The Easy Sin

by Jon Cleary

  Then Norma Nickles came into the bedroom: floating in, as Malone always thought of her. She had been a ballet dancer before she had become Sam Penfold's most reliable assistant in Physical Evidence. She was blonde and attractive and looked feminine even in the police dark blue blouson and slacks.

  “How are you two making out with Miss Doolan?”

  “Have you spoken to her?” asked Malone.

  “Only when I first came in. I told her we'd have to go through the entire apartment and she got a bit haughty about it.”

  “If your boyfriend was missing, you've found your maid dead in your kitchen, kidnap notes on your computers, how upset would you be?”

  “With the guy I just dumped, and no maid, not particularly upset. But I see your point. Our Kylie's not going to need smelling salts.”

  “You come up with anything?” said Kagal.

  “Nothing that's going to help us much. But I could write you a character profile on Mr. Magee and Miss Doolan. They're the original designer junkies, I think. The closets are full of designer labels. Alex Perry dresses, Blahnik shoes, Gucci handbags—”

  “What about him?”

  “Versace, Armani—”

  Malone, who wouldn't have gone beyond K-Mart if allowed by his wife and daughters, who was a life member of Fletcher Jones and Gowings, thought labels, especially if worn on the outside, were like birdshit, something that should be scrubbed off.

  “Spare me the details. Where does the money come from?” He looked around the apartment.

  Kagal looked at him as if he had just arrived from the upper reaches of New Guinea. “Scobie, Magee is I-Saw. I-Saw, for Crissakes.”

  “Eyesore?”

  Kagal spelled it out for him: “I-S-A-W. Don't you ever read theBizCom pages in the papers? They have all the cute names, they're like twelve-year-old kids—”

  “I'm not interested in BizCom or Information Technology, whatever you want to call it. I'm still getting used to faxes instead of telegrams—” He stopped at the look on Kagal's and Norma Nickles' faces. “Righto, I'm joking. But no, I don't know who or what I-Saw is.”

  Kagal didn't quite take him by the hand; but almost: “I-Saw was started by Magee three or four years ago. It's a software programme for lawyers, worldwide. It's supposed to be, or anyway claimed to be, streets ahead of anything else in that field. It made Magee a millionaire, a multi-millionaire, almost overnight. On paper, that is—which is where most of these smart guys were, to begin with. I-Saw has started to go wrong over the last two or three months. It's got cases against it, geeks charging Magee pinched some of their programmes and adapted them—”

  “What's wrong with that?” asked Norma, who had seen more larceny in ballet than any choreographer cared to admit.

  Kagal looked at his boss. “Is that the sort of principles they teach in Physical Evidence?”

  “All the time,” said Malone and gave Norma a smile to show he didn't mean it. “Go on.”

  “I-Saw is on the point of going into receivership. I'd say that is one of the reasons Magee is giving up his lease on this—” He nodded around them. “And why Miss Doolan sacked the maid this morning.”

  Malone gave the matter some thought. “So Mr. Magee could've done a bunk, put those kidnap notes on the computer as some sort of joke against our girlfriend?”

  “And killed the maid on the way out?” asked Norma, still practical-minded. “Why?”

  Malone knew it was a weak argument: “Maybe he had a barney with her and thumped her with the saucepan. Any prints on it?”

  “No. And I don't buy that argument.”

  I'm losing the reins here, thought Malone; and said, “Neither do I. You think of a better one?”

  Said Kagal, also practical-minded: “Why would he be wearing gloves in his own apartment? I mean if he put the messages on the computers as some sort of dirty joke against his girlfriend? Or did he put on gloves to pick up the saucepan to scone the maid?”

  Malone sighed. “You practical-minded buggers make me tired. Why don't you have a little Celtic imagination?”

  “I once lived with an Irish ballet dancer.” Norma shook her head at the horrible memory. “He'd get out of bed after sex to riverdance. All stiff arms and ratatatat with his feet.”

