Free Crooked by Camilla Nelson Page B

for Reilly. And Reilly looked after him. He knew Ducky was loyal.’
    â€˜What else?’ Gus tried to probe further. But it wasn’t any use. Twiggy backed away.
    â€˜I reckon that’s too much already.’
    Gus turned to go. ‘Make me a promise. Get off the gear and do something useful.’
    â€˜And what would that be?’
    â€˜I dunno,’ Gus shrugged. He got into the unmarked and wound down the window. ‘Need a lift somewhere?’ He nudged the car forward.
    â€˜In that old rattletrap?’
    Gus laughed, then put his foot to the floor and flew up the rise. He reached Kings Cross during the worst hours of traffic congestion. Sailors waving beer bottles caroused in the gutter, and a man in a striped butcher’s apron, with a large orange fish on his head, wandered aimlessly through the cars. Further along, under the glittering puffball of the El Alamein Fountain, a young couple were spooning and an old geezer sang out his encouragement, beating the rhythm on a bottle of metho in a brown paper bag.
    Gus parked the unmarked and pounded the pavement. Hewent over the case in his mind and gradually things took on a whole new complexion. If O’Connor was coming from the Kellett Club on the night he got shot … well, there was something odd about it, something that could stand further scrutiny. Gus passed a well kept terrace with a fragrant frangipani in the front garden, and a dilapidated flat building with red stuccoed window boxes a-riot with angry geraniums. He passed a tumbledown mansion cut into squats, with wet laundry looped about the spiked iron railings and a flower garden blossoming with urine-stained mattresses and unloved appliances.
    Then he saw it. The missing blue Holden sprouting four tail fins and a week’s worth of parking tickets. ‘Jee-suss,’ he swore.
    Gus stared at the battered blue vehicle for a very long time. The bonnet was up and the carburettor was gone. The rear tyres and four hub caps were missing. Breathless, he scrambled to his feet and strode up the block, not pausing for breath until he was standing on the footpath outside the Kellett Club.
    Ernie Chubb, Reilly’s squinty-eyed gnome, was squatting on his haunches in front of the door. He was dressed in a pair of pink checked trousers, with his shirtsleeves rolled meaningfully above the elbows, showing the matching chrysanthemums tattooed on each arm. He blew out a large fan of smoke. ‘Hang about, mate. This is a private establishment.’
    â€˜No worries,’ said Gus, spreading his fingers. ‘I just want a word with Dick Reilly.’
    â€˜Yeah,’ said Chubb, dropping his fag into the gutter and standing up. ‘But it could be this Dick bloke doesn’t want a word with you.’
    â€˜How about you ask him?’
    Chubb put a hand on Gus’s chest, and gave him a shove. But Gus didn’t move. He hesitated, then said, ‘Tell him I’m an old mate of Harry Giles’s.’
    Chubb fell back. ‘Mate of Harry’s? Why didn’t you say so?’
    Chubb banged on the peephole and ducked through the door, returning a few minutes later to show Gus down a cruddy-looking hall to the back of the club. There was a door at the far end with a light underneath. Chubb pushed the door open, and Gus stepped inside.
    Reilly was cocked back on a mauve rondo couch in the corner, shirt-collar unbuttoned, tie yanked down, blue sock-feet propped on a straight chair in front. He looked up as Gus entered.
    â€˜So you must be Harry’s little mate?’
    â€˜Yeah, that’s right,’ said Gus, slowly.
    Reilly mused, ‘Quiet sort of bloke, Harry was. I disremembered him for a minute there, you know. But Harry’s done me a couple of turns, before it all came unstuck. Poor bastard.’ He let his socked feet plop gently to the floor and drew his thick eyebrows together. ‘Do you want a drink then?’
    â€˜Sure, why not?’