Open File (11 page)

‘Not afraid a cough’ll pass the virus?’

I shook my head.

‘Some think this.
Merde
. Yes, Justin and I were friends for a little time. Not lovers, you understand. He wasn’t gay.’

‘Was he taking drugs?’

‘Mr Hardy, I would laugh except that it would hurt me too much. No.’

‘Look, Pierre, I’ve been told that Justin was a loner. Apart from the people he skied and surfed and snow-boarded with, he didn’t have any real friends. I don’t see you as the sporting type.’

He smiled; he was already tiring, and this time the smile seemed to stretch the skin on his face to splitting point and force his dark eyes deeper into his skull.

‘You want to know why he . . . what is the expression? Took me up?’

‘Yes.’

‘He was clever, you know that of course. He was paying me to teach him French. I did. He learned some quite quickly.’

‘Why?’

There was a long pause and I could almost see his brain working, going back to a time when there were possibilities, a future. Then the sad shadow returned.

‘He said he wanted to join the Foreign Legion.’

I thanked him, asked if there was anything he wanted that I could help with, but he was exhausted and didn’t reply. We shook hands again.

Before leaving I put most of whatever I had in my wallet in the donation box.

So Justin wasn’t gay, wasn’t into drugs and had tried to learn French in order to join the Foreign Legion. That sounded like a fantasy, and the police had established with a reasonable degree of certainty that he hadn’t left the country. He’d found out that neither his great-grandfather, grandfather or father were war heroes. Was that enough to turn him away from school, Duntroon and his family? Had he found out that his father was a crook?

All these interlocking questions occupied my mind along with plenty of other related ones—like, who killed Angela Pettigrew and why? And what were Paul Hampshire’s chances out and about in Sydney with Wilson Stafford after him, ably and viciously assisted by Sharkey Finn? And where did I stand if my client, obviously ‘a person of interest’ to the police, became of more interest?

I’d walked to the hospice after driving to Darlinghurst where I had an arrangement with the owner of a house in Forbes Street. His terrace house had a side recess that I could just fit the Falcon into and he let me park there for a modest fee. After the confrontation with Stafford and his henchman, I’d taken to keeping my licensed .38 Smith &
Wesson to hand. I took it from the car and went up to the office. These old buildings have many pitfalls—poor lighting, dodgy stairs, places to hide. I observed all the precautions, feeling, when I reached the office safely, a mixture of relief and guilt at being paranoid.

For all the civility and humanity of the nun and the courage of Pierre Fontaine, the hospice experience had shaken me and I poured a solid slug of cask wine before I sat down to look at the mail and the faxes. There was nothing that couldn’t wait or simply be ignored. I dug Watson’s card out of my wallet and rang him. I identified myself and the indifference in his voice was packed into one word.

‘Yes?’

‘I wondered whether you were making any progress on the Pettigrew case?’

‘What makes you think I’d talk to you about that?’

‘Did you get to talk to Hampshire? I’d be interested to hear what he had to say.’

‘I’m hanging up, Hardy.’

‘Before you do, does the name Wilson Stafford mean anything to you?’

He didn’t hang up and I enjoyed the moment and the change in his tone.

‘Why should it?’

‘Well, I had a meeting with him yesterday. Not a pleasant one, but one way or another things came up that might interest you.’

‘Okay, Hardy, you’re living up to your reputation as a pain in the arse. What do you want?’

‘Just a quiet talk. I tell you some things and you do the same. Remember, I’m still looking for the missing son of a
murdered woman and a man you’d no doubt describe as a person of interest.’

‘I don’t want you interfering.’

‘I don’t want to. I’m looking for mutual cooperation. Where’re you based, Sergeant?’

‘Chatswood.’

‘That’s not so far. Why don’t we have a get-together over a drink later today?’

‘You’re pushing it.’

‘I listened to the news and read the paper. You’ve put a tight wrap on the thing, but as I look at it you haven’t got a fucking clue who killed the woman or why.’

He let go an exasperated sigh. ‘Six thirty, Tosca’s wine bar. See if you’re a good enough detective to find it.’

He hung up.
Temper, temper
, I thought. I wrote up some notes on the meeting with Fontaine and did some more of my diagrams with the boxes and the connecting arrows and the dotted lines that meant
maybe
this related to that.

