Brunswick street blues, p.24
Brunswick Street Blues, page 24
‘Gene knows someone who works for ASIO?’
‘Yeah, you wouldn’t believe it. It’s Joe! You know, the chubby guy that likes to dress up like Mama Cass from the Mamas and the Papas. Takes all types, hey?’
‘Joe’s not with ASIO. He’s a parking inspector who seems to be tied up with that crazy mob of anti-freeway activists.’
‘Well, that kind of makes more sense, now that you say it.’
I drank some more tea. Baz made it so strong you could stand a spoon up in it.
‘I’m glad to be out of Gene’s place,’ said Baz. ‘It’s pretty freaky.’
‘Poor, crazy Gene.’
‘He swore to me that he’d given you a secret message that you’d understand—letting you know that I was safe.’
‘A secret message?’ Then I remembered all the lost pets—a cat called Barry and a dog called Brownie. ‘Gene is just too paranoid sometimes,’ I said. ‘Did you see that tunnel he has going out from under his shed? And all that weird equipment in there?’
Baz nodded. ‘Like I said, pretty freaky.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
I let Baz take my bed, figuring that sixty-two was too old to sleep on our couch and still hope to walk in the morning. Then I turned out the lights in the lounge room and attempted to bed down myself, although I left a lamp on. I wasn’t ready for complete darkness.
Sleep was not coming. I gave up and was just making myself a cup of Milo when Mitchell tapped on the glass of the back door.
‘I came in the back gate. Can I come in?’
I crawled out of my cocoon of blankets and unlocked the door.
‘It’ll be all over the news tomorrow morning.’ Mitchell sounded tired but buzzed. ‘Police have taken the barrels away for forensic examination. It’s too early to know if Betty Jones is in one of them, but my gut is telling me that she is, poor woman. Either way, Mullett is toast. He’s in the hospital under police guard. I heard from a source that his sons both completely lost the plot and started airing all kinds of dirty laundry.’ He produced a bottle of sparkling wine from his satchel. ‘Want to join me in a celebratory drink?’
‘Sure.’ I put the Milo tin away and took out two halfway decent glasses from Bunny’s mismatched collection.
‘Where’s everyone else?’ Mitchell popped the cork and poured.
‘Baz is snoring up a storm in my room, Timmy’s in his caravan and Bunny’s asleep in her room, she took a Serepax.’ I took a long sip of the bubbles. It wasn’t quite on par with the Melbourne Cup champagne, but it wasn’t Two-Buck Chuck either. ‘Bunny gave me a couple of Serepax too, but they haven’t worked. I’m too wired.’
We settled on the couch. The bubbles in my glass glinted in the dim light.
‘Adrenaline,’ said Mitch. ‘It can take a while to wear off even if you’re dying of tiredness. That’s what used to really wipe me out in war zones.’
‘I think there may be another reason,’ I said. ‘While I was in the cellar, when I thought I was going to die … it triggered something.’
‘Do you want to tell me about it?’ Mitchell’s voice was gentle and his eyes looked black in the low light.
‘I did see his face, after all. The man who killed Nora.’ I pulled a blanket around me, then continued before I could lose my nerve. ‘It was Errol Grimes. I saw him clearly and there’s no mistaking it. I don’t know what I should do about it.’
There was a long silence between us, then Mitchell put his arm around me.
‘I’m going to be honest with you, Brick. I’m not talking as a journalist now. You’ve got Baz back safe. Mullett’s going to be in deep legal strife for a very long time. You won’t have to worry about anything being built next door to the Phoenix—not in the next couple of years, anyway. As long as they don’t build a cross-town tunnel through there.’
‘But if you were in my shoes, you wouldn’t let Grimes get away with murder, would you?’
‘I’m not you, Brick. Errol Grimes is Victoria’s most powerful politician. He has friends in high places and historical charges are a minefield. You’d be putting yourself up to the worst kind of scrutiny—Baz, too. I’ve seen that kind of thing destroy people. Good people. People who wanted to do the right thing.’
I leaned against his chest. He smelled of smoke and sweat, but it was good to have someone there to cry on since I didn’t seem to be able to hold the tears in any longer.
