Later that evening, I ate dinner with Beering and O’Reilly at Gino’s. My idea, of course. We’d spent what seemed like hours at the stable and the local police station, answering questions and giving our statements. Having Beering as a witness certainly helped, but he insisted on playing it by the book and calling in the chief racing steward, Des Haimes. So by the time Haimes came in and interviewed O’Reilly and me, and the police had done with us, it was past ten before we finally left.
A few minutes later we all met up at Gino’s. Beering and O’Reilly were standing by the takeaway counter waiting for me. The place was full, and apart from my little table around by the side wall, there wasn’t a spare one in the house. Billy was manning the register and when he saw me come in and join the others, he came around from behind the counter and made a fuss of us and sat us all down.
‘You must be a regular, Punter, to score a table here on a Saturday night,’ said O’Reilly.
‘He’s a bloody regular all right,’ said Beering, ‘it’s his second office. Isn’t that right, Punter?’
I admitted I did drop in once or twice a week and that the manager and I were on first-name terms. We ordered pizzas and cold beer and when the drinks came around O’Reilly offered up a toast.
‘Here’s to you, Punter, and you too, Jim, for finally sorting this bloody mess out. I can’t say I’m happy with how it all ended, but at least it’s done with now and I can get back to training my horses without any interference. I owe you one, Punter,’ he said to me.
We raised glasses and drank. O’Reilly still couldn’t come to terms with Frank being involved.
‘I can’t believe it. He was my trusted foreman for years. The last person I would have suspected.’
‘He was the last person anyone would have suspected. If I hadn’t seen him at the bullring jumping Tempest around, none of us would have known. But I didn’t pick him as a murderer until I saw his chaff bag hidden away with the mallet inside. I’m glad he at least admitted to that before he topped himself.’
‘Crooks come in all shapes and sizes, believe me,’ said Beering cynically. ‘The sad thing about Frank, which so often happens, is that further crimes are committed to conceal an original crime. His first crime was being a paedophile. Then, it escalated to nobbling and, finally, murder to cover the nobbling. Fuckin’ senseless.’
Over pizza and another round of beers, Beering told us what the likely way forward would be.
‘Firstly, I’m going to see those detectives from the State Crime Squad who handled Oakie’s kidnap. They’ll be glad of the breakthrough linking the two together.’
I made a face. ‘Great. More interviews with West: the bitch from hell. I’m so looking forward to it.’
‘I don’t think she’ll pester you too much,’ said Beering. ‘You and I and Sheamus have all given our statements to the local police tonight. There’s nothing much more to add. Frank’s confession seals the nobbling. Now he’s dead, all they can do is resume their search for Ronnie and Craig.’ Beering took another swig of beer. He could throw it down all right. ‘Although the reality is we’re no closer to finding Ronnie and Craig than when Gofer died. He was our big hope, was going to lead us straight to ’em. And because Frank only ever made contact with ’em by phone, we still haven’t got any idea where they might be holed up.’
‘We’ve got one thing,’ I said, ‘the cock fight. Frank said he rang him from the cock fights one night. Maybe that’s where he hangs out.’
‘He did say that,’ said O’Reilly enthusiastically. ‘Perhaps you could find them at the cock fights.’
Beering sat back, a stubby in one hand, the other thoughtfully scratching his nose. ‘Yeah, they could be hanging out there. We did say that in our statements. They’ve got to spend their time somewhere. But I still reckon we’ve got more chance of finding them down at the local TAB, where they’ve most likely been backing other nags to beat Sheamus’s horses.’ Beering took on a more serious tone: ‘Thing is, cock fights aren’t like the footy or the races. They don’t run a schedule in the paper saying the first fight begins at five past twelve. They’re illegal for a start. A clandestine, underground sport that you only hear whispers about. Let me ask you two: you ever been to one?’
I hadn’t and O’Reilly said he’d only heard of them through one of his owners.
‘See. There you go. You have to be in the know to find out where they are on. Even then, it’s not like you rock up and buy a ticket. They’ve got lookouts posted, plus they’re usually held in remote locations and the venues change every time. I know it’s extremely difficult to get in any sort of surveillance close up. The police have raided a few cock fights in the past, usually on tip-offs by the RSPCA, but they rarely get a conviction. No one owns up to owning any of the birds. Most that happens is the landowner is fined. But in this case it gives us a lead worth following. I’ll raise it with the State Crime mob. It would take a bit of setting up, I’d imagine, but they’ve probably got someone on the force who’d be up on that sort of thing. It’s a police call now, anyway.’
