I thought about that for a moment. “No. Because she hates them so much she wouldn’t want to keep anything at all connected to the monks.”
“I agree.” Putting her sunglasses back on, Dusty reclined in her chair. “If you call that good news, I hate to think what the bad news might be.”
“The bad news is I haven’t been able to find anything suggesting Brody Johnson might have lived in Portsea.”
“Keep trying. See if you can make contact with artists living in the area. They might know something. Also, try to track down his birth records. You might need to use your highly developed hacking… I mean IT skills… for that.”
“I’ll get right on it, Boss.”
Dusty gave me a mock salute. “There could be something in his past to give us a clue as to why someone would want to hurt him. There certainly doesn’t seem to be anything since he became a monk.”
“Unless we’re looking for a fellow monk who is a psychopath.”
I was thinking of Saya.
“Yep. A mild mannered monk hiding a raging beast inside. That’s the point really. We all walk around disguising the beasts in our personalities. Luckily, most of us don’t have the sort of inner demons which make us murderers. If only there was some way of telling which of us does. We don’t know if someone is a psychopath – they usually look just like the rest of us. I hate to say this, but the only way to confirm our theory of a psychopathic monk would be if he kills again at the Sanctuary.” Dusty paused briefly in reflection. “If Ram was killed by a fellow monk, why now? Unless our psychopath is a new recruit, he’s had years to kill Ram. Did something happen last February or around that time to cause the monk to commit murder?”
“Good point. Worth checking out.”
“The same point applies to anyone else. What triggered the desire to kill Ram five months ago? Moose’s trigger could have been the altercation with Ram the day before he died. Kellie’s trigger could have been the anniversary of her son’s death. That’s why the victim’s last twenty four hours is so important; that’s when the reason for the murder usually happens.”
Later, I filled Dusty in on what I had done so far to track down the birth records of Brody Johnson. Saya had told us Ram was born in 1969 in Melbourne. With that information I had already tried to track down the monk’s birth records, employing my ‘highly developed IT skills’ to access the data bases and cover my tracks. Should I be caught, I risked deportation back to Ireland; the last thing I wanted. However, thinking about getting caught is foolish; it can lead to a lapse of concentration, resulting in mistakes. So I had put that out of my head.
Trying different spellings of both Brody and Johnson and searching within a five year range on either side of 1969 yielded nothing. Then I considered the possibility he might have been lying about his place of birth. Maybe he hadn’t been born in Victoria. I did the same extensive search in all the other Australian regions. Still no trace of his birth records. Johnson being a common name made the task more difficult. Also, Brody might not have been his birth name. It might have been a name he acquired during his lifetime. Therefore, he could be any one of thousands of other Johnsons.
“Ram might have been born overseas,” I suggested.
“Would that be hard to check?”
“I could probably search Australian Government records of incoming passengers and citizenship records; that sort of thing. It would be extremely time consuming though.”
“Let’s not go down that track unless we have to. I don’t want your time taken up with that when I have other jobs for you to do. Besides, the other possibility is that Johnson wasn’t even Ram’s real name. He might have given a false name to escape a dark past.”
Judging by the anticipation in her voice, I concluded that this scenario appealed to her. Dusty loved unearthing secrets. Her brow furrowed as her excitement began to recede. “The trouble is, if he’s not Brody Johnson, how do we find out his real identity?” Her eyes appealed to me, like a child hoping to convince a parent to hand over a treat.
“Right,” I said, acknowledging it was a job for someone with my skills. “But I need something to start with. Even a maze master can’t find a needle in a haystack.”
“Ah. And here I was thinking you were a magician.” Dusty flashed me her familiar cheeky grin. Her face became serious again as she pondered the problem. “We don’t even have a photo of Ram.” Her expression brightened as another idea caught her imagination. “I know Jake said there was no CCTV on the hill but Ram might have been snapped on camera when he was in Port Douglas. Maybe at Alexandra Village where he volunteered.”
“He’s been dead for almost five months. I doubt they’d still have the footage.”
“Of course. You’re right.”
She swung her legs over the side of the recliner and sat up, gazing thoughtfully at her bare feet. Bright turquoise nail polish decorated her toe nails.
Abruptly coming out of her reverie, Dusty slapped the side of her head with the heel of her hand.
“Nincompoop! That’s what I am. Why didn’t I think of it before? The police will have his DNA. I could ask Jake to run it through the data base.” Her brow furrowed again. “That would take too much time. Besides, Jake can probably only access the Queensland data base. If Ram’s DNA is on record for any reason, it’s most likely to be with Victoria Police if that’s his home state. On the other hand, it could be in any state in Australia.” She shrugged and started tapping out a message on her phone. “It’s worth a try though. I’ll ask him.”
Jake responded almost immediately with a text informing her that the police had a sample of Ram’s DNA. However, it had not been released for testing as this required permission from the deceased person’s next of kin. They had been unable to locate any family of Ram.
“So there goes my brilliant idea.” Dusty grimaced ruefully.
