Bleak Spring. Jon Cleary

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      The men outside had begun to disappear, going off on their enquiries. ‘I was looking in at a show the other night. Cops, on Channel Ten. The Yanks seem to have a bloody army of cops. And hardware! When their helicopters take off, it’s like that scene in Apocalypse Now, you remember? I sat there and I lost heart.’

      Clements dropped into a chair that threatened to break under his bulk. ‘Let me cheer you up. I’ve done a trace, through a mate of mine in a stockbroker’s office, on Shahriver Credit International. It’s as gen-u-ine as those Reeboks they sell you off the back of a truck.’

      ‘It’s not a bank?’

      ‘Oh, it’s a bank all right, properly registered here, with its headquarters in Abadan.’

      ‘Abadan? That wasn’t mentioned on the letterhead. Where’s that?’

      ‘In Iran, just over the border from Iraq. My contact tells me nobody worthwhile here in Sydney does any business with it.’

      ‘It sounds like the O’Brien Cossack Bank.’ He and Clements had worked on that case. ‘Or Nugan Hand.’

      ‘Worse. It’s nowhere near as big as that other one that’s in the news right now, the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, the BCCI – ’

      ‘I love the way these banks just roll off your tongue.’

      Clements went on as if he hadn’t been interrupted: ‘Shahriver is the same shonky set-up, I gather.’

      ‘Is it being investigated?’

      ‘Not yet, but it’s on the cards, according to my mate. They took forever to get into BCCI and that’s twenty times bigger than this outfit.’

      ‘Who deals with it if no one here in town does?’

      ‘That’s something we’ve got to track down.’

      ‘You come up with anything else?’

      ‘Yeah, I got in touch with the Commonwealth, out at Coogee. There was a withdrawal last week from that joint account – five thousand in cash.’

      Malone pondered that a moment, then: ‘Where does Shahriver hang out?’

      ‘Down in The Rocks.’

      ‘That’s not bank territory.’ He stood up, reached for his hat. ‘Let’s go down and see if they offer us anything. We might get a cheap pair of Reeboks.’

      The area known as The Rocks is a narrow strip crouched between Circular Quay, where the harbour ferries dock, and the hill that carries the southern approach to the Harbour Bridge. For the last half of the nineteenth century it held its own as one of the roughest, toughest enclaves in the world; its gangs, or ‘pushes’, with their eye-gouging, elbows to the jaw and knees in the kidneys had set the example for footballers of the future. For a brief while it was Sydney’s Chinatown; the smell of opium was only slightly less than that of the sewage that ran down the hill. A prostitute did not cost much more than a meal, except that, when the exercise was finished, her pimp stood over the client and, with a knife or a razor, extorted his own value-added tax. Nowadays The Rocks is a tourist area, the old shops dolled up, the warehouses turned into museums, the Chinese opium dens now Japanese sushi restaurants. The occasional prostitute can be seen propositioning male tourists, but she is tolerated by the police as reducing the country’s external debt. The Rocks is chicly historical, but at least it is where it was born and happened and has not been transplanted.

      Shahriver Credit International was housed in a restored colonial mansion in what was known as the High Rocks. Driving up through the Argyle Cut, the 80-foot-wide and 120-foot-deep cut hacked out by convicts using only picks and shovels, Malone said, ‘When they first moved me in from the suburbs, I was posted down here.’

      ‘You want to come back?’ said Clements. ‘You’d look good in uniform. A nice cap with silver braid on it instead of that bloody awful pork-pie you’re wearing.’

      ‘I’ll stay where I am. One thing about Homicide, the public isn’t always on your back.’

      Here in the High Rocks one caught a glimpse of what life, for the colonial middle class, had been like. They had built homes that reminded them of Home; from the rear windows of their houses they could look down on the ships bringing them their wealth, for most of those who had lived here on the ridge had been shipowners or importers. Devon House, headquarters of Shahriver Credit International, was the largest house in the street, an English Georgian residence given a colonnaded verandah across its front as a concession to the southern sun. A spiked railing fence separated it from the street; a discreet brass plate beside the big oak door was the only hint that business was conducted inside the mansion. It was not a bank that invited small-time depositors or offered chargefree cheque accounts.

      Malone and Clements, having taken the receptionist by surprise, were shown into the office of the managing director. The receptionist, a Chinese girl whose English was as affected and precise as that of a bad elocution teacher, said, ‘We have two police officers here, Mr Palady. They had no appointment.’

      ‘That’s all right, Kim.’

      Palady rose from behind his big desk. He was short and thin, black-haired and sallow-skinned, further monotoned in banker’s grey. It was impossible to tell his nationality; the roots of his family tree could have stretched from Constantinople to Cathay. He had a soft silky handshake and a voice to match. He would not have had a clue how to run a suburban bank branch, but one had the feeling he could rip off a million or two in added fees from even the smartest entrepreneur. Still, his smile was practised enough to make the two detectives feel not unwelcome, though Malone doubted they would be asked to stay to lunch in the boardroom.

      ‘Mr Palady, we’re investigating the murder of one of your depositors, Mr Will Rockne.’

      ‘The name doesn’t ring a bell, Inspector.’

      ‘He had five and a quarter million dollars deposited here. I don’t want to sound a smart-arse, Mr Palady, but how much do you have to have in your bank before a name rings a bell?’

      Palady smiled; he had been offended by the best, so a smart-arse Sydney cop could be suffered. ‘I am new here, Inspector, only a few weeks in your country. I still have to acquaint myself with all our depositors. At the moment, like all banks, we are concerned only with those clients going bankrupt or reneging on loans.’

      ‘You have your share of those?’ said Clements, making notes.

      ‘Not as many as other banks.’ He smiled again, smugly.

      ‘Where did you come from, Mr Palady?’ said Malone. ‘You said you’ve just arrived here.’

      ‘From Kuwait. I was there all through the Iraqi occupation. Our board thought I needed a rest cure.’

      ‘Where are your board?’

      ‘In Curaçao, the Netherlands Antilles.’

      ‘Your board’s in Curaçao,’ said Clements, ‘but your head office is in Abadan?’

      Palady seemed to look with new respect at Clements; up till now he had hardly glanced at the big man, as if treating him as Malone’s СКАЧАТЬ