by Garry Disher
‘Ellen,’ he muttered, head down, while Pam cocked her head and said nothing.
Ellen watched him and pondered. His mortification was genuine: she should trust him. Still, she withheld that. She wanted a stronger indication that he could be trusted.
It came just before lunch. Ellen walked down High Street to the delicatessen, bought three smoked salmon and avocado rolls, and came back to find Pam and Scobie side by side in the incident room, deeply absorbed. She stood back to watch and listen for a couple of minutes, trying to read Sutton. He was explaining the progress and lack of progress in the Katie Blasko case. Pam was asking him questions-but she, also, was trying to read him, Ellen realised. She watched them sift through the statements, photographs and other documentary evidence, Scobie gesturing once or twice as if overwhelmed by the workload. He hadn’t spotted Ellen yet. ‘A ton of stuff to go through,’ he said. ‘Just look at it all: CCTV footage, parking and speeding fines, witness statements to check again.’ He glanced at Pam, trying for humour. ‘I bet you wish you were back in a patrol car.’
‘No thanks, Scobe,’ she said brightly. She peered at the sheet of paper in her hand. ‘Rising Stars Agency,’ she read. ‘What’s this?’
Scobie almost broke then. He told Pam about Duyker’s scam, his voice catching as if he couldn’t comprehend the evil that Duyker represented. ‘My own daughter could have been his next victim.’
Pam was watching Ellen over his shoulder. They communicated silently, instinctively, and Pam said, ‘Oh, hi, Sarge.’
Scobie turned. ‘Sorry. I was just catching Pam up on some things.’
‘Scobie,’ Ellen said, ‘there’s something you should know.’
It took her ten minutes. He was shocked, now and then glancing uneasily at the door, as though Kellock might materialise there.
‘Scobie, keep your cool.’
‘I cant.’
‘Yes you can. You’ll have to.’
They ate lunch hurriedly, and then resumed work, Scobie throwing himself into it, as if work might cure his fear and agitation, and punish him because he’d felt desire for another woman and been naive about human wickedness.
And he found salvation of a kind. ‘I think I’ve got something,’ he said two hours later. ‘Duyker gave us a cash register receipt to prove he wasn’t in Waterloo between three and four on the Thursday Katie was abducted?’
‘Correct. A big newsagency in the city.’
‘Duyker wasn’t there,’ Scobie said, leaning forward and tapping the monitor screen, ‘but Neville Clode was. I’ve got him picking discarded receipts off the floor inside the main door of the newsagency that same afternoon. Five-thirty, to be precise.’
Pam and Ellen joined him. ‘That devious little shit,’ Pam said.
They watched Clode peruse the receipts and dump all but one into a bin. ‘Model citizen,’ muttered Ellen. ‘Back it up, Scobie, to around three-thirty, then roll it forward to five-thirty. We need to double check that neither Clode nor Duyker were there between those times.’
Scobie complied. It took a while. ‘Nope,’ he reported.
‘Okay, let’s pick both of them up. Duyker first.’
They crossed the Peninsula in a CIU Falcon, Scobie directing while Pam drove, flicking the wheel expertly, her pacing and anticipation giving them a smooth ride. Ellen closed her eyes in the back seat and let Scobie twitch and prattle on in the passenger seat.
Finally the car slowed. Ellen opened her eyes. ‘His van’s here,’ Pam said.
‘Scobie, go around the back,’ said Ellen. ‘Pam, you come with me.’
She knocked on Duyker’s door and the fact that it swung open, and the air was saturated with the odour of blood and the buzzing of springtime flies, told her that she was too late, Kellock had got here ahead of her and taken care of a loose end.
60
She went into action. ‘Scobie, head back to Waterloo, grab a couple of uniforms for backup, and arrest Clode.’
‘Will do.’
When he was gone, she made a series of calls, first arranging an all-points apprehension order on Kellock: air, sea and ferry ports, bus terminals, train stations. Then she called Challis. She didn’t need his advice; she wanted to hear his voice, that’s all. But his mobile was switched off or out of range, and had been since yesterday. Finally she called Force Command headquarters and asked for a team of armed response police. There was a pause when she said who the target was.
‘One of ours? You sure?’
