Blood River

by Tony Cavanaugh

  The body was nestled under a towering pink bougainvillea on a grass verge that spanned the length of the street and the cliffs. The heat was intense. Even past midnight, it was over thirty degrees. That, along with the sub-tropical Brisbane humidity, made them all sweat. Beads on their foreheads, droplets coming off their cheeks and wet pools on their chests and backs. Rachael asked one of the cops if either of them had a smoke, and the female constable – Belinda – did, even though she wasn’t meant to because the Force frowned on smoking. She reached into a pocket and pulled out a packet of Marlboro Red and, with shaking hands, lit the cigarette for the woman on the ground and then decided to have one herself and then her partner – Geoff – who had only been in uniform for a couple of months, shipped across from Toowoomba, asked if he could have one as well and she just handed him the packet, which he took with shaking hands and they puffed, all three of them, deep and long, hearing in the far distance the faint sounds of sirens approaching and just get here already and none of them looking at the body of the man, dressed in a charcoal-grey suit, maybe in his fifties – hard to say because his head had been neatly sliced away from the neck but not entirely and then folded sideways, so it was resting on his left shoulder. A thin piece of flesh was all that remained between head and neck. As if he was a gory toy where you could pop his head back on then lift it off again. Adding to the toy analogy, thought the constables, was his mouth.

  The killer had cut from the edges of his mouth to the base of his cheek bones, creating an upwards curl of the dead man’s lips. His eyes were wide open, staring at them, his mouth frozen in a smile.

  That was all they had seen. That was enough.

  There was more.

  —

  BELINDA, SHE FELT as if she were in a chimera. Rachael didn’t move, sitting on the edge of the footpath, staring at the reflections of the bright city lights on the surface of the swollen river. She wondered how deep it was. How far before you reach the bottom. After a moment, she realised the Chili Peppers were still playing and she pressed stop.

  The sirens were getting louder now, a little closer. They smoked in silence, Belinda, her back to the others and the body. She watched as, off to the east, out past where the river mouth spews into the sea, about thirty kilometres away, sheets of lightning ricocheted across the sky, defining the edges of the massive storm clouds at the river’s mouth, flashing with white light, then vanishing. No thunder. Not yet.

  Geoff, his eyes closed, was looking back, down the calm streets of Toowoomba watching a kid riding a bike to school, laughing, with Vegemite sangos in his bag, slung around his neck at a time when life had not yet become confusing.

  A sheet of drizzle began to wash over them. The lightest of rain. The weather bureau had predicted more storms. A flood was beginning to look inevitable.

  ‘So,’ Geoff said to Belinda in a contrived effort at making conversation (but look, he’s freaking out, so give him a free pass) ‘what do you reckon about the Y2K bug? You reckon that, like they say, all computers around the world are going to shut down on New Year’s Eve?’

  It was November 18, 1999, and there was panic that, at the end of the year, every computer on the planet was going to kill itself because only very recently did programmers consider that there was the next century, the one that starts with 20, and every computer on the planet could only note, see and think about years starting with the prefix 19. Doomsayers were thinking the world was going to end.

  Belinda stared at him for a moment. Okay, yep, she thought, he’s just seen his first murder victim, and it’s very gory, and we weren’t told about this shit at the Academy. The Virgin Death was how one of the instructors had referred to the rite of passage of seeing your first homicide. Not every cop gets to see a murder victim but, just in case, be prepared for how your guts will freeze, and the countless hours you will spend wondering about the victim, what their life was all about, their close-to-last moment of realisation, knowing they were about to die. Because that’s what they do to you, the dead, that’s what they make you do – think about their last beat of breath, about your last beat of breath. What the instructor didn’t mention was that The Virgin Death might be so horrific, so hideous and grotesque, that it would be as if the killer wanted not just to kill his victim but to fuck with you, so that you might never erase the image from your mind.

  As if the killer had just won a game, and the prize was to remain in your head for the rest of your life.

  I have no opinion on Y2K, thought Belinda, I just want to go home.

