by Emma Viskic
‘Wait here.’ He slipped the phone from her grasp and walked a little way down the road, out of her line of sight. A few slow inhalations before pressing play.
Tilda crossed-legged on a couch, eyes huge in a wan face, hair wild. She spoke directly to the camera, looked up as though at the person holding it. The picture went black.
Tilda alive.
Alive and unharmed, not locked in a cellar, not buried in a shallow bush grave. A weight lifted from his chest, allowing him to breathe properly for the first time all day. Not safe, not by a long way, but a proof-of-life video meant the kidnappers were serious about an exchange.
He jogged back to the car.
‘It’s OK,’ he said as soon as he opened the door. ‘She’s all right.’
After Frankie watched the video, she sat with her eyes closed, shivering. He turned on the heating. An urge to talk to Kat. To be with her and hold her and tell her all his fears and terrors. She’d probably be working late on her new sculpture. Loose-limbed and happy, thinking only about the task at hand. He’d have to tell her about Tilda tomorrow, whatever the news.
He checked the video: nothing distinguishing in the background, just Tilda confused on a brown couch, a wood-panelled wall behind her. The email drew a blank too. Sent through one of the major servers; no way of pinpointing its origin. He forwarded it to Sammi, asking her look into it, but didn’t hold out much hope.
Frankie opened her eyes. ‘They didn’t make any demands.’
No, they were softening her up, giving her a glimpse of what could be, letting her imagine what might. The next message would come soon, and it’d be threatening.
‘They’re getting organised. Took her without any planning. What did she say?’
‘Time and date. Filmed it about an hour ago.’
The phone vibrated: Sammi.
—No info. $50 added to your bill
She was fast, at least.
He explained the message to Frankie, who scrubbed a hand through her hair, making it as untamed as Tilda’s. She was still shaking. ‘Fuck. What do we do now?’
‘Wait for Fawkes’ email.’ He kept talking as she shook her head. ‘Nothing else we can do.’ No leads, no ideas. Just waiting for the kidnappers to contact them. Trying not to think about slaughtered policemen and a dead man called Jordan, the risk each minute brought.
‘Yeah, OK,’ Frankie said. ‘But we can’t sit here with the phone on. We need an internet café – somewhere with coffee.’
She needed food, not coffee, something with lots of calming carbohydrates. Both of them did, probably: neither of them had eaten all day.
‘I know somewhere close.’
22.
Alberto’s café was open for business, new windows gleaming. A room full of colour and movement: lamps on each table and strands of fairy lights looped along the brick walls, a dozen customers signing animatedly. Not a bad turn-out for the usually slow Thursday night; the community turning up to support Alberto after the vandalism. And to catch up on the news.
Frankie stopped in the doorway, taking in Nick’s greeting from behind the coffee machine and a few waved hellos from the customers. Caleb had given her the basics of the sabotage job, but hadn’t said anything about the café or his connection to Alberto. And right now he had no idea why he’d risked exposing it to her. She gave him an unfathomable look and headed for a table in the back corner.
Nick approached, his usually bright smile missing a few watts.
‘More problems?’ Caleb asked. There hadn’t been any messages from Alberto.
‘No – I mean, Grandad just told me to cancel the marquee. The one for the fiftieth. He said there’s no point if the business is … I’ve never seen him like this before.’
‘I know. I’m working on it.’ Not very well, not with any results. He turned to Frankie. ‘Point to what you want on the blackboard or ask me to translate. Nick doesn’t speak or lip-read.’
‘Why not?’
‘Same reason you don’t sign.’
‘I sign.’ She proved it by laboriously signing to Nick, ‘Want coffee white, food hot.’
Nick gave her an encouraging smile and replied slowly. ‘Sure. Do you mean spicy hot?’
‘Yes, hot.’
An odd request from a woman whose tastes usually ran to salt and cholesterol. She’d probably meant to sign ‘please’ but accidentally touched her fingers to her lips instead of her chin.
