One Single Thing

by Tina Clough

  When he looks up and starts talking, his voice is calm. There is no hint of drama; he is simply stating facts. ‘No, it doesn’t matter. I have to do this, or I’ll despise myself for the rest of my life.’

  I sit down, consider pouring myself another glass of wine and decide not to; I want nothing to distract him now.

  ‘Not long after Rob told me about Stuart and I looked at his record on the log, he suddenly announced that Hope was no longer suspected of anything. He said Wellington had sent a message directly to him, that all surveillance was to cease as of that day. Rob and I were very busy just then, and a couple of days later, when Stuart asked if we had removed the camera and stopped monitoring her phone and so on, we said yes. He can become nearly impossible when things back up – keeps changing his mind about what is the top priority, pulls you away from a half-finished job to start another one and loses his tempter over details. No structure and no self-discipline.’

  He takes a sip of his wine. ‘But we didn’t actually get around to it until a few days after he first told us to do it. And when we went to her flat there was a swipe pad on the door and we couldn’t get in.’

  ‘Noah did that,’ I say. ‘As soon as he discovered Hope was missing.’

  ‘Well, we had no idea what it meant. Rob wanted to tell Stuart that we had delayed taking the camera down and now we couldn’t get in, but I was uneasy. I didn’t want to do anything to draw attention to her case just then, even though I didn’t know about either of the abductions at that stage. So I said, let’s just stop the recordings and close down the link. We could do that remotely.’

  He frowns as he remembers the decisions he had made at that time. ‘We left the camera in the window frame,’ he says, ‘and the rest of the gear on the outside wall. We just stopped recording. But I was worried about Stuart and his obsession with Hope, so I continued checking her text and email messages for a short time. Which was illegal, if surveillance had really been ordered to be stopped. I never told Rob.’

  The timeline seems increasingly complex; one set of events overlaps another, and the consequences are not discovered until later. I go through the sequence in my head.

  ‘Let’s see if I’ve got this right, Tama. This means the camera was active at the time of both abductions. Let’s go with Samantha’s scenario. Say Hope took the call from a bogus policeman in the bedroom, where Dao found her phone. She goes downstairs, leaving the door just ajar. The camera stops recording the moment she is out of sight – and she never comes back. So if it is Stuart, he was recorded the first time, but never entered the flat the second time. Then Noah returns from holiday and puts the new lock on. And there will be recordings of him in that flat for a day until you guys deactivated the camera remotely.’

  Tama nods. ‘That’s right. And yes, the first abduction was recorded, but Stuart noticed and deleted it. When he went to watch the old recordings of Hope, he must have spotted the date of the abduction video. And he realised the camera had still been operational when he went in and now it was all on record. If he had taken her a couple of days later, we would never have known. The link would have been deactivated and he would have been safe. He must have panicked when he understood what had happened. But somehow, he managed to delete that recording. That should not have been possible, so there is a major flaw in the software that we haven’t been aware of.’

  I can’t believe how unlucky this is; there had been evidence of the abduction, but it has been deleted. Tama looks from me to Dao and shakes his head as if he can hardly believe the story himself.

  I decide to tell him that one of Hope’s stories was a detailed account of the first abduction. I tell him how she described it, and he nods. ‘Yes, that’s exactly how it happened.’

  He sees my incomprehension and smiles without much joy. ‘I told you this was complicated to tell, didn’t I? You see, I continued watching the flat on and off and after a couple of days I realised that someone else was living there – Noah, as I know now. I had no idea what this meant. Had Hope moved? Or had something happened to her? Or was she in there and never went out? I couldn’t figure it out.

  ‘I studied the server log more closely and that’s when I discovered that Stu had deleted a video file. He knows we have a backup system, but he can’t access it – it’s on a separate server. The abduction video he thought he had got rid of had been backed up before he deleted it. I watched it on the back-up server and that’s where I can grab it from – easier than finding it among deleted files. It doesn’t show his face because of the mask, but you can see his fancy watch. It’s clearly visible – his sleeve rides up as he struggles with her. The mask covered his whole head, but a big mole on the back of his neck shows in the gap above the collar of the overall. It’s very distinctive, large and a weird shape.’