  “Riverdancing in bare feet?” said Malone. “You're kidding us. Righto, we put out an ASM on Magee, let The Rocks do it. We'll see what comes after that.”

  He went back into the living room as a woman came in the open front door and was halted by one of the uniformed men.

  “Yes?” said Malone.

  The woman looked around at all those who were staring at her. “What's going on?”

  “Who are you?” asked Malone.

  “Caroline Magee.”

  “A relative? His sister?”

  “No,” said Caroline Magee. “His wife.”

  There was a gurgling sound from Kylie Doolan, like the last of the bathwater going down the plughole.

  IV

  “We split up six years ago, in London,” said Caroline Magee.

  “You're English?” asked Malone.

  “No.” But the vowels had been rounded, she would never sing “Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport.” “We met there, were married for two years. I'm from Coonabarabran.”

  Bush country: but she had brushed off the bindi-eyes and the paddock dust and the slow country drawl. She was a dark auburn version of Kylie Doolan, just a little sleeker, more sophisticated looking. But her eyes were large and frank, if still puzzled.

  Malone had explained to her what had happened in the apartment. She had listened without comment, then just shaken her head. Whether in disbelief or expectation, it was hard to guess. But she did not crumble.

  “Have you been in touch with your husband lately?”

  “Yes, over the past couple of months.”

  “Shit!” said Kylie Doolan.

  Up till now neither woman had spoken to each other; indeed, Caroline Magee had hardly looked at Kylie Doolan. Malone, wiser than he played in the ways of women, had held off introducing the two till he saw how far the wife would undermine the girlfriend. He had learned a lot from an observant wife and two sharp-eyed daughters. A cop, he had also learned, could surround himself with less helpful company.

  Caroline Magee looked at Kylie. “And you are the girlfriend?” She made girlfriend sound like bimbo. The rounded vowels had spikes, like deep-sea mines.

  Paula Decker and John Kagal sat silent; they had seen this before, but it was always worth attention. Women at odds with each other are more interesting than men in the same situation. There is more subtlety; or there was in this case. These two had been in training, though neither had known of the other.

  “Yes. We've been together quite a while. Here.” Kylie looked around, staking out her claim, even though the lease had been cancelled. In, it seemed, more ways than one. “He never mentioned you.”

  “That'd be Errol. He always played things close to his flat little chest. Or has he put on weight?”

  “You don't sound as if you've come back to—to take up with him again.” Kylie's tone also had spikes.

  “No. He asked me to come back to help him.”

  “In what way?” asked Kagal.

  “I'm a computer software specialist. I taught Errol all he knows.” She was sitting on an upright chair, her knees together, her hands holding her handbag on her lap. Yet there was no prim stiffness to her, she looked totally relaxed.

  “You knew he was in trouble?” said Kagal.

  There was a slight hesitation. “Yes.”

  Kagal looked at Kylie Doolan. “You knew, too?”

  She had her hesitation. “Ye-es.”

  “Well, you have that in common.” Paula Decker had been silent up till now. She sounded as if she was unimpressed by both women. “And Errol, too, of course.”

  Caroline Magee looked at her. “My interest in my husband is purely business. Or was.”

  Kylie snorted, but Mrs. Magee just ignored
her.

  Malone said, “Where are you staying? Or were you planning to stay here?”

  “No, she is not staying here!” Kylie had sat up as if she had been bitten by a spider or something else less welcome than Mrs. Magee. “No, no!”

  “Of course not.” Caroline Magee's smile could have sliced rock. “I'm at the Ritz-Carlton, just up the road. Errol booked me in there,” she added. “He wanted me close by.”

  Malone could taste the sweet-and-sour. “Detective Kagal will escort you back there. You can tell Mrs. Magee how much Sydney has changed in the time she's been away, John.”

  “It'll be a pleasure,” said Kagal, who was the only one to have caught Malone's wink.

  Caroline Magee stood up. “You truly don't know where Errol is?”

  “No, we don't know,” said Malone. “I'm hoping he may call you at the Ritz-Carlton. You'll let us know, of course.”

