by Vanda Symon
Oh, the relief of a scorching-hot shower, washing away the chill and weight of the day. After what felt like hours stuck in cesspit squalor, and then being the bearer of bad news, despite the headache I’d felt the need for an after-work burn-off and the meditative effects of pounding one foot in front of the other. My doctor had told me to lay off exercise for a while, but I decided the mental-health benefits of a run outweighed any possible physical risks. My chosen route avoided the botanic garden –there were memories there I didn’t need to revisit right now – and instead the allure of the Green Belt had beckoned. Our native forests were mostly evergreen, so even in its winter guise, its dense, darker-hued solitude and stillness soothed my mind and warmed my mood. And with it snaking across the city, reaching halfway up the hillsides, you were rewarded with tantalising peeks of the harbour and out to sea. Maggie and I lived in a semi-detached bungalow up in Roseberry Street, which meant that in order to get home each night I had to pass through the Green Belt. Its trees and lush-green foliage seemed to provide a mental, as well as the obvious physical, demarcation between the hassles of work and the haven of home.
‘I will never complain about you skiving off washing the dishes ever again,’ I said as I shoved aside last night’s pots to make room for my cup of tea. After my interludes at the Castle Street flat it had been tempting to get clean before my run, but I was glad I managed to resist the urge to shower until after my exertions. Still, it was a temptation to decontaminate my work clothes, or at least sprinkle them with flea powder. I had decided Maggie’s and my housekeeping prowess wasn’t as bad as we originally thought.
‘That’s rich coming from someone who seems to be allergic to vacuuming.’
‘Well the damned thing sucks, or doesn’t, which is the main problem.’
‘You could try emptying it.’
‘Oh, is that what the little red indicator thingy is for?’
Domesticity was never going to be one of my strong points. I was perfectly capable, just reluctant. As far as I was concerned life was too short, and no one ever died from a lack of housework, although I suspected disaster might only be an infestation away in Castle Street.
‘What are you up to tonight?’ I asked. My headspace had improved, and I was in a get-out-of-the-house mood. Although, if I was honest, I was in a stay-away-from-the-phone mood. I’d decided on the perfect solution to avoid being hassled by landlines or the cellular variety. ‘We should go see a movie.’
‘Can’t, sorry,’ Maggie said. ‘Mr Hunk’s taking me to a faculty function – one of those boring things where you drink too much wine, don’t get enough food to absorb it all, then have to try and hold intelligent conversations with people who make Einstein look like a dunce and know a damn sight more about everything than you do.’
‘Yippee. Why go then?’
‘Did I mention the wine was free?’
‘Sounds fun. Need a chaperone?’
‘No.’ Maggie let out a laugh. ‘So,’ she said emphatically. ‘When’s Paul coming over next?’
Damn, was I that transparent?
‘This weekend, I think,’ I said, and pretended to get busy tidying up the bench. My diversionary tactics didn’t work.
‘You think? You’re not sure?’ I could tell from her sceptical tone she wasn’t going to let it go.
‘This weekend, definitely.’
There was a pause, and I was pretty confident what the next question was going to be.
‘Have you talked to him since you got back?’
Yup, as anticipated. I turned around, to see Maggs standing there, head tilted, sporting her well-I’m-waiting look.
‘He rang today to see how I was, but there was too much happening at work to talk for long,’ I said, which was the truth. The office wasn’t exactly private either, and Smithy had never warmed to Paul and gave me frosty looks whenever I was on the phone to him, so I avoided it as much as possible.
‘I really hope you’re going to sort it all out this weekend. You can’t go on being so non-committal about him, it’s not fair. Not fair on him and not good for you.’ It wasn’t like she was saying anything I didn’t already know, but it wasn’t as simple as just sorting it out. If only.
‘We’ll talk about it this weekend, face to face and when we’ve got time. Until then I’ve got way too much going on at work to waste energy worrying about it.’ A defensive edge had crept into my voice. I dropped my eyes to avoid her laser-beam glare.
‘All I can say is, don’t cock this one up, Sam. Life seldom throws you a guy like him. Don’t do anything stupid.’
27
Marlene Stewart wore a sharp black trouser suit, with a black turtleneck jersey underneath the jacket, and a black silk scarf knotted around her throat. The only hint of colour in her ensemble was the navy-blue calfskin gloves lying perfectly, one atop the other, on the table beside her pale, clutched hands. Her make-up was flawless, the striking red of her lipstick contrasting with the pallor of her skin. She wore eyeliner and shadow, but not mascara. The perfect arch of her eyebrows framed a face fighting for control and etched with pain. Richard Stewart Senior stood behind her, flagpole rigid, but with one hand on his wife’s shoulder. Richard Junior’s nickname of Clifford could have applied to his father too. He was big and redheaded, with the damaged skin of someone fair who had spent a lifetime in the sun.
‘Thank you for coming in today. We appreciate how difficult this must be for you both.’
They had declined the offer to be interviewed at their house; I could understand them not wanting the police or anyone associated with the criminal business of their son’s death defiling the precious sanctity of their home.
