The Bear Pit (31 page)

“Even the Pope would look bad in a police photograph.”

She tried for a smile, but it was too much effort. Then she said, “If he calls again—you're tapping my phone—”

“I'm afraid so, Lynne—we have a warrant.” Malone stood up. “John knows it. He may not phone again, but if he does, tell him to give himself up. It will be easier for you, tell him.”

“You think so? Seeing him go to jail for—how long? Fifteen, twenty years?” She shook her head so vigorously her hair fell down over her face; she pushed it back. “No, I think I'd rather he just disappeared.”

Malone understood her thinking; but he couldn't agree with her. “Don't obstruct us, Lynne. We don't want to put you in jail.”

Gail Lee said nothing, just patted Mrs. Masson's shoulder as she stood up. She looked around the cluttered room, picked up a Banana in Pajamas doll and put it on one of the low tables, where it instantly fell over. “What happens to all this?”

“The bank takes the lot. What happens to the money in the suitcase?”

“The court confiscates it and it goes into general revenue.”

“So it gets lost? Can I claim it? It would save Happy Hours.”

“I think you'd have a hard time proving it was yours,” said Malone. “I agree with you, it could save all this, you could bring the kids back—”

“No.” She shook her head again, facing facts. “The parents would never bring their kids back. Not after—”

Malone and Gail walked to the door. There Malone turned back, saw the bent-over figure that
looked
for a moment like nothing more than a large child. Then she raised her head and said, “What are you going to say to your daughter?”

“I don't know,” he said. “Unfortunately, she's long past day care.”

II

John August had no intention of stalking Gert Vanderberg; he had no idea where she lived nor did he care. He had been in Rockdale by sheer accient. After he had spoken to Ailsa, Lynne's assistant, yesterday he had debated where he could run to. He was dressed only in a shirt and overalls and he was carrying his metal tool-box; he was not exactly dressed for catching a bus or plane to some distant destination. He had not panicked; that was not in his nature. He knew his picture, the old police photograph of twelve years ago or whatever they dug up, would not be displayed till the first of the evening's television news at five o'clock. He went into the McDonalds at North Sydney and over a cheeseburger and french fries he pondered where to go from here. He took his work diary out of his toolbox. There was a job for next Tuesday, putting in some new bookshelves; the job was originally for tomorrow, but the woman, Mrs. Milo, had cancelled, saying she and her husband would not be back from Noosa till next Monday. The address was in Neutral Bay, twenty minutes walk from here. He finished his cheeseburger, put the carton and the greasy napkin in the waste-bin, neat as always, offered his table to a woman with three children, winked at the kids and left.

The Milo residence was a two-storied house on a narrow block; he had come looking for it last week when he had been in the neighbourhood. No one saw him enter the house. There was a side entrance and he went down it and round to the back of the house. He checked to see if there was an alarm system, found none and five minutes later had opened the back door and was inside the house.

He spent the night there, turning on no lights, feeding on biscuits and tinned fruit and black coffee; there was nothing in the big refrigerator. He was careful to leave no fingerprints, once looking ruefully at the finger with the missing joint that had given him away at the Sewing Bee. He slept fitfully, Lynne moving in and out of his restless mind, then he got up early and went into the bathroom. He
found
a pair of scissors and cut off most of his dark hair, then with Mr. Milo's electric razor he trimmed it down to a short stubble. Before he shaved he looked at his face; it was nondescript, a face in the crowd. He had not shaved for two days and there was a dark shadow on his long upper lip; he decided to grow a moustache. Still standing in front of the bathroom mirror he put on his gold-rimmed glasses. The disguise was minimal, but he would pass. There are advantages to being average.

He had breakfast of honey on dry cereal and black coffee. Then he went into the main bedroom to rummage through the closets. The Milos evidently spent a lot of money on clothes; expensive labels swung round on hangers like calling cards. Mr. Milo, it seemed, was about the same height as August, but beefier; the jacket and trousers he chose were a size too large, but he was being chased by police, not tailors. He smiled at the thought of taking the jacket and trousers back to the Sewing Bee for alteration, but the smile was just the faint echo of a hollow laugh. He was past humour, at least for the moment.

