Vodka Doesn't Freeze

by Leah Giarratano

  'So they've got no real hope of getting him, then?' asked Scotty.

  'Oh, we know who he is,' Davis answered, indicating right to turn their vehicle into an emergency-services bay at the front of the hospital.

  Jill and Scotty stared at her.

  'It's your perp from the beach. David Carter. Shopping centre cameras got a perfect shot of his face.'

  32

  DAVIS HAD ARRANGED TO meet the victim and her mother in an office in the outpatients' department of the hospital. She, Jill and Scotty were perched on classroom-style chairs in the sterile, windowless room. The space was small, and Scotty had had to search the department to scavenge another two chairs for Martha McKenzie and her daughter Madeline. Madeline, the eleven-year-old abduction victim, was having her eyes checked by a nurse in a room nearby.

  To distract herself from the airlessness of the room and the fist of dread that had been groping at her stomach since she'd heard the details of this case, Jill focused on the features of her companions. She found that if she used all of her senses to absorb herself in her environment, she could stay out of the basement that was always waiting in her mind.

  She started with Charmaine Davis. Mid-heeled black leather ankle boots. Straight-leg navy pants, cut higher than was fashionable last year – a look her cousin Alyssa would say was 'so right now'. A thin black belt looped through her pants and contrasted with the tailored white shirt, casually open just below the neck. Her dark brown hair fell below her collarbone and feathered around her face. Her cheekbones were high; her make-up shiny and see-through. The distraction exercise, taught to her by Dr Merris, was supposed to move on to the other senses next, describing things she could hear, smell and feel in the room, but a cough from the doorway interrupted her.

  Jill hadn't figured on Madeline being so very small. She felt a flare of anger towards a mother who could let a child so young go to a shopping centre alone; then she mentally chastised herself. People had criticised her parents for not being at the swimming carnival from which she had been abducted. The blame should only be directed at the offenders. The men who spent their lives devising methods to exploit any chink in the armour parents tried to build around their kids.

  Martha McKenzie, petite and in her mid-thirties, wore a summer skirt, sandals and a well-cut blouse. She looked puffy-eyed and pale. Crying too much and no sleep, thought Jill, remembering her mum's eyes looking that way for a year after she got home. She stared at them in the small room and waited just beyond the doorway, clearly reluctant to enter. Only a sliver of the little girl was visible, as she stood close behind her mother in the entrance. Dark glasses protected Madeline's eyes.

  'Hi, Martha. Hi, Maddie. Thanks so much for coming. Please come in.' Charmaine stood, a warm smile lighting up her face, her hands extended, palms up. She touched Martha's shoulder in welcome, then stepped backwards to give the mother and daughter room, and to introduce Jill and Scotty to them. Jill stood, but Scotty, aware of his size in this room, remained seated. He edged his chair as far back against the wall as he could. He tucked his endless legs behind Jill's chair, and scrunched down in his own.

  'How'd the eye check-up go, Martha?' Charmaine asked after she'd presented Scotty and Jill.

  Martha took a seat, with Madeline perching on the edge of her chair like a little bird, closest to the door, head down, her foot touching her mother's.

  Martha sniffed and Charmaine reached for a tissue box from a sideboard in the room, and placed it close by. 'God only knows,' Martha answered, her tone angry. 'It's hard to find one bloody doctor in here who speaks English.'

  Charmaine looked troubled and offered, 'Would you like me to arrange for a nurse to come in and explain things better, Martha?'

  'No, don't bother. Apparently her eyesight will be okay. The nurse said she doesn't really need the glasses now, but . . .' She looked down at her daughter, face still pointing at the floor. 'Anyway, maybe tomorrow we'll take them off.'

  Madeline said nothing, a sheet of blonde hair hiding even her glasses. She was skinny and brown-limbed, baby hair still on her legs, pink socks, white sneakers. Jill shook her head to shut out the image of an adult male pawing at her drugged body.

  'Maddie, have you been back to school yet?' Charmaine asked the little girl, who shook her head.

  'The school's been bloody hopeless too,' answered her mother. 'I've asked for someone to drop around some of her work, but they won't do it. They reckon it's best for her to get back there as soon as she can.' She raised a trembling hand to her eyes. 'Don't they know how stressed out I am? They'll be lucky if I let her go back next year. I'm too scared to even leave the house. What if the perverts who took her are watching us?'

  Madeline gave a tiny mew and raised her face to stare at her mother. Martha McKenzie groped around for her bag. 'Are we going to be much longer? I've got to have a smoke. My nerves are bloody shot to pieces.'

  'I know you don't want to be here, Martha, but I've got one thing I have to ask Maddie to do today.' Charmaine leaned towards the little girl, her voice warm and reassuring. 'Maddie, I know I said we wouldn't have to talk for a while, so I've brought you a present for breaking our deal.'

  The dark glasses peeked up. Charmaine held out a small gift bag.

