‘It looks as if I’ll be home tonight.’
‘You’d better be. We really need to talk, Cliff. Where are you? In some pub at the Cross, I suppose? Pissing on?’
I was still holding the Diet-Slim; I looked across to a set that featured a silver-grey rolls Royce-a woman sitting in a fur coat was getting out of it and smiling up at a guy in a dinner suit.
‘Yeah, something like that’, I said.
‘I’ll see you tonight.’ She hung up and I skirted the jungle, a schoolroom and a torture chamber back to where Sam had Selina reading while sipping: the book was The ABC of Love.
Sam clicked away and the blonde moved lights and Selina smiled and smiled until I wondered at her patience. The money would have to be good. Eventually they called it a day and, after kisses all round, Selina climbed back into her jumpsuit and we were on our way.
‘Lunch?’ I said.
She shook her head. ‘Not for me, but I’ll watch you.’
It was lunchtime, and things were quiet outside as we moved towards the car. Suddenly there were hurried sounds behind us, and I heard a whooshing noise and felt one side of my head tear itself loose from the middle. I crumpled, heard the sound again and my shoulder caught on fire. I went down further but managed to grab a pair of legs and pull. I looked up and saw a big guy in blue overalls pulling Selina towards a car. She screamed once and he hit her, and she was quiet. Then a knee came up into my face and I slammed down hard on to the footpath.
It all took about fifteen seconds: I was going to lunch with a beautiful girl and then I had a bleeding face, dented shoulder and no girl. And I’d be missing lunch. I brushed aside the few people who tried to help me and staggered up to Forbes Street to hail a cab. My ear and nose were bleeding and my clothes were dirty, but the Sydney cabbie is a brave soul. I gave the driver Groom’s address, and mopped at the blood. My entry at the agency sent people fluttering and bells ringing: Athol came out quickly and hustled me off to wet towels and a large Scotch. I told him what had happened while I cleaned up.
‘Did he hit her hard?’
‘I don’t think so. Why?’
‘That face is just pure gold. I don’t like to think of it being knocked about. What should we do now?’
I pulled a bit of loose skin off the ear and started the blood flowing again. ‘Call the cops’, I said.
He shook his head. ‘I’d rather not. You’ve got no idea what people are like in this racket. Any police trouble involving Selina and her career could be finished just like that.’ He snapped his fingers. ‘The face has to be a pure image, untainted, see?’
‘Not to mention your commission.’
‘Right. There must be something you can do.’ He was reproachful; I could have said that a bashing and an abduction were very different things from a loitering perv, but I didn’t.
‘Give me a bit of time on it. If I can’t come up with anything pretty quick you’ll have to get the cops. Where does she live? Who’re her friends?’
He told me that Selina shared a flat in Woollahra with another girl, and gave me the address. He didn’t know much about friends. I got to the flat quickly; my leg gave me trouble on the stairs, but never let it be said that Hardy gives in to pain. I forgot about the leg when I saw the flat door hanging on one hinge inside a shattered frame. I looked straight into the living room-torn paper, ripped and crumpled fabric and carpet made it look as if a small bomb had gone off inside. I took a few steps past the door and stopped when a woman came into the room. She looked at me and screamed.
‘Easy, easy’, I said. ‘I’m a friend, you must be Jenny.’
She nodded; her face was white and her hands were flying about like frightened birds. ‘Who’re you?’ she gasped.
‘Cliff Hardy.’ I produced some documents, thinking that they might help bring some order to the chaotic scene. The woman started swearing and I poked around in the debris while she visited terrible things on unknown persons. I gathered that she’d walked in on the violated flat just before I did; the telephone had been ripped out of the wall-the only departure from a cool, thorough bit of searching. No book, and there were a lot, was undisturbed; all lined clothes had been slashed; drawers had been tipped out and the contents sifted and all edges stuck or otherwise fastened-carpets, furniture, pictures, ornaments-had been lifted and inspected.
She picked things up and dropped them helplessly. ‘Why?’ she said.
‘It’s to do with Selina. Has she been in trouble lately? Been seeing any strange people?’
‘Strange? No… but she said there was a perv hanging around.’ Alarm leapt in her voice and eyes. ‘Is she all right? Where is she?’ She seemed to notice my injuries for the first time and drew the right conclusions. ‘Something’s happened!’
‘Something’, I said. ‘I’m not sure what. Selina’s been grabbed by someone, not a perv. How close are you to her?’
‘Oh, we’re… friends. I worked in TV, and I met her while she was doing a commercial. We got along, and she needed a flatmate. Grabbed? What does that mean?’
‘I wish I knew.’ I bent down and picked up a photograph from the floor. It had been detached from a frame and the backing had been cut away. The picture was a studio portrait of a self-satisfied looking guy with good teeth and ringletted brown hair.
‘Who’s this?’
‘Colin Short, Selina’s boyfriend.’
‘Athol Groom didn’t tell me about a boyfriend.’
‘He doesn’t know. Selina keeps him a secret.’
‘Why?’
She began making piles of the dismembered books. ‘He’s a photographer. A model isn’t supposed to be on with any one photographer. Shit what a mess. Why would anyone do this? What do they want, money or what?’
I squatted and helped her with the books. ‘They were looking for something. Selina ever mention a hiding place?’
‘Come on, we’re grown up people.’
‘Where does Short live?’
‘He’s got a sort of studio just around the corner. If I could find the address book…’ She rummaged round in the mess and came up with a notebook. She read out the address and I wrote it down. ‘He phoned this morning, as a matter of fact.’
‘What did he want?’
‘God, why are we doing this? Something should be done!’
‘Believe it or not, this is doing something. What did Short say?’
‘He just wanted to know if Selina got away okay. She was supposed to go to London the lucky…’ She broke off and looked contrite.
‘Don’t worry’, I said. ‘I know what you meant. How did Short take the news that she wasn’t going?’
‘Seemed upset. He kept asking me was I sure.’
I grunted and stacked a few more books. Jenny told me that Selina had been keeping company with Short for nearly two years, sometimes she spent the night at his place, sometimes he stayed at the flat. I got the door into a position where it would open and close and persuaded her not to call the police-Athol Groom was handling that end of it I said. She nodded then she dropped to her knees and started rooting urgently through the mess.
‘What’re you looking for?’
‘The dope’, she said.
I contemplated walking to Short’s place, it was only a step, but the leg was throbbing so I drove. As it turned out, that was lucky. I was fifty yards from the address when I pulled into the kerb to watch something very interesting. Short, whom I recognised from the photograph, despite his white overalls and a pair of heavy industrial goggles pulled up on his head, was loading something into a blue van. He made a trip back into the studio which had a shop front directly on to the street, came out with another bundle and pulled the door closed behind him. He walked past a white Toyota station wagon which had his name and business painted on the side, got into the van and drove off. I followed.