He left the house the way he had entered it. He was wearing a tan sun-hat with a green-and-brown ribbon, one of Mr. Milo's Ruffini & Brooks' oxford blue shirts, a brown custom-tailored sports jacket and a pair of Daks cavalry twill trousers, the extra width drawn in by an expensive leather belt with Mr. Milo's initials on the buckle. He had never been so well dressed in his life. The effect was spoiled only by the tool-box he carried.

He debated whether he should head north or south. For some reason most fugitives, if they did not flee the country, headed north, as if Queensland were a habitat where a leopard could change his spots without anyone's noticing. True, not so many years ago, southerners had thought of the Gold Coast as a habitat where white-shoed leopards sold swampy spots to any sucker who came north, but now it seemed that every second retiree was heading north. The region had become respectable to a point where even
Baywatch
had been invited to settle.

August decided to head south. He walked to Milsons Point railway station, caught a train to Town Hall and changed to one for Sutherland; there he would steal a car and drive maybe even as far south as Victoria or even Tasmania, the island State so often left off maps, even those drawn by
mainlanders.
It might be an ideal state in which to get lost.

Just before the train reached Rockdale he saw the two transport police officers coming through from the carriage in front. The train drew into the station, he got up and stepped out as the doors opened. He didn't hurry, took his time, a well-dressed handyman on his way to work; he even paused to give a hand to an old lady having difficulty stepping on to the platform. In the carriage the two officers had paused by a youth in T-shirt and jeans, baseball cap on back to front, who had his feet up on the seat opposite him. He was in trouble.

Still haunted by what he had done to, and for, Lynne, August had gone into a public phone-box and called her. He had guessed that the police would have a tap on her phone; but he
had
to speak to her. When he hung up he felt worse.

Then he went looking for a car; or rather, a pair of number-plates. In Pentridge a professional car thief had given him a course in car-stealing—“Think of it as a rehabilitation course, mate. Don't leave here without learning nothing.” He found a street lined with cars and in five minutes, after opening his tool-box, he had removed the front and rear plates from a Subaru. He put them in his tool-box and moved off, glancing right and left out of the corners of his eyes to make sure he had not been observed.

He went back to Rockdale station, caught a train to Sutherland and found the sort of car he was looking for—“Never pick one with a distinctive colour, mate, not unless you got an order for it.” It was a light grey Datsun, a commuter's car parked in a street across from the station. Again unobserved, he changed the plates, opened the driver's door as he had been taught, hot-wired the car and drove away, heading south but with no particular place in mind.

At seven o'clock he pulled into a motel in Narooma, two hundred miles down the coast, registering as J.W. Milo, the initials on the shirt he wore. There, on Channel 15's late news, delivered by a woman newsreader whose claypan make-up rendered her expressionless, he saw the encounter between Lynne and the young bitch who, in the sign-off, identified herself as Maureen Malone.

He went to bed seething with anger at what they were doing to Lynne. In the middle of the night he woke determined on revenge.

III

“I've resigned,” said Maureen. “I leave on Friday.”

“You resigned or they sacked you?” Malone had arrived home, bringing his irascible temper with him like an office workload.

“Both.”

“Lay off her, Dad,” said Claire.

The two of them had been waiting for him, like ambushers, as he came round the side passage from the garage. He had seen Claire's car, a Honda Civic, parked at the kerb and he had wondered why she was here this evening. They had jerked their heads at him and escorted him—like cops?—in through the pool gate and sat him down in one of the chairs beside the pool. Then they had sat opposite him.

He had looked towards the house. “Where's Mum?”

“We told her to stay inside. This is between you and us,” said Claire.

“How did you get into the act?”

“I rang Mo this afternoon to tell her Clizbe and Balmoral were withdrawing the suit against her and Channel 15. She asked me to come home and give her moral support.”

“You're not here as her legal adviser?”

