Sensitive New Age Spy (19 page)

I clicked on a black and white shot in the Gaarg family archive and enlarged it. The caption made interesting reading.

‘Did you know that Jindivik had its own twenty-seat cinema?’ I called to Julie.

She came in, leaned over my shoulder and studied the photograph. It was part of a series published in
Post
magazine to celebrate the restoration of Jindivik in 1958. Sir Linus and Lady Gaarg, with a very young Artemesia at their feet, were posed awkwardly in the plush seats of a tiny art deco cinema.

Framed movie posters lined the walls of the cinema and I clicked on one to enlarge it. It featured an illustration of a muscular man stripped to the waist, wielding a heavy wrench, while another bloke loaded a shell into a large cannon aimed towards the harbour bridge. Big, bold type screamed,
TENSION AT ITS GREATEST!
and Aldo Ray never looked so good.

‘
The Siege of Pinchgut
,’ I said, pointing to the movie’s title.

Julie was intrigued. ‘What’s that all about?’

‘It’s a 1950s film starring Aldo Ray. An escaped convict holes up on Pinchgut – also known as Fort Denison – and threatens to blow up a freighter full of high explosives moored nearby. The whole city is shut down and they evacuate all the harbourside houses. Sound familiar?’

‘Wow,’ she said. ‘That’s a bit of a strange coincidence.’

‘And you know what I think about coincidences. Let’s keep digging into Miss Artemesia Gaarg.’

‘I’m on it,’ Julie said, heading back to her laptop. ‘But come and have a look at this. I’ve found some interesting happy snaps from the World Whale Conference in San Diego last year.’

In the living room, I had to put my head right next to Julie’s to get a clear view of the laptop’s screen. Her hair smelled nice.

‘This one’s for you, Alby,’ she said, clicking on a thumbnail. ‘The caption says it’s a reception to welcome conference delegates from Australia.’

It’s a fact of life that male press photographers will unerringly gravitate towards the best-looking girl in a group and get a shot of her, often ignoring crowned heads of state, famous opera singers and the guest of honour. Our man in San Diego had upheld this noble tradition and the lovely Cristobel Priday looked fantastic.

‘She’s quite a babe, young Cristobel,’ Julie said.

‘Can you enlarge it a bit?’

‘Which bit? Everything looks in perfect proportion to me.’

‘You should see her in the flesh.’

Julie laughed. ‘In your dreams, Alby.’

I smiled. Images of Cristobel in that Tiger Lily bikini and in the bubble bath had been invading my dreams lately, I must confess. But there was something else in the photograph that caught my eye.

Cristobel was chatting with two bearded and besotted-looking greenies wearing save-the-whale T-shirts. Behind her I could make out Artemesia deep in conversation with a well-built, crewcut man in a short-sleeved shirt. Julie brought that section of the image up to fill the screen.

‘That face look familiar?’ she asked.

I’ve got an excellent memory for faces, it goes with the job. Names sometimes give me trouble. ‘His picture was in the files on the choirboys Clare brought to the meeting, right?’

Julie’s good with names. ‘It’s Chip Brames.’

‘So we’ve got Artemesia Gaarg, friend of the whales and benefactor of the Reverend Priday, deep in conversation with Chief Warrant Officer Chip Brames, until very recently senior helicopter pilot and choir leader on the USS
Altoona
.’

‘That’s got to be more than coincidence.’

‘It gets more interesting,’ I told her. ‘Brames and Pergo were both in Iraq in 2004 and they were both mixed up in shady deals. I’d put money on their paths having crossed there.’

‘I’ll see what I can find on that. Pergo was working for Black Falcon security back then, right?’

‘Yep. Jesus, Jules, I don’t know what the hell any of this means yet, but I think we’re finally starting to join the dots.’

Mrs T came in with a tray that held a pot of tea, three bone-china teacups, a plate of fresh oatmeal biscuits, and my phone. ‘I hope I wasn’t too long, dear,’ she said, ‘but some of these people do like a natter.’

That was rich. I’d once gone on a two-week assignment to South Africa, waving goodbye to Mrs T while she was on the phone to her friend Kay, and I’m pretty sure the same call was still in progress when I waved hello a fortnight later.

‘It looks like you had more success with the nursing home than I did then, Mrs T,’ Julie said.

