Only the Dead

by Ben Sanders

  ‘Not really,’ she said. ‘A lot of his friends were through his wife. I think he lost touch with them after the split.’

  ‘What about people at work?’

  ‘There’s a guy called Charlie. The surname’ll come to me in a minute.’

  ‘Okay. Who’s Charlie?’

  ‘He knew Ian. They worked together a lot, I think. He’s still with the police.’

  ‘Have you met him?’

  ‘I did actually. Many years ago. They graduated Police College together. I met him then.’

  ‘Do you have any way of contacting him?’

  ‘Ian will probably have a number somewhere. It’ll be with all his things.’

  ‘You mind if I have a look?’

  ‘No, I don’t mind.’

  She looked at him quietly. ‘What’s made you feel you got to dig through all this misery?’

  ‘I just feel like I should.’

  She didn’t answer.

  He said, ‘I’ve done a lot of things in my life I regret. I just want to do something that I don’t.’

  She smiled. She said, ‘You seem like a decent chap. I wish I could absolve you of whatever it is that makes you feel you’ve got to do what you’re doing.’

  Her eyes teared up. She removed her glasses and cleaned them on a sleeve and slipped them on again. She watched Oprah for a brief moment. ‘I remember holding him at the hospital,’ she said. ‘Probably the happiest day of my life. But maybe I should have left him there for some body else if I knew where he was going to wind up a little further up the street. I don’t know.’

  Duvall didn’t know what to say to that. He stood up. The woman set the cat on the floor and gathered the crutches. She stood awkwardly: gulps and a grimace. A wide stance and hunched posture stabilised a shaky equilibrium. She nodded at the door. ‘Head on through. It’s in the garage. I’ll bring up the rear.’

  He walked through to the garage. Animal stench greeted him: dense and heated, like inhaling a used glove. Cats swirled and mewed at ankle height. Taped cardboard boxes were stacked against a metal vehicle door. He threw a switch and got weak single-bulb illumination. The camp stretcher was crisply made up. A small dresser stood adjacent, lamp and a couple of paperbacks atop it.

  The woman clattered through behind him. A feline entourage rode her wake. ‘All that boxed stuff is his. Police only just gave it back.’

  He crouched and checked out the dresser. It was only three drawers deep. A broken tongue of masking tape ran lengthwise. He found a framed wedding photograph and a creased passport in a worn envelope. A wad of bank statements not much cheerier than his own. A Prozac prescription. Framed headshots of two young children. He tilted it under the light and picked out a smeared thumbprint collage. He imagined Ian Riley looking at it in the dim solitude, reliving better days.

  The top drawer held a softback address book. He thumbed it, front to back. Entries were seldom. He found a Charles Easton. He showed it to the woman.

  She raised her glasses, brought a harsh squint in close. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That’s the boy.’

  The second drawer held a ballpoint pen. He transcribed the Easton details to a receipt stub in his wallet. She watched him, breath short, propped up in teetering stability. He thanked her for her time. He offered his condolences. She didn’t reply. His sympathy hung out there unacknowledged. He made for the door.

  She said, ‘I’m not normally one to be asking favours of strangers, but if you get a hold of whoever did all this, you can look them in the eye and tell them perdition’s waiting, and he’s got a wry grin.’

  She eased herself down onto the stretcher. The mattress sagged deep and met the floor. She looked at the bedside table. The book and the lamp. Artefacts of life wasted, an unintended tribute in household clutter.

  Duvall said he could let himself out. He nudged through eddies of roaming cats to the front door and left.

  He walked down to the busway and found a public phone beside the platform. Thank God it took coins. He consulted his receipt stub and dialled Charles Easton’s home number. The call rang unanswered. No message service. He dialled Manukau Police Headquarters from memory, and a patrol administrator put him through to Easton’s desk. No answer there either. Duvall shook his pockets for change and heard a feeble jingle. He fed the slot and called the same number, got hold of Charles Easton’s supervisor. The guy told him Easton was out on patrol. Duvall asked for a cellphone number, and the guy transferred him direct. Third time lucky: Easton picked up.

  Duvall said, ‘Mr Easton, my name’s Mitchell Duvall. Susan Riley gave me your number.’

