The Broken Shore (12 page)

‘We?’ said Cashin, looking into his eyes. ‘Does we mean you? What the fuck do you know about anything?’

That didn’t help. It was another hour before he could go home. He drove carefully, he was tired, nerves jangling. At the Kenmare crossroads, he remembered milk and bread and dog food, there was only a bit of the butcher’s sausage left. He pulled in to Callahan’s garage and shop.

The shop was unheated, smelling of sour milk and stale piecrust, no one behind the counter. He got milk, the last carton, went to the shelves against the wall to get dog food. One small can left.

‘Back again.’

Derry Callahan, oil smears on his face, was standing behind him, close up. He was wearing a nylon zipped-up cardigan, taking strain over his belly.

‘Good to see you blokes earnin yer fuckin money for a change,’ he said.

Cashin looked around, smelled alcohol and poisonous breath, saw Callahan’s pink-rimmed eyes, the greasy strands of hair hand-combed over his pale spotted scalp.

‘How’s that?’ he said.

‘Takin out those two Daunt coons. Pity it wasn’t a whole fuckin busload.’

There was no thought, just the flush. Cashin had the can of Frisky Dog Meaty Chunks in Marrow Gravy, in his right hand. He turned his hips and brought his arm around close to his body and hit Derry in the middle of his face, not a lot of travel, they were close. The pain made him think he had broken his fingers.

Callahan went backwards, two short steps, dropped slowly to his knees, at prayer, hands coming to his face, blood getting there first, dark red, almost black, it was the fluorescent lighting did that.

Cashin wanted to hit him again but he threw the carton of milk at him. It bounced off his head. He stepped over to kick Callahan but something stopped him.

At the vehicle, Cashin realised that he was still holding the dog food can. He opened his hand. The can was dented. He threw it onto the back.

Rebb heard him arrive, a beam of light, the dogs jumping, big ears flapping, running for him. He fondled their ears, hand hurting. Dogs went between his legs, came around for more.

‘Thought you’d buggered off,’ said Rebb. ‘Leaving me with your mad dogs and your debts.’

THE DOGS woke Cashin a good way out from dawn and, blind, he crossed the space, let them into the cold, dark room, went back to bed. They snuffed the kitchen for dropped food, gave up, jumped onto the bed, spoilt rotten.

Cashin didn’t care. They sandwiched him, pushed against him, lay their light heads on his legs. He went back to sleep, woke with a start, a sound in his memory, a scrape, metal against metal. Head raised, neck tense, he listened.

Just a sound in a dream. The dogs would hear anything unusual long before he did. But sleep was over. He lay on his back, fingers of his right hand hurting, hearing the sad whimpering pre-dawn wind.

The boys in the ute.

In the same circumstances, I’d make the same decision.

It resulted in the deaths of two young men.

Until that moment in the stale room, it had not fully dawned upon him that the line ran directly from the bleeding and dying boys to him on the phone talking to Villani.

I think you might be over-dramatising. It’s just three kids in a ute. Can’t be that hard to do.

Would it have been different if Hopgood had spoken to Villani? Would Villani have rejected the advice if it came directly from Hopgood?

No matter how much they might have botched raids on the boys at their homes, there wouldn’t be two dead.

He tried to think about something else.

Rebuilding Tommy Cashin’s blown-up house, lying ruined since just after World War I. How stupid. It would never be done, he’d waste his spare time for a while, then he’d give it away. He’d never done anything with his hands, built anything. How had the idea come to him?

It had somehow developed on his walks with the dogs as they returned to the house in its tangled wilderness. And then one morning on the way to work he met Bern at a crossroads. A load of uncleaned old red bricks was on the back of his Dodge. Sitting beside Bern was a local ancient called Collo who cleaned his bricks, sat outside in all weathers covered in a grey film of cement dust, whistling through the gaps between his teeth, utterly absorbed in chipping at mortar.

They pulled onto the verges, got out. Bern crossed the road, smoke in his mouth.

‘Bit early for you,’ said Cashin. ‘Pull down a house in the dark?’

‘What would you cunts know about honest labour?’ said Bern. ‘All got these fat flat arses.’

‘Student of arses, are you?’ Cashin said. And then he said the fateful words. ‘How many bricks you got there?’

‘Three thousand-odd.’

‘How much?’

‘What’s it to you?’

‘How much?’

‘For a valued customer, forty a hundred, clean.’

