*
Breeze was in his Renault out front of Pinter’s brown brick Footscray unit, reading up on the Catlett file with eyes scrunched up tight, as though gripping onto a monocle.
‘Get anything interesting?’ he asked as Furn swung into the front passenger seat.
‘He’s scared alright,’ Furn replied. ‘But I didn’t take it too much further ‘cause I get the feeling he is mostly scared for his family.’
Breeze tossed the Catlett file into the back seat and put on his seatbelt. ‘I took two calls while you were paying your social visit.’
‘Yeah?’
‘What do you want first, the good news or the bad news?’
‘Just give it to me and I’ll tell you which is which.’
‘The Assistant Coroner wants you to know that with all the cyanide pumped into your overnight car guest he no longer feels comfortable about his barbeque menu. Says he’ll stick to beef.’
Furn scratched a nervous itch on his nose. ‘That ain’t the good news, right?’
‘Not really. I was looking forward to the precedent of Dr Dong Dang eating one of his patients. The good news is Catlett has enough room around his pool for a couple of cops. We’ve been invited.’
He went to the ignition and the Renault purred to life. Furn had to admire that: his own car was always too busy reminding him about his seatbelt to purr. He glanced back at the Pinter’s windows, hoping that a pair of shrouded eyes behind the curtains would indicate his visit had resonated longer than the slamming door. The couple of seconds it took Breeze to get the Renault moving weren’t encouraging.
The car hungrily gained speed out into the traffic only to be like the dog that found the end of its leash: a red light followed by a turn onto the ever busy Dandenong Road and the momentum was lost. Furn figured Catlett’s address would be closer to the city and a long way from here. He got to the radio before Breeze could cue up one of his European hip hop collections, tuning to the Parliamentary Broadcast. There was a speech in progress: the Minister for the Environment defending the Murray-Dowling River Scheme.
‘You’ll put me to sleep at the wheel,’ said Breeze. ‘You really still think that’s part of your future? You do realise we’re hunting one brother so that the government can sew his arms onto the other. That’s my reading of this little situation and you can bet if you ran for public office it would get leaked out. The community would be horrified and you wouldn’t get a vote.’
‘I partially agree,’ replied Furn smoothly. ‘The community would be horrified. But the funny thing is people wouldn’t mind it so much if they thought I was on their side - and to make sure of it, I’d get a vote or two.’
Breeze laughed. ‘You’re sick enough to be a politician.’
Furn chuckled too, though it quickly faded to his usual habit of concentrating on every word the Parliamentarians were uttering. It didn’t come to him easily, like a foreign language, a language from above the swamps.
Although it was true enough money did not grow on trees, it was evident enough in the inner suburb of Kew what kind of trees could grow on money. Lush, lavish gardens immaculately tendered, and seemingly deserving the fences that kept them separate from the harsh reality of the city beyond. Breeze pulled into the roadside by a towering white-washed wall, and immediately turned off the engine and radio.
‘Perhaps, by the time you’re ready to stop being a cop you won’t be in much of a state to do anything else,’ he said.
‘I’ll be fine,’ said Furn. ‘But a politician needs a public name. I’m still working on mine, though I get the feeling this case will help.’
18 Ceremony Crescent, Kew. The gold-plated street number was undersized on the tall white brick wall – the second-to-bottom line of an eye-test. There was an intercom beside the arched driveway gate. Furn pressed down on its luminous green button.
‘Are you the two detectives?’ promptly came a husky female voice over the speaker.
‘That’s right,’ said Furn, glancing up at the surveillance camera above the gate. ‘Furn and Breeze.’
‘Okay. Wait a moment.’ The woman’s voice was slow, like she had been sleeping late.
The gate began to roll open. It was slow too. The emerging gap brought the woman into view; she was approaching from along the driveway from quite some distance away. Furn looked that way quickly, his eyes drawn to her long tanned legs in a provocatively short summer dress.
Breeze nudged him with an elbow and murmured, ‘Catlett must be dribbling more off the court than he does on it.’
The woman was striding confidently, her long black hair swinging with her hips, her eyes hidden behind large sunglasses. She was skinny without imposing the finer details of her skeletal structure to the world.
By the time she had reached the gate Furn had convinced himself he was looking at just another line in a report and his eyes were back to normal.
‘Would you like to see a badge?’ he asked.
‘No need,’ she said with a trace of a smile and that familiar huskiness. ‘Seen one you’ve seen them all.’
‘Are you in the cheer squad?’ Breeze asked brazenly.
‘For the Melbourne Tigers?’ the woman scoffed. ‘No, thanks. Clance explained the rules of basketball plainly enough. He didn’t do so well at explaining the appeal. Shall we talk at the pool?’
There was a sheen of lotion on her skin, and a pleasant smell of perfume. Behind her was an expansive, well-trimmed lawn leading up to a beautiful gabled house. The tinted glass implied shades of paranoia.
‘Let’s go,’ said Breeze, although she was already on her way. He forced his eyes off her superbly formed buttocks to the open carport and garage. He knew that with careful attention such structures could give as much away about criminal activities as a medicine cabinet disease. What he saw here was a luxury CLC-Class Mercedes Benz and a lawnmower with a steering wheel.
‘What’s your name?’ Furn asked their escort.
‘Rish Jones. Call me Rish. Sorry if you find the garden barren. There used to be a wonderful rock garden but Clancy’s agent had it removed. She didn’t want him spraining an ankle while sleep walking - which he usually does with a bottle in hand.’
She stopped at a wire fence between the house and garage, which was perhaps the last line of defense should the invading glimpses of reality successfully breach the front wall. ‘Go through. Clancy is expecting you. I’ll prepare some refreshments. We have a soft drink sponsor so I hope that will do.’
