Stiff Read online

  ‘Personnel records are confidential, love.’ But she got a carton of milk out of the private bar-fridge in Apps’ inner sanctum. ‘You’ll have to see his nibs. And I’m not sure how long he’ll be.’

  The longer the better as far as I was concerned. ‘A cross-section of names, that’s all I need,’ I said. ‘No personal particulars or anything.’

  She fiddled with an electric kettle at a sink in a small alcove. ‘Sugar too, love? Or just milk?’ My novelty value was slight, but at least I was better than nothing. ‘What happened to your face?’

  ‘Possum,’ I said, pulling a chair up beside the desk. ‘I’ve got an on-site van up the river. The thing must have got in through the air vent and been stuck there all week. Soon as I opened the door it went for me. Half-starved probably.’

  Not bad at short notice I thought. She clucked sympathetically, whether for me or the possum I couldn’t tell, and put a cup of something brown in front of me. Then she opened her top drawer, took out a glass ashtray and put it on the desk next to my elbow. She dredged a packet of Alpine out of her bag and extracted a cigarette. ‘If His Highness comes in, this is yours. Okay?’

  I grinned and sipped the weak oversweet instant coffee like it was pure ambrosia. ‘No worries,’ I said. ‘No worries at all.’

  She held the end of the cigarette to the glowing element of an electric radiator tucked under the desk near her feet. When it caught she put it to her lips and puffed it into action.

  I gave her my most hapless look and nodded towards the time sheets. ‘I’m running a bit late,’ I said. ‘I don’t suppose I could...’

  She shrugged. ‘Long as you’re quick,’ she said. ‘I don’t imagine it’d do any great harm.’

  I flipped through the sheets. They were dated for the previous week. The employee’s name was handwritten in the left-hand column, the daily hours in boxes in the middle, the confirming signature of the shift supervisor on the right. It was perfect.

  I began copying the left-hand columns. A couple of dozen names would do, I figured. Enough to keep Agnelli running around Trades Hall like a blue-arsed fly for weeks, trying to figure out if any of them had Lollicato connections. As I wrote I began to whistle under my breath.

  The names were a real ethnic grab-bag, heavy on Yugoslavs if anything. Zoltans, Zorans and Dragons, lots of -ic surnames. Some were real puzzlers—Amol Ratna, Zeki Muren. But Italians, if anything, were under-represented. If Agnelli was looking for an Italian connection he would be disappointed.

  I was well into the third page before I glanced over at the signature down the right-hand margin. It was an almost childish scrawl, half block letters, the mark of a hand that rarely held a pen. E. Bayraktar, it read. I rapidly flipped through all the sheets on the desk. The signature appeared on three of them, against more than thirty names.

  Agnelli is going to love this, I thought. If he must have his seedbed of simmering discontent, what better place for it than among the deceased’s most intimate working companions? I scribbled furiously. The names on Bayraktar’s first sheet were the usual cosmopolitan mishmash, but about halfway down the third page they became more decidedly Turkish. Well, they seemed Turkish. Dursum and Orhan and Oguz were Turkish names, I felt almost sure. Kartal Tibet, that was hard to pick, sounded Himalayan. Ahmet Ayik, now surely that was Turkish. And Nasreddin Hoca, that rang a bell.

  Ding dong, it went. Jingle jangle. Clang, clang, clang. It rang loud and it kept ringing. Nasreddin. That was a name I’d seen somewhere before. But where?

  ‘These permanents?’

  ‘No, love. That’s the casuals. Permanents get paid direct into their bank accounts. Only casuals get weekly cash. Filling out that many different bank transfers every week would be a bloody nightmare, pardon my French. Look at those names. Honestly, you couldn’t spell half of them if you tried.’

  ‘That must be a lot of fiddling around for you, making up the pay packets.’

  She snorted smoke out her nose. ‘I’ve got enough to do as it is, love. The packets get made up by Armaguard. All part of the service. I send them the forms and they deliver the pays on Friday, all ready for the shift supervisors to take round after lunch. Speaking of which, you’d better hurry up with that list. I’ve got to get them finished this afternoon.’

  ‘All finished,’ I said, quickly noting down the last half-dozen names on Bayraktar’s page. I took the cup to the sink and rinsed it. ‘Tell Himself thanks for the welcome and that I’m not sure when I’ll be back,’ I said. ‘Could be any time.’ She liked that.