  ‘If he thought the camera had been removed, why do you think he wore a disguise when he abducted her the first time?’ I’m interested to hear his ideas about this; we have speculated about it more than once, but we can’t make sense of it.

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe he didn’t trust that we had taken the camera down and he was worried we’d wonder why, if he asked again. And then the second time he came – I can understand why he wouldn’t go up to the flat. She would never have let him in, would she? So he must have devised a way of grabbing her at the street door or in the street.’

  I top up our glasses and consider all the details we have now. At last we know why Stuart wore that mask, even though Hope had already seen his face. Instead of asking if the camera had really been removed, he made sure he would not be recognised. And then he was shocked to find that not only was there a recording of the abduction, but there were things on it that could identify him – the watch and the mole on his neck. So he deleted it.

  Dao gets up. ‘Let’s have the ice cream now. We can talk about what to do next while we eat it. But getting that block removed from Hope’s police file is vital – that must happen as soon as possible.’ She disappears into the kitchen.

  Tama sits silent and thoughtful. When Dao returns with the ice cream he pulls out his wallet and extracts a folded sheet of paper which he puts on the table. With a bowl of ice cream in front of him and a spoon in his hand, he points to the paper.

  ‘This is for you,’ he says through a mouthful of ice cream. ‘Shit, that’s fantastic ice cream, what is it?’

  Dao starts laughing. ‘Avocado and honey – “with a touch of balsamic vinegar”, it says on the label. We love it – their second-best is red wine and black pepper. Now, why did you only turn up at places where Hope had been in the evenings, but she never saw you follow her there?’

  ‘Well, I’m only one person and I have a full-time job, so I had to prioritise. I figured that the most likely time Stuart would try to get close to her – or even rape her – was in the evening. And I knew he had access to her emails and text messages. He and I both knew where she was going to be when she went out, unless she made a date by phone call, of course. So I staked out the place she was at, parked somewhere really handy and waited. Most of the time it worked. I’d follow her taxi or bus and either drive right past the taxi at her door or park and follow on foot from the bus stop, see her safely home.’

  Dao and I look at each other and nod. It makes perfect sense. The time and effort Tama put into his efforts to keep Hope safe is a testament to his determined personality. We talked about it a couple of times and tried to work out firstly how he did it and secondly why it was only at the end of evenings out that she spotted him. We never quite got it right.

  ‘Incredible,’ says Dao. ‘Hunter sometimes says I’m a star, but I think you are a star too.’

  ‘I agree. Above and beyond the call of duty, as they say.’

  Tama smiles. ‘I don’t know if Stuart left the block on Hope’s police file or if he put it back, but he told us she was of no further interest. Did he lie? Or has she really been cleared, but he made sure the police file is still blocked for his ow
n reasons? Impossible for me to tell at my level and if I ask it will filter back to him.’

  ‘Is there some way of double-checking what the truth is about that? I don’t know what – some register or database you can dig into to find out? Do you know how they normally remove a block from a police file?’

  I am making random suggestions off the top of my head. There are no clear-cut answers to our problem and I am getting frustrated. When Dao was being hunted because she knew too much, my role was familiar in a way. I used my army training, evaluated situations, prepared for trouble, left nothing to chance. It was me against them; if they tried to kill her I had to be able to kill them first. This time there are so many people involved, different considerations, having to dig and delve to find things out. Officials and confidential information, other people risking their careers and reputations, difficult personalities. I am in a foreign landscape that I must somehow navigate without a compass.

  ‘I am trying to find out how they normally lift the restrictions on a file,’ says Tama and my attention flicks back to the present. ‘I don’t know how they notify the police that the file is OK to use. Perhaps someone with the right level of access goes straight into the police database and takes the block off? It’s not something I have experience of.’