I thought there might be a quicker way, but I didn’t say anything.
‘Second thing,’ said Beering, ‘is they’ll reopen the Malloy case and investigate it as a murder. Run a check on that mallet and shoe and test it against Nick’s tissues. With Frank already confessing to killing him, it should tidy things up and prove it was no accidental death. And you,’ he said to O’Reilly, ‘need to get back to training winners.’
‘I’ll have no excuses now,’ grinned O’Reilly.
We ordered some coffee and sweets and I suddenly realised one other person deserved to know about today’s activities.
‘Okay, you two,’ I said, ‘I owe someone a favour. I need you both to answer five more minutes of questions before we call it a night.’
They both looked at me with a smile of suspicion, especially Beering.
I pulled out my mobile and dialled a number. When she answered I said, ‘Kate, I know it’s late, but do you want to cover a scoop?’
Kate broke the story in time for the Sunday papers. It was just a small piece and she didn’t have time for all the details, which was why I was filling her in over breakfast the next morning at a little café at Southbank. Kate and I sipped our cappuccinos after admitting defeat to the biggest serve of scrambled eggs and mushrooms I’d ever seen. Even Big Oakie would have had trouble putting them away.
‘Thanks for that tip last night, Punter. And also for putting me on to Beering and O’Reilly. Gave the story some real authenticity.’
‘It was the first bit of good press O’Reilly’s had for some time.’
‘Yeah, well, it clears his name and lets him start afresh. I wish Beering would have opened up a bit more, though.’
‘You’re lucky you got what you did.’
‘I know. It’s just that the article quotes alleged nobbler Frank McDonald as an alleged murder suspect, involved in an alleged bizarre blackmail scheme. I couldn’t name the Davis brothers as suspects either. The police wouldn’t let me. Still, I don’t see any of the other Sunday papers covering it,’ she said, proudly flicking through a pile of newspapers at our table.
‘I think you painted a pretty good picture of what happened. And I’ll bet the other papers’ reporters will be busy trying to run O’Reilly to ground today to find out. Good luck to them, he’s heading up the ranges to check on some yearlings. He rang me this morning, told me it’s the first day he hasn’t been worried sick since the whole thing started a few weeks back.’
‘It must have been terribly nerve-racking for him seeing his business collapse around him and not knowing why. He’ll be grateful to you.’
‘Us, actually. He’s offered to train Romaro Boy for nothing and sign over the full ownership of Romaro Boy to our syndicate rather than just lease him.’
‘Wow! That’s generous. The girls will be happy. When’s he race next?’
‘I think he’s got him entered for Caulfield in a couple of weeks’ time, but he’ll probably just make sure that he and all the other nobbled horses have recovered okay before he goes and starts any of them again.’
A waiter came around and we ordered another round of cappuccinos. He asked if we’d finished with our breakfast and I told him we were done.
‘Hang on,’ said Kate, ‘why don’t you put that in a doggy bag and give it to Chan.’
Chan, my dear little mate. Normally I would have taken him home some scraps. A treat, which he’d come racing up the stairs for when I called him. But I wouldn’t be calling him again, ever. My face must have betrayed my emotions; Kate sensed immediately that my mood had changed.
‘Punter, you okay? What’s wrong?’
‘Chan. He’s dead, Kate. I think one of those Davis bastards killed him to warn me off snooping around O’Reilly’s stable.’
Kate was as distraught as I was. Not that she saw much of Chan. I never enjoyed Kate’s company as much I would have liked in my flat, but the few times she’d been around, Chan had always purred and rubbed his way to affection with her.
‘Oh, God. How could they? Punter, I’m so sorry for you. I know how much that cat meant to you.’
She put her hand on mine and I swear we both blinked back a tear.
‘I know,’ I said. ‘I miss him terribly. Bloody senseless, barbaric act. It’s made me even more determined that they get caught.’
We sat in silence for a moment, both of us thinking about Chan.
‘Actually, you might be able to help,’ I said.
‘How so?’
