by Alan Carter
Paulie splutters on his chocolate muffin.
‘You’re thinking the same?’
‘I know,’ she nods. ‘I’m surprised myself. I was even checking out houses for sale here in that last week before we came back. I just assumed.’
‘But?’
‘But I’ve seen me mam and she’s fine and she can come and visit now anytime she likes. Right?’
‘Sure. Of course.’
‘And your folks as well. As long as your dad smokes outside.’
‘I’ll let him know.’
‘And me mates, they can come as well.’
‘There’ll be some spare blokes in the valley for Petra to try out.’ Petra, Vanessa’s best friend and notorious man-eating bridesmaid.
‘I know. I’ve already told her.’ She shakes her head at the babbling loudspeakers. ‘This place is doing me head in.’
‘Do we stay Chester or go back to Burgess?’
She shakes her head. ‘I’ve got used to the new name, it’s like being married again.’ Her hand slips on to mine. ‘Besides we don’t want to confuse Paulie any more.’
He wipes the muffin crumbs from his mouth. ‘I’m not stupid, you know. Just special.’
But it’s agreed that we’ll stick with Chester.
I’m seeing Vanessa in a new light. We do think the same things, we do share a way of viewing the world. It just gets obscured sometimes. Steve’s term. Tau o te ate. Soul mate.
Paulie is getting worried though. ‘Are we still going to the match?’
We go. They lose.
PART TWO
30
November has turned by the time we get back to the valley and they still haven’t caught the Pied Piper – that’s what the tabloids are calling him. After a dressing-down from the DC, a black mark on my record, and a promise to Marianne Keegan that I will keep my Glock in my pants, I’m back on duty.
Latifa is happy to see me back and also relieved. ‘They had this bloke from Traffic standing in for you. He never took his finger out of his nose. He must have thought he was still in the car on his own in the bushes. Yuk.’
It’s a compliment of sorts. I’m happy to get on with the humdrum and once again be gainfully employed earning an honest quid on an overcast Monday. Boy racers. Drunks. Gun-licence applications. Hunting infringements. Petty vandalism. School visits. Vanessa has lined up some part-time and relief work at three local schools. The patchwork enables her to work around Paulie drop-off and pick-ups. Some days our paths cross and we snatch a coffee and a chat in the middle of the day. We’ve even managed a quickie once, last week, in the car but it left us with cricks in the neck, and sandfly bites. Still, with the shadows of Sammy and Marty dispelled, we have a new lease of life in more ways than one.
But Gary worries us. He stays in that hut on the other side of the drive and we see little of him. The work has dried up and anyway he hardly seems physically capable of it now. To be brutal, it’s a real downer, a blight on our otherwise cloudless horizon. I’m contemplating cutting him loose.
Vanessa says no. ‘He’s been through a lot, love.’
She’s right. He put his life on the line for me and he lost a mate. He’s still not fully recovered from Marty’s savagery. And here I am talking about kicking him out because he’s spoiling my second honeymoon.
‘Maybe try talking with him?’ she says.
There’s a thought. I brew up a pot of tea and take that and a tin of cake over.
‘Cheers,’ says Gary, without much energy.
‘How’s the shoulder?’ Marty’s blade sliced deep into the muscle tissue and it’s taking a long time to mend. He also lost some teeth and a bit of his ear.
‘Sore.’ He nods at my uniform which I haven’t bothered changing yet. ‘Back at work I see.’
‘Yeah. It’s nice to have something ordinary to focus on after … everything.’
‘Right. It would be. I can see that.’
‘Any work coming your way?’
He lifts his shoulder a fraction. ‘Not easy right now.’ Reaches for his wallet. ‘If it’s the rent you’re worried about.’
I shake my head. ‘Not an issue.’
Gary looks up and fixes on me. ‘So what is it you want?’
Dusk is my favourite time of day in the valley. The hills loom so close and the light changes rapidly. The river has just fallen into shadow and gone from green to purple-grey. A breath of wind ripples the surface.
‘I’m sorry for involving you in my wars.’ He shakes his head and tries a smile. I press on. ‘I am responsible, I know that. I should have made you and Steve go.’