‘Why don’t you take a seat, Mr Stewart.’ I indicated the chair opposite and noted the shared look of despair between the two as he sat and they reached out for each other’s hands.
‘We need to ask you some questions about your son. I apologise in advance if any of them may seem difficult or inconsiderate, but we need as much information as we can get in order to bring Richard’s killer to justice.’
Smithy had asked me to conduct the interview. He thought a feminine touch would be better, given the circumstances. Just because my system was oestrogen-heavy, though, didn’t mean I was any better equipped to handle these emotionally charged occasions.
‘If we could start by asking when you last had contact with Richard?’
It was Richard Senior who answered the question, his voice firm, if slightly nasal. ‘We were talking about it last night, after you left, and it was definitely on Sunday the thirtieth of August; that was the weekend that ship got stuck at Aramoana.’
The ship grounding was going to be one of those pivotal events in history around here, one of those moments when everyone could remember where they were and what they were doing; like I could remember where I was when Lady Di was killed: a kid, in the milking shed with Dad, listening to reports on the radio. Or, for those a little older, where they were when man first landed on the moon.
‘Did you see him, or was this a phone call?’
‘Phone call. He was at home for dinner with us on the Friday night, but we didn’t see him for the rest of that weekend because he had something on with his friends. He didn’t say what exactly. Marlene would have talked with him on the phone on Sunday evening around eight-thirty, wouldn’t it have been? Just before Bones started on the TV?’
I looked at Marlene for clarification and she nodded before looking away.
‘Did he regularly come home for a meal?’
I’d addressed the question to Marlene, but Richard Senior replied. ‘He did most weeks; at least that way we knew he got one decent feed. I don’t think they ate well at his flat.’ It would seem they had decided Richard Senior was the designated speaker. ‘We didn’t like his flat. It was very … Well, it was foul, and down there with all the students – but he seemed to think it was all right. He wasn’t about to move, although we thought he could have done better.’
I got that; as a parent, I’d have been disappointed too.
‘Was he a student?’
‘Not exactly. He had a job as an electrician, at Cartright’s, but he was doing a few business papers at the university part time to expand his skills. At least that was something positive.’
‘Did he talk much about his flatmates?’
‘No, not really. One of them, Leo, we already knew, as they went to school together. He was a nice enough boy. But the other one was a dead loss. To be honest, we didn’t often bring it up with him – or the other areas of his life we didn’t agree with – it just ended in arguments and upset everyone, so we tried to keep the peace. He didn’t tell us much about anything and we stopped asking.’
I felt a pang of pity for this man, for both of them. He was acknowledging his son wasn’t exactly squeaky clean, and I was grateful he was gracious enough to provide me with an opening for what could otherwise have been an awkward line of questioning. It couldn’t have been easy for them.
‘So you were aware of his past convictions for drug supply and stolen goods?’
He took a large breath. ‘Yes, and it broke our hearts. You know, we’re a good family. We gave him everything he could need as a child, did our best for him, but he got in with the wrong crowd as a teenager and he went a bit off the rails. Not hugely, I mean – he wasn’t doing any major crime or anything like that and, thank God, he didn’t seem to have a big problem with using drugs himself. He was a good boy, deep down, a really good boy.’
Marlene’s shoulders were starting to shake and I saw Richard Senior lean over and give her a little nudge of reassurance.
‘Do you think he was still involved in the drug business?’
‘Like I said, we couldn’t talk about anything like that with him, but yes, I do believe he was still involved.’ His resolve was beginning to crumble and the change in his voice was reflected in the increased crumpling of Marlene’s face. ‘And we’re really worried that all this, everything that has happened to him, is because of it.’
It was clear I had two people here who dearly loved their son, but could not reconcile themselves with what he did. It would seem they regretted their lack of communication with him, but what else could they have done? He was a grown man who made his own choices. Still, I guessed that was something they’d mull over for a very long time. I was trying to be as objective as possible and not fuel their assumptions; that way any information they gave would be unbiased and not tailored to fit our preconceived ideas. I chose my words carefully.
‘We have to consider that Richard’s death may have been as a result of his involvement with drugs, especially considering his previous conviction; but we also have to be open-minded and look at all possibilities in this investigation.’
A moment of quiet descended upon the room – quiet suffused with anguish.
‘They made it look like an accident, dumping him? What kind of people would do a thing like that?’ Richard Senior asked.
‘Yes, they did,’ I said. ‘I know it is hard to imagine that there are people capable of committing such acts.’
His next question came out hoarse, almost a whisper. ‘And he’s so bad we can’t see him, not at all?’
Jesus. The mental image of Clifford came into my head, and I found my eyes misting up despite my efforts to stay strong, stay professional.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. My voice wavered. ‘Please, you don’t want to remember him like that.’
The last shreds of control deserted Marlene’s face, and large tears rolled down her cheeks. She reached out and grasped at my hand, the shock of physical contact almost as much as the shock of hearing her grief-laden voice.
