‘It was left at each site.’ Everett sighed in frustration. ‘I was beginning to think it was an A for Alison.’
‘Oh, you couldn’t be more wrong, Detective.’ Sister Moore kneeled at the symbol, let her finger trace the shape:
‘Paris used it as her graffiti tag, and would also sign her name with it sometimes. It’s the Eiffel Tower, Detective.’
22
The Rover nudged the gutter in the grey light of dusk as Jaimie pulled up outside the community hall. She had been stoic in the face of exhaustion and the stress of what they’d been doing, but Taylor had noticed her mood lifting the further they drove down the mountain and away from the old camp. He knew better than anyone that no park ranger signed up for this kind of shit, but that bad things could happen in some of the most beautiful places on God’s green earth. Being in Dench’s cabin, knowing its history, must have left an impression on her. Being in a place where terrible things had happened stole something from the uninitiated. Innocence, perhaps.
‘Thanks for the ride, Jaimie,’ he said. ‘I want to get these photos to Everett right away.’
She was silent, her head slumped forwards.
‘Hey,’ he said, waiting until she turned to him. ‘You handled yourself well up there, kiddo.’
The faintest of smiles formed on Jaimie’s face. ‘I appreciate the compliment, but I really didn’t think we’d find that place. I should know my park better.’
‘Don’t be too hard on yourself. It’s a big area. One that has an unholy alliance with the loggers. And, besides, you haven’t been posted here all that long. Give it time.’
She reached across and put her hand on his. ‘Thanks.’ Then she asked, ‘Can I buy you dinner? You know, for mentoring me today?’
‘I think Everett and I have some work ahead of us. But thanks anyway.’
She withdrew her hand, and said lightly, ‘Go play with your cop friend.’
‘Thanks, Ma,’ Taylor said and stepped outside.
The Rover circled the dormant fountain in the square and headed back towards the ranger’s station. Taylor waved to Jaimie as she passed, a gust of wind nudging him back a step. He braced, leaned into the squall, and looked up at the mountains still steeped in a misty blanket; that strange silent landscape above the violent airstreams below. Beyond it, a leaden wall of cloud headed his way. The river lapped at the levee bank behind him. He remembered the image of the dig site on their return from the cabin, completely underwater now. His world seemed to be sinking beneath him.
Taylor glanced at each end of Main Street, squinting through the wind. The town was succumbing to the twilight, and in no time the dusky shadows would dissolve into night. He thought that soon the folk of Devlins Reach would lock their doors, huddle around whatever light they could muster, and hope that the Hoodoo wouldn’t come knocking.
The shrill sound of a bell startled Taylor. He snapped around, realising it had been a bicycle when he saw the two Wiggins boys riding up the sidewalk towards him. They were struggling against the wind. Taylor stepped aside as they headed to the Royal. A little early to be taking their father home. The mute kid in the red windcheater rang his bell again as he passed. Maybe that was a thank you. His brother, in his grey hoodie, nodded his gratitude. Taylor wondered what impact the town’s latest events had had on them. Being the sons of a drunken ferry master; isolated on the Reach, with a killer out there somewhere; finding those three bodies. It wasn’t something he would have wished on any twelve-year-old.
The the boys stopped. The mute kid stumbled in the face of a wind gust, his fair hair swept over his eyes. He brushed the wispy strands from his face and patted his chest to get his brother’s attention, then fluidly signed something with his fingers. His brother shrugged in reply. They glanced back at Taylor, laid down their bikes and walked towards him, hands tucked deep in their pockets.
‘What’s up?’ Taylor asked. He searched their eyes for a look of mischief or pain from their ordeal. But neither was evident. All things considered, they were just two tired kids out in a storm.
‘Fingers here wants to ask you something.’
Taylor nodded. ‘Okay.’
Fingers signed; his brother spoke. ‘You work with the policeman inside?’ Fingers pointed to the community hall.
‘Uh-huh.’
‘Then you’ll know if he thinks our da had something to do with these murders.’
Another thing to add to their burden, thought Taylor. They were obviously resilient and, at the end of the day, had each other, but he still felt sorry for them. ‘I really can’t say,’ he told them. The truth was, their father remained a person of interest.
