Salt and Blood Read online

  ‘Jesus, you’re bleeding.’

  I lifted my hand to my face and felt the cuts. I turned back to Harkness, who was sitting up straight with all the colour drained from his face. ‘Just some nicks,’ I said to the samaritan. ‘Must’ve been a stone.’

  ‘Yeah, them old windscreens shatter like buggery. Well, if you’re all right …’

  ‘Thanks for stopping.’ I turned back to Harkness. He was bleeding from cuts to his left ear and the side of his face. ‘Pick the glass away carefully, bit by bit. Don’t brush it.’

  He did as I said and I did the same. Tiny cubes of glass lay all over the seat and floor. I opened the door and he got out and leaned against the car, sucking in deep breaths. ‘That was no fucking stone.’

  I reached into the back for a rag and brushed glass from the seat. ‘No. Someone took a shot at us. Two shots. From over in the bush.’

  ‘Shit. At me or you?’

  ‘I can’t think of anyone who’d want to kill me just at the moment.’

  Colour was coming back into his face. I found a crumpled pack of tissues in the glove box and gave him a couple. We dabbed at our cuts while cars passed with their occupants looking at us curiously.

  ‘You heard the shot and pulled me down,’ Harkness said. He pushed back the hair that had flopped into his eyes and shoved the bloodied tissues into the pocket of his jacket.

  ‘Reflex action,’ I said. ‘Let’s find a garage and see if we can get the windscreen replaced.’

  We got into the car and I reversed onto the road. The second bullet had left a long, raw scrape on the top of the Falcon.

  ‘It’s happened to you before, hasn’t it, Cliff?’

  ‘Broken windscreen? Sure.’

  He laughed. ‘Closest I’ve come to being shot at has been in television. They put in a windscreen made of a special sort of sugar and the armourer fires a blank charge.’

  ‘I don’t watch much television. What show was that?’

  ‘It’s a while back. I forget.’

  I kept the speed down, but the breeze blowing into the car was still cool despite the mildness of the afternoon. At the second garage they said they could replace the windscreen, but not for a few days. The Falcon was too old for the size and shape to be in stock. The mechanic looked the car over doubtfully. ‘Want the roof fixed, too?’

  I said I did and he said it’d require a deposit so I let him take a swipe of the credit card. ‘Gonna cost you.’

  ‘That’s life.’

  I could see where the bullet had embedded itself in the upholstery at the back but I didn’t think the windscreen repairer would notice; the back seat was pretty ratty anyway. We cleaned ourselves up in the station rest room. I phoned for a cab and we waited out front. There was a pub immediately across the highway and I could’ve done with a drink or two but it wasn’t quite the time. Harkness hadn’t said a word since mentioning his television work.

  I unlocked the door to the Curlewis Street flat and watched Rod Harkness mooch in and drop his bag on the floor as if he’d occupied the place for years and it held no interest for him. He shrugged off his jacket and slung it on a chair, slumped into the nearest chair and barely cast a look around the living room. I went into the kitchen and saw that someone had paid a visit to the supermarket.

  ‘They laid in some supplies for you,’ I said. ‘Want some coffee?’

  He shrugged. ‘Sure. Why not?’

  ‘Sugar?’

  ‘Three.’

  I made two mugs of instant coffee and sat down across the room from him. ‘We’re going to have to talk. I was hired to keep an eye on you. Help you get back on your feet. There was nothing said about someone trying to kill you. I can usually read people pretty well, but I can’t tell whether you’re surprised or not. What’re you feeling now—surprise, fear, don’t-give-a-fuck—what?’

  He stared at the brown carpet for a minute and then lifted his head slowly. Blood had started seeping from his cuts again and he’d touched them and smeared his face in spots. He had a tragic look that wasn’t posed or theatrical. He took a long pull on his coffee and clasped his hands around the mug. ‘To tell you the truth I think I’d describe my attitude as puzzled. Completely puzzled.’