Mrs T put the tray down on the table. ‘The night matron is called Jessie and her grandmother came from Skye, just like I did, dear, so we had a nice old chat. I said it was a wrong number when she answered, but after she heard my accent we just got into it. Then I said I was calling from Sydney and she told me one of their patients had lived in Sydney for a long time. Morag Cullen is her name and the poor woman has dementia. Who’s for tea?’

I knew we wouldn’t get any more out of Mrs T until the tea was poured, so I picked up the pot, filled the cups – milk in first, just the way she liked it – and passed around the biscuits.

‘Well, strange as it seems,’ she continued, ‘a Sydney
charity is funding a whole new wing for Morag and all the other old dears with dementia. Apparently Mrs Cullen’s husband arranged it. Andy Cullen was a harbour pilot in Sydney for over twenty years, would you believe it? Visits Morag every day, regular as clockwork, even though she doesn’t really know he’s there, poor wee thing. He hasn’t been in for the past month, though. Apparently he came out of retirement to do one last seafaring job.’ Mrs T looked at me. ‘Is that of any help?’

‘Great,’ I said. ‘Exactly what we needed to know. There wasn’t anything you left out?’

‘Just the tarragon.’

‘What tarragon?’

‘Jessie suggested I might try some tarragon in with my lamb shanks.’ She wrinkled up her face and shook her head. ‘I don’t think so, Alby, do you?’

‘I’m with you on that one, Mrs T. And I think you were probably right about that extra pepper too.’

My mobile beeped. I excused myself and went into the office, and with the push of a button I was listening in on a conversation between Chapman Pergo and Carter Lonergan.

The exchange was short and to the point. Pergo was his usual insincere, reassuring self. He was on the case, his leads were good, and his people were closing in on the culprits. He was so damned convincing that for a minute I almost believed him myself. He promised Lonergan the
problem would be dealt with by Monday.

I replayed the conversation a couple of times, not for what was being said but to identify the background noise at Pergo’s end, which I couldn’t quite make out. Finally I gave up and switched off the phone. ‘Who’s for pizza?’ I said, coming back into the living room.

‘The lamb shanks should be ready in a wee while, Alby,’ Mrs T said.

‘Sorry, Mrs T, but right now we’re in a situation that can only be resolved with a home-delivered pizza. Anyone not like anchovies?’

You’re totally spoiled for choice when it comes to pizza in Bondi. Gelbison do a fabulous house special with garlic, tomatoes, mozzarella and seasoned potato chunks, Pompei make a calzone to die for, and the Tratt has a fantastic goat’s cheese and prosciutto with rocket, but they don’t do home delivery. I ordered from Bazza’s Pizzarama because they guarantee twenty-minute delivery and they have the most powerful scooters.

The delivery boy looked down at the hundred-dollar note in my hand and shook his head. ‘I only carry ten bucks in change, didn’t they tell you?’

‘How do you feel about a nice home-cooked meal with two lovely ladies and an extremely large tip? You like lamb shanks?’

My friends in the Astra would have logged a pizza boy in and a pizza boy out. A fifteen-minute scooter ride later,
I was hammering on the steel door of Boxer’s Surry Hills apartment.

‘I didn’t order a pizza,’ Boxer said, and then when I took my helmet off, ‘Jesus, and I thought times were tough in the film industry.’

Boxer’s loft was a huge unrenovated warehouse space with worn wooden floorboards, high ceilings and large windows. The central living area was filled with various decrepit chairs and sofas, rescued from council pick-ups, surrounding a giant plasma-screen TV, and the kitchen featured a full-sized, four-group restaurant espresso machine. Benches and old wooden tables around the loft’s walls were strewn with a jumble of electrical equipment, soldering irons, vintage reel-to-reel tape recorders, modern Nagra recorders and assorted microphones. As usual, there were numerous computers in various stages of disassembly and reassembly.

‘Interrupt a nap, did I?’ I said.

Boxer was wearing a long Japanese yukata robe. ‘Not exactly.’

There was giggling from the curtained-off area that served as his bedroom.

‘One of the waitresses?’

He grinned. ‘The good-looking one.’

‘Come on, Boxer, they were both pretty good— Oh.’

His grin widened. ‘They’ve got the weekend off. Me too.’

I tossed him my mobile. ‘Sort this for me and I’ll get out of your hair. Last recorded call between Lonergan and Pergo.
See if you can figure out what the background noise is.’

Boxer connected the phone to a computer and put on headphones. While he worked I ate a couple of slices of pizza. Halfway through I had to check whether I was chewing the crust or the cardboard box.