  As the first of the police cars turned the corner and screamed towards them – an unmarked, sirens and lights – she and Geoff quickly crushed out their smokes. They watched as the car pulled up and two cops stepped out.

  They knew who the two cops were. Everyone in the Force knew who they were. Even if they hadn’t met them. Homicide’s Odd Couple. Lara, the youngest detective in the Squad, ever, a twenty-something Asian woman with dyed blonde hair and Billy, the oldest detective in the Squad, with the fiercest reputation in the state of Queensland, ever, an old school copper who would smash a suspect over the head, dangle him from a balcony or just forge a confession from him. In the old days. But the old days were long gone, so they said. Not that anyone, least of all Billy, believed that. So they said. And Lara was meant to be one of the new breed. Super smart, a woman, not Anglo. She was meant to have a huge career ahead of her. So they said. She could even be a commissioner one day, one day when people wouldn’t scoff with disbelief and horror at the notion of an Asian woman in that role. So they whispered.

  How on earth did these two get paired up and who’s going to kill who first and how come it hasn’t happened already?

  —

  DRIZZLE WAS TURNING into hard rain. A bolt of sharp lightning, like a dagger, pierced the horizon and then thunder rolled in. The storm was in the east, but closer now. Approaching.

  ‘Can we put a fucking umbrella over the vic so we don’t lose the crime scene? You!’ Billy shouted to Belinda. ‘Get a fucking umbrella now; it’s about to fucking pour.’

  He was wearing a dark green suit and his shoes were shiny black patent-leather; the phosphorus from the streetlight above reflected off his shoes as he sidestepped the puddles.

  Every constable was nervous about Billy and hoped never to cross paths with him. Billy would smash you if you got in his way. The word was that Billy had grown up in the East End of London and his hello trademark was a slash across the face with a razor-blade-embedded bicycle chain. Billy was a bad guy, Billy was a good guy – it all depended on who you talked to. He’d been one of the top homicide cops when constables like Belinda and Geoff were still in the womb.

  No-one knew very much about Lara, except for the obvious and that she was meant to be really smart. No-one even knew if she was of Chinese descent or Japanese or Korean. Someone said her parents were boat people from Vietnam but that was the extent of the word on Lara, on the street, in the world of police-constable-gossip-land.

  As Belinda rushed to get an umbrella, Geoff took a few steps back and watched as Lara moved close to the victim.

  ‘This is a serial killer,’ she said to Billy.

  ‘Have there been any other killings like this?’ he shot back as if talking to a student who might have just failed a test.

  Geoff watched as Lara turned to the older man and, like a student would talk back to a teacher, said, ‘No.’

  Ignoring Geoff, the two Homicide cops spoke to one another, the torn body of the victim on the ground next to them.

  ‘What did you just do wrong then?’

  ‘Not think,’ she replied.

  Neither one of the Odd Couple seemed to care that this was playing out in front of a rookie constable and a freaked-out witness. They were living in their own world.

  Billy moved in close and lowered his voice and spoke in whispers. Geoff could still hear them, just, if he craned in to eavesdrop, so intrigued was he by this odd dynamic and certain a little bit of in
tel about the Odd Couple would elevate him in the eyes of others. He noticed they were staring intently at one another and, for the first time, he realised that Lara towered over Billy. She must have been about six foot and Billy must have been about five-six. He just carried the gravitas and threat of a giant.

  ‘How long have you been in Homicide?’

  ‘Seven months.’

  ‘And this poor bloke, lyin’ here on the ground, murdered in the most foul of ways, what number murder victim would he be for you, in your seven months?’

  ‘Number four.’

  ‘Don’t fuck it up by …’

  ‘… by starting with a conclusion.’

  ‘Good. You will get to the top of the class, one day girlie. ’Specially with Billy Waterson being your teacher. Right then, what do you see?’

  —

  I MUST HAVE been six or seven when I thought to myself: I’m going to be a cop. It had more resonance than being a firefighter or an archaeologist, probably because my mum had been one herself, back in Hong Kong.

