‘When’s the last time you saw him?’
Hill looked at the woman. ‘Week ago?’
She nodded. ‘Week and a day.’
‘Why’d he leave?’
‘He had a fight with Sport and Con,’ Ro Bush sighed. ‘And me and Vance for that matter.’
‘What sort of fight?’
‘Artistic,’ she said. ‘Tim didn’t want strings and choir, he wanted a smaller, rougher sound.’
‘Won’t do,’ Hill snapped. He was about my age or a bit younger but his energy seemed to have run out. He wasn’t fat, but tired and slumped he looked it. His skin was greyish and his eyes had an unhealthy, fishy look. ‘This is for a movie, a big movie; it opens with wide shots, we’ve gotta have the treatment on the song.’
Ro Bush shrugged the way you do when you’ve heard something twenty times before. ‘Tim argues the opposite-big visuals, small sound.’
I grinned at her. ‘Who’s right?’
‘Tim,’ she said.
Hill groaned. ‘The money’s right, like always, and the money says give it the treatment. Christ!’
‘That’s it,’ she said. ‘Back and forth for a few hours, then Tim storms off-this is around dawn you understand-and that’s the last anyone’s seen of him.’
I scribbled. ‘This is Tuesday, a.m.? Right?’
Hill nodded.
‘How much booze?’
‘In who?’
‘In everyone.’
‘Lots,’ Ro Bush said. ‘There always is, they were all drunk except me. I get sick if I drink very much.’
‘Drugs?’
Hill shrugged. ‘Sometimes, not that night I don’t think.’
‘Talbot uses drugs?’
‘They all do,’ she said. ‘Tim’s no different.’
‘Terrific. Okay, well I’ll need the names and addresses of all the disputants, picture of Talbot, some ideas about his friends, how he spends his time and so on. Who can give me that?’
‘I can.’ She got up and went behind the glass. I thought there was something shifty about the look Hill was giving me and there was no point in just noting the fact in my notebook.
‘This doesn’t quite hang together, Mr Hill. The police could look for him, or his Mum or someone. What do you know that I don’t know?’
Hill made a face like a man having wind trouble. ‘You said it before-Talbot’s heavily into drugs. He’s supposed to be clean at the moment but this could’ve set him off. If the cops find him they could have something on him-he’s no good to me in Long Bay.’
I grunted. ‘Exactly who is who around here?’
‘I’m the boss of the record company, independent outfit-Centre Records. I’m the executive producer on this movie theme. Ro’s the manager of the studio here, smart girl.’
I’d been around long enough to ask the right question. ‘ Executive producer, who’s the actual producer?’
Hill looked even more uncomfortable. ‘Not settled,’ he said. He handed me a card and a plain door key. ‘Can I assume you’ll do it?’
‘I’ll take a look, sure. A hundred and twenty-five a day and expenses.’
‘My number’s on the card. That’s a key to Tim’s place.’ He took a deep breath and tried to straighten his shoulders. He went back towards the studio and the shoulders had slumped again after the first step.
‘Here you are, Mr Hardy.’ Ro Bush handed me a typed sheet and a magazine clipping. The photo showed three men lounging against a big convertible which was full of musical instruments. The car had STEAM CLEANING stencilled on the side. One of the short fingernails touched the faces. ‘That’s Sport Gordon, that’s Jerry Leakey, don’t know what happened to him. Here’s Tim.’
Talbot looked ill at ease in the company of the others; he was hanging on to the neck of a guitar sticking out of the car like a boy holding his mother’s hand. He was thin and young with a lot of hair; the thinnest part of him was his nose which was long and looked to be scarcely wider than my little finger. A crease ran across Jerry’s face which was perhaps symptomatic, but Sport Gordon presented full face and full force. He was muscular in a singlet and tight jeans, looking like young building workers do before the beer gets to them.
‘Steam Cleaning were pretty big a year or so ago. Sport did the vocal for the theme song by the way.’
Ro Bush smelled of something good and as she didn’t come much above my shoulder it was easy to sniff without being impolite.
‘Hill said that Talbot wasn’t a performer.’
‘He’s not, not really. Steam Cleaning were more of a studio band. They did some gigs, a few big ones too, but Tim played with his back to the audience most of the time.’
‘I’ve never heard of them,’ I said. ‘But that doesn’t mean much, the last live band I saw was the Rolling Stones.’
It wasn’t the way to her heart. ‘We call them the M’n M’s around here.’
‘What’s that mean?’
‘You know-the little sweets, like smarties.’
I shook my head.
‘Also the multi-millionaires. See?’
‘I suppose so. What happened to… Steam Cleaning?’
She shrugged. ‘They broke up. Nothing unusual-problems between Sport and Tim. They were the writers.’
I couldn’t resist it. ‘Like Lennon and McCartney? Jagger and Richard?’
‘Mm, I don’t think they’d be flattered by the comparison.’
‘How come Sport’s singing now, then?’
‘Oh, that’s not strange. Tim’s the writer and the producer, and he picks the vocalist. Sport’s got a great voice.’
I stored away the difference between Hill and Bush on the producer question and looked at the sheet. There were half a dozen names and addresses including Sport Gordon and Ro Bush. She studied me as I studied the list.
‘I consider myself a friend,’ she said.
‘We all need them. Thanks Miss Bush.’
‘Ro.’
‘Okay.’ I tapped the paper. ‘Music and cars?’
She nodded. ‘Tim builds them, modifies them, drives like he plays-excellently.’
‘How much looking has anyone done?’
‘Not much. Vance called in at his flat. Nothing there. I rang Sport and Ian-they’re on the list. They hadn’t seen him. His family’s interstate, Brisbane I think.’
‘You’re the only woman on the list.’ I looked at her enquiringly.
She shook her head. ‘No to what you’re thinking. He’s shy.’
‘I really need to know the economics and politics of this. This record’s important to who?’
‘Everyone: Vance needs a hit to get his label moving; Tim and the other session musos all need the money; Sport’s doing all right solo but he could use a hit single; the movie needs its theme.’
‘What about you?’
‘We get paid for the studio time. Doesn’t hurt to have nurtured a hit but there’s nothing riding on it for me, really. I’m worried about Tim, though.’
‘You sound like the only one who is. Hill’s worried about his hit and Con’s worried about his blaps.’ I looked at the paper again. ‘Con’s not on it.’
‘Con’s a creep and he’s out of his depth. I’m sorry, I have to get back to work. There’s more than one bloody record being made here although you wouldn’t know it sometimes.’
I took a card from her too and went out onto the street. It was 11 p.m. an unusual time to start on an investigation but Hill had told me when he’d phoned in the afternoon that the musicians didn’t start work until night fell and kept at it until dawn. He’d wanted me to get the feel and I suppose I had: booze, drugs, temperamental outbursts and blaps all being recorded on thirty-two tracks. I couldn’t help thinking of post-1970 pop music as a sick combination of adolescence and money; I didn’t feel comfortable with the matter but then, I’d once found a missing Jamaican marriage celebrant who’d specialised in Rastafarian weddings and I hadn’t felt comfortable with him either.
Talbot’s address was in Glebe, handy to home. I drove down towards the water and took the last turn to the right. The street was dog-legged, with big buildings on either side. Talbot’s flat turned out to be a bed-sitter in the back of a house that had no water view. I picked my way down the dark corridors where one light in three worked. The key turned easily in the lock and I stepped into a room of stale smells.