‘Perfectly sure. Armed and dangerous. He’s already shot one man dead.’
Another pause. ‘Where exactly are you?’
Ellen gave directions.
‘Take a while to get there. Hour and a half, maybe.’
‘I realise that.’
‘Meanwhile don’t do anything rash.’
‘I won’t,’ Ellen said, immediately taking Pam with her to Gideon House to hunt for Kellock. They’d barely reached the outskirts of Mornington when her mobile rang and Superintendent McQuarrie was barking at her.
‘Tell me this is all a bad joke, Sergeant Destry.’
‘No, sir.’
‘Armed response officers? A warrant for his arrest? What the hell is going on?’
Ellen had to go carefully here. Everyone knew that the super used Kellock for information and influence, but did the relationship go deeper than that? She didn’t say anything about the paedophile ring, or police involvement, but merely said that Kellock was apparently unhinged and had shot dead a witness.
‘I hope you know what you’re doing.’
There had been a time when Ellen might have said ‘So do I’ to herself, but not any more. ‘I do, sir,’ she said with some force.
McQuarrie muttered and broke the call.
Gideon House came into view, set one block back from the Mornington seafront in an overgrown garden. Once a gracious residence, and later a boarding house, it now sheltered street kids and the homeless with funding from the shire and the state government. It looked run-down, and Ellen wondered if the Kellocks were siphoning the upkeep funds into their own pockets, along with abusing the kids in their care.
That’s if Kellock’s wife was involved.
Ellen knocked. A shy-looking kid answered.
‘Is Mrs Kellock in?’
‘Er, yep.’
‘Could you fetch her, please?’
A moment later, Kellock’s wife appeared from the gloomy interior. She was bulky, blowsy-looking, with short, stiff, carroty hair, an affronted jaw and a hard face. She wore dressy black pants and a silk shirt, with plenty of gold on her fingers, wrists and neck. Narrow, tanned feet in elegant sandals, with bright red nails. A woman who tans joylessly all year round, Ellen thought.
‘Mrs Kellock, I’m Sergeant Destry and this is Constable Murphy. May we speak to your husband?’
The reply was guarded. ‘He’s not here.’
‘Do you know where he is?’
‘He doesn’t tell me his every move. Why do you want to know? He’s in charge of the station. He doesn’t have to justify himself to anybody.’
It was absurd pride. Ellen said firmly, ‘We need to speak to him.’
‘Try his mobile.’
Ellen knew that would spook him-that’s if he hadn’t already flown the coop. She asked, ‘Do you and your husband live here, Mrs Kellock?’
‘We have a flat at the back.’
‘Could he be there? Maybe he slipped home while you’ve been in the main building?’
‘No.’
‘Can you think where else he might be?’
‘Why?’
Because he’s on a murderous rampage, Ellen thought. She cleared her throat, suddenly uneasy: had she sent Scobie Sutton into a trap? ‘We need his input on something,’ she said with an empty smile.
The eyes narrowed and an expression passed across them, as though Kellock’s wife knew why they were there, and that everything was about to fall apart in her life. She recovered and said tartly, ‘He cou
ld be at a conference, at divisional headquarters, at one of the other stations. Check his diary.’
‘We have, Mrs Kellock.’
Pam had been silent until now. ‘Your husband is closely involved here, Mrs Kellock? He’s close to the children who live here?’
‘What’s that got to do with anything? Who do you think you are? My husband is senior in rank to both of you and I want you to remember that.’
It was pointless grandstanding. Ellen said, ‘Do you have another house?’
‘Of course.’
‘Where is it?’
Kellock’s wife scowled, then muttered an address in Red Hill, twenty minutes south.
‘Could your husband be there?’
‘Well, why don’t you go and look,’ snapped the woman, stalking off around the side of the big house.
Ellen got out her mobile phone, walking around with it in the grounds of the building until she got a clear signal. ‘Scobie? Thank God.’
He cut in hurriedly: ‘I was just about to call you. Clode’s dead.’
She breathed in and out. ‘Any sign of Kellock?’
‘No.’
‘Same MO as Duyker?’
‘Yes. Shotgunned in the groin and bled out on the floor.’
‘You know the drill, Scobie. Secure the scene. We’re heading for Red Hill: the Kellocks have a house there.’
