‘I’m surprised the insurance company was happy with these arrangements,’ I said.
Stevenson let slip a wry smile. ‘Ah, now there you’ve caught me out a fraction. That’s another reason for my… preference for your services, Mr Hardy.’
It’s nice to find that people aren’t completely straightforward. Humanising.
Stevenson was right about leaks in the detective business, but there was one sure way to plug them, at least temporarily-with money. I knew some of the art theft boys in the game, and my first move was to get in touch with one I could at least partly trust. Quentin James is an art validator, assessor and recoverer of stolen objects. We’ve worked together successfully a few times. Money is his god, and the right amount buys his total discretion.
I went to James’ office in Pitt Street and laid out the story. James is close to sixty, very fat and wheezy, a chain smoker and boozer, but he knows his business. As an ex-smoker I find it hard to spend much time with him in the fug he creates. He’s not a window opener, not a fresh air man.
‘Hmm, I believe I heard something about a Galliard going up for sale. Not which one, mind. Interesting.’
‘What d’you think of the amounts mentioned?’
‘Hard to say. Could be right.’
‘Is it possible that someone might think the pearl is worth more than the painting?’
James shook his head as he exhaled and a cloud of smoke wafted towards me. ‘No. More likely a ransom job. “I’ve got the pearl. You pay up and you’ve got your package back.” He hasn’t been approached?’
‘Not yet. So who’re the likely candidates?’
‘Alarm system disabled, wall climbed, glass removed. Wall hard to climb?’
‘Hard for me, impossible for you.’
He smiled. ‘I find climbing stairs taxing enough. There’s work involved here, Cliff, my boy. Ring around, find out if Stevenson’s had any inside work done on the house lately. Who did it, if so. Who they might pass info to. Like that.’
‘I’m on a big earner, Quentin. I’ll pay.’
‘Leave it with me.’
I busied myself with other matters for the next few days. Then two things happened. First, the story of the theft broke in the newspapers. The report described the painting and the pearl and said that the Sydney private enquiry agent Clint Hardy was investigating. I rang Stevenson immediately.
‘It wasn’t me,’ I said. ‘I wouldn’t get my own name wrong.’
‘I believe you. It’s most unfortunate. Perhaps my wife, perhaps one of my daughters… I don’t know. They gossip. Have you made any progress?’
‘Some.’
‘Well, our arrangement holds.’
‘You haven’t been approached with an offer?’
‘Offer?’
‘To buy back the pearl. Understand?’
He said, ‘No,’ quite sharply, but whether he knew I was getting at him was hard to tell.
Later that day, Quentin James faxed me a list of three possible burglars.
I rang him. ‘Sandy Foreman’s in jail,’ I said.
‘You’re well informed.’
This was just part of the fencing that goes on in this business. James would have known that Foreman wasn’t a candidate and put the name in to pad the list and check that I was on the ball. I was left with two names-Jim ‘the fly’ Petersen and Kevin Barnes. James gave me last-known addresses for both.
‘Something’s troubling me about this business of ours,’ James said.
I liked the ‘ours’; James has a way of inserting himself into things. ‘And what’s that, Quentin?’
‘Can’t quite put my finger on it. When the penny drops, I’ll let you know.’
That could mean almost anything or nothing at all. I had to hope it didn’t mean that James was dealing a hand of his own. These days, he was too fat and lazy to take the trouble, but he had a reputation for playing both ends against the middle and you never knew.
Kevin Barnes was nearest to home. He lived in a rent-controlled flat in Darlinghurst, one of the few remaining. Barnes’ family had been in crime for three or four generations, stretching back to the days of the razor gangs and before that to ‘the pushes’ of the inner city. James’ fax included brief notes on the subjects. Barnes had served a number of terms for burglary and break and enter, having graduated from shoplifting. He was also an arsonist when the price was right and was not above a little standover work. Bit of an all-rounder, Kevin.
I climbed a creaking iron staircase that was insecurely attached to the building in Riley Street and knocked on the door of the flat. Most of the space on the tiny landing near the door was occupied by cartons containing empty beer cans. Naturally, cats had pissed on the boxes.
The woman who answered the door had a pair of the most tired eyes I’d ever seen. She had dyed blonde hair, a lot of make-up and wore a halter top, bikini pants and white spike-heeled shoes. Her hair, clothes and body put her in her forties; her eyes made her a hundred and ten.
‘You Clive?’
‘No.’ I got my foot in the door before she could close it. ‘I’m looking for Kevin Barnes.’
‘At the pub.’ She put her heel on my instep and pressed down a little. I pulled the foot back and she slammed the door.
She meant the nearest pub and that was the Seven Bells, a block away. It was an old-style Sydney pub: dark and smelly with faded advertisements showing people wearing clothes that had gone out of date about the time I was born, and drinking from glasses of a shape I could barely remember. There were four men drinking in the bar-one pair and two singles. I ordered a middy, paid the correct money, and put a five dollar note on the bar. ‘Kevin Barnes?’
The barman palmed the note and inclined his head at one of the single drinkers. Not a word spoken. I carried my drink across to where he sat on a stool. ‘Mr Barnes?’
He looked at me, raised his glass and took a drink, then picked up his cigarette from the ashtray and had a drag. There was one cigarette left in the open packet. Both hands shook and I could tell that Kev’s burglary and standover days were past. He was big but the flesh was sagging on his bones as if something was sapping him from inside. The ashtray was full of butts and his bleary eyes and slack mouth told me the middy he was drinking was more like his tenth than his first. His woman was on the game and cats were pissing on his doorstep.
‘I’m Barnes,’ he slurred. ‘An’ I wish I wasn’t. Cop?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘Sorry to trouble you.’
I moved away and finished my drink. I put ten dollars on the bar and the barman stood ready to pounce. ‘His next packet of smokes is on me,’ I said.
It took me three days to track down Jim Petersen because he was in funds, and when Petersen was in funds he went to racecourses. I caught up with him at Rosehill. ‘Jockey-sized’ was how James’ notes described him, and others had told me about his dressing-New York gangster style, pork pie hat, dark shirt, light tie. I watched him place a large bet and then stroll to the ring to take a look at the horses parade. It was an unimportant race at an unimportant meeting and not many people were about. When I joined him at the railed fence there was no one else within ten metres. I stood slightly to his left, partly blocking anyone’s view, and bent his right arm halfway up his back while clamping his left hand on the rail with my left.
‘Gidday, Jim,’ I said.
‘What the hell’re you doing?’
‘Engaging you in conversation.’
‘Piss off.’
‘Jim, if you don’t cooperate, I’m going to break your right arm, dislocate your right shoulder and break your left wrist all in two seconds flat.’