Feeding the Demons

by Gabrielle Lord

  Seventeen

  Kit was making coffee in the kitchen when the phone rang.

  ‘Kit?’

  ‘Gerald. Hullo.’

  There was a pause. ‘I was hoping to come round. There are still a few of my things with your things. It’s Saturday. I hoped I wouldn’t be interrupting your work.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘There are. And I don’t work today.’

  A long silence between them reminded her of how their marriage had been for a long time. ‘You could drop round tonight,’ she said. ‘I hope by then to have the last of the unpacking finished.’

  •

  ‘I’ve asked Gemma Lincoln to be here today,’ said Angie in the Strike Force room, ‘because not only was she the killer’s first target to come to light, she was also a policewoman for ten years and has a good reputation among the people who knew her.’ Garry Copeland looked at her, raising his eyebrows. ‘Some of you here may remember her,’ Angie added.

  Gemma made sure her eyes didn’t connect with Bruno’s, who seemed intent on doodling on a small notepad. Beside him, Colin, the intelligence officer, Ian Bloor and Sandy Mac sat opposite Angie. Garry turned to Gemma. ‘Gemma here also made a video recording of what the offender had done to her clothes and that has proved most helpful,’ he said. ‘It was her action that got us the first DNA sample.’ He looked around. ‘We need to pull in anyone and anything that can help us with this fellow.’ Even me, Gemma thought.

  Tacked onto the whiteboard behind him, the FACE printout stared out over the table. Some of the eyes around the table were checking Gemma, while others peered at the FACE image of the man Bo Bayliss had described. ‘Right,’ said Dr Copeland, remembering to defer to Angie who was in charge. ‘Over to you, Angie.’

  ‘Take a good look at that face,’ she said. ‘And remember to keep in mind that just because it looks like a photograph, it’s not. There probably isn’t anyone in the world that looks exactly like this. We’ve created this picture. So don’t lock on to that face. It’s just to give you an idea. I wonder sometimes if the old Penri’s weren’t better, because they gave you the idea but not a perfected fixed image like this.’ She paused. ‘Anyway, that’s by the way. The other thing I want to draw to your attention is that there’s been a distinct change in the MO as you can see from these photographs. I know most of you have been to the crime scenes. But looking at these pictures is helpful for revision. I’ve asked Garry to talk to us this morning so that he can brief us on anything he thinks is important from the psychological point of view.’ She nodded at Dr Copeland, who took over. His sweaty forehead shone in the fluorescent lights as he opened a notebook in front of him and glanced down at the handwritten points.

  ‘I’ve just come from the morgue,’ he said. ‘The initial examination suggests that the same knife’s been used as was used to kill the woman at Maroubra.’ He tossed a close-up photograph of the knife wounds onto the table. ‘And the attack on the clothing. Of course that won’t be confirmed until all the tests and measurements are in from the analysts.’ He looked around the table and nodded to Gemma. ‘We’re naturally going through Bianca’s relatives and friends—and Marcia Harding’s, too. Just in case there’s anything helpful there. This image behind me here . . .’ he indicated the FACE printout, ‘might well be the man we’re looking for.’

  Angie briefly outlined Bo Bayliss’s story of the man with the knife, then showed them the computer image of a wicked-looking knife. ‘This is the sort of knife we’re looking for,’ she said. ‘Once we’ve got the exact size of the blade and the serrations from the PM doctor, I’ll get copies out to all of you. And to the media section. There’s a distinctive curve to the tip of the blade.’

  Dr Copeland pointed to it with a bitten fingernail. ‘We’re not telling the media this, and the doc only just told me, but that hooked blade actually drew sections of the viscera back out with it through the skin.’ There were no reactions from the group; such horrific detail was an everyday affair here. ‘So that makes it a bit different from the usual run of the mill weapons. And it gives us that something extra.’ Angie and Gemma looked at each other. ‘We’ve got classic organised and disorganised aspects to this case together here,’ he continued. ‘For those of you who still don’t know what that means . . .’ He pushed over a pile of collated booklets. Angie slid one over towards herself and Gemma. ‘A Psychological Assessment of Crime—Profiling’ was printed in large letters across the top above the New South Wales Police insignia. Gemma glanced over while Angie flicked through the pages. Others passed copies around the table.