  He eats the last of his ice cream. ‘God, this is the best ice cream ever! But what I can do right away is give you this.’ He pushes the paper in my direction. ‘As I said before, I can’t copy the video file or send it anywhere without leaving a trail. And if someone in Wellington notices, then I’m toast – and we can’t get anything more. So maybe starting at the Stuart end will give you something to go on while I try to work out how to remove the stop on Hope’s file. And if I can’t remove it, I will grab the abduction video and the log of Stuart’s activities and wait for all hell to break lose.’

  The note reads:

  Stuart Browning, 154 Bellevue Rd, Mt Eden.

  It was his parents’ house, both are dead, he never left home and never married.

  Drives a black BMW X1, reg FBL430.

  Tama leaves half an hour later.

  I deliberately avoid discussing how this information might be used. His role is to get the evidence of Browning’s activities documented and pass them to us. It will be safer for him not to know what we are doing, but when I say this he snorts derisively.

  ‘Safety is an obsolete word in my dictionary, Hunter. Once I’ve done what I have to do, I might as well call Wellington and confess. They’ll be on to it pretty fast. Maybe confessing would be a good idea, give me a better chance.’

  ‘And when they discover, what will you do?’

  I have no wish to coerce him into anything, but I would prefer some freedom of action once we have the evidence. We stand in the open doorway and Dao joins us. The summer night is warm and still and the street is quiet. I glance at the big tree across from the house; there is nobody standing in the deep shadow.

  Tama turns to Dao. ‘I’ll say nothing about you two, of course. It would hamper you and do me no good at all. It is better that they think I just collected the evidence for myself, to use against Stuart. No breach of confidentiality, just unauthorised data capture.’

  ‘Are you sure you shouldn’t take it to the police? Or to a lawyer? It might be faster than what we can do.’ Dao is worried about what will happen to him, and so am I.

  He shakes his head. ‘Nothing would happen very fast – investigations, interviews blah blah. It will become very complicated and meanwhile my hands are tied. Possibly yours too, if they somehow find out about you.’

  He gets into his car and we watch his tail-lights disappear around the corner. Dao is probably as disappointed as I am; this has become an either/or situation. Either we do our damnedest to find Hope and let Tama sacrifice himself, or we leave it to the authorities and it might be too late to save her. So much time has passed already; the chances of her being alive must be getting slimmer each day.

  Chapter seventeen

  The next morning Dao and I discuss the pros and cons of telling Willow about Tama’s job and possibly some of what he told us. Dao is against telling her anything, but I’m not sure.

  ‘Things have changed. Now we know something quite explosive – a top guy misusing surveillance information and then committing a serious crime. Time is of the essence here, and Hope must be found.’

  Dao shakes her head. ‘I know, but if we tell Willow she’ll tell the cops or whoever, and then we can’t do anything. They’ll take over and stop us working on it until they’ve looked into it. They might not even believe that Stuart has done anything. It will take forever! How long will that creep keep Hope alive – another week? Or two? Or is she already dead? There will be endless delays, not like when we do things.’

  We finally agree that I will not tell Willow about Tama’s job. We don’t know the name of the organisation, but he has made it clear that he would prefer not to tell us, and we have respected that. Perhaps it is some last reserve on his side; not making the final breach of confidence to outsiders. Neither will we tell her that he has evidence about Hope’s disappearance. I will only indicate that he has access to confidential information and that it points to a particular person in a top-level position.

  I send an email to her private address, so she gets it on her phone. Sending it to her office address would make it official and I nurse a vague hope that she will agree to co-operate with us.

  When she calls, I know within seconds that there is no way she will help us unofficially. She is furious. ‘Have you no idea how much you are risking by dealing with this guy? What did he tell you? If you’re keeping information from me, I can’t achieve anything!’

  It is a long time since she was this angry with me. Not that it makes any difference. I just have to try to calm her down a bit. And perhaps not see her for some time.

