The Simple Death

by Michael Duffy

  They emerge onto the vast strip of the Warringah Expressway, the broad slope up from North Sydney, a confusion of concrete and macadam running for several kilometres and broken up by flyovers and off-ramps and the occasional lay-by over to the left, where the expressway is cut into a low sandstone cliff. There is a blue car behind her now, like the one Troy was driving this morning. She looks at Carl and he has his eyes closed, his face damp with sweat and his breathing heavy. It doesn’t seem possible, but he might be asleep.

  ‘Keep in the middle of the lanes,’ he says.

  Sixty-four

  His phone rang.

  ‘Troy here.’

  There was a bang and sound in the background, like traffic. But no voice. He disconnected and it rang again, this time an employee from Morning Star, the insurer of the education department’s fleet. She gave Troy the location of the car Scott was driving. Troy handed the phone to McIver and raced out to the Ford, getting a radio link as he gunned it through the narrow streets of Paddington and down into Darlinghurst, striking New South Head Road just before the tunnel into which Scott’s car had gone a minute earlier.

  ‘She stopped for a minute in Oxford Street,’ McIver said, coming over the radio. ‘We have to assume Burns is in there with her.’

  Other unmarked cars had already been scrambled to follow Scott. Troy put his light on and cut into the Harbour Tunnel, raced up the right-hand lane, using his lights to clear the way. By the time he emerged on the freeway he could see the Lancer ahead. Mac handed over to an inspector from the Tactical Operations Unit, who told him which of the surrounding vehicles belonged to police. They hadn’t been able to get enough vehicles there in time, so they needed Troy too. The inspector described how they would box in the Lancer and force it to stop. Already, as much of the surrounding traffic as possible was being diverted by use of automated signals and signs, and roadblocks were being set up at the off-ramps.

  ‘Lucky it’s not rush hour,’ Troy said to himself as he accelerated and took up the position he’d been allocated, on the left of the Lancer. He looked across to check that Burns was in the car with Scott.

  Sixty-five

  What is it?’ says Carl.

  He opens his eyes and looks around. Leila has been trying to identify the other smell in the car, the one mixed in with Carl’s sweat. She realises it is blood.

  ‘Are you hurt?’ she says.

  ‘Jesus. We’re boxed.’

  Not quite. Leila has been watching, before Carl opened his eyes, as cars have come up and formed a line behind them and then dropped back, forcing the traffic behind to fall away. It is the honking from the protesting drivers that has alerted Carl. Now there are cars on either side of them and one behind, unmarked police cars she thinks, but none in front. They all fly past an off-ramp, and she sees lights flashing among a bunch of vehicles at the top. Looking in the rear-view, she watches as two cars also with red and white lights work their way up the right side of the almost completed box.

  Carl pulls the gun from beneath the bag, pointing it at her. She wonders what she can do. She wants very much to do something.

  ‘Drive faster,’ he says, opening his window.

  They pull ahead of the blue car on their left, and she thinks maybe she should crash the Lancer into some sort of object if the opportunity appears, slam it to the left so Carl will be injured more than she. Then the blue car is back alongside even though she is driving at almost a hundred and twenty kilometres an hour, the Lancer with its modest engine shaking with the effort. One of the cars with the flashing lights is ahead of them now, starting to drop back to complete the box.

  ‘Bastard!’ Carl yells, but it is not at the car in front. His head is turned towards Troy’s car and he must have seen who is in it. Transferring the gun to his right hand, he points it out the window and fires. The blue car disappears, Carl grabs the wheel and pulls it towards himself, and now they are out of the box and he let’s go of the wheel, points the gun at her again and yells, ‘Go!’

  There is something coming up on the left with incredible speed, maybe a bus shelter. Pushing down hard on the brake, grabbing his right arm with her left to push the gun away, she slams the car into it.

  Sixty-six

  The bullet shattered the window next to Troy’s head and passed through the car, smashing the passenger window too on its way out. Glass hit the side of his face, some of it bouncing around his eye, and he braked heavily, swinging the car into a space that suddenly appeared on his left. As he stopped he saw that the freeway widened for several hundred metres to accommodate a bus stop. He heard an almighty crash as the Lancer smashed into the aluminium and glass shelter.

  Getting out of his vehicle, he shook the glass from his hair and ran forwards. The other police vehicles had overshot and were now revving back, their engines screaming.

  The Lancer had gone almost right through the shelter and its front was sticking out the far side. The car’s roof had been half ripped off, and when Troy got around the front he saw that both Scott and Burns were still in their seats. There was a lot of blood on their faces but they were conscious, although Scott didn’t look too good. Burns was jabbing a gun at her anyway, prodding her chest. She was very pale, her head tilted back, and the way the crumpled front of the car had gathered around the lower part of her body, it was clear she wouldn’t be getting out in a hurry. Burns was ranting at her in a low voice, as though there was an argument he had to put to her as a matter of urgency.

  The other cars stopped, and officers rushed up to the accident scene, guns drawn despite the strong smell of petrol. Troy got them together and saw that their weapons were reholstered. He could already hear the approaching fire engines and ambulances. Telling the others to keep back, he walked up to the wreck.

