Bear Pit. Jon Cleary
in disappointment. ‘What’s he done? Are you going to tell me?’
‘How much do you know about him? How much has he told you about himself before he met you?’
She walked slowly, almost blindly, across to a backless bench under one of the trees, the seat where Fred had sat in his exclusion. She sat down and Malone sat beside her, straddling the bench. Inside the hall a game had been started, the children laughing like a mocking chorus while the cicada had been joined by what sounded like a hundred others.
‘He came from Melbourne, he said he’d been married before but it broke up after a couple of years. He has a mother down there, but I’ve never met her.’
‘Has he been a good – partner? A good husband?’
‘I’ve been married before. John is twice as good as the legal husband I had. I love him – does that answer your question? Now tell me what he’s done.’
She looked at him pleadingly, but he turned away as Gail came out of the hall. ‘Mr June is on his way. He’ll be five minutes –he’s coming from Lane Cove.’
‘What did you tell him?’
‘I said there was some trouble with one of the children.’ She looked at Mrs Masson’s angry frown. ‘I’m sorry –’
The frown now seemed to be permanent, like a scar. ‘For Christ’s sake, tell me what he’s done. You come here, upsetting everyone and everything –’
‘We haven’t done that, Mrs Masson,’ said Malone quietly. ‘We’ve upset you and I’m sorry about that. But no one else. Just let’s wait till Mr June gets here.’
They sat, while the laughter and screams came out of the hall and a magpie carolled in the jacaranda above them and a couple of mynahs chattered at it to get lost. The cicadas suddenly shut up and the other sounds seemed to increase. Then abruptly Mrs Masson stood up, looked at her watch, said, ‘It’s time for their morning snack,’ and walked, almost ran, into the hall.
‘It’s never easy, is it?’ said Gail.
‘What?’
‘Telling them what they don’t know. Don’t want to know.’
‘Never.’
Then two minutes later the van drew up in the street outside. A man got out and came hurrying into the yard. Malone and Gail crossed from the bench to stand in his way as he headed for the hall doorway. ‘Mr June?’
He pulled up sharply. ‘Yes. Are you the child’s parents? What’s happened?’
‘No, Mr June, we’re not.’ Malone produced his badge. ‘Can we have a word? Over here under the trees.’
June hesitated, then followed them. There was nothing threatening about him, though Malone had not been sure what to expect. He was medium height, running a little to fat, with a round pleasant face and thinning black hair that needed a cut. He was dressed in overalls that, with inserts showing, had been let out at the seams; a pair of gold-rimmed glasses hung on a string round his neck. His left hand had the top joint of the middle finger missing.
‘What’s the charge?’
‘None so far. We just thought you could help us with our enquiries.’
‘Shit, that old one!’
‘You’ve heard it before, Mr August?’
For a moment there was no expression at all, as if he were alone without thought. Then abruptly his face clouded, he rolled his lips over his teeth. ‘I gave that name away nine years ago –’
‘Why?’
‘I wanted to make a new start. I’ve done that –’
Then Mrs Masson came out again into the yard; hurrying, as if running away from the children. She rushed straight at August, grabbed his left hand, stood holding it as if he were another of her charges. ‘What’s it about, John? What do they want?’
‘They just want to ask me some questions. I –I saw something the other day – I didn’t tell you about it –’
‘What?’
He was a practised liar; he had been living a lie for nine years. ‘A couple fighting – they just want me to tell them what I saw –’
‘Someone’s dead? They said they were from Homicide—’ One could almost see her mind racing, she was defending – what? She looked at Malone. ‘Is someone dead?’
‘Yes. We’ll just take Mr – Mr June back to our office. He’ll be back here within an hour.’
‘Why can’t you ask him the questions here?’ She was still clinging to his hand. She’s a mother, Malone thought, but where are her own kids?
Then the children came spraying out of the hall, a yellow-smocked torrent. Justin, Jared; Jaidene, Alabama, Dakota, Wombat Rose: even Fred joined the circle round the adults. Twenty or thirty other children milled around. They all stared at the adults, innocent as cherubs but ears as wide as devils’. Wombat Rose looked up at Malone and winked at him with both eyes.
‘Come on, Mr June. We’ll have you back here in an hour.’
‘I’ll come with you, John –’
He took his hand from hers, put it against her cheek. ‘It’ll be all right, sweetheart. Don’t worry, I’ll be back, it’s okay.’
It was difficult to tell if he was trying to tell her something. Was there some secret between them? But she just looked at him blankly, shook her head as if to deny mat everything was okay.
Malone, Gail Lee and August/June went out of the yard, trailed by a dozen kids as far as the gate. Mrs Masson still stood under the jacaranda tree; the tiny splurge of yellow smocks leaked away from her, leaving her high and dry and alone. August looked back and waved with the hand that was his mark.
‘I’ll follow you,’ he said, moving towards his van.
‘No, lock it, John. We’ll get you back here.’
‘That’s a promise?’ For a moment something like a smile hovered around his small mouth.
‘No, John. Depends what you have to tell us.’
Gail drove the unmarked police car and Malone sat in the back with August. They had been travelling for ten minutes before August broke his silence. ‘Now we’re away from Lynne, tell me why you’ve picked me up.’
‘We’re questioning a list of clients from the Sewing Bee. Your name was on the list.’
He laughed. ‘The fat and the thin, a list of all those needing alterations? Come on–’ Then he sobered, looked quizzically at Malone. ‘This hasn’t got something to do with what happened to the Premier last night?’
‘What makes you think it has?’
He shook his head. ‘You don’t catch me like that. Yeah, I was at that place, the alterations centre, what’s it called? The Sewing Bee. I remember standing at the window, having a look at the place across George Street, Olympic Tower. What I’ve read, what was on radio this morning, Hans Vanderberg was standing at the front of the hotel when he was shot, right? He was shot from the Sewing Bee, that what you’re saying? So what am I supposed to know?’
He wasn’t belligerent, just curious. Malone had met other hitmen and they had all had a characteristic coldness, sometimes blatant, other times subdued. It was a job, with most of them part-time: you killed the target, collected your pay, went home.. One or two of them had been show-offs, mug lairs, but they did not last long; sooner or later someone hit them. August, if he was the hitman in the Vanderberg case, was out of character.
There was silence in the car again till they reached the Harbour Bridge, where they were held up by a long bank-up of traffic. August looked out at the mass of cars