A Different Turf. Jon Cleary

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СКАЧАТЬ to Woollahra. We’re going to interview the two gays who were bashed in the first killing.’

      2

      Woollahra lies between the self-conscious trendiness of Paddington and the sun-bleached brashness of Bondi and hints it would rather not know either. Its streets are tree-lined and its buildings vary from Victorian mansions to the occasional expensive but unattractive blocks of, not flats for God’s sake, but apartments. Consulates occupy some of the side streets, foreign flags fluttering from masts like travel banners; some masts are bare, consulates of empires and countries no longer whole. The main street, Queen Street, is a collection of antique shops, small galleries, one or two restaurants and everyday-living shops where even the delicatessen aspires to be chic. Whether it is the consulates, the Goethe Institute on the main cross-street, Ocean Street, or the sense of privacy in the side streets, there is a suggestion that the small suburb could be European, a section of Paris or Vienna. The inhabitants are overcome with delight if one makes the suggestion.

      Walter Needle lived in a three-storied Victorian house in a side street. A wide garden fronted it, a garden as manicured as a display centre. Needle was an architect, a boutique practitioner who had won several awards for his designs for houses and small buildings. Malone had no idea what sort of houses he designed, but this pale-rose Victorian mini-mansion hinted he might go in for heavy opulence. Malone, having learned that Needle worked at home, had phoned ahead before leaving Homicide.

      Needle himself was in his early sixties, heavy if not opulent, grey-haired and florid-faced; he looked as if he might have played rugby or lacrosse in his youth, some blood sport. On the other hand his partner, Will Stratton, was pale and bloodless, someone who might have played croquet or crocheted; his handsomeness was almost too delicate. Needle introduced him as ‘my partner’ and Malone was at first unsure whether he was his associate in business or marriage.

      ‘Come in, come in!’ Needle swept them into the house, led them through a wide hallway papered in red silk and into a large sitting room that looked out on a high-walled garden as equally manicured as the front plot. Huge ornamental pots held glowing flowers that appeared to have been ordered not to sprawl or festoon. At the far end of the garden three manicured small cypresses stood at attention; in one corner of the high walls a Japanese maple had been allowed to droop, but not obsequiously. Crumbs, thought Malone, I wonder if the wind is allowed to blow around here?

      ‘Will keeps everything just so,’ said Needle and Malone knew then what sort of partner Stratton was. ‘So you’re dragging up all that horrible business last February? God, we’d hoped it was all forgotten.’

      Needle was too bulky and heavy, even a little old, to flutter, yet he gave that impression. He had motioned for Malone and Kagal to sit down, but he moved around the room like a restless bull. Stratton sat in a chair opposite the detectives, cool and poised. He was dressed in a black long-sleeved polo shirt, black slacks and showed six inches of yellow silk sock above black loafers as he crossed one leg over the other. He did not clash with the room, which had one black wall and two yellow walls and the huge window that looked out on to the garden. The colour scheme of the furniture, all of it elegant, almost too delicate to be sat on, certainly not to be lounged on (Malone was glad he had not brought Clements), was black and yellow.

      Needle must have pressed a bell somewhere, because a Filipino houseboy appeared with a tray holding coffee and biscuits. Needle continued talking, ‘We’ve done our best to put it all behind us. They almost killed Will, you know, what they did to him. He was beautiful—’

      ‘Still am,’ said Stratton. ‘Inside.’

      Malone had now had time to study the younger man. He was slim to the point of being almost girlish; and yes, he might have been beautiful once. His face now was a pale mask; if one looked closely, one could see the faint scars. He had not smiled either at meeting the detectives or since they had come into this room; his face, it seemed, was set in the one grave expression. His dark blue eyes and his sleek dark hair accentuated his paleness.

      ‘The doctors had to re-build his face,’ said Needle, still moving around the room. ‘I could have killed – well, I shouldn’t say that to you, should I?’ He had a wide smile. ‘But why come back now?’

      Malone explained about the three murders since last February’s. ‘It’s a consortium, they call themselves. We suspect they are gay—’

      ‘What makes you say that?’ said Stratton.

      ‘Righto, maybe they’re not. But for the time being we’re focussing on the gay community – they may have talked to someone, let slip who they are and why they’re committing these murders.’

      ‘It’s pretty obvious why they’re committing them, isn’t it?’

      This pretty boy is going to be difficult. ‘Yes, it is, Mr Stratton.’

      ‘If we had heard anything of these – these murderers, don’t you think we’d have been in touch with the police?’ Stratton had not taken coffee or biscuits, just sat without moving, one leg still crossed over the other.

      ‘Perhaps,’ said Kagal. ‘But perhaps you felt that justice had already been done. I mean, for what happened to you. Were you bashed too, Mr Needle?’

      Needle sat down at last, a buffalo in a Regency chair. ‘A little, nothing like Will was. I managed to hold them off for a few moments – I used to play rugby when I was young, thirty, forty years ago. It was like being in a ruck – you know, fists and boots. Then the – the killer appeared, fired his gun and it was like the referee blowing his whistle to stop the mayhem. Everything stopped for a moment, then the – the killer took off. One of the bashers made a grab at him and that was when he lost his wig. And—’ He stopped. ‘God, I’d forgotten all about them. Where’s my cream linen jacket, Will?’

      ‘In your closet—’ Stratton looked at Kagal and suddenly smiled; or rather his face seemed to crack. ‘It took Walter a long time to come out of it’

      ‘All right, all right,’ said Needle. ‘Look for it, will you? There should be some glasses in one of the pockets.’

      Stratton rose leisurely, taking his time, and went out of the room. Needle looked after him. ‘He hasn’t been the same since – since the bashing. He’s developed a real hatred of the world.’

      ‘It’s understandable,’ said Malone. ‘Certain sections of it, anyway. You have your offices upstairs?’

      ‘No, I have a suite of offices in town – that’s where my staff work. But since what happened to Will, I’ve worked at home – to be with him. He is all I have,’ he said and all at once looked old and sad.

      Malone and Kagal remained silent Malone glanced at the younger man, but Kagal’s face showed nothing. Was he feeling pity for Needle, was he seeing himself like this years down the track? But, of course, Malone reminded himself, Kagal’s loved one could be a woman.

      Stratton came back into the room; he moved with the grace of a dancer and Malone wondered if that was what he had been. He handed a pair of horn-rimmed glasses to Needle, sank gracefully into his chair again and crossed his legs. There was an indifference to him, an attitude that he was outside the discussion, that he had built up a screen between himself and what had happened to him last February.

      Needle passed the glasses to Malone. ‘You see? I think they’re fakes, stage glasses. That’s clear glass, not prescription lenses.’

      Malone squinted through the glasses. ‘Did СКАЧАТЬ