  ‘I didn’t realise I knew a Susan Riley.’

  ‘Ian Riley’s mother.’

  Three seconds. ‘Okay.’

  ‘I was just wanting to ask you some questions about Ian.’

  ‘Convince me you’re not a journalist.’

  ‘I’m a private investigator.’

  ‘Who’s your client?’

  ‘I can’t reveal that.’

  Easton didn’t answer.

  Duvall decided not to lie: ‘Look, I’m not working for anyone; I’m not looking for a story. I just want to know what happened.’

  ‘That’s some pretty intense curiosity.’

  Duvall said, ‘I’m not bullshitting you. I just met his mother; she said she was at your graduation.’

  ‘What year was that?’

  ‘She didn’t tell me.’

  ‘What’s to say you weren’t bullshitting her?’

  ‘All I want is to meet and ask you some questions.’

  ‘We’re not meeting. I’ll tell you that now.’

  ‘Five minutes of your time.’

  ‘Well, we’ve been talking for thirty seconds, so you’ve got four and a half minutes left.’

  ‘She said you and Ian worked closely.’

  ‘On and off.’

  ‘So do you know why he was on antidepressants?’

  ‘Ever had someone just ring up and start asking questions about a dead friend? It’s a bit weird.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I’m just trying to help; you didn’t want a face to face.’

  A brief stretch of quiet. ‘No, I don’t know why he was taking the pills.’

  ‘His mother said he seemed withdrawn before his death. Do you know anything at all about that?’

  ‘Have you got a pen?’

  ‘No. Why?’

  ‘I’ll give you a number and you can call me back.’

  ‘Just bear with me. Two minutes.’

  ‘No. Listen to what I’m saying: I’m going to give you a different number, and you’re going to call me back on it. Okay?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘You got that pen?’

  A bus passed: he palmed his free ear to suppress the roar. ‘Yeah. Give it to me.’

  Easton recited another mobile number. ‘I’m driving,’ he said. ‘Wait two minutes, and then call me back.’

  ‘I’m at a payphone, and I’m running low on change.’

  ‘Tough shit, you should have thought ahead.’ He hung up.

  Duvall emptied his pockets and topped up the phone, repeated the number continuously under his breath. The handset was dewed with palm sweat. He wiped it off, let his watch step around two minutes. He dialled, fingers timed to the spoken mantra.

  Easton answered. ‘Well done,’ he said. ‘Two minutes, bang on.’

  ‘Look, as I said, I’m low on money here so it would be great to keep this brief.’

  ‘Uh-huh. Well, shut up and listen carefully. I’m going to give you some info, and if it gets out that you got it from me, I’m going to break your spine. All right? If the sergeant or receptionist or whoever patched you through, asks you what we spoke about, you can tell them I was absolutely fuck-all use to you. understand?’

  ‘I don’t really get where we’re going with—’

  ‘Do you or do you not understand?’

  ‘Yes, yes, I understand. Okay.’

  ‘Good. So here’s some go
od tattle for you: back in January, Ian was assigned to this robbery investigation shit—’

  ‘His mother told me.’

  ‘Okay, right. Just temporary help-out work. He said he got allocated to run interviews with this detective — guy was called Frank Briar — remember the name. Anyway, they went out to this address in Avondale to talk to some guy Leroy Turner, this is last month, beginning of January, because someone thought he might have had an inside line on some of these robberies. Cut a long story short, turned out he didn’t. But they knocked on this guy’s door and got him outside and put him in the back of the car for an interview; Ian driving and Briar in the back running the questions. And as I said, the guy’s got nothing to give, so he clams up, says nothing. So Briar punches him in the side of the head, threatens to burn his ear off with a lighter if he doesn’t start spilling something. And the guy’s freaking out, because obviously he’s got nothing to say. Anyway, this keeps up; Briar’s asking his questions, the guy’s saying he knows nothing. Eventually, Briar clicks that the guy’s none the wiser, so he packs it in, lets old Leroy out of the car, and gives him a kick in the guts to get him on his way. That’s how Ian told it, anyway.’

  ‘How long have you known this?’