‘Let’s say twenty-five.’

‘I’ll sell you bricks for twenty-five, I can get forty? Know how scarce old bricks are? Antiques, mate.’ He spat neatly. ‘No, you don’t know. You know fuck all.’

‘Say thirty.’

‘Whaddaya want with bricks?’

‘I’m fixing Tommy Cashin’s house,’ said Cashin. The words came from nowhere.

Bern shook his head. ‘You’re another fuckin Cashin loony, you know that? Done at thirty. Delivery extra.’

Now the bricks were stacked near the ruin.

Cashin got up, pulled on clothes, made tea. On the edge of dawn, he set out for the beach with the dogs, a fifteen-minute drive, the last few on a dirt track. Under a sky of streaked marble, he walked barefoot on hard rippled sand against a freezing wind.

His father’s view had been that you didn’t wear footwear on the beach no matter what you were doing there. Not thongs, not anything. If the sand was hot, well, shut up or go home. Cashin thought about the summers of having his soles burnt, cut from broken glass and sharp rocks. He must have been seven or eight when he stood on a fish hook. He hopped and sat down hard, tears of pain flowing.

His father came back, lifted the foot. The hook was in the soft flesh behind the pad of his big toe.

‘No bloody going back with hooks,’ Mick Cashin said and pushed the hook through.

Cashin remembered the barb coming out of his skin. It looked huge, his father took it between finger and thumb and pulled the whole thing through. The skin bulged before the eyelet emerged. He remembered the feeling of the length of pale nylon gut being drawn through his flesh.

The dogs liked the beach, weren’t keen on the sea. They chased gulls, chased each other, snapped at wavelets, ran from them, went up the dunes to explore the marram grass and the scrub for rabbits. Cashin looked at the sea as he walked, his face turned from the grit blowing off the dunes.

A strong rip was running parallel to the beach, just beyond the big breakers. They went all the way to the mouth of Stone’s Creek. The outgoing tide had divided the stream into five or six shallows separated by sandbars, perfect finger biscuits of different widths. This was where Cecily Addison told him Adrian Fyfe planned to build his resort.

Hotel, golf course, houses, God knows what else. Brothel, casino, you bloody name it.

On a wild polar day like this, the idea was lunacy.

The dogs went to the first rivulet, wet their feet, thought about crossing to the first biscuit. Cashin whistled and they looked, turned, ready to go home for breakfast.

When he had fed them, showered, found a clean shirt, he went in
to Port Monro to clear his desk. There was no knowing how long the suspension would last. Forever, he thought.

Outside the station, a woman sat in an old Volvo wagon, two young children imprisoned in the back. He parked behind the building and by the time he unlocked the back door, she had her finger on the buzzer.

He looked through the blinds before he raised them: thirtyish, many layers of garments, weak and dirty hair striped in red and green, a sore at the corner of her mouth.

Cashin unlocked.

‘Keep fucking easy hours here,’ she said. ‘This a copshop or what?’

‘Not open for another half an hour. There’s a sign.’

‘Jesus, like fucking doctors, people only allowed to get sick in office hours, nine to fucking five.’

‘Missed an emergency, have we?’ He went behind the counter.

‘I’ve fucking had it with this town,’ she said. ‘I go into the super last night, they reckon they seen me taking frozen stuff out of me trackie at the car. So I’m gonna walk around with fucking frozen peas down me trackie, right? Right?’

‘Who said that?’

‘The Colley slut, she’s history, the bitch.’

‘What did she do?’

‘Sees me coming in, she reckons I’m banned. Half the fucking town there, hears her.’

‘Which super are we talking about?’

‘Supa Valu, the one on the corner.’

‘Well,’ Cashin said, ‘there’s always Maxwell’s.’

She thrust her chin at him. ‘That’s your fucking attitude, is it? I’m guilty without trial? On their fucking say so?’

Cashin felt the tiny start of heat behind his eyes. ‘What would you like me to do, Ms…?’

‘Reed, Jadeen Reed. Well, tell that Colley bitch she’s got no right to ban me. Tell her to get off my case.’

‘The store has the right to refuse admittance to anyone,’ Cashin said. ‘They can tell the prime minister they don’t want his business.’

Jade widened her eyes. ‘Really?’ she said, a grim smile. ‘Fucking really? Don’t give me that crap. You telling me I park a Mercedes
wagon outside the fucking super the bitch would try this on? Reality fucking check, mister.’