Chatswood was changing fast, with high rises springing up; the holes in the ground and cranes in the air indicated that more were on the way. I located the wine bar on the ground level of an apartment block. Not far to go for a drink, a coffee, a paper, the dry-cleaning, a bunch of flowers or a loaf of bread. Everything to hand. Thursday night. I was deliberately a bit late and the evening shoppers were having a quick one before heading home or out to eat.

Tosca’s was the usual sort of place, trying to make up its mind whether it was Australian, European or American and getting everything wrong. The bottles in the wicker baskets
clashed with the chrome tables that didn’t harmonise with the sports prints on the walls. But there were free nuts and olives on the bar, which was a welcome sign anywhere. Watson, still in his black jacket but without the tie, sat at a corner table with an inch of red wine in his glass and a cigarette in his hand. He gave me the briefest of nods. I scoffed some nuts, bought two glasses of red and joined him.

‘Thanks,’ he said.

‘We’re off to a good start.’

‘I wouldn’t say that necessarily.’ He stubbed out the cigarette, finished the wine in his glass and moved the other one closer. He looked tired, long hours and no result showing on his face. He glanced around, an automatic action, checking for anything he didn’t like, or anyone he didn’t want to see. He had all that sitting right in front of him and his attention switched back to me.

‘So. What’s this about Wilson Stafford?’

I drank some of the wine. Not bad, not great. A bit overpriced but I could always go back for some nuts and olives. ‘Sorry, Sarge. It’s a two-way street. How are you going with the investigation? Did you talk to Hampshire?’

‘He’s your client. Hasn’t he been in touch?’

I had another pull on the drink. Didn’t answer.

‘Okay, you want something. We’re not making progress—no witnesses, no sightings. Forensics are a zero. Hampshire showed us a copy of the record of telephone calls he made from where he was staying over the relevant time. He had two pizza deliveries and sent out for booze and an escort. He couldn’t have made it to Church Point. Somehow I don’t think he was in the country long enough to have had the time to organise a hit.’

‘Any sign of Ronny?’

‘Your turn, Hardy.’

‘Right. Was there any sign that Angela Pettigrew had a lover?’

‘No, not from interviews with neighbours and friends. Come on, what’ve you got?’

I told him that when the confrontation with Sarah and Ronny had happened, Sarah had called her mother a hypocritical bitch and Ronny had asked if I was the new bloke—implication obvious. I had a little more up my sleeve—Hampshire’s hint that Sarah wasn’t his daughter—but in these situations you don’t show your hand until you have to. I kept that in reserve.

Watson nodded. ‘That’s something. Okay, no, we haven’t found Ronny. What about Stafford?’

‘What’ve you got from Sarah?’

‘Bugger-all. The policewoman who’s met her says she’s a tough little nut under the posh school manners. Turns them on and off as it suits her. She’s got a tame shrink. Won’t say who he is but she reckons he says she’s too traumatised to be interviewed. We have to look at her, of course. I assume she inherits and the house must be worth a bit. It’s been known to happen.’

I remembered Ronny’s comment that Sarah was an actress. I’d have to keep in mind that she was likely to put on a performance.

‘Right,’ I said, ‘I need to talk to her about her brother and maybe I can get her to open up on what she meant about Angela’s hypocrisy. Nearest and dearest kill each other, don’t they? You have to be interested in that. You should be able to set it up for me to at least try to talk to her.’

‘Jesus. All right, I’ll think about it. Now what’s the fucking connection with Stafford?’

I didn’t give him the full rundown Templeton had given me, Hampshire was still my client after all, but I told him enough to indicate that Hampshire had played fast and loose with a dangerous man and possibly with others. Money was missing and people went looking and sometimes other people got in the way.

He lit a cigarette and considered what I’d said as he smoked and drank his wine. He didn’t look very impressed but then, that wouldn’t be his game. He stubbed out the cigarette.

‘You’re saying Hampshire’s dirty?’

‘I’m told he’s never had so much as a parking ticket, and that’s his style. My informant said he operated well under the radar.’

‘Your informant being?’

I shook my head.

‘Bears looking into. I’d still like to get on to this Ronny. You reckon you could get the daughter to talk about him? Or anything else useful?’