‘Well, it’s the only lead we’ve got, but the Davis brothers did let slip they were at a cock fight when they rang Frank up one time.’
‘A cock fight?’
‘Uh-huh. You heard right. I talked it over with Beering last night; he reckons it’s a possibility, but they’re very difficult to locate unless you’re in the know. I was hoping you or someone at your paper might have done a story on them at one time, give us some sort of lead to follow up.’
Kate sipped her coffee thoughtfully. I could see her mind ticking over. ‘Cock fights, huh? I’ve not covered anything about them myself, but I know one of our staff investigated a story about twelve months ago. I could talk to him, see what he knows?’
‘Thanks, that would be great.’
When we got up to leave, I left a couple of notes on the table to cover the bill and asked Kate if I could drive her someplace.
‘No, I’m going straight into work. Gotta provide some more details for a nobbling, murder story that broke last night.’
‘Just as long as you keep my name out of it,’ I said.
‘Don’t worry, you’ll be described as a witness who assisted police with their inquiries . . . Punter,’ she said, clasping my arm tenderly, ‘I really am so sorry about Chan.’
I drove back to my flat, not knowing quite what to do with myself for the rest of the day. It was too early to start doing any form for next week’s racing. I’d read all the morning’s papers and I definitely wasn’t going to tackle any housework on a Sunday. I thought about going for a surf, although it was getting on a bit in the day to head down the coast. I moped around in the kitchen and made myself a pot of tea. Outside, Mrs Givan was putting up another load of washing on the line. Whites today. Chan and I used to watch her come out with her laundry basket and I’d always make a bet with Chan over what colours they’d be. I’d say: ‘two to one it’s colours, Chan’, and he’d give me a meow. And if she’d hung out a black wash I’d tell him we’d done our money and he’d give me another little meow. What a beautiful creature he was. Fucking callous bastards.
I decided to go for a surf anyway. An hour and a half later I was paddling my wave ski out through the kelp beds at Honeysuckle Point and cursing to myself as they wrapped themselves around my paddle blade like oversized spaghetti. Small fish darted off in alarm as I broke clear of the seaweed and paddled out the back. The swell was solid and the water and sky were a brooding grey as if to match my mood. There were only a few locals out on long boards; no one that I knew, so I kept to myself and surfed solidly for two hours, catching some all right waves. I’d fluked the incoming tide and the waves built up steadily in size, giving some nice long rides. At the end of my session, as if on cue, the late afternoon sun came out and threw a coat of sparkling blue over the ocean. My spirits had lifted, the endorphins had kicked in after some exercise and I felt a whole lot better about things.
When I got back to my car, I took a shower in the old grey besser brick toilet block and changed out of my wetsuit into my clothes. After I loaded my ski and gear into the back of the van, I jumped into the front and checked for messages on my mobile. I had two: the first from a guy called Ian Patterson, who I didn’t know; the second from Kate, telling me who Ian Patterson was. He was an Age journalist who covered similar ground to Kate. Crime, the courts, police rounds. Except this guy had done something Kate said I’d find interesting. I called him up.
‘Hi, this is John Punter. You called me?’
‘G’day. Yeah, Kate said you’d appreciate a rundown on a story I did a while back, cock fighting in Victoria?’ He sounded like he was tapping away at a computer terminal as he spoke. Didn’t journalists ever take time off writing?
‘That’s right. Can we meet?’
‘I guess so. I’m tied up here till at least seven, but if you’re in the city after that we could catch up over a beer.’
‘Tell me a time and place and I’ll be there.’
Patterson suggested we meet at the Stevedore’s Retreat. It was only a few blocks down from where he worked at The Age. I knew the pub, had avoided it for ten years when it used to be a six a.m. early opener for waterside workers and derelicts. Now it was a glowing tribute to yuppies and inner-city residents who eagerly handed over eight dollars a glass for imported beers. It still had the original tiled floor in the main bar, although they no longer had to hose away the blood from the previous night’s brawls. The only thing they’d clean up now was an upmarket chardonnay that had been carelessly spilt.
Patterson was sitting at the end of the bar nursing a near-empty glass of beer, and I sidled up next to him and introduced myself. He was about my age, thirty-something, with a short-cropped head of hair and round, enquiring eyes peering out through oversized glasses. He’d been reading a newspaper spread atop a manila folder, which he put aside when I offered my hand.
