‘Collinson’s mine.’
I nodded. ‘The kid’s out of it?’
‘All right. Get rid of her!’
I gave Helen Broadway’s number to Jess, and told her to keep calling it until she got through. Helen would help her, I said. Jess calmed down, repeated the number a couple of times which seemed to soothe her and said she’d do it.
I hung up, got up from the table and poured myself a drink.
‘What the fuck was all that about?’ Dottie put her foot on another butt on the floor.
‘Hardy’s going to take us to Collinson. Wouldn’t care to give us the address, Hardy?’ Hayes took a length of paper towel and blotted those sweat beads.
I shook my head. ‘I want to see to the kid. I want to see Collinson dead, if that’s the way it has to be.’
‘I don’t trust the cunt’, Catchpole said.
‘Don’t be bloody stupid!’ Hayes wadded the paper towel and threw it at the open tidy bin. He missed. ‘We’re not talking about trust here, we’re talking business. Still, you’ll have to give me a bit more, Hardy. Convince me you know where Collinson is.’
It was the right question for him to ask.
‘I know where you got the information about Collinson’s kids’, I said. ‘From a guy named Wally Bigelow, used to be a private detective.’
‘That’s right’, Hayes said.
‘What happened to Wally?’
‘He dropped dead. I was about to put some pressure on him to give out a bit more. He sold me some of it, but not enough. Bloody old pisspot. Died of fright.’
‘He didn’t know any more. Twenty years ago he was partners with a private detective named Phillips. Collinson’s wife hired Phillips to check on her husband. Collinson went by another name then. He’d begun to organise himself, be Mr Anonymous, but he wasn’t quite there. I’ve talked to Phillips.’
‘So we could talk to Phillips’, Williams said.
‘No’, I lied. ‘I’ve tucked him away. You can’t get to him.’
‘What’d this Phillips have to say?’ Hayes was calm, weighing his words.
‘He reckoned Collinson had a place to hide in. A perfect place, it sounds.’
‘When was this?’ Catchpole said.
‘Nearly twenty years ago.’
‘Shit! Twenty years! Everything’s different!’
‘I wouldn’t say that. You’re just as slimy as you were then.’
‘Knock it off, Hayes snarled. ‘It is a long time, Hardy.’ He looked dubious, and convincing him was the key to the whole thing. I had one more card to play. ‘I’ve got what seems to be the only known photograph of Collinson’, I said. ‘Put that bloody gun away, look reasonable and I’ll let you see it. The Guthrie kid in Brisbane’s going to be all right. I got him to the hospital, so I’m in good there. If I walk away with the other one, I’m on a bonus. I want a deal as much as you, Hayes.’
The idea of the photograph excited him-police training maybe-and the money talk was a clincher. He understood that sort of motive. Dealing with him was like trying to walk on a slippery, sloping roof, but I had as much duplicity as he did, and neither of us had handholds. He put the automatic on the table.
‘We’re dealing. Let’s see the picture.’
I got out the old photograph and passed it to him. He examined it like a violinist with a Stradivarius.
‘Well, I’m buggered.’
Dottie Williams leaned over and looked. ‘Looks like the picture the kid talked about. Said he had it, then he couldn’t come up with it. Said it’d been pinched.’
‘How’d you get to him, Hayes? The kid, how’d you get to him?’
Hayes grinned. ‘Dottie got to him.’
‘He was as green as grass’, she said. ‘The first hand job I gave him blew his mind.’ On closer inspection the pale-red aureole of her hair was a dyed, teased fake; her clothes reeked of tobacco, kissing her would be like licking an ashtray. But maybe I was getting discriminating as I got older. Liam Catchpole broke in with a typical contribution.
‘Who needs Hardy?’ he said. ‘Let’s get what he knows out of him and go and do the job. Fuck Hardy! Fuck the kid.’
Hayes seemed to give the idea some consideration, then he shook his head. ‘We haven’t got the time. Ray’s on the move, and Christ knows what’ll happen if he gets to Collinson first. If he’s as crazy as his bird says he is, he could kill him, or they could take off for Aca-fucking-pulco or somewhere. Besides’, he looked at Catchpole, who was propped back against the sink where I’d been, ‘you reckon you can put the scarers on Hardy?’
A lot of the stuffing had gone out of Catchpole since I’d last seen him. His reputation was more for slipperiness than gutsiness, but neither was apparent now. His face was tense and pale, acne-pitted, and he was pushing back his lank, oiled hair with nervous flicks. There was a brown scuff mark across the toe of his right, white shoe.
‘I could if I had Tiny here’, he muttered.
‘Forget it’, Hayes said. That should have been good news for me, but the trouble was it sounded as if he was saying forget Williams, forget Catchpole, forget Guthrie, forget Hardy. Forget everything except Hayes and Collinson. His obsession was strong, maybe stronger than his ability. I had to hope for that, hope for a chance or half a chance.
Hayes finished his drink and put the photograph in his pocket, where it made a dark blur behind the crisp, faint-lined material. ‘Where are we going, Hardy?’
‘South. Thirty miles or so.’
‘Cautious, eh?’
‘That’s right, eh.’
‘You’re being a smart-arse again, and I was trying to like vou.’
‘Don’t bother. Do we have to take them?’
Hayes retrieved his gun and put it away in a holster he wore at the back and on the left-hand side. He was right-handed, and slid the automatic back and away smoothly.
‘Yes’, he said. ‘Dottie, would you go and get my jacket from the front room?’
She went out, and Catchpole fidgeted by the sink, very unhappy with it. I consulted the New South Wales road map I keep the phone books and postcode list.
‘Where’s Parker?’ he snapped.
‘He’s off with the bird who lives here, probably up her by now.’ Forgive me, my friends, I thought.
Williams came back with the jacket, and Hayes shrugged into it. He adjusted his cuffs and the set of his tie that didn’t need attention.
‘Want to guess at my fee for this job, Hardy?’
I shook my head.
‘Course there’s expenses, Liam and Dottie are in for a cut. But the fee’s half a million dollars. Sort of motivates a man.’
‘It would’, I said.
‘Right. Now, I’ll go with Hardy, and you two can follow us.’ He lifted his chin, drawing the loose flesh under there tighter. ‘Go ahead, Hardy. Make me rich.’
17
Hayes pushed the magazines and other junk in the back seat of the Falcon aside, and settled himself there. I tried to comfort myself with the thought that I had a. 38 Smith amp; Wesson Chiefs Special an arm’s reach away under the dashboard, but no comfort came. Guns are confusing things; I was no match for Hayes with a gun, I knew that, and in a way I was a better match for him without one. That’s highly theoretical, and the theory wasn’t any comfort either.
Hayes positioned himself directly behind me. ‘Any way of locking the driver’s door?’ he said.
‘No.’ I showed him how it opened however the door lock was set.
‘Great’, he said. “Try that and I’ll blow your brains out.’
I was about to start the engine, but I held off and half-turned to almost face him. ‘Would you? Where would that get you? You’d still be in the dark about where Collinson is. It seems to me you need me.’
‘You’re half right, Hardy, but that isn’t right enough. I need you for a quick result, that’s true. But I can get a result other ways-I could get Mrs Guthrie to tell me about the private detective she used, and set about finding him. There’s the bloke in Parramatta your cop friend Parker is working on. I might do some good with him. Ray Guthrie might be worth twisting. All slower, but Collinson’s not leaving the country while he’s all hung up about his flesh and blood. I’d get to him sooner or later.’