Death on Dangar Island

Max 'The Mauler'

Beer. DI McKinnon was on his third in half an hour. She’ll be right, he thought to himself. He wasn’t far from home and not even the greenest copper would ping him if he was breath-tested on the way. He’d have to screw up big time – like run over a kid on a bicycle – if another one or two was going to get him into trouble. ‘And that just ain’t gunna happen,’ he said aloud to himself before taking another long draught.

‘Look out. The big fella’s going off his head,’ crowed the scruffy barfly holding up a table nearby. ‘First sign of madness, talking to yourself.’ McKinnon let it go, but the barfly persevered. ‘They say it happens to all you blokes eventually – the stress of the job and all that shit. That’s why the coppers’ union wants you all to have free sessions with the head doctors, isn’t it, mate?’ Despite his being in plain clothes, everyone down at the tavern knew his business.

McKinnon swivelled briefly in the direction of his heckler and shot him a tight smile. ‘You watch your mouth, Tony, or I’ll have the drug squad down here with a great big German Shepherd. You wouldn’t like that now, would you?’

The man paled for a moment and then bravado took hold again. ‘Oi! What bull have you been feeding this bloke, Sandy?’ he bawled in the direction of the bar. The big bartender looked up briefly and just shook his head as if he couldn’t believe the stupidity of the question. It didn’t take a genius to work out who was selling drugs at your local pub and, while McKinnon was no genius, he did pride himself on his powers of deductive reasoning.

‘I’m a detective, you dickhead,’ he barked at the drunken fool without even bothering to look in his direction. ‘Do you think I need a bartender to tell me what you’re up to?’ He stared off into the distance and took in the view of the four-lane highway, feeling smug. One of his two phones rang. It wasn’t the work phone, so it was probably his wife checking up on him. ‘G’day, darl,’ he said warmly.

‘G’day yourself, studly,’ responded a gruff male voice.

He whipped the device away from his ear and frowned at the screen. ‘Bloody hell, Maxie. What are you doing calling me on the personal number?’ Max ‘The Mauler’ Clifton was an old mate from the division who was now working vice.

‘I dunno, mate. Maybe I wanted to set up a hot date with ya.’

McKinnon let out a snort. ‘Quit stuffing around, Maxie. What’s this about?’

‘It’s about that case you just picked up over on the island – what’s it called again?’

‘Dangar?’

‘Yeah, that’s the one. A snakebite, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah, it’s looking that way. Why, what’s the drama?’

‘Nothing much, but I hear down the grapevine you’ve got a little bloke by the name of Israel Wren sniffing around.’

‘Oh yeah, the professor,’ scoffed the DI, making a note to kick Howell off the case. ‘What about him? You know him, do you?’

‘I guess you could say that. I’ll give you the skinny on him, Scotty, and you can thank me later. Remember how I was telling you I got an inside line on the Jenkins thing last year? Well, he was it. Put it this way: if it wasn’t for that little bloke finding a way to get it through my thick head that Jenkins was behind it, some young black kid would have gone down for it. Mate, I’ve got a hide like a water buffalo, but if I put away an innocent kid on murder, I’d be rooted. It’s one of the reasons I swapped over to vice – at least I know pretty much everyone I’m lookin at’s got it coming to ‘em one way or another. Anyway, I just thought I’d give you a heads up about this Wren character. He’s pretty cluey, and if he’s hanging around you might want to throw him a bone every now and then.’