“Pull your head in, Dad. This is no time for jokes.”

“I think I need Mum here. For moral support.”

“No, you don't. Now shut up and listen. Tell him what happened, Mo.”

The evening air was still, a faint tinge of autumn to it. From a back yard further down the street there came the shouts of children: a happy family careless of moral support or legal advice. Malone looked towards the back of the house and saw Lisa standing at the kitchen window. She raised her hand and gave him the thumbs-up sign. At least there was moral support there. Maureen said, “I didn't want to do that interview, Dad. Honestly. I knew what it might do to Mrs. Masson. But Justin, my producer, was sold on it or else—if I didn't do it, I was back to being a researcher, nothing more, I'd get all the little shitty jobs. He
gave
me that dickhead Barney as cameraman—he knew Barney would shove the camera in her face, he's that sort. A real blokey bloke, can't stand women—but can't stand poofters, either. A real pain in the butt, I hated working with him . . . I was between a rock and a hard place, Dad.”

“Basically and at the end of the day. Skip the clichés, Mo.”

Maureen looked at her sister. “He's not going to listen—”

“I'm listening,” said Malone. “You haven't given any evidence yet to excuse you.”

Then Tom, wheeling his bike, came round from the side passage. “Hullo, what's going on?”

“Get lost,” said Claire.

“Sounds like you need some help, Dad—”

Malone waved a gentle hand of dismissal. “Go in and help Mum lay the table or something.”

Tom went to say something, then thought better of it. He was learning the vibrations that come earlier to girls than they do to boys; he was not insensitive but he was still struggling out of the membrane of youth. “Just yell, Dad—” he said and went in the back door.

Maureen was struggling to hold in her feelings; she was on the verge of tears. “Jesus, Dad, haven't you had to do things you thought were wrong! I told you—I didn't want to do it—”

“Are they running the item tonight?”

“Yes. Look, I'll go back and tell Mrs. Masson I've resigned, that I didn't want to do it—”

“The damage is done. Leave it for a while, till we see how things turn out.” He was softening, but not by much. He turned to Claire: “Why are Clizbe and Balmoral dropping the suit?”

“We don't know—they wouldn't tell us. Just told us to forget it and send them the bill. Which we'll do, with pleasure.”

“Dad—” Maureen leaned forward, put her hand on his knee; he hesitated, then put his own hand over hers. “I'm really sorry. The trouble is, Channel 15 have got more to follow. I didn't dig it up, one of the other researchers did. Clizbe, Balmoral and Peter Kelzo have got together—”

He frowned: wolves and bears mixing?

“I know,” she said, squeezing his knee. “But it's true. Last week they were cutting each other's
throats
—well, Joe St. Louis was bashing Mr. Clizbe . . . Now . . . Now they've got a deal where Kelzo drops his man from the Boolagong pre-selection and he gets behind Balmoral. They're out to toss Mrs. Vanderberg—”

He shook his head at that. “They've got Buckley's chance of that. They might just as well try for pre-selection in Serbia.”

“Well, they're going to try. And there's another thing. Channel 15 have found out that Jerry Balmoral has been taking out that Chinese girl in the Olympic Tower partnership—”

“Camilla Feng,” said Claire.

“I remember her,” said Malone. “Quite a dish.”

“I'll tell Mum.”

“The suspicion is,” said Maureen, “that the two hundred and fifty thousand that's supposed to have been given to Boolagong came from Olympic Tower. They're after something—”

“What?” asked Malone.

“We—” Then she remembered that she and Channel 15 were no longer we. “They don't know. But there's a rumour of a casino being built at Coffs Harbour—nothing definite yet—they could be after the licence—”

“Rumour, suspicion—” He looked at Claire.

“What we think, our firm, is that Clizbe and Balmoral have gone to someone on the Channel 15 board and made a deal. No suit, no more story. We think the deal's been made, but no one's telling us. Just drop the suit, we were told, and send them the bill. It stinks.”

“It gets your sister off the hook.”

“Yeah, that's the good part. But it still stinks.”