ThornyDevils (15 page)

Dave laughed. Peter thought briefly about cooking them all
something for dinner, but decided on another home cooked meal from the Apollo instead. Why mess around with perfection?

They perched in front of the television with a pile of fish and chips as Dave lay in front of the set, clicking through the channels and finally settling on the ABC.

‘You don’t want to watch that,’ Peter remarked casually.

‘I want to watch the news. It’ll be on in a minute.’

‘Yeah, me too,’ said Sam.

Peter was outvoted. He thought of leaving, but Dave encouraged him to stay.

‘It shouldn’t be that bad,’ he said.

‘You reckon?’ Peter growled. He checked his watch. Seven o’clock. The news and the lead story.
Scuffle erupts at prominent businessman’s funeral. Truth journalist involved in the fracas.
He looked away. It was going to be a train wreck.

‘Hey, that’s you, young fella!’ Sam pointed a chip at the screen. He shifted himself to the edge of his chair, straining to see the screen. ‘What are you doing lying on the ground?’

‘I was tired,’ Peter exploded as he leapt off the couch, ‘what do you think?’ He grabbed his wallet and headed for the front door.

‘Where are you going?’ Dave called out as he fled.

‘To the Tote. I need to debrief with Victor and Bob.’

‘You want us to come?’ Sam asked.

‘I want to be alone for a while,’ Peter said as he closed the door.

Sam and Dave exchanged quizzical looks. ‘Why’s he going all white fella on us all of a sudden?’ Sam asked.

‘He had a bad day today,’ Dave replied. ‘And he knows he’ll probably have another bad one tomorrow.’

Peter arrived at the office early, feeling heavy and bleary-eyed. Contrary to his original plan, he’d returned home after only one VB and spent most of the night tossing and turning and thinking about Stella Reimers. At four o’clock in the morning he drank a glass of port and finally convinced himself that he was being stupid and childish. How could he be threatened by someone he hadn’t met? It was ridiculous.
Peter Clancy threatened. Peter Clancy intimidated. Not on your…

He sensed a different atmosphere in the office as he walked down the corridor towards his cubicle. It was a hint of perfume. Then he heard a new voice: an assertive, loud, hammer-drill of a New York accent. It was reminiscent of New York during rush hour: not that Peter had ever been there.
One day
.

His guts twisted tighter and tighter as the voice grew louder. He hadn’t been this stressed since his first day as a cadet journalist. That old, familiar Peter Clancy coping mechanism was kicking in.
I want to run. Over hill and dale. Run. Until I find a pub.
Stella Reimers spun in her chair when she heard Peter approach.
Too late.

Great!
he thought.
She’s in the next cubicle next to me. Team bonding. I hate team bonding.

Stella bounced out of her chair as if she’d pressed an ejector button, just as Peter threw his bag on his desk.

‘So, you’re the infamous Peter Clancy?’ Stella proclaimed, thrusting her hand towards his. ‘Pleased to meet you.’

Peter had prepared himself to dislike Stella, yet he liked her accent. He always liked the New York accents. It was up there with his other
favourites: Cockney, Aboriginal and Irish. She wasn’t what he’d expected. She didn’t look like a journalist who could reduce New York cops to blubber. He expected a woman in black, a Cruella DeVille type, who ate puppies for breakfast. What he saw was an attractive, bottle blonde in her forties, well coiffed and finely tailored—more corporate than journo, more real estate agent than body-counting crime investigator. Maybe she did a better job of camouflaging her darker side than Cruella.

Peter took her hand. She pumped it harder than he’d expected. ‘Me too,’ he said.

‘Feels clammy,’ she observed. ‘You feeling okay?’

‘Just…’ he stumbled. ‘Just a bit…’ He scratched for words.

‘Not contagious are you?’

‘Just feeling a bit under the weather.’

‘That’s what people say when they’re hung over, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah. Sorry,’ he replied. ‘It’s part of the Aussie way of life.’

‘No need to explain,’ Stella laughed. ‘I spent a year here as a college student. I lived with a family in Sydney. My God, it was backward. Like stepping back in time thirty years. No brewed coffee in the coffee shops.’

Peter nodded. He thought of his recent experience up north. Some places hadn’t changed.

‘The beaches were so pristine and the sea was like a jewel,’ she continued. ‘Men were mates and women were sheilas. And me, I was the Yank. From what I’ve seen thus far, things have changed. Improved.’

‘We joined the rest of the world. At least Sydney and Melbourne have. Large parts of Australia are still instant coffee.’

