It’s not until Higgins and I try to move the naked man that I realise we’ve hit the jackpot. I didn’t recognise Mayor Jessop minus his clothes and the sneer on his face. By the time I’ve accounted for everyone, he’s come around and he’s baying for blood.
I toss Jessop his clothes, and tell Higgins to help him dress. I figure it’ll serve as his punishment for exceeding orders, yet again.
‘I’ll have you sacked,’ Jessop’s yelling at me. ‘I’m the mayor; I know people in high places.’
‘Is that so, Your Worship? In my experience, the only thing people in high places are good for, is pissing on you from a great height.’
I telephone the Australian army base from Mrs Singleton’s, and a couple of MPs arrive a few minutes later. I turn the two servicemen over to them, and notice that nobody’s looking particularly worried about it. I’m not surprised: they’re boys under pressure. During war, morality takes a back seat, even in Wangamba.
But not on my watch.
I leave Mahoney to stand guard with his truncheon drawn, and make especially certain that Tommy Sharman stays put until we can take him to the station. After that, Higgins and I begin the first of the two trips needed to bring everyone in: the three girls, Mayor Jessop, Snowy McIntyre, Mrs Singleton and, of course, Tommy Sharman.
As luck would have it, I’ve just helped Mayor Jessop and two of the girls from the car, when I spot Maud Percy making a beeline for the station.
‘Yoo hoo,’ she calls out, scurrying towards us, ‘Sergeant Furey.’
Mayor Jessop catches sight of her too, and he lifts his arm and tries to hide his face. Since he’s handcuffed to one of the girls, all that does is open up the décolletage of the girl’s dressing gown, and bares one of her shoulders. I have to commend Higgins in doing a stellar job in dressing Jessop: his shirt tails stick out of his gaping fly, and the effect is magnificent.
I glimpse old Maud’s face. She’s beside herself.
‘Dear God in heaven!’ she exclaims, crossing herself furiously as she peers at the girl first, and then at the mayor’s crotch. ‘Mayor Jessop?’
He drops his arm and the girl’s decent again, but I fear the damage is done. He knows it too. ‘Just helping Sergeant Furey bring in…’ he mutters, but his face betrays him.
‘Well,’ I say, ‘now you know that’s a bloody lie.’ I turn to Maud Percy. ‘You were right, Miss Percy, there was a brothel operating out of King Street, just as you thought. We raided it today. Constable Higgins and I are just bringing in the occupants.’
I’m no longer worried that the mayor may use his influence to avoid the sting of the law. His fate is far worse. Maud Percy’s tongue is the equivalent of death by a thousand cuts.
Once we get everyone back to the station and into the cells, Higgins starts the job of filling out charge sheets and interviewing. Everyone is singing roughly from the same hymn sheet: it’s a therapeutic massage centre, the girls administer physical therapy, and there’s definitely no hanky-panky.
Physical therapy. Without any clothes on. In a bed.
I call in Doc McDonald to perform examinations on the girls, and he tells me that what he’s discovered is consistent with the premises being used as a knocking shop, rather than a kneading shop.
He draws me aside. ‘One of the girls is pretty young. You need to know that she’s given birth fairly recently. She’s a bit of a mess; I’d say she delivered herself. She’s got scars that are still relatively new.’
I stare into the Doc’s bleary eyes. ‘You mean… So, she might be one of the mothers we’ve been looking for.’
‘I’d say almost certainly.’
Doc McDonald finishes up, and he’s about to leave when Tommy Sharman starts rattling his cage and demanding that someone get him his lawyer.
‘You fucking animal, Furey!’ he screams. ‘Look at what you done to me!’
It’s true that I might have let him get the better of me, and I might have given him a bit of a touch-up. I might have also asked Mahoney to take the potholed route back to the station with him tied up in the back of the ute.
‘Shut up, Sharman,’ I bellow back at him. ‘You’ll get your go, when I’m good and ready.’
I turn to the Doc. ‘You want to give him a once-over, and sign off that you found him in tip-top condition?’
He smiles. ‘Never saw anyone in better health.’ Then he takes a look at Tommy Sharman and starts. He leans into me. He’s staring at me goggle-eyed. ‘I know him!’ he whispers.
‘You sure?’ I ask. ‘He’s not from around here, you know?’ The Doc’s not got the best reputation for clarity of recall.
He nods and takes me to one corner. ‘About ten years ago, I worked at St Vincent’s Hospital, down in Darlinghurst. I treated that man; I sutured his face.’ He continues, ‘I don’t remember much about my patients usually, especially not after ten years, but he was particularly memorable because of the company he kept.’
The Doc’s leapt up in my estimation. ‘That makes sense. He told me he came up here from Sydney.’ I swivel around to look at the scars crisscrossing one of his pudgy cheeks. ‘Can you tell me anything about him?’
The Doc’s earnest now. ‘You heard of Tilly Devine?’ he asks.
‘The razor gang wars? Of course. Hasn’t everyone?’
‘Well, this man ran with her mob. When I met him, he was a pimp, a distributor of illicit cocaine and a thug. He’d found himself on the wrong side of someone wielding a cutthroat razor. I doubt very much he’s changed.’
‘Right.’ I remember something the Doc mentioned during the autopsy. ‘Maurie Pilcher. You said that the top of one of his ears had been cut off. You said it was a clean cut. Do you think…?’
‘…that it was cut off with a razor?’ He finishes my sentence.
‘Well?’ I urge.
He smiles. ‘Very likely. And not a coincidence, either. I shouldn’t be the least surprised if Mr Pilcher and Mr Sharman were very well acquainted before either of them set foot in Wangamba.’
‘That’s what I’m thinking too,’ I reply.