Pride’s Harvest

Mungle hesitated, then shrugged. ‘I better. I can’t go on dodging the poor bugger.’

Malone wondered how many other Kooris he had dodged in the past. It struck him that, even in his mind, he had used the word Koori, the blacks’ own name for themselves.

The lock-up cells were clean and comfortable, but that was all that could be said of them. There was an old-fashioned lavatory bucket in one corner, two narrow beds and that was it. These were for one-night or two-night prisoners; they weren’t meant as home-from-home for long-term inmates. Malone had been told that remand prisoners were taken over to Cawndilla, the District headquarters town. There was a steel door to the cell, with a small barred opening in it; a small window high in the outer wall also had bars on it. Malone guessed that dangerous crims would not be locked up here, but would be taken immediately to District. Five minutes with Billy Koowarra told Malone that the boy was not dangerous.

He was nineteen, stringily built, with long curly hair and a sullen face that at certain angles made him look no more than a schoolboy who had just entered high school, one that he hated. He nodded when Mungle introduced Malone and stood leaning flat against the wall, like someone waiting to be shot.

‘This the first time you’ve been locked up, Billy?’

The boy looked at Mungle, who gave him no help; then he looked back at Malone. ‘Nah. I been in here, I dunno, two or three times.’

‘Drunk each time?’

‘That’s what they said.’

Malone decided to hit the boy over the head, shake him out of his sullenness. ‘Billy, what do you know about Mr Sagawa being murdered?’

The boy’s eyes opened wide in sudden fright, as if he had just realized why this stranger from the city was in here to question him. He looked at Mungle, then leaned away from the wall as if he were about to run; but he had nowhere to run to. ‘Jesus, Wally, what the fuck is this? Why’d you bring him in here, let him ask me something like that?’

‘Take it easy, Billy. If you dunno anything about Mr Sagawa’s death, just say so. Inspector Malone isn’t accusing you of anything.’

‘I wanna get outa here!’ Koowarra looked around him in panic. ‘Shit, all they locked me up for was being drunk! I ain’t done nothing!’

‘We’re not saying you have,’ said Malone. ‘When did you last see Mr Sagawa?’

Koowarra had begun to shuffle along the wall, his back still to it. ‘This fucking place is getting me down, Wally! Get me outa here!’

‘I can’t do that, Billy, not till Inspector Narvo comes back. This is the fifth time you’ve been in here, not the second or third. You’ll probably have to stay here another night, I dunno. But that’s the worst that’s gunna happen to you. Now why don’t you tell us? When did you last see Mr Sagawa?’

Koowarra had stopped shuffling, was flattened against the wall again. He looked from one detective to the other, then he said, ‘Monday. I went out to see him, I dunno, about seven o’clock. I was gunna apologize and ask for my job back.’

Malone had not expected such a direct answer, but he knew that often a prisoner being questioned told the truth, or what sounded like the truth, in the hope of a favourable reaction from his questioner. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Wally Mungle frown as if he, too, hadn’t expected such a frank answer.

‘That was all you had in mind, Billy? Just to apologize and ask for your job back?’

The boy suddenly seemed to realize that he might have been too honest; his face abruptly got older, seemed to become wooden and darker. ‘What else would I wanna see him for?’

Malone shrugged, careful not to press too hard. ‘I don’t know, Billy. What did he say when you apologized?’

‘I didn’t see him. When I got out there – ’

‘How did you get out there?’

‘I walked. I don’t own no wheels. I tried to thumb a lift, but nobody around here gives a Koori a lift, not after dark. Right, Wally?’

‘Right.’ Mungle sounded even quieter than usual.

‘Why didn’t you get to see Mr Sagawa? Wasn’t he in his office or anywhere around the gin?’

‘I think he was in his office. His car, he’s got a blue Toyota Cressida, was parked outside.’

Malone looked at Mungle. ‘Was the car still there the next morning, when they found his body?’

Mungle nodded. ‘It was still there. The car keys were in the ignition.’

‘Any prints on the car?’

‘The Crime Scene fellers didn’t find any. Not even Sagawa’s.’

‘Didn’t you find that queer? The owner’s print nowhere on his own car? You didn’t mention that in the running sheet.’

Mungle worked his mouth in embarrassment. ‘I forgot, Inspector. I thought it was queer at the time, but I didn’t make a note of it. Sorry.’

Malone wasn’t going to tick him off any further, not in front of a prisoner, even if the latter was his cousin. He looked back at Billy Koowarra. ‘Why didn’t you go in to see Mr Sagawa?’

‘There was someone with him, I think. I waited about twenty minutes, but nobody came out. So I started walking back to town.’

‘What time was this?’

‘I dunno, about seven thirty, I guess. Mebbe eight o’clock, I dunno. I don’t own a watch.’

‘Was there another car there?’

‘Yeah, a fawn Merc.’

‘You recognize whose it was?’

The boy shook his head. ‘I didn’t get close. I stayed, I dunno, about a hundred yards away, by the kurrajong tree near the inside gate as you come up from the road.’

‘How many Mercedes in the district?’ Malone asked Mungle.

‘Half a dozen, I guess. Ask Billy, he’s the car man.’

For a moment there was a spark of – something: a dream, a hope? – in the boy’s dark eyes. ‘Yeah, I can’t wait till I get a car of me own – ’ We Kooris are supposed to live in the Dreamtime. Some of us have different dreams to others. ‘There are seven Mercs around here. Not all the same model, though.’

‘Did the car pass you when you were walking back to town?’

Koowarra spread his hands, almost an Italian gesture. ‘I dunno. There was half a dozen cars passed me, maybe more, and a coupla semi-trailers. One of the cars was a Merc, but I dunno whether it was the one out at the gin.’

‘You didn’t hear any row going on in the office?’

‘No, I was too far away. I told you,’ he added petulantly. He was edgy again, pressing himself back against the wall. Somewhere in another cell a man’s voice, a little slurred, had begun to sing: Like a rhinestone cowboy . . .

Malone looked enquiringly at Mungle, who said, ‘Another cousin. He knows all the country-and-western ballads.’

Malone wanted to ask why the other cousin had to borrow his sad songs from another culture; but didn’t. Instead, he said, ‘Righto, that’ll do for now, Billy. When you’re released, don’t leave town. We’ll need you as a witness.’

‘Shit, where’m I gunna go? I’m stuck here, like everyone else.’ He banged the back of his head against the wall, then leaned towards Mungle, grabbing the front of the latter’s shirt. ‘Get me outa here, for Chrissake! I can’t stand being locked up no more!’