Then I tinkered with the clamps for a good fifteen minutes, trying to ensure that I had enough pressure but didn't force out glue and starve the joints. 'Trust your hands,' Charlie used to say in the early days. 'If you're straining, it's too tight.' I didn't quite understand this: Charlie could tighten the nuts on the Sydney Harbour Bridge with his bare hands without taking any strain.

When I'd cleaned up, I went home. Reluctantly.

Sunday night. I cleaned the kitchen and the bathroom, fed the dishwasher, tried to read the Sunday Age, opened a bottle of wine, drank half a gla.s.s, stared at the contents of the fridge. Made a cheese and gherkin sandwich. Women come into your life and all the hard-earned self-sufficiency deserts you. Suddenly you're half a person again.

The phone rang. Long-distance beeps.

'Jack Irish?' Ronnie Bishop's friend Charles Lee in Perth.

I said I was sorry about Ronnie's death. I didn't have the heart to tell him I wasn't interested in Ronnie anymore.

'Jack,' he said. 'I should tell the police this now that Ronnie's dead. Remember I told you about the answering machine tape? How it was missing?'

'I remember.'

'Well, I found it. About half an hour ago. Under the drinks cupboard next to the phone. It must have slid under there when the burglar tipped out the phone table drawer. It's got the messages from Melbourne for Ronnie.'

'Have you listened to them again?'

'Yes. They're from different people. The first one left a name and phone number. Danny McKillop. Do you want the number?'

I said, 'No. I've got that number. What about the other one?'

'There's just a message. No name. It's a man.'

'What's the message.'

'I've written it down. He said, "Ronald, listen to me carefully. It's absolutely vital that you bring the evidence. You were stupid to take it and now you've been doubly stupid. I'll have to extricate you." Then he says something that sounds like "sculling's the one in trouble". And then he says, "Ring me when you get here."'

'Can you play that to me over the phone?' I said.

Charles hesitated. 'I can try. I'll put it on the stereo tape deck and hold the phone near the speakers. Hang on.'

I could hear him moving about the room. There were a few false tape starts, then he came back on and said, 'Here goes.'

There was an electronic whine, a pause, a throat-clearing. Then the rich voice of Father Rafael Gorman said, 'Ronald, listen to...'

When the message finished, Charles said, 'Did you get that?'

I said, 'Loud and clear.'

'Do you know who it is?'

'I think so. Well done, Charles.'

'I should tell the police, shouldn't I, Jack? It could be very important.'

I made a decision without a second's conscious thought. 'Charles,' I said, 'this is important but I want you to wait until I call you before you tell the police. It won't be more than forty-eight hours, I promise. Will you do that?'

He didn't hesitate. 'Yes. Yes, I will. Jack, there's something else.'

'Yes?'

I waited.

'This is probably quite meaningless.'

I waited.

'I certainly wasn't going to tell those men, but there was something the day Ronnie left for Melbourne.'

'What was that?' I said encouragingly.

'Well, I drove him into the city that morning. I had the day off. He said he had to get something out of his safe deposit box at the bank. I dropped him outside and waited, double parked. He was only about five minutes. Then we drove back to his place. His suitcase was already packed and he opened the zip compartment and he took something out of his jacket pocket and put it in.'

'Any idea what?'

'No. Something flat, that's all.'

'And you think that's what he'd got out of his safe deposit?'

'Yes. Well, I can't be sure. I felt bad about not telling you before.'

'I'm glad you have now. It could be useful. Keep it to yourself. Thanks, Charles. Ring me if you think of anything else. I'll get back to you as soon as I can.' Then a thought occurred to me. 'Maybe you can help with something else. Someone I don't know knows I was in Perth asking about Ronnie. Have you told anyone about me?'

Again, he didn't hesitate. 'No. It'll be that architect b.i.t.c.h next door. When you were in your car I looked around and I could see her shape against the venetian blind upstairs. She thinks you can't see her, but there's light behind her. I've seen her there before. Once when my friend from work came to keep me company while I was tidying up Ronnie's garden she had a good look. And then she came out and took the dog up the street and back. It was because she couldn't see his licence plate from the window, I'm sure.'

'Who would she tell?'

'Those men, I suppose. The ones I told you about.'

I said, 'Thanks again, Charles. I'll be in touch.'

In the kitchen, I poured a gla.s.s of wine. There was a little tingle in my body. I found a piece of paper for doodling and sat at the kitchen table.