‘We invited ourselves in.’
‘Still.’
Gary sips from his mug. ‘My dad was in Vietnam. Can you imagine that? Maori fighting these little peasants far away. At the same time Maori were marching in the streets here just to get some basic rights.’ He stares at a stain on the rug, Steve’s blood never fully washed out but Gary keeps it there anyway. ‘They gave my dad a medal. He was real proud of it, showed it around, felt pretty flash for a while.’
‘Good on him.’
‘He knew it wasn’t his fight and he probably had more in common with the Vietcong than the pakeha giving him his orders.’ A nibble at the corner of his slice of cake. ‘But he was among some mates, and mates are more important than a cause.’
‘When I was back in the UK, I spoke to the man behind all this. There’ll be no more.’
He nods. ‘So you’ve found peace.’
‘I hope so.’
He lifts a hand. ‘Your own little corner of paradise. Nice block of land and your family back home with you. Sweet as.’ Across the river the pines sway in the evening breeze. ‘But I need to have my peace, my reckoning. Utu.’
‘Forget it, Gary. Unless you get on a plane and pay him a visit, it’s not going to happen.’
A shake of the head. ‘Not just that bloke. I’ve got a list that goes way back.’
I study him and get to wondering if I’m on that list. One more pakeha who’s taken too much for granted. ‘I know it’s hard, mate. But we need to look forward.’ I place my hand on his arm.
He lifts it off and smiles. ‘Thanks for the tea. And that cake.’
In the night I hear Gary pack stuff into his ute, close the cabin door, step up onto our back porch and slide the key under the potted tomato plant. There’s a brief whistle as he summons the dog up onto the tray. The car door opens and shuts, and the engine starts. There’s a crunch of gravel as he goes. I can’t tell what I feel. Relief? A new foreboding?
Vanessa stirs, pushing back into me. ‘What is it?’ she murmurs.
‘Nothing.’
31
After several postponements due to either illness or diary clashes from both sides, Beth is going to see the hypnotist today. DI Keegan has asked Latifa and me to pick Beth up from her house near the marae and bring her to Blenheim. Beth is nervous and her cigarette smoke fills the police car.
‘I’ll be asleep and he’ll be like totally in control. He’s not going to make me do weird stuff like take my knickers off in public, is he?’
‘Just taking your knickers off in private’d be a nice change,’ says Pete, contributing to the tobacco fug in the back.
‘Shut it,’ snarls Beth.
‘I’ll be with you in the same room,’ says Latifa. ‘I’ll make sure you’re alright.’
Instead of the police station, the appointment is at some private consulting rooms around the corner from Marlborough Boys’ College. DI Keegan meets us there and we adjourn to the office next door which has a video link, while Beth and Latifa settle in with ponytailed Professor Sumner and his Japanese wall hangings. Meanwhile Pete has gone to the library to watch videos on YouTube.
It’s a remarkably low-key transition from Beth’s state of nervous wakefulness to the trance-like state we now see. No swinging watches or you-are-feeling-very-sleepy. Blink and you’d miss it. Beth is back on duty serving drinks and meals and colle
cting glasses that night in the Woodbourne Tavern.
‘There’s a table just emptied,’ she says. ‘Boys from the vineyard down the road. Four pots, four plates.’ She tuts. ‘Ginger kid left half his food again. Fucken waste.’ Her mouth goes into a chewing motion. ‘Chips are cold.’
Sumner takes her through rounding up the glasses and plates and heading back towards the bar.
‘Get off me, ya fucken creep!’ She slides her waist away to the left. ‘Fucken Rogers, no shame after what you done. Today of all days.’
‘Are you saying that?’ asks Sumner.
‘Thinking it.’ She wrinkles her nose. ‘He stinks. He wears those cheap nylon shirts and no deodorant.’
‘Who else is at the table, do you know them?’
‘Three other blokes. Haven’t seen the others before.’
‘Describe them. Describe the man who is next to Mr Rogers on his … left?’
‘No, right. Left of Fuckface is the carpet. On his right, chubby, with black curly hair. Looks a bit like Pete but with better teeth. Ear stud. Blue polo shirt. Looks like he wants to fuck me. Looks like he wouldn’t know what to do.’