  ‘I don’t know. Since after it happened, I guess. He was a good guy. Ian, I mean, he knew where the line was. If he was down, odds on it was something to do with what I just told you.’

  ‘You think he felt guilty at not doing anything?’

  ‘Yeah. Well, not doing anything to help.’

  ‘Would you be prepared to testify to what you just told me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I wear a uniform and drive a patrol car. I can’t afford to stand up and put my name to something like that and put my livelihood on the line. Simple as that.’ He paused. ‘Do with it whatever you want,’ he said. ‘But leave me out of it.’

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  WEDNESDAY, 15 FEBRUARY, 10.37 A.M.

  He needed breathing room.

  Devereaux left the file with Hale and went out for a walk. He headed north down to Quay Street and the waterfront. The whole atmosphere was a head-clearer. That salt-diesel maritime odour. A roadside doughnut trailer’s hot grease aroma. The idle swill of pedestrians, the manic Stuka-style dive bombs of gulls seeking food scraps. He lit another cigarette and leaned on the railing past the Ferry Building, face to the harbour. A group of school kids passed behind him: a single-file parade of merry pastels and a whiff of sunblock. He wondered what they thought of him: this strange grey figure, propped on a rail. Smoke and furrowed brow. He looked at the water. A malformed fluid shadow gazed back, dimpled by ash. He couldn’t recall past aspirations embodying this moment. He wondered if it was true for anyone.

  He was geared towards response to aftermath. But he couldn’t reconcile a wait-and-see approach when it came to Don McCarthy. He needed an indication of mindset: was the guy going to indict him, or was there too great a risk if the Devereaux side of the story went public? He pulled a gun on me. But he was assaulting a suspect at the time; he’s made a habit of it. Vote now on the lesser of two evils.

  Devereaux stabbed the cigarette dead on the rail and binned it. He walked across to the corner of Queen and Customs and browsed a music store. Finger-walking CD rows had a therapeutic effect. He bought some Ryan Adams. His phone rang. Caller ID said Lloyd Bowen. The pessimist in him ruled the call a dismissal announcement. He got mental audio snippets of potential phraseology. He blocked it out and answered.

  Bowen said, ‘Sergeant, when your phone rings, it’s a good idea to pick up fast.’

  ‘What can I do for you, inspector?’

  ‘I want you in my office in ten minutes. We need to get this shit cleared up.’

  Devereaux checked his watch. Ten-fifty. He said, ‘What shit?’

  The line went quiet. He thought Bowen almost laughed. ‘You shot a man on Monday, sergeant. If your memory’s going after two days, you need to rethink your chosen profession. Ten minutes.’

  ‘I’m down the bottom of town.’

  ‘So walk fast.’

  Out of habit, he’d dressed for work: suited, but no tie. He needed a tie. He bought one on the way up High Street, knotted it on the run. Must have been the fastest purchase the place had seen: cash and keep-the-change. He’d barely broken step.

  Devereaux checked his watch. Ten fifty-two. Eight minutes to get up to Cook Street. He wasn’t much of a runner. Smoking ensured it. He tried for a jog. Lung capacity permitted a brisk walk. Footpath traffic was slow-moving. He kept to the gutter to dodge congestion. Wing mirrors made swipes for his elbow. He reached the station, dead on the hour. A uniformed officer met him outside Bowen’s office.

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘They’re in a meeting room, I’ll show you through.’

  He was led to the same conference area they’d used for him on Tuesday morning. Lloyd Bowen, Frank Briar, and Thomas Rhys from Police Conduct sat dour-faced behind a long table. An empty straight-backed chair faced them. The room was hot. Bowen was sideways in his seat, legs crossed, an impatient toe tapping a table leg. A glass of water sweltered under his stare. Devereaux stepped inside. The uniform closed the door behind him. Three glances in neat unison.

  Briar said, ‘You’re a minute late, but we decided to wait anyway.’

  ‘You’re a sweetheart.’

  Briar didn’t answer. He topped up his own glass from a communal jug. Rhys dropped his gaze and jotted something on a pad.