Father Gorman had said, Scullin's the one in trouble. Trouble over what? Danny McKillop's attempt to get his case reopened? Not if Bruce was to be believed. Why then had Ronnie come to Melbourne if not in response to Danny's phone call? How would Scullin be involved? What was the evidence his old employer wanted him to bring? Evidence of what? Had Gorman steered Ronnie out to the doctor's establishment in the bush so that he could be murdered? Did this have any connection with Danny?

The phone rang again. Blinking, I looked at my watch: 11.15. It was Linda. Just when I'd stopped missing her for three minutes at a time.

'You alone?' she said.

'No,' I replied. 'I had three girls home delivered from Dial-a-Doll.'

'I've been burgled. The place is a shambles.'

I sat upright. 'What's gone?'

'My laptop. All my disks. Whole filing cabinet emptied. Not the television or the VCR or the stereo.' There was a pause. 'It's a bit scary.'

'Don't touch anything. Grab some clothes and come over here. We'll get the cops in tomorrow.'

'No,' she said. 'I'm okay. I've already rung the cops. If I don't stay here tonight I'll never come back.'

'I'll come over.'

'No. It's fine. I just wanted to tell you. Hear your voice, really. There's something else.'

'What?'

'Everything I've put into the computer system at work is gone. Wiped.'

'Accident?'

'I don't think so.'

'Don't you have some kind of security?'

'Yes. There's more.'

I waited.

'That creep in Sydney I told you about? The regional director?'

'Yes.'

'He's told my boss here that I'm to drop any story about Yarra Cove or anything to do with Charis Corporation.'

Suddenly the room felt cold. 'What did you say?'

'I said I'd think about it.'

'Sure you don't want to come over here?'

'Yes. I'll call you in the morning.'

'Call me any time. How did they get in?'

'Don't know. The front door was still locked.'

'Have you got a chain?'

'Yes. And two bolts.'

'Lock up tight after the cops leave. And don't let the cops in without showing you their ID. Get them to push it under the door or through the letterbox. Okay?'

'Right, O Masterful One.'

'I think you're back to normal.'

'Getting there. Talk to you tomorrow.'

'Early. Before you go to work. Goodnight.'

There was a moment's silence. Neither of us wanted to be the first to hang up.

'Well,' she said. 'Missed you.'

'Me too,' I said. 'Life's been lacking something.'

I put the bars on the front and back doors and looked down the lane for a while before I went to bed. I tried to sleep but I kept thinking about Drew's description of the rise of the Kwitny empire. He was right. I had been a bit like a yokel from Terang. For a whole decade, I hadn't paid any attention to anything except cabinetmaking and plodding around looking for people who didn't want to be found.

27

Linda rang at 7.30 a.m. I was up, just out of the shower.

'Let's have breakfast,' she said. 'I haven't got much time.'

We met at Meaker's at eight and ordered orange juice and muesli.

'I'm not sure what to do,' she said. She looked thinner somehow. 'I'm not as brave as I thought I was.'

'It comes to us all.'

'It's not just the burglary,' she said. 'I was being followed yesterday. I tracked down the man whose sheetmetal works across the road from Hoagland burnt down. He didn't want to know me. Then he rang yesterday and said he'd thought about it and he'd talk to me. I went out to his house, out in Swanreach. Lives all alone in this brick-veneer palace. He says he didn't want to sell at first because it suited him to be in Yarrabank. Then he sniffed that the whole place was being bought up, so he held out, thought he'd get twice what they were offering.'

She was silent while our breakfast was served. We both drank some juice.

'He says two men came to see him at home. Just arrived at the front door. They offered him ten per cent more than the agent's offer. When he said no, one man said there wouldn't be any more offers. No threats. After that, a whole series of weird things began to happen. The two family dogs died, poisoned. About ten kilos of broken gla.s.s was put in the swimming pool. Undertakers got calls to go to the house. One night, five different pizza deliveries were made. Then his wife's car went in for a service and when she drove it again the brakes failed. She broke her arm and some ribs.'

'Did he go to the cops?'

'Early on. They said there was nothing they could do. Hire a security firm.'

'Did he tell them about the pressure to sell his factory?'

'He says yes. He went to his local MP, too.'

I said, 'Swanreach? Don't tell me.'

She nodded. 'His MP's Lance Pitman.'