‘How about we go out for coffee and bagels? Bob tells me there’s a cafe around the corner that sells them and he says they’re not half bad,’ she suggested. ‘I’m starving. You eat bagels?’

‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘Although I think I just need a drink.’ He caught Stella smiling. ‘And by that, I mean a coffee.’

***

‘I saw you on television last night,’ she commented as they finished ordering and sat at the nearest table. ‘You don’t mind putting yourself in the line of fire.’

‘Embarrassing,’ Peter cringed. ‘Got too enthusiastic.’

‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘You showed gumption. I like that. Initiative. You’re as much a part of the story as the story itself.’

‘You think so?’ he brightened. ‘Thanks.
The Truth
’s always had a reputation for assertive reporting. The other papers in Melbourne are softer in their approach. They like to build relationships. We prefer to break them down.’

‘Word of advice: Fuck the other papers. You have to eat them.’ Stella’s bagel arrived. She smeared it with cream cheese and bit into it. ‘Most of my stories came from the streets or tip-offs, not from press conferences and press releases. You have to get in there and shake it around.’

Peter gazed at her with admiration, although he felt as if he might have just glimpsed Stella’s inner Cruella. Was it possible to admire someone and be shit scared of them at the same time? As he pondered, Bob wandered into the conversation, sallow-faced Bill Symes riding his coat tails. Bill was the kind of senior journo who never shared a lead. Stella wiped her fingers, stood up and kissed Bob on both cheeks. Bob motioned to Bill to find himself somewhere else to sit.

‘How’s my crime reporting team settling in?’ Bob asked, as he grabbed another chair from the next table and eased himself into it.

‘You know what? The bagels really aren’t half bad, the coffee’s good and so’s this guy. I mean bloke,’ she laughed. ‘Early indications are he’s got balls.’

‘He has,’ Bob chuckled. ‘He just needs me to twist them every now and again.’

Stella laughed loudly. Peter didn’t.

She pushed her half eaten bagel away and sipped her double espresso. ‘Bob has brought me up to speed with what’s happening with this O’Leary story,’ she told Peter. ‘It’s got the sense of a Mafia war about it.’

‘You don’t think it’s a straight out murder. A crime of passion?’ he asked.

‘In my experience…’ she hesitated. ‘The way I figure it, they’re rich. They run the dockyards. Dockyards are the epicentres of crime everywhere. They’ve pissed someone off. They definitely stink. There’ll be more going down. You wait and see.’

‘That’s why it’s important to have your scanners with you at all times,’ Bob stated.

‘I’ve got mine.’ Stella took her scanner out of her handbag. ‘Thanks, Bob. Most places I’ve worked I’ve had to buy one myself.’

‘Where’s yours, Peter?’ Bob asked.

‘I must have left it at home.’

Bob looked unimpressed. ‘If you want to stay on this story, Peter,’ he spat, ‘you better get your scanner. That scanner’s got to be more important to you than a well-earned shit. Get it?’

‘I get it. I’ll go home and get it now, okay? Sorry.’ He took a last mouthful of coffee and bounced out of his chair.

Stella’s scanner crackled into life.

Report of two shots fired at Footscray Market. Cars in the area of Footscray market…

‘Already?’ Peter stopped in his tracks.

‘Better go,’ Bob ordered. Peter and Stella exchanged glances. ‘You’re both going. Hurry.’

‘Where’s Dave?’ Peter asked.

‘Last I saw, Dave was flirting with Shazza at the front counter. I’ll tell him to meet you at your car.’ Bob was already headed towards the office as his voice trailed off. Peter was surprised to see how briskly he was able to walk when motivated.

‘Which car?’ Stella asked.

‘The Stag.’

‘The Stag?’

Peter replied, ‘It’s a car.’

Dave barely managed to squeeze his camera bag plus his six-foot frame into the back seat. Stella looked anxiously at Peter as she watched him turn the ignition over several times.

‘Does this old bucket go?’

‘Slow start but a quick finish. Nearly there,’ he replied, as the motor began to whine into life.

‘The body will be in the damn morgue before we get there,’ Stella remarked in frustration.

The Stag roared, blowing a plume of smoke out of the exhaust. Peter slipped it into gear and put his foot down. The Stag spun away from the kerb.

Stella grabbed hold of the dashboard. ‘That’s more like it. Don’t worry about breaking the law. The cops will all be at the shooting.’