  I drank some coffee. Moccona freeze-dried, about the best instant you can get. There was blue-vein brie in the fridge along with olives and sweet and sour cucumbers. Two litres of milk, three bottles of Perrier, packets of sliced ham and smoked salmon. There was a loaf of rye bread and a bowl of fruit. I hadn’t looked in the freezer compartment but I’d have been willing to bet it wasn’t empty. The Harknesses hadn’t abandoned the black sheep quite as thoroughly as I’d thought.

  ‘Puzzled,’ I said.

  ‘Yeah. Do you know I’ve got no idea who’s behind getting me out of Rutherford House? Every couple of years there’d be an examination and I’d be told I was staying a little longer. Then this last time … Jesus, I still can’t quite believe it. ‘Who …?’

  ‘Didn’t they tell you?’

  ‘All I was told was that a firm of civil rights lawyers I’ve never heard of had instituted procedures that led to psychological assessments that advised my release. My fucking family appealed against the recommendation but the lawyers carried the day. I gather I’m sort of on probation and you’re part of that, along with me taking my medication. And here we are.’

  I felt a mild impulse to defend the family. ‘Your family want to know who hired the lawyers as well.’

  ‘I bet they do. But I don’t suppose the lawyers are required to tell them.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know.’ I took the credit card from my pocket and passed it across to him along with the documentation. ‘They’ve provided you with funds.’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘Seven thousand bucks plus.’

  ‘That’s about right. I had a few grand left when I … I had to give Warren power of attorney. Knowing him, he’d have invested it wisely. What else have they got in mind?’

  I thought about it before replying. Should I tell him about his mother and brother commissioning Glen to find his wife and child? I decided to hedge the bet. ‘Maybe you ought to ask them.’

  He shook his head almost violently. ‘No way. I couldn’t bear to be in the company of either of them. Not for one minute. If you try to make me, I’ll resist.’

  I finished my coffee and made a don’t-blame-me gesture with both hands. ‘I’m not here to make you do anything.’

  He grinned. ‘No, you’re here to stop me from drinking. Don’t worry, I won’t. The impulse has gone.’

  ‘Good. That should make my job pretty easy.’

  ‘I dunno about that.’ He suddenly seemed to find some energy. He drained his mug, set it down on the floor, stood and began to inspect the flat. He went into the bedrooms, the bathroom, toilet and kitchen. I stood in the middle of the living room while he prowled around. He came from the kitchen munching on an apple.

  ‘This isn’t bad,’ he said. ‘What would it be worth, about?’

  I shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Maybe six hundred thousand, maybe more.’

  ‘Jesus. That much? I’m out of touch with property values along with everything else. Have I got a lease?’

  ‘I saw an agent’s card by the fruit bowl. You could ring them and find out.’

  ‘Maybe you could ring them?’

  ‘Look, Rod, I’m not your servant.’

  ‘Sorry. I know that. I should have … You’re a private detective, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Okay. Well, I want to hire you to find how those lawyers who got me released found out about me and who’s trying to kill me and if they’re all one and the same.’

  6

  I phoned Glen, gave her the minimum amount of detail, and she said she’d be there inside an hour. I stalled Rod Harkness until then by telling him that I had to consult my partner. He occupied himself by going over the flat minutely, unpacking his bag and arranging his few belongings in the living room and the
bedroom without the surfboard. He had a dozen or so books, including the two-volume biography of Elvis, and he arranged them on a shelf near the television.

  He went into the other bedroom and stayed there for a few minutes. ‘A Malibu,’ he said as he came out. He lifted his eyebrows in the first theatrical gesture I’d seen from him.

  ‘Good board,’ I said.

  ‘Old man’s board—easy to paddle.’

  When he opened the sliding door to step out onto the balcony I stopped him.

  ‘Think,’ I said. ‘There’d be a dozen places around here to take a shot from.’

  ‘Jesus. Am I going to have watch my back for the rest of my life? I feel like a protected witness.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Am I what?’

  ‘Are you a witness to something that someone doesn’t want you talk about, ever?’

  ‘No.’ He closed the door and sat down. One hand felt the scratches on his face and ear, the other tapped nervously on the arm of the chair. ‘What’s he supposed to be doing, this partner of yours?’

  ‘She. And I’ll let her explain. More coffee?’

