office and back as it suits me and them. Thatâs it,â she said. âI phone out for groceries, grog and pizza.â
âWhat about when you meet up with Mr X?â
âOh, Iâd be safe enough with him.â
I left and went to the gym for the lightest of workouts and a long soak in the spa. Back in the office I worked the Internet and the phone. I discovered that Liston was officially one of the thirty most disadvantaged postcodes in the country according to a sociological survey. The suburb had been named after a local farm and had become a dumping ground for battlers needing Department of Housing help in the eighties. Back then, it was at a distance from Campbelltownâout of sight and mind. It had a very high level of unemployment and welfare dependency and a considerable Aboriginal population.
I had contacts in the parole system and social services and from some of them I got a picture of how the place had changed in recent years.
Terri Boxall, a parole officer, said, âIt was a shithole to start with. One of those good ideas gone wrong. They built the houses cheek by jowl all facing this big open parkland with virtually no private space per house. The dead-end kids turned the open space into no-go areas and the rest of the people huddled inside by the tele drinking and producing more dead-end kids.â
âYou imply itâs got better.â
âIt sure has. The Department turned the houses aroundâremodelled them so they faced away and knocked some down so there was some private space.â
âI canât imagine a government department being that imaginative. Worked, did it?â
âTo an extent, but the big thing was the introduction of the Islanders.â
That got my attention. âIslanders?â
âSamoans, Tongans, Fijians. They sorted out the car thieves, burglars and yahoos. Theyâre churchy, you know? Law-abiding, despite their problems.â
âWhen was this, Terri?â
âItâs been progressive. Probably started eight, ten years ago.â
âThat could fit.â
âWhatâs your interest, Cliff ?â
âIâm looking for a woman named Billie Marchant. Ever heard the name?â
âSorry, no.â
âI know sheâs got friends out there, and sheâs got a kid and Iâm assuming sheâs in touch with him. I donât know how old he isâmaybe fifteen, maybe more. In a photo he looks to be black.â
âWhatâs his name? Are they in your kind of trouble?â
âNo, not directly. I just might be able to help them. Hard to say at this point. I donât know his name.â
âGood luck. Tell you what, thereâs a sort of community protection set-up there. Iâve got a few . . . clients in Liston and these people help me keep tabs on them from time to time.â
âCommunity protection?â
âCivil rights fundamentalists might call it vigilantism. I wouldnât. Have a word with John Manuma. Mention my name.â
âGot a phone number?â
âHe wouldnât be interested in talking to you on the phone, Cliff. Youâd have to front him, face to face, as it were.â
âAs it were?â
âHeâs a Samoan, two hundred centimetres or thereabouts.â
âThat tops me by a fair bit. Shouldnât be hard to spot.â
Terri told me that the community protection office was a shopfront in Listonâs only commercial centre and that it was staffed by volunteers and open seven days a week, so Saturday wasnât going to be a problem. I wasnât going out there today because tonight I was going to keep an eye on Lou Kramer, hoping to find out who her Mr X was. She was playing her game by her own rules, and in mine you just canât be too careful.
After a quiet afternoon, I was in my car at 6 pm equipped with field glasses and a camera, stationed across the way from the entrance to the Surrey Apartments.