  “Of course.” She had an elegance to her that Kylie Doolan, no matter how many designer labels she wore, would never have. She had come a long, long way from Coonabarabran. “Am I going to be under police surveillance?”

  Malone wondered what she knew about police surveillance. “Not unless you ask for it.”

  “No, thank you.” She gave Kylie Doolan another false smile. “Nice meeting you, Miss Doolan. Pity it's all over.”

  She left with John Kagal. The PE team had moved out, the Crime Scene tapes were up, there were only two uniformed officers, Paula Decker and Malone left. And Kylie Doolan.

  “What a bitch!” said Kylie.

  “Errol really never mentioned her?” said Paula Decker.

  “Never!” Kylie looked as if she was about to shiver apart with anger. “How could he be so—so—”

  “I think you'd better move out of here,” said Malone. “For a night or two, anyway. Have you got someone you can stay with?”

  Kylie looked around the room, then back at Malone. “Yes, my sister. She lives out at Minto.”

  Ultima Thule of the suburbs: about as far from these Circular Quay apartments as one could get. “We'll get a police car to take you out there. We'll keep in touch. And if Errol gets in touch—”

  “Out at Minto?” She pushed the suburb off the edge of the world. Malone wondered if Errol Magee knew as little about Kylie as she had known about him. “He'll call here if he's going to get in touch with me.” She waved an angry hand, as if she suddenly hated (or was afraid of) the big apartment. “There's a phone in every room with an answering machine—you noticed? Bloody computers with e-mail and faxes . . . The bastard!”

  “Take care, Kylie.”

  Malone nodded for Paula Decker to follow him to the front door. “Get on to your boss, ask him to set up a watch on the switchboard at the Ritz-Carlton, in case Errol calls. They'll probably nominate a strike force, your command will be running it.”

  “Are you staying on the case?”

  He grinned wryly. “We'll see. I think there are too many complications in this one for a simple- minded Homicide man.”

  “I'd like to transfer to Homicide.”

  He didn't ask why; he suddenly felt old and tired. “Good luck.”

  He left her and went home to Randwick, where there was no computer, no e-mail, no fax, only Lisa. Oh yes, there was Tom, his son, and he had a computer in his room; but Malone never looked at it, avoided it as if any virus it contained was the Ebola strain. There were the two mobile phones, without which no home today was completely furnished, but he looked on them as infectious. He consoled himself with the thought that he belonged to the last century, the further back in it the better. He wallowed in technology atavism.

  He wondered if Errol Magee, linked to his world with every conceivable communication, would be heard from again.

  2

  I

  SHIRLEE BRISKIN was neat: everyone said so. Her blonde hair, her features, her dress: a neat package, said her doctor, a lecher, and her chiropodist, a lesbian lecher, swooned over her neat feet. In her house there was a place for everything and everything was in its place, or you'd better look out. In other people's houses she straightened the pictures on their walls. Her daughter Darlene, a cynic, told her she should have gone into government: she'd have had the country shipshape in no time.

  Shirlee was also utterly amoral, though neat about it. She had not been innocent from the day she had first walked; she had gone from bad seed to full bloom in one step. She had learned the Seven Deadly Sins at convent school and thought them an ideal design for living. Her entire lack of morals and scruples was, in its own way, a sort of innocence. Or so she liked to think, when she thought of morals and scruples at all.

  “What the devil got into you?” Her vocabulary, too, was neat; she never used four-letter words. “How could you mistake a man for a girl?”

  “Mum, it was fucking dark in the room—”

  “Wash your mouth out.”

  Corey Briskin sighed. He loved his mother in an off-hand sort of way, but you always had to be careful of the landmines of her temper. She, with some help, had planned the kidnapping of Errol Magee's girlfriend, but, like a good general, she had not come to the scene of the action.

  “And that girl,” said Shirlee. “Their maid, she's dead.”

  “You were the one's been watching everything. You said she only came in during the day.”

