Challis - 03 - Snapshot

by Garry Disher

  Not everyone can take the pressure, Vyner said. The heat was indescribable, dust storms, Arab fanatics taking pot shots at you all the time, no wonder some guys lost the plot. But Sammy was always there for us. Until one day this total he almost said arsehole, then did say itarsehole of a lieutenant tears strips off him for comforting a guy whod crawled into a foxhole in tears. Well, it was totally unfair, so I punched him out.

  Mrs Plowman shook her head. And they discharged you? Its disgraceful, it really is.

  Vyner sighed. I feel good about myself in the sense that I know I did the right thing, even if it was an act of violence, but now Ive got a black mark against my name and something like that follows you around, makes it hard to get a job, hard to get references...

  Mrs Plowman said firmly, Stay there, and left the room. Vyner allowed himself a small grin, then strained to hear the start of the seven oclock news on the old bags TV set, which was quietly murmuring in a little nook on the other side of an archway in the open-plan room. He caught the words anonymous caller and police are anxious to speak to and his skin went cold. At the same time, his mobile phone rang. He had a text message, but before he could read it, Mrs Plowman returned with her purse, flushing, determined to do the right thing by a friend of her son, a friend whod been tossed onto the scrap heap by an uncaring system to the tuneVyner tried to count the notes in her little fistof around $500.

  Well, a guy had to eat. He was still due the remaining $10,000 for this mornings hit, but it wasnt like he got paid to top someone every weekor even every yearso meanwhile you took what you could get. Five minutes later, he was in his car, reading his SMS. It said simply: elimin8 anon callr.

  It had to be Gent, the fuckup.

  Vyner reached into the glove box for his notebook. A latex glove spilled out, a box of matches, a spare brakelight bulb, and finally his chewed Bic pen.

  I am the jagged tooth of a lone crag, he wrote.

  He thought some more.

  I am the doom maker.

  Too bad that he had to return to the Peninsula. Too bad that he wouldnt be paid for this hit.

  * * * *

  Challis received two calls while he waited for a breakdown truck to cart his car away from Lofty Ridge Road and a taxi to take him home.

  Tessa Kane got in first. How come I have to hear it on the seven oclock news, Hal?

  Honestly, it slipped my mind, he said truthfully.

  He was pleased to hear a friendly voice in the darkness, but the conversation went wrong in subtle and obscure ways. Exactly what did this person tell you? Tessa demanded.

  Very little.

  A man or a woman?

  Is this off the record?

  In the last few months you havent thought highly enough of me to tell me anything on the record. It seems that I call you, you never call me.

  Challis felt a twist of futility and anger. A part of him wanted to appease her, a part of him wanted to help her, and a smaller part of him wanted to see her again. He tried to get comfortable in the cramped space of the Triumph. He said, quote, I didnt think hed go that far.

  Tessa absorbed that. What else?

  Nothing.

  He waited. But Tessa could outwait him any day of the week. He asked if I was in charge of the case. I said yes. Then he got spooked and cut the call.

  Tessa said nothing.

  He got agitated and asked if Id put a trace on the call. I had, and Id taped it. But the trace failed.

  Caller ID?

  I rang the number, finally someone answered. It was a coin phone in a supermarket.

  Which one?

  Look, Tess, I cant say any more.

  He heardand in his minds eye, sawher bristle, but the explosion didnt come. All right, she said, and cut the call.

  Challis sighed, and at once the phone rang again. Challis, he said.

  McQuarrie here.

  Yes, sir.

  The superintendent was clipped. Why wasnt I told?

  Sir?

  This anonymous tipoff.

  Sir, I

  I have to hear about it on the evening news.

  It wasnt a tipoff as such. A man called. He seemed rattled, as though a shooting hadnt been part of the plan this morning, but hung up before I could question him.

  Didnt it occur to you that by plastering it all over the news youve scared the shooter off, not to mention that he might start killing his accomplices to shut them up?

  Challis said evenly, Its a calculated risk.

  Be it on your head, Inspector, be it on your head. Anything else?

  Not at present.

  Well, keep digging.

  Sir, Challis said, but the line was dead.

  Then he made a call of his own.

  * * * *

  20

  Ellen cooked lasagne for dinner, knowing that it would please her husband. She recognised the impulse, one familiar to social workers, counsellors and the police from endless domestic violence situations, in which womenand sometimes menstrove futilely to please their spouses, patch up squabbles, mend cracks, keep the peaceuntil it all blew up again.

  She hated herself for it.

  But did you just throw away twenty years of marriage without trying? She knew the pressure that Alan was under. The man shed marriedbig, bluff, competent and cheerfulhad gradually been ground down by disappointments. He felt left behind by his colleagues and his wife, and hadnt the strategies to adjust to or rise above the situation.

