by Garry Disher
He thought about that now, as he crept up the gravel driveway, the Triumph clattering miserably. He was restoring a 1930s Dragon Rapide at the little aerodrome near Waterloo, but various things had happened in his life and the Dragon was mouldering away in a hangar there. He felt guilty about that. His father, who’d valued hard work and finishing the tasks you set for yourself, would have been badly disappointed. Challis could hear the old man’s voice in his head and he wished he’d brought his inhaler with him.
He followed the driveway around. There were no vehicles parked near the house. No sign of life, either, until he’d parked at the bottom of the verandah steps and got out, when the huge front door swung inwards and Lisa appeared behind the outer screen door. She stood waiting for him, a hazy shape behind the fine wire mesh.
‘Hal?’
Challis climbed the steps warily. ‘Lisa.’
‘What’s up?’
‘Is Rex here?’
‘He’s away. Why?’
Challis let some silence build. ‘I think you know why.’
‘Sorry?’
‘Did Sadler call you?’
She didn’t say ‘Who’s Sadler?’ but frowned. ‘No. Why? What’s going on?’
‘I’ve just come from him. He claims that Gavin intended to prosecute Rex for cruelty to a horse. I think Rex killed Gavin, not Paddy.’
She looked astounded. ‘What?’
‘Lisa, those Homicide detectives will be back eventually.’
‘I don’t know what you’re on about’
‘Let’s talk. Tell me what happened. Did Gavin push too hard? Did Rex snap? You can’t go on protecting him.’
‘Stop it, Hal.’
He took a step closer. She took a step back. He stayed where he was. ‘Let’s sit down and talk,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you can make me a cup of tea. I almost crashed on the Pass and I feel a bit shaken.’
‘Good,’ she said. ‘Pity you didn’t go over the edge.’
He considered the words and her mood, and realised that things had gone beyond her control and she was merely striking out to deflect her guilt or misery. ‘Lisa,’ he said gently, approaching the screen door and extending one hand to the knob. The hinges squeaked as he opened it, and then he could see her clearly. She was dressed in spotless riding boots, jeans and shirt, as if about to exercise her horse, but her hair was awry and her eyes red and darting.
‘Hal, don’t.’
He entered a cool, echoing hallway as she retreated. At the end of the hallway he glimpsed a white door, sufficiently ajar to reveal a huge black enamel kitchen range. ‘Let’s sit at the kitchen table and talk. Please?’
She looked sour, thwarted, but stood back to let him pass, and then followed him. They sat at a long wooden table. Lisa watched him tensely, and then her face cleared. ‘Are you okay?’ she asked, placing her hand on his. ‘I’m sorry about your father, I really am.’
Challis withdrew his hand. ‘Where’s Rex?’
‘Away on business.’
That irritated Challis. ‘Did you make that anonymous call to the RSPCA all those years ago, Lisa? Did you set up Paddy Finucane?’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Did Rex mean to kill Gavin? I bet he didn’t. There was a struggle and he went too far and when he realised what he’d done he came to you for help.’
She said sharply, ‘Hal, stop it. You’re making a fool of yourself. You’re being offensive. Just go, all right?’
‘Rex was relying on you to get him out of trouble, just as he’s always relied on you.’
She gestured curtly. ‘This only involves Rex in the sense that your precious brother-in-law was a pig to everyone.’
‘You’re right, he was, toward the end.’
He said it gently, to encourage an admission, but Lisa said, in her hard, emphatic way, ‘So why are you coming after us? Gavin harassed a number of people.’
‘But only one person killed him.’
‘People are saying your sister killed him. I can’t say I blame her. Now, shut the door on your way out.’
She showed her cutting profile, as if Challis were a tradesman with grubby hands. He looked at her consideringly. ‘You’ve always had to cover for Rex, haven’t you. He’s a drunk. Does he hit you, Lisa?’
As a way of turning her, giving her a way out, it failed. ‘The door’s behind you.’
