Blood River

by Tony Cavanaugh

  Still, I wondered why she was released four years after she would have been eligible.

  —

  I BECAME POLICE Commissioner six years ago. The Dutchman sat in the chair for another nine years after Billy and I ‘solved’ the Slayer case. He was replaced by a rank-and-file guy named Jackson who fitted a standard profile: male, full white, a cop since seventeen, in his mid-fifties, safe, beloved by the conservative government. Jackson was fair, pleasant and did nothing. He died of a massive heart attack arriving for work one morning. There’s a plaque for him downstairs, next to the main entrance.

  Then me. By then I had climbed the ranks and worked in every department, even fisheries and livestock, and in each of those departments I learned a lot and I earned respect, up and down the line. Every department I worked in gave me a new understanding of crime within the fabric of our society and the people who dedicated their lives to it. I sound like I’m making a speech but I came to believe it. I had arrived at the top floor and was a deputy commissioner.

  I had the ministerial tap, I did the interviews but, after all that, I was voted in by the rank and file. Me, a part-Asian woman. There have been female commissioners in the past but not in Queensland. And not many; you can count them on the fingers of one hand. And there has never been anyone who wasn’t white with European genealogy. Most Asian cops are in the specialised Asian Crime Gang Squads, fighting the Triads or Yakuza or the Thai bikers. Up until recently the three other Asian cops were assigned to the Asian police liaison team, in Sunnybank, not far from where I grew up, without a weapon or powers of arrest.

  Our government, with its second term narrowly won, is like so many all over the world now: schizophrenic. Half of its ministers are hard-core right-wing cowboys like our Attorney-General, and the other half are leftist greenies, all of whom have formed an alliance to hang on to power.

  The Police Minister is progressive, and when she approached me to take on the job, she asked if I could lead the Service more deeply into this new century and, at the same time, try to drive out some of the old (and not so old) dinosaurs who liked to think that policing was about bashing suspects and trouncing around with teenage girls at the annual Schoolies week, showing off their guns from a balcony on the thirtieth floor of a Surfers’ Paradise unit with three semi-naked underage girls hot on vodka and valium (the VV). That was the culture I agreed to manage.

  There would have been some jockeying for the position between the other deputy commissioners and maybe even some of the assistant commissioners but remuneration was an issue, even though the wage is unspeakably massive for anyone, let alone a tattooed girl who grew up on the south side; over four hundred thousand dollars. Some of the top guys were leaving, off to other states that paid more. I didn’t haggle. There comes a point where you wonder how much money you need. I’m still living in Hendra. Same house. I’ll die there. I bought a new car, a black BMW, but I still look for the specials at Woolworths and never get a bottle of wine that costs more than ten dollars.

  I went around to the deputy and assistant commissioners and told them I’d been asked to throw my hat into the ring and said I wasn’t in the mood for a political fight; that sort of crap is best left to the politicians, and they all supported me. Expect for a couple of old guys who tried to white-ant me but the minister clobbered them with smiles and transfers to the far north.

  It’s a full-on job. I have more than eleven thousand police officers working for me, in a capital city of almost two and a half million in a state of almost five million people, in a vast area of almost two million square kilometres, from dirt-red outback specks of remote communities to the wild tropical jungles of the far north, crocodile-infested swamps and waterways, no roads and tens of thousands of square kilometres of dense unmapped rainforest, from the Torres Strait Islands, just south of Papua New Guinea to the glitter of Noosa with its thousand-dollar-a-night accommodation to the Florida-inspired glitz of the Gold Coast. I try to travel across all the regions and I try to be on top of all the crimes that confront us now, from cryptocurrency hacking of billions of dollars to a kid running a red light. From sex slavery to overfishing. From cattle duffing (yes, it still exists) to premeditated murder, from terrorist threats to hate crimes. I have a Facebook account, set on private, with a fake name and sixteen friends, all of them cousins from Hong Kong and Cairns. Damon is not one of them. (I haven’t spoken to him since the frightful night in the Mexican cantina serving Indian food. It closed after six months. It’s a Uyghur restaurant now.) In my role as Commissioner, I oversee official social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and Pinterest as well our website and numerous blogs. Our FB page has almost a million likes.

