Squirrel & Swan Precious Things

by M. D. Archer

  The Dixon’s living room was starting to feel more familiar to Sophie than her own, but it was still strange to be here for what felt like an intimate family moment.

  “Polly was well looked after, relatively, but she was kept sedated for a lot of the time she was there. She never saw her captor, but is certain it was a man. He wore a mask and weird, baggy kind of industrial overalls each time she saw him. He left her water and snacks, and returned every few days to give her a proper cooked meal. The night she was taken, she can’t remember anything except waking up there. She knew she was somewhere near the water, but nothing else. Polly told us that while her laptop was password protected, her phone was not, so it would’ve been easy for him to access her Facebook and post on her behalf. Because of the mask and the overalls she couldn’t provide any specific details regarding his physical description.”

  “So basically nothing useful,” Paige said loudly. Sophie elbowed her. “Ow.”

  “What about Jason?” Carolyn said. “Any news?”

  “I have nationwide alert on him. Checking the airport, intercity buses, and we are getting a credit card trace at the moment. His phone is off.”

  “What did he want with her?” Carolyn asked, her features strained. “If he just kept her sedated, mostly, what was his plan?”

  Roman just shook his head. “I really don’t know. We’ll have to wait until we find him.”

  Tyrone Dixon, who had been quiet up until this point, stood up. “Thank you, Detective. You’ve been great. Good work.” He leaned forward to shake Roman’s hand just as his phone rang. “Sorry, I have to take this... we’re waiting to hear the papers have been signed,” he said.

  Sophie watched him take the call.

  “Oh, good, thank God.” Relief coursed over Tyrone’s face and through his body.

  “It’s gone through?” Carolyn called across to her husband.

  Tyrone beamed and nodded, still with the phone clamped to his hear.

  “It’s the Titan deal he’s been working on for the last couple of months,” Carolyn explained. “It was supposed to be signed today, and he’s been very stressed. On top of the Polly situation...” She shook her head and took a sip of tea.

  Sophie could almost hear Carolyn changing her internal narrative to account for Tyrone’s behaviour over the last few weeks. Their cheating husband surveillance would be never spoken of again, she knew, because Carolyn would not be confronting her husband after this ordeal.

  “Tyrone was involved in the Titan Industries manufacturing deal?” Roman said, conversationally. “I read about it in the paper. A massive factory, the industrial complex in South Auckland?”

  Carolyn nodded. Sophie sat up straighter in her seat. Paige’s nose twitched as she watched Sophie pull out her phone. She was on Facebook, scrolling through someone’s account.

  Tyrone hung up and ran his hands through his hair. “Yes. Yes,” he repeated to himself, clenching his fist and smiling as he walked over to the kitchen bench. He leaned against it, visibly relaxed.

  Sophie watched him. And Paige watched Sophie.

  “What’s up?” Paige’s nose twitched again as she nudged Sophie. Sophie shook her head not now to Paige and stood and walked across to where Tyrone was standing. He straightened to full height when he realised Sophie was standing right in front of him, less than two feet away—closer than social convention usually permitted.

  “Excuse me, sorry, can I use the washroom?” Sophie smiled at him.

  “Uh, yes, of course, it’s down the hall... last door on the left.”

  But Sophie didn’t move, instead continuing to stand too close to Tyrone. He cast a glance at his wife who was now frowning. He took a step backward, shuffled a bit further away, then gave up and walked straight over to where Carolyn was standing with Roman. He put his arm around her and Carolyn stiffened at first, but then relaxed into the embrace. Tyrone hadn’t noticed that Sophie had picked up his phone as she turned and left the room. No-one had, except for Paige.

  WHEN SOPHIE RETURNED a few minutes later, she surreptitiously replaced the phone and sat down next to Paige on the couch.

  “What’s going on?” Paige whispered. The Dixons continued to speak with Roman.

  “I needed to make a call,” Sophie whispered back.

  “What’s wrong with your own phone?”

  “You saw that, huh?”

  “Yeah, but don’t worry, no one else did. So, what’s happening?”

