Salt and Blood by Peter Corris Page B

curious about him …’
    â€˜Yeah, well, a couple of the blokes at the station wanted me to go in and give him a good kicking, you know? I might’ve too, I was pretty angry. I went into the cell and he was babbling. Drunk, but not that drunk by now, not after everything that’d gone on over an hour and a bit.’
    â€˜Let me guess,’ I said. ‘He seemed to have forgotten all about it. As if it’d never happened.’
    Hughes looked surprised. ‘That’s right. I kind of got him to stop talking and tried to tell him whatan arsehole he was and he didn’t know what I was talking about. He went right on spewing out this stuff.’
    What stuff?’
    â€˜He was saying he’d killed his wife and kid. Not sort of, really. Actually killed them.’
    â€˜He was pissed.’
    â€˜Like I say, not
that
pissed. Sounded like he meant it.’
    â€˜And you reported this?’
    â€˜No.’ He swivelled and looked along the street at the multicultural parade as if he was gazing backward in time to when he had full control of his body. ‘I shouldn’t, but I’m going to have another coffee. Coffee’s real bad shit, you know. You can’t drink it when you go on a homeopathic course. It’s toxic as hell. You have to clear it out of your system first up.’
    â€˜That right?’ I signalled for the waitress and ordered two more long blacks. When they came he stirred in two spills of sugar, breaking all the rules. ‘I envy you, man. When we finish here you’re going to jump in your car and go chasing after what comes next. Right?’
    â€˜I wouldn’t say jump, but yeah, that’s more or less right. Why didn’t you report what Harkness said, Brett?’
    â€˜I thought about it and I was going to but then his brother and solicitor arrived and I found out he was an actor and that changed my mind. See, what he’d been babbling was like in two voices. He’d say something in one voice, and then something else in another quite different voice. Changingfrom one to the other real quick. When they told me he was a TV actor I figured he was remembering some old script or something. Sounded just like some of that crap. Then I heard that he was being taken out of circulation and I let it go.’
    At least now I had something to take to Jerry Weir, but Hughes had more to say. ‘I wanted to tell you this when Frank Parker told me that you were minding Harkness and that someone had taken a shot at him.’
    â€˜Yes?’
    â€˜Thinking back I don’t reckon he was quoting from a script. I reckon he was confessing to killing his wife and kid. And it’s likely there’s someone out there who wants him for that, wouldn’t you say?’

14
    Brett Hughes finished his coffee and began playing with the paper napkin, folding it into smaller and smaller squares. ‘I’ve given you a problem, have I?’ he said. ‘I was sort of thinking I might be helpful. Talking like this, getting that call from Parker. Felt like old times. I miss the job. Still miss it like hell after all these years.’
    Right then I was thinking that I could do without my job very easily. It was getting complicated the way it can, with new information piling in on the old and contradicting it or calling it into serious question. I shook my head to make him feel better. ‘No, mate. It’s useful information, I just don’t quite know how to make use of it. The thing is, this woman I’m working with has taken off with Harkness. So it’s a question of how dangerous he is.’
    He unfolded the napkin. ‘Very, I’d say. Sorry.’
    â€˜The psychiatrist who recommended his release says he isn’t.’
    â€˜Did he know about the confession? That’s how you could see it now, I have to say.’
    â€˜She. Yeah, I suspect she did. Wouldn’t talk to me about it though.’
    Hughes shrugged