Wyatt - 05 - Port Vila Blues (15 page)

She had it coming, he said
promptly.

The Goldman woman took that
seriously, jotting something down in her notes. In what way?

Well, I mean, she come up behind me
flashing her lights, blasting me with her horn. I mean, how was I to know she
didnt have a carload of skinheads on board, like, you know, an ambush or
something?

But, Terry, you stopped the car.
You wouldnt stop if you feared for your life. I have to ask thiswere you high
at the time? Had you taken anything, alcohol and drugs together perhaps?

Jesus Christ, I thought you were my
fucking lawyer.

Im not fucking anything, Ms
Goldman said, and it was like a slap across the face to Baker.

He put up his hands. Okay, I
apologise. I just want to know how come youre, like, taking this womans side.

Terry, Im simply doing what the
prosecution will do to you in the courtroom.

Baker considered that for a while. All
right, how about we argue self-defence?

But you knocked her to the ground.
A chipped tooth, lacerations, a mass of bruises. How do you explain that,
except as an overreaction? The kind of overreaction one might expect from
someone under the influence of drugs or alcohol, I might add.

Baker closed his eyes, tightened his
fists. A wave of blackness and heat swept through his head, sparks popping
behind his eyelids. He fought it down. Fucking lay off about the booze and
drugs, will ya? Please? Just lay off? His voice was high, pained. Everyone on
at me, all the time, Ive fucking had enough.

Hed scared her. He didnt want
that. He waited for his heart to stop thumping, then took a deep breath. Like
I said, she come up behind me flashing her lights, tooting her horn, so
naturally I thought I had a flat, or maybe the boot was open. Then we both stop
and she gets out of her car and comes at me, sounding off about the blasted kid
should be
restrained,
whatever. Like I said, self-defence.

Its you who should have been
restrained, Terry.

He looked at her and it was full of
hate. So thats how its going to be, youre all gunna have these digs at my
expense, turning everything I say around. Yeah, thanks a lot.

Terry, did she actually assault
you?

He shifted in his chair. Sort of.

How do you mean? Did she hit you,
spit on you, threaten you with anything?

If Idve been closer I wouldve
felt the spit coming off her. She was good and toey.

Did she threaten you verbally?

How do you mean?

Did she say shed do something to
hurt you if you didnt restrain the childwhats his name? Troy?

Troy, yeah, little brat. Well, she
reckoned I was careless, kind of thing, letting the kid ride around without a
belt on. He showed her his palms apologetically. I know, I know, I shouldve
strapped him in, but you know how kids are, all over the place, cant keep still.

Terry, Im trying to work out if
you were provoked in any way, and, if so, whether or not you were justified in
striking out at Mrs Sullivan. Mitigating circumstances, in other words.

Talk English, cant ya?

She leaned forward. We may be able
to obtain a fine and a suspended sentence if we can show that your striking the
womanthough to be deploredwas understandable given the nature and degree of
her provocation.

Baker muttered, We should get the
bitch to back down.

I didnt hear that, Mr Baker.

Baker put his head on one side. But
youd have her address, right?

Terry, Im warning you.

But Baker was lost in staging
another revenge and his mind drifted. Wait till the Sullivan woman was in a
multi-storey carpark somewhere, shove a spud up her exhaust pipe so she cant
get the car started, then jump her, get her to withdraw all charges, maybe put
her out of action somehow.

Thats if he could find her. Christ,
the Sydney phone book was probably chocka with Sullivans.

He became aware of a snarling
exhaust note outside the building. When it didnt let up after half a minute,
Baker went to the window.

He liked it, oh he liked it very
much. Some bloke was parked across the street in a hotted-up panelvan,
brrrapp-ing the motor, letting the vehicle hunt and rock a little as if he were
slipping the clutch, ready to take off. But it wasnt the panelvan that
interested Baker, it was what it stood for. Clearly the poor bastard had been
given a bums rush in court and he was shouting his grievances to the world
through a megaphone: Men and women are not equal . . . Justice for women,
injustice for men . . . Modern justice, keeping a father away from his kids.

Go for it, Baker muttered.

The lawyer joined him at the window.
Oh, God, not him again.

Baker laughed. Got lumbered with De
Lisle, did he?

If anything, De Lisle would be on
his side. No, hes been hassling us for months.

She had her mouth open for more but
just at that moment the traffic cleared and the panelvan screamed and leapt
smoking and snaking away from the kerb, across the street and through the main
glass doors of the courthouse.

They heard the crash. The screaming
started a couple of seconds later. Hes hurt someone, Ms Goldman said, and
she hurried out.

Baker left, too, but he paused for a
moment at her desk first. He spun the file around. There it was, Diana
Sullivan, an address in St Leonards.

They were all moaning and wringing
their hands at the front of the building. The panelvan had come right into the
foyer and buried itself against the front desk. Baker saw blood and glass, a
lot of it. If hed been a different kind of a person he could have lifted the
occasional wallet and handbag in all the confusion. As it was, he saw Ms
Goldman helping a woman into the Ladies. She saw him. Im sorry, Terry, she
said, harried, pale-looking. Ring me tomorrow?

No worries.

Great.

Baker slipped away through a side
door. Carols Kingswood was in a K-Mart five blocks away. It took him a while
to find the street directory under the UDL cans and toys and other crap on the
back floor. St Leonards.

But when he got to the address, no
one answered his knock, and when he went around the side of the house, a woman
from next door poked her head over the fence, demanding to know who he was and
what he wanted.

He waved the classifieds section of
a newspaper in her face. Ive come about the VW.