The two boys glanced at each other, then continued speaking.
‘We’ve seen things.’ Fingers was on fire, his brother struggling to keep up. ‘Our father gets a little mean sometimes, on account of the drink, but he ain’t the Hoodoo. But we’ve seen it.’
Taylor nodded at the community hall. ‘Maybe you should be telling Detective Everett this.’
Fingers shook his head vigorously and pointed to Taylor.
‘No,’ said his brother. ‘Just you.’
‘Okay,’ said Taylor. ‘I’m listening.’
Fingers nodded to his brother, and gestured for him to do the talking.
‘No one comes or goes to the Reach without us or our da knowing about it,’ he said. ‘Unless you can fly or swim the river, the ferry is the only way in or out.’
‘Are you saying that the Hoodoo crossed on the ferry?’
Grey Hoodie looked at Fingers for encouragement. ‘Maybe … About a year ago, a woman got dropped off by a taxi on the other side of the river. We were helping our da that day, so it must have been a weekend. Weren’t no cars waiting, so she just walked on board and sat on her suitcase in the middle of the deck. It looked kinda funny.’
‘What makes you think she’s your Hoodoo?’
‘I know it sounds crazy, but she seemed kind of weird, and she never returned to the ferry … didn’t make the crossing back. Since she turned up, those men have been killed. And she was never seen in town, so she’s here somewhere. ’
‘Do you remember what she looked like?’
‘She was pretty,’ he said. ‘Kinda skinny, with short black hair. I remember because I ain’t never seen hair so black. She wore these dark sunglasses too. They were big, you know; covered a lot of her face. On the haul across the river, I asked her name, but she just smiled.’
‘Did she tell you?’
‘I think she was yanking my chain. She said it was something like Yip … Yiping … something like that.’
Taylor thought of the ochre rock paintings of Yilpinji. ‘Was it Yilpinji?’ he asked.
The boy’s eyes widened. ‘That’s it! Sounded Aboriginal to me, but her skin was real pale.’
‘You boys know the Reach better than I do. Where could she have gone?’
The kid shrugged. ‘It was like the Reach just swallowed her up. Right after that old Jeep picked her up outside the marina, we never saw her again.’
A shock went through Taylor at the mention of the Jeep. ‘The car that picked her up. Do you remember what colour it was?’
‘A kind of creamy colour, I guess, but dirty.’
‘Tan?’
He nodded. ‘Yeah, that sounds right.’
Could it be that simple? A reunion of Dench and Alison? Some unholy alliance to finish what they started with the three wise monkeys? And what was the connection with Yilpinji? Taylor glanced over his shoulder at the community hall. He had to share this with Everett right away.
‘And you didn’t see who was driving the Jeep?’
‘Nope,’ Grey Hoodie said. ‘But sometimes we’ve seen it prowling around at night.’
The boys mounted their bikes. Fingers rode off. His brother was about to follow when he paused to look up at Taylor. ‘It’s not our da, okay?’
Taylor nodded and watched as they rode away. He fished out his phone and googled Yilpinji.
It was much as Jaimie had explained it to him, with one exception. Yilpinji was a woman – a witch.
*
The community hall was unlocked, the double doors rattling against the frame in the wind. Taylor swung open the unlatched side, fighting the gale, then all but fell inside as the door slammed shut behind him. The interior was dusky, muted light struggling through the windows; a hint of exhaust fumes from the generator outside was seeping into the room. Even the knocking pipes held the comfort of familiarity now.
Everett paced to and fro by the trestle table, the phone to his ear. He waved Taylor over. ‘Thank you, sir,’ the detective said down the phone. ‘I understand.’ He breathed a sigh of relief, then slipped the mobile into his pocket.
‘Good news?’ asked Taylor.
‘That was my boss. In light of the recent killing, they’re sending a small tactical response team in.’
‘Tactical response? That’s some heavy firepower right there.’