‘Punter. Same again?’ I asked.
‘Thanks. Kate told me all about you. I’m Ian Patterson.’
The barman took my order, gave us both some fresh glasses and Patterson gave me the folder.
‘It’s not much,’ he said, ‘just a photocopy of the article I wrote a year or so back on cock fighting.’
I flicked it open and scanned through. The headline pretty well spelt it out. ‘ILLEGAL COCK FIGHTS TERGETED IN OPERATION SPECKLE’.
‘You wrote that?’
Patterson nodded, took a draught of beer. ‘It was about a police raid on a joint the RSPCA had tipped them off about. It took months to raid it, even with all the evidence they had. The venue was in an old shearing shed in the middle of the bush. Perfect place for a cock fight.’
‘How come it took so long to bust them? I mean, with the RSPCA tipping them off and all, couldn’t the police just march in and shut them down?’
‘Uh-uh. Not as easy as that. They’ve got to organise a search warrant, plan to contain the participants, of which there was upwards of fifty people. Then they need to impound any birds found – dead, alive and injured. They’ve also got to get inside to raid it without tipping everybody off, which is extremely difficult to do.’
‘How’d they manage it?’
‘It was a case of the classic Trojan horse,’ he said.
I raised my eyebrows, didn’t follow.
‘With all the lookouts at the gate and the track leading into the property, you couldn’t just rock up with a police convoy and sirens blazing. They had to disguise themselves to get in. What they did was turn up in a couple of unmarked Tarago vans, the vehicle of choice often associated with punters attending cock fights.
‘That’s how they nabbed them. Two dozen cops piled out and sealed off the joint. They seized twenty-five birds and about as many dead ones, although of course no one admitted to owning them. But just being in attendance at a planned and staged cock fight is an offence, so they charged everyone there.’
‘It sounds like the operation was a success.’
Patterson took another sip and set his glass down again. ‘Not really. The landowner, who denied he knew anything about it, was fined five thousand bucks, but most of the others got off with fines of a thousand or less. They confiscated some cock-fighting spurs and all the gambling cash, which was a fair pile. But the thing is, they just change to another venue and start up all over again until the next time they’re raided.’
‘Were you there that night?’
‘Not in the actual raid itself, but they let me come in with the back-up police about half an hour later when they’d secured the area. They were keen to publicise the crackdown, so I saw everything.’
‘What are they like, the fights?’
‘I haven’t seen a live one, but they’re brutal. I saw the evidence from the injured and dead birds. You wouldn’t believe the torn flesh: they attach these spurs and metal blades to their feet. And the birds themselves are very aggressive, they’ll grab each other by the throat and kick and peck their eyes and faces apart if they get half a chance. It’s usually a fight to the death between them. The floor was caked in blood and guts from the night’s fights.’
‘And they get a crowd to these fights? I mean, who goes to something like that?’
‘You’d be surprised. There’s a small but select group of breeders and fighters. They and their families often make up the bulk of attendees. Cock fighting attracts a lot of gambling, and because of the large amounts of cash wagered, there’re always guns and other weapons around. Needless to say, cock fighting has always attracted a criminal element. They’re a pretty dangerous place to be unless you know someone there.’
I ordered another round of drinks and left a twenty-dollar note on the counter for the barman. No change returned; it was an expensive round, but the beer was good and cold and I was enjoying the story.
‘That’s about all I can tell you,’ he said. ‘There’s more you can look up on the internet, or you could go to the RSPCA. I’ve got some contacts there. Is there anything else you want?’
‘Yeah, I want to go to a cock fight.’
They called it the main mountain road; it didn’t even pass for a track. I edged my van over the corrugations as best I could. I’d tried sitting on eighty – that didn’t work, threatened to rattle the suspension to death. Sixty was still too fast and bumpy, so I’d slowed it down to about forty, which seemed to be the best compromise between the van’s shaky chassis and the track. The town of Labertouche was fifteen kilometres behind me and I still hadn’t found the turnoff road to the guy’s farm. To my right was about forty thousand acres of state forest, and on my left, struggling little farmlets appeared sporadically. I was beginning to think I’d missed it – in fact I nearly drove straight past the narrow laneway. I braked hard on yet another corrugation and my van groaned under the punishment. I’d overshot the laneway a few metres so I had to back up a little. But this was it, Valley View Track. About the only view I could see was an impenetrable band of gums reaching skywards.