  It was the uniform that had first caught my attention. Mum, standing in a row of fellow officers, men and women. Staring straight ahead. Looking so serious. A dark blue suit of pants and a four-pocket safari jacket with polished silver buttons over a white shirt and black tie with a wide black leather belt and two-pronged silver buckle. She looked important.

  I wanted to be important.

  But the thing about being a cop is that people shoot at you. You might go to work and you might get killed. That’s what dad had said. Before he had died. That’s what mum had said. That’s what my little brother who used to blow popcorn at me from out of his mouth, disgusting little prick, that’s what he had said, in a rare moment of thought and care.

  ‘Your dad is correct. You’re going to put yourself in situations that will, inevitably, put you in the firing line of a crook’s gun,’ said mum.

  ‘What’s a crook, mum?’

  ‘A gangster. We used to call them ‘crooks’ in Hong Kong. Lots of English policemen call them crooks. You do not want to be in the firing line, Lara. Listen to what your mother says. A crook is a person who might kill you.’

  Oh no, not me, mum. Not me.

  As I got older, the more they discouraged me the more I thought: this is my calling. I am going to be a cop and I am going to rise up through the ranks and join the Homicide Squad. Because I knew, even then, that Homicide was the most revered squad, and every time I read about someone being murdered I had an inner shudder of revulsion and kept thinking about who the killer was, and whether the victim would ever find justice.

  By the time I was nineteen, after I had clawed out of an inferno of two catastrophically dangerous relationships and a spiral of self-hate, when things finally got clean and twenty/twenty vision returned, I said: Lara, become a cop. Do it. Stop thinking about it, just do it. Make your way from grunt, up the ranks, get to Homicide. It’s where you need to be. In Homicide you will be in control and ruin will no longer be your friend. Duty, responsibility, the search for a killer and the fight for justice, these will be your life jackets.

  Billy told me it would pass and I would become inured but it was the banality of murder that got me. People killing people like they were cooking a steak; hey, do you want it rare, medium or well done? That was what I battled, where my darkness lived. I had already seen some bad stuff, but justice or retribution, call it what you will, drove me every day, every night.

  I didn’t believe in God and I still don’t but I do believe in the divinity of my job. I am honoured to avenge those who have been murdered.

  Seven months in, my experience of murder had been: one, gang-related; two, a jealous husband; and three, a guy who thought killing his wife would lead to financial gain. All three with clean, clear motivations. An easy ride.

  Now all of that was about to change.

  Cry Me A River

  ‘THIS IS WHAT I SEE,’ I SAID AS I LEANED DOWN, UNDER THE dripping bougainvillea, its pink petals scattered on the ground, crouching on all fours, ignoring the damp grass, ignoring the dead man’s grin, focusing on the separation of his head from his body.

  I shone my small Maglite onto the wound.

  ‘An extremely sharp-bladed knife. Not serrated or else we’d see jagged flesh. Victim has almost been decapitated. Head folded sideways, onto the left shoulder. There is deliberation here. The killer has created a pose. As if he’s creating a sculpture.’

  I moved in closer. I could smell the blood and the slow-rising putridity of the open wound. Staring hard at where the side of the man’s neck was still attached to his shoulder, I thought that a snip from a small pair of scissors would finish the job.

  ‘Further deliberation in that the head has been cut but not entirely removed. This would eliminate a strike while the victim was standing. Such a strike would be impossible to control and decapitation would almost certainly be the result. It wouldn’t have taken long, cutting most of his head off. The victim is lying on his back. It is extremely unlikely, given the position on the grass here, that the killer made the incision from behind. Most likely cutting from the side, straddling him, looking into his eyes. No signs of a fight, so I’m going to suggest that the killer incapacitated our victim before he proceeded to cut into his neck.’

  Billy was walking around the body, listening intently. He and I were in our zone. The two constables and the witness off to one side, watching.

  I leaned over the victim. ‘There seems to be another pool of blood under his head. We’ll wait until forensics arrive before we touch or move him, but I’m going to suggest there will be another wound. The incapacitating blow.’

  I then stared at the mouth. ‘The killer has incised either side of the mouth with an upwards cut of approximately three centimetres. To make it look like a … a smile?’ I looked up at Billy. ‘It reminds me of the villian character in the old Batman series.’