  The ashtray disappeared back into the drawer, butt and all.

  ‘Oh, one last thing before I go. You wouldn’t happen to have Herb Gardiner’s address on file here somewhere, would you?’

  Gardiner’s place was in Coburg, back towards the electorate office, a fifteen-minute drive. On the way through Broadmeadows I looked for lunch. Out that far, Sydney Road was already the Hume Highway and all I found were fast-food franchises and used-truck yards. Behind them, tract houses spread across the plain where once the Woiworung had hunted and gathered. Presumably with more success than me. I passed the Colonel and kept going.

  By comparison Coburg was almost picturesque, a two-time Tidy Town runner-up. It was a world of fifties cream brick veneer, ruler-straight lawn edges, garden gnomes, roll-down garage doors, low fences, oleanders and lemon trees. None of your unruly natives were tolerated here, dropping their leaf business on the paths and clogging up the guttering. Herb Gardiner’s house was the neatest in his street. A big For Sale sign was planted on the front lawn.

  I stepped over the wrought-iron gate and rang the doorbell. As a four-note chime sounded distantly, a white silky terrier hurtled around the corner in a frenzy of yapping. I braced to defend myself, and a female voice screamed in my ear. ‘Garn. Git.’

  The fanged snowball skidded to a halt, turned and limped away. A woman of about Charlene’s age, respectably made up, was standing behind the heavy grille of the screen door wiping her hands on an apron.

  ‘Mrs Gardiner?’

  ‘Vera passed away six months ago.’

  ‘But this is the Gardiner house?’

  She didn’t want anybody getting the wrong idea. ‘I’m The Nextdoors. I pop in now and then to give Mr Gardiner a hand with the housework. If it’s about the house, he’s up the street I’m afraid.’

  I was suddenly acutely conscious of my appearance. I straightened my back, ran my fingers through my hair and tried to look as prospective as possible. If I’d been wearing a hat I’d have taken it off and fiddled with the brim. ‘Been on the market long, has it?’ I enquired politely.

  ‘The sign has only just gone up.’

  ‘Well, another time, I suppose.’

  The screen swung open. ‘Herb won’t be a moment, I’m sure.’

  I wiped my feet vigorously and stepped onto the salmon pink carpet of the entrance hall. The wallpaper was pink, too. A pink on pink fleur-de-lis motif, with a row of miniatures, ballerinas in candy tutus. The telephone table was white though, Queen Anne, to match the antique ivory and brass telephone. I followed the wall-to-wall through to the lounge.

  Mrs Nextdoor went into an impromptu pitch. ‘As you can see it’s too big for one person. Herb’s been here on his own ever since…’ She tactfully left the sentence unfinished. ‘It was the same when my husband went. Herb, I said, you can’t live forever surrounded by memories.’

  ‘I can understand that,’ I said. And I could.

  Herb’s memories were pure oestrogen. The lounge was the hall writ large. The sofa was done in pink floral with matching throw cushions. The pelmets above the windows were upholstered in the same pattern, with little valances matching the gathered lace of the drapes. Rows of porcelain dolls with painted blushes stared out of a blondwood crystal cabinet towards a print of a sad-eyed clown with a ruffled collar hanging on the rambling-rose patterned wallpaper. There was so much pink I thought my eyes must be haemorrhaging.

  On the mantelpiece in
front of a bevelled mirror circled with lilies was a big oversized brandy balloon half-filled with rose petal potpourri, but the smell was that of thickly laid-on air freshener. The only visible evidence of human habitation was a scattering of brochures and documents on the pink-tinted glass top of a brass-rimmed coffee table. Besides them sat a copy of Best Bets, tell-tale male spoor.

  The helpful widow offered me the sofa. ‘I’d best leave the formalities to Herb. I’d feel a bit strange showing someone around someone else’s house, if you know what I mean.’ That was a relief. I perched gingerly on the edge of the crepe de chine.

  I decided I’d give Gardiner five minutes. If he hadn’t shown by then, I’d take the phone number and call him from the office. To tell you the truth, I wasn’t even sure why I was there. Covering my arse, I suppose. Dotting the t’s and crossing the i’s.