‘Piece of piss, Alby,’ Boxer said after five minutes. ‘Airport boarding call. “Final call for passengers on flight DJ872 to Hobart.” ’

I phoned Julie. ‘Sounds like Pergo’s on his way to Hobart. Priday said Cristobel was spending the weekend whale-watching in Tasmania with Artemesia.’

‘Hobart? Hang on a tick,’ she said. I could hear the shuffling of papers. ‘This might explain why everyone seems to be heading south. Artemesia has a place just off the coast of Tassie called Adamek Island. The Gaarg Foundation bought the lease off the government – it’s an abandoned whaling station.’

‘That’s a bit poetic. Champion of the whales buying a joint where they used to slaughter the damn things. What does she need her own island for?’

‘This press release says she’s establishing a self-sustaining vegetarian community.’

‘Why Tasmania?’

‘Just a sec… It says here that global warming is going to make everywhere north of Albury uninhabitable within thirty years, blah, blah, blah… They also chose the island for the prevailing winds… the community’s power is supplied
by solar panels and wind turbines.’

‘With everyone chowing down on lentil burgers and soy beans, you’d think a lack of wind would be the least of their problems,’ I said. ‘But an isolated private island would be the ideal place to…’ I moved away from Boxer and lowered my voice, ‘…stash a couple of stolen nukes. Check the charter companies. See what movements they’ve had heading south out of Mascot or Bankstown over the past twenty-four hours. Call me back.’

Just as I pressed
END
my mobile beeped. A text message from Gudrun. Holy fuck!

Julie called back. ‘A private jet on charter to the Gaarg Foundation left Bankstown airport for Hobart twenty-five minutes after your little fracas at Soggy Togs.’

I walked to the far end of the loft to make sure I was totally out of earshot of Boxer and his playmates.

‘I just got a text message from Gudrun,’ I told Julie. ‘They’ve identified the dead choirboy who was pulled out of the water off Eden. He was a weapons specialist, the only one in the group, which would explain why they took Clare.’

‘I’m not following you,’ she said.

‘With nuclear warheads it’s a bit more complicated than just lighting the wick and standing clear. There are safety interlocks and codes to be keyed in. Our dead weapons specialist would have had the know-how to detonate a nuke.’

‘And you think Clare is capable of doing that?’

‘She’s got a degree in electrical engineering from MIT,
plus another in weapons engineering from Annapolis. It could mean she has the training.’

‘So the nukes-for-ransom story’s crap!’ Julie said.

‘Exactly. Can you get me on the first available flight to Hobart tomorrow? And I’ll need some serious firepower.’

‘Leave it with me. But I’ve just found something else you have to see.’

‘What?’

‘I’ll email you the link. Is Boxer’s computer on?’

‘Yep. What’s it about?’ I headed back to the workbench.

‘It’s a video on the World Whale Conference website. Apparently the Japanese government chose the week of the conference last year to announce it was increasing its scientific whaling quota to close to a thousand minke whales, and it was adding fifty humpbacks and fifty fin whales – an endangered species. The video is of Artemesia’s speech to the conference after that announcement.’

The email arrived and I opened the link. The video showed a speaker reading out the new quotas at the conference and Artemesia immediately rising to her feet to seize the microphone. She made an impassioned plea to the delegates to find ways to persuade the Japanese to stop slaughtering the whales. There was no doubting her conviction, and her anger and frustration were clear to see. Her voice wavered with emotion as she finished her speech with ‘Japanese whalers fire explosive-tipped harpoons into the hearts of these magnificent creatures.’ She paused, looked at the crowd,
then said, ‘I wonder how the Japanese government would feel about an explosive-tipped harpoon being fired into the heart of their nation?’

You could see the fire in her eyes as the crowd leapt to their feet, whistling, cheering and applauding, but there was something about the look on her face that was chilling. I felt sick to my stomach.’

‘Jesus, Jules.’

‘I know.’

‘I’m on my way back. See you in fifteen.’

‘Be careful, Alby.’

I ended the call. Boxer had wandered up to watch the video of Artemesia over my shoulder. ‘She’s certainly committed,’ he said.

‘Or needs to be.’ I looked at Boxer. ‘Mate,’ I said, ‘I really hate to do this, but about your plans for the weekend…’

I scootered back to Bondi, slipped the pizza guy an extra fifty bucks, and was packing for Hobart when my phone beeped. It was Lonergan making a call, so I listened in.