  He nodded and I made some. I got out a mug for Glen and heard a knock at the door as I did so. I gestured to Harkness to be quiet and took a look through the spyhole. It was Glen looking stylish in a blue silk dress and tailored black jacket. I let her in.

  ‘I hadn’t necessarily planned to meet him,’ she said quietly.

  ‘What happened today changes things. He’s in here. Want some coffee?’

  ‘Okay.’

  I filled the mugs. Harkness had his back to us and was looking out the window when we came into the room. I handed him a mug. ‘This is Glen Withers, Rod. She’s the enquiry agent your mother and brother hired. I’m sort of subcontracted to her.’

  You see it sometimes but not often. An instant attraction between two people. A realisation hitting them both simultaneously that there’s a connection between them, a set of possibilities. It comes out in the way they breathe, move and speak. It happened then. Glen and Rod transferred their coffee mugs to their left hands at the same time and shook hands as if the palms and fingers had been itching to meet. They didn’t maintain the clasp for longer than was usual, but there was something reluctant in the way they broke the grip.

  ‘Mr Harkness,’ Glen said quietly. ‘I’m glad to meet you.’

  ‘Rod,’ he said. ‘Rod Harkness. Cliff and I are on first-name terms so I guess we should be.’

  ‘Glen, then. Yes.’

  They stood still, not far apart but apparently unable to move. I cleared my throat. ‘Right. Let’s sit down and thrash this out a bit.’

  Glen moved to a chair and let her shoulder bag slide off. She caught it by the strap and lowered it to the floor. I sat down but Rod remained standing as if that was the best angle for him to look at her. He drank some coffee but it was just a way to stop himself from staring. She was expertly made up, her hair was shining and her clothes flattered her. I’d expected her to be in jeans and a T-shirt on a Sunday afternoon, the way she’d usually been when we were together, and wondered what she’d been doing. She drank some coffee and put the mug down on the floor beside her bag.

  ‘How much have you told Rod about what we’re doing?’ Glen said. She was talking to me but she was glancing at him.

  I shook my head. ‘Virtually nothing.’

  Glen shifted her sights firmly to Rod. ‘That’s how I was instructed to play it,’ she said. ‘I was to pursue my enquiries without meeting you or letting you know what I was doing. Cliff here was to help with your …’

  Rod smiled. ‘Rehabilitation.’

  ‘If you like. But an attempt on your life changes things.’

  Rod looked lost. ‘How?’

  ‘Someone got you out of Rutherford House,’ I said. ‘One of Glen’s jobs was to find out who. If whoever got you out—I mean alerted the civil rights boys—did it in order to kill you then clearly Glen would be working in ignorance of all the circumstances. She has to know why you’re a target.’

  ‘But I’ve no idea.’

  ‘That’s why I have to tell you the rest of it, Rod,’ Glen said. ‘It’s a relief in a way. I was never too happy working with a living, breathing human being as a sort of subject.’

  I watched them both as she said that. One thing was sure—they weren’t just subjects to each other now. I wondered if they sensed some sort of biochemical kinship, like the alcoholism. But it seemed unlikely. All I knew was I was beginning to get that three’s-a-crowd feeling.

  Rod drained his coffee mug and stretched. He did it easily and it was apparent that he hadn’t just lain in bed for seven years. I seemed to recall from the website that there was a gym at Rutherford House, plus a tennis court and pool. ‘So, Glen, what else are you investigating?’

  Glen hesitated. ‘I wonder if I should check with … my clients first. Tell them what’s happened.’

  ‘Only if you could do it face to face,’ I said.

  Rod and Glen both looked at me. Rod said, ‘Why?’ Glen said, ‘You’ve lost me.’

  ‘To get a read on their reactions. Isn’t it possible that there’s really no mystery about who arranged for Rod’s release? What if Rachel and Warren did it themselves? What if they want him dead?’ I waved my hand at the flat, including Glen and myself. ‘What if all this’s just an elaborate cover?’

  ‘That’d be diabolical,’ Rod said.

  ‘Are you saying they’re not?’

  Rod didn’t answer.

