Dragons at the Party Read Online Free PDF Page B

Kirribilli. This small enclave on the north shore of the harbour, directly opposite the Opera House and the downtown skyscrapers, had had a chequered history. In the nineteenth century it had been the home of the wool merchants. In the 1920s middle-class apartments had been built on the waterfront. After World War Two it had gone downhill till in the late sixties it had become a nest for hippies and junkies. Then real estate agents, those latterday pioneers, had rediscovered it. Now it provided pieds-à-terre for retired millionaires, luxury apartments for some prominent businessmen, small town houses for young executives and their families and, almost as a gesture of social conscience, two or three rooming houses for those who couldn’t afford the prices of the other accommodation. Kirribilli, an Aboriginal word meaning “a good place to fish,” also provided Sydney havens for the Governor-General, the Prime Minister and ASIO, the national intelligence organization. It was natural that the local elements, including those in the rooming houses, thought of themselves as exclusive.
    The dead end street leading to Kirribilli House was blocked off by police barriers. The television and radio trucks and cars were parked on the footpaths of the narrow street. The anti-Timori demonstrators were jammed solid against the barriers; there was a sprinkling of Asians amongst them, but the majority were the regulars that Malone recognized from other demonstrations; in the past twenty years protest had become a participation sport. Standing behind the demonstrators, as if separated by some invisible social barrier, was a curious crowd of locals, some of them looking disturbed, as if already worrying about falling real estate barriers. Murder and political demos did nothing for the exclusivity of an area.
    Standing just inside the gates of Kirribilli House was a group of thirty or forty Paluccans, men, women and children. They were all well dressed, some in Western clothes, others in Eastern; they looked nothing like the photos Malone had seen of those other refugees of recent years, the Vietnamese boat people. Yet for all their air of affluence they looked frightened and lost.
    “They’re probably the lot who came in with the Timoris on the RAAF planes,” Clements said. “They’ve had them out at one of the migrant hostels.”
    “Better question them, find out if any of them were missing last night. Get Andy Graham and Joe Raudonikis to talk to them.” Then Malone noticed the three Commonwealth cars parked in the driveway. “Someone’s here from Canberra.”
    Someone was: the Prime Minister himself. As Malone and Clements walked towards the house, Philip Norval, backed by half a dozen staff and security men, came out of the front door with Police Commissioner John Leeds.
    The Commissioner, as usual, was impeccably dressed; he was the neatest man Malone had ever met. He was not in uniform, probably as a concession to the holiday weekend, but was in a beautifully cut blazer, slacks, white shirt and police tie. Why do I always feel like a slob when I meet him? Malone thought.
    Then he looked out of the corner of his eye at Clements, a real slob, and felt better.
    “Ah, Inspector Malone.” Leeds stopped with a friendly half-smile. He nodded at Clements, but he was not a man to go right down the ranks with his greetings. He turned to the Prime Minister. “Inspector Malone is in charge of the investigation, sir.”
    Philip Norval put out his hand, the famous TV smile flashing on like an arc-lamp. He gave his greetings to everyone, even those who didn’t vote for him. “ Scobie Malone? I thought you’d be out at the Test.”
    “Maybe Monday, sir. If . . .” Malone gestured towards the house. He had once played cricket for New South Wales as a fast bowler and might eventually have played for Australia; but he had enjoyed his cricket too much to be dedicated and ambitious and, though he never regretted it, had never gone on to