‘Was it Rex’s idea to make that phone call to the RSPCA? I bet he took the photos on Gavin’s camera, too. Did he also drive Gavin’s car out east and make you pick him up?’
‘Hal, I’ll call the police if you don’t leave me alone.’
‘Whose idea was it to bury him in Glenda Anderson’s grave? You’d been to her funeral, is that it? You knew the ground was soft?’
‘Hal,’ said Lisa, frowning and reaching for him across the table, ‘we were lovers, now we’re friends, but you’re spoiling everything. Please stop.’
He jerked back, his spine rigid. ‘Why did you send Meg those letters? Misdirection? You’ve always been good at that.’
‘What letters?’
‘You know very well what letters. It was cruel, Lisa.’
Her face tightened. ‘That’s it. That’s enough. You’re frightening me. Please leave.’
She was unwavering. He didn’t know what would make her break. He didn’t let himself think that he was wrong about her. ‘Where’s Rex?’
‘Why? Want a quick shag before he comes back?’
‘When Sadler phoned, did Rex take the call, or did you?’
‘What call?’
‘Probably no more than an hour ago, as soon as I left Sadler. Rex took a call, heard something he didn’t want to hear, and ran, am I right? Saved his own skin and left you behind?’
Her gaze went involuntarily to the window. Challis stood, looked out. The darkening blue ranges that sheltered Mawson’s Bluff seemed to stretch forever, into the stony saltbush country where people died or disappeared. The sun was barely a fingernail on the horizon now. ‘Is he running? Hiding?’
She joined him, her hip touching his thigh. She was quite small, he realised. She packed a lot into it. ‘You seem determined to make yourself miserable, Hal. All this jealousy. It’s unbecoming. I’m married. Get that through your skull.’
Challis pointed. ‘Is he out there somewhere?’
She bumped his hip and with a low chuckle said, ‘What’s out there is a little plateau, with a ruined shepherd’s hut, just a couple of walls and a chimney. That’s where Rex and I had our first screw.’
It was intended to wound him, on several levels, but what it did was convince him of her guilt. Wondering what he’d ever seen in her, Challis said coldly, ‘I want you to come with me. I’m taking you in. You’ll make a statement to Sergeant Wurfel.’
‘You’re pathetic, you know that?’
He tried to grab her. She was quick, lithe, shrugging him off, almost as if they were young again and it was a Saturday night and she was rebuffing his advances in the back seat of his father’s station wagon. She darted down the hallway and into one of the rooms along it. Fear grabbed him then. He was paralysed, his mouth dry. There would be firearms on the place, for shooting vermin and putting injured animals out of their misery. He called, ‘Lisa, don’t.’
She emerged with a shotgun and motioned with it. ‘Out,’ she said, ‘or I swear to God…’
Challis tried to hold himself upright but his spine tingled as he passed her in the long hallway and on down to the front door and out into the gathering darkness.
53
Meanwhile Scobie Sutton had arrived home and found Beth getting ready to go out. She was small, round, unfashionable and always did her duty as a wife and a Christian. With a pang, he compared her to Grace Duyker, who seemed to him the kind of woman who’d admit some risk and improvisation into her life. Risk and improvisation like him, in fact. If he dared make the move. If she let him.
‘Anything wrong, Scobe?’
He pushed the fingers of both ha
nds back through his sparse hair tiredly. ‘The van Alphen shooting.’
It was a good diversion, and close to the truth. The Fab Four-Ellen Destry’s term, but entirely apt-had questioned him again, this time concentrating on van Alphen’s role in the Nick Jarrett shooting. ‘Pretty sketchy, these notes of yours, DC Sutton,’ they said, and ‘Perhaps you were steered by Kellock and van Alphen,’ and ‘It would appear that a culture of protection and containment exists in this police station.’ They asked questions that the shooting board officers had asked: Why had he failed to test for gunshot residue on the hands of Kellock and van Alphen? Why had he bundled items of clothing from both men together with the victim? Why had he let them move the body, or at least before he photographed it? Why had he failed to have the blood on the carpet tested, and allowed the carpet to be steam-cleaned?
