by C. A. Larmer
There were plenty of other fitness fanatics up at this hour but she barely noticed them as she padded the pavement down to Rushcutters Bay Park, a million thought bubbles popping inside her brain. And in amongst them all, confusing the picture completely, was Max Farrell, his puppy dog brown eyes looking up at her, sad and confused.
It was now two days since their fight and he hadn’t called. Of course he hadn’t called. Why would he? She’d been a complete brat and she didn’t deserve his phone call. She should have congratulated him, she should have been supportive, instead she had done exactly what he’d accused her of—she had thought only of herself. Oliver, too, had accused her of believing that the world revolved around her, and Roxy’s heart was swamped with regret and shame.
When was she going to grow up?
There had been a message from Caroline last night, however, asking if she was okay, and Roxy had texted back with the words, “I will be. Thank you”.
She didn’t know what exactly that meant but she couldn’t let this get her down today, or distract her. Instead, she tried to focus on the case at hand, and what on earth Betty’s so-called “receptionist” was doing trying to break into Wolfgang Bergman’s house.
She sighed. The receptionist had to be Betty’s son, Brian. It fit perfectly. Both men were in their forties, both overly protective, and both with the same sounding voice. They must be one and the same.
So why didn’t Betty introduce him as her son when they first met at the office? Why all the secrecy? she wondered.
And, more importantly now, why was he breaking into Wolfgang’s house? Surely, the only beef Brian had with the old miner was the fact that he had slept with his mother and broken up an already unhappy marriage.
Was that reason enough? she wondered. Do sons really care whether their mother had a fling thirty-seven years ago?
Roxy stopped in her tracks. She recalled something Betty had said to her when they last met and she gasped aloud, startling another woman who was jogging past her. The woman swept a glance at her and then picked up her pace.
“That wasn’t a fling!” she said aloud, then turned around and retraced her steps, back through the park towards home.
The bubbles had suddenly burst in Roxy’s brain, leaving one clear thought remaining. It was time to get the truth out of Betty Reilly—the whole truth—and she knew exactly where she would be at this early hour.
Chapter 32
Betty was hunched over in the waiting room of the Serious Crime Squad when Roxy arrived and she looked distraught behind her bright green spectacles. She didn’t seem too surprised to see Roxy, though.
“Your son, Brian?” Roxy said, nodding a head towards the interrogation room, and Betty offered her a small nod.
Roxy sat down on the stiff plastic chair beside her. “How’s it going so far?”
Betty sat up straighter and shrugged. “They’re not telling me anything.”
“Did they give you any idea when they’ll be finished?” She shrugged again, blinking a few times. “Come on, let’s go and get a cuppa, hey? These things can take hours.”
Betty looked warily towards the office and then back at Roxy. Eventually she struggled to her feet, her whole body shaking as she stood up. The once youthful looking woman now appeared all of her sixty-five years and then some, her seemingly cheerful demeanour long dissipated. She was jittery and she was on the verge of tears, blinking rapidly as she always did when stressed, and Roxy took her arm to help her outside. She felt for the woman, she really did, but she also needed to hear the truth and she wasn’t going to let jitters get in the way this time.
Spring was still refusing to show up and the day was turning gloomier by the minute. They found a narrow, grimy milk bar two blocks down from the police station and settled into an indoor booth with a small jukebox on one side with the words “out of order” taped across it. She ordered two mugs of tea—coffee was never a wise choice in dumps like this one—and then waited until they arrived before speaking.
Eventually, very gently, she said, “Why didn’t you tell me your son was the receptionist at your office?”
“Oh, I’m never allowed to, my dear! Brian makes such a fuss about it, you see. Doesn’t like people to know we’re related, feels it’s unprofessional, even though he did get the job because of me ...” She pulled off her glasses and gave her eyes a rub.
“And does he live with you, too?”
She stopped rubbing and placed the glasses back on. “Always has. He’s never been very good at relationships and, well, he just loves his mum, doesn’t he? Says I need looking after.” She glanced at Roxy with pride then, but there were traces of something else, too, something resembling anxiety.
