Pride's Harvest (32 page)

Philip Chakiros, in a fancy rollneck cardigan and jeans, came to the door. “Yeah?”

“Could I see you out here, Mr. Chakiros?” Malone could hear a chatter of voices back in the house, mostly male ones amplified by drink, and he didn't want to face a platoon of Ray Chakiros's mates from the Veterans Legion. With the enemy out here on the garden path, they might think they were back on the Kokoda Trail or the Mekong Delta.

Phil Chakiros hesitated. “What d'you want?”

“Who is it, Phil?” His father came lumbering down the hall, dinner jacket and bow-tie now discarded, a beer can in his hand. “Ask „em in—Oh Christ, it's you! What the hell d'you want?”

“Just a word with your son, Mr. Chakiros. Don't let me interrupt your party.”

“Come back at a decent hour. Shut the door, Phil!”

Malone, foot ready, waited for the youth to make a move. But young Chakiros just shrugged and stepped out on to the veranda, “It's okay, Dad. Go back inside.”

“
No, you come inside—” Chakiros was all belligerence, stoked by the drink he had had, ready for a small war right on his own doorstep. “Come on—”

“
Dad
.”

Chakiros stared at his son, as if disbelieving that he had been given an order; then, like a good soldier, if a poor father, he turned and stomped off down the hall. His son stepped out on to the veranda and led the way down the steps and path to the front gate.

“Just in case he comes back. Dad's still a Wog father in lots of ways—he thinks he rules the roost.”

“Who does? You?”

“My mother.”

“You're not a Wog?”

The boy gave him a sharp glance. “No. D'you think I am?”

“I don't put labels like that on people.” It wasn't always true; his own father, with his prejudices, sometimes spoke through his voice. “Phil, where have you been all evening?”

“Oh Jesus! What am I supposed to have done now?”

“That doesn't answer my question.”

Young Chakiros leaned against the brick gate-post. It was not an arrogant pose, but rather one of weariness. Gone was all the smart-arse defiance of last night. “I've been at the Legion club all night, till I came home about an hour ago. Dad and Mum called in there and picked me up. Why, what am I supposed to have done this time?”

“Do you have anyone who'll vouch for you having been at the club all night? Don't suggest any of your mates from last night. They'd bounce the truth around like a rubber ball if I questioned them.”

“You're like everyone else, you've got the wrong idea about „em. They're a bloody sight more honest and law-abiding than some of the shit you have down in Sydney. They don't go around beating up old ladies, for one thing . . .” Then he sighed, as if he were weary, too, of defending his mates. “Okay, ask the bar stewards, they'll tell you where I was. And some of Dad's mates. They're inside now, them and
their
wives. They didn't go to the ball, not the older ones.”

“Name one.”

“There's George Gillies—”

“Could you go in and ask him to step out here a minute?”

“Dad's not gunna like it.”

“I'll put up with that. I've put up with a lot worse since I landed here in Collamundra.”

“Okay, I'll get him.” He straightened up, walked a few paces back towards the house, then stopped. “You still haven't told me what this is all about. I think I'm entitled to know.”

“Someone tried to shoot me tonight.” He decided, on the spur of the moment, not to mention Trevor Waring. Let Waring himself broadcast that
he
might have been the intended victim.

“Jesus!” His shock was genuine; there was no doubt of that. “You mean you think I tried to do it?”

“Phil, you were carrying a gun last night that was fully loaded. You tailed me and Sergeant Clements for something like ten Ks. You told us you'd been out shooting kangaroos, but the gun hadn't been fired. You're an intelligent kid. Wouldn't you put yourself on the list of suspects when someone has a shot at me the following night?”

The boy had turned back to face Malone. “No. You just said I'm intelligent—I am. Too intelligent to be that fucking stupid.” He was growing angry, genuinely so; Malone was sharp enough to recognize that it added weight to the boy's argument. “I don't like you, Mr. Malone, but you're wrong about me wanting to kill you. We had the gun in the car last night because we were gunna shoot out some road signs—we do it all the time.”

