‘I have to drive you, come with you. He doesn’t want the squad car outside his place. And so, since you’re trying to do something about a major injustice, I’m willing to do that.’
He looked at the dogs in the yard and he thought about her mouth, the kisses. Kisses from nowhere. Separated by twenty years.
CASHIN AND Helen sat at a kitchen table in what had been the garage of a house. Now it was like a small pub with a bar and a full-size snooker table and an assortment of chairs. A television set was mounted on a side wall.
Chris Pascoe brought a six-pack of beer from behind the bar and put it on the table. He sat down, took one and popped it. ‘Help yourself,’ he said. ‘So what’s this about?’
‘The watch Corey had,’ said Cashin.
‘Suse told you.’
‘I’m keen to know how he got it.’
‘Thinkin of chargin him with theft? Well, he’s had the fuckin death penalty. Slipped your mind?’
‘No. What we want is to find out who bashed Bourgoyne. It wasn’t the boys, I’m pretty sure about that.’
‘Since when?’
‘Since I decided to believe Susie about when she saw the watch.’
Pascoe drank, wiped his lips, found a cigarette. ‘Yeah, well, Suse don’t know where he got it, his mum don’t know.’
‘His mates might know though.’
‘Mates mostly dead.’
Helen coughed. ‘Chris, I said on the phone, I’m here because of Donny. I want his name cleared, the names of all the boys. And the Daunt. The Daunt shouldn’t have to wear this.’
Pascoe laughed, a smoker’s ragged laugh-cough. ‘Don’t worry about the Daunt. Wearin the blame’s nothin new for the Daunt. Anyway, how’s it help to find where he got the watch? Bloody thing must’ve been pinched some time.’
‘If it turns out Corey pinched it, that’s it,’ said Cashin. ‘We’ll just leave it there, call it quits.’
‘I hear Hopgood doesn’t like you,’ said Pascoe.
‘How would you hear that?’
Pascoe shrugged, smoked, little smile. ‘Walls got ears, mate. You’d be sleepin under the bed these days, right?’
The side door opened violently, banged the wall. The other man from the pier, the gaunt-faced man with dreadlocks. Cashin thought he looked bigger indoors.
‘So what’s the fuckin party?’ he said.
Pascoe held up a hand. ‘Havin a talk, Stevo.’
‘Talk? Beer with the cops? Things fuckin changin around here, mate. Havin the fuckin trivia nights with the cops next.’
‘Gettin the Corey watch stuff sorted,’ said Pascoe. ‘That’s all.’
‘Yeah, well,’ said Stevo. ‘It’s sorted. Who’s the lady?’
‘The lawyer,’ said Pascoe. ‘Donny’s lawyer.’
Stevo stepped across, stood behind Pascoe, reached over and picked up the six-pack, ripped out a can, looking at Cashin, at Helen, back at Cashin, blood in his eyes. ‘Not drinkin?’ he said. ‘Don’t drink with boongs?’
Pub fight shit, thought Cashin, no answer would defuse it. He looked at Pascoe. ‘Listen, if your mate here’s in charge, I’m gone.’
‘So piss off,’ said Stevo.
Pascoe didn’t look around. ‘Settle down, Stevo,’ he said, a briskness to his tone.
‘Settle down? Don’t you fuckin tell me to settle down, where the fuck you…’
Pascoe shoved his chair back, took Stevo by surprise, knocked him off balance. He was upright in one quick movement and walking Stevo backwards, barrel chest bumping, three steps, pinned him against the bar. In his face, their chins touching, Pascoe said something to Stevo, Cashin couldn’t catch it.
Stevo raised his hands. Pascoe stepped back, gestured. Stevo went behind the bar, leaned on it, didn’t look at them. Pascoe went back to his chair, drank some beer.
‘What I’ll say is this,’ he said as if nothing had happened. ‘What I’ll say is Corey coulda got the watch in a trade like, y’know.’
‘For what?’ said Cashin.
‘Jeez, how’d I know? What do you reckon?’
