for the handle, a one-eye peep around the edge of the door.

Duvall said, ‘Hello.’

The kid said nothing. He took a step back and bit his bottom lip, hands clasped tightly in front of him. He must have been seven or eight years old.

‘Is your mother home?’

The child nodded, disappeared with a pattering scurry, door left ajar.

She appeared a moment later, hair bloated in a loose tousle
as if she’d been sleeping. She had the door fully open before she recognised him.

‘Shit.
Mitchell
?’

He smiled. ‘Hi.’

She kept hold of the door, reached across herself to smooth her hair. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I just wanted to see you.’

She stood there for a moment, palm turned in against her hip, elbow cocked, like she always used to. ‘Jordan, you can play on the PlayStation for a wee while.’

She jerked her head to signal him to come inside. He ducked his chin to his chest and stepped in. She closed the door after him. The kitchen was left of the entry. She led the way through and stood leaning against the edge of the sink, fists propped knuckles-down either side. Her eyes hadn’t left him, like he couldn’t be trusted unwatched. He drew out a vinyl-covered chair and sat down at the table. The chair was metal tube. A bent leg left it jittery.

She said, ‘I don’t even know why I let you in.’

‘Thanks anyway.’

She didn’t answer. He noted a trio of beer bottles arranged beside the door.

‘Is that your son?’ he said.

She nodded.

‘How old?’

‘Seven.’

She saw his quiet arithmetic: ‘Relax: he definitely isn’t yours.’

Duvall tried for a laugh, saw her expression, sealed his mouth. He said, ‘Were you asleep?’

‘I’ve got a migraine coming on. So you can make it quick.’

Migraine. He restrained himself from a reflexive glance at the bottles.

‘Did you call me earlier?’ she said.

‘Yeah. Wanted to check you were in.’

‘And you hung up without saying anything. Big of you.’

‘I’m sorry. I just wanted to check that you’re doing okay.’

‘First time you’ve ever had that thought.’

‘No reason not to start.’

She bent and delved in a cupboard, came out with a silver blister pack of Nurofen. She cracked a tablet into her open palm and threw it back like a breath mint. A wincing, dry swallow.

‘Might want to keep them a bit higher,’ he said. ‘Case the young fella finds them.’

She arched an eyebrow. Still looked great as she did it. ‘Right. Anything else?’

He shrugged, like he meant nothing by it.

She shook her head, like marvelling at good luck. ‘I thought maybe one day you’d come back.’

‘Well. Ta-da!’

She ignored him. ‘Probably spent half my time hoping I’d never see you again, and the other half hoping you’d come back so I could tell you some things I wanted to say.’ She picked a cuticle. ‘So I guess they sort of cancelled each other out, because here you are and I don’t really know what to tell you.’ She shrugged again and looked at the floor. ‘Other than I got married and had a child and found someone who doesn’t make me hate myself. Actually feels pretty good, if you know how that feels.’

‘It must be great.’

She didn’t answer. Electronic noise from the next room: the PlayStation in action. ‘Why isn’t he at school?’ Duvall said.

‘Behaviour problems. They’re giving him a break for a couple of days.’

‘Like, being stood down?’

‘Yeah, I guess that’s what it is.’

He took a breath and went for it. ‘I came because I wanted to tell you I’m really sorry.’

She combed her hair with her fingers. ‘You may as well not have bothered.’

He didn’t answer.

She looked at the door. ‘I think we’re past that point where apologies actually mean anything. Just makes me feel sorry for you really because you’ve actually gone this long before it occurred to you that you’d done something you needed to fix.’

He didn’t answer.

She smiled wryly. ‘So what sparked this great guilt then? Did you find religion? I’ve had guys do that before. “Since I’ve found God I realised it was bad of me to abuse you.”’

He shrugged. ‘Just thought the scales were stacked one way and not the other.’

‘Which means what?’

‘I think I’ve done more bad things than good. I want to switch that around.’

She flicked the Nurofen sleeve idly, seemed to consider another helping. ‘I don’t think one “sorry” is going to tilt the scales back the other way very much.’

‘Better than not at all.’

She returned the tablets to the cupboard and pulled out a chair and sat down opposite him. ‘You’re not a bad person. You’re just an idiot.’

He avoided her gaze. ‘I dream about the people I hurt during the tour. I used to dream about them virtually every night. On the nights that I didn’t, I’d worry that they had dreamed about me.’

She didn’t answer. He said, ‘Sometimes I just lie awake in
the dark and I think about everything bad stacked up behind me, and I wonder if at some point something changed for the worse, or whether things were just never any good.’

‘Is that meant to win some sort of sympathy vote?’

‘No. I think that’s just the truth of it. Don’t do anything you think you’ll regret. Hindsight will blow the dust off it one day.’

She palmed something unseen off the table. ‘What did you hope I was going to say to you?’

‘I don’t know. I guess if I was hoping for something then it’s probably a bad sign. I just wanted to get it off my chest.’

The noise from the television paused. She waited for it to resume before speaking. ‘So. What are you doing with yourself?’

He smiled. ‘Balancing the scales.’

‘Don’t. No one cares.’

‘I care.’

‘There’s no point. Nobody’s keeping score. People waste half their lives doing bad things. The dumb ones feel remorse and try to do something to fix it. The smart ones just move on and try not to waste any of the time they’ve got left.’

‘And what do the good ones do?’

She didn’t reply.

‘I don’t see this as time wasted,’ he said.

‘Depends whether you’ve got something to show for it. If you don’t, then I’d say it’s time wasted.’

She squinted one eye, like the headache was gaining ground.

He said, ‘There were internal police investigations after the Springbok tour. We all just closed ranks and walled them out. Nobody cooperated. They made us do this run along Hobson Bay. They had some assault victims at various positions who were supposed to identify us as we went by.’

‘And?’

He shrugged. ‘And nothing happened. I did the run. I got
from one end to the other and nobody picked me out.’

‘Which is a good thing.’

‘I don’t know. I spent a long time thinking that maybe I somehow sidestepped what was owed to me.’

She was quiet for a long time. He didn’t know whether she agreed with him, or she’d run out of things to say. ‘I’m training to be a nurse,’ she said. ‘End of this year, I’ll have my degree.’

‘Congratulations.’

‘You need to do something, too.’

‘I am doing something.’

‘Whatever it is it’s not doing you any good.’

‘I thought maybe I could come back and see you.’

She shook her head. ‘That isn’t going to do any good either. I’ve boxed you away and forgotten about you. It isn’t going to be any good for either of us if I start pulling stuff out of storage. I’m pleased you came today because I thought I hated you but having you sitting here I realise that I don’t and that’s a good thing. But you can’t ever come back.’

He didn’t reply.

She said, ‘Forget about everything that happened up to now and try to make everything that happens after it worthwhile. I’ll see you around, Mitch. Or, maybe not.’