Flashpoint

by Felicity Young

  She fixed Vince with a cold hard stare. He reciprocated with a stream of obscenities. The red stripes down his cheek glistened like war paint.

  ‘Sort this out, will you, Rod? Vince and I are going for a little chat outside,’ Cam said, pushing Vince towards the door.

  When they reached the veranda, Cam allowed his grip to slacken on Vince’s arm. Vince shrugged away, attempting a clumsy swing at his senior officer, but Cam caught him by the wrist and twisted his arm behind his back with a force that made Vince gasp.

  ‘You just don’t learn, do you, Vince?’ Cam slammed the side of Vince’s face into the wall, making his fat lips pucker into an obscene kiss. ‘You haven’t got a scooter to ride on, mate,’ Cam said, leaning in so close he could smell the whisky and beer of Vince’s breath. ‘That was quite a good performance you put on for Superintendent Cummings in there; I’d say suspension pending investigation at the very least.’

  Vince’s face contorted further as he let go a strangled sob. To Cam’s surprise, tears started tracking down the bloodied cheek. Cam’s hand began to ache and he released his grip, sensing the danger was over. Vince turned and leaned against the wall, then slid to the floor like a melting blob of lard. He took a swipe at the snot that dribbled from his nose. Cam had to turn away for a moment.

  In a voice thick with mucus, Vince said, ‘This job is my life.’

  ‘You should have thought about that five complaints ago.’

  ‘It was that icy bitch, she provoked me.’

  ‘Does Leanne provoke you too, Vince? And what about that bloke who “tripped” in the cells last year, did he provoke you?’

  ‘You can’t prove a thing.’

  ‘Not yet. Just as I can’t prove your incompetence at the crime scene the other day. I know you moved the body; you compromised the crime scene and then didn’t have the balls to own up to it. There’s sure to be an inquiry now, and every shonky thing you’ve done will be exposed. This assault in the pub is the icing on the cake and will give credibility to all the other accusations building up against you.’

  Vince drew up his knees, flopped his head onto his arms and began to sob.

  ***

  Seeing Vince broken didn’t give Cam any sense of satisfaction. Though he’d be glad to have the man out of the service, his revulsion was tempered by pity as he struggled through the front door of Vince’s house to the main bedroom then lowered him onto the mattress on the floor. Cam was about to leave when Vince let out a strangled plea for coffee. Good idea, Cam thought. Maybe over a coffee he’d find out the truth behind the fight. There was something about it that had left him feeling uneasy, as if there was a lot more going on than mere sexual rivalry.

  He picked his way out of the bedroom, stepping over the piles of unwashed clothes and holding his breath against the musky smell that clung to his face like a wet flannel.

  And he’d thought his place lacked that homey feel.

  Vince was divorced with no children, but had somehow managed to appropriate the Senior Sergeant’s living accommodation. Cam was glad he hadn’t pushed the point and claimed it for himself. The brick and tile house might have been a superior dwelling to his own fibro cottage, but the station cleaning budget would never have stretched far enough to make it fit for human habitation.

  Cam went into the kitchen to search for a kettle, a sticky resistance pulling at the soles of his shoes as he walked across the lino. Mounds of dirty dishes coated with tiny black ants snaked around the bench tops; blowflies paddled through pools of goo; splattered sauces decorated the walls like a Pro Hart painting.

  He found the cleanest saucepan from the top of a dirty pile and gave it a rinse before putting some water on the stove to boil. The only coffee he could find was in a lidless jar, shared by a shiny black cockroach.

  He opened the fridge and recoiled from the stench of rotting meat. When he slammed the door shut, the vibrations tipped over a stack of containers on top of the fridge, including a carton of ant dust. Noxious powder rained down upon him, adding a frosting of white to the sticky vinyl floor.

  ‘Shit, shit, shit.’ He grabbed a cloth from the sink and began cleaning up. As he wiped the fridge top, the cloth pushed against a cardboard file and a storm of documents fluttered down to join the mess.

  With a curse of frustration, Cam squatted to retrieve what he expected to be a stash of unpaid bills. It was then he noticed the official police stationery. He stopped for a moment, frowned, then flicked it over to read the front of the file. It was marked in large red letters: CASE UNSOLVED. The date fell within the timeframe when Vince was Acting Sergeant.