‘Does he say anything?’
‘No, just laughing and staring at my tits.’
‘Who else is there? Across the table, maybe?’
She shifts slightly in her seat. ‘Younger. Neat, short, brown hair. Dressed nice, his clothes fit well. Those shirts that you wear a tie with. Jacket over the back of his chair. Looks a bit embarrassed.’
‘Does he say anything?’
‘No, just keeps checking his watch like maybe he should be going. He’s wearing a wedding ring.’
‘Who else?’
‘That’s enough, Des. They’re grieving.’ A pause. ‘Leave it, Des. Stop.’
‘Describe him, he’s straight across from Des, or diagonal?’
‘Straight across.’ Beth’s eyes open, has she woken up?
‘Describe him. Tell me about his hair.’
She squints. ‘Very short, fair, little bit of grey.’ Sumner tries to get her to detail his facial features: eye colour and shape, nose, mouth and such. She’s shaking, bottom lip trembling. Tears forming in her eyes. ‘Pōuri,’ is all she can say or see. Darkness.
Sumner leads her out of danger. ‘His shirt. Tell me about his shirt.’
She steadies. ‘White. Short sleeves. Collar. Tennis. Marlborough Tennis Club.’
‘Trousers? Shorts?’
‘Can’t see.’
‘Is he wearing a watch?’
‘No. There’s a band of pale skin around his wrist like he used to wear one.’
‘Right hand or left?’
‘Right.’
That’s enough, Des. They’re grieving. ‘How does he know?’
‘What?’ says Keegan.
I repeat the line to her. ‘He must know Beth’s connection to Prince, that she’s related. How? Did Rogers mention it?’
She puts it to Beth via Sumner. All it elicits is a shrug.
‘He knows the family,’ I insist. ‘He’s met them or seen them.’
‘Shush,’ says Keegan. ‘You might be right but she’s not taking us to him today.’
More questions from DI Keegan’s feed through Sumner’s earpiece but they come to nothing.
Latifa whispers something to Sumner and he turns back to Beth. ‘What is his smell?’
She winces. ‘Like when you’re walking up the lane and someone’s slung a dead cat into the bushes.’
‘His real smell?’
‘Real enough to me. I don’t care if other people can get it or not. I do.’
DI Keegan will unleash her hounds to try and track down those boys from the vineyard who were at the adjoining table, even if Beth reckons they were backpackers and long gone. Still, the vineyard might have records. And the other men at the table, associates of Des Rogers in some way. And the Marlborough Tennis Club, the membership lists, club photos and competitions.
‘And he’s had some previous contact, however brief, with the family,’ I remind her.
‘Maybe but without Beth’s ID of him it doesn’t count for much. Maybe someone else from that night will fill out the picture.’
‘And he’s probably right-handed.’
‘The watch?’ says Keegan.
‘The imprints on the child’s neck.’ I mime the action of pushing the kid’s head under water. ‘Maybe that’s how he lost his watch? Who knows?’
‘Who indeed.’ Keegan lets out a sour sigh. ‘And not forgetting the spiritual smell of roadkill.’
‘Don’t knock it,’ says Latifa. ‘You’re a lot closer now because of our voodoo.’
When I’m back at the office, Vanessa calls. She’s pissed off with me. ‘What did you say to Gary last night? He’s gone.’
When I left for work this morning, I didn’t mention it. ‘Really?’
‘No note, no nothing. Just the key under the pot and the place cleared out.’
‘He’s probably got stuff to think about. Maybe he just needs some time on his own.’
‘Stuff?’
‘Unfinished business.’
A sigh. ‘Men.’
I try Gary’s mobile and it goes straight through to voicemail. ‘It’s Nick. I heard you leave last night. You don’t need to go, and you’re welcome back any time.’ I’m sounding, I don’t know, white and well-meaning? ‘Whatever, look after yourself. Stay safe.’
Latifa is looking at me. ‘Gary gone?’ I nod. ‘Probably for the best.’ She pins up a missing-dog notice on the board.
‘You think?’