‘It’s more about who’s equipped to cover that kind of ground than it is about firepower.’ He sat heavily in one of the chairs, his face so weary it looked like a loose-fitting mask. ‘Marine Area Command won’t risk a river crossing, so TR will trek in over the old Spencer Pass on foot. That’ll require ropes and abseiling. The rest of the team will be here once PolAir can fly.’
The thought of a tactical team coming over the hill like the cavalry relieved the tightness in Taylor’s chest a little – but they still had the night to get through.
The ranger laid a bundled handkerchief on the table in front of Everett. Taylor unfurled the cotton mantle to reveal the lipstick from the cabin.
‘Is that our Hoodoo’s?’ Everett asked.
‘It belongs to whoever wrote their calling card on the mirror in the cabin.’ Taylor, already opening the photos on his phone, showed the detective the one he’d taken of the A. ‘Hoodoo, Alison …’ he paused for a moment ‘… Yilpinji.’
‘Yilpinji?’
‘Yeah,’ Taylor said. ‘Long story, but there seems no end to what they’re calling our perp.’ He pointed to the lipstick. ‘Either way, I figured this may have some clean prints for you.’
Everett inspected the surface, moving it around with the tip of a pencil. ‘You figured correctly.’
Taylor gestured to his phone. ‘I took close-ups of everything in the cabin I thought might be relevant,’ he said. ‘Jaimie has some photos too. She’ll send them to your phone later.’
‘Good work.’
‘Another thing – I think the ferry is the key to a lot of this,’ Taylor said. ‘I just had a conversation with the Wiggins boys about some one-way traffic.’
Everett frowned. ‘One-way?’
Taylor told him about the conversation, and his theory about Alison and Dench, but Everett didn’t seem as pleased to have the information as Taylor had thought he would be. The detective slumped in his seat, palm to forehead as if stemming his thoughts. ‘The timing fits,’ he said with a sigh, ‘but I’m still not convinced that Alison is our perp or that Dench is still alive.’
Taylor considered the two graves up at the cabin. If they were Dench’s and Paris’s, someone had to have buried them, and it was unlikely to have been little Alison before she made it out of there. Now Taylor was just as frustrated and confused as ever.
Everett straightened in his chair. ‘Sister Moore was here earlier.’
He told Taylor about his conversation with the nun. It was hard to acknowledge – didn’t make sense; but then, did any of this? How could she have done something like that, even for her brother? She’s a nun for Christ’s sake! And how has she lived with it for so long? He tried to shake it off, but the weight of the ghosts in this place was suffocating. And yet, Taylor felt certain they hadn’t all had revealed themselves yet. ‘So, where does that leave us?’ he asked.
‘With more information than we can process, I’m afraid.’ Everett took a moment to listen to the water pipes drumming their song, then turned his focus to the lipstick on the table. He gestured to it. ‘For now, we work with the solid evidence at hand.’
Taylor looked up at the evidence boards on the stage. Everett was right. Theory is theory. Evidence is evidence.
Wasting no time, Everett stood and, using the last of his homemade dusting powder, dusted the lipstick tube for prints, concentrating on one at the base in particular. ‘Thumb,’ he murmured. He placed a clear piece of adhesive tape over it and peeled it carefully away. The print was clean and clear. ‘Perfect,’ he said, then stuck the tape down on a clear piece of white paper. ‘And very familiar,’ he added.
‘A match?’ Taylor felt like a passenger all of a sudden.
‘Same as on the motorcycle tank,’ Everett said, pointing the tip of his pencil at the centre. ‘See … the same Y-shaped island protruding left of the delta channels?’
‘Uh-huh.’
The detective wrote some notes in the blank space beside the print and sat back, satisfied. He reached for Taylor’s phone. ‘Let me see the other pics,’ he said, holding out his hand.
Taylor handed his phone over, and Everett scrolled through the photos. The ranger watched his various reactions and pictured the mysterious dark-haired woman crossing the river – a lone figure on the windswept deck of the ferry, eyes fixed on Devlins Reach as she drew ever closer.
23
Taylor rapped his knuckles on the edge of the table, more to break the silence than to get Everett’s attention. It worked on both counts, though. The detective looked up from his computer screen.