I drove the van cautiously down the track; a four-wheel-drive would have been more suitable. Eventually I came to a driveway with the yellow letterbox the guy had said to look for. There was absolutely no sign of life that could be seen from the driveway. It wasn’t until I’d driven in another three hundred metres that the trees cleared to reveal an old ramshackle sort of a house. There seemed to be mess all around the place. Fencing wire, steel posts, firewood stacked in careless piles. Wooden pallets, hessian sacks and old cars left to rust in the front yard. The place was a dump, a real hicksville, and I started to regret coming.
My arrival triggered off the baying of a pack of mongrel dogs chained to the side of the verandah. There were about half a dozen of them, some big mean-looking half-bred things amongst them. Dogs don’t worry me normally, but I stayed in the van, content to wind the window down and wait for someone to come out.
‘Siddown and shuddup, you fuckin’ things,’ shouted a mystery voice. I couldn’t yet see the guy, but his voice silenced the pack quickly enough. They whined and whimpered, their chains clinking as they retreated back under the verandah.
‘G’day,’ I said cheerfully towards the front door where I’d heard the voice. ‘I’m looking for Alan.’
‘Whadda ya fuckin’ want?’
Friendly sort of a bloke. I could make out his shadowy outline now; he was standing behind the cover of his flyscreen door looking at me.
‘I’m John. I rang you last night. The bloke Ian Patterson spoke to you about.’
No answer.
‘I’m here about the birds.’
I’d rung him yesterday after getting his details off Patterson. Getting a contact name out of Ian had taken some doing. Patterson was reluctant to burn any of his cock-fighting contacts in case he needed them again, and I had to talk fast to persuade him I wouldn’t. Eventually, we agreed on a cover story for me. Patterson rang Alan and told him about a mug punter he knew with cash to burn who wanted some action at the cock fights. Could he put him in touch? Patterson told me he could just about hear Alan’s ears prick up over the phone at the mention of money. Patterson knew how I made a living through Kate, so I promised to tip him a winner. We shook hands on it and I departed with a slim lead to the cock fights. It was looking slimmer by the minute.
It was very quiet and still in that squalid yard. I could feel Alan’s eyes staring at me and the dogs’ too, straining at their leashes. Maybe someone else was looking me over, you wouldn’t know who or what was in that house.
‘Maybe I’ve come to the wrong place,’ I said. ‘That would be a shame, because I’ve come here to do business.’
Patterson had told me Alan was a greedy little bastard. Said he hadn’t knocked back a sling when he was trying to get some background information off him to write that story.
Still no answer. I waited another minute or so, then held my palms up in an exaggerated gesture of defeat. ‘Okay, then. Seems Ian was wrong. I’ll take my money elsewhere.’
I made to turn the key in the ignition and that seemed to make up his mind for him.
‘Wait,’ he said, stepping out onto the porch. ‘Come round the back.’
He was as filthy as he was ugly. Oil stains up and down his torn overalls. Caked-in dirt on his fingernails, which looked like they hadn’t seen soap for a month. He had a runty little face like one of his in-bred dogs, a pudding-bowl haircut of greasy hair and slitted eyes just like the fighting cocks he was showing me. We were in a huge shed at the back of his house. It was full of what looked to be two-sided, metre-high, A-frame huts. There must have been about a hundred of them. Each little hut was occupied by a cock, with all of the huts spread out just far enough from each bird so they couldn’t reach each other. To make sure, all of the birds had a cord tethered around them to keep them from fighting their neighbours. They were aggressive-looking things and they eyed each other suspiciously whilst strutting up and down, pecking the dirt and crowing over their territory. I stopped to look at one with a fiery mane of orange feathers and striking black tail feathers.
‘He’s a looker.’
Alan grinned and scooped up the bird, which he cradled expertly under one arm. ‘That’s a breed known as a Roundhead. Fights like a threshing machine.’
I looked at it, careful to keep a respectful distance away from its alert orange eyes and wicked-looking beak. ‘What’s with the head?’ I nodded at the bald red knob.