  “I have a theory,” Sophie said. “I’ve got Leo working on something. He’s going to call back in a minute.”

  “I think we need to compare notes,” Paige said. Standing up, she said to the others, “We’re just going to step outside for a moment.” Paige yanked Sophie to her feet and dragged her outside. “Let’s get Leo back on the phone.”

  THIS WAS QUITE EXCITING, Leo thought.

  What he needed was a headset, to keep his hands free while he took calls. Urgent calls, coming in from his two field agents while he worked behind the scenes, the real mastermind behind it all. Leo’s eyes lit up at this delicious embellishment. Another call came in. Leo wiped his sweaty palms and picked up the phone. Yes, he would purchase a headset ASAP.

  “Go for Leo,” he said.

  Paige cringed and rolled her eyes at Sophie.

  “Leo, I need you to look up something else. Fast.”

  “WHERE COULD JASON BE?” Carolyn was asking Roman when Paige and Sophie returned.

  “Anywhere, really. It’s not hard to stay off the grid for a few days, but anything longer, it gets more difficult. Unless you have help,” Roman added.

  “Jason is away on holiday in the States,” Paige interrupted. “I imagine the credit card records will confirm this.”

  Surprise lit up Roman’s face.

  “Jason is abroad?” Carolyn was also surprised. “But how did you know?”

  “Yes, please enlighten us,” Roman added.

  “His social media activity,” Paige said, omitting to add that Leo had maybe gone a little deeper than your average online voyeur could.

  “But what is interesting,” Sophie said, turning to face Tyrone. “Is unlike Roman and Mrs Dixon, you don’t look at all surprised about this.”

  All eyes turned to Tyrone. He took a step backward.

  “What? Uh, yes, I just remembered. Jason did say something a few weeks ago, in passing... work has been crazy,” he added.

  “Hmm. But you know what is strange...” Paige said, directing this to Tyrone but addressing the whole room.

  “What?” Roman, Carolyn, and Tyrone said at the same time.

  “The GPS on your phone, Tyrone, says you were in Opoutere yesterday afternoon.”

  “What?” Carolyn said.

  Roman’s brows knitted together. “He was?”

  “Well, yes... that’s when... I got your message, Caro, about Opoutere... you called, and it went straight to voicemail, so I checked the message, and it was too exciting, so I went straight there from the office. Well, I picked up some coffee for the ride.” Tyrone scratched his forehead and smiled in a self-depreciating way.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Carolyn spread her hands as she stepped toward him. “I thought you were still in that meeting. When you got home you didn’t say anything.”

  “And according to your GPS you left your office shortly after 2:30 p.m., which is about two hours before we knew where she was,” Paige said.

  “Oh, uh, that must be a mistake, GPS isn’t perfect, you know. Phones gets buggy... mine has been playing up for weeks. Mike, one of the IT guys at work, looked at it and said it happens sometimes... the GPS goes screwy... something to do with the satellites getting their wires crossed.” Tyrone smiled again. “Technology, huh. You’re always complaining about your phone, aren’t you Caro.”

  “That’s quite the specific bug isn’t it, Mr Dixon,” Paige said.

  “How do you know what his GPS says?” Roman interrupted, but he didn’t wait for a response, instead turning to f
ace Tyrone. “Your phone please?” He extended his hand.

  Tyrone patted his pockets and looked around.

  “Sorry, I borrowed it briefly,” Sophie said, retrieving it from the kitchen bench and handing it to Roman. “It’s how we know you have been travelling to and from Opoutere every few days for the last couple of weeks.”

  “What? No. That’s a mistake. It must be picking up on all the travel to the building site... it’s down south. Obviously, the GPS is detecting the southern motorway route, but somehow the satellite message is getting mixed up and not recording the actual destination.”

  “Fine,” Paige said. “Let’s say you aren’t full of crap and your phone is riddled with bugs and obsessed with Opoutere.”

  “Why is it,” Sophie tagged in, “that when Polly had been found, you weren’t relieved?”

  “How on earth can you make such a judgement?”

