River of Salt Read online

  ‘Dumb bastard.’

  Now Blake saw that lying in the grass was an injured kangaroo.

  ‘Ran out in front of me. Lucky it didn’t break my headlight. Can’t leave it like that, though.’

  A large man with a sizeable beer gut, Nalder was sneaking out of his forties, having disguised himself for many a year as early-fifties. He raised the iron and struck down hard: one, two, three times on the head of the roo. He got his breath back, seemed to realise he had nothing to wipe the tyre iron clean.

  ‘Bloody things are everywhere this summer.’ His eyes met Blake’s. ‘You said it was urgent.’

  The sudden violence had shaken Blake. He thought the animal had quivered after the first blow and had been forced to pull his gaze away.

  ‘Two guys turned up trying to shake me down. I think they’re running the racket up the coast to the Heads at least.’

  ‘And you tell me this because?’

  ‘Because I pay you twelve pounds a week. And you’re a cop.’

  Nalder still looked at a loss with what to do with the bloody tyre iron. For an instant Blake thought he might use it on him.

  ‘Your twelve pounds a week is, I think I’ve made clear, insurance that you will get no competition in the liquor business. Anybody applies for a licence, I object. Makes my life simpler, yours too. Now, I am prepared to turn a blind eye to the occasional underage drinker or public urinator emanating from your establishment — call it goodwill — but as you know, I will not tolerate drugs or depraved acts. Nor does your twelve pounds entitle you to have me act as your private security.’

  ‘I’m not the one breaking the law.’

  ‘I only have your word for it. The parties involved will deny it.’

  ‘I’m not the only place they’re pulling it.’

  ‘You’re the only one who has come forward and complained. And the Heads is out of my jurisdiction. Look, what do you see before you: a policeman in a suit, a detective?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No, you see an ageing sergeant in his uniform. That’s the way I like it, the way we both should like it. You start reporting anything above a little larceny or common assault, our crime statistics rise. Some wanker in an office somewhere decides they need a CIB division in Coral Shoals. You don’t want that. Neither do I.’

  Blake told himself to take this very slow and calm, like the Massimo Benetti job when he found himself on the creaky landing and had to slip off his shoes. Benetti was in the lavatory. Even now he could transport himself back in time and hear a radio from somewhere else in the building. It was playing old music, Glenn Miller. He’d waited in the shadows. When the toilet flushed, he’d slipped his shoes back on for the exit. The door opened on Benetti standing there in his singlet. A look passed between the men that said everything about their respective roles: You are going to kill me. Yes.

  Blake shot him twice in the chest. He never knew what Benetti had done wrong.

  He had to be just as calm now. Getting hot under the collar never helped anybody. He needed Nalder. He put himself in the cop’s shoes, caught a whiff of Nalder’s logic.

  ‘So what am I supposed to do?’

  ‘Take care of it. Make your choice: pay up or find another solution.’ Nalder’s eyes bored into Blake’s. ‘Sure, you look like butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth, but I know you, Saunders. I’ve seen a thousand Blake Saunders since I started this job. Well, maybe not ones as smart as you. You’re a businessman. Thankfully I am but a humble policeman. You will have to make a business decision.’ The matter as such was clearly at an end so far as the cop was concerned. ‘I believe you had a large crowd of youngsters there last night?’

  ‘Yes. Of course no alcohol was served except in the restaurant.’

  Nalder lay his heavy mitt on Blake’s shoulders. ‘See, that’s what I mean, a businessman. Now, regrettably I have to return to the station to protect the good citizens of this principality but perhaps you will save me the trouble of a return trip?’

  Blake had come prepared. He handed across the envelope containing the twelve pounds.

  Nalder smiled. ‘Watch out for the roos.’