‘Bad thing to go through, being stabbed, and losing your mate. And people only give you so much time, don’t they?’
‘But I …’
‘Yeah, yeah. You’re very concerned for his welfare and you want him to try and move on. Abracadabra, he’s done it.’
She has this way of twisting the knife.
The afternoon is spent shuffling electronic paper around and cruising up and down SH6 looking for miscreants. We find three and ticket them. It’s only Tuesday of my second week back but already I feel an itch. Maybe it was being back in tenuous connection with the investigation this morning and watching Beth on that grainy video link reliving her encounter in the Woodbourne Tavern. I see this pasty soft-faced man in a tennis shirt, a hand holding a child’s head under the water, Prince Haruru facedown in the mud at Linkwater, Jamie Riley propped against the shoe fence, and Qadim Reza among the vines in the Wairau Valley. The Pied Piper has killed two kids in a month yet before that there was a five-year gap. I can’t believe nothing has happened during that period but DI Keegan has had people checking and they’ve found nothing.
Unless, of course, he was doing it somewhere else during that time.
I phone Keegan and put it to her. ‘Yes,’ she says. ‘We’ve looked into that too. We sent it over to the Aussies, they do a good line in paedos.’
‘And?’
‘Plenty of creeps but none of them look like ours. There’s a couple of unsolveds, one from Queensland two years ago and the other from Perth around the same time. We’re taking a second look.’
‘But?’
‘But I’ll keep you posted.’
‘Perth,’ I say, thinking Patrick Smith. ‘What is it about Perth and perverts?’
‘Too much sunshine? Both begin with a P?’ Her voice drops a notch. ‘I hear you’re back on track with Vanessa?’
‘Yes. I am.’
‘That’s great,’ she says.
Do I detect a hint of regret? I’m not going to ask.
‘I don’t suppose I could take a look at the Aussie unsolveds?’
‘You don’t suppose right. Bye Nick.’
Two in Australia, and maybe others elsewhere. Where would you start? Interpol? No doubt DI Keegan has already been down that line too. Besides, Interpol relies on member countries with diligent officers who feed into the system in the hope of solving their mysteries. But I think about Des Rogers and all the others
of his ilk out there. What if the investigators don’t give a toss because the victim is from the wrong race, wrong tribe, wrong religion, wrong class? What if the investigators are corrupt and deliberately want to bury a case? The Pied Piper. The world is his oyster.
DI Keegan might not want to let me into the system officially but it doesn’t stop me googling. The search-engine question would have the metadata spooks on my tail but this stuff never was for the faint-hearted. The Queensland case was in Rockhampton, halfway up the coast, during the winter of that year. A child missing for a week before being found floating in the river. Raped and strangled and with evidence of alcohol and drugs in the system. But I understand Keegan’s lack of enthusiasm, the victim was a twelve-year-old girl. Why the second look? Then it emerges from later reports that the drug was Rohypnol.
The Perth case was a month later: a ten-year-old boy from the suburb of Armadale, discovered in bushland near a reservoir. The body badly decomposed from exposure to winter rains. Again, rape and strangulation but no mention of drugs or alcohol in the system. This time I don’t understand Keegan’s lack of enthusiasm. Time and decomposition might account for lower or even no traces of drugs and, even if there aren’t any, it doesn’t mean there’s no connection worth investigating. Maybe the Rohypnol is a later development, a refinement in his MO. Or perhaps Keegan has seen more in the detailed police and forensic reports that makes her think, nah, probably not.
Latifa is looking over my shoulder. ‘You need to get a life, Sarge. Get home to that family of yours.’
She’s finished for the day. She looks bright, perky, and smells nice. ‘Plans?’
‘Daniel.’ The speedster. Apparently it’s going from strength to strength. ‘Karaoke night at the Havelock Hotel.’
I wish her well and close down the horrors on my computer screen.
After dinner that night, and with Vanessa still frosty with me over the Gary thing, there’s a call on the home landline. It’s the halfway house in Blenheim saying Deborah Haruru wants me to come and see her.
‘Now?’
‘No, next Christmas would be fine,’ says the warden. ‘And bring that girl with you as well.’ I assume she means Latifa.