  “It was an accident, Mum.” Phoenix Briskin, without his ski-mask, wouldn't have attracted attention. He had such a plain face Shirlee sometimes wondered what she had been thinking about when she had conceived him. He had a thick neck and shoulders that could have carried an ox-yoke. “She was gunna scream the house down if Corey hadn't clocked her.”

  Shirlee looked at Darlene. “Who was the bloke you said you saw come into the flat?”

  “Got no idea,” said Darlene. “All I could see was that he was wearing gloves. On a summer night, if you're wearing gloves, you're up to no good.”

  “Corey was wearing gloves,” said Phoenix. “So was I. Medical ones.”

  “Pull your head in,” said his brother wearily. The resemblance between them was so faint one could be mistaken. Corey had a pleasant face, except for a certain caution about the eyes, as if he trusted no one. He was slim without being skinny and, where his brother was flat-footed, he moved with a certain grace. “What we gunna do with Mr. Magee? Can you ask a guy to pay for his own kidnapping?”

  “Why not?” said Darlene, who had gone further at school than her brothers. “There are self- funded retirees. Here's a self-funded kidnappee.”

  “Let's talk sense,” said Shirlee, never without a supply of brass tacks.

  They had brought Errol Magee, still drugged, to this house eighty kilometres south of Sydney. It was a timber house with a corrugated-iron roof, a turn-of-the-previous century relic; it stood in two hectares of partly-cleared, partly-timbered land that had somehow escaped developers and city folk looking for a weekend hideaway. Clyde Briskin, now dead by his wife's steady hand, had inherited it from his parents, who had inherited it from their parents. Clyde, though a drunk and a philanderer when he was not holding up service stations or in jail, had been a sentimentalist. In his will he had inserted a clause, as had been in his parents' and grandparents' wills, that the property was never to be sold. Shirlee, no sentimentalist, had nominated it as one of her reasons for poisoning him with fox bait.

  Now she was glad they had not been able to sell the house. It was an ideal hideaway; there were no neighbours for at least a kilometre on either side. The road that ran past the property was a dirt track that led to a dead end against the Illawarra escarpment. Errol Magee could have disappeared off the face of the earth.

  “I think you and me should talk to Mr. Magee,” said Darlene. She was better-looking than her mother, but not a neat package; there was always the suggestion that something, physically or emotionally, was going to break out of her. But she had control, something else she had inherited from her mother. She worked for a bank, where control is endemic. “We'
ll see how much he values himself.”

  “Let me and Corey do it,” said Phoenix. “We can scare the shit outa him—”

  “Darlene and me can do that,” said his mother. “Wash your mouth out. Here, Darlene, put this on.”

  She had planned everything, even to the calico hoods to be worn when they were with Magee. They were pale blue, with round holes for eyes and mouth. “Very chic,” said Darlene, slipping a hood over her head. “Does it go with my yellow shirt?”

  “Cut the crap,” said Corey, “and get in there and tell him what our price is.”

  Errol Magee was feeling sick: with the smell of the chloroform in his nostrils and with fear. Early this morning two hooded men had come into this room and taken him to the toilet, where everything had gushed out of him. They had brought him back here to the kitchen chair in this bedroom and rebound him with the brand-new leather straps. They had not spoken to him, just ignoring him when he had asked why the hell he was here. Then he had been left alone till now.

  He looked up in surprise when the two women, hooded as the men had been, came into the room. He had heard voices somewhere at the back of the house, but he had not been able to tell how many there were.

  “Mr. Magee,” said Shirlee, nailing brass tacks to the floor, “let's talk business.”

  “Business? What sort of business?” His voice was a croak. His hands, bound together by a strap, were in his lap. In his blue dress, his knees bound together, he looked demure.

  “Well,” said Darlene, “we made a mistake, Mr. Magee. We meant to take your girlfriend, not you. Do you usually mope around the house in drag at night?”

  Magee felt even sicker, with embarrassment. “No. No, of course not! It was—it was a joke, I was fooling around . . . What's going on, for God's sake?”

  “We've kidnapped you,” said Shirlee. “For money. Five million dollars.”