The One That Got Away

by Jennifer Palgrave

  ‘Why on earth would Kevin be going for a cruise?’ Lauren asked.

  ‘No idea,’ said Michael. ‘He was wearing a suit, perhaps some corporate function. There’s a large catamaran moored there that gets hired out.’ He paused, ‘Thinking about it again, I saw him speak to a well-dressed woman at the head of the steps, so it must have been a corporate function.’

  Lauren stiffened at the end of the phone. ‘Tell me about the woman.’

  ‘Can’t really, Lauren, it was only a moment and by that time I was quite a way away. Let’s think.’ He paused. ‘I noticed she was well-dressed because she had heels, a very flash handbag–I can spot those at a hundred metres–and a short stylish cut. And I think she was loaded down with jewellery–something was flashing off her anyway.’

  ‘Oh my God, that sounds just like Darya.’

  ‘Your Ukrainian? I can see you’re still on the case,’ said Michael. ‘Don’t get in Deirdre’s bad books, will you. Anyhow, let’s catch up when you’re back in town. Kiano is doing some backbreaking work this weekend and there’s the bones of a rock garden emerging.’

  ‘I’d love to,’ Lauren replied. It was so good to have those two around.

  Then her thoughts returned to Kevin. What was going on with Darya? There was no way Darya would have helped him skip, she’d made her opinion perfectly clear. So if she wasn’t helping him, what was she doing? Her thoughts whirled. Kevin, the Lange plot, Judith Butler, Brett, Darya, Karori Gardens, a catamaran… She couldn’t see how it all fitted. It was too hard. Or possibly, too awful to contemplate.

  24

  ‘I am constant as the northern star’

  Monday saw Lauren happily back in her apartment, except that Kevin’s whereabouts was still on her mind. If someone may be out to get you, you want to know where they are.

  Fearing another dressing down, she put in a call to Deirdre. ‘Any updates on Kevin Driscoll? I’m back in Wellington now.’

  ‘We’re following some leads,’ Deirdre replied. ‘I can’t tell you too much but the police are inspecting a catamaran that was hired out on the day Kevin was known to have arrived in Wellington. With that tip-off from your friend Michael, we believe he may have been on it.’

  ‘I talked to Michael yesterday,’ said Lauren. ‘He hadn’t told you that he spotted a woman with Kevin who may have been Darya–Brett’s wife. While we were talking he remembered that a well-dressed woman spoke to Kevin on the jetty. It sounded to me like Darya.’

  ‘Interesting,’ said Deirdre. ‘When we talked to Brett, he said he was to meet Kevin for lunch at Shed Five but he didn’t turn up, so he and his wife had lunch without him. We’ll have to talk to Michael again, and to Brett’s wife.’ She sighed and said, ‘At least I’ve had more people assigned, what with the Judith Butler investigation and now this. By the way, we’ve virtually no hope of finding if there was anything suspicious about her death–Judith Butler was cremated. Meanwhile, you should continue to be security conscious.’

  It was reassuring that Deirdre was forthcoming, Lauren thought as she put the phone down. She was worried that she might have been permanently on the outer. She talked to Phyl, who came up with a myriad of suggestions for how Lauren could guard her house and her person. Lauren felt she hardly needed to do anything, Phyl was so hyper-vigilant. Still, she would consider an alarm system. Ro could benefit more from Phyl’s advice, since she too might still be in danger. She checked her diary; Ro would be flying back late Wednesday and then they could catch up.

  It was annoying not knowing what had happened to Kevin, but he did seem to have disappeared. For the time being, at least. Perhaps for longer. She had been thinking about Darya again, and how surprised she’d been to know Darya was a visitor at Karori Gardens. A death and a disappearance with Darya in the vicinity on both occasions. Her neck prickled. Things seemed to be coming to a head.

  It was before nine when she rang Ro on Thursday morning. A sleepy voice answered the phone. ‘You have to wake up, Ro. Lots to tell you–did you keep up with New Zealand news while you’ve been away?’

  ‘I know the news about Jacinda being pregnant, it was all over the news in Oz. Stunning, eh!’ She was waking up quickly. ‘Mostly a good press, too, apart from some of those Aussie radio jocks. They’re such sexist boors. They talk as if only men are fit to run the country.’