‘There’s a chance. She spoke to me once. But I won’t kid you, I’m mainly interested in learning a bit more about her brother.’

He finished his wine. ‘You realise that if what you say about Hampshire having enemies who might’ve killed the missus isn’t just hot air, it could have implications for the disappearance of the kid.’

‘I’ve thought of that.’

‘I imagine you have, and I’ve thought about the missing kid as well. Two years isn’t all that long. What if he turned up? What if he and his mum had words? How about that?’

‘I’ve thought of that, too. That’s why you’re willing to help me talk to Sarah, and the condition will be that I ask
certain questions and wear a wire. I never thought it was out of the goodness of your heart.’

Watson gave me his hard stare. ‘You’re a mate of Frank Parker, who just got a deputy commissioner slot, aren’t you?’

‘That’s right.’

‘It figures. He’s a bleeding heart, smart bastard, just like you. I’ll be in touch. Thanks again for the drink.’

‘You didn’t buy a round, Ian.’

He gave me the finger and left.

I went back to the bar, got another red and a handful of nuts and olives—that’d do for dinner. I felt that I was making progress of a kind but I wasn’t sure in which direction. Who killed Angela? Where was Ronny? How many enemies did Paul Hampshire actually have? And what of Justin? Did all roads lead to Rome?

It wasn’t early and it wasn’t late. It was one of those in-between times a single person has trouble filling in. I wished I could ring Kathy, have a talk about things like surfing and sex—they went together when I was young, and maybe they would again now—but I didn’t have her number. I could have rung the pub but it might have looked like pursuit, intrusion. Best to leave things the way they were.

When in doubt, work.
I drove to Darlinghurst and went to the office. That meant walking through some shadowy spots at a volatile time of night when the crazies were out. I put the .38 in my pocket. A couple of trannies were walking down Forbes Street on the way to their patch on William Street at the bottom of the stairs. They gave me the
invitation and I gave them a polite refusal. They seemed happy and I guess, compared to how things had been for them not so very long ago, they had reason to be. Some things had changed for the better.

The other people on my floor—the astrologer, the numismatist, the antiquarian bookseller—had gone home. In a funny way we all got along fine—marginalised semi-professionals trying to make a living in the face of scepticism, indifference and hostility. At various times we’d been close to getting together for a drink. Could have been fun, but it’d never happened.

The lights were off and as I turned on the stairwell ones they barely cut the gloom. Atmospheric. I let myself into the office. No light blinking on the answering machine but a fax had slid out and dropped to the floor. The tray had broken away some time back and that’s where the sheets finished up when I wasn’t around.

I picked it up and read it. Handwritten capitals: MR HARDY I’M VERY AFRAID OF THE POLICE AND EVERYTHING. PLEASE HELP ME. SARAH HAMPSHIRE.

Watson rang me the next morning to say he’d okay’d it for me to talk to Sarah. I didn’t tell him that I’d faxed her the night before to say that arrangements were being made. The fax number was the same as the one for the Church Point house. The appointment was for midday—Sarah was absenting herself from school on compassionate grounds. From what I knew of her, that wouldn’t cause her too much concern.

I met Watson and a detective named Constable Kate Cafarella at the Mona Vale police station. Constable Cafarella had been spending some time with Sarah. Apparently a kindly neighbour, a Mrs Hartley, had been providing support—meals, laundry and such.

Cafarella was tall, beak-nosed, not unattractive.
Formidable
, as Pierre Fontaine might have said, but I couldn’t see her as someone frightening to Sarah, who seemed pretty tough in her own way.

Watson supplied the recording device and Cafarella watched as I stripped off my shirt and taped it into place. Watson seemed a little embarrassed.

‘Nothing else to do, Kate?’ he asked.

‘I thought I should bring Mr Hardy up to date on how things stand with Sarah.’

She wasn’t hopping up and down with excitement at my manly figure, but she showed an acceptable level of appreciation.

‘Thank you, Constable,’ I said. I flipped on the switch of the device as I buttoned up my shirt.

‘She came out of the sedation she’d been given at first, clear as bell,’ Cafarella said, ‘and we got nothing out of her. Nothing at all. Refused to answer the mildest of questions. Didn’t kick up a fuss—no tears, no orders to piss off. Just . . . blankness. No, I’d call it a brick wall.’