  Since his arrival Cam had painstakingly gone through every unsolved case in Glenroyd over the last year, but this was the first he knew about any hijacked tanker. What the hell was Vince covering up? Cam let out a tired sigh: more headaches, more paperwork and more incriminating evidence against the man.

  Rumbling snores from the bedroom told him Vince was long past the coffee stage. Cam took the water off the stove, tossed it into the sink and threw the pot back onto the pile of dishes on the draining board.

  With the file tucked under his arm, he sidestepped the upturned garbage can and walked into the lounge. A milk crate sat in front of an old brown TV. Cam guessed that the bulk of the furniture had been sold to cover Vince’s notorious gambling habits, or taken by his fleeing wife.

  The only other articles in the room were an ironing board and an iron. Several clean, well-pressed uniforms hung from the doorframe on coat hangers. They seemed incongruous amid the filth and chaos of the house. Cam raked a hand through his hair and glanced at the file in his hand.

  ‘Shit, Vince,’ he said out loud. ‘What the hell have you gone and done now?’

  12

  WEDNESDAY

  Cam parked the police ute in the school car park, but remained seated, trying to work out the best approach to Jeffrey and Anne Smithson. He was unsure if Smithson’s previously prickly attitude to the police was due to Vince’s insensitive handling of the initial interview, or just the man’s natural personality shining through. He suspected a combination of both and opted for the kid glove approach; the last thing he needed at this early stage of the investigation was a cry for a lawyer.

  He took in the view of the school before him. The brick paved path from the car park led to the administration block, a rectangular two-storey red brick building with white framed Lego-like windows. At right angles on either side ran two identical buildings, one a classroom block, the other the boarding wing. The latter had been closed for many years. Unlike its newly renovated sisters, it was still covered with the ivy that once threatened to strangle all three buildings.

  The ute radio crackled. Derek, on duty at the station, was calling Peter to check out some reported stock theft at a sheep property ninety kilometres north of them. That meant Pete would be away for most of the day. Damn: with Vince now suspended, they were more undermanned than ever.

  Leanne shifted in the passenger seat. ‘Shouldn’t we just go in and get this over with?’

  ‘I want to check out the back first,’ Cam said.

  They crunched across the gravel car park, heading towards the back of the main school buildings. The morning was still and hot, with all the promise of a scorching day ahead. After only a few paces, Cam’s uniform shirt was stuck to his back, the scratches stinging. Ruby had been asleep by the time he’d got home last night and he’d been unable to reach them with the disinfectant. This morning he’d left her moaning in bed, stiff and sore from her bike accident, not wishing to upstage her with his own injuries. She’d said she was too sore to go to the stock feeder’s this morning, but would try her best to hobble over in the afternoon.

  Cam’s thoughts turned back to the school. Ancillary buildings were grouped behind the main block, connected to each other by covered walkways. The indoor swimming pool and gym complex opened up to newly paved netball courts, which in turn led to the oval. Cam narrowed his eyes against the glare and wa
s just able to make out a restored federation style house shimmering on the far side of the green expanse. He guessed this was the principal’s residence. With shady verandas and turned wooden posts, it was an ideal vantage point from which to sit and sip tea while watching the inter-school hockey matches. Beyond the house swept the open farmland of the extensive school property.

  Leanne took in the vista with wide eyes and an open mouth. ‘Wow, I’d love to have gone to a school like this. It used to take me over two hours to bus in to Toorrup High.’

  ‘You think it looks grand now, you should have seen it twenty-five years ago. The girls were able to keep horses then. Let me see, over there I think.’ Cam pointed to a group of dilapidated sheds in the distance. ‘It doesn’t look like they’re doing those up, though they seem to be doing a pretty good job elsewhere.’ He swivelled around in a full circle, whistling air through his teeth as he looked. ‘These renovations must have cost a bomb.’

  He switched his gaze back to the school buildings and the mess the builders had left behind. Though this phase of the renovations was complete, someone still had a lot of clearing up to do before the start of the school term. The scaffolding had been dismantled and stacked in a pile. Paint splatters and dollops of concrete patterned the ground and the fresh smell of cement hung in the air.

