St Kilda Blues (Charlie Berlin #3)(52)

It was hot in the room, now it was summer. Most of the building work had been done at night and on weekends over winter when the place had been freezing, but the physical activity had kept him warm. After the building there had been the stocking of the place with the necessary items and, again, these had been brought in bit by bit at night and on weekends. The soundproofing and the hooks in the ceiling beam had been the final items and they were now done. The list of supplies, like the plans for the place, had all been kept in his head, where they were safest.

He slowly ran his left index finger around the room, counting items silently, mentally ticking things off the list. When he finished he realised the room was ready. It was time to invite his first guest over, and the realisation of how close it actually was brought the heat up between his legs. Tomorrow was Saturday and it was still summer school holidays for another two weeks so the dances and discotheques would be packed.

The dagger and sharpening stone were on the small table he had built from leftover timber. He picked up the knife and studied the edge in the pale blue light. Just over his head, screwed into a cross beam, were the two 500-watt lamps he had used for work lights during construction and which were now aimed down towards where the girl would be sitting. The lamps were off now but when they were switched on there would be plenty of light to photograph her and those who would come after through the blue filter mounted on the camera lens. He would photograph his guests in black and white, since no colour developing laboratory could be trusted not to report the images to the police. When he wasn’t photographing his guests, when he was just playing, the room would be lit by a single 100-watt bulb covered in blue plastic.

Brother Brian had taught him a long time ago that a photographic filter lightens colours nearest to it in the spectrum and darkens those furthest away. Brother Brian had also taught him how to easily remember the order of the colour spectrum: just remember the name ‘Roy G Biv’. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. A red filter makes red lips appear paler but makes the blue sky in a photograph much darker and more dramatic. A blue filter or blue light, on the other hand, made anything red appear much darker, more dramatic, especially against a pale background.

He floated the blade of the dagger gently across the edge of his left palm, barely touching callused skin already marked with a delicate, almost invisible crosshatching of old scars. A thin line of blood welled up, dark in the soft blue light, almost black against his pale skin. He licked it away. Tonight he would iron his clothes and polish his shoes and practise his smile and his conversation in the mirror and tomorrow it would begin. His guests were waiting out there for him, the shy ones, the awkward ones, the ones who only wanted someone to be nice to them, even just for a moment. And he knew a moment was all that it would take to persuade them, to win their trust, to win them over. All most people wanted was for someone to like them.





TWENTY-TWO


Bob Roberts glanced at his wristwatch for the third time in ten minutes. He was driving faster than was probably safe for the conditions but Berlin had decided a few miles back to keep his mouth shut. Roberts was a good driver and the police pursuit training he’d had was obvious, but the silly bugger was still taking some risks. Five minutes later he overtook a sputtering Volkswagen blowing blue smoke from its exhausts and just managed to tuck back in on their side of the road ahead of an oncoming truck that was flashing its lights.

‘Got some place you need to be, Bob?’

Roberts didn’t take his eyes off the road. ‘You said you wanted to talk to those newspaper people.’

‘I did, but I would have taken a left about ten streets back to put us on Sydney Road.’

‘This way is quicker and besides, the trams would have slowed us up. Anyway, I need to take a slash, all that bloody tea at the Marquets’ place.’

‘There’s a pub up ahead.’

‘I’m not bloody blind, Charlie.’

Berlin counted around a dozen pubs before they pulled up opposite the Collingwood Arms. Roberts rolled the car into a no-standing zone and left the motor running. ‘Just be a tick, move it if you have to.’

Berlin watched Roberts sprint across the road, checking his wristwatch once more as he walked into the public bar. Over the years Berlin had known a lot of coppers who needed to stop by the nearest pub midmorning just to make it through to lunchtime. They were the moody ones, the ones with short tempers and foul mouths and constant headaches who were suddenly all sweetness and light after they had just ‘popped out for a couple of minutes to grab something’, and come back smelling of peppermint or salted peanuts.

Berlin knew the signs from personal experience, though it was a long time since he had popped into a public bar and fallen into the deep dark hole that was always waiting inside those doors. But as far as he knew Bob Roberts wasn’t one of those men.

He glanced down at his own wristwatch. He wanted to get to the GEAR offices before lunchtime if possible, or just on lunchtime. Sometimes people anxious to get away from work blurted out the odd fact that they might not have mentioned in a more measured interview.

Berlin’s hips were starting to ache in the cramped confines of the sports car. Jesus, was he getting that old? How many hours had he spent sitting all alone at the controls of the Lancaster as it droned on through the darkness? Had his hips ached then, or had the fear and the responsibility blocked out the pain? Shifting position didn’t seem to help any.