  She of the Nextdoor hovered, uncertain of the protocol. ‘Nice big place,’ she improvised. ‘Ideal family home. Too much cleaning for one. Herb’s new place is fully serviced. Hot though, Queensland.’

  ‘Queensland?’ I improvised back. ‘Nice weather.’

  ‘Can’t say I blame him, day like today. But I don’t know how he’ll get on by himself. A man needs someone to look after him.’

  Indeed, he did, I admitted. Make that three minutes.

  ‘Anyhow, you might as well have a cuppa while you wait. Fully equipped kitchen.’ That about exhausted the conversational possibilities. She opened the door through to the kitchen. Baking smells, good ones, came in and fought with the evil air freshener.

  A white cuckoo clock ticked loudly in the silence. My stomach growled back at it. Past two-thirty and I still hadn’t eaten. I picked up the form guide, put it down, flicked through one of the brochures. Ocean Towers, Broadbeach. Absolute beachfront. Two and three bedroom apartments from two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, plus on-road costs.

  I tossed the glossy folder back down onto what could have been a title deed and looked around. Not a bad swap, a quarter of a mill’s worth of sea views and a spa for a crocheted tissue box worth maybe half that, absolute maximum, drizzle running down its windows. Old Herb must certainly have been stacking it away all these years. And why not? A lifetime on your back on the concrete with your mouth full of self-tappers, staring up into the innards of a bung compressor. Make a nice change, Broadbeach would.

  My own old man had done something similar when they bought the pub out from under him for a drive-in bottle shop. But instead of the high-rise condo in Surfers he’d gone for the fibro shack on Bribie Island and the aluminium runabout. Horses for courses. Plus it looked like Gardiner had a bit more nous in the financial planning department. That wouldn’t be hard. Whelan senior had been through six pubs in twenty years, each smaller than the one before it.

  I was thinking about making a break for it when a little tan Toyota Corolla scooted into the driveway and disappeared down the side. The dog yapped a bit, then the front door opened. For a man in his sixties, Herb Gardiner was very well preserved, a bit of a gent in a Fletcher Jones tweed jacket, corduroy trousers and a rollneck navy-blue jumper. He had the nuggetty face of an ex-pug and the lightness on his feet of a man who’d just taken out the box trifecta at Eagle Farm. He wore the crooked grin of a short man on good terms with the whole world. If he was suffering from post-fatality trauma, he was bearing up well.

  ‘And who are you, then?’ he demanded with exactly the inflection you’d use yourself if you walked into your lounge room and found a total stranger with a scabby face dawdling on the divan.

  As I stood up to tell him, the widow came out of the kitchen. ‘He’s come about the house,’ she said. The apron had disappeared and she’d plumped up her hair. Gardiner shrugged off his tweed jacket, brushed the raindrops away with the meticulousness of a bloke who took good care of his tools, and draped it over the back of one of the pink armchairs.

  ‘Actually,’ I said guiltily, ‘the union suggested I get in touch.’

  ‘Did they just?’

  Fair enough. This one called for a very straight bat. ‘It’s a courtesy call really, Mr Gardiner. My name is Murray Whelan. It’s about the, uh, incident last week at work.’

  Gardiner gave me the stop sign. ‘Those scones of yours smell scrumptious.’ He sprayed charm all over the widow, splashing some on me in the process. He scooped the brochures up off the coffee table and slotted them into a gap in the blondwood shelf of white-bound encyclopedias. ‘I’ll make a bit of space. Sit down, Mr Whelan.’

  ‘Murray, please.’

  The scones appeared before my bum had even hit the cushion, straight out of the oven. A good three inches tall, they were, on a tray with jam and whipped cream and little linen serviettes. As Mrs Nextdoor bent to lower the tray, Gardiner, master again in his own house, patted her rump. She all but purred. He looked at me across her backside and winked. Here was a man who had it made, and didn’t he know it. For the first time all day, I was beginning to enjoy myself.

  ‘Leave you boys to it, will I then?’ she said.

  ‘Rightio, pet. Thanks a lot.’ Gardiner pulled up his sleeves daintily and reached for the teapot. Under the grizzled hair of his forearm was an ancient tattoo—a faded, languorous mermaid. ‘I’ll be mother,’ he said.

