I stopped twenty yards away from the door to my building. The lane was usually quiet. A church at the top end on the right, then the ABC premises. Nothing much on the other side. An auto-electrician’s workshop that had made the place busy in the past had closed down a couple of days before I signed my lease. In my building were an iridologist, an astronomical-chart drawer, a dental technician and me. Most of the offices were unlet and it was the same in the other buildings. The area had to be scheduled for renovation or demolition and redevelopment. So, not a lot of traffic, but there was something unnatural about this stillness.
It came to me in a flash and I reacted instinctively by flattening myself against the wall, pressing back into a long boarded-up doorway. All the flapping posters had been taken down and nothing bad been put up in their place. The posters would have posed a problem for anyone trying to shoot from further up the lane. I trusted the feeling of danger; I’d had it too many times before in quiet kampongs and apparently empty paddy fields, but I felt ridiculous-this wasn’t Malaya, or Vietnam, or New York City. I sucked in a breath and realised that I’d been holding myself in a sort of suspended animation. Survival stuff. Why not? I moved my head out of its rigid, locked position and forced myself to look with one eye down the lane. I desperately wished for a weapon, but my Smith amp; Wesson. 38 was locked away in the office filing cabinet.
To use even one eye you have to expose some forehead. I squinted up the lane, prepared to run forward to my doorway. What the hell if I looked ridiculous? I was imagining things. No-one was watching. The bullet tore a furrow through the bricks a metre or so in front of me and whined off to hit the wall opposite. I was blinded by the brick dust but still registering impressions. The shot was muted. A silencer fitted. Bad for accuracy, but what use was that to me now?
I heard a sound behind me and used my undamaged eye to look. A car had turned into the lane and was coming slowly towards me. Jesus, I thought, a crossfire. Good planning men. This is it.
The car continued slowly up the lane. It was a sleek green Rover, a respectable person’s car. The driver was a fat man, pale-faced, apprehensive.
‘Hardy!’ The harsh voice came from up near the church. ‘Leave it alone!’
The Rover stopped. I could feel my fingers crushing the salad sandwich into a soggy mess. The driver wound down his window.
‘I’m looking for an auto-electrician,’ he said.
7
It wasn’t the first time I’d been shot at and it didn’t leave me weak and shaking, although it was a while before I could peel myself from the wall and go into my building. When I got to my door and fished for my key I realised I was still holding the food and drink. I put them on the desk and opened the drawer where I’d installed a cask of red wine. It was a good fit. I filled a coffee mug and rolled a cigarette. A bullet within a metre of the skull cancels out some good resolutions. Bitter lemon just wasn’t going to cut it. I smoked the cigarette, ate the squashed sandwich and drank the wine. All very natural functions and reassuring to be able to perform them. I wanted it to stay that way.
Given that, I had the option of doing what I was told-dropping it. I could return Virginia Shaw’s money, tear up her Melbourne number and get on with summons serving and doing character checks for employers and looking for a little light car-repossession work. I could even spend some money-fly up to Cairns and see if Cyn was cheating on me with someone in a safari suit. A great start to my new, independent life as a small businessman that would be. Two jobs, two messes and a quick run for cover.
Not on. My phone call to Andrew Perkins had produced immediate results. I’d rubbed a few people the wrong way as an insurance investigator and there were those around who didn’t like me for one reason or another, but not enough to send a shooter. It had to be Perkins. The intention may not have been to kill me. It was hard to tell, also impossible to prove. Perkins didn’t have to go into hiding on my account, but he’d be on the defensive. What was clear was that Detective Ian Gallagher had been right-there was something behind the Meadowbank shooting, perhaps something big. I could go to Gallagher and show him… what? The chunk out of the wall? The brick dust in my hair?
After another cigarette and half a mug of wine I’d convinced myself that the personal had merged with the professional and that I should have a meeting with Andrew Perkins. I dug out my slightly out-of-date copy of Hammersmith’s Australian Law List, one of the tools of the trade, and looked up Perkins. No chance of a private address, but some of the more status-conscious types liked to list their clubs. Perkins’ entry named the GPS Club-meaning he’d attended one of the major private schools-the Naval amp; Military and the White City Lawn Tennis Club. No affiliations with my only club-the Balmain-Rozelle RSL. I couldn’t see myself strolling into the GPS Club wearing my Maroubra High School tie and a brief second lieutenancy, gained in the field, wouldn’t cut much ice at the Naval amp; Military. But White City was a different matter. Tennis shirts and shorts tend to cancel out class differences and my father-in-law, Dr George Lee, was a member.
I phoned White City and was told that the members engaged in social tennis on Saturday afternoons and club competitions on Sunday, weather permitting. It was Friday and the forecast for Saturday was fine and warm. I phoned Cyn’s father at his practice in St Leonards.
‘Doc? Cliff. Lost many lately?’
‘No more than usual. Had an extraordinary haemorrhoid just now-big as a cricket ball.’
‘Wish I’d been there. How’s Inge?’
Inge is Cyn’s mother-a Danish-born snow queen whose genes dominated Doc’s to produce my blonde wife. Doc is squat and dark-a case of opposites attracting. Lee is a gipsy name, in some cases, and Doc and I had formed a good bantering friendship over the years based on our common supposed gipsy heritage, sporting interests and love for Cyn, who is an only child.
‘She’s fine. Cynthia’s gone to Queensland so I know the two of you aren’t coming into bourgeois territory to cadge a decent meal. No trouble I hope, Cliff?’
‘No trouble, Doc. I need a favour. You’re a member at White City?’
‘Mmm, yes. Haven’t been down there for a while.’
‘Ever met a bloke named Perkins? A lawyer?’
‘Don’t think so. As I say, I haven’t played there much lately-too old, too busy.’
‘You’re still financial, I hope.’
‘Of course. Still the best grass courts in Sydney, and grass is the only surface for the game.’
‘I agree. Could you find out whether this Andrew Perkins plays regularly and get me in to meet him?’
‘How soon?’
‘Tomorrow would be fine.’
‘You’re a bull-at-a-gate sort of chap, Cliff. I’ll see what I can do. Where are you?’
I told him the office number would get me for the next few hours and I’d be at home after that. I resisted the call of the wine and drank the bitter lemon as I made some judicious entries in a file headed ‘Shaw, Virginia’. I made out a deposit slip to bank her cheque and wrote a cheque of my own for my NRMA membership which had fallen due. Paperwork over for the day-a big change from my previous job. I was missing Cyn, or rather the thought of her, already. I didn’t have a contact number in Cairns. I supposed I could get one from the office, but why hadn’t she given me one? Why hadn’t I asked? I glanced around the drab office thinking that Cyn would have been able to brighten it in some way. I hadn’t invited her to see it. We weren’t in good shape. Doc and Inge would be worried if they knew.