  Three large skips filled with building debris stood near the back wall of the classroom block. He ambled towards them, handing his sunglasses to Leanne. With the help of an overturned bucket he heaved himself up into the closest skip.

  ‘What are you looking for, Sarge?’ Leanne shaded her eyes and watched as he carefully balanced around the edge of the skip. ‘Be careful, there might be glass,’ she added.

  ‘There is. Lots of it.’

  There were also rolls of old carpet, bricks, lumps of plaster, empty paint buckets and the rotting remains of someone’s lunch. He stepped across to the next skip and crunched across the dry junk until his foot slammed through some plywood and he sank shin deep into refuse. He latched onto a piece of old skirting board sticking up from the pile; it was all that stopped him from falling face down into the muck.

  He heard laughter from below.

  ‘I’ll remember you when it’s time to check the septics, Leanne,’ he called down. He stooped to sift through some of the surface rubbish, finding pretty much what he’d expected: breathing masks, sheets of old wallpaper, plastic containers.

  ‘What are you looking for exactly?’ Leanne asked, batting at the flies circling her head.

  ‘I’ll know when I find it. You can learn a lot about people from what they throw out.’

  He stepped onto the third bin and made a similar inspection. A used coffee filter had stuck onto his leg. He pulled it off, looked at it for a moment then threw it back onto the pile.

  ‘Well?’ she said as Cam jumped down from the skip.

  ‘Well what?’

  ‘Well, did you learn anything?’

  Cam wrinkled his nose and looked down at his soiled uniform. ‘I think I learned that it’s not a good idea to go fossicking through someone’s garbage just before an interview.’ He dusted plaster powder from his pants. ‘Come on. Let’s go see Mr and Mrs Smithson.’

  ***

  Cam addressed the seated couple in Anne Smithson’s office. ‘The body belonged to a man named Herbert Bell. I believe he was once employed as a groundsman at the school.’

  Anne Smithson’s eyes widened and an ivory hand moved to her mouth as if she was trying to wipe away a crumb without being noticed. Mr Smithson shifted in his chair and cleared his throat.

  ‘That’s terrible. We must send our condolences to his family,’ he said. ‘How . . .’ His voice came out as a squeak, forcing him to clear his throat again. ‘How do you think it happened?’

  ‘Until I can prove otherwise, I’m regarding his death as suspicious.’

  Mrs Smithson took a breath. ‘Constable Petrowski said it was an accident.’

  ‘Such deaths are always considered suspicious until proved otherwise.’ Cam gave the couple a few seconds to absorb the news and leaned over to Leanne to see her notebook. ‘Bell worked for you for about six months – is that correct, Mrs Smithson?’

  She nodded. ‘Part time, only a few hours a week.’

  ‘I understand you have no official wages record.’

  Mrs Smithson opened her mouth to speak, but her husband interjected.

  ‘I take care of the monies,’ he said.

  Cam switched his gaze to him. ‘You paid him cash?’

  ‘Yes, chicken feed, the amount wasn’t even declarable.’

  Cam made placating gestures in response to the man’s defensive tone. ‘That’s OK, I’m not here to question you about your taxes; it was just something I needed to double check. Mr Bell was involved in a little social welfare fraud of his own.’ Cam turned to Mrs Smithson. ‘When did he last work at the school?’

  She raised her eyes to the ceiling for a moment before looking at her husband. ‘December?’ she asked him, shrugging.

  He nodded and smoothed his moustache.‘Yes, December I think.’

  Mrs Smithson put on large tortoise-shell framed glasses and flicked through her desk diary. ‘December the fifteenth, to be precise.’

  Leanne wrote the date in her notebook.

  ‘What were his reasons for leaving, Mrs Smithson?’ Cam asked.

  Mrs Smithson glanced at her husband. Again he answered for her. ‘Unfortunately, I had to dismiss him.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I found him in the potting shed, drunk, and not for the first time. He became abusive when I started to reprimand him. I had no choice but to dismiss him there and then.’

