Chopper Unchopped (163 page)

For Ray, the knowledge that he was the bastard grandson of Henry Lawson was a source of great personal pride.

“A HUNDRED grand is a bit of money,” Ray Peddy grumbled.

Rex Slater and Robin Stokes nodded.

“Will she have the dough with her?” asked Slater.

“I don’t know,” said Peddy, “she’s coming over later, after Hector’s funeral.”

“Hector The Cannibal,” spat Stokes, “he was a sick dog.”

“Nah” said Ray, “he weren’t no dog, but he was a mental bastard, all right. No worries about that.”

“This McMahon sheila isn’t much better, is she?” sneered Stokes.

Peddy nodded. “Yeah, they reckon she’s a bit of a case. In fact, they reckon she’s a total nutter. She was with Hector when Westlock and his crew blew him away. God, I’ve heard some twisted stories about that moll, but the mad cow is talking a shit load of serious money, and she’s got it, there’s no question on that point.”

“A hundred bloody grand,” said Stokes, nodding his head happily at the mention of the money. “We can invest that and get back on top again. We’ve been sitting back watching the world go by for too long.”

“It’s about time we got up and got back into it,” said Peddy, “especially now that the whole bloody Collingwood crew is dead or in jail.”

“The old Francis Street boys can climb back out of the shadows. Piss on the bloody Reeves family, anyway,” said Slater.

Ray Peddy grinned. “Every dog has its day – even a bitch, as the old man used to say, and he probably got the gift of the gab from Henry Lawson. Anyway, they all had their day; now we have our go on the swings and slides, hey boys?”

“Yeah,” said Stokes, “and the bloody merry-go-round as well, hey Ray? Ha ha.”

The three men laughed like hell. Things were looking up.

Ray Peddy was a man aged in his early 40s, tall and thin as a shovel handle and just as hard, with the facial features of a corpse, sunken deep set blue eyes and a smile about as warm as dry ice. He had spent his whole life in the shadow of the Reeves family and the Van Goghs, and two generations of bad blood had kept the Peddy clan on the outer of Collingwood crime and politics. But this hadn’t stopped the Peddys seeing themselves as the true and rightful first family of Collingwood. To be left out, cast aside and forgotten about for more than fifty years had left the clan rotten with jealousy, resentment, bitterness and hatred.

When his cousin Richie contacted him about a hundred thousand dollar hit, with the cash being put up by none other than Penny McMahon, Hector Van Gogh’s moll, Ray Peddy knew that it was the way back in for the family. Hector had killed Ronnie Reeves, Westlock had killed Hector, so every one was dead or in jail. If Ray and his crew could kill Westlock, collect the hundred grand and, with Penny McMahon’s help, invest it in the drug trade the Peddys could be millionaires within a year.

Penny McMahon could be used, disposed of when no longer needed, and relieved of every cent she had before she was finally dropped into a hole. A thousand thoughts danced and squirmed inside Ray Peddy’s small brain as he sat in the lounge room waiting for Penny McMahon to call.

“C’mon, moll,” thought Ray Peddy “Hurry up. How long does it take to bury some no-eared mental case.”

Hector The Cannibal’s funeral seemed to be taking all afternoon.

PENNY McMahon walked away from the Carlton cemetery and climbed into the luxury of a black stretch limo. Her lawyer, Bernie Bayen, got in beside her. The driver closed the door and slid behind the wheel.

“Napoleon Street,” said Penny. “You know where that is?”

The driver was young. He glanced in the rear vision mirror and studied Penny’s face under the black lace veil.

“Collingwood,” he said. “Napoleon Street, Collingwood.”

“Yes,” said Penny. “Be a darling and take me there.”

The driver smiled and nodded as Penny pushed a button and a glass partition came up, separating the driver’s area from her own. It was black glass and very private. The glass was thick and sound proof, as well as preventing the sticky beak driver from peeking at her in his mirror.

“You’re not really going to pay Ray Peddy a hundred grand, are you Penny?”

The lady in the $3000 black silk dress pulled a plastic bag out of her black snakeskin purse and proceeded to lay a long line of snow white powder down on a small table in front of her. She didn’t answer. She was too busy snorting the speed cocaine mix up her left nostril with a straw.

“Want some?” she said. It was free, so of course he did. He was a lawyer. He took the straw and snorted until the powder had vanished.

“No, I don’t think I’ll bother giving Peddy anything more than ten grand and a head job. He’s a gutter crim,” said Penny. “A low grade bum with big dreams. An over-the-hill has been who never was. Ten up front and a promise of the rest after the event. And a little oral kindness on my part to show good will should have the fool jumping for joy.”