  Madeline looked towards her mum, who was still rummaging in her bag. She looked up briefly, 'Come on then, Maddie. What do you say?'

  'Thank you.' A whisper.

  Earlier, while waiting for Madeline and her mother, Charmaine had shown Jill and Scotty the Polly Pocket toy she had bought for the child. These were tiny little dolls with accessories that Maddie had previously told Charmaine she collected.

  No wonder she's so great at getting important details from victims, thought Jill admiringly.

  Madeline took a surreptitious look inside the bag. A tiny smile flashed white teeth for just a moment.

  'We have a photo we want you to have a look at, honey. I just want you to see if you know this person,' said Charmaine. 'That's the yucky thing I need you to do today, okay?'

  Martha McKenzie's hand went to her throat at Charmaine's words. When the detective pulled an A4 envelope from her briefcase, the woman covered her mouth as if to stop herself screaming.

  'Is that him?' Martha's hand shook. She reached out for the envelope, and then pulled back as if it might burn her.

  'This is a photograph of a man, and we need to know whether Madeline recognises him from anywhere.' Charmaine's voice was still warm, but also firm.

  A violent red flush had spread up Martha's throat and into her cheeks. She stared at the envelope as Charmaine withdrew a large glossy photograph.

  Jill and Scotty had checked out the photo while waiting. It was of a fifty-year-old, balding white male, in a cheap suit and tie. He was standing on the steps of the Federal Court, a cigarette in his podgy hand. Police had taken the photo during his last court appearance.

  Jill felt uncomfortable when she found herself thinking that she preferred the image of the only other time she'd seen this man, when his head was broken open like a ripe rock-melon on the sand at the beach.

  Slowly, Madeline stood. Her face pale, her mouth a thin line, she moved hesitantly towards Charmaine. Her mother reached out towards her, then dropped her arms in her lap, her hands compulsively grasping one another as though to stop them grabbing Madeline and running with her from the room.

  Madeline stood before the desk on which Charmaine had placed the photograph face down.

  'Now, Maddie, I need to let you know something before I turn this page over.' Charmaine was seated and her head was on the same level as the little girl's. 'The man in this photograph is now dead.' She paused at the sharp intake of breath that sounded like a sob from Mrs McKenzie. 'So if you recognise this person, you need to know that you will never, ever have to see him again, okay?'

  A barely perceptible nod from Madeline.

  The little girl reached up and removed the dark glasses. Blinking, she placed them carefully on the table. They made
the softest of sounds in the tiny room.

  'Good girl. I'm going to turn over the photo now,' said Charmaine.

  Jill held her breath.

  Charmaine turned the photograph over. Carter's face stared up from the table. For a moment the scene was frozen. When Madeline cried out and dived across the room into her mother's lap, Jill jumped to her feet. Martha enveloped her daughter and the two rocked together as one, as if they were alone in the room, distress emanating from their single silhouette.

  33

  SCOTTY AND JILL LEFT Madeline and her mother with Charmaine and their grief, and quietly exited the office. They walked silently through the corridors of the hospital. Jill mostly felt numb, but she was also aware of a vague sense of satisfaction that the man who'd caused that chaos was dead. One day that was going to help Madeline recover. She remembered the fear that had chased her everywhere after the police brought her home. She'd believed the men who'd taken her could find her again any time they wanted to. After leaving her naked and still blindfolded on a school oval two suburbs from her house, there'd been no sign of them. If she'd had proof they could never hurt her again, that they were dead, she knew that would have helped.

  When the glass doors of the hospital slid open to let them out, Jill blinked in the sunlight. She rubbed at her arms with her hands, chilled by the refrigeration of the hospital, and wrinkled her nose at the cigarette smoke that hung in a cloud around the entryway. Patients in pyjamas and gowns, leading their drips and monitoring machines like pet dogs, sucked in lungfuls of smoke while they chatted to each other and their visitors.

  Scotty strode towards the road in front of the hospital. Jill had to jog to keep up.

  'We're going to see Sebastian.' Scotty's face was closed. He stared into the distance. 'If there is some sort of club for these arseholes, we're taking it down.'

  Jill sighed. She'd seen her partner in this mood before. If she didn't work with him, he'd charge in there on his own.

  'We'll need a plan,' Jill said. 'They're not just going to admit they all hang out together.' They crossed the road and began walking through the park opposite. Jill negotiated around a homeless man lying face up in the 11 a.m. heat, his bottle already empty beside him. She was going to stop to make sure he was alive, when he grunted and opened his eyes. He mumbled something about the ozone layer, staggered to his feet and began to shuffle over to the shade of a tree.

  'Surveillance, then. Let's at least go have a look at where this prick lives. Check this club out. And I want to talk to him. Shake him up a bit.' Scotty was in full stride, his features set.

  Jill assumed they were heading for the bus stop at Taylor Square. They'd left the car with Charmaine Davis and would need to use public transport to get back to Maroubra.