  ‘It isn’t going to happen, Carl,’ he called.

  Burns stopped talking and looked around. There was blood all over his face, and his left shoulder was at a strange angle. Scott’s eyes didn’t follow his movement, and Troy suspected she had gone into shock.

  ‘You bastard,’ Burns said. ‘I thought I’d seen you off.’ Said without rancour, like they were old friends.

  ‘Time to put the gun down,’ Troy said.

  He wished they’d turn off the sirens. They were getting closer now, and Burns seemed agitated. The two helicopters didn’t help either, although at least they were keeping their distance.

  ‘My left arm’s broken,’ said Burns. He looked at Scott for a moment. ‘People like her, they think they rule the world. Snap their fingers and you come. Have you seen their house?’

  ‘Big place, with a wine cellar.’

  ‘Julie was sucked in by all that, it was embarrassing. I should shoot this bitch.’ Waving the gun in front of Leila’s nose.

  ‘You’ll ignite the petrol. Terrible way to die, Carl.’

  ‘So? What, you think I should just put the gun down, we can talk this over?’

  The sirens had been turned off, thank God.

  ‘Let’s do that. Talk to me.’

  Burns shifted and now the gun was aimed at Troy’s chest. The petrol smell seemed stronger than ever, but that might have been his imagination.

  ‘I think my leg’s broken too. Something’s not right down there. How long do you reckon I’d get?’

  Troy did his best. ‘Depends if you and Pearson argued. Maybe ten years, less with parole. You could do that.’

  ‘Pearson?’

  ‘We broke your alibi.’

  ‘I didn’t do Pearson. What else is there?’

  If you say so, Carl.

  ‘Nothing,’ Troy lied, ‘The priest recovered.’

  Burns swung his arm around so that the gun touched Scott’s neck. ‘Tell me the truth about what you know or I’ll do her. Now.’

  There’d been a leak to the media, Troy knew, about t
he search at Ashfield. Burns might have heard something on the car radio. Or he might not have. A decision had to be made, without all the facts.

  ‘Okay. We found your box.’

  Things stopped, probably only for a micro-second although it seemed longer. Then Burns nodded and there was silence for a while. Troy wanted something to happen, but he knew this was a weakness. Still, the petrol smell was definitely stronger.

  Burns said softly, ‘The first was just a favour in the nursing home, he asked me to do it. The next one too—you’d be surprised how many people ask. Then it was people who’d annoyed us—’

  ‘What about Julie?’

  Burns nodded, looked sad. ‘Good old Jules.’

  ‘We need to get you into an ambulance, Carl. Leila too.’

  Burns looked at Scott, who was completely still, staring at the sky.

  ‘Bitch,’ he said.

  ‘Carl—’

  Burns put the pistol into his mouth and blew the back of his head off.

  Troy took a step forwards, then stopped. He waited for the world to explode in a fireball. Everything seemed to have slowed down again, and after a bit he knew that if he was still waiting, it wasn’t going to happen. And then it began to snow, great looping strands of white foam from the firies who’d raced up behind him. The ambos came after them, once the whole scene was covered in snow, and began to work on Leila Scott.

  People were staring at Troy, one tried to speak to him but he couldn’t hear. Eventually McIver was there and said something, held his arm.

  ‘You okay?’ was what he was saying.

  ‘Yeah.’

  A woman in a bright yellow coat had flicked some foam off Carl’s head, and it was red. There were so many emergency workers around the crash now it was almost a crowd.

  We’re very good at cleaning up afterwards, Troy thought dimly. Once it’s too late.

  ‘Attractive, isn’t it?’ McIver said. ‘All the colours and lights.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Like a picture. And only we know what it means.’

  It came to Troy that McIver might be slightly mad, but he didn’t want to think about that now. He said, ‘China’s leaving. Got a job in security.’

  ‘Homicide as a stepping stone to better things,’ McIver said, staring at the wreck.

  Troy said, ‘What could be better than this?’ He could see Peters out of the corner of his eye, other detectives too. ‘I don’t think we should talk to Emery, if that’s okay by you.’

  ‘Okay,’ said McIver. Sometime later he nodded, said, ‘Really,’ and looked around. ‘We’ve done enough for now.’

  THE FUNERAL

  Sixty-seven

  Anna was graceful in a black dress, moving around the kitchen with a certain delicacy as she did her best to keep it clean despite the little fellow’s uncouth eating habits. She had her hair drawn back and was wearing gold earrings, the effect different to the silver she usually wore. Troy kept glancing at her, trying to see just what the difference was, and looking away. He wondered if she was too beautiful to be going to a funeral, but there was nothing he could do about that.

  They dropped Matt at a friend’s house and began the long drive towards Campbelltown. Troy told Anna about his last visits to Luke at Charity, and about what he’d learned of Luke’s relationship with Brigita Kalnins. She didn’t know any of this and now he told her the whole story. He also described the promise he’d made to Luke, never to disclose what he’d learned.

  ‘You’re telling me,’ she said.

  ‘You don’t count,’ he said. It was what he’d decided. ‘You’re not someone else.’

  ‘Nick!’