  ‘The bottom line of profiling is this,’ said Garry. ‘A crime—like any other activity—quite naturally reflects the personality of the offender. If a person in their everyday life tends to be organised, any crime he commits will also tend to be like that. This fellow,’ he pointed to the stills from the crime scene at Maroubra, ‘is not organised. He climbs through a window that’s left open. He hangs around waiting for opportunity to knock. He goes into a motel room because the door isn’t properly closed.’ He stared hard at Gemma as he spoke. ‘There’s no reason to assume that he was going to do anything different at Maroubra than he did at the Tusculum Hotel. But something happened. He was taken off guard when the woman went to investigate the noise. That event changed his MO. In one night he changes from pervert to murderer.’ Garry looked around the group. Some were listening to him, others were hunched over the booklets, reading. ‘That first murder wasn’t planned. He killed because he was interrupted.’

  ‘But he’s organised in the sense that he carries his own knife around with him,’ said Gemma. ‘He doesn’t just grab one from the crime scene.’

  ‘That’s true,’ said Garry. ‘He’s also organised in the way he cases his area, looking for a chance. He doesn’t just randomly hit out. He’s always looking, always hoping he’ll find some chink he can slip through. He probably lives local to the crime scene areas.’

  So he organises his own personal necessities, Gemma thought, but waits for a random opportunity to use them. He doesn’t plan the crime; just always goes prepared. Gemma thought of her own work, of Spinner and Noel cruising the streets, following vehicles, waiting for the right moment to take a still photograph or operate the hidden video camera as their unsuspecting quarry went about his business. We’re all watchers, Spinner once said. We’re all voyeurs. Waiting for the right moment to strike. The thought made her hair follicles prick.

  ‘So what you’re saying,’ said Angie, ‘is that he has organised and disorganised traits.’ She paused. ‘Sounds like me.’ Laughter broke the tension in the room.

  ‘It certainly does, ma’am,’ said Bruno, and there was no avoiding the hostility in his tone.

  ‘Up until the Bianca Perrault abduction and murder, his traits were consistent,’ Copeland continued, ignoring the undercurrents around the table. ‘Then something happened.’

  ‘Something’s changed,’ said Gemma. ‘In his life.’

  Garry Copeland raised an eyebrow at her, wrinkling his polished forehead. ‘It was a dark day for the New South Wales Police Service when you left us,’ he said. He looked around the group to see if his irony was properly appreciated before he continued. ‘We’ve also had the results back from the Scan expert who looked over the statements we took earlier from the people who knew Bianca. I’m told there are two individuals we should talk to again. That’s being done now.’ His mobile rang and he snatched it up.

  ‘Copeland speaking,’ he said. He wrinkled his domed forehead even more. ‘Okay. Right. I’ll come down straight away.’ He rang off, closed his notebook and stood up. ‘I’ve got to go. I’ll get copies of the results of the tests back to you all as soon as possible.’

  ‘Thanks, Garry,’ said Angie. ‘Can we all meet back here tomorrow morning and see how things are going? Say ten o’clock?’ She put the lid on her pen and clipped it into the pocket of her
suit coat as she stood up. ‘Everything you get, give to Colin the intelligence officer. So let’s get out there, people, and give him plenty to do.’

  As the two women left the room, Gemma turned to Angie. ‘Can you meet me tonight? I’ve got an appointment with Dr Firestone. I’d like you to come with me.’ Angie looked at her watch. ‘Please,’ said Gemma. ‘I hate asking.’

  ‘As long as it’s not late,’ Angie said. ‘I’ve got a heavy date with Dreamboat.’

  At ten past seven there was a knock on the front door. Kit walked through the house, switched on the front room light and opened the door. Gerald walked in and looked around. Kit studied him closely, looking for the effects of Alexander’s work on her ex-husband’s body. There was something different there already, she thought. Gerald was straighter, taller somehow. The familiar collapsed hunch of the shoulders and the poked out neck had already subtly changed. His dark hair and eyes seemed more alive, his colouring less sallow. If she were seeing him for the first time, instead of through the resentment-coloured lenses of years of misunderstandings and arguments, she conceded, she might even think he was a good-looking man.