  Hed been an only child, that was part of the problem. Because his parents had indulged him, and hed never disappointed their modest expectations, or encountered significant setbacks or challenges early in life, hed coasted uncomplicatedly through school and later the police academy. Life to him was easy, predictable and not all that serious. But then had come the regular, mundane but testing responsibilities of full-time work, marriage, fatherhood and a mortgage. The world wasnt small any more, but big, and full of ambitious, talented and hardworking men and women. He was ill-prepared and only moderately talented. He didnt take to drink, drugs or sleeping around to make himself better; instead, he developed biting suspicions and grievances, which he kept barely contained. He fumed, his brow permanently dark. He hated the world and, Ellen suspected, hated himself.

  There was a yellowing photo of him on the fridge, and she glanced at it while she cooked. Taken when he was twenty-two, he was a fine-looking man, grinning widely as he passed out of the police academy. It hurt her to think that so cheerful and invincible a man could be reduced to sourness and futility.

  And so she was cooking him a lasagne, to make him feel better, to atone for the morning, to put the world right again. She hated herself for it. Once upon a time, shed cooked lasagne out of love. Now she cooked it because love had gone. Did lasagne ever bring love back? She thought of Janine McQuarrie then, and wondered about her strategies for enduring a loveless marriage. Ellen and Alan ate early, a habit set years earlier, when theyd had a child in the house.

  Like it?

  Its delicious, he said, chomping away. It occurred to her then that he did eat more than he used to, and exercised less. Maybe hes depressed, she thought, but she had no idea how shed ever broach that subject with him.

  Meanwhile he was comforted by the food he was eating, so she told him about her day: the circumstances of the murder, the unappealing personalities of the main players, the anonymous caller. Hal thinks she said.

  He cut across her. Hal thinks, Hal thinks. Youre always going on about what lover boy thinks.

  Alans head was full of sour imaginings, and he half believed that she was attracted to or had even slept with Challis. Fed up suddenly, Ellen said, Keep it up, Alan, and you might get what you wished for.

  He flushed, scowled and looked away impotently, then swung his head back to her. Do you want to know how my day has been?

  Why dont you tell me, she said in an uninflected voice.

  While you and lover boy have been swanning around the Peninsula, mixing with the rich and
powerful, I have been measuring skid marks and collecting chips of glass and paint at accident sites. Ive been sloshing around in blood and motor oil, getting my hands dirty. Welcome to the real world, Ellen.

  This was another old refrain, life as a competition. She didnt buy into it but packed the dishwasher and settled herself in front of the TV, feeling small and alone. Alan joined her. At once she returned to the kitchen and phoned Larrayne, who was distracted and uncommunicative. The conversation faltered and then Alan was there, tapping his watch face to tell her this was becoming a costly phone call. Have to go, sweetie, she said. Want to speak to Dad?

  It was a small victory and she relished it. Alan took the phone from her and talked for a few strangled minutes, clearly counting the mounting dollars and cents. Eventually he hung up and said ferociously, Why do women say in thirty minutes what can be said in five?

  Shes our daughter, for Gods sake, Ellen said.

  She dodged around him and returned to the sitting room, where The 7.30 Report was discussing legal definitions of the provocation defence in cases of domestic assault and homicide. Poor bastard, said Alan feelingly of one of the studio guests, a league footballer and notorious wife-basher.

  What would you know, muttered Ellen, aware that she sounded about fifteen.

  Alan shrugged, strange, conflicting expressions passing across his face, as though he wanted to strike her and felt he had the right, as though he was scared to think he couldnt control himself, and as though he had access to secret knowledge and courses of action. Fed up, and not trusting herself, Ellen walked to the kitchen pantry and dug out the jar of chocolate biscuits, eating one standing up at the sink and staring out at the night.

  Dont I get one? her husband said.

  Wordlessly she nudged the jar towards him.

  Cat got your tongue?

  Ellen was saved by the wall phone above the bench. Hal! she said, her eyes hard on her husband now.

  Challis explained, in his mild, pleasant rasp, that his car was stuffed and asked if she could give him a lift to work in the morning.

  A lift? Sure, Hal, pick you up at eight, she said, her voice animated for her husbands sake and her own.

  * * * *

  21

  At six-thirty the next morning, Challis walked along the dirt roads near his home, lubricating his stiff joints. He passed an orchard, a berry farm and a plaything vineyard owned by a Melbourne stockbroker. Challis was the odd one out. He had a salary and did nothing with his two hectares but watch the grass grow and turn the fruit from his old plum trees into jam every summer.

  Another sea fret this morning, and apparently nothing and no one about, only the blasts of the foghorns, carried mournfully to him from the Bay, reminding him that he was not alone in the world. He increased his pace, his body responding, until he came to a bend in the road and face to face with a kangaroo, as surprised to see it as it was to see him. They faced one another for a taut moment; it was a big roo, at least two metres high, and probably from the small mob rumoured to live in uncleared land near the old reservoir. Then the animal turned powerfully, leapt a fence and was swallowed by the fog.