  On his return, Nalder deliberately diverted past the golf club. The fortunate were out in their short-sleeve Gloweaves, nothing more on their minds than a pesky insect as they were lining up to putt to the background click of reticulation. Tonight would determine whether he could join their number. His application for membership would be considered … again. With Rob Parker nominating him this time, he felt sure he had a strong chance. As a solicitor, Parker carried weight. More clout than Jack Hitchcock who had been his champion last year. Jack was a nice enough fellow and well respected by the RSL blokes, but he didn’t mix with the young professionals who really controlled things at the golf club. It pissed Nalder off that he had been rejected last year — you had to wait twelve months before you could reapply — but, on the other hand, what made the golf club so desirable was that it didn’t just let in anybody. Once you were in, you were ‘in’. He had always had a strong desire to belong to a group: a clan.

  As a younger man, Nalder had flirted with the idea of joining the Masons. The police force had two strong groups, Catholics and Masons, and he was no Mick. That Freemasons had arcane rituals appealed greatly to him but then he met Edith and soon enough they were married and had the two boys and then war had broken out. Nalder had joined the navy and spent three years on a minesweeper that had never seen action. There was much about the comradeship of the navy he had enjoyed but as a club it offered no entrée to higher status. For that you needed to be an officer. He left the same rank as he went in and returned to policing. When the Coral Shoals job came up, he was the only one to put up his hand. The others had seen a tiny station, no chance for advancement, a frontier world. He, on the other hand, had smelled potential. Going on for ten years now, his word had been law here. There were only six of them at the station and he was the most senior. He was more or less the sheriff of this strip of coast and the adjacent hinterland. On the few occasions when a more serious crime had been committed, the regional detectives came down from the Heads and attended but they knew their place. You wanted to build flats or shops in Coral Shoals, you wanted to operate a liquor licence or drive a taxi, you wanted to so much as fart in Coral Shoals, you needed Nalder’s approval. Oh sure, it might seem like it was the mayor, Tom Street, or the town planner, John Duggan, who was calling the shots but it was him.

  Street had been his servant ever since he’d found his son drunk as a skunk having just crashed into Harrison’s furniture store. Nalder had been able to keep the kid’s name out of it and make Harrison happy by goosing the insurance. Duggan had smacked up a prostitute after the Heads’ race-day carnival two years ago. Nalder had called in a favour from his colleagues to the north and everybody had walked away happy. Well, perhaps that wasn’t strictly true. Duggan wasn’t happy once it was his turn to repay the largesse displayed by his local policeman. However, the constant threat that his wife could be made aware of his deeds had made him compliant. At first he’d not wanted to approve the George Street shops on what had been set aside as a public carpark for beach patrons, running a whole lot of claptrap about aesthetics. Nalder had been forced to remind him about the aesthetics of fucking around on one’s wife with a prostitute. Tony Puglise the developer was grateful of course and saw to it that one of the shops, the hair salon, was titled in Edith’s name. The rent wasn’t going to make them millionaires but every penny helped; the shop, the tithes from the Yank and a couple of other businesses, various one-off contributions from ratepayers looking for council approval on this or that, all swelled the coffers. Originally he’d thought he’d be using the money for Brian and Andrew to go to a private school up in Brisbane but neither showed any academic aptitude. It would be throwing good money after bad. Instead he’d bought a caravan park down the coast and that was ticking along nicely, the proceeds enabling him to buy three vacant blocks within a couple of hundred yards o
f the beach. Nobody else here seemed to appreciate the value of land so close to the water with a booming population. Well, it might take twenty years but there would come a time when he hung up his boots for good and when that land would enable him to live like a king.

  He was galled by the knowledge that he was worth as much or more than many of those members of the golf club who thus far had rejected him. Regrettably, it was not possible to know who had voted against him. Each member who attended the nomination meeting had a black and a white ball, black for ‘no’, obviously, white for ‘yes’. They dropped them in a ballot box and then these were tipped out into a tray. One black ball was enough to nix you. Though members weren’t supposed to reveal details, he had been told that four black balls had been issued against him. Had Duggan been there, he would have been an obvious suspect, however, Nalder had been secretly watching from the carpark and had noted Duggan was not present. So he had at least four other enemies. It could be anybody. As a policeman you were bound to have run-ins with people, although his gut told him it was probably just some bloody snobs who thought a policeman wasn’t up to their level. That’s where Parker should help.

