‘Tell them to give us room Green,’ I panted, ‘or I’ll blow a hole in you. Tell them!’
Green waved his arms like a man signalling a plane in. ‘Go away,’ he moaned, ‘go away. Oh Christ look at the place, what a mess.’
The fat man had melted away somewhere leaving his mirror clouded and streaky, another six-foot stretch of glass was blood spattered and broken pieces littered the floor. There was a deep gouge in the polished boards where the thrown bar-bell had landed after it hit the mirror. I wasn’t feeling so good myself.
Green got up off his knees and I signalled him with the gun to move to a corner where there was a chair and a low bench. He moved and did some more arm waving.
‘Leave us alone. Kurt, Carl, get this mess cleaned up and piss off. We’re closed.’
He seemed to have the authority he needed and some to spare. Two of them picked up the man whose face I’d smashed and carried him like a baby. A section of the mirror swung out and led to a locker-room and storeroom evidently, because they came back with brooms and wet towels and got to work on the devastation.
Green plonked himself down on the bench and gave me and my gun an ugly look.
‘Do you know what those mirrors cost?’ he barked.
‘I didn’t throw it,’ I said. ‘I didn’t want any trouble. Now I’m going to ask you again, do you know anything about the man in those pictures?’
He paused and looked keenly at me; his eyes seemed to be mocking me or maybe they were just hostile. ‘I said I didn’t know him,’ he said deliberately.
I brought the gun up a few inches but he knew I wouldn’t use it; we both knew it. He relaxed and I wondered if he was thinking about trying to take me, but there was a deep cut under his knee, bruised around the edges and dripping blood, and I didn’t think he’d risk it.
‘Why did you start all that?’
He shrugged. ‘I don’t like coppers of any kind.’
‘Bullshit. Who was the guy who spoke to you when Carl hit the five hundred?’
The eyes mocked or were hostile again. ‘Nobody. He was putting on a bet.’
I looked at the clean-up gang. ‘Where is he now?’
‘Didn’t you see?’ Green sneered. ‘He got in the way of some of the glass, I imagine he’s gone for stitches.’
I tried to bring the man’s features back and up into focus but I couldn’t. I hadn’t bothered to look at him closely, I’d been too interested in the stupid medicine ball game. He was big and dark, I had that much, but nearly all of them were big and dark.
‘What’s his name?’
‘I’m not going to tell you. What are you going to do — shoot me?’ He laughed and ran his hand over the grey hair.
‘There’s a racket here,’ I said. ‘I can smell it.’
‘No racket here, my friend, I make men into the men they want to be. That’s all.’ He started to stand up and let out a gasp when the weight fell on his injured leg. He slumped down onto the bench. ‘You’ve cost me money. I wouldn’t come around here again if I was you.’ He drew in a breath and yelled, ‘Ronnie!’
The girl stuck her head around the partition, she saw the gun and pulled back out of sight.
Green yelled again. ‘Ronnie, get me the first aid box… and bring a hand-out over here.’
She came teetering across the boards as the clean-up finished. Her eyes were big and frightened and her expensive top teeth were chewing on her ripe lower lip. She was carrying a white case about the size of a shoe-box and a piece of foolscap-sized, buff-coloured paper fluttered in her hand.
Green stuck out his leg. ‘Clean this up, Ronnie.’ He took the paper from her, folded it down the middle and handed it to me.
‘This is a legitimate business, probably more legitimate than yours. Have this in exchange for your crummy card.’
I put the gun away and took the paper, feeling bad. It had the name of the joint printed stylishly across the top with a photo of Green striking a pose beside it. I put it in my pocket and got up. I had nothing more to say. I felt that if I threatened to shoot out all his mirrors Green would still laugh at me. I was preoccupied with the thought that Warwick Baudin and my bonus and everything else that mattered might have passed within touching distance of me. Green swore when Ronnie started in on his wound and I felt a little better about it all.
I unshipped the. 38 when I passed Ronnie’s desk and watched for vengeful lurkers on the stairs but there was no one. The disposals store bristled with bayonets and knives and there was a gun-shop next to that; the place was high on weapons and low on intelligence and I included myself in that. I bought coffee and some aspirin in the next block and sat rubbing the sore spot near my ear and wondering about my next move. I pulled out the Spartacus Studio’s blurb and looked it over: Leonidas had his name in about ten times and there were testimonials to the efficacy of his courses from satisfied Mr Victorias and Mr Queenslands. A name near the bottom of the screed took my eye — the supplier of weight-lifting and gymnasium equipment to the studio was Richard Selby.
20
I was doing it all by reflex now, bouncing from point to point and not initiating anything, but that’s the way things break sometimes and I had the feeling that my bounces were taking me closer to the nerve centre of whatever the hell was going on. Selby’s firm was listed — the Titan Gymnasium I Equipment Co. Its factory and office were in St Peters, a short drive, but a hot, bustly one in four o’clock traffic. I dragged myself back to the car and broke all the rules about drug use by swigging some of the Irish whisky before I started and smoking a cigarette as I drove.
I passed the dark, satanic chimneys that landmark St Peters and started threading through the streets that are a mixture of light-industry, factories and terrace houses. Selby’s place was a big, red-brick structure with a flat face sitting flush with the pavement. It had big roller doors at either end and a glass-panelled door in the middle. The word Titan was written across the front, the letters being composed of strokes in the shape of barbells.
I sat in my car watching the place, smoking, and wondering how to tackle Selby. Maybe I could strongarm him into telling me what he knew about Brain and Bettina’s child and Warwick Baudin and maybe I couldn’t. Maybe he didn’t know or someone else was using him. It was a tangled skein with the deaths of Brain and Callaghan as knots and the lost Chatterton at the end of the string. I was musing, stalling like this when two men came out of the centre door. The shorter man, wearing a yellow blazer and tan slacks, was Selby. His face was brick red in the sunlight and his oiled, black locks glistened. The other man was a few inches taller and very broad; he was wearing a fawn suit and his face was partly s wathed in fresh, white bandages. I watched them talking for a while and then had to gulp for air; I realised that I’d been holding my breath. They talked intently for a few minutes but then Selby clapped the other on the arm and went back into the building. The man with the bandages stood for a moment squinting against the sun; I strained my eyes at him willing him to be the man I wanted but I couldn’t be sure. He was about six foot two and his hair was dark but his features were disguised by the wrappings. His clothes were good without being hand-made; he looked fit but a bit on the heavy side: it was possible.
He walked over to a blue Datsun and got in it by bending the right places at the right time. I tagged along trying to feel confident that I had the fish in the net, but full of doubt. He stopped in Newtown for a paper and had his car checked right around; wherever he was going he wasn’t in a hurry. His next stop was at Victoria Park where he sat on a bench and read the paper. Then he smoked a cigarette. I did the same fifty yards away sitting in my car with the beginnings of a bladder problem. He strolled across to a telephone booth, not far enough from his car to give me time to do anything about my bladder, and did some nattering. Then another cigarette, then some tie-straightening and comb work in the side mirror and he was ready to go.