‘This one, then.’ Nick pointed to the penne all’arrabbiata on the blackboard and received a thumbs-up from Frankie.
‘You don’t want that,’ Caleb told her. He’d tried Alberto’s version of the chilli-infused Calabrian dish once and would rather be pepper-sprayed than eat it again.
Frankie gave him narrow-eyed look. ‘You really mansplaining my order?’
‘Deafsplaining. You asked for –’
‘I know what I asked for.’
He gave Nick his order, got a puzzled look at his request for a glass of milk as well as his usual long black.
Frankie sat back as the young man left. ‘So how long you been doing this?’
‘What?’
‘Being with your people.’
Were they his people? ‘A few months.’
‘And you’re doing a job for them? Brave man, pissing in your own backyard. So what’s your theory – greed, fear or revenge?’
The unholy trinity of criminal motivation.
‘Possibly dodgy developers. And there’s an ex-son-in-law who might hold a grudge. Although he’s been out of the picture a while.’
‘People can simmer for a long time if they’ve got a real fire in their belly.’ She looked around the room. ‘They might be better off just selling if the business is damaged.’
‘Alberto won’t sell. This is one of the few Deaf-friendly workplaces around.’
‘They’ll cope in other jobs. You did.’
‘Cope’ was the right word. He hadn’t realised how enjoyable work could be until he went into partnership with Frankie. Hard to know why she’d asked him and not a fellow cop: they’d been a good team the handful of times their paths had crossed in his days as an investigator and hers as a cop, but he’d come with no connections and limited experience. Not to mention a few communication issues. Was it because she thought he’d be easy to manipulate?
He wavered, then asked the question. ‘Why’d you ask me to go into business?’
Her expression didn’t change. ‘Your sunny nature.’
Nick’s mother, Ilaria, was coming from the kitchen bearing two large plates and a glass of milk. A fine-boned woman with the same wavy brown hair as Nick, but only flashes of his brightness. Always in muted greys and browns, her clothes a couple of sizes too large. Strange to see her in the café instead of the kitchen.
Her eyes skimmed their faces as she set down the food. ‘Nick’ll be over with the coffees in a minute.’ A gentle signer: small movements, close to her body. She glanced around the room and adjusted the already straight table lamp.
Caleb hesitated; they couldn’t have a private conversation in a room full of signers. ‘Want me to come outside?’
A wry smile. ‘Guess there isn’t much point. It’s not like everyone doesn’t already know my business.’ She stood a little straighter. ‘Nick said you’re looking for Tony. I’d rather you didn’t.’
‘Alberto told you about the trouble with the business?’
‘Of course.’
‘You think your ex-husband could do something like that?’
‘No, he’s too impatient. You won’t talk to him, will you?’ Direct eye contact now, her fingers plucking at her apron.
Couldn’t say yes, shouldn’t say no. ‘I’ll speak to you first if I have to.’
She gave him a short nod and left, tension radiating from her like phosphorous.
Frankie watched her go, then picked up a fork. ‘You were the best raw talent I’d seen, and I could stand being in the same room as you.’ She stabbed a piece of penne. ‘Most of the time.’
A moment to work out she was answering his question about their partnership. Jesus, a compliment. No idea what to say in reply, so he just pushed the milk across the table as she ate her first mouthful. There’d be a second or two before her brain caught up to her mouth, then the entire five stages of grief.
She stopped chewing, eyes widening. ‘Christ.’
At the bargaining stage.
‘Hot,’ he said, twisting his hand away from his lips. ‘Please.’ He brought his hand from his chin. ‘Good not to get the two confused.’
She grabbed the milk and gulped it down. ‘You could have warned me.’
He managed to eat half his meal before Frankie claimed it, then went to find Alberto. The cook was in his cramped office behind the kitchen, pecking one-handed at the computer. He looked up as Caleb toggled the lights. ‘That was fast, I only just texted’
‘Something else happen?’
‘In a way. Come and look.’