Scobie was a wreck.
‘Where are you going?’ he asked his wife now.
‘The Community House on the estate.’
‘Why?’
Beth gave him her mild, reproving smile. ‘Sweetheart, I told you, the public meeting. The petition.’
Scobie remembered. The locals were trying again to have the Jarretts kicked out. Five hundred signatures from residents and local shopkeepers. Officials from Community Services and the Housing Commission would be there, together with Children’s Services welfare workers and a senior officer from Superintendent McQuarrie’s HQ.
‘Good luck,’ said Scobie tiredly, looking around the kitchen absently to see if she’d prepared something for his dinner. He could see Grace Duyker coming up with something rare and subtle, a vaguely French sauce over tender veal, a fragrant Middle Eastern dish.
‘I hate to see families broken up,’ Beth was saying worriedly, ‘kids taken away. In my opinion this kind of pressure is only going to lead the Jarretts to more crime, not less.’
Scobie thought approvingly of Grace Duyker’s toughness and scorn, and found himself snarling at his wife: ‘The Jarretts continue to commit crime because they’re evil, and because gullible people like you believe they can be saved.’
Beth stood stock still, her face white and shocked. ‘Is that how you see me? Gullible?’
Scobie swallowed. ‘I think you try to do good where it sometimes isn’t warranted, where it won’t work.’
Her hand went to her throat. ‘Oh, Scobie, I thought I knew you.’
‘Forget I said it. I’m sorry.’
‘I cant.’
Scobie touched her upper arm, his voice gentle. ‘Go to your meeting, love.’
Beth said stoutly, ‘I might just vote to let the Jarretts stay.’
Scobie, punch-drunk with tiredness and strange emotions, said, ‘Do what you like.’
Suddenly he was bawling. Beth, with a brave little face, said, ‘You work out what’s wrong and we’ll talk about it when I get back. For dinner you could zap last night’s leftovers in the microwave.’
Detective Constable (provisional) Pam Murphy still had to sit a Police Board interview, but she’d passed all of her core subjects and been assigned to work with Ellen Destry in Waterloo CIU, so life was looking pretty good by Monday evening.
She didn’t miss the physical training, the theory or the gruelling tests. She didn’t miss the Academy at Glen Waverley or the classrooms at Command headquarters, where each day she’d had to pass through the foyer with its glass cabinets displaying guns and other murder weapons. Instead, she was feeling thankful that it was all over. Sure, she’d be obliged to take a million training courses in the coming years, but none of the really gruelling stuff. God, last week she’d run into a group of guys who’d enrolled for Special Operations Group training: of the sixty candidates, only nine had survived.
Seven o’clock, clouds across the moon, so it was pretty dark out, especially at the Penzance Beach yacht club. Uniform had checked it out: a burglary, meaning it was now a CIU case. Sergeant Destry, looking edgy and distracted, had told her John Tankard had called it in. ‘Apparently the manager’s on the premises, waiting to give you a statement.’
The wind rose on the water, moaning through the ti-trees, and soon there was a lonely metallic pinging. Sail rigging, Pam realised, slapping against the masts of the yachts parked in the yard behind the clubhouse. She approached the building and found a door open but almost pitch black inside. She went in, one hand patting the wall for a light switch. She’d left her torch in the CIU Falcon. It occurred to her that she still had a lot to learn.
‘Police!’ she called.
Maybe the burglars had come back and beaten the manager over the head, tied and gagged him.
The door slammed behind her.
She spun around, thoroughly spooked now, and felt for the doorknob. It wouldn’t budge. She was locked in. She looked up and around, trying to find the patches of lighter darkness that indicated the windows.
They were clerestory windows, up high, far out of reach.
She tried to swallow and her heart was hammering. She fumbled for her radio, badly panicked, the weeks of training counting for nothing.
Stay cool, she told herself, releasing the call button of her radio, her mind racing. Think.