Taylor nodded at the laptop. On the screen was a photo of Sampson’s body sitting prone against the tree with his skeletal lipless smile, the warpaint of blood testament to his lost battle.
‘My wife Maggie told me she didn’t like having this stuff in the house,’ he told Everett. ‘Too close to home, she said … And she was afraid Erin might see it.’
Everett returned his focus to his screen, minimising the image to reveal his emails. ‘Can’t say I blame her,’ he said.
Taylor huffed an annoyed laugh. He wasn’t getting it. ‘I assured her it was under control.’ He stood, and paced in short bounds. ‘Now I’m not so sure. I mean, is it possible that Paris gathered intel on us once she was aware we were associated with the case?’ That sudden possibility seemed like a betrayal of Maggie and Erin.
Everett remained calm, turning his chair to watch Taylor as he paced.
‘So, you think we’re targets,’ the detective said – it wasn’t a question. ‘Me I get, but why you?’
Taylor stopped pacing and sat on the edge of the table to contemplate the question. ‘No,’ he said. ‘We’re not targets. We’d be dead by now if that was the case.’
‘So why does Paris need to know about our backgrounds?’
‘Because she’s not indiscriminate in her killing,’ Taylor said. ‘Even when she had the chance to run us down on the road, she spared us.’
‘She came awful close, though.’
‘Yes, but, like I say, in the end she didn’t. Despite the terrible things Paris has done to her victims, she displayed enough prudence – call it what you will – to focus only on her targets. Remember that she’s had years to plan this.’
‘You’re not starting to feel sympathy for her, are you, Taylor?’ The detective opened the photo of Sampson again, as if to remind Taylor what she was capable of. ‘She’s planned and executed killings.’ He gestured to the screen. ‘And she’ll kill again.’
Taylor looked long and hard into Sampson’s eyes. ‘But she was a victim first,’ he said softly, turning back to Everett. ‘Maybe we should tap into that, to draw her out.’
The detective considered Taylor’s observation with his customary tapping of the face of Archie’s watch. ‘Okay, so … if our perp is, in fact, Paris, then we know she’s something of a chameleon: she’s proficient at taking on whatever persona she needs to so she can survive.’
‘That’s right.’
Everett rubbed at the stubble
on his cheeks. ‘So … every form of intel trolling leaves a trail, no matter how good the hacker is.’ He opened his emails again. ‘You say it was your boss who contacted you about this case?’
‘Yeah, Brian Ross. He received a request from the New South Wales police.’
‘Who, exactly?’
Taylor shook his head. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, ‘but they must have identified themselves somehow … Brian is a smart guy. He wouldn’t take on a request like that lightly. And, besides, the case report I received was through an official police channel. It certainly looked authentic to me.’
‘Can you access those emails through your phone?’
‘Yeah, sure.’ Taylor retrieved his mobile and scrolled down until he had Brian’s email. He tapped the screen and handed it to Everett. ‘The email came from DI Kensington,’ he said.
Everett read the dispatch. ‘Looks legit,’ he said. ‘My contact in all this is Detective Inspector Doug Kensington from Local Area Command. The same officer who advised me you would be joining me as a consultant. From what I understand, he received advice from a New South Wales Parks and Wildlife senior officer about your possible assistance in the case.’
‘That would have been Brian or one of his seniors.’ Taylor rolled his shoulder, stretching aching muscles. ‘So, the police connection appears sound, but the Parks and Wildlife link remains unclear.’
Taylor took his phone back and began scrolling through each email header, particularly the names copied in the correspondence. He was looking for any reference to Jaimie, but there was only the original contact details from Brian. Then he noticed something out of place. A Parks and Wildlife name he didn’t recognise: r.anne@ … A frown crept across his face, exposing his confusion.
‘What’s the matter?’ Everett asked.
‘A name I don’t recognise.’ Taylor was already calling Brian Ross’s number.
‘Hello, Brian Ross, Vic Parks and Wildlife.’
‘Brian, it’s me, Taylor.’
‘Hey, buddy. I see you’ve found yourself in the middle of it again.’
The Reach Page 22