  ‘I told you the other night that this is how it’s going to be, Willow. Noah is too unstable to have around when he’s taken a dislike to someone. He’s irrational – I think he might be on drugs. And I told you Tama might come up with more information.’

  Willow is ablaze with indignation. ‘I take it that Tama works for one of the intelligence agencies? He is endangering his career and your reputation! Noah told me a bit about that meeting where he was present. Tama has broken professional confidentiality by talking to you – for all I know you might be in possession of classified information. This is serious, Hunter! I don’t care if they call it whistle-blowing or farting in a bucket, it’s bound to end up in the courts.’

  That childhood expression takes me back thirty years. I see her in my mind, aged seven or eight, after she discovered I have given her Barbie doll a crew cut and turned her into a soldier, shouting ‘I hate you, Hunter. Go fart in a bucket!’ If she wasn’t so angry, I would laugh, but I know better these days.

  ‘Of course, I know it’s serious. I’m not an idiot. But if we’re going to find Hope it will depend on speed, not on following the bloody rules. I don’t give a shit if it’s classified so long as the information helps us find her. Nobody else is doing anything about it, are they? And it’s beginning to look as if we’re well on the way now, so let’s pray it’s not too late to find her alive.’

  I am angry too. She should understand that sometimes expediency takes precedence over following the rules. I told her we would not involve her, that we would keep anything borderline illegal to ourselves. Attacking me now seems unreasonable.

  ‘If you want to have some classified information, just let me know.’ I am on a roll now, just want to irritate her some more. ‘And then you can file one of those requests for official information. By the time that’s been processed Hope will have perished long ago, if she isn’t dead already. But I’m not working with Noah. I don’t trust him. I’ll do this on my own. Let me know if you want to know what we’ve discovered already. It will make your hair stand on end.’

  I end the call and turn around to find
Dao staring at me. ‘I’ve never heard you to talk to Willow like that before! Is she really angry?’

  ‘Furious is more like it – steam coming out of her ears. I’m not sure what Noah has told her about our meeting with Tama. He’s a bloody liability. I’m having nothing more to do with him. Let them be legal and proper, we’ll just do what needs to be done.’

  ‘Aren’t we going to see Willow and Matt anymore?’

  ‘Of course, we will. We just have to keep clear of any talk about what we’re doing, things we can’t tell her, and give her a bit of time to cool off. As soon as we know enough to force the cops to do something, we’ll tell Willow everything.’

  We sit down and discuss ways of finding out more about Stuart. When I suggest breaking into his house and searching it, Dao protests. ‘If the neighbours spot us they’ll call the police. And then we’re stuck and can’t do anything at all.’

  ‘OK, but we can’t just sit outside and watch his house – we could spend days without finding anything out.’

  Then I remember the woman who came around a few weeks back doing a neighbourhood survey about playgrounds. ‘That’s a good idea,’ says Dao. ‘I’ll be the survey lady. We just have to decide what the survey is about.’

  We refine the survey concept to suit us, get the props together and we set out for Bellevue Road. It is new territory to me and I drive right down the length of it and then around the block where Stuart’s house is and park just behind the corner. Dao has her clipboard on her lap and Scruff has his lead on; ready to go.

  ‘Stay here,’ I say. ‘I’ll walk back and have a look first. Just to make sure there aren’t any surprises.’

  The street is lined with mostly weatherboard villas, probably dating from the 1920s and 30s. A couple of modern houses have inserted themselves among the older ones; overall it is a homogenous street of well-kept properties. I walk on the far side, so I can look across and study Stuart’s place without being obvious. White walls, grey windowsills and a leadlight window beside the front door; immaculate. A concreted driveway to the right of the house, a garage set well back, a glimpse of a biggish garden at the back. No obvious CCTV camera. I go all the way to the next corner, cross the street and walk back again. There is not much to see, but from this angle I can see a side door and a window on the side of the garage, which might be useful.