  He cruised down the tapeworm road that took him back to the heart of town, and for the first time actually considered what the Yank had said about the extortion racket. It wasn’t good but his hands were largely tied. If he did anything official, there would have to be a report. Powers-that-be would read it. One of them might even realise that Coral Shoals existed. If any policeman more senior than him got posted here, bang went the gravy train. On the other hand, tangling with crooks direct was not a course of action compatible with where he saw his life heading. In fact it was the direct opposite of what he should be doing, enjoying a top-shelf whisky in the dead of winter before a blazing fire, cosy in a lamb’s wool pullover in the company of the good men of Coral Shoals, talking real-estate deals, and looking at the tight arse of the waitress to the hiss of a soda siphon. Or enjoying a cold beer on the terrace on a summer night, like tonight, smoke from his cigar drifting among fluttering moths, a yellow moon trying to catch their men-only jokes. There was, too, a certain attraction in the accoutrements of the game itself: the little wooden tees that you could push into the spongy earth, the gleaming steel shafts of the clubs, the gloves, soft leather that matched perfectly the style and swirl of brandy in a balloon glass. All of these made the experience more than a mere game. They formed a language that bonded the chosen, the powerful men of the community, and that set them apart and made them brothers. Once he was in the club, Nalder would no longer just be the local cop. He would be Leslie, ‘Les’, their valued equal.

  In one way it didn’t surprise Blake that Nalder had stiffed him regarding the shakedown guys. Life was like that. It was never as easy as you wanted. There was always shit to clean up. One look at Leftwich made him think the salesman would agree wholeheartedly. Jacket off, Leftwich was vigorously polishing the duco of a Holden with a chamois in the prescribed circular motion. It looked like he’d already done a whole row of the vehicular bargains available on the lot of Clarke’s Cars. Blake saw a smear of ash over the last two cars in the row and thought he’d figured out why this was occupying the salesman’s morning. Leftwich had clearly lit the incinerator at the wrong time, forgetting about the prevailing wind. Blake was almost at the door of the office when Leftwich called out.

  ‘He’s not in.’

  Blake angled his body at him.

  Leftwich said, ‘I think it was a big night last night at the party. He called at nine to say he wasn’t coming in.’

  ‘I was supposed to get paid.’

  ‘Sorry, you’ll have to speak to Mr Clarke about that.’

  Blake didn’t think he looked sorry at all.

  Blake went back to his car and drove to the beach. There were only two other boardriders out there. Even from the shore he could recognise Pete and Dave. They all got on fine but today he didn’t feel like talking to anyone. He might understand Nalder, was not surprised by his attitude but all the same, he didn’t like it. If he’d have had Jimmy with him, those bozos would have taken one look and cleared out, but they looked at him and they saw ‘easy target’.

  He climbed back in his car and drove fifteen minutes south. The break wasn’t as good here but at least he would be alone. As usual when things niggled at him, the water changed everything. This is life, infinity, God, he thought as he let the power of the ocean lift him up and propel him. He felt good again, cleansed by the river of salt.

  Just under an hour later he was in Carol’s cool room, the smell of her hair mingling with the fragrance of a warming day outside as it squeezed through the shutters. They fucked like beggars fighting over a scrap, neither giving an inch, both knowing whatever morsel they got would be never enough to not have to go through the same ritual again. What had led her here to this point, what failures or half-won dreams, he never inquired. He really did not care, did not want to jeopardise the sanctuary that he found when inside her. All he knew was that for a short time the throb was morphined out; the snow of Philly, the bare room with their chipped plates, the apartment building’s dark vestibule smelling of stew, the weight of the revolver in his hand, the mist of his breath in the back of the car outside the flat where Jimmy was holed up, the flash of the gun, all that was blotted and there was only skin and heartbeat and the relinquishing of control … and for the flimsiest time, peace.