Mitchell let me cry, providing me with refills and human warmth. He held me until the sedatives kicked in and I fell asleep.
* * *
When I woke there was sunlight coming in the windows. I was tucked under a blanket on the couch. My mouth felt dry and there was no sign of Mitchell. I went to the fridge for some water and found a note from Baz under a magnet. Flora had taken him to check on the Phoenix and start the paperwork for the insurance claim—if they were allowed to make a claim.
I sat at the breakfast bar, sipping water and attempting to pull myself together enough to make a pot of tea. I turned on my phone but before I could dial Baz, it rang. According to caller ID it was Brucie.
‘Brucie, I’m not coming into work,’ I said as I answered. My voice came out as a croak. Then I remembered there was a council meeting scheduled. ‘Someone else will have to go to the council meeting tonight.’
‘Shut up, Brick,’ Brucie cut me off. ‘I think Selena McManus has just been taken away in an ambulance.’
The grogginess left me immediately.
‘I was having a smoke out of the third-floor toilet windows and I saw it all. Only at first I thought it was you who was hit. I thought I saw you walking down the road and I was going to yell something out the window—you know, “nice tits” or something, because I know how much you girls love that—when a car came barrelling across the road straight up onto the footpath! I thought you’d been cleaned up!
‘I called the ambulance, obviously, then I ran outside. There was a crowd of people around, but I bashed my way past them. I still thought it was you for a moment, she was wearing black jeans and boots and an old green jacket like that one you insist on wearing. She had almost no make-up on and must have put a red rinse through her hair. She looked so different that I didn’t recognise her at first. I think she was trying to look like you.’
Mitchell chose that moment to return to the lounge room. It looked like he’d just had a shower.
‘What’s the matter, sleeping beauty? A pea under your mattress?’
‘Brucie says Selena was just hit by a car outside council. He reckons she was dressed like me at the time.’
Mitchell dropped his smartarse expression. ‘Shit. I bet she was trying to sneak into the council chambers to get an exclusive with your boss about her sexcapades with mayor. You must have given her the idea when you switched clothes with her on Cup Day.’
‘This is my fault? Someone was trying to get me?’ I went back to my burrow on the couch still clutching my phone.
‘What do you think?’
I was tempted to pull a blanket over my head. ‘I don’t know what to think anymore.’
‘Tell Brucie to keep quiet about it being Selena and not you.’
Brucie agreed immediately to keep it under his hat. ‘I know you’re mixed up in something bad, Brick. Just call me if you need anything and stay safe. I’ll cover for you here.’
Mitchell sat next to me on the couch, his face serious. ‘Let’s think this through. My father was killed in a hit and run: no driver found. Old mate Otto was skittled in the street: no driver found. And now Selena gets run down outside your place of work.’
‘Do you think Mullet’s put out a hit on me?’
‘He’s still in hospital. His sons, too. They have burns, broken bones … and at least one of them is in the middle of a major psychotic episode. And why would Mullett put a hit on you? No, I’ve been thinking it over. I can understand Mullett might want to kill me. But why didn’t his sons just come here and grab me, if they were so keen? Why did they risk returning to the Phoenix?’
My mind was refusing to function, but luckily Mitchell’s question was rhetorical. He kept on thinking out loud. ‘I reckon Mullett didn’t know I was staying at this house which means he wasn’t behind the raid here on Melbourne Cup Day. Maybe I wasn’t even the target of that raid. Maybe you were.’
He paused and I was suddenly aware of how quiet it was in the neighbourhood. It was as if we were in the middle of nowhere.
‘I hate to tell you, Brick,’ Mitchell continued, ‘but I think someone must know about what you witnessed as a child.’
‘How? I only just remembered it myself. And you’re the only person I’ve told. I didn’t even tell Baz yet.’
‘Well, Mavis told us that someone was using Nora’s death to blackmail Grimes. Maybe Grimes decided to find Nora’s foster daughter and neutralise the threat—you. He doesn’t want people to know he killed a former girlfriend and got away with it. It would ruin his career—or I hope it would. These days, honestly, nothing would surprise me.’