  Glen’s coffee was down to the dregs and she swilled them the way a Scotch drinker swills the last bit of liquor and the remnant of the ice trying to make it last, wishing there was more. ‘It would also be highly insulting. They’d be betting I couldn’t find that out.’

  I shrugged. ‘They don’t know how good you are.’

  ‘I’m getting lost here,’ Rod said. ‘Please tell me what else you were supposed to investigate. If it’s necessary you can still brace Warren and my mother about the shooting and see how they react.’

  ‘That’s true,’ I said.

  Glen drew in a deep breath. ‘Okay. The other part of my commission was to attempt to locate your wife and child. Your mother and brother said they hoped to reunite you with your daughter.’

  Neither Glen nor I was in any way ready for what happened next. Rodney Harkness seemed to shrink in size as if he was cringing away from his physical existence. He let out a high-pitched shriek, sprang from his chair and dashed to the bedroom. He slammed the door and Glen and I sat there and listened to his passionate and despairing keening.

  7

  When the sound of Rod’s distress reached an unbearable level, Glen got up and went into the bedroom, closing the door behind her. I heard murmurs and the wailing broke down into sobs and then sniffs and then silence. I wandered around the flat wishing there was something strong to drink. I flicked through a couple of Rod’s books, including the Presley biographies. The little bits I read confirmed my impression that Elvis was a deeply needy man who was ruthlessly exploited. But then, as a friend of mine once said to someone who’d put this proposition in a pub discussion, ‘He spread ’em.’

  I inspected the surfboard again. The receipt had gone. A lot of work to wax. Just the thought of paddling it out to catch the waves made my shoulders ache. If Rod was going to take up surfing again he’d do it with me on the beach. That thought jerked me back to what I should have been thinking about all along: Minding him had turned into protecting him and protecting him logically led to finding out who wanted to kill him, which was what he was offering to hire me to do. Given my contract with Glen, not to mention our association, how awkward was that?

  Although it had been spelled out in the information we’d already been given, one thing was now even clearer than before—judging by his reaction to Glen’s talk of finding his wife and child, their loss was at the heart of his problems. Glen emerged as I was unenthusiastically contemplating another coffee.

&nb
sp; ‘He’s exhausted,’ she said. ‘Probably sleep for a while. You making more coffee?’

  We took the mugs out on to the balcony. If there was someone holding money to kill Harkness and expecting more, he wouldn’t take pot shots at two non-targets. I was sure from watching from the taxi that Rod and I hadn’t been followed to Bondi, but that raised the question of how many people knew about the flat.

  ‘You’ll have to find out from your clients who knows about Rod being here,’ I said. ‘So we can judge how safe he is.’

  ‘Right. My impression is that Warren handled it, but who knows? He might have put his secretary on it. Think I should tell them what’s happened, Cliff?’

  ‘Tricky. And here’s another one. He,’ I inclined my head towards the bedroom, ‘tried to hire me to find out who wants him dead.’

  ‘Shit. What did you say?’

  ‘Said I’d talk to you.’

  ‘This has got stickier than it started out, and it was sticky enough.’

  ‘And how.’

  Glen raised an eyebrow. ‘That doesn’t sound like you. What does that mean?’

  I meant, and you’re attracted to him, but I said, ‘Nothing. I think we’re going to have to work more closely together on this than we thought.’

  ‘You’re staying with it though, aren’t you? Even though minding isn’t protecting.’

  She had a double need now—the need to be working, to be engaged, and the interest in Harkness himself. ‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Might have to vary the contract a bit. Expenses’ll be higher.’

  ‘Thanks, Cliff. I think we’ll split it down the middle. I’ll look for the wife and child and you find out who’s trying to kill him. That gives you the pointy end.’

  ‘Only right. What about finding who’s behind getting him out?’

  Neither of us had touched our coffee and it was cold by now. Glen emptied hers out into a pot plant holding a stunted rubber tree and I followed suit. ‘I think we might both be involved in that one,’ she said.

  We put off talking about Rod’s collapse and what it might mean for his fitness to get on with his life. Instead we discussed whether or not to tell Lady Rachel and Warren about the shooting.