Alan wiped a grimy paw across the top of the bird’s head as if to show me. ‘We shear the wattles and the combs. Less of a target for the opposing bird,’ he explained.
I walked on. ‘And that breed. What are they?’
‘They’re called Hatches.’
‘They’re a big bird.’
‘Yep, they’re known for their power. And those over there are Blacks, bred for speed. I cross ’em now and then. But it’s no guarantee they’ll make a good fighter.’
‘How old are they?’
‘Most of these are two-year-olds,’ he said, sweeping his hand over the shed. ‘I don’t like to fight ’em too early.’
I paused as we watched two birds go at each other. They couldn’t reach one another because of the cord, but they spat and jumped and kicked at each other like they meant business.
‘I tell you what,’ I said. ‘I want to buy three of the Roundheads and two each of the Blacks and Hatches.’ I took out a roll of cash, let him see I had plenty. His greedy little eyes looked more and more like the cock’s that he still had thrust under his arm. He pretended to think about it for a moment then named a price he thought he could take me down for.
‘I dunno, Alan. That seems a lot of money.’
‘They’re the best damn fightin’ birds you’ll buy.’
I flicked my thumb through the roll, considering.
‘Anybody’ll tell you, mine are the best fighters around.’
He wanted that money, wanted it bad.
‘Here’s what I’ll do. I can’t take them with me today. So here’s a thousand now,’ I said, palming him some money. ‘I’ll give you the rest when I pick them up next week.’
He would have been happy with that, but I wanted more. I held up another two thousand in front of him; his fist like a chook’s claw ready to strike out for it.
‘Uh-uh. Not now. That’s betting money for fight night. Half the winnings are yours if your best bird wins. I can’t be fairer than that.’
Or stupider. It wasn’t a hard proposition to accept, a mug punter with money burning a hole in his pocket. ‘You let me tag along, show me the ropes. Tell me which bird you think can win.’
It wasn’t until I left the farm and drove back towards Labertouche that I picked up mobile coverage again. When I did, I called up Oakie and gave him the short version of what I’d been up to. I could hardly get a sentence out without him butting in wanting to know more.
‘Whadda ya mean, cock fights? The hell are you talking about?’
‘It’s a lead I’m chasing up. Involves something O’Reilly’s foreman, Frank, said about Ronnie and Craig Davis.’
‘The Davis brothers? What have those bastards got to do with O’Reilly? Thought we were chasing them over Michelle’s kidnapping?’
‘We are. Listen, I can’t explain over the phone. Can we meet up tonight, you and the boys?’
‘Leave it with me. I’ll get a hold of the guys. Kevin should be okay, and I don’t think Tiny bounces anywhere of a Monday night. Where are you?’
‘Driving back from Labertouche.’
‘Where the hell’s that? They got a track there?’
Typical Oakie, he navigated his way around the state by racecourses.
‘No. The only track they got is one that will shake your car to pieces. I’m about two hours’ drive from home.’
‘Okay, let’s meet at seven at the White Horse Inn.’
I drove straight back to town from the farm and had an easy run all the way along the freeway until I hit the outer suburbs. Then the peak-hour traffic slowed me down and it was another forty minutes before I finally made it into the hotel’s car park. It was only ten past six, too early yet for Oakie and the boys, so I hit the bistro. I found a table and whilst eating my way through a gourmet steak and mushroom pie, I thought through what I’d accomplished today. I’d gained an ‘in’ to the closed world of cock fighting through Alan. I didn’t trust him as far as I could kick him, but all I had to do was get into the fights with him. And tagging along gave me the perfect cover. It might be a long shot that Ronnie or his brother Craig would be there, but it was the only lead we had left. I still hadn’t worked out what I would do if I saw them there. I had some ideas, but that’s what I wanted to talk over with Oakie and the boys.
They all trooped in soon after, led by Oakie, who grabbed a quiet corner table on the other side of the room. I got up and walked across to join them.
‘Fellas,’ I said, ‘how’s things?’
Kevin and Tiny gave me a nod and Oakie said g’day.
‘How did Michelle and Veronica’s Gold Coast holiday go, they back yet?’
Oakie gave a good-natured scoff. ‘Oh yeah, they had a ball. Michelle found herself a new boyfriend while she was up there.’
‘No way! That’s great. A local bloke?’