  Entertaining Herb’s uninvited callers was clearly not what the good widow had in mind when she’d come round to play house, but she copped it sweet. Gardiner would be around for a little while yet. She went out through the kitchen and I heard the back door close.

  ‘So, what’s this all about, son?’ Gardiner said amiably.

  It was long past the point where there was any mileage in playing funny buggers. I put my cards on the table, face up between the apricot conserve and turf tips. ‘I work for Charlene Wills,’ I said. Gardiner accepted my credentials with a nod. The local member was well known.

  ‘Dunno if you saw it,’ I went on, ‘but there was bit of speculation in the Sun yesterday to the effect that this business out at Pacific Pastoral on Friday might lead to some kind of industrial problems. The government would prefer that didn’t happen. A committee in the Industry Department has called for a report. Since I work in this area they decided I was just the bunny to write it for them. And because you’re the union rep and also happened to be on the spot when the body turned up, I thought I’d come straight to the horse’s mouth.’

  Gardiner took all this in, nodded again and broke open a scone. ‘I went through all of this pretty thoroughly with the police and so forth on Friday.’

  I hastened to reassure him. ‘Oh, I’m not interested in the death per se, just any possible industrial implications.’

  Gardiner applied butter. ‘Who else you talked to?’

  ‘No one much, yet. Lionel Merricks.’ This was nothing but craven big-noting. I wasn’t even sure he’d recognise the name.

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘You don’t muck about, do you, son?’

  I brushed it aside, modestly. ‘Just protocol really. It’s the situation on the ground at Coolaroo that interests me. And you’d know more about that than any chairman of the board.’

  ‘What about Apps?’

  ‘Correct me if I’m wrong,’ I said. ‘But I got the definite impression Mr Apps wouldn’t recognise an industrial situation if it bit him on the bum.’

  That got a chuckle. Gardiner relaxed back into his armchair, cup and saucer on his lap. ‘Bit tense, was he?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Is he always so stroppy?’

  I must’ve been making a good impression. Gardiner touched the side of his nose and proceeded to slip me the inside oil. ‘Couple of months ago a mix-up happened in one of our shipments to America, sub-standard meat or something. There was hell to pay. Threat to the credibility of the export industry, all of that. Apps copped a bit of flack from the higher-ups and he’s been like a bear with a sore head ever since. You talk to anyone else?’

  ‘Not really. Some bloke named McGuire, the safety officer. A cleaner called Memo. My impressi
on is that I’m on a fool’s errand.’

  So far I was doing too much talking. At this rate those scones would get away from me. I smeared one and bit down hungrily. ‘What do you reckon?’ I mumbled through the crumbs and cream. My mouth filled with heaven, all melting and warm.

  Gardiner picked up his cup and settled deeper into his seat. ‘Well it’s all news to me, son. I’ve been there sixteen years, ever since I left the service, and in all that time we’ve had fewer than half a dozen strikes and stoppages. And they were all at the behest of the union, backing up the log of claims and so forth. The slaughtermen, up to their knees in guts and shit all day, now they go out at the drop of a hat, and who can blame them? But our lot, industrial action isn’t their style. Most of them would rather have the day’s pay and solidarity be buggered. I just can’t see it, myself. I certainly haven’t heard anything, son. And I would, believe me, I would.’

  This was music to my ears. I tackled another scone and moved on. ‘So what do you reckon he was up to in that chiller? Bayraktar, the bloke you found?’

  ‘Well, he wasn’t working on his tan, I can tell you that much.’

  ‘Fair bit of that sort of thing goes on out there, does it?’

  ‘As much as anywhere else, I suppose.’

  ‘So it’s pretty widespread?’

  ‘Stands to reason that a man who works in a meat warehouse would be a mug to buy his own chops. But not everybody’s walking out the front door with a side of lamb under their arm, if that’s what you mean.’

  I’d walked into that one with my eyes wide open, practically called the man a thief to his face. I backed off at a million miles an hour. ‘Bit stiff, though. Freezing to death for a couple of kilos of free sirloin.’

  ‘Maybe he was greedy. Had quite an appetite by the look of him.’

  ‘Ever had much to do with him?’

  Gardiner wiped his fingers on one of the little floral serviettes. ‘Knew him to look at. The ethnics keep pretty much to themselves.’