  ‘The Joker,’ he said.

  ‘Yeah. Him.’ I looked back to the face. ‘Who knows what the psychology is behind the mouth-cuts and the horrible-looking grimace, but the killer would appear to have spent some time with the victim. This was not a rapid-fire killing. Once he demobilised the victim, he arranged him.’

  I moved in closer.

  ‘One of his teeth is missing. Third from the middle. I think it’s called a canine something.’ Shining my Maglite around the wide-open mouth, I added, ‘It’s a fresh wound. It’s been pulled out.’

  Billy said nothing as he watched me crouching over the dead man without touching him. As I stood, we both looked at my jeans, which from the knees down were soaked in blood. ‘He’s wealthy,’ I said, moving on. ‘Wearing an Italian suit.’

  ‘How do you know it’s Italian?’

  ‘I caught a glimpse of a tag on the inside jacket pocket. His shoes also appear to be expensive and …’ I leaned down to his left hand without touching it. ‘He has a Rolex. So,’ I said, turning back to Billy, ‘I guess we can eliminate robbery as a motive.’

  ‘Do you want to roll him over and see if he has a wallet? Find out his name and address?’

  ‘I don’t want to touch him,’ I replied. ‘Do you?’

  He nodded, as if I had passed a test, not that it was a hard one, even for a rookie in Homicide.

  Billy turned and looked in the direction of the main road, about three hundred metres away. ‘Where the fuck are forensics and the science teams? And the Coroner?’

  Him

  WHEN I WAS A KID, DAD TOOK ME TO THE EKKA.

  You go to the showgrounds and eat fairy floss and ride on big rides and get scared in the crappy ghost train ride and eat those revolting hot dogs which are deep fried in batter, a bit like the revolting deep fried Mars Bars, which I once tried when I was in Glasgow.

  I love my dad.

  He did lots of things for me. When I was a kid.

  I guess he would be upset with me if he knew I had just killed a fear, stabbed him in the back of the neck and nearly sliced off his hea
d.

  At the Ekka there were cows and horses and fresh strawberries and a massive hall where you’d buy your showbags, as many as you could carry. There were hot dogs or hot chips dripping with cheap tomato sauce which, if you weren’t careful, would splodge onto your clothes. Lots of fairy floss and, even though I was a kid, the vague surety of being sick when you got home, clutching your tummy and spewing into the toilet bowl but, not for a second, with any sense of regret as I munched happily away.

  My dad took me on a roller coaster. I was about seven but I was tall for my age. That’s the criteria to take the ride. Not age. Height. Dad freaked out and gripped the edge of the seat and looked as though he was going to have a heart attack, which freaked me right out. But after, as he and I stepped back onto hard land, I felt an extraordinary surge of adrenalin. Later I learnt that it was an endorphin rush.

  Rush, rush, rush. I felt as though I could fly. I felt invincible. My eyes were dazzling. A white burst of energy emanated from me, in every which way.

  I felt the same when I killed the fear on the edge of the cliff tonight. A starburst of white energy. It felt good. The first fear kill, it felt great. Better than the first kill, the aoife kill.

  Fear is His word for man. Aoife is His word for woman.

  I am going to do it again. Another fear kill. I am going to do it again. Soon.

  —

  I WENT HOME and cleaned off the blood and put my clothes in the wash. I’m back now. Back at the crime scene. There is a bit of a crowd, even though it’s the middle of the night. I guess word has spread around the neighbours.

  The street is long and thin. It’s a crest. On one side, a little stretch of park with a sheer and long drop of craggy rock face, down to the river. Mountaineers scale the rock face to practise before heading overseas to do the real thing. I’ve watched them. On the other side of the street is another long stretch of grass and stunted trees and bushes; hidden behind them, stepped back in darkness, are old wooden houses that look as though they’ve been there for over a hundred years. Big trees in the front yards. Most likely it’s the people who live in these houses who have come out to gawk. Most of them are wearing pyjamas and holding umbrellas. It’s hot.