‘But how would Grimes know that I was Nora’s foster child? It was fifteen years ago. I look totally different, my name is different. There’s no legal paper trail, thanks to Baz.’
‘Your first name isn’t different.’
‘Still, it’s a stretch …’
We sat in silence and I heard a plane flying high overhead.
I suddenly felt very angry. ‘Mavis must have told him about me. She knows that Nora was my foster mother. She knows about Grimes and Nora.’
‘Why would she do that?’ asked Mitchell.
‘Because she’s fucking nuts, that’s why.’
Bunny entered the kitchen looking ridiculously well rested and headed straight for the kettle. ‘Morning, folks. What trouble and hijinks have you cooked up for today?’
‘Bad news,’ I said. ‘We think someone other than Mullett may have been behind the break-in that ended with you tied up in the kitchen. Which would mean that we should really get out of here ASAP, in case they come here again.’
Bunny put down the kettle without filling it. ‘What? But if it wasn’t Mullett, who was it?’
‘We’re starting to think Errol Grimes might have been behind it,’ said Mitchell.
‘Are you fucking kidding me?’ Bunny looked at Mitchell. ‘You must be really talented at pissing people off.’
‘What can you tell us about the guy who tied you up?’ I asked.
Bunny abandoned her efforts to make tea and sat down. ‘He was big and wearing black. Balaclava. Gloves.’
‘What about his voice?’
‘He didn’t talk. Just whacked me, and when I came round I’d been tied up and gagged. Actually, one thing I remember now: he took some photos with his phone, particularly of something that was on the kitchen bench.’
We looked at the bench. There was a knife block with no knives in it, a vase with no flowers in it, and the silver-framed photo of me and Nora, exactly where I’d left it on the day Mavis gave it to me.
‘Do you think he could have recognised Nora from this photo? Like Mavis recognised her?’ I asked.
There was another knock at the back door and there she was, as if conjured by the devil. I opened the door, grabbed Mavis roughly by the arm and pulled her inside. Her hair had now been completely cut off, but in an expensive way that was quite stylish. Otherwise she looked grey and haggard.
‘What have you done, Mavis? Did you tell Grimes about me? Why would you do that?’
Mavis crumpled onto a stool and put her head on the breakfast bar. ‘I didn’t tell him anything. I haven’t seen or spoken to him since the day he hit me.’
‘Are you sure?’ I asked. ‘Because Selena McManus was just hit by a car outside the council building. And we think it may have been an attack intended for me. What do you remember about the man who tied you up on Melbourne Cup Day? Could it have been Grimes? Because we didn’t see him at the Melbourne Cup. Maybe he came here.’
‘No. I’m sure it wasn’t Errol. I know how he walks. What he smells like. I’d know if it was him.’
‘But do you think the man could have been working for Grimes?’ asked Mitchell. ‘Did he say anything to you?’
‘No. He didn’t talk at all. I don’t even want to think about it.’ Mavis pressed the heels of her palms against her eyes.
I sat down next to her and put my hand on her forearm. ‘We really need you to think, Mavis. I know it’s a scary memory and you don’t want to think about it. But this is really important.’
She opened her eyes again. ‘I’d been in the bathroom having a shower,’ she said. ‘I was about to get dressed when I heard a loud crash out here, so I threw on my clothes and I came out. There was a man in black, wearing a balaclava. When he saw me, he hesitated—I think I surprised him. Then he grabbed me, tied my hands and shoved me in the bath. He smelled disgusting, a mixture of body odour and cheap cologne.’
‘BO and cologne. I know who that reminds me of.’
‘Timmy?’ asked Bunny.
I frowned. ‘Well, yes, but also Hugo Clark.’
‘Yes,’ said Mavis, although she didn’t sound convinced. ‘A bit like Hugo Clark. But a lot of people like cheap deodorant.’
I turned away from Mavis. ‘Mitchell, could Hugo have been the person who attacked you in the archives department?’
‘I didn’t see anyone and it was pretty stinky in that room, but Hugo Clark would have after-hours access to the council building.’
I sighed. ‘Why are you here then, Mavis? If you’re not here to kill me on behalf of your psycho ex.’