After breaking every road rule and running over a bin on the footpath for good measure, the Stag arrived at the Footscray Market, occupants safe if a little shaken.

‘What’s this place, then?’ asked Dave.

‘Looks just like an indoor market to me,’ Peter remarked as Stella rolled her eyes.

‘Like the meat packing district back home,’ she observed, reading the names on the advertising boards. ‘It’s run by Italians.’

The car park was already teeming with police, ambulance and media.

‘Shit,’ Peter said as he flung open his door, ‘the place is crawling.’

Stella had already jumped out and was heading towards the action. ‘I’ll go for the police,’ she yelled, as she scurried in her high heels towards the police cordon. ‘You look around the periphery.’

Peter crossed his arms and leant against the Stag as Dave assembled his camera. ‘I might as well stay in the car,’ he complained, ‘she’s claimed it for herself.’

‘Stop whining,’ Dave replied. ‘We’ve got work to do.’

While Stella was ingratiating herself with the police, Dave and Peter rushed towards a refrigerator van emblazoned with the words,
Donarto’s Fruit & Vegetable Distributors
. The police had taped off the crime scene from the back of the van to the loading dock area.

‘What a frigging mess!’ Peter said to Dave. ‘It looks like a bloody fruit salad.’ In the midst of the scattered boxes of peaches, apples and pears lay a man in a pool of blood.

Peter pushed his way through the media scrum. ‘Shit!’ he exclaimed as he caught a glimpse of the body right before an ambulance officer lowered a sheet over it. ‘The poor bastard’s face is blown off. My God!’ He felt a wave of nausea and looked away at Stella, who was throwing questions at Dale McCracken. The diversion settled his stomach. McCracken’s face was illuminated like a neon sign. Peter grinned.
The Yank attack dog is onto you, McCracken. Go on, Stella, bite the bastard!

Dave was clicking off shots of the body, camera propped over Peter’s right shoulder. ‘Probably a sawn off shotgun at close range.’

‘Over here,’ Peter grabbed Dave and led him away to where Tony Donarto was being loaded into the back of an ambulance. Tony was sitting upright, holding a bandaged hand and looking grey with shock. Dave reeled off another series of shots.

‘Fuck you!’ Tony yelled as he pulled the sheet up over his face. ‘Have you bastards no respect?’

‘Everything okay, Tony?’ Peter shouted back. Tony’s eyes fixed on Peter.

‘Clancy, you prick,’ Donarto spat out. ‘I’m not saying anything to you. Scum pig. I could still be deputy mayor except for you, you bastard.’

‘Do you know what happened, Tony? Was this an attempt on your life? Any comments we can print?’

Tony was being pushed into the back of the ambulance. He grabbed the loose oxygen mask off his face and threw it at Peter, hitting him in the chest. The ambulance officer shoved Peter off to the side and slammed the door shut.

‘Take care, Tony,’ Peter waved. He turned to Dave. ‘I wonder who the great Tony Donarto’s been upsetting?’

Dave tapped Peter on the shoulder and motioned him to look at Stella and McCracken.

‘They suddenly look friendly,’ Peter declared. ‘What’s going on there?’ He thought about rushing over there and interrupting, but he figured Stella could have her moment. Just then, he noticed a solitary man propped against the truck parked alongside Donarto’s, trying to light a cigarette. His hands were shaking so much that he kept dropping the lighter, picking it up and repeating the whole process without success.

‘Take a look at this guy,’ he said to Dave. ‘He looks pretty shaken up.’ He started walking towards the old man. ‘I’m gonna check him out.’

The man had given up trying to light his cigarette in favour of drawing his hands through his wispy hair.

‘Need a hand?’ Peter asked the man, as he picked up the lighter. He noted the man’s bloodied apron.

‘Very bad for my nerves. All of this,’ the man said in faltering English.

Peter held the lighter to his cigarette.

‘
Molto grazie.
Thank you. Thank you,’ the man stammered as he sucked back on the cigarette.

‘It’s a very bad thing,’ Peter agreed. ‘One man dead, another injured. You look like you could use some help as well,’ he added sympathetically. ‘Did you see everything?’

‘You from the police?’

‘No. From the paper. I’m just trying to find out what went on. I’m Peter.’ He held out his hand.

‘Gianni.’ The old man refused Peter’s hand. ‘But I can’t talk to you. You make all this sound bad.’ He took another drag on his cigarette and looked away.

‘It won’t be like that, Gianni. I just want to know what you saw. I won’t even mention you.’