“Very intelligent.”

“Okay, so it's fucking dumb. I know that. But you get bored in this town, especially if you're as intelligent as you think I am. I can't wait to get out of the fucking place, but, I dunno, I get just so far and then I come back . . .”

Malone made a guess: life here as the spoiled son of one of the town's wealthiest businessmen,
dull
as it might be, had its easeful comforts.

“Where were you last Monday night? You didn't go to that concert at Bathurst, did you? Were you out shooting up road signs again that night?”

“No, we were over at Bathurst, like I said.” He sounded dogged now, as if he had made enough admissions for the night.

Malone let that one alone for the time being. “Who sent you out to tail us last night?”

Phil Chakiros hesitated. “Nobody. We just picked you up by chance.”

“You're lying, Phil.”

The boy was silent for a long moment; then he shrugged once more. “Look, don't take this any further, okay? I don't think he meant any real harm. It was my father. He's—well, he doesn't like anything going on in this town that he doesn't know about, that's all.”

Maybe.
“What he knows—who does he pass it on to? He just doesn't bring it home and you all sit around the dinner table and discuss it.”

“My mother wouldn't allow it. She hates gossip.”

“She sounds a nice lady. How does she feel about the mess you've got yourself into with doping that horse this afternoon?”

“She belted me.” He said it without smiling, a twenty-three-year-old who thought it the most natural thing in the world for his mother to hit him for doing wrong. “She's old-fashioned.”

I wonder what you'd think of me?
But would he belt Tom when Tom got to be twenty-three? “She sounds nicer by the minute. Give her my compliments. You're going to be rubbed out, you know, despite anything your father might try to do for you.”

“I know. That's why I didn't go to the ball tonight—my mother wouldn't let me. She said she was too ashamed to be seen with me in public.” He turned towards the house again. “I'll get George Gillies.”

“Never mind, Phil. You've cleared yourself.” Malone opened the front gate, went through and closed it behind him. He was aware of the smell of mulch on the garden and even in the starlit darkness
he
could see that the lawns were neatly mowed and trimmed. He wondered if Mrs. Chakiros, an old-fashioned mother, made her son work around the house for what indulgences his father gave him. “Good night. Pass up the road signs, Phil—there are better things to aim at. Oh, one more thing. When your father hears everything that goes on in town, does he pass it on to Chess Hardstaff?”

“Yes. How did—?”

“How did I know? I think I'm like your dad, Phil. I'm getting to know everything that's going on in this town.”

IV

Sunday morning Malone went to Mass with Lisa and the three children. She had brought them in in the Warings' Land-Rover; though Sean Carmody had once been a Catholic, it seemed that none of the Warings was. The church for the eight-thirty Mass was only half-full; some of the congregation, especially the men, also seemed half-full from last night's binge. The priest, an understanding young man whom Malone had seen at the races yesterday afternoon helping attend to the injured jockeys, kept his homily short and his voice low out of sympathy for the soft, sore heads in the pews. Malone had half-expected him to mention the Sagawa murder, at least to offer a prayer for the dead man's soul; but all the priest asked for was a prayer for the recovery of the injured jockeys; Sagawa was beyond recovery, being dead and a Buddhist. Malone waited for him to pray for the souls of the dead horses, being a true-blue Aussie, but no mention was made of them, though some of the congregation, being bereft owners and out of pocket too, looked disappointed. Malone's thoughts, as usual, wandered a long way from the purpose of the Mass. He was sure, however, that God didn't mind. He sometimes wondered if the Lord ever grew tired of the constant demands on His own attention.

As the collection plate was coming round, Lisa whispered, “What's the matter with your hand?”

“I thought you were going to put something in the plate.”

“Not that, stupid. We all know how you can't put your hand in your pocket.” He was notorious for his careful approach to charity; he had once suggested that Peter's Pence should be split into farthings.

Maureen,
leaning forward to hear this, nodded emphatically. “Tightest fist in the West.”

Her mother clipped her, without taking her eyes off the Band-Aid on Malone's hand. “How'd you do it?”