She went up the porch steps, her legs offering as much of themselves as the Detective Sergeants were willing to demean themselves to get. That they didn’t bump heads was the only credit they could claim. They entered through the gate, carefully closing it behind them in case they were entering some kind of wildlife preserve. Garden gnomes replaced Rish as escorts, lining the cobble stoned walkway that took them into the backyard and the rectangular swimming pool that occupied much of it.
Clancy Catlett’s legs, waxed and inked, were glistening with perspiration in one of the many deck chairs around the pool. The upper half of the man was concealed under a tilted bamboo umbrella. The Detective Sergeants’ elongated shadows crept in underneath it, alerting Catlett to their presence. He swung across the deck chair and pushed up the umbrella. Narrow intense eyes on a bold Nubianesque nose and with a set of lips as plush as cushions. He had the edgy look of a real talker -someone with things to say, even to police, and even if they could be used against him.
‘Are you Clancy Catlett?’ said Furn, flashing his badge.
‘You’re really asking?’ he gnarled. ‘Cops are supposed to be informed. It’s typical everyone knows that answer but you.’
His neck was at an awkward angle, seemingly struggling to adjust from looking down at people to looking up. ‘Maybe you ain’t real cops at all. The bruises are healed up. The insurance has been paid out. The statements have been given. In other words, the party here is over. Nothing left to do except the washing up. You the guy
s that do that? Anyway, if you are the cops, there’s no need to ask you to sit down ‘cause cops don’t sit in deck chairs.’
Breeze stepped up to the pool and patted the glassy water with his shoe heel. He followed the turquoise ripples out towards the centre of the pool. ‘The good thing about this conversation is it’s already finished,’ he said. ‘You’ve just told us everything we need to know.’ He lifted up his leg. ‘And my shoe is cleaner too.’
Catlett leaned forward as the two detective sergeants started to walk away. ‘Hey, wait. What did I tell you? Don’t be in such a rush. I’m the victim, right? It’s only the suspects that have the right to remain silent. You didn’t know I was a ballplayer and I didn’t know whether you had a backbone holding you up or just that piece of tin. Now everything’s smooth. Rish is getting drinks. At least stick around for that. How was she at the gate? She was a nanny when I found her, but I don’t have any kids so I’ve been retraining her in hospitality.’
Breeze turned back with pointed indifference. ‘You were a fringe on the Timberwolves before you downsized to the local league. I know something about basketball.’
Catlett held up his hands incredulously.‘Take a look around. You think I ain’t getting paid?’
Breeze put his hands on his hips. ‘I’ll tell you what I think. You got beaten up by the Sapiens and if they actually took something of value it was too valuable to tell the cops about.’
Catlett was about to speak but Breeze held out a hand to shut him up.
‘You also neglected to tell the cops about the calling card they left behind. You thought you had some gang banger pals who could do a better job than the cops at exercising revenge. I’m referring to your recently deceased tattooist. Getting a tattoo must allow a lot of time for gangster storytelling. And you got a lot of tattoos. And you might have even believed half the crap he was saying. He would have been a logical choice to go to with your grievance.’
‘The way he died -’ added Furn, getting in on the act, ‘the moment he died...you wouldn’t need to be afraid of death to be afraid of that.’
‘Having a murdered man’s ink all over your body must be disquieting,’ said Breeze.
‘Yeah,’ said Catlett, ‘cause he hadn’t finished one.’ He scooped up a Pepsi from beside his deckchair and drank it like he was squeezing an orange.
‘That’s what I’m talking about. Your enforcer got enforced and you’re still acting blasé. That tells me someone else has taken on the job. Someone with actual skills. Not a friend of yours or you would have asked him in the first place.’
‘Funny, ‘cause I’m telling myself if you had any skills you would’ve been on this job in the first place.’ He was pointing at his house again. ‘There’s no money on interchange benches.’
‘Anyone we can scratch off our suspect list in this we’ll give a medallion for restraint,’ murmured Furn as he marched out the backyard.
Breeze remained behind for the earnest hour with a dour look. ‘We’re the real thing, Clancy. Give us something to work with. There must be a reason you incurred the Sapien’s wrath. You have my word the reason will remain confidential.’
Catlett screwed up his face and pushed back in the deck chair. ‘If I knew that I would have solved this crime myself. I’m not letting a couple of dogs get away with breaking into my home, rendering me unconscious.’
Breeze shrugged his shoulders and started after Furn.
‘Leave your card in case I think of something,’ said Catlett, wanting to stretch out the moment a little further.
‘It’s the Sapiens leaving cards,’ snapped Breeze dismissively. He increased the speed of his stride then and joined Furn back in the Renault.
Furn was in the driver’s seat, his arm was out the window and he was tapping a beat on the door panel as he listened to that European hip hop. ‘I like your theory about the tattooist. A good, solid cop theory. Any ideas who Catlett’s new avenging angel might be?’
‘I’ve got a fair idea. A guy working out of the Authority Exchange.’
Furn went to the ignition. ‘That’s not too far.’
There was a tap on the curb side window. Two iced cokes sat on a tray underneath two proud breasts in a showcasing translucent blue blouse. Breeze buzzed down his window.
‘Talking with that man can be hard work,’ said Rish. ‘Have them to go. It’ll be a cool off.’
Breeze lifted the glass off the tray. The bottoms dripped with the residue from the rush.
‘Do we need to return the glasses?’
Rish leaned into the car, her sunglasses off and her personality out with a smile. ‘If you don’t, that would be stealing.’