  It was a warning. He’d realised in the past week she had a firm idea of where things had gone wrong before, and had a plan for how to avoid it happening again. He didn’t believe in plans on the whole, but was happy to go along with what she had in mind. Sometimes the important thing was to think you were in control.

  ‘I’m tempted to tell people,’ he said. ‘It’s wrong that Luke’s reputation is destroyed while Geoffrey Davies goes free. Apart from what he did back then, Mac says he’s a bully.’

  He could tell the world. There were two journalists he’d dealt with once, and he thought he could trust them.

  ‘If you break the promise,’ Anna said, ‘really break it, that means you don’t respect Luke as much as you did.’

  ‘And this Napoli—’ he said.

  ‘It’s not about them. This is about you.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No, really, Nick. Think about it.’

  He’d thought about it a lot. But now he thought about it again, and realised it might be different to the way he’d been seeing it.

  There was a surprising turnout at the church, and when the service began, Troy saw why. The archbishop was doing the mass after all, and this had freed Luke’s parishioners from indecision. They’d come to mourn his death, if not his life. But at least they had come to mourn.

  Because of the size of the crowd, Troy and Anna were sitting towards the back of the church. There was no sign of McIver, which disappointed him; it didn’t fit with the way he saw their friendship. The readings were done by people Troy didn’t recognise, one an old priest and the others laypeople. He paid attention for a while and then his mind wandered, as it often did in church.

  Looking around, he saw a man on the other side of the aisle who reminded him of Jim Austin: an Aboriginal man wearing a light top with the hood down. It might be Sam, and yet Luke had said he was in jail. Maybe it wasn’t Sam. Troy looked again, but people in between them had shifted, and the guy’s face was hidden now. If it was Sam, he hadn’t aged well.

  The archbishop’s sermon was masterful, short and full of sweet sentences about not knowing what happens in another person’s soul. Only God can know the full truth about any one of us. This moved into a brief meditation on how hard it can be to know the truth about anything, although we must strive, and Troy saw the archbishop was spinning a web of uncertainty around Luke, the least uncertain of men. It was gently done: he could not afford to suggest Luke was innocent, given what was on the public record. But still. Walsh concluded that Luke Carillo had fought a good fight. He finished his course. He kept the faith.

  Troy wondered if the sermon was directed at himself, partly. Maybe the archbishop’s presence today was some sort of appeal.

  And maybe he would keep his promise, he thought, as the service ended. Maybe the time had come to accept that this was, as Anna said, what Luke wanted.

  As the coffin was carried down the aisle, Troy stared at it and said a prayer. He realised that telling Burns about the Queensland inquiries during their second interview might have dangerously unsettled him. Perhaps this was why Luke had died. Maybe, in the bigger scheme of things, he had made a terrible error and it needed to be accepted, and Davies’ crime needed to be accepted too. Thinking of such matters in church seemed to make more sense of them. Troy was not sure if God had anything to do with this. Religion did, definitely.

  Anna and he made their way into the aisle, surrounded by people. Everyone wanted to shake the archbishop’s hand on the way out, so progress was slow. Troy looked around for the man who might be Sam. He couldn’t find him, but saw another familiar figure. Geoffrey Davies was ahead of them in the queue, standing next to a tall, thin woman and chatting to an old couple in front of them. Troy pointed this out to Anna, who craned her neck and said the tall woman was Davies’ wife.

  ‘He’s got a nerve,’ Troy whispered.

  You had to be amazed at the man’s presumption, as though he thought he could impose himself, impose a new meaning, on Luke’s funeral. On his life.

  Davies was in profile now, and he saw the man’s jaw thrust upwards in a pose familiar from television, the tanned face and the steel-grey hair
that always looked as though it had been elaborately styled, al- though Davies swore it wasn’t. It had been joked about in parliament, and Davies had declared he’d never used a hairdryer in his life. The stupid things you know about politicians, Troy thought.

  Finally they were greeting the archbishop, who looked impressive in his funeral vestments and was courteous to Anna. As she moved away, Walsh said to Troy, ‘How are you?’

  ‘I see Davies is here.’

  Walsh blinked. ‘He shouldn’t have come.’

  There was no apology there, just a statement of fact, more convincing than an apology.

  ‘Napoli’s gone quiet.’

  ‘He won’t be speaking of this again,’ Walsh said softly. ‘He’s not going to be heading the education review anymore. Sometimes, Detective, it’s our friends we have to watch most closely.’

  Troy stared at the archbishop, and remembered how powerful he was. How effective. Maybe even impressive. He nodded and moved away, and saw that Anna was talking to some people about their own age. They were a couple who’d been to the same marriage preparation talks Luke had given in the months before their wedding, years ago.

  Troy wandered off in the crowd, wanting a few minutes to think about what he was going to do. The archbishop hadn’t asked him, which he respected. Last night, he’d decided he would call the newspapers today, tell them about the whole sordid deal: Luke’s reputation destroyed forever, Davies’ protected, in return for more government funding of Catholic schools. But now he was undecided. He thought about his conversation with Anna in the car. If he hadn’t opened up, talked to her about this, everything would have been simpler.