She gave him the address. He grunted. ‘He’ll have done a runner.’
‘I know that, Scobie,’ Ellen said. She ended the call, jerked her head at Pam. ‘Let’s go.’
They sped down the Peninsula, taking the freeway south and exiting onto a road that climbed steeply away from the coast, past vineyards, orchards and little art-and-craft galleries. Red Hill was a ribbon of houses amid huge gums, with vines and hobby farms on the nearby slopes. It was a well-heeled town, home to wineries that offered costly wines and meals to weekend tourists from the city. Ellen navigated, directing Pam to Point Leo Road and finally a gravelled track that plunged between dense stands of gum trees. A firetrap in summer. Pam braked suddenly.
They’d come to a clearing, a house fronting a tight turning circle. There were two vehicles, a police car and a Toyota twin-cab, a dented working vehicle. The house, of sandy brick, red tiles, gleaming aluminium window and door frames and potted ferns, looked out of place amongst the native trees. Ellen leaned forward, one hand on the dash. ‘I know that Toyota. It belongs to Laurie Jarrett.’
Both women glanced at each other then. ‘I should have realised,’ Ellen said.
‘We need backup, Sarge.’
‘Yes.’
But their arrival had alerted Jarrett. He burst from the house, pushing Kellock ahead of him with the barrel of a shotgun. ‘Stay out of this,’ he yelled.
Ellen and Pam alighted from the car. They did not approach him but stood behind their open doors.
‘Laurie,’ Ellen said, feeling futile and pointless, ‘put the gun down.’
He was coiled and powerful behind Kellock, who looked soft, depleted, in shock, his shirt hanging out and blood around his nose. ‘I’m doing what you lot should have done a long time ago,’ Jarrett said, prodding Kellock closer to the Toyota.
He had something in his free hand: a rolled magazine. To distract him, Ellen said, ‘What have you got there, Laurie?’
‘Have a look.’
He tossed it deftly; the magazine fluttered then fell like a stone. Ellen emerged cautiously from the shelter of the car and retrieved it. She was now about fifteen metres from Jarrett and Kellock, who were beside the Toyota. She straightened the pages of the magazine. It was printed on glossy paper, with plenty of pale, defenceless flesh on show, the children otherwise dressed in Little Bo Peep outfits, nurses’ uniforms and schoolgirl tunics. It was called Little Treasures.
‘What am I looking at, Laurie?’
His face burned with a kind of exultation. ‘What the fuck do you think you’re looking at?’
There was silence while she flipped through the pages. Then she heard him snarl, ‘No you don’t, sweetheart.’
Ellen glanced up: he was gesturing with the shotgun. She looked back over her shoulder. Pam had moved away from the car, her hand on her holstered.38. ‘Both of you,’ Jarrett said, ‘guns on the ground. Now!’
‘Do it, Pam,’ Ellen said.
She placed her own gun on the gravelled driveway, watched Pam follow suit, and then she returned her attention to the magazine. A moment later, she found Alysha Jarrett. Laurie’s daughter had been allocated a four-page spread. Her smiles were mostly empty, but there was pain in the emptiness.
Feeling sickened, Ellen looked up. Laurie was watching, still burning. ‘Now you know,’ he said.
‘Yes.’
‘Look closer.’
Ellen forced herself to comply. Hairy groins, but no faces, no way of identifying the abusers. Then she froze: she’d almost overlooked a bare foot with a birthmark like blood spilt across it. And there was Clode’s spa bath. She looked up again. ‘Taking care of business, Laurie?’
‘Yes. First Clode, then Duyker. Clode told me about Duyker, snivelling piece of shit. They both told me about Kellock.’
‘Don’t make it worse, Laurie. Let Mr Kellock go, so that DC Murphy and I can arrest him.’
Kellock struggled. He still hadn’t spoken. Jarrett clubbed him with the shotgun, a meaty thud. ‘Fuck that, Ellen,’ he said savagely. ‘The police will protect their own, just like they always do.’
‘No. There’s too much evidence against him.’
Kellock looked at her then, as though relieved to think that she might sway Jarrett. She felt nothing for him and looked away. ‘Mitigating circumstances, Laurie. The judge will understand. No one should have to bear what you’ve had to bear.’