  ‘Yes, yes, but that’s not the news I want to talk with you about. You need to get straight up and come over here. I’ll make you some breakfast and a coffee. And Ro, find your key and lock your door before you leave.’

  While she was waiting, Lauren rehearsed what she wanted to tell Ro: Deirdre telling them to butt out, being sent out of Wellington, no leads to find if Judith’s death was murder, Kevin going missing–and Darya being present in Karori Gardens the day Judith Butler died and then on the wharf talking to Kevin.

  Ro arrived looking disheveled, as if she had thrown on whatever clothes were lying on the floor. Lauren placed muesli, fruit and yoghurt in front of her and they sat at the kitchen table, the morning sun streaming into the room. Lauren spoke while Ro ate and after Lauren had finished, Ro sat silent for a minute or two, frowning. ‘Extraordinary,’ she said at last. ‘I’ve been so keen to get on with writing something about the Lange plot.’ She sipped her coffee and said, ‘Perhaps if I named Kevin as one of the plotters, he might turn up from wherever he is to sue me.’

  ‘Better sued than murdered.’ Lauren was tart rather than amused and Ro apologised for making light of it. ‘It just seems so absurd. Things that happened in history come to haunt us. It’s like a weird dream.’

  Lauren looked at her. ‘Get a grip. We need to think carefully about this. Judith was almost certainly murdered for talking to us.’ Ro winced and put her head in her hands, as if trying to banish the thought.

  Lauren continued, ‘My best guess has been that Kevin was behind it. Or someone he hired. Although Kevin would have been less likely to look out of place at Karori Gardens than some thug. He could have claimed to be an old friend. Some truth in that.’

  She wrinkled her nose, then stood up and started to clear the table. ‘But now I’m wondering about Darya.’ She put dishes on the bench, then turned around to Ro. ‘Darya was on the spot and she does strike me as ruthless. And now that Kevin’s disappeared....’ She didn’t finish the sentence. ‘But back to Judith. I’ve been racking my brains to think how we could turn up anything that might implicate Darya.’

  Ro thought hard. ‘It’s an off-chance, but how about we talk to your hairdresser’s Mum, the one Darya was visiting? From what you’ve said, Darya doesn’t seem the sort to bother doing acts of kindness. Perhaps the old lady can tell us something about those visits.’

  Lauren thought she herself should steer clear of Karori Gardens. She had probably stretched their cooperativeness to the limit. They decided Ro should visit Mrs Kravetz. She wanted to go immediately, but Lauren advised her to go home first and get dressed more respectably. Ro took the implied criticism with reasonably good grace. ‘Do you think I should get a blue rinse on the way?’

  ‘Shut up,’ Lauren replied, giving her a hug and pushing her out the door.

  ‘Lauren.’ It was Megan’s voice on the phone. Ro had not long left, and Lauren had just got to her desk. ‘Are you free for a coffee? I’m at work, but there’s something I’d like to talk to you about urgently.’ Lauren agreed to meet her at Pandoro’s in half an hour. It was turning into a busy morning.

  ‘It’s about Darya Wilson,’ Megan said, after they’d ordered their coffee and found a seat. ‘I told you how difficult she was, wanting a prime sponsorship during the Festival, even though the programme was just going to press. We managed something at the last minute, got them in as co-sponsors of one of the big events. Sydney Opera Company.’

  ‘Yes, you told me. What’s the opera again?’

  ‘Tosca. Puccini.’

  Lauren nodded, ‘Oh yes, the one where the heroine stabs the villain who has it in for her lover.’ Possib
ly more appropriate than anyone might guess, thought Lauren.

  Megan looked irritated and impressed at the same time. ‘Yes, I know you’re an opera buff, but it’s not the plot of Tosca that I wanted to discuss. Darya hasn’t stumped up the money. It was a lot, fifty thousand. We usually get donations in before the programme goes out, but the timing was so tight. We asked Darya to pay in the New Year. She promised she would, but when I checked after getting back to work the funds hadn’t come in.’

  Their coffee was delivered and Megan continued, between sips. ‘I emailed her last week and got no reply. I had taken down her details, so early this morning I phoned her. She was difficult to talk to. She seemed in a rush. Firstly she apologised–not very sincerely, it seemed to me–and said she’d been very distracted. Asked me to contact her husband and assured me he’d sort it out. Told me I’d find him at home. Then she hung up without giving me his details. I thought you’d know how to get in touch with him.’