‘Nah. Comes from down here. He was up there holidaying when they met. Nice young bloke. You’ll meet him soon enough if you’re around our place. He’s just about moved in.’
Tiny laughed. ‘At least you can keep an eye on him then.’
‘He’s eatin’ me outta house and home. Speaking of which, you eaten yet?’
‘Couldn’t wait, sorry. Been a big day.’
‘So I hear. We’ll order ours and then we can get down to business.’
I bought a round of beers whilst they were up at the bistro and we resumed our seats over dinner and drinks.
‘Mmm. This is a good roast,’ said Oakie, shovelling a piece of lamb the size of a fist into his mouth. ‘I told the guys you got some new leads. Why don’t you fill us in.’
With Oakie and Kevin and Tiny digging into their meals and with everyone’s mouth full except mine, I had the floor to myself.
‘Okay, there’s been a few things that have come to light since we last got together. We all know that Ronnie and Craig Davis were behind Michelle’s kidnapping. What we’ve since found out is that they’re the same two behind O’Reilly’s stable nobblings. They were blackmailing Frank, O’Reilly’s foreman, to get to his horses.’
‘No way!’ said Oakie. ‘Frank? For God’s sake.’
‘Way. Don’t forget their form. Extortion, bashing and blackmail are their bread and butter.’
‘But Frank McDonald, what the ’ell would they have on him that they could screw him over a barrel?’
‘You took the words right out of my mouth.’
Oakie looked at me, puzzled.
‘He liked boys, Oakie. He was a rock spider.’
I filled the guys in on how Frank had been blackmailed by the Davis brothers and how he’d worked the nobblings, taking them up to the bullring and jumping them to exhaustion on race morning so they’d knock up in their races when the pressure was on.
‘Jesus! That’s how he did it,’ exclaimed Oakie. ‘I wouldn’t have picked it in a million years.’
I nodded. ‘No one suspected him. That’s why he got away with it for so long.’
‘And he hung himself,’ said Oakie. ‘He couldn’t take the shame of it?’
‘That, and also the fact that he was the one who killed Nicholas Malloy.’
‘He what?’
I nodded my head. ‘That’s right, it was no accident. Frank murdered him to keep him quiet. Malloy had seen Frank taking horses to the bullring, that’s why he had to go.’
Oakie grunted. ‘What about Gofer? You reckon he was involved in the nobblings from the start?’
I thought back to the time I’d seen him at the track, smirking outside the mounting yard when one of O’Reilly’s favourites had gone down.
‘Yep. When they bashed and robbed Frank, they might not have realised whose wallet they’d pinched until they flashed it in front of Gofer. He would have picked up on Frank’s foreman’s badge. Sniffed a quid in it, told Ronnie how to work it.’ I paused for moment, took a sip of my beer before going on. ‘The other thing, which is really why we’re here tonight, is that we’ve finally got a lead on where to find Ronnie and Craig out of all of this.’
‘I told you!’ beamed Oakie. ‘Didn’t I tell you that if you hung in there you’d find something sooner or later.’ He was like an excited schoolboy told that class had been cancelled and he could go home early.
‘Hang on, Oakie, let’s not talk it up too much just yet. It’s just something Frank divulged.’
‘What, what’d he say?’
‘Well, remember we’ve all been racking our brains to think about where Ronnie and his brother might hang out. We know they don’t go to the races, too many people would recognise them.’
‘Yeah. And they don’t hang out at no pubs or clubs that me and Kevin have been checking out,’ said Tiny.
‘Right, so the question is, what do Ronnie and Craig do for R&R? They’ve got to spend their money somewhere and get out for air. They can’t stay holed-up twenty-four-seven. So if we can’t find their hideout, the next best thing is to find out where they go for fun. And I think I’ve found it.’
Oakie and the boys looked attentively at me.
‘One time when they called Frank, giving him instructions to pull a horse, they let slip they were at a cock fight. And I’m warming to them being regulars at the cock fights. It’s something that would appeal to them. They’re illegal, clandestine and attended mainly by crims and desperates who don’t ask questions. There’s betting and booze. The venues have lookouts stationed for cops and they change the gigs regularly to keep one step ahead of the law, so they’d feel fairly safe in attending.’