Alberto switched on the outside lights and led him to the narrow gap between the building and side fence, one of the few places not covered by the cameras Caleb had installed. He lifted an upended rubbish tin, revealing a jerry can and handful of rags. Petrol wafted into the air. A raw wooden fence beneath low-hanging eaves. If that caught alight the building’s ceiling would be down before the fire brigade got there.
Alberto replaced the bin. ‘No idea how long it’s been there. I found it half an hour ago when I was stacking boxes by the fence.’
Had the arsonist had a change of heart or just been interrupted? Too much to hope it was an empty warning.
‘Check your insurance,’ Caleb said. ‘Make sure it covers fire. Water damage too. Everything.’
Alberto patted the air. ‘It’s all right, Nick gave me the lecture last week. I upped the insurance, got top cover on everything.’
That was going to raise a few red flags if he ended up making a claim.
‘Make sure everything’s well documented. You go to the cops yet?’
‘Had to use the NRS, couldn’t get an interpreter. They say they’ll come and look.’
A relayed phone call wasn’t going to cut it; the operator wouldn’t have voiced any of the fear behind Alberto’s typed words. It might take the cops days to respond to a calm message about a can of petrol.
‘Give it a couple of hours, then go to the cop shop,’ he told Alberto. ‘Use a pen and paper if you have to.’ He stopped to get his thoughts in order. ‘Is anyone pressuring you to sell? Developers or neighbours?’
Alberto shook his head.
Damn. It was looking more and more like the danger was coming from within. ‘Tell me about Nick’s father.’
A flush crept up the cook’s face. ‘It’s not Tony.’
‘You like him?’
Alberto’s mouth folded. ‘The man’s an arsehole. A hearie. Tried to keep Ilaria and the boy away from us, barely bothered to learn sign. I should have known sooner what he was …’ He rubbed a hand across his face. ‘I don’t want Nick knowing, but I pay his dad to stay away. The business goes down, the bastard doesn’t get any money. He’s a problem gambler, needs it.’
‘Got an address?’
‘He’s overseas. Thailand.’
‘You sure?’
‘I paid for the ticket. One way.’
Maybe the man had stayed put, maybe he hadn’t, but if the cops didn’t take Alberto seriously now, he’d need more help than Caleb could currently give. Broken windows were bad enough, but arson could be fatal.
‘I’m too distracted,’ Caleb told him. ‘It’s not safe. If the cops give you the run-around, you need to get someone else on the job.’
Alberto was motionless, the overhead lights casting his eyes into shadow. ‘Please don’t make me expose my family to a stranger.’ He turned and went back inside before Caleb had a chance to respond.
23.
Caleb fetched Alberto’s ladder and moved one of the cameras to cover the side fence. Rearranging lifeboats. Anyone determined to burn down the building would do it whether or not there were cameras. The only hope was that the arsonist really had changed their mind.
Frankie came outside as he was packing everything away. She held up the phone. ‘There’s an email from Fawkes.’
A short message containing a lot of information.
—harold holt pool in 45. just you. do laps in slow lane get head wet
‘What d’you reckon?’ Frankie asked. ‘Conspiracy nut?’
Good question. Holt’s death in 1967 was a favourite of the conspiracy theorists. The then prime minister had gone for a swim in rough seas off Portsea and never returned. Most people accepted he’d drowned, but some held out he’d been taken by a foreign government. Everyone agreed that naming a pool after him was in very dark humour.
‘Probably just careful,’ Caleb said. ‘Bad acoustics for a directional mic, and I can’t wear a wire.’ Or hearing aids. Which meant trying to follow an unfamiliar speaker with no intonation to guide him. An accent or lisp could stop him, a mumbler or fast-talker.
Frankie was frowning, apparently coming to the same conclusions. ‘I’ll go.’
‘No, it’ll spook him. I’ll change the location.’ He typed a quick reply.
—Can’t do pool. Need hearing aids
The message came instantly.