‘I want to go public.’ Mavis’ face was grim. ‘About Grimes and what he did to me. Will you help me, Mitchell?’
‘This day is getting out of hand very early.’ Mitchell exhaled loudly. ‘First things first, we should get out of here. It might not be safe.’
‘Where can we go?’ I asked. ‘Baz’s flat’s still out of action from the fire.’
‘Ring Baz and tell him to stay with Flora,’ said Mitchell. ‘Then wake up Timmy and tell him to grab his laptop. I know a place that’s definitely safe.’
‘What about the cats?’ I looked around, wondering whether Bunny had a large box anywhere.
‘I’m sure they’ll be fine,’ said Bunny and Mitchell in unison.
We all squeezed into a taxi and Mitchell gave the address. When we arrived, Gene did not look best pleased to see me, Mitchell, Bunny, Timmy and Mavis on his doorstep.
‘What the fuck, man?’
‘Gene. It’s an emergency,’ said Mitchell. ‘Mullett and his boys are out of action, but we think there’s someone else involved in this whole bloody mess. Someone just tried to take out Brick with a car.’
‘Shit, Brick, are you okay?’
I was glad to get some sympathy—even if it was from Gene. ‘They got the wrong person. But we’re worried they’ll try again.’
Gene let us into his house and we were soon huddled on the couch in his lounge room. I accepted his offer of a beer so as not to offend.
‘We need to think logically about this,’ I said. ‘What do you know about Hugo, Mavis?’
‘Not much. I usually tried to stay as far away from him as possible. He gave me the creeps. Sometimes I’d catch him watching me and, seriously, it was like the hair on my neck would stand up.’
‘We know that someone played hardball to make Mavis give up the development committee chairman position,’ said Mitchell. ‘A position that Hugo then slipped into. Maybe Hugo was behind the scare campaign.’
‘I can imagine him doing something like that,’ said Mavis with a shudder. ‘Like I said, he’s creepy.’
I took a tiny sip of my beer, but it was so disgusting that my stomach nearly rebelled. ‘You looked into his background, Mitchell. Is there anything that connects Hugo with Errol Grimes? Did Hugo play football? Was he into horse racing?’
‘No. The thing that drew my attention to Hugo in the first place is all the blanks. It’s like he didn’t exist until about ten years ago.’ Like me, Mitchell was looking wary about drinking any of Gene’s homebrew. ‘We know Selena is the third hit and run that may be connected, so maybe this has something to do with Grimes as well as Mullett. We know they’ve scratched each other’s backs in the past. It’s highly possible my father also uncovered some information the premier doesn’t want to come to light. Your friend Sue was onto a lead regarding a possible witness to Otto’s accident. Do you think she had any luck in finding them?’
I grabbed my phone and dialled Sue. It barely rang before she picked up.
‘Brick? Are you okay? I heard on the radio that they’re trying to identify a young woman who was run down by a car outside the council building. From the description, I was worried it was you!’
I’m glad there was another person who was concerned for my welfare. ‘It wasn’t me, Sue, it was Selena.’
‘Thank goodness for that!’
‘Listen, Sue, this is very important. That night we picked you up, you’d been looking for a witness to Otto’s hit and run. Did you ever find them?’
There was a moment’s silence and I knew Sue had indeed found the witness.
‘This is not a time to worry about a scoop,’ I said. ‘It’s a matter of life and death.’
‘There’s not a lot to tell—I’m still working on it. But the witness saw a man get out of a car carrying Otto. He was unconscious, if it’s any small mercy—I can hardly bear to think about it. The man lay Otto down on the road, and before the witness could really believe what he was seeing, he drove right over him and then off down the street!’
‘Did the witness give you any description of the man?’
‘He could only say that the driver was big and that his face was mostly covered by a beanie. But he did say that the man had a big, bushy beard.’
‘A beard. Like Hugo Clark.’
‘Yes,’ said Sue. ‘Like Hugo Clark. I’m still a long way from having anything I can run with, if I can run with it at all. But in any case, my newspaper’s an inconsequential piss fest. It would never publish something this big. Do you think Mitch would help me pitch the story to one of the big news agencies?’