I looked at the three of them. ‘You guys know anything about cock fights?’
‘I never been to no cock fights,’ said Oakie. ‘I’ve bet on the dogs, the trots, the horses, even the boxing, but I never seen a cock fight before. Only heard about ’em. Fuckin’ dangerous places to go to is what I’ve heard. Gettin’ out with your money intact is what I’d be concerned about.’
Tiny had heard of them too, but never been to one. ‘Mate of mine, a bouncer, went one night. Swore there was as many guns there as roosters. Fuckin’ joints are known to attract every drug dealer and two-bit crook in town.’
Kevin surprised us all. ‘I’ve been, once before. Not in Australia though. It was in the Philippines. Bloody sport’s a national obsession over there, they bet on ’em like there’s no tomorrow. But it’s probably a lot safer to attend one there than back here. I don’t think I’d be just bowling up and asking for a ticket on the night unless I knew someone. And that’s if you know someone.’
‘I agree,’ I said. ‘Kate put me on to a contact of hers at the paper who covered a cock-fight bust by the cops a year or so ago. I got a name off him. The bloke he gave me breeds a few and fights ’em. That’s where I was today, at some godforsaken cock farm at the back of Labertouche buying roosters. It was like a scene out of Deliverance.’
Tiny laughed. ‘Whadda ya come up with?’
‘Seven game cocks that’ll scratch the insides of your eyes out.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Seriously, I bought ’em. Cost me plenty and they can’t even lay an egg. It was my ticket into the fights. And I get to tag along with a known breeder, which makes for good cover.’
‘You know where they’re holding ’em?’ asked Oakie.
‘No. He stopped short of telling me that. I’ve got to meet him out at a truck stop at the back of Keysborough this Saturday night. So it’s probably around the area somewhere.’
‘Shit, I don’t know, Punter,’ said Oakie. ‘It sounds dicey. Could be a set-up, a place like that.’
Kevin saw where I was going with the plan. I could see him working it through in his mind.
‘Could be a set-up,’ he agreed. ‘But the guy’s probably just checking him out, to make sure he’s not a cop or a journo looking to bust another story. He tells him to meet at the service station, if he’s on his own he takes him there. If he’s suspicious, he keeps driving on.’
‘He is a bit suspicious,’ I admitted, ‘but he’s also a moneyhungry little bastard. I gave him some cash for his birds with a promise of a bet to nothing on the night, if one of his cocks won their fight. He thinks I want to breed a few and fight some. I reckon I can at least get in the door with him and then scout about for the Davis brothers whilst I’m there.’
‘Yeah, that might work,’ said Kevin.
‘Hang on a minute,’ said Oakie. ‘Sounds too dangerous, you going in. Why not send in Tiny or Kevin instead of you? The Davis brothers don’t know what they look like, but they’ve seen you before.’
‘My point exactly. I want them to recognise me. It’s the only way I’ll flush them out. If I rock up there bold as brass like I own the place, they’ll want a piece of me. Want to find out why I’m snooping around. They can’t afford to do nothing. Besides, Tiny and Kevin wouldn’t get past the gateman without knowing someone, whereas I’ve got an in with Alan.’
‘I don’t know, Punter. It’s a risk. Have you actually seen ’em without their masks on?’
‘Yeah, I’d recognise them from a police file that Kate showed me. If they’re there, I’ll find them or they’ll find me.’
‘How you going to work it if you make contact?’ said Tiny.
‘That depends on what they do.’
‘Because we might not be able to get too close if things go wrong, especially if we can’t get inside the fights.’
‘That’s why I brought this along,’ I said, pulling out the D Tracker and laying it on the table.
‘Wouldn’t want the battery going flat on the laptop again,’ groaned Kevin.
‘No, and it won’t. Because we’ve got more time to prepare and plan than we had last time. Today’s only Monday, the cock fights are not till midnight on Saturday. If they’re there, I’ll either slip the D Tracker under their car, or keep it with me and follow in my van for you guys to track me at a safe distance. What do you reckon, worth a try?’
Oakie leant forward, his shovel-sized fists opening and shutting nervously in anticipation of action. He turned to Kevin and Tiny, giving them a grin like I’d seen him do at the races when he’d had a winning day. Then he turned and looked to me.
‘Let’s go to the cock fights,’ he said.