  Lauren frowned. She couldn’t tell Megan why Darya might have been distracted over the last few weeks. The most she could do was reassure her. ‘I’m sure Brett will forward the funds. It wouldn’t be in his interests to break a promise. He’s quite set on being the big philanthropist. I can give you his number, it’s still in my phone.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Megan. ‘I hope you’re right. The funny thing was, I’m sure Darya was at the airport when I was talking to her. I distinctly heard one of those announcements blare out when she was speaking. I had to ask her to repeat herself. I’m sure I caught the word ‘Sydney’.

  Shit, thought Lauren, she’s scarpering. ‘What time was that?’ She tried to sound casual.

  ‘Must have been around eight thirty. I’d been putting off phoning her because she was such a difficult woman, but I thought I should do it first thing, so it wouldn’t hang over me all day.’

  Ro went to Karori Gardens later in the morning, her sombre mood a contrast to the first visit, when she got so excited about what Judith revealed in her interview. Despite the police warnings about security, there was no one at the reception desk. Just a note giving visitors an extension to phone. She picked up the visitors’ book, and began leafing through it. Yes, Darya clocked in at two thirty on the 24th of December. She flicked further back, and found more visits–all around two thirty, so nothing odd there. She wrote her own name in with today’s date, then rang to find out where Mrs Kravetz was.

  Mrs Kravetz was sitting on a chair in her room, her walker nearby and a tray of magazines to hand. She didn’t appear to be doing anything, just staring at the floor as if lost in thought. She raised her head when Ro came into the room and looked pleased to have a visitor, even though it was clearly not someone familiar. ‘Good afternoon, dear. And who might you be?’

  Ro had her introduction prepared. ‘I’m Rowan Wisbech, I’m a friend of Mrs Wilson. I understand she’s been visiting you. We’re a little concerned about her, we haven’t seen her lately. Have you seen her since Christmas?’

  Mrs Kravetz looked worried. ‘No, she last visited on Christmas Eve. I’ve been disappointed not to see her again, I so much enjoyed talking to her.’ She looked around. ‘No one else speaks Ukrainian here, did you know?’

  Ro brought her back to Darya. ‘But Mrs Wilson does?’

  ‘Yes, and she’s such a lady, always dressed smart, but she didn’t talk about herself. Have you visited her house? Is it nice?’

  Ro lied. ‘Yes indeed, over in the Wairarapa, a lovely place. So how did Mrs Wilson seem to you when she last visited?’ As she spoke, she perched on the side of the bed.

  Mrs Kravetz looked thoughtful. ‘It’s funny that you should ask, she did seem out of sorts that day. She usually came a bit before afternoon tea, and stayed and had a cup with me, then left. But on Christmas Eve, I’d just heard the tea trolley clattering down the corridor when she suddenly got up and went out; I thought she’d left. But, no, she came back in and we talked some more–but she missed out on her tea. She stayed longer than usual and then she rushed off again, without saying Merry Christmas.’

  The old woman lowered her voice. ‘To tell you the truth, I thought she must have a tummy bug.’ Then she brightened again. ‘She did leave me a present.’ Mrs Kravetz reached into the bedside drawer and pulled out a pretty little brooch. ‘It looks very expensive, don’t you think?’

  Ro leant over and admired the brooch. She had no idea whether it was Cartier or crap. She said her goodbyes gracefully and left.

  By the time Ro phoned again, Lauren was home from coffee with Megan. She had scratched herself together a late lunch and was wondering whether she should call Deirdre about Darya being at the airport. But Deirdre probably knew already, she’d said she wanted to speak to the Wilsons. And by now Darya would be well off on her journey, wherever she was headed. She told Ro about Darya’s possible flight.

  Ro was full of news, too. ‘Mrs Kravetz said that Darya did behave oddly. Bolted out of the room at afternoon tea time, then stayed on late, then suddenly left. What do you think?’ They imagined scenarios–all of them involving Darya spending time in Judith’s room, either once or twice. What Ro reported was enough to convince Lauren that it was Darya, not Kevin, who had killed Judith. She must have set up the visits with Mrs Kravetz as an alibi. Could she really have been so devious? She must have been desperate to stop Brett being implicated in the Lange plot, if Kevin caved in to police questioning. How she could have known about it was unclear.