  ‘You look well,’ she said as she let him in, leading him through the house to the kitchen at the back. Halfway down the hall Gerald said to her, ‘I wish I’d started going to Alexander years ago.’ So do I, Kit said to herself, but thought better of saying it out loud.

  ‘I’ve just put some coffee on to brew. Would you like one?’

  He nodded and looked around. ‘This is a nice place, Kit. You’ve really landed on your feet.’ She raised an eyebrow and started getting cups and the sugar bowl out of the cupboard. ‘I’ve got a little place in Newtown. I’m thinking of buying it. But the price they’re asking is ridiculous.’

  ‘I’ve got your things together,’ she said. ‘The little watercolour and those china fire dogs you always loved. I’ve wrapped them up so they should be all right in that.’ She indicated a box on the floor near the kitchen door stuffed with paper. She poured coffee, and was about to stir in the two teaspoons of sugar Gerald had liked.

  ‘No, no,’ he said. ‘No sugar these days.’ Then he asked, ‘Can I look outside?’

  Kit took him out into the garden and they stood a moment in silence, holding their cups of coffee, listening to the swing of the sea.

  ‘What a great spot,’ he said again after a while.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’ve always dreamed of a place like this.’

  Suddenly, Gerald was crying; the terrible rasping sounds a man makes because the machinery is so rusty and unused. Kit stood near him, not touching him, not saying anything. She had never known her husband to cry. Her professional mind knew this was a sign of growth; her woman’s heart went out to him.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he was saying. ‘I’m sorry I buggered everything up. I’m sorry I hurt you so much.’

  Kit waited while he put his coffee cup down, blew his nose, wiped it and put his large handkerchief back in his pocket.

  ‘I’m sorry too,’ she said. ‘That I didn’t know what to do until it was too late. Neither of us intended to hurt the other.’ She thought of the years she’d wasted trying to make him better, wasting the energy she needed, neglecting her own life, her son, assuming a responsibility that had never been hers, thereby only delaying his eventual collapse into despair and his final search for a therapy that would work for him.

  ‘We only have one soul to save,’ she said. ‘That’s something I know. And that is a lifetime’s work.’

  ‘I should never have married,’ he said, not hearing her. ‘I’m just beginning to realise how much hostility I have in me. Towards women. Towards everyone, really.’

  Join the club, she thought. ‘We’re all full of it, Gerald. Somehow, it’s so much easier to hate than to love.’

  He was defensive again and eager to be gone. ‘But then,’ he said, ‘we’d never have had Will.’ He looked hard at her. ‘That might have been a better thing all round.’ Kit decided to remain silent. Gerald finished his coffee and there was an awkward silence between them.

  On the way out of the house, he turned to her. ‘I think of Will a lot lately. I’m starting to see that my depression had profound effects on him. I’ve been going over the events of my childhood with Alexander and I’m quite astonished at the similarities. There are connections I’m seeing now that I didn’t realise were there at the time.’

  ‘I’ve asked Gemma to help me contact him,’ Kit said. ‘We both must be thinking along similar lines.’

  Gerald’s face became animated. ‘Will you let me know if you find him?’ he asked. ‘I’d love to see him. Just talk to him. Addict or not, he is my son. Our son.’

  Kit nodded, biting back a tear.

  They said goodbye on the doorstep of the lounge room and Gerald went to kiss her but Kit turned her head slightly so that the kiss landed on her cheek, to the right of her mouth.

  ‘Would you like to have a coffee with me sometime?’ he asked, lowering his gaze.

  ‘I’ll ring you,’ she said. ‘I’ve got rather a lot on at the moment.’

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Goodnight.’ He looked into her eyes a second too long and Kit thought she saw something hostile as he turned and walked away.

