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place since Elvis. The same could be said for his jeans and the grime on his hands and under his nails. His nose was flattened and slightly askew and a big piece of right eyebrow was gone.
    ‘Vin McKillop?’ I said.
    He had a length of two-by-four hardwood in his right hand, poking the fire. He looked up at me without expression. Boxer’s eyes. ‘Who wants him?’
    ‘I’m a lawyer,’ I said. ‘It’s about Danny McKillop. I know he’s dead but I need to talk to someone who knew him.’
    The man threw his two-by-four into the flames.
    ‘What about him?’ he said.
    ‘It’s about the accident. The woman’s death.’
    He picked up another splintered piece of wood. ‘He done the time,’ he said flatly.
    ‘I’m trying to find out if he done the crime.’
    The man spat into the flames. ‘What’s it to you if he done it or not done it?’
    ‘It’s complicated,’ I said. ‘Can you spare me a bit of time? There’s an interview fee.’
    ‘I’m on the job.’
    ‘Take half an hour unpaid. I’ll pay you for that too.’
    Vin McKillop positioned the wood carefully on the fire and rubbed under his nose with a forefinger. ‘There’s a pub around the corner,’ he said. ‘Cost you twenty bucks.’
    The pub was empty except for two old men sitting at a formica table in a corner looking at nothing. The place smelt of stale beer and carbolic. I got two beers and sat at a table near the door. Vin came in and went straight through the door marked GENTS. When he came back, he stood at the bar. He was making some kind of point. I picked up the beers and went over to him.
    ‘Cheers,’ I said.
    Vin didn’t say anything. He just picked up the glass and drank three-quarters of the beer. ‘So,’ he said, ‘what’s the fee?’
    I had a fifty-dollar note ready. I put it on the bar. Then I put a twenty on top of it.
    Vin put the money in his top pocket. He took a cigarette out of the same pocket without revealing the pack and lit it with a plastic lighter. He took a deep drag and let the smoke run out his nostrils. I felt like asking him for one. ‘You a Jack?’ he said.
    ‘No.’ I took out a card and held it up for him to read. He looked at it.
    ‘Need glasses,’ he said. ‘What’s it say?’
    ‘It says I’m a lawyer.’ Vin couldn’t read.
    ‘Danny don’t need a lawyer now.’
    ‘There’s his wife and child,’ I said. ‘Had you seen him recently?’
    ‘Seen him when he come out. Didn’t know him. Lost about a hundred pounds.’
    ‘What kind of work did he do before he went in?’
    ‘Nothin.’ Vin drained his beer and signalled the barman with a big, dirty finger.
    ‘Surprise you when he hit the woman that night?’
    Vin flicked his cigarette stub into the trough at our feet. It lay there smoking. He lit another one. ‘Yeah, surprised me.’ He held his cigarette hand just above the counter and drummed with his thumb.
    ‘Why’s that?’
    ‘What’s it matter? Cunt’s wormfood now.’
    Vin’s beer arrived. I paid.
    ‘It matters. Why were you surprised?’
    He drank half the beer and wiped his mouth on his cuff. ‘Hadn’t been near the car for months. He was on a year suspended for pissed driving. Fat prick was shit-scared of doing time.’
    ‘But he could’ve forgotten all that, he was so pissed.’
    Vin scratched an armpit. ‘Yeah, well, that could be right if you can work out how a bloke that’s so legless he’s passed out in Punt Road about quarter past eleven can get sober enough to go home and get his car and drive about thirty blocks to cream some bitch at twenty to twelve.’
    ‘Danny didn’t mention that before the trial.’
    ‘Fucking right.’
    ‘How do you know where he was at quarter past eleven?’
    ‘Mate of mine saw him.’
    ‘You didn’t tell the cops?’
    ‘Didn’t hear about it till after Danny was inside.’
    ‘Why didn’t your mate tell the cops at the time?’
    Vin blew two flat streams of smoke out of his nostrils. ‘Cause he was hoping Danny’d get