She stood and began pacing up and down along the edge of the pool. After a few moments she turned, eyes shining. “All is not lost. I have another brilliant idea. You,” she jabbed her index finger at me for emphasis, “might still be able to find out if he changed his identity. What if Ram altered his name the same time he entered Sunyarta Sanctuary? If he was running from something or someone, it stands to reason his change of name and move to Queensland happened at the same time. That would give you a starting point; the date he entered Sunyarta.”
I tapped on my computer keyboard, searching for change of name in Australia. “Could be a problem,” I said as I read the pertinent information. “If you don’t need your new name on legal documents like your driver’s licence, passport, that sort of thing, you can change your name without having to register it.”
Disappointment crossed Dusty’s face. “He wouldn’t have needed those sorts of legal documents living as a monk.”
“Right. He could have changed his name to Brody Johnson and left all his legal documents in his original name. I’ll check it out just the same. We might get lucky.”
“Good thinking. It’s also possible Brody Johnson was just the name he used as an artist. You know, like authors use pen names. If you can’t find a name change, go back to his art. After all, he left a clue there. Keep searching for artists who lived, worked or painted in Portsea.” Dusty held up both hands with her fingers crossed for luck. “Check out all the artists from Portsea, even if the names don’t match.”
Dusty had gone out to meet Jake, lorikeets were partying loudly in the trees outside and the day was drawing to a close by the time I’d found the information we needed. Dusty was going to be shocked to learn who Ram really was.
Chapter 22
Dusty’s face was ashen. “Are you serious?”
The morning breeze wafted in through the open balcony doors of Dusty’s apartment as I explained how I’d followed the Portsea lead and eventually struck gold. I sent a photo of Ram’s paintings to an artist who had lived in the area all his life. In return, he emailed me a snap of a painting which had been part of a series of ocean sc
enes hanging in a Portsea cafe. The particular picture he sent me was almost identical to one of the paintings hanging at Sunyarta. The ones in the cafe had been done by a local resident called Paul Walker, a talented amateur artist.
Walker’s paintings were removed from the cafe display after Paul Walker, who was a primary school teacher, had been accused of sexual abuse of three of his students.
Dusty shook her head in disbelief. “Are you sure Paul Walker and Ram are one and the same?”
“The artist in Portsea is confident both paintings were done by the same person. Not only that, Paul Walker’s year of birth is the same as Ram’s.”
Dusty swallowed. “No. This can’t be true.”
I understood how she felt. Even though I hadn’t known Ram personally, everything we’d learned about the man had caused me to like him.
“Sean, you say he was accused. Is it possible the girls were just being spiteful; trying to get back at their teacher for not giving them a good mark or something like that?”
“I doubt it. The girls were in their late teens by the time they made the accusations.”
“I see what you mean. They’re not likely to hold a grudge about a bad mark in primary school for so long.”
“Paul Walker’s lawyer claimed the girls’ motivation was financial. Not long before the girls made their accusations, Walker had come into a considerable amount of money. His case was strengthened by the fact he had an alibi. At the time one of the girls said he was in her tent abusing her, he was seen at the other end of the campsite with another staff member, watching the antics of a ringtail possum in one of the trees. He could not have been in the girl’s tent at the time she claimed.”
“So it was a false accusation?”
“That was the defence. However, the girls’ accounts of what happened to them were seen as credible. Their lawyer pointed out that the girl had made a mistake about the time. It was dark and she was in shock. Walker didn’t have an alibi for the time the other two girls were being abused.”
“Was he convicted?”
I shook my head. “The case against him fell apart when one of the girls decided not to testify.”
“Sounds fishy to me, Sean. Surely if she were a genuine victim she would want to do everything she possibly could to nail her abuser.”
I have no doubt that would have been the way Dusty would react. She would fight with fierce determination to the very end. It was difficult for her to understand that someone else might react differently.
“I imagine a teenage girl could find it traumatic to stand up in a court of law and relate what happened,” I suggested. “The general consensus was that the girls were telling the truth. Those who witnessed their testimony had no doubt they’d been raped by their teacher. One newspaper report hinted that even Walker’s lawyer had doubts about his innocence.”
“I see. Public opinion would have been enough to finish Walker’s career as a teacher.”
“Right. So he moved interstate and became a monk.”
“That’s assuming Ram is Paul Walker. We need to be absolutely sure before we proceed any further, Sean. I don’t want any hint of paedophilia to be associated with Ram if he isn’t Walker. It would be so unfair.” Dusty gazed thoughtfully into the distance. “I can ask Jake to see if the police can locate Paul Walker’s family and get a DNA sample for comparison. But it’d be a lot quicker if we could get a photo of Walker to see if the monks can identify him as Ram.” Catching the smirk on my face, she paused. “What are you looking so smug about? Don’t tell me you’ve already got a photo of him.”
I swivelled the laptop around so she could see the image on the screen; the only photo of Walker I’d been able to find.
Dusty studied the image for a few thoughtful moments. “Hard to believe that’s the face of a paedophile.” She sighed. “Jake should be able to get the police sketch artist to change this photo. You know, age Walker’s face and shave his head.”