Hot eyes now. ‘I’ll note your complaint, Ms Reed,’ he said. ‘You might also like to take your problem up with the Department of Consumer Affairs. The number’s in the phone book.’

‘That’s it?’

‘That is it.’

She turned, walked. At the door, she turned again. ‘You wankers,’ she said. ‘Looking after the rich, that’s your fucking job, isn’t it?’

‘Got a record, Jadeen?’ said Cashin. ‘Any form? Been in trouble? Why don’t you sit down, I’ll look you up?’

‘You cunt,’ she said, ‘you absolute fucking cunt.’

She left, tried to slam the door but it wasn’t that kind of door.

Cashin went to his desk and worked through the papers in his in-tray, looked for matters that needed his attention. The dogs were walking around the enclosure like prisoners in an exercise yard, walking because it was less boring than the alternative.

I’m not suited to this work, Cashin thought. And if I can’t handle this station, I’m not suited to any kind of police work. What else did Rai Sarris do to me? It wasn’t just the body. What neural cobweb did the mad prick cause to fizzle? Once I had patience, I didn’t get hot eyes, I didn’t punch people, I thought before I did things.

Sergeant Willis wrote that on Cashin’s first assessment, showed it to him before he sent it. ‘Don’t get up your fucking self about this, son,’ he said. ‘I say it about all the girls.’ At his cubicle, he turned. ‘Course, in my day, a report like this, they’d say put the wuss on traffic.’

Kendall arrived. She was making tea, her back to him, when she said, ‘The business in Cromarty.’

‘Yes. A monumental stuff-up. I’m now on holiday. You’re in charge. The relief kid’ll stay on.’

‘How long?’

‘Who knows? Till ethical standards get the blame sorted out. It could be permanent.’

‘They the Bourgoyne ones?’

‘Looks like it. Them or someone they know.’

‘Good riddance then,’ she said.

Cashin looked out the window at the sky, hated Kendall for a while, her quick stupidity. He saw the sparks, the crushed ute, the rain, the blood in the puddles. The boys, broken, life leaking away. He thought about his son. He had a boy.

‘It only looks like it, Ken,’ he said. ‘Nobody should die because we think they might have done something wrong. Nobody gave us that power.’

You fucking hypocrite, he thought.

Kendall went to her desk.

He finished, took the files and his notes and went over, put them in her in-tray. ‘Pretty much up to date,’ he said.

She didn’t look at him. ‘I’m sorry I said that, Joe,’ she said. ‘It just, shit, it just came out, I wanted to say…’

‘I know. Solidarity. That’s a good instinct. Call me if you need anything.’

He was at the back door when she said, ‘Joe, feel like a bit of company. Well, any time. Yes.’

‘Take you up on that,’ he said, went out.

He walked around to the Dublin. A new four-wheel-drive was parked outside and Leon had two customers, a middle-aged couple having breakfast. Soft-looking leather jackets hung on the backs of their chairs.

‘Takeaway black,’ said Cashin. ‘The overdose.’

‘Either you sit down or you get one of those vacuum cups,’ said Leon. ‘Polystyrene does nothing for expensive coffee.’

Cashin had no interest. ‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ he said.

Leon went to the machine. ‘Your muscle boy was in yesterday. Very fetching but not keen on paying. Long and pregnant pause before he shelled out.’

Cashin was looking across the street at Cecily Addison talking to the woman outside the aromatherapy shop. ‘He’s a city lad,’ he said. ‘They treat officers of the law differently there. Like royalty.’

‘Message received. Roger. Do you say that? Roger?’

‘We say Roger, we say Bruce, we say Leon, it all depends. Case by case.’

Leon brought the container to the counter, capped it. ‘Bringing in reinforcements for the march?’

‘The march?’

‘Could be ugly. Feral greenies, rich old farts pulling up the drawbridge.’

‘I could be missing something here,’ Cashin said. He had no idea what Leon was talking about.

‘The march against the Adrian Fyfe resort? Been away, have we?’

‘Can’t keep up with events in this town. It’s all go, go, go. Anyway, I’m on holiday.’

‘Why don’t you try Noosa, chat to rich retired drug cops? It’s warm up there.’

‘Don’t care for the victuals in Noosa,’ Cashin said. As he said the word, he saw the strange spelling. ‘Listen, an ordinary old toasted cheese and tomato?’