“I knocked it on the car door. It's nothing.” He had no intention of telling her of the shooting last night, and he hoped Trevor Waring would keep his mouth shut.

“Did you put Dettol or something on it?”

“Russ poured a beer over it. Relax. The priest is looking at you.”

Lisa and the children went up to receive Communion. Malone, after a reproachful look from Lisa, got up and followed them. He hadn't been to Confession in at least three years, but his sins, he figured, were minor; venial ones, as the Marist brothers at school used to call them. He was probably guilty of at least one of the seven deadly sins, but at the moment he couldn't think of any. He thought of them at random, gave his own judgement. Wrath: probably; Envy: no; Gluttony: no; Avarice: definitely no; Sloth: and still be in Homicide? Lust: well, maybe, but he had always kept it in hand (or maybe he should rephrase that). And last but not least, Pride: well, no, he didn't think so. If he had felt it, it was not large enough to be sinful. He stepped out of the pew and fell in behind Lisa and the children. A state of grace was a state of mind and he couldn't remember when he had last felt exalted enough to enter Heaven at a moment's notice.

Standing in the aisle he wondered if Sagawa's murderer was somewhere in the queue, his mortal sin expiated by confession to the priest and the Host ready to be laid on his tongue, all sin forgiven, even murder. He could see no one up ahead remotely connected with the Japanese; he wanted to turn his head to look behind him, but a woman pushed him in the back and whispered for him to get a move on. The Lord mustn't be kept waiting, not while you looked for a murderer in His church.

Coming out of the church he was surprised to see Narelle Potter rising from a back pew and going out ahead of them. He had not thought of her as a churchgoer; but maybe she was the town's Mary Magdalene, making a late penance.

“Are you coming back to Sydney with us tomorrow, Daddy?” said Claire.

“
I don't know, love. I still have work to do out here.”

“Are you working today?” Maureen made a face when he nodded. “Oh darn! Why do cops have to work seven days a week?”

“I think I'll work one day a week when I grow up,” said Tom.

“Just like the rest of the country,” said Lisa, who at times could be puritanical towards her adopted land. Immigrants make the best, if not the most welcome, critics. “Will you be coming out for lunch?”

“I'll see how things go. I'll try and make it for supper, though, I promise.”

“We've been invited to a sunset supper out at the Nothlings'.”

Malone raised his eyebrows. “Amanda Nothling's?”

Lisa nodded. “I gather it's an annual thing to close out the Cup weekend. Not the whole town, just the elite.”

“We're elite?”

“I guess we are. Ida said they'd got their invitation and we're included.”

“Us too?” said Maureen, who never could and never would refuse an invitation: she would have gone to the razing of Carthage and the bombing of Pearl Harbor if she had been invited. “Us too?”

“No. Whenever were kids an elite?”

“They are in American TV sitcoms,” said Claire.

“Sitcoms? Keep your jargon out of my hearing. There's your friend Mrs. Potter.”

Malone grinned at the children. “No time for jargon, but she loves
non sequiturs.
”

“What's that?” said Tom.

“I dunno. It's something she taught me.” He looked over his shoulder at Narelle Potter, who was standing at the church gate talking to a young couple, “I think I'll walk back to the pub with her.”

“I knew it was gunna happen,” said Maureen, ham-acting. “Leaving his wife and kids for another woman.”

“It's just a sitcom,” said Claire. “It's not real life.”

“
I don't think I'll get married,” said Tom, “or have kids.”

“I'm glad to hear it,” said mother. “Not for the time being, anyway.”

Malone belted each of his grinning kids under the ear, kissed Lisa, said he would call her at lunchtime and hurried to catch up with Narelle Potter as she went out the gate. “Mind if I walk back with you?”

Her mind had been elsewhere; she looked startled. “What? No, not if you want to. Is that your family? Nice-looking kids.”

“They get it from their mother.” He was modest; which is close to a state of grace. “You're a regular at Mass?”

“Are you?” That meant she wasn't. So what had brought her here this morning?

“When my wife and kids hold a gun at my head, yes.”