I think you must have the wrong
address. Diana doesnt own a VW.

Baker was perplexed.

Besides, the woman went on, someone
assaulted her and shes gone to stay with her mother till the trial.

Then, conscious that shed said too
much, the woman frowned and reached a fleshy arm over the fence. Let me see
that ad.

Baker backed away. He said, Its
okay, no worries, my mistake, and other unconvincing things as he backed out
of there.

In the Kingswood again he planted
his foot. If the nosy cow was calling the cops right now hed better track down
some mates whod swear hed been on the piss with them all afternoon.

So, forget the Sullivan woman.

Fix De Lisle instead.

* * * *

Twenty-two

Just
coffee, Wyatt told the kid waiting on them at the corner table, near a door,
next to a window.

Liz Redding looked at him across the
table, a faintly amused expression on her face. What he read there said that
she thought him abstemious, and not only because he hadnt ordered anything to
eat, so he said, And an apple danish, seeing her mouth stretch into a grin.

Now I dont feel so bad about
ordering scones and cream, she said. Its been a while since breakfast, and
its a long drive up here.

This was small talk. Wyatt didnt
try to look interested. Liz Redding wasnt someone whod indulge in it for
long, anyway.

He nodded pleasantly, looked around.
He was sitting where he could see the room, each door, part of the strip of
asphalt outside. Liz Redding had her back unconcernedly to the room. That was a
good sign, it said she wasnt expecting trouble. Then he realised that she
could see all she needed to see reflected in the mirror behind him. He decided
that that was a good sign, too.

There were no other customers. The caf
was the kind of place that did plenty of business on weekend afternoons, a
little on weekday afternoons, virtually none before lunch. All that glass on
three sides admitted plenty of warming sunlight into the room. Wyatt could
detect coffee in the air. The waitress had passed their order through a serving
hatch behind the cash register and was perched on a stool now, chin down,
frowning over the split ends in her hair. A radio murmured on a shelf behind
her, too low for him to isolate one word from another. No music, so he guessed
it was a talk show. Crockery clattered in the distant reaches of the kitchen.

The tables, chairs and benches
gleamed with a honeyed, piney light. It was a restful place for a transaction
outside of the law. Wyatt scratched one fingernail across the tucks in the
check-patterned gingham tablecloth and saw Liz Reddings hand there,
long-fingered, elastic, appealingly knuckly. They were good hands to look at
and he imagined the rest of her.

One hand seemed to twitch in
reaction to him, lift, fall to the cloth and pick at the material. She said, They
want me to check the stones.

Hed expected that. He passed her
the Tiffany but then their orders arrived. Liz Reddings eyes were avid, full
of appetite. Just in time. I could feel crankiness coming on.

Wyatt watched her spoon the
chocolatey froth of her coffee into her mouth, take the first sip, lick away
the residue from her upper lip. She leaned toward him across the table and he
thought for a moment that she wanted to kiss him, but she propped her chin in
her cupped palm and said, Whats the waitress doing?

Wyatt looked past her to the cash
register. Shes gone out the back.

Good.

Liz sat back, fastened her jewellers
glass to her eye, examined each of the stones intently. Wyatt watched her
hands, the clean, healthy pores like pinpricks speckling the brown skin. She
looked up. So far so good. You havent substituted pieces of cut glass for the
stones. Now to see that you havent substituted cheap diamonds for expensive
ones.

She was twinkling, enjoying herself.
She handled the Tiffany again, peering for telltale scratches around the
settings. Satisfied, she rummaged in her bag and brought out a tiny set of
scales. Wyatt watched carefully, but her hands were quick and covert this time
and he glimpsed nothing of what else she might have in the bag.

Still all clear?

He nodded.

She placed the scales on the table,
effectively concealing them among the cups, plates, sugar bowl and a tall,
matched pair of salt and pepper shakers.

Shes back.

Liz froze. Her hands crept around
the scales.

Its okay. Shes staring off into
space.

Liz used a small tool to prise out a
couple of representative stones. She picked them up with tweezers, weighed one
and then the other in the tiny bowl of the scales.

Womens Weekly
seal of approval, she said. Each
stone weighs in as the real thing. Sorry, she said, meaning the rigamarole.

Wyatt was unconcerned. Its
business, he said.

He had no appetite, for the
transaction was not complete, but picked up the danish anyway and bit into it.
The pastry was thick, binding, and it dried the inside of his mouth. The apple
was too chunky. He drained part of his coffee, ate more of the danish.

It was then that Wyatts mouth
seemed to fill with grit. He grimaced, tongued the stuff to his lips, removed
it with his fingers.

Whats wrong?

Wyatt placed the offending sludge
onto his plate and separated pastry and apple from a jagged chip of tooth and
new amalgam. His tongue automatically ran along his upper teeth, registering a
rough hole and a loose fragment, all that remained of the tooth that had been
making his life hell for two months.

Ive lost a filling.

Fascinated, Liz Redding stared at
the chip on his plate. More than that. Your tooths split. Is it the tooth
thats been bothering you?

He nodded.

A new filling on top of old ones?

Yes.

It split open, she said. Theyll
do that. Which one is it?

Top. Back, he said, his tongue
busy.

Thats not so bad. It wont affect
your chewing and you wont need a false one in its place.

You seem to know all about it.

She was still leaning across the
table, her upper body straining toward him. Unconsciously he leaned toward her.
They seemed to be joined by this humble human catastrophe.

Thats why they failed to notice the
junkie with the gun. He came in through the main door and a moment later Liz
blinked and murmured, Behind me.