“Is that why he was breaking into Wolfgang’s house?”
Betty looked away and took a small sip of her tea, so Roxy tried a different angle.
“This is all to do with that Survey Congress isn’t it? You told me you and Wolfgang had one night, that night of the Congress. You didn’t call it a fling or an affair. You called it brutal and I didn’t take that literally. But it was brutal, wasn’t it?”
Betty began blinking rapidly again and wouldn’t meet Roxy’s eyes.
“You said you were stupid and naïve. You called it a ‘mistake’. What did he do to you, Betty? Did he—”
“Force himself on me?” Betty interrupted, staring at Roxy now, her eyes brimming with tears and anguish. “I told myself for years that he didn’t. That I had gone willingly because, you see, I had. I looked up to Wolfgang Bergman, we all did—hell, Gordon did too, more than anyone, except perhaps Berny Tiles. So, yes, I did go willingly. I flirted with him all night. He was the big man around town, he had all the money, all the power. He was even charming back then, would you believe?” She smiled weakly. “So after my husband passed out on a lounge, yet again, I was angry with him and bored, and I was far too drunk so ... well, I waited for Wolfgang out by the pool, waited for him to finish his poker game and romance me.” Her eyes were brimming over with fat, wet tears. “But there was no romance, Roxy. He was aggressive, he was angry, I suppose, after the bet and he ... well, I didn’t like it. I told him that. I told him to stop.”
She put a hand to her mouth and choked back a sob.
“But he didn’t stop.”
She shook her head quickly. “You young ladies call it date rape these days. Back in my day it was my own goddamn fault.”
“No, Betty—”
“Oh yes, my dear. That’s what Wolfgang told me. That’s what Browny and Clive told me ... Not in so many words of course, but that was the general gist. I’d flirted with him, I’d cheated on my husband, I deserved everything I got. I was an outcast the next day. None of them would talk to me. Except Berny, of course. I’m not sure he even knew. He’d left the bar by then, taken his ‘beautiful bet’ and gone back to his wife.”
“But the others knew?”
“Of course they knew! How could they not? Browny and Clive were still playing poker when it happened. We were out by the pool. I was screaming. I had bruises the next day.”
“And no one did anything?!” Now it was Roxy’s turn to blink rapidly.
“He was Mr Powerful, Roxy. Of course no one did anything.”
“And Berny didn’t suspect? From the bruises?”
She shook her head firmly. “Berny wasn’t the brightest matchstick in the box. I don’t know if he ever knew. Perhaps that’s why he still idolised Wolfgang to the end.”
“And what about your husband?”
She sobbed. “Oh, Gordon knew, all right. He saw it in my face and in the bruises and in the way I couldn’t look at him for days afterwards. Maybe one of the other men told him, too, I don’t know, but he wanted to kill Wolfgang, he wanted to rip his head off, but of course he didn’t. I loved my husband, deep down Roxy, I know that’s hard to understand after what I did to him. But he was weak. He wasn’t a strong man. In some ways I wish he had ripped into Wolfgang. Instead he ripped our marriag
e apart and he slowly died within. You see, he felt responsible. It was my fault, I had flirted with that hideous man, but Gordon took the pain and made it his own. He said he should have protected me and he didn’t. He didn’t feel worthy of me after that.”
“And your son ...?”
“Brian was just three then.”
“But you told him recently, right?”
She sniffed and didn’t speak, so Roxy said, “He wasn’t breaking in to Wolfgang’s house last night to steal the silverware, was he?”
She choked, flung a hand to her mouth. “He was so angry! I should never have told him. Yet again I was so stupid.” She blew her nose. “When he turned forty, I thought it was time. He could never understand why his father had left us, you see, it had been eating him alive, too. I think it was the reason he could never form proper relationships. He just didn’t trust love, you see? So I thought if Brian understood how hard that time was, what had happened, maybe he could forgive his father at last, and get on with his own life.”
“But he didn’t forgive him, did he?”