Her thoughts didn’t take her in the direction of burglars and burglary. They took her in the direction of rookies, probationary cops, who are always good for a laugh. It was entirely probable that everyone at the Waterloo police station was waiting to hear how she coped tonight. They wanted fear, loss of control, booming through the public address system. They’d preserve her shame on tape, burn it onto a CD, for the world to enjoy over and over again.
‘DC Pam Murphy, requesting urgent assistance,’ she said, pressing the transmit button.
The radio crackled in delight, ‘Go ahead, DC Murphy.’
Pam gave her location. ‘I’m with Constable John Tankard,’ she continued. ‘I’m afraid he’s soiled his trousers-fear, or a dodgy lasagne at lunchtime. Please send assistance and a spare nappy. The smell is awful.’
The dispatcher snorted. ‘Will do.’
‘I got a peek when he cleaned himself up,’ Pam said. ‘I know there’s a height requirement for the Victoria Police, but shouldn’t there also be a length requirement?’
Behind her the door was flung open and a teary, angry voice beseeched her to shut the hell up.
54
All through that long Monday, Ellen repeated it like a mantra: Trust no one. It made sense. According to Andrew Retallick, not just one but several policemen had abused him. Kellock, presumably, but who else? Maybe even the superintendent. Maybe even Scobie Sutton. She wasn’t dealing with a couple of miserable individuals but a secretive, protective and organised circle of men. She’d known from other cases in Australia, Europe and the States how powerful these circles could be. The makers and keepers of the law often dominated: judges, lawyers, cops, parole officers. These men had the clout and know-how to protect themselves, subvert justice, and kill.
At least now she knew that van Alphen hadn’t been involved. That didn’t mean he’d been a sensitive, caring individual: fuck, he was so blinded by hatred of the Jarretts that he’d branded Alysha a tart and liar and helped ambush Nick Jarrett. A vaunting avenger, yeah, but not a paedophile.
He’d been working for the good guys, and that had cost him his life. Who had shot him? Kellock, probably. Ellen, in the incident room on Monday evening, glanced back over her shoulder and kept misjudging the reflections in the darkened windows. Would he come for her here? At Challis’s? Arrange an ambush somewhere?
She tried Larrayne again. The phone went to voice-mail again. Where was she? Finally she tried Larrayne’s mobile phone, knowing it was futile, for there was no signal in the little valley where Challis lived.
But, bewilderingly, Larrayne was there on the line, shouting, shouting because there was background noise, not a weakened signal. ‘I’m in my car, Mum.’
Ellen practically fainted with relief. ‘Where?’
‘Just coming in to Richmond.’
&nbs
p; Ellen pictured the old suburb, on the river and close to the inner city. Students, yuppies, small back street factories, a solid working-class core and a long street of Vietnamese restaurants and businesses. She was puzzled and concerned. ‘What are you doing there?’
‘Do I have to tell you everything? A group of us are having a swot session for next week’s exams.’
‘Thank God for that. When will you be back?’
‘I left a note on the table. I’ll stay overnight, work in the library tomorrow, and come home tomorrow evening.’
‘Sweetie, can you stay away longer?’
Larrayne was the daughter of police officers. She said warily, ‘Something’s happened.’
Ellen said simply, ‘Someone might try to do me harm.’
‘Mum! You can’t stay at that house any more, out in the middle of nowhere!’
‘I know that, sweetheart.’
‘Well?’
‘I’ll find somewhere else, I promise.’
‘I don’t like this,’ said Larrayne, a little hysterical now. ‘Van was shot. Are the same people after you?’
‘Not if I get them first.’
Larrayne went into full paranoia mode. ‘Text me, okay? Or send an e-mail with the details. Don’t trust the phones.’
‘I will, sweetie.’
Ellen finished the call and went to the head of the stairs to listen. The station was muted but not dead. She heard voices and laughter. Suddenly Pam Murphy’s voice came crackling out of the public address speaker above Ellen’s head. There was an edge to it. Ellen listened tensely, realising that Pam was in trouble. But as she listened, she relaxed. Soon she was grinning. She said aloud, ‘Good one, Pam,’ and returned to the incident room, where she made a call.