  After a moment she heard his car start up in the street, and she listened to it fade away as it turned the corner past the ringtail possum print on the road. She recalled the time seven-year-old Will had climbed up into a tree and wouldn’t come down while his father railed and threatened below. Kit had run outside, wondering what the fuss was about. And then a perfect thing had happened as Gerald realised the absurdity of the situation and was suddenly overcome by laughter. The three of them had laughed together and Will’s face had been radiant.

  Eighteen

  Dr Firestone answered her electronic door buzzer and unlocked the security gate at the foyer in Liverpool Street, letting the two women in. The entrance was small with a fake Louis Quinze mirror and table against the highly polished granite walls. They took the lift up to the seventh floor and stepped out to find Dr Firestone in slinky green satin lounge pyjamas, waiting to lead them to her apartment down the hall. Her coppery blonde hair tumbled to her shoulders. Inside her cream and beige rooms, she offered them drinks. A plate of Japanese rice savouries and peanuts waited on the low coffee table.

  ‘It’s very good of you to see me,’ said Gemma. ‘These are the photographs I mentioned on the phone to you.’

  ‘I like to examine photographs,’ the woman said, pouring three glasses of mineral water. ‘Far less messy than crime scenes. Although I used to do a lot of them when I was younger.’ She sat down on a cream lounge with Gemma and Angie opposite her. ‘Are these from a recent police case?’ she asked with a frown on her attractive face. ‘They look somehow dated to me.’ She turned them over but there was nothing on the back.

  ‘They’re thirty years old,’ said Gemma, noticing that without the make-up and vivid red lips, the glasses that the doctor reached to put on as she examined the pictures made her look like a stern headmistress.

  Gemma looked at her friend and at the expert. ‘They are photographs of the crime scene concerning the death of my mother. She was beaten to death with a hammer when I was five. My father has spent nearly thirty years in prison for her murder. He says he is innocent.’

  Because both women were death professionals there was no comment, but the atmosphere was suddenly charged and yet there was a softness, a deference in the way Dr Firestone handled the photos that would not have been there had these been pictures of an anonymous victim.

  ‘Thirty years is a very long sentence,’ said Dr Firestone.

  ‘Yes,’ said Gemma. ‘He collected an extra fifteen for being part of an attempted break-out in which a prison warden was nearly killed.’

  ‘A very hard karma your father seems to hav
e,’ said the American, slowly studying each photograph.

  ‘He was a doctor,’ Gemma said, ‘a psychiatrist.’

  Dr Firestone went methodically through all the photographs, sometimes pulling one back to compare it with another, until they were all laid out in front of her. Gemma looked at her mother’s upside-down and battered face, the black pools and splashes surrounding her hair still glossy in sections.

  ‘What was the prosecution’s case based on?’ Dr Firestone asked.

  ‘Bloodstain pattern interpretation,’ Gemma replied. ‘All circumstantial. My mother was dying when my father arrived home. But the police didn’t believe him. The academic experts and the government analyst all agreed that the impact splatter was damning.’

  ‘So your father was largely convicted on the evidence of these pictures?’ Dr Firestone asked.

  Gemma nodded. ‘Yes. Almost entirely. The Crown witnesses argued that the bloodstain patterns on his clothes and on the walls near where my mother was struck were impact splatter.’

  ‘What was your father’s account?’

  ‘He said that he came home at about eleven o’clock that night and found her lying on the floor. She’d been badly beaten with a hammer that was never found. The french doors onto the back garden were opened. They’d been forced with a gemmy. My father said he held her in his arms while the ambulance came and that she coughed blood onto him.’ Gemma’s voice faltered.

  Zelda Firestone looked slowly at the pictures again, one after another. Then she started again, gathering them all up, lying them down in sequence on the table. She stood up and went to the small white kitchen that ran off the lounge room. The smell of November lilies suddenly filled the room, and Gemma turned round to see an extravagant arrangement of them in a large blue vase behind her. They reminded her of the arrangement she’d given to the Ratbag. Dr Firestone came back into the room, bringing more ice for the mineral water in a bowl. Again, she sat opposite the two younger women, sifting through the pictures. From a drawer, the expert drew out an elegant magnifying glass on a long gold chain. Gemma became aware of how hard her heart was beating as the woman continued to study the crime scene photographs, sometimes with the glass, sometimes without.