She shook her head. “He couldn’t forgive any of them. He said they were all culpable and they all needed to ... pay.”
She began blinking rapidly again and Roxy placed a hand on hers, trying to coax her on. “So he tracked down Brownlow?”
She nodded. “He didn’t mean for him to die! He was just trying to teach him a lesson, show him what it’s like to be brutalised, he felt he was as guilty as Wolfgang for not stopping it. But then Brownlow started taunting him, calling me a whore, and my son ... my beautiful, protective son ... he saw red ...”
“So he stole Brownlow’s wallet and other stuff to make it look like a mugging gone wrong.”
She shrugged. “I suppose so. I don’t know.”
“And Gordon?”
She sniffed. “My fault again. After you rang, I didn’t tell him the details, I knew that he was angry with his dad. I didn’t want him to track Gordon down. But, well, he must have listened in on our phone call and heard you say his dad was at the hostel in Woolloomooloo, so I can only guess he found him. I don’t know what happened. He didn’t tell me. I didn’t ask ... I don’t want to know ...”
“But why kill his dad?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know!” She sobbed. “Maybe because he didn’t protect me. When I told Brian about that brutal night, I was expecting him to forgive his dad, but instead he was angrier than ever. It didn’t matter that Gordon was drunk at the time, unconscious. Brian was enraged to hear that he had just let it happen. He said he should have looked out for me, got me back to the hotel, that he was never worthy of me in the first place.”
She doubled over and continued to sob while Roxy reached over and patted her softly on the back. A couple who were just sitting down at a neighbouring booth looked at Roxy alarmed but she held a hand up to let them know it was okay.
She gave Betty a few minutes to collect herself before she said, very gently again, “What about Berny?”
Betty looked up, expression aghast. “No!” She shook her head fiercely. “He knew Berny had nothing to do with all of this. I told him that. Berny wasn’t there when it happened. He didn’t blame Berny, he didn’t kill him. I can promise you that!”
“But don’t you see, it makes sense? He killed Brownlow. He killed Gordon. It’s too much of a coincidence.”
“No! No, he’s told me everything, he’s confessing everything to the police now. But he didn’t kill Berny, I promise you that. Why admit to two murders and not a third? He wouldn’t lie. He didn’t do it.”
Roxy sat back and thought about this as Betty continued sobbing into her hands.
“What I don’t understand, Betty, is why your son didn’t go straight to Wolfgang first. Why kill the others and leave Wolfgang alive? He was the guiltiest of all.”
“Oh, don’t think he didn’t try. Have you seen Wolfgang’s house?” She frowned. “Of course you have. You’ve been there, interviewed him. Then you’ll know it’s like Fort Knox. It’s not his precious money he’s protecting. It’s his life. I’m sure my son and I are not the only enemies Sir Wolfgang has made in his long, horrendous life.” She sniffed loudly. “The morning after I told Brian about the ... about what Wolfgang had done to me, he went straight to Wolfgang’s house, he wanted to beat him to a pulp, but he told me he couldn’t get in. Wolfgang was bed bound so he couldn’t get close. I was so relieved. I can’t tell you how relieved I was. Oh, I’ll always hate Wolfgang, but I didn’t want him dead, or any of them. I thought it was over. I didn’t know that Brian was biding his time, waiting for Wolfgang to get better. That in the meantime, he would start tracking down the others. But he must have found Browny quite quickly.”
Roxy nodded. She too had tracked him down the easiest. He was the only oldie in the group who had bothered to get connected, set up a Facebook page and pour his life details out for all to see. For a vengeful son to find.
“So Brian took his anger out on Brownie instead?”
She nodded and started weeping again while Roxy continued patting her gently on the back, knowing it was insufficient support and there was little else she could do. It was all such a horrendous tragedy, such a bleak, awful time for Betty who had been the original victim and was continuing to pay even now, while Wolfgang slept quietly in his bed, oblivious to all their pain.
Roxy thought about Berny, too. If Betty was right and Brian didn’t kill him, then who did? And why?
