Free Blood and Circuses by Kerry Greenwood

glanced sideways and realised that Reffo had left him, without even waiting for his pound. He looked through the window and sighted the blond man standing on the corner of Johnson Street, waiting for the traffic to clear.
    ‘Bloody well gimme me red biddy!’ shrieked Lizard Elsie, pleased with the smash. ‘Or I’ll get another chair!’
    At that moment, when all eyes but Tommy’s were on the brawl, a car slid around the corner of Johnson Street. There was a shot, perhaps two shots. Tommy Harris found himself running. He came out of the pub and dropped to his knees to cradle Reffo in his arms, whose life spurted out of a dreadful hole that had been blasted in his chest and onto the unforgiving bitumen of Brunswick Street.
    ‘They got me,’ commented Reffo. He said something in his own language. Then he gasped, ‘Exit,’ and died.
    His was the first death that Tommy Harris had seen. He knelt in a spreading pool of cooling blood, holding the dead man close and reminding himself sharply that constables do not cry.
    The occasion was also notable for the fact that, for the first time in living memory, Lizard Elsie had slipped away from a fight without insisting on her bottle of ruby port.
    Detective Inspector Robinson invited his visitors to be seated. Grossmith steered Tommy Harris into a chair beside his own. He was worried about the boy—one of his most promising constables. First he had nearly fallen off a roof and been rescued by a female murderer. The next day he had watched Reffo die. It might have been too much for the young man. He was a country lad, after all, came from Hamilton. He wasn’t a kid who had lived in the streets like some. Grossmith himself had found his first corpse when he was ten, an old drunk who had died in a lane in Fitzroy. But Harris was shaking and his face had blanched so that his freckles stood out like ink-blots. Grossmith did not like the look of him.
    Neither did his superior officer. Robinson said very gently, ‘Tell me what happened, Constable. What did Reffo say?’
    ‘ “They got me,” sir, he said. “They got me,” and then he said something in Balkan. I didn’t understand it. Then he said, “Exit” and then he died.’
    ‘Both barrels of a shotgun at close range,’ said Grossmith. ‘It don’t do you no good. Blasted out most of his guts.’
    Tommy Harris made a sound like a sob and then shut his mouth hard. Robinson pressed a buzzer. His sergeant looked in.
    ‘Get us some tea, will you? Lots of sweet tea.’ The sergeant looked at Constable Harris, pursed his lips and nodded. Robinson said to Grossmith, ‘What can you tell me about Reffo?’
    ‘Real name Georgi Maria Garinic, thirty-five years old, native of Rumania. Came to Aussie after the War, naturalised, took his oath and all. Been living in ’Roy, making a crust as a carter and driver. Big, strong, blond bloke. Known associate of the Brunswick Street Boys, that’s Jack Black Blake’s mob, the Brunnies. Not nice citizens. You remember Blake. Record as long as me arm. He hangs around with the Judge, Little Georgie who’s as mad as a cut snake, Billy the Dog, and Snake Eyes. Not nice citizens. Feuding with the ’Roy Boys at the moment. Crims. Petty stuff, mostly. Receiving stolen goods and the odd burglary. I’m sure as eggs that both the Brunnies and the ’Roys are standover merchants but I can’t get no one to complain about them. You know what it’s like. They’re all terrified that if they stand up in court they’ll get a petrol bomb through their front window. I reckon the Brunnies had something to do with the butcher’s shop fire but I can’t prove it. Lately we been thinking that they had something big on. That’s why I sent Harris down to the Provincial. Reffo ain’t what you could call truthful but them Brunnies hate the ’Roys. I thought we might pick up a useful word or two.’
    ‘Perhaps we did. Ah, thanks, Sergeant. Here you are, Harris.’ Robinson spooned sugar into the solid