The photo was soon on its way to Jake’s email address.
“You know what?” said Dusty. “Once upon a time I would have gladly tied a paedophile to a bed of nails and subjected the creep to torture with a red hot branding iron. I’m sure you can guess what part of his body would be sizzling under the iron.” I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. “Then one day I remembered something Uncle had said to me when I was a kid.”
Dusty’s godfather, who she respectfully called Uncle, had a quiet way about him – as if he experienced life from within a knowledge base deeper than that of the average person. His connection to nature, to the plants and animals of the land, was the force that guided him. This meant he was detached from the material existence most people, at least most people in western cultures, are strongly connected to. I hesitate to call it spiritual, not wishing to imply a religious aspect. I think it is more intuitive and innate. The indefinable something that guides Uncle had impacted on me so deeply I’ve never forgotten my one and only meeting with the dignified Aboriginal man. It didn’t surprise me that the life lessons he taught Dusty had stayed with her.
“It was when I attacked Lionel, one of Uncle’s kids. Lionel pulled my hair. I mean, pulled it hard. It really hurt. I was about ten or eleven at the time. I had a bit of a temper on me in those days.”
I raised my eyebrows at her use of ‘in those days’. I’d seen Dusty in temper mode on more than one occasion. In fact, the day I met her I observed her in a spectacular display of anger when she’d taken on a drunken youth who was tormenting a defenceless old sheep with a piece of timber. The guy didn’t know what hit him when Dusty used her advanced karate skills to disarm him, flip him over and pin him to the ground.
Catching my expression, she laughed. “All right. I still have a temper but, believe it or not, I have a lot more control over it now.”
I chose not to challenge her on that. “What did you do to Lionel?”
“I picked up a piece of wood and whacked him over the head with it.”
“Ouch! You killed him?”
Dusty shook her head, her serious expression indicating her remorse for her childhood behaviour.
“Luckily he ducked, so he didn’t get the full impact. That didn’t stop him from screaming and dancing around like a rooster with its head chopped off.” She rolled her eyes. “So naturally Uncle came out to see what was happening which is exactly what Lionel wanted.”
“I’m guessing Uncle wasn’t happy with you.”
“That’s an understatement. When I told him it was Lionel’s fault because he’d hurt me first, you know what he said?”
“What?” Having experienced the quiet wisdom of Uncle myself, I had no doubt he’d handled the angry young Dusty in his own unique way.
“He said: If you strike back you sink to the same low level as your attacker. He told me I was no longer the victim. I had become a thug. He was right.”
“So you no longer wish pain and suffering on paedophiles?”
“I didn’t say that. I wish it and I fantasise about it. I just know it’s not a good idea to act on those wishes.”
“So you’re saying that if a paedophile abuses a young girl, destroys her innocence and probably her life, she becomes a thug if she retaliates and no longer deserves sympathy?”
I couldn’t keep the incredulity out of my voice. I was thinking of my sisters. As far as I was concerned, the victim of a paedophile could do whatever she likes without losing one iota of my sympathy.
“I didn’t say she wouldn’t deserve sympathy. Of course she would.”
“What you’re saying is that if the person who killed Walker, assuming that’s who Ram is, was one of his victims, she had no right to kill him?”
“I understand why she had the desire and the intent but, acting on that makes her a murderer. As a victim I would feel only compassion for her. As a murderer I see her differently.”
“If you solve this case and cause one of Walker’s victims to be punished, won’t you be doing more harm than good?” Seeing some h
esitation in Dusty’s expression I took the opportunity to hammer home my point. “You can’t really believe she deserves to be punished as a murderer, after what he did to her?”
“It does present a moral dilemma.” Dusty heaved a sigh. “The thing is, if we let one person get away with murder because we think it is justified, where do we draw the line? Who draws the line? My job is to track down the murderer. It’s up to the legal system to judge whether the murder was justifiable and to allow for mitigating circumstances.”
“If the law punishes a person, isn’t that the same as retaliating?”
“Not really. Punishment by law is decided after due consideration of evidence and circumstances.”
I knew she had a point.
Chapter 23
“Fine!” It was a declaration Dusty had accepted the truth about the dead monk and was ready to move on.
Jake, who had returned to Cairns a few days earlier, had sent through the altered age progression image of Paul Walker. When Dusty emailed a copy of the new photo to Saya at Sunyarta, he confirmed the person in the image was Ram. Both Dusty and I were disappointed the man we had thought to be a nurturing, gentle monk had turned out to be a vile paedophile.
“This changes everything,” continued Dusty. “Walker could have been killed by one of his victims.” I noticed she was now referring to him as Walker instead of Ram. “That would explain the kick in the testicles. And disrobing him; she wanted to remove any suggestion that he was really a monk and also strip him of his dignity, the same as he had done to her. And pushing him over the edge of the cliff, like a discarded object. That’s what he did to her; treated her like a thing, an object to be used and discarded at will.”
Disguising Demons Page 10