“Come on,” she said to Betty eventually. “Let’s get you back to the station. Maybe they’ll let you see your son now.”
Betty blew her nose again and looked up at her with wet, blinking eyes. “Will you wait with me?”
“I’d like to Betty, but I can’t. I have something I need to chase up, and I need to do it now. Before anyone else gets hurt.”
Chapter 33
The Sydney Flower Markets are located in an enormous warehouse down at Homebush Bay, fifteen kilometres west of the CBD, and as Roxy pulled into the public parking lot, she was surprised to see plenty of empty spaces. She credited the late hour. It was now almost 11:00 a.m. and most florists had probably come and gone.
As she walked towards the front entrance, she counted five vehicles with the name Blooming Bros spray painted across the side, including a truck, two vans and a moped, and she was surprised. Sondra’s husband’s business was not just blooming, it was positively booming.
The inside of the warehouse was like a living, breathing Monet painting with splashes of vivid colours and extraordinary perfumes pummelling the senses. There were around 170 stalls where local and regional growers supplied city florists as well as the general public, and everywhere people were running about and calling out under bright hanging lights. Buyers were wandering the aisles checking out the buds and haggling for prices, and Roxy had no idea where to start. She spotted what looked like an information desk on one side but there was no one at it. She crossed to it and glanced down to find a map of the warehouse with the names of the stalls handwritten in. She had difficulty reading the writing and was about to give up when a voice behind her said, “Need some help?”
Roxy swung around to find a short, plump woman in a bright pink parka staring at her.
“Yes, hi, I’m looking for the Blooming Brothers stall.”
“Oh, Tony’s shop? Sure, just head down aisle nine, take a left and go right to the back towards the corner. You can’t miss it, it’s in front of the freezer.”
Roxy did as instructed and soon found her way to one of the biggest stalls where dozens of buckets were set up with a wide variety of fresh flowers, mostly roses in every colour imaginable. It was cold inside the warehouse, obviously to keep the flowers fresh, and she noticed most of the workers were rugged up, but Tony’s corner was colder still, and she thrust her hands into her jacket pockets as she approached.
She couldn’t see Sondra anywhere, nor could she see anyone who resembled a tiny “gnome”, as Sondra had described her husband
a few days ago. She did spot a fairly large, Italian man wearing a thick, black jacket and a woolly, Russian-style Ushanka on his head. He was issuing instructions to a younger man beside him and glanced up when she approached, raising his eyebrows as if to say, “Can I help you?”
“Hi, I’m looking for Sondra Lane.”
“Sonnie’s out at the moment, I’m her husband, Tony, can I help?”
“Oh,” she said, surprised. “I’m Roxy Parker, I’ve been—”
The man tugged his hat off quickly and reached a hand out to shake her hand. “Yeah, I know who you are.” He turned back to his worker and said something that saw him walk away, bucket of yellow roses in his hands. “Sonnie told me she’d hired you. To find her dad’s stuff. How’s that working out?”
“That’s what I wanted to talk to her about. She’s not around?”
He shook his head. “You can talk to me.”
She considered this and wondered how much he knew. She usually tried to maintain a certain level of confidentiality with her clients, but this was her client’s husband, after all. “It’s just that ... well, I found what she was after.”
“Yeah, the deed. Got it with you?”
So he knew all about that then. “The police are keeping it safe.”
He frowned. “The police? What’s it got to do with them?”
“Well, they are investigating Berny’s murder, as you must know. They think it may be related to the gold mine. It’s a possibility, so they’ve asked to—”
“Yeah but how come they got it in the first place?” His frown had deepened to a scowl that not even the pretty blooms around him could offset. “Sonnie paid you to find it and get it to her.”
“I appreciate that. But soon after I found it, the police called and I showed them the deed. They insisted on keeping it as evidence. They also want to talk to Sondra. She hasn’t been answering her calls.”
“She was working three weddings yesterday, yeah? Plus, it’s been a manic weekend down here, got an expo on tomorr’a. She’s been run off her feet. Just getting her first break in hours.”