  They sat at her formica table — here they called it laminex — sipping instant coffee. She wore a singlet and panties. Because his swimmers were still wet he was naked.

  She said, ‘I didn’t expect you this morning.’

  ‘That bother you?’

  She looked at him across the top of her black brew. She was still wearing last night’s make-up. ‘No.’ She cast about for cigarettes, seemed to decide against it. ‘I might have had company though.’

  This was true. He should have considered that.

  ‘I apologise.’

  ‘You wouldn’t have been jealous?’

  He toyed with his cup. ‘No.’

  She sat back. ‘No, I don’t believe you would have been. Must be good to be that … free.’

  ‘You don’t get jealous.’ It was a statement. She’d never seemed possessive.

  ‘I don’t show it.’

  This genuinely surprised him. He wondered if this was the beginning of the ‘girlfriend’ talk. He’d experienced a few of those in his time, didn’t like them at all. But she didn’t pursue the subject.

  ‘How was your night last night?’ she asked instead.

  ‘Good crowd, all young. You?’

  ‘Could have fired a cannon. You know The Honeymooners, that TV show?’

  ‘Jackie Gleason, sure.’

  ‘Is it really like that? People live in those tiny apartments and other people drop in?’

  ‘The big cities in the east.’

  ‘Why do they live like that?’

  ‘They don’t have a choice.’

  Edith had cooked sausages for dinner, with mashed potato and peas. No fish on Friday here, this was no Mick house. Normally Nalder loved his Friday dinner. He would drain a chocolate soldier, then he and Edith would sit out on the back porch, sometimes turn the radio up so you could hear it through the window. Tonight though, he’d had to pretend how much he enjoyed the meal. For the umpteenth time he checked his watch: 7.16. They would be just filing into the room at the golf club now, free jugs of beer on the table no doubt, ham and mustard sandwiches, probably. He had not told Edith about his renewed application. He’d made that mistake last year, expecting naturally enough he’d be accepted. When he had failed, she’d made all the right noises about them being snobs, and who would want to play that silly game anyhow et cetera? She just didn’t get it. Quite frankly she was probably pleased. Edith wouldn’t be comfortable in those dresses they wore to their balls and dinners but, dammit, she deserved it. And he definitely deserved it. He’d served this community … another quick c
heck of the watch … 7.18. His doorbell rang. Could they have decided already? Had somebody declared there was no way they were voting for him and so that was it? Game over? He rose quickly from the old cane chair and walked through into the dining room. Edith, who had been engrossed in a Pix, made to get up but he stayed her.

  ‘I’ve got it.’

  ‘It’s probably Phil wanting our mower tomorrow. Tell him to buy his bloody own.’

  The house reflected none of Nalder’s steadily growing assets. He’d been sorely tempted to buy a Rover but had thought better of it. When ordinary policemen started to spend up, they stopped being ordinary. He yanked open the door, determined to confront his fear as soon as possible.

  He was taken aback to find two men in suits and hats who just had to be …

  ‘Sergeant Nalder?’

  Shit. Had they come to arrest him?

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘We would have called but nobody had your bloody number and there’s no answer at the station. Detective Inspector Ian Vernon,’ the spokesman tapped his chest. ‘Detective Sergeant Tony Apollonia. Homicide.’

  The ballad had gone down well, couples on the floor taking the opportunity to dance close after the more frenetic surf rumble. The room was almost as full as the previous night but with an older crowd of liquor drinkers, profits would be higher. Blake couldn’t enjoy it though. He was still on alert, scanning the crowd to see if Harry and Steve had turned up. Maybe they would leave him squirming a little longer?