  Challis went on, his heart hammering, to the top of the hill, passing the farm where, as always, four outraged dogs followed him along the fence line. There was no relief from the fog. He turned around and went back down the hill again, while the foghorns called and condensation splashed fatly on the fallen leaves around him. He thought about the child, Georgia, running from the killers, hiding, then emerging again to call for help on her dead mothers mobile phone, pressing 000, her tongue tip showing in the corner of her mouth. Hed listened to the tape yesterday: a precise little voice, very clear about her name and the name of the street, Lofty Ridge Road, and the street number, and assuring the operator that yes, her mother had been shot dead.

  He wondered about the gun. Were the killers local? Had the shooter obtained the gun locally?

  And who was their anonymous caller? Someone associated with Christina Traynor? Janine?

  Finally, someone would have to interview Mrs Super some time today.

  He stopped at his mailbox, retrieved the Age and a litre of milk, and walked up his driveway, avoiding the boggy lawn. At the back door he removed his boots and went inside to shower, dress and make coffee and toast.

  He breakfasted where a patch of sunlight slanted across his kitchen table, flicking through the Age, which carried the news of Janine McQuarries murder on the front page, together with a couple of sidebars, one on himself and the other on the anonymous caller. Hed finished and was rinsing his cup and plate when he heard a vehicle and peered out of his kitchen window, which looked onto the gravelled turnaround where visiting cars parked. Ellen Destry. She was early.

  She knocked on his back door and he stood aside to let her in. Youve got pittosporum outside your front gate, she announced. And blackberries.

  Have I?

  You need Pam Murphy. She belongs to a crowd called the Bushrats, who go around clearing weeds on public land.

  Ellen was cheerful but bore the chilly air with her, leaving behind cool, damp eddies as she passed him.

  Coffee?

  Thanks. I love your coffee. Sorry Im early.

  Youre early because you hope Ill offer coffee.

  Nothing wrong with your deductive instincts.

  She strolled ahead of him to the kitchen, unbuttoning her jacket, and that single action, and her easy familiarity with him in his house, rattled Challis. Again he wanted to touch her. What was wrong with him?

  It was scarcely easier in the kitchen. She hung her jacket on the back of his usual chair and sat, relaxed and confident, asking, with a kind of bright-eyed gaze, Can you froth the milk?

  Sure.

  Challis busied himself with cleaning out the espresso pot and filling it with water and fresh coffee grounds. Something to eat?

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw her pat her trim stomach. She looked sharp and fresh: tailored pants, a long-sleeved top, wings of fair, staticky hair swinging about her shoulders. Better not.

  I have croissants in the freezer.

  Oh, God.

  He laughed, microwaved a frozen croissant, and placed it before her on a plate, together with a pot of his own plum jam. She reached out a hand challengingly.

  Go ahead, he said. Give yourself a sugar hit.

  I think I will.

  She tore the croissant into pieces, spread jam and began to eat, her tongue darting after crumbs. Then she froze: a car had pulled up in his driveway. She glanced tensely at the window. Expecting visitors?

  At that moment, he guessed exactly what was uppermost in her mind: she was fearful that her husband had followed her. It didnt matter that her presence here was warranted. Alan Destry was the type of man to harbour suspicions and act on them. Challis touched her wrist briefly, got up and went to the window. He didnt know the car. Meanwhile, whoever had been driving it knocked on his front door. Probably Bible bashers, he murmured. As he left the room he heard her get to her feet and move across to the kitchen window.

  He opened the front door to two men, who were interchangeable in their plain grey suits and cropped hair, but one man was thin, the other bulky. Both looked as if theyd been up for hours. They flashed Federal Police ID and one of them said Christina Traynor while the other watched him.

  Federal? thought Challis. Have I got myself into a jurisdictional tussle? More and more did he feel that he was living through the clichs of TV cop shows. We could have done this in my office, he said mildly.

  No we couldnt, said the thin man.

  Challis shrugged. Whats your interest in Christina Traynor?

  Wrong question, said the thin one. Whats yours?

  Lets do this inside, Challis said, and he took them through to his kitchen. Ellen sprang to her feet and watched guardedly.

  The men stopped, glanced inquiringly at Challis, who thought that he might as well make everything clear. This is Sergeant Ellen Destry, from Waterloo. My
car has broken down and shes giving me a lift to work. In fact, we should probably leave now.

  No chance, said the thin man.

  Challis gave him an empty smile. Then may I offer coffee? Proper coffee, not instant.

  We didnt know youd have company.

  If this is about Christina Traynor, Challis said emphatically, then Sergeant Destry stays. Shes part of the investigation and knows as much as I do. So, coffee?