  'All right, we'll check out his place, Scott,' said Jill. She hoped to stall before they actually spoke to Sebastian. He'd just shut up shop if they were too inquisitive.

  Jill took two steps for every one of Scotty's. The sun felt good on her shoulders after the chill of the hospital. They were approaching The Wall, a sandstone barricade that was formerly the outside wall of an old gaol.

  The Wall ran along Darlinghurst Road, and was a well-known strip for child prostitutes. Jill remembered a time when up to twenty young boys would hang here, blatantly soliciting, waiting for one of the steady stream of vehicles to slow down and pick them up. There was often a raucous atmosphere – sometimes there'd be a brawl that spilled into the traffic, over a client, a patch of turf. It only helped to draw the crowds; many, visitors from the suburbs with their car doors locked and windows up, were just out for a look at the seamy side of life. There was always at least one boy leaning into the driver's window of a car with dark windows. Nowadays the show was over, police routinely busting the kids, and sometimes the men who preyed on them. Most times of the day and night, however, if you waited long enough, you'd see a boy dart out from the park and hop into a car, or notice that there was a disproportionate amount of youth hanging around the mobile needle exchange or food van that was often stationed at The Wall.

  A van stood there now, distributing sandwiches and cups of tea and water to the homeless and poor that lived in this area. Jill followed Scotty as he walked straight up to the van.

  'Detective Scott Hutchinson,' said Scotty to the middle-aged man and woman in white T-shirts handing out the food and drink. 'We're investigating a paedophile network, and we're wondering whether you see many people around here taking young boys into their cars.'

  'You're kidding, right?' the woman said flatly, continuing to distribute her styrofoam cups. 'You know this is The Wall, don't ya?'

  'There's no need to be sarcastic, Beryl,' the man next to her said, stopping his work for a moment and staring down from the van. 'Yes, son, unfortunately there are still many cars stopping regularly for the kids around here.'

  'Same cars all the time. We take the plates and call you guys, but we see 'em here again the next week. Bloody perverts.'

  'We don't know about a network, but there does seem to be a regular group that comes around . . .'

  'There ya go. Do some good right now if ya want.' The woman interrupted her partner. 'That bastard's here all the time.' Beryl was pointing at a dark, late-model Range Rover that had pulled over about a hundred metres from where they stood.

  Scotty was in full flight before Jill had even turned. She had started to run after him when the big car screeched away from the gutter, leaving Scotty standing in the street staring after it. He was writing in his notebook as she reached him.

  'Well, I know what I'm doing this afternoon. Gonna hunt down that squirrel and then do some work looking into who this Sebastian is, where he lives and what he eats for fucking breakfast.'

  'I'll go and see Honey again, then.' Jill could see Scotty was on a mission and wouldn't need passengers.

  Ninety minutes later, Jill sat in a coffee shop in Surry Hills waiting for Honey. She'd ordered a coffee, but it had grown cold in front of her. Her head already buzzed, and she didn't need any more of a rush.

  To try to block out thoughts of little Madeline and her mum, she paid attention to the patrons with whom she shared the café. Although it was now 2 p.m., she knew that many of these people were eating breakfast. This suburb caught up an eclectic mix of university students, artists and clothes designers, young professionals, and the unemployed from the numerous housing commission high-rises. A scowling gay couple periodically spat a few words across the table at each other and then studiously ignored one another; a dreadlocked girl in a multi-coloured caftan yawned over a herbal tea, while her multi-pierced companion munched muesli. A woman in a serious suit and heels clattered away on a laptop; while at the next table a scrawny blond man was on the heroin-nod over bacon and eggs. The disgruntled waitress nudged him awake with her hip as she walked past carrying empty coffee cups.

  The waitress had fixed Jill with a stare a couple of times before Honey finally breezed in. Wearing pelvis-skimming denim shorts, midriff-baring white halter top, over-sized white-framed sunglasses and gold gladiator sandals laced halfway up her calves, she woke everybody up. Used to making an entrance everywhere she went, Honey gave Jill affected air kisses, bending forward and giving half the café a view to remember. Jill heard the gay couple, united at last in whispered theatrical mortification.

  'Hi, Honey.' Jill was pleased to see her, happy to be distracted.

  'What are we eating, sweetie? I'm starving.'

  'Order whatever you like.' Jill knew by now that Honey enjoyed being spoiled, and today she felt content to indulge her. Honey ordered eggs Benedict with toast, mushrooms, coffee and a blended fruit juice. Jill ordered bottled water and a smoked salmon and avocado sandwich on wholegrain bread. No butter.

  When the waitress bustled away, leaving their table covered in food and drink, Jill pulled a cloth carry bag from under the table.

  'Your clothes,' she said. 'Thanks for lending them to me.'

  'Oh, no problem, sweetie, any
time. You should wear stuff like this more often. You were hot!' Honey put the bag down beside her. 'What happened to you when the alarm went off, anyway?'