  ‘It’s still all supposition,’ said Ro. The police might be onto the Wilsons about Kevin’s disappearance, but they won’t do anything about Judith.’

  ‘And who do we care about most?’ Lauren replied with a wry smile.

  Ro surprised her. ‘I still care about who was involved in the plot against Lange. For all we know there could have been other people spurring Kevin on, as well as Brett. It’s what started all this. And it was you who went on about bringing them to justice.’

  Lauren had to agree. ‘I still think that’s important. But now I want the perpetrators brought to justice for much more recent crimes–and more successful ones at that.’

  Ro was insistent. ‘We don’t know that Brett was involved in Judith’s death or Kevin’s disappearance. If Darya has scarpered, it leaves the way clear for me to talk to Brett about the plot against Lange. And, Lauren, I’ll need you to come with me, to find the house–and to introduce me.’

  ‘Introduce you! You want me to say, “This is my friend Ro–she’s here to grill you about your movements in 1988”? And besides, Deirdre has told us not to do any more snooping. We should just let her know what Mrs Kravetz told you about Darya at the rest home.’

  Ro managed to look like a child begging for a sweet. ‘We can’t let it rest here. Please, Lauren, can’t we pretend we just happened to be in the Wairarapa, and thought we’d pop in? A social call?’

  Lauren looked dubious. Then she laughed. ‘There is an excuse we could make–Megan asked me to check that they’d put that donation into the Festival bank account. OK, I’ll come with you.’

  25

  ‘Into what dangers would you lead me, Cassius?’

  They set out before lunch the next day. They’d decided not to say they were coming. ‘Surprise is a good tactic,’ said Ro. Lauren wondered if Ro had been reading military history.

  As they wound slowly over the Remutakas, Lauren remembered her last trip to the Wairarapa. The helicopter ride had been quite an experience, noisy and fast and great aerial views until that fog came down. That had been scary, Brett being so reckless before Darya intervened.

  On this trip she was enjoying the magnificence of the ranges, as the small ribbon of road twisted and turned and slowly rose through line upon line of steep hills. At the summit she pulled over, parked the car and said, ‘Let’s look at the views on both sides and think about how we’re going to manage the conversation when we get there.’

  She paused, and then confessed, ‘I still think we’ve been a bit hasty. I don’t know
that we should be going to talk to Brett in that isolated house all by ourselves. I know Brett had a temper when he was young, and I’ve seen him being obstinate to the point of folly lately. Stubborn and bad tempered, could be unpleasant to be around.’

  Ro got out of the car and stretched, her red hair glinting gold in the bright sun. She said, ‘He’s unlikely to do us any harm, no matter what we say to him. Too many other people know about everything now–the cold case, Judith’s death, Kevin’s disappearance. I’m still really keen to see how we can tie him to the Lange plot. That’s what we’re missing. Let’s walk up to the lookout and decide how we’ll approach him.’

  At the top, they took in the spectacular views before they sat down on the grass and thought about the forthcoming meeting.

  Lauren said, ‘I realise we’ll need to be circumspect. We’ll start with Megan’s wanting to know if the Arts Festival money they promised is coming. Should we tell him Judith’s death looks suspicious? And should we say it’s strange I asked Brett to call off Kevin, and now Kevin’s disappeared?’

  Ro said, ‘I don’t think we can second-guess how it’ll go. We should just be as polite as we can, but look as if we think he has some answers. I’ll record the conversation on my phone. And don’t forget what we really need to know: how was Brett involved in the plot to poison Lange?’

  ‘You wouldn’t get the truth if you asked him that direct,’ said Lauren.

  Ro nodded gloomily, and they walked back down the lookout track and got into the car. The road downhill was much quicker than the long haul up and they made good time to Greytown. It was Lauren’s favourite settlement in the Wairarapa. It still had the air of a sleepy tree-lined country town, in spite of all the restaurants and shops catering for visiting Wellingtonians. They didn’t want to arrive at Brett’s right on lunch time, so they stopped at one of the restaurants.