‘You find who did this to my boy,’ she said, her eyes locked with mine. ‘You promise me you’ll find them.’
I felt the warmth and trickle of moisture down the side of my face.
‘I will,’ I said. ‘I will.’
28
I slid into a chair at Nova, thanked the waitress who placed a glass of water in front of me, and checked out the menu. After this morning I needed a breather and a complete change of scene, not to mention some real sustenance. I’d have killed for a wine. I’d been a good pixie and made my lunch most days this week, so I’d sidled today’s into the rubbish bin on the way out the office door. I quite enjoyed dining alone, even if you did get odd looks from the other punters. At least it was lunchtime, so the looks didn’t carry the sympathetic edge they often did for those flying solo at dinner. What was so odd about a girl dining alone? Mind you, if I kept up my cowardly ways, I’d be dining alone permanently. I’d taken the pathetic way out last night and pretended I was at the movies, seeing as I couldn’t do the real thing. I turned my cellphone off and didn’t answer the landline when it rang. Sometimes a girl just couldn’t face confrontation, even if it came cached in gentle words and a melty voice.
There was something decidedly odd about the chap dining at the table opposite me. He was quite an attractive guy to look at: dark hair, full beard, mid-twenties, though it was hard to tell with all the face fuzz – that was one trend I wished would go away. He was tidily dressed, but there was nothing regular about his eating style. His movements were jerky and pronounced – they reminded me of when kids take a big lurching swing at things and miss. It took him three goes to get his mouth into position to drink his coffee from the straw balanced in the cup, then, when he finally did, he knocked the straw and it fell out onto the table. I watched the painstaking process of swinging his hand to pick it up and then getting the straw back in the cup. The coffee would have gone cold in the time it took. I looked at what he was eating and realised there was no way in hell he was going to be able to cut up the bacon by himself, although the eggs were doable. I looked around to see if any of the waiting staff were keeping an eye on him, but they were busy running around after the recent influx of lunch guests. The people at the next table had positioned themselves with their backs to him, probably so they didn’t have to watch, because it was slow and laborious, and borderline excruciating. By this time he’d managed a slurp of the coffee and was directing his attentions at the bacon.
He had a couple of goes at it, failed, and then, with his jerking movements, looked up, trying to catch the eye of the waitress. None were in the vicinity. His eyes then fell on me. He had startling, pale-blue eyes that were sharp, penetrating and eagle-like. You could almost see the cogs whirring around at high speed – the brain was clearly in much better working order than the body.
The moment he looked at me, one word popped into my head: ‘Spaz’. It had to be. I made an executive decision, got up and walked over to him.
‘Hi, I’m Sam.’ I pointed to his lunch. ‘Do you want me to cut that for you?’ I hoped he wouldn’t be offended at my offer. Was it politically correct to offer assistance nowadays or were we supposed to politely ignore those clearly in need of help, in case we hurt their feelings? I opted for the possibility of a large social faux pas and took the ‘help out’ option.
He looked up at me with a jerk. He had to move his jaw to the point of dislocation to come out with the words ‘Yes, please’.
I set to cutting up the bacon and arranging things on his plate so they were in bite-sized piles. I’d had to perform similar operations for my niece and nephew, and one of the farm workers when he’d busted his arm and had one of those stickie-outie casts. How could I approach the question of whether or not he was a colleague of the victim? I couldn’t come straight out and ask, Hey, is your name Spaz? That was the kind of thing that could silence a room and result in being thrown out by the management. I took the safe option.
‘What’s your name?’ I asked.
‘Cedric,’ he said, eventually. At least I think it was Cedric.
My God, not only did he have cerebral palsy or something equally challenging, but his parents had saddled him with a name like that. No wonder everyone called him Spaz.
‘Cedric, are you by chance at university?’
He nodded. ‘Why?’
‘I’m actually a detective, Sam Shephard,’ I gave myself a promotion to avoid having to explain the ‘detective constable’ bit, ‘and someone gave us a description of someone like you’ – shit, that sounded condescending – ‘as part of one of our enquiries, but they called them Spaz.’ I said the name as quietly as possible but still imagined everyone in the restaurant turning around to look.
‘You’re a bit short for a detective.’
‘Pardon?’ I looked at him and saw the sparkle in his eye and realised he was taking the piss. I recognised the reference with a clunk from my misspent deep-space-obsessed youth, and couldn’t help but laugh. Personally Han Solo was my man, I always went for the rakish ones.
‘You’ve been watching too much Star Wars, and no, I’m not here to rescue you.’
‘But you have,’ he said and nodded towards his plate. The movement just about threw him off balance. He then lifted his hands up and thrust them at me, wrists together. ‘Am I under arrest?’
Talk about ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’. Here I was feeling sorry for the guy, and as it turned out he was a bloody comedian, and strangely charming at that.
The waitress finally turned up and looked at me with suspicion. ‘Is there a problem?’ she asked. Suddenly I felt guilty, which was nuts. I could see Cedric’s amusement at my discomfort. Was it politically incorrect to clip a disabled guy around the ear?