  Cam looked at the couple; neither returned his gaze. Mrs Smithson was twisting the pearls at her neck, Mr Smithson tapping his foot. This was getting interesting. After a while Mr Smithson sighed, crossed his legs and rested his hands in his lap. Cam noticed how the knuckles on his right hand were swollen, like a fighter’s. He took his notebook from his breast pocket and rested it on his leg. ‘How did he react when you dismissed him, Mr Smithson?’

  Smithson’s eyes met his wife’s before returning to Cam. ‘He swore at me.’

  Cam began to write a nursery rhyme in his notebook. Always be writing something down, he had learned. It gets people agitated. Makes them more likely to say what they’d rather keep to themselves.

  ‘And then what?’ he said.

  ‘He turned his back on me and left the shed.’

  Jack and Jill went up the hill . . .

  ‘He didn’t attack you?’

  ‘No, I would have reported him if he had. Exactly where are you going with this, Sergeant?’

  ‘Mr Bell recently lost some teeth; that’s how he was identified,’ Cam said. ‘His dentist said he’d an appointment for a denture fitting two weeks ago. Apparently he told the dentist that someone knocked his teeth out in a fight.’

  Smithson stitched his lips into a thin jagged line and folded his arms. ‘That’s nothing to do with me,’ he said.

  To fetch a pail of water . . .

  Cam’s pen hovered above the page. He glanced over at Leanne; her eyebrows were raised and she was leaning forward in her chair to study Mr Smithson as if he was an unusual insect. He’d have to have a word with her about that. Suspects often gave themselves away with body language, but cops did too. Cam had always likened the questioning of a suspect to an intricate game of poker. You had to know when to hold ’em, know when to show ’em. She was showing too much interest now.

  Anne Smithson had turned a lighter shade of pale.

  ‘It would’ve been quite a punch to get those teeth out. I imagine the person who hit him must have suffered some kind of knuckle damage,’ Cam continued in his well-practised, neutral tone.

  ‘I know nothing about any fight.’ Jeffrey’s lips pursed. He placed his left hand over his right.

  Jack fell down and broke his crown . . .

  Cam leaned over to scratch an itc
h on his leg, then straightened to gaze around the luxurious office. He had never understood the attraction of antiques. Elizabeth’s parents had a house full of them and they’d always made him feel uneasy. He was not comfortable with the idea of collecting the possessions of long dead strangers.

  ‘Had you seen or heard from Herbert Bell since he stopped working for you?’ he asked.

  Husband and wife shook their heads.

  ‘Do you have any idea where he went from here?’

  Mrs Smithson explained she’d heard Bell had moved to be caretaker at a neighbouring property. Leanne’s pen made scratching noises as she wrote down the address.

  Time for an awkward silence, Cam thought, let Jeffrey stew for a bit. The mantle clock ticked on as he took in the degrees and diplomas covering almost every inch of wall space. Between the two of them, the Smithsons seemed to have enough qualifications to staff a university. The largest of these framed documents caught his attention; he narrowed his eyes, attempting to decipher the gothic writing.

  The clock bonged out the hour. Its deep vibrations shuddered through the oriental carpet under their feet. Finally Jeffrey said, ‘Will that be all, Sergeant?’

  Cam abruptly switched his gaze from the diplomas back to Smithson. ‘Where were you on Saturday evening between 6 pm and midnight?’

  Jeffrey stiffened at the unexpected question. ‘Are you asking me for an alibi?’

  ‘Just answer the question please, sir.’ Cam’s resolve to tread softly began to falter. These two were hiding something and he intended to find out what it was.

  ‘This is preposterous! You surely don’t think . . .’

  ‘It’s a routine question, sir. It should be fairly simple to answer.’

  Anne cleared her throat, meeting Jeffrey’s eyes with an unspoken question. He stared at her for a moment then nodded.

  Looking back to her diary, she found the relevant page and began to read softly.

  ‘At 6 pm we had an emergency committee meeting with the Glenroyd Progress Association. After that we went out to dinner with the Hamptons. On the way home we discovered our neighbours’ sheep had wandered on to the road. We tried to call our neighbours on the mobile phone but found we had no range, so we drove over to their house and together rounded the sheep up. When we were finished, they asked us in for a coffee. We didn’t get home until almost two.’