‘So who’d be on the other side?’
‘Big ask, mate.’
‘That’s useful. Got any other stuff you’d like to tell me? Other people don’t like me? How about Steggles? Wall ears hear anything about Steggie?’
‘Dead man walkin. The fuckin prick.’
‘Do it myself,’ said Stevo, slurring. ‘Fuckin tonight. Blow the cunt away.’
‘Shut up, Stevo,’ said Pascoe. ‘Just fuckin shut up.’
Cashin took a can, ripped the top. He glanced at Helen. She had the air of someone watching a blood sport, lips parted, smears of colour on her cheekbones.
‘Listen,’ said Cashin. ‘You want something, tell me quick, I’m thinking about food now. I eat around this time of the day, the night.’
‘Corey done some stupid stuff, will of his own,’ said Pascoe. ‘Couldn’t tell him a fuckin thing, just go his own way.’
Cashin said, ‘This’s dope you’re talkin about?’
Pascoe waved a big hand. ‘People grow a bit of weed, make a few bucks. No work around here.’
‘So what did he do?’
‘Well, y’know, there’s ways of doin business. I’m not talkin fuckin truckloads, you understand, just beer money. Anyway, I hear Corey did these private deals, him and Luke, he’s another kid wouldn’t listen, bugger all respect.’
Pascoe offered the cigarettes. Cashin took one, the lighter, lit up, blew smoke at the roof, his instinct told him to make the leap. ‘Piggots,’ he said. ‘This is Piggots?’
Pascoe looked at Helen, looked at Cashin. ‘Not all asleep in Port, are you? Yeah, Piggots. They got ambitions, the fuckin Piggots, such dickheads but they reckon they’re headin for the big time, they’re gonna be players.’
‘Fuckin Piggots,’ said Stevo. He had a Jim Beam bottle in his hand now. ‘Blow the cunts away. White fuckin maggots.’
‘Stevo,’ said Pascoe. ‘Shut the fuck up. Watch TV. Find the fuckin cartoons.’
Helen said, ‘Chris, correct me, you’re saying Corey traded for the watch with the Piggots?’
‘That’s, that’s possible, yeah.’
‘Tell me how the Piggots got the watch,’ said Helen.
Pascoe was looking at Cashin. ‘Can you imagine?’ he said. ‘These Pigs got the idea this shit’s easier than poachin abalone. Don’t even want to grow it themselves, don’t want to move it. All reward and no risk.’
‘That’s very ambitious,’ said Cashin.
‘My fuckin oath. And I hear they got someone to do a cook for em, too. This bloke, he’s like a travellin speed cook.’
‘Is that right?’
‘Shouldn’t be allowed, should it?’
‘No.’
Pascoe leaned forward, put his face as close to Cashin’s as he could. ‘Can’t expect fuckin Hopgood and the local boys to do anythin, can you? Be unreasonable since Hoppy’s got a share in the horse. Whole leg, I hear.’
‘Something’ll have to be done about that,’ said Cashin.
‘Fuckin right.’ He sat back. ‘Hearin me.’
Cashin nodded. ‘Hearing you.’
Helen coughed. ‘About how the Piggots got the watch,’ she said. ‘Can we get on to that?’
Cashin thought that he knew the answer, delivered to him by some process in the brain that endlessly sifted, sorted and shuffled things heard and read, seen and felt, bits and pieces with no obvious use, just clutter, litter, until the moment when two of them touched, spun and found each other, fitted like hands locking.
‘Ray Piggot,’ he said.
‘You’re so fuckin quick,’ said Pascoe. ‘Yeah, the bumboy. That’s what I hear.’
The complaint against Ray Piggot. Hopgood and Steggles at the station, Ray in the car outside. Ray who looked all of fourteen.
‘Ray Piggot stole the watch from Bourgoyne?’ said Helen, uncertainly.
‘Well, wouldn’t have been a present.’
‘I don’t understand what’s going on here,’ said Helen. ‘Who’s Ray Piggot? Am I just…’