  “Easy,” Sophie said. “There are physiological and behavioural concomitants of human emotions. Such responses can be indexed and many are observable to the naked eye. You exhibited classic signs of worry, not relief.”

  “Before you ask, she has a PhD in this,” Paige said.

  “Of course I was worried about my daughter. I was worried about what had happened to her.”

  “But the thing is, Mr Dixon,” Sophie continued. “You never seemed particularly worried about Polly. Yes, there was something weighing on your mind, but it wasn’t concern about her. I noticed it from day one.”

  “I told you. In all likelihood, she’d just taken off. She fought with Caro that night, you know.” Tyrone looked desperately at his wife. “Polly’s done it before.”

  Carolyn, who had been silent up until this point finally spoke up. “But not like this, Tyrone, she’s never gone for this long without telling us where she was. And Sophie’s right. You were distracted and stressed, but you weren’t going out of your mind with worry like I was. You didn’t rush out and try and find her. Not once. And when we thought Jason might have taken her, I was wild, but you, well, you weren’t. At first I was impressed at how calm you were. I thought you were holding it together for my sake, but now I realise now how strange all of it was.”

  “Because you didn’t need to worry, did you,” Sophie said. “You knew where she was, and you knew she was okay.” Taking centre stage like was not normal for Sophie, but in times like this, her anxiety disappeared. She knew what she was doing, she was in the zone and everything else just fell away. “Because you were the one who took her. You were the one who kidnapped her in the middle of the night and ferreted her away to the Coromandel. It was you.” Sophie finished with a flourish. “Wasn’t it?”

  Carolyn gasped. “Tyrone.”

  “Don’t listen to her honey, it ridiculous, it’s obscene.”

  “It is obscene,” Sophie agreed.

  “But why? Why on earth would I kidnap my own daughter?” Tyrone blew out an exasperated sigh.

  “Because she found out, didn’t she?” Paige stepped forward. “About the deal you were brokering. Polly Activist Dixon, the daughter of the man in charge of the Titan deal, found out what was going on behind the scenes and when you realised this, you knew she could ruin the deal for you. That she would stop the deal, if she could. And how would that have looked? Your own daughter ruining the deal of the century. So you had to get her away, where she couldn’t go to the media—just until the deal was done. Or until you could cover up the paper trail, or something, correct?”

  “Why? What’s the problem with the deal?” Carolyn said.

  “Because your husband has brokered a deal for the purchase of ten hectares in South Auckland by Titan, and the development of this land into an industrial complex; but Titan is owned by Sunshine International, a company that’s been cited 137 times for violating environmental codes and carrying out illegal industrial practices, not to mention causing major environmental incidents such as toxic spills and illegal dumping of toxic waste.”

  Half of this information was courtesy of Leo, feeding them information from his deeper-than-legal online searches; but Sophie had made the initial connection. The deal Tyrone was brokering, that he was so stressed out about, was connected to the dodgy company Dominic mentioned. Tyrone had referred to an important development deal in South Auckland the first time they had met, and Dominic’s most recent Facebook assertions suggested that Sunshine International was in NZ for a development deal in South Auckland.

  “How do you know this?” Roman asked.

  “We just worked the clues,” Sophie said, smiling at Paige.

  “And Polly worked it out, didn’t she?” Paige said. “Or she was about to. Polly somehow put it together. She was about to connect Sunshine Holdings to your deal and then it would have been all over, wouldn’t it?” she said to Tyrone. “So you had to muzzle her. At least temporarily. And that’s why you kidnapped your own daughter.”

  Tyrone shook his head. “You don’t have proof,” he said weakly.

  “Our IT... uh... consultant, has found a paper trail between Titan and Sunshine International Holdings,” Paige bluffed. Leo would get there eventually, he just needed a bit more time.