  Bowen said, ‘Sergeant, if you’re ready, we’ll begin the interview.’ He nodded to his left: a camera and mic system ready and waiting on a tripod. Briar did the honours and got up and started the recording. He recited the standard litany: time, date, persons present. He said, ‘Sergeant, you look a little flustered. Do you want a drink of water?’

  ‘Clear the recording and start again,’ Devereaux said.

  ‘May I ask why?’

  ‘You’ve inferred for the record that I’m somehow uncomfortable. You’ve prejudiced the interview before we’re even under way.’

  Rhys and Bowen said nothing. Briar shrugged, affected confusion, like he’d enquired in good faith. He stopped the recording and erased the brief exchange, recited the requisite preliminaries for the second time.

  Devereaux slid low in his seat and got comfy. He poured himself some water. Half full, to prevent a nervous slosh.

  Briar leaned forward on his elbows and spun his wedding ring. ‘Sergeant, the purpose of this interview today is to discuss some of the violent situations you’ve previously been involved with.’

  ‘I thought we’d covered that in my first interview.’

  ‘Only briefly.’ Briar paused and took a small mouthful of water. ‘You seemed reluctant to address the topic.’

  ‘Only because I can’t see how past events bear any relevance to the shooting I was involved in this week.’

  ‘One of our aims is to determine whether there was any element of prejudice or recklessness on your behalf when these incidents occurred.’

  ‘Well, don’t worry. There wasn’t.’

  ‘If you could agree to bear with me and answer the questions, maybe we can determine that.’

  ‘I can’t think of better irony than you probing me on prejudice and recklessness.’

  Bowen pinched the bridge of his nose, swore on expelled breath. He stood up and stopped the recording. ‘Sergeant, I’ll tell you now, we’re not going to have the same bullshit we got last time. Get rid of the attitude and answer the questions.’

  ‘You can’t deny me right of reply.’

  Bowen started to say something then clenched his jaw on it. His cheeks were colouring. ‘Answer. The fucking. Questions.’ Spoken like a dripping tap.

  Devereaux took a sip of water.

  Bowen hit Record and sat down. Briar said, ‘August of two thousand eleven, you were involved in an arrest during which a suspect was fatally shot in the neck.’

 
‘The suspect in question was a paedophile.’

  ‘It doesn’t alter the fact he was shot.’ He checked his notes. His gaze flicked back up. ‘Name was Jon Edward. I take it the name’s familiar?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  The room went quiet. Three seconds. Four.

  Devereaux said, ‘Was there another question there I’m supposed to be answering?’

  Briar said, ‘Can you describe what happened?’

  Devereaux said, ‘Me and a private investigator named John Hale had been kidnapped by Edward and a gang member named Clayton Cedric Moore. When Hale attempted to apprehend Moore, Moore’s firearm discharged a round which hit Edward.’

  ‘And that round proved fatal?’

  ‘That’s correct.’

  ‘So how did the gun discharge?’

  ‘Moore’s finger was on the trigger at the time.’

  ‘How do you know this?’

  ‘John Hale told me.’

  ‘Okay. Moore’s testimony at the time was that you executed Edward, and subsequently modified the crime scene to reflect the scenario you just described.’

  ‘That’s a lie.’

  Briar moved on. ‘Do you typically involve private investigators in official police operations?’

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘So can you explain the circumstances that led both you and John Hale to be kidnapped?’

  Devereaux took a breath. He had some water. ‘It’s all laid out in the report. Pull it and read it. But I’m not going to answer any more questions on it in the context of an interview relating to a completely separate event.’

  He drained his glass and stood up. Bowen twirled his pen. He said, ‘Walkouts are never a good look.’

  Devereaux slid his chair in.

  Bowen said, ‘Sergeant, you’re here voluntarily, but I’d strongly recommend you sit down.’

  Devereaux drew himself square. He centred his tie and said, ‘In light of the fact Detective Sergeant Briar is the subject of a complaint regarding the assault of a suspect in custody, I don’t feel it’s appropriate for him to be conducting this interview.’

  Briar didn’t flinch. He glanced at the recorder, quashed the urge to turn it off. Bowen stalled a beat and then shook his head and said, ‘I wasn’t aware of such a complaint.’