Bernie Bayen smiled and grabbed Penny’s leg.

“How about tossing a little oral kindness my way?” he said to his biggest client.

Penny McMahon stared coldly from behind the coke bottle glasses and black lace veil.

“Don’t push your luck, Bernie.”

“Sorry, Penny,” he said, crestfallen. “Don’t know what got into me. Must be the coke.”

Penny softened. “Maybe later,” she said in a soft voice. “I’ve got a lot on my mind at the moment.”

“Yes, of course” said Bernie. “I’m sorry.” And he was. Sorry because she wasn’t slipping that manicured hand inside his tailored suit. And sorry he’d got on the wrong side of her. He was as crooked as a Sydney cop, and he had no delusions about his client. She was a flint-hearted bitch who fancied violence almost as much as she did sex and coke.

Penny was thinking about that very subject. She turned her head and looked out the window. Sex, drugs and death, she thought. If it wasn’t one, it was the other. She shivered as the speed-cocaine mix rushed through her veins, then a warm feeling came over her. But there was an empty feeling underneath the artificial chemical glow.

The truth was, she missed Hector. What would she do now? Where would she go? Sonia was on her way back to NSW. Penny had no-one. Of course, she could return home to her family and take up her old post at St Guztov Ladies College until she got her mind right, but that seemed another world now. She loved the dark side – had sold her heart, mind, body and soul to the devil and loved every minute of it. But she needed another Hector to look after her. It was a puzzle.

She reached a decision. She would sort out this Westlock business and return to the safety of home and family and St Guztov’s, but maybe do a little after dark dirty work, just to keep her hinges oiled. Yes, that’s what she would do. She lounged back in the leather seats, relieved that she’d made up her mind.

She was day dreaming, staring absently out of the window, when she noticed something out of the corner of her eye. It was that dirty lawyer. He had his dick out and was having a three bags full, really ripping the head off it with furious intent. The speed and coke racing around in his blood had really sent him silly. His face was flushed red and ready to explode, and it wasn’t the only thing. He was staring at Penny’s black stocking legs and her stiletto shoes.

Penny turned and snapped at him: “Bernie, you had better not point that in my direction. It’s a silk dress and it will be a bugger to – no, no Bernie. Aim it away from me, for God’s sake!”

It was too late. A stream of white fluid spurted in Penny’s direction in a big, wet, sticky loop. It landed all over her, hitting the silk dress with a splat and running down her right leg.

“You dirty, dirty little man,” she snarled. “All down my dress. Oh, you’ll pay for that, you filthy little swine.”

“I can’t help it,” whined the lawyer. “You turn me on so much and you know the coke sends me silly. I’m sorry, Penny.

“After Hecky’s funeral as well, you dirty, filthy little swine. Have you no respect for the dead?” Her voice was getting shrill and hard. “None at all,” said Bernie recklessly. “I love you, Penny, I love you!” he blurted.

Penny rubbed furiously at the offending mess with a white hanky as the shamefaced legal flunkey tucked himself away.

“God, I can’t believe you did that,” hissed Penny. She had seen a thousand acts of depravity and relished each and every one of them, but this particular childish nonsense from her lawyer had her spitting chips.

“I’ll need to be punished,” said Bernie in a whimper.

“You most certainly will,” said Penny. But the thoughts going through her mind had nothing to do with the S and M, B and D scene that Bernie was hoping for.

PENNY was still trying to clean her black silk dress with her hanky when Ray Peddy opened the front door.

“Oh hi,” said Penny, dropping into her best sexy purr. “I’m Penny McMahon. Richie told me to pop over. I believe we could help each other out.”

Ray Peddy looked the woman up and down. All he could see was hips and tits wrapped in tight black silk. Penny lifted the black lace veil and gave Ray a wide smile. Her eyes looked like saucers under the thick coke bottle glasses.

Ray thought she had a very funny head on top of a very serious body.

“Come in,” he said. “What happened to your dress?”

“Oh, my silly lawyer spilt something,” she said.

“Gee, that’s no good,” said Ray. “We will have to get you out of that and give it a clean.”

Penny gave Ray a coy smile and continued on into the lounge room. Rex Slater and Robin Stokes got to their feet.

“Boys,” said Ray, “this is Miss Penny McMahon.”

Penny smiled again and gave one and all a big hello and shook hands all round. Then she removed a bundle of hundred dollar notes from her bag, followed by three more. “There is ten thousand dollars there, Ray,” she said as she handed the cash to him, “just to show good will.”