  “But the thing that gave you away, Mr Dixon, was your behaviour,” Sophie added. “It was when you got the call that the deal had gone through, that you finally relaxed, and I knew then what you’d been worrying about. Not your daughter. The deal. Put that together with the timing of Polly’s disappearance, her environmental activism, the posts of her friends and the fake Facebook posts—in order to remove police interest in the case, to make it look like a girl who’d run away—and finally, your repeated absences from home, and the office, including yesterday afternoon, when you disappeared with all that food, sneaking away via the company car, leaving your own parked in the garage. It was you that ran past me at Jason’s bach, wasn’t it? You heard us arrive and you raced off. You would have beaten us back here, but you did actually get a flat tyre, didn’t you? The only truthful thing you have said in who knows how long. You knew the jig was up, that Polly had been found, so you were just praying that she wouldn’t wake up properly, or wouldn’t remember, or wouldn’t even think to report what she knew about Sunshine and Titan, until the deal went through, and that is why you only finally relaxed, just before, when you got the call.” Sophie nodded.

  “But you have no proof,” Tyrone repeated.

  “Once Roman traces your comings and goings over the last two weeks, they’ll have all the evidence they need,” Paige said.

  “But the GPS,” Tyrone said with more than a hint of panic. “I already explained—”

  “Give it up Dad.”

  No one had heard Polly enter the room.

  “Just tell them.” She shuffled further inside, still swaddled in her duvet. “It was you, all along, just admit it.”

  “What?” Tyrone gasped and took a step backward. “No.”

  But then, as if he had been punched in the gut, he collapsed inwardly, like an imploding building. His legs buckled and he collapsed to the floor. He crouched there, one hand supporting him, the other on his forehead. When he looked up his eyes were wet. “You knew? It was me?”

  “Not at the time, but now... looking back? Yeah, I knew it was you. The way you walk... even your deodorant... and the way you stuck the chopsticks in the side of the takeaway cartoon.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “I would have worked it out,” she said simply. “You’re my dad.”

  20

  Paige and Sophie were quiet on the drive home.

  There were no words to describe the messiness and the drama, of what had just unfolded. Tyrone Dixon had kidnapped his own daughter, kept her sedated, scared and alone in a remote bach in the Coromandel, while he waited for a business deal to go through. The night she disappeared, she’d mentioned Sunshine International at dinner, and Tyrone had been shocked to realise, after a quick search of her room, that she was close to figuring it all out. After Polly had left, he’d put sedatives in his wife’s tea and carried
her upstairs to bed. He’d then texted Polly—the text she received while out at The Place had been from her father—and had asked her to come home. Dominic had been right. She had gone home that night.

  After Polly confirmed her dad was the culprit, Roman had asked him to come back to the station to make a formal statement. Tyrone had nodded, cast one more anguished look at his family and then walked outside. Before Roman followed him out, he’d stopped and shaken both Paige and Sophie’s hands. He’d lingered in front of Sophie, struggling to say something, but in the end all he said was that he’d be in touch. Chest tight, Sophie had nodded and hoped he would.

  Carolyn, on the couch with her daughter in her arms, had remained where she was as everyone else left, for once unable to play the dutiful host.

  PAIGE AND SOPHIE RETURNED to the office, ascending the stairs with burdened steps. The resolution of this case had taken a big bite out of both of them.

  “I feel as if we should have a drink,” Paige said as she let them into the office. She pulled a bottle of whiskey and two tumblers from the back of the cupboard. Sophie looked at this stash with surprise.

  “We’re a detective agency.” Paige shrugged in explanation. “At least we are... sort of, right? And we cracked the case,” she added, holding up the bottle of whiskey as a question to Sophie.

  “Let’s do it.” Sophie nodded. “That was rough.”

  Tumblers of the amber liquid in hand, they took seats in the two armchairs in the corner, underneath the window.

  “We solved it, not the police. We should be proud of ourselves...” Paige trailed off because it didn’t feel like something that should be celebrated. They’d likely witnessed the death of a family today, and they both knew exactly what that meant.

  “Are you alright?” Sophie asked.

  “It’s so weird, Soph, it’s been four years, but I still find myself wondering, how can it be true. How can Dad just be gone... forever?” Her voice cracked. “A part of me died with him, Soph, a part I’ll never get back.”