Wet Graves by Peter Corris Page A

to him?”
    â€œI don’t know. I’ll have to keep digging—try his colleagues, try to get at his bank accounts.”
    â€œThat’s … ugly.”
    The rich tend to think that their money is beautiful, but that it’s ugly for others to look too closely at it. I decided that there was something a bit hard about Mrs Burton. Perhaps I let that show. In any case, the rapport between us dissolved. I told her that I’d let her know if I found anything useful. She nodded and put her cigarettes away. We could have been discussing a stolen car. She forced a smile and walked away, her firm, disciplined body steady on her high heels. I didn’t think Louise Madden would like her much. I didn’t myself, but Brian Madden had and that was what mattered. My trip to the north shore hadn’t worked out so well—I’d turned over some of the physical and personal residues of Brian Madden’s life, but I didn’t feel that I knew the man at all.
    I’d made some notes while I was in Madden’s flat—I had the name of a travel agency he’d used when he’d taken a trip to New Caledonia a few years back, also the name of a Queensland resort he’d stayed at for a week during his summer vacation. The registration number of the Laser was in my pocket along with the names of a solicitor, a doctor and the high roller, Henry Bush. Threads to pull, and I pulled them through the rest of the afternoon. I called at the travel agency and phoned the resort and got what I expected—nothing. Brian Madden had done just the one bit of business with them. From the secretaries to the doctor and solicitor I got appointments. In return for a modest financial consideration, I extracted a promise from a contact in the Department of Motor Transport to make available all recent information on the Laser.
    When I rang Henry Bush’s number I got his answering machine: “Hi there! This is Henry Bush. Sorry I can’t talk to you right now, but I will pronto if you’ll leave your name and number after the yodel.” A high, trembling Swiss yodel tickled my eardrums. I was so surprised I hung up without leaving a message. That must happen to a lot of people , I thought, maybe that’s why he does it . Anyway, he didn’t sound like the kind of man to commit murder for ten bucks.
    All this took me through to six o’clock and left me in the Crown Hotel in Norton Street, Leichhardt, where you can get a glass of red or white wine for a dollar and the use of a public phone in the bar. I bought my first drink of the day at 6.01 and moved away from the phone. I felt I’d put in a reasonable sort of a day on the Brian Madden case and could now turn my attention to Rhino Jackson. The Crown is right across the straight from one of the gambling places Jackson was reputed to protect. And if he wasn’t there, I had a good chance of finding someone who knew where he was. But I was fairly confident of finding him; Jackson was a gambler as well as a protection-provider, and gamblers are addicted to the atmosphere of gambling. No other kind of air can sustain their life.
    As I drank the glass of one-dollar red I reflected that everything I knew about Jackson would be known to the police. But in looking for a missing witness you’re not necessarily in competition with the police—it depends how hard they want to find him, or her. Sometimes they want to very badly and then it’s the SWOS force and the sledgehammers on the doors at dawn; sometimes they don’t and all that happens is that a few questions get asked and a few forms get filled in. Until I learned more from Parker and Sackville, I had no way of knowing how hard the police were trying. With me it’s different—I’m always trying hard, usually for the money and in this case for my skin.
    I thought about another glass of wine but settled for a light beer and then went across the street to the Bar