‘You’re under-worked,’ Glen said.
‘Is there such a thing?’
‘Not for some people, but there is for you. You’ve got a low boredom threshold.’
‘Are you teaching community policing to the boys and girls in blue, or psychology?’
‘Don’t be snaky, Cliff. Your mortgage on this place must be down to nothing by now. Business is bad. You need something else to occupy your time and energies. I’m only trying to help.’
I put my arm around her as we leaned against the fibro wall of the outside laundry and bathroom. ‘I know you are, love. And you’re right. No kids, credit cards under control and I own the car, such as it is. There is a bit of mortgage left, though. I had to buy Cyn out, remember, and she hiked up the price.’
‘The dreaded Cyn,’ Glen murmured, ‘I wonder if I’ll ever get to meet her?’
‘Don’t see why. I haven’t met her for over ten years.’
There wasn’t much to say to that, but when Glen proposed that I talk to Dan Sanderson about lecturing to his students I couldn’t think of any way to refuse. Glen had a knack of being right in advance of me finding she was right. I was getting used to it.
As I drove to Darlinghurst I was thinking that she’d been right again-after all, I’d enjoyed the time with the students and had been offered another spot. I could have scooted around the streets to Glen’s flat and waited for her but we had our rules. That night we were meeting for a meal in Glebe before going to my place and such arrangements were sacrosanct. I hadn’t been into the office for two days and there was always a chance that someone had slipped a note under the door asking for my help in finding Lassiter’s lost reef. I parked beside the church wall in St Peters Lane and entered the building for what must have been the three thousandth time. Stop it, I thought. You’ll be counting the number of stairs you’ve climbed next, multiplying fifty-eight by three thousand. You’re doing it already. Knock it off!
There was nothing interesting under the door, where one of the other tenants, an iridologist, shoves my mail. That could mean a lot of things. The iridologist might be sick, or she might be pissed off with me for not availing myself of her services, or there just might not be anything interesting coming my way. The thought depressed me and I sat at my desk watching the sun go down at around 4.30. It was the shortest day of the year, still three hours to seeing Glen and dinner time. There was only one thing to do.
I’d had one glass of red from the office cask and was thinking about a second when the phone rang. I grabbed it with relief.
‘Hardy Investigations. Cliff Hardy speaking.’
‘I thought you might be there. You have a lonely look.’
A woman’s voice. Familiar. Who?
‘Are you sure you’ve got the right number?’
‘I’m sure, Mr Hardy. This is Paula Wilberforce. I looked you up in the book. I’m sorry if I alarmed you this afternoon.’
‘You didn’t alarm me, Mrs Wilberforce.’
‘I think I did. Anyway, I wanted to apologise and to make it clear that nothing you tell me would ever be attributed to you in print. I’m simply asking for help, Mr Hardy. Like one of your clients about whom you spoke so eloquently today.’
Put it down to the early sunset or the wine or the total absence of anything interesting to do beyond the few routine jobs I had on hand-the upshot was that I agreed to allow Paula Wilberforce to interview me in my office the following day at 11.00 a.m. She sounded pathetically grateful, but I could see her blue eyes glittering. The woman was dangerous, even over the phone. I was thinking better of it as soon as I replaced the receiver, but what could I do? The snaky side of me said that it was Glen’s fault for getting me into the academic racket in the first place. It would give us something interesting to talk about over dinner. I drew off another glass and stared through the window at the lights of the city. The angry traffic noises and the static of men and machines in conflict drifted up to me. Suddenly, I wanted to be up at Whitebridge, at Glen’s cottage overlooking the ocean with the lights of Newcastle away to the north and the sound of the waves on the beach. And I couldn’t just up stakes and go because I had Mrs Wilberforce to see tomorrow and Dan Sanderson’s second class to talk to the day after that. To hell with it, I thought. Maybe I should do a PhD — Dr Cliff Hardy, Senior Lecturer in Detection and Personal Mismanagement…
The knock at my door was sharp-anxious or angry. I called out, ‘Come in’ and stuck the glass in the top drawer. A woman entered from the gloom of the passageway. She was smartly dressed in a navy suit with a red blouse. As I eased up politely from my chair I saw that she was wearing nylon stockings and sneakers. She saw me looking and smiled. ‘I’ll explain,’ she said. ‘You’re Mr Hardy’
I nodded. ‘Cliff Hardy. Please sit down. Your name is…?’
Verity Lamberte. You’d better write it down. The Lamberte has an “e” on the end.’
I wrote the name on a pad and added ‘35, dark brown, shoulder length, wedding ring, 170cm’-you never can tell with women, they can change their appearance in all sorts of cunning ways. Verity Lamberte was a vital, attractive sort of woman, a little too sharp-featured to be called good-looking, but with the confidence in her manners and gestures that good-looking women often have. She sat in my client chair, very composed and relaxed, with a big leather holdall on her lap. She unzipped the bag and held up a pair of expensive-looking high-heeled shoes. ‘I wear these to work and take them off the minute I can.’
I nodded. ‘I would, too.’
She smiled. ‘I was told you were a wit.’
I was starting to like her and to wonder if she’d fancy a glass of cask red. “Who by?’ I said.
‘Barbara Winslow. The other reason I came in my runners is that I didn’t like the look of this building of yours after dark. I’ve got some Mace in my bag but I wouldn’t like to have to deal with some low-life while wearing high heels.’
‘I hope you locked your car.’
‘I did, and set the steering lock and the alarm.’
“That should do it. You seem to be ready for anything, Mrs Lamberte. Are you sure you need a private investigator?’
She put her hand into the bag and pulled out a package wrapped in brown paper. It was about the size of a thick paperback book and it had been sealed with masking tape. The package had been opened and the tape was now only partly holding the paper down. She slid it across the desk. ‘Have a look at this.’
I released the tape where it was gripping and folded the paper back. Inside a lot of wadding consisting of strips torn from a newspaper, were six pistol cartridges-. 357 magnums, Winchester brand.
‘That was posted to my husband,’ Verity Lamberte said. ‘I believe he is planning to kill me.’
2
Mrs Lamberte told me that she and her husband, Patrick, were on the way to getting a divorce. The lawyers were working on a settlement.
There’s quite a lot of property involved and, unfortunately, custody questions. We have two children.’
‘How long were you married, Mrs Lamberte?’
‘Ten years, five good ones and five very bad. Michelle was born in the happy time, she’s eight. Shane is only four. We’ve been separated for six months. I’m claiming custody of both kids.’
‘You referred to your work. What do you do? And what does your husband do?’
‘That’s diplomatic. Not many men would put the questions that way around.’
‘I’m learning,’ I said.
‘Patrick is… listen to me. I’m a partner in a small travel agency. I used to be an air hostess. We specialise in business travel. Patrick’s an architect and he has interests in other things.’
‘I gather the divorce isn’t amicable?’
‘Far from it. In the last few years before we separated we fought about everything.’