—39 mins
***
They made it with three minutes to spare. Caleb bought bathers and changed in record time, headed out to the large undercover pool. A soaring glass ceiling reflected the rippling water against the night sky. Nearly closing time, but the under-fifteen squad were still ploughing up and down the pool, teammates cheering them on; audible even without his aids. More than 110 decibels, then – he’d have to tell Tilda. Hopefully tonight; please God tonight. The kidnappers couldn’t want to keep her till tomorrow, surely. To guard and feed an upset nine-year-old, risk Frankie going to the police, an inquisitive neighbour. There’d be another video any minute now, the handover soon after. Had to be.
He dove in and got going in a steady freestyle, pausing at each end. Five laps, six, seven; increasingly worried Frankie would lose patience and come in. It had taken most of the journey to convince her not to act as back-up, and he wasn’t sure his arguments had stuck.
A shadow moved across the bottom of the pool as someone slipped into the lane ahead of him. He swam to the end, caught hold of the ledge. A man in his early twenties, with shaded goggles and a black swimming cap pulled low on his forehead. Long face and nose, thin limbs twitching with energy. Kat would sketch him in sharp vertical lines.
‘I’m Caleb.’
‘No shit. Why are you interested in Transis?’
No accent or chewing gum, just the rounded vowels of a private school boy. A prayer of thanks to the gods of lip-reading. Now to speak without auditory feedback; it’d be a short conversation if he accidentally started yelling.
‘I’m looking for a child who’s been kidnapped,’ he told Fawkes. ‘I think it’s connected to the taskforce.’
‘What kid?’
‘Maggie Reynolds’ daughter.’
Fawkes grabbed the edge of the pool, hauling himself out.
Caleb caught his arm. ‘I’m not working for Maggie, I’m just looking for her daughter. Her name’s Tilda. She’s nine.’
The young man glanced at a passing lifeguard and dropped into the water.
Caleb kept hold of his wrist. ‘Tell me what you know, and I’ll tell you what Maggie’s saying on the video. Start with Imogen Blain. What do you know about her?’
‘Never heard of her.’
His arm had relaxed slightly in Caleb
’s grip, but his gaze was darting around the pool, from the walls to the swim squad at the far end of the room.
‘It’s a pool,’ Caleb said. ‘Can’t be bugged.’
‘Everything can be bugged.’
‘Then mouth the words, I can’t hear you anyway.’
Fawkes frowned. ‘Like. This?’
‘Yes. Tell me about Maggie – what’s your interest in her?’
‘Staying alive.’
‘She threatened you?’
‘Not her – her clients. I did some work for the feds a few months back. For Transis. To, you know, get myself out of some trouble. I was … and … I … they …’
‘Slow down. What kind of work was it?’
‘Hunting down dirty money. A thread traced back to Maggie. Nothing major, but interesting, so I told them. And then … he … they …’
‘Slower.’
Fawkes’ mouth folded petulantly. ‘It’s really. Hard. Talking. Like. This.’
An urge to laugh. ‘Yeah, must be difficult. What happened when you told them about Maggie?’
‘They shut Transis down. Then this big bloke came to my house and told me to hand over my hard drives and forget everything … smashed up … scared … my mum … Bastard.’ Spit flecked the corners of his mouth, the fear fresh even months later. Outrage, too, as though hurt his good work hadn’t been appreciated.
‘If that all happened months ago, why are you worried now?’
‘Because some informant went and got one of Maggie’s clients arrested last week. Another one found out and decided they didn’t want to be next. Killed the informant and most of fucking Transis.’ Fawkes wrenched his arm from Caleb’s grasp. ‘Now tell me about the video or I’m out of here.’
Fawkes had timed his move for the lifeguard’s return patrol, apparently deciding the woman’s attention could play in his favour.
When she’d gone, Caleb said, ‘I’m missing the name, but Maggie’s saying, “It’s safe. I’m the only one who knows. No. Don’t tell anyone about blank. Please.” The name’s something like Turner or Kirner.’
‘You don’t know?’ Fawkes was tightening his grip on the ledge.