He seemed to be listening. She went on: ‘We failed to protect Alysha or punish her abusers, we hassled your family, we blamed you for shooting van Alphen-that wasn’t you, I take it?’
He shook his head.
‘And Kellock and van Alphen killed your nephew.’
There was a twist of pain on Laurie Jarrett’s face. He shook his head as if to clear it. ‘Killing Nick was the only good thing they did,’ he muttered.
Ellen and Pam exchanged puzzled looks. ‘I thought you hated them for that,’ Ellen said, while Pam asked, ‘What do you mean, Mr Jarrett?’
Laurie Jarrett looked from one woman to the other. The pain outgrew him as they watched, his voice and manner breaking apart. ‘Don’t you understand? Ellen, I took your advice, really sat down and talked to Alysha. Know what she told me? Nick and the others had sold her to Clode.’
Ellen gulped. You thought you’d seen the worst, and then someone would go one step further. ‘Oh, Laurie.’
She ran the shooting of Nick Jarrett through her head again. She’d never doubted that Kellock and van Alphen had ambushed him, but she’d always seen it as a case of rough justice. Now she could see that Kellock had an additional-or different-motive: he feared that Nick Jarrett might have learnt about his involvement with Clode and Duyker. Nick Jarrett probably wasn’t part of the ring-Clode was merely a source of ready cash-but he might have known about it. Clode might have boasted about his other activities and acquaintances.
‘Laurie, let him go.’
‘I should’ve realised what was going on,’ Jarrett said, his distress growing. ‘I can’t bear to think about it.’
Kellock twisted violently as if he knew it was his end. Jarrett clubbed him again. Ellen cringed at the meaty sound of it. ‘Laurie! Listen to me! Did Clode owe money to Nick? Is that why he was beaten up?’
He blinked. ‘What?’
‘Did Clode owe Nick money?’
‘Who fucking knows?’
‘We need details, Laurie. We need to speak to Alysha. We need you there. Come on, put the gun down.’
‘You must be joking,’ Jarrett said, bright and unequivocal again, as though his heart had never broken. He struck Kellock’s kidneys with the barrel of the shotgun.
‘Get in.’
Kellock hauled his huge mass over the driver’s seat and across the gearstick to the passenger seat. Jarrett climbed in after him, first motioning the shotgun at Ellen and Pam. ‘We’ve leaving now. You two won’t try to stop us.’
Ellen said, ‘Don’t do this, Laurie,’ and Pam began to circle around him.
In answer, he shot out the tyres of their car. They froze, their insides spasming, pellets and grit spitting and pinging. He said again, ‘You won’t stop me.’
Ellen glanced around at Pam, who gave her a complicated look. ‘We won’t stop you,’ she murmured.
The Toyota threw gravel at them as it started away but it wasn’t speeding. It moved sedately through the trees, exhaust toxins hanging in the still air, and they heard it pause at the main road above, and turn right. Waterloo lay in that direction, where the land levelled out to meet the sea. But before that there were many other roads, and back roads, full of secret places known to men like Laurie Jarrett.
61
After finding Neville Clode’s body-Clode bent in a foetal position in a pool of blood, his private parts perforated from a shotgun blast-Scobie Sutton secured the scene, putting a senior constable in charge, and then sped away to help the girls in Red Hill. He hated to think of them going up against Kellock. Kellock scared him. He hated Kellock.
He was driving a police car, there being no unmarkeds available. He rocketed through Bittern and turned onto Bittern-Dromana Road, which had a reputation for a couple of dangerous intersections. If you were drowsy or inattentive, you were alerted by a series of speed humps. Not short stubby ones, like in a suburban street, but broad shallow ones. They didn’t harm your suspension but they sure made you jump and take notice.
He was mentally mapping his way to Red Hill when he heard the dispatcher warn all personnel to be on the lookout for a white Toyota twin-cab, registered owner Laurie Jarrett, last seen in the Red Hill area. Jarrett was believed to have a hostage and be armed and dangerous. Oh God, Scobie thought. He accelerated. He was still down on the coastal plain, fifteen minutes from Red Hill. Frantic, he thumbed the speed dial on his mobile.