Ray Peddy’s eyes nearly fell out.

“Would one of you fellows be good enough to unzip me?” asked Penny. “Ray, I believe you mentioned something about cleaning my dress?”

“Oh yeah,” said Ray. “Rex, do ya reckon ya could get rid of that stain?”

Rex Slater stood with his mouth open as Robin Stokes jumped to and unzipped the black silk dress. Penny stepped out of it, wearing black elastic top stockings, a black gee string and not a lot else.

“Well,” said Penny, “while Rex cleans my dress I might take you two boys into the bedroom and clean you. Is that okay with you, Ray?”

The evil-eyed man nodded.

“What about you, Robin?” she said sweetly, turning to him.

Another nod.

“What about me?” said Rex, as Penny walked down the hallway with Ray and Robin in tow.

She called back, “Well, if you want some, darling, you had best get my dress cleaned up.” With that, Rex turned and headed into the bathroom and started up a storm of soap suds and running water. He turned into Mr Sheen with a hard-on.

“ONE thing I can’t cop,” said Westlock, “is these boot scooting, bum rooting modern day cowboys.”

“I completely agree,” said Holliday.

The two men walked out of the house on Hanover Street and climbed into Doc’s sister’s brand new 1996 Audi A4 sedan.

“Your bloody sister is doing okay,” said Westlock.

“So she should be,” said Holliday, “she’s on her third husband and he’s got a dodgy ticker. Yeah, I reckon Helen will see him off as well.”

“She’s not a lot to look at either,” said Westlock, “I don’t know how she does it.”

“Ya not wrong, Graeme” said Doc, “poor old Helen was born with a face like a kicked-in shit tin and she’s been losing ground in the looks department ever since. But she seems to stooge these wealthy old goats into marrying her, all right.”

“Ha ha,” Westlock laughed. “When does she get back from America?”

“Oh, about a month, I think.”

“I hope she takes them photos for me,” said Westlock. He had asked Helen Holliday the merry widow to take some photos of Tombstone in Arizona, Dodge City in Kansas and San Antonio in Texas. He was keen on the cemeteries and final resting places of some of America’s more famed wild west gunslingers.

“Yeah, she’ll remember to do all that,” said Holliday confidently.

“Okay, Doc,” said Westlock “It’s time to hit ’em up and move ’em out,” and with that Holliday patted the Audi into gear, dropped the clutch as if he was Peter Brock and roared off down Hanover Street.

“Where we going, anyway?” he asked when they got to the first intersection.

“Head over to Little Wellington Street, Collingwood. I got to see Frankie Farrell’s wife,” Westlock said.

Frankie Farrell was serving four years for a bungled armed robbery on a petrol station. He’d done two years and was desperate for parole. His wife, Jan Farrell, had rung St Kilda Road police complex with an urgent message for Westlock to contact her on Saturday morning, but Westlock wasn’t seeing anybody till Hector Van Gogh was safely in his grave.

Jan Farrell was a table dancer at a King Street night club and earned extra on the side by dating some of the club’s more upmarket clientele. Or, more to the point, allowing some of the more upmarket clientele to date her. Jan enjoyed the society of scoundrels and being treated in a somewhat cavalier fashion, sexually speaking, in return for mucho dinero.

Hawking the fork seemed to Jan the perfect way to get herself and Frankie financially ahead of the game while he was in prison. And it wasn’t just the money. While he wasn’t around, she liked misbehaving. Frankie Farrell was the High Chamberlain of mentally challenged nitwits and a glamour wife with a geisha girl face and a baby oil arse was the only way Frankie would ever get a dollar in his pocket.

And if Jan was anything she looked glamourous. “Why is it,” wondered Westlock, “that losers like Farrell ended up with sweethearts like Jan?” Life and love were at times a great mystery to Westlock.

Meanwhile, Holliday pulled up outside the neat single fronted white weatherboard house in Little Wellington Street.

“Wait here,” said Westlock. He got out of the car, walked to the gate, stepped over it and in four steps reached the front door. He rang the bell. The door opened a moment later. Holliday took a good look at Jan Farrell from the car. She was all hips and tits, a long-legged slut with this petite pixie face. A white girl with a China doll exquisite face. She smiled at Westlock and Holliday at once saw the look he had seen a thousand times before. It was a whore’s face. She was giving Westlock the old “Hello Sailor” smile. If old Graeme doesn’t get his end in here there’s something wrong, he thought to himself.