  I pressed ‘like’ under the guise of my FB pseudonym. The day after the minister had asked me to run all this.

  —

  THE CHINK THING was irrelevant. Surprisingly. We are good at finances, remember (which is a complete fallacy but who am I to disabuse their belief?) so the union welcomed me because there were some serious issues with overtime and penalty rates and some mad-crazy stuff inherited from Victoria where, the longer you work, like in Homicide, the less you get paid by the hour. The union reps, who are hard-core, old-fashioned guys from the eighties, signed off on me within seconds, as soon as I said I would fix this craziness and ensure all the staff are treated and remunerated fairly. Not to mention arguing for a pay rise, long overdue. Not to mention arguing for more cops on the street, despite the inevitable new focus of fighting crime with drones, facial recognition and sitting behind a computer. Governments were leaning towards online in the reporting of crime and pulling right back from personal interaction. It’s all about money, but I told the minister that I would not be that type of commissioner. I said to her: ‘I don’t know if you have ever been burgled, but as the most common crime it’s quite devastating for home owners to be so violated, and generally they want police to attend their premises, to talk to them and to reassure them something will be done about it.’ In the future they will go to their computer, if it hasn’t been stolen, tick a few boxes, write a quick summary and hopefully wait for an arrest. Not cool.

  I, and I knew the troops felt the same, appreciate old-school human interaction.

  My decades-long experience as a cop on the beat, in Homicide, Rape, Fraud, starting off as a scared constable behind the counter then on the footpath, to now, had, I hoped, earned their respect. Not like The Dutchman who was big with the online approach. I was in for the long haul and they knew it; they knew I had their backs.

  I had long ago stopped dyeing my hair blonde. I think it was the night before I testified at Jen’s trial. I am no longer, and have not been for years, a rebel.

  Mum died a few years ago, still at me, right through her last days of cancer, to get married and have babies. I’m not a person who carries regret but I was sad she passed thinking she was a failure in not having delivered me into marriage. Her duty. Up to her last breath, I kept on apologising that I’d not done the right thing for her, steadfastly refusing to get married, let alone have a boyfriend, failing to be the filial daughter, the good daughter.

  Almost right up to her last breath, she was still at me about Damon.

  ‘You lost him, you silly girl; now he’s a millionaire living in the Silk Valley.’

  ‘Silicon Valley, mum.’

  ‘You’re in your forties now, you can still find a man, you are still pretty, even though you are getting to be middle-aged and then, when you hit fifty, it’s all over, young lady. Then you’ll be an old lady.’

  I wept at her funeral and I have a photo of her on my desk, next to another one, a sun-drenched shot, framed, of me and my brother and dad at the barbecue with the chops and mum, dripping wet, laughing, as she ran out of the water, the shallows where she had drifted like a starfish. A passer-by took it. An old man with a fishing rod. Took the photo, gave the camera back to dad and walked away. I wonder if he’s still alive and, if so, what happened to him.


  —

  THE SKIRT WAS the issue.

  In conservative Queensland with a Service that, not so long ago, championed men like Billy, my skirt was a problem. The guys could deal with an Asian, but taking orders from a girlie, that was, even in the second decade of the twenty-first century, asking a lot. The last bastion of subjugation; would they allow themselves to be told what to do by a girl in a skirt?

  I addressed it directly. With the help of the union, we had a meeting in Roma Street and I stood up in front of about three hundred cops and said:

  ‘I have been asked by the government to be Commissioner and I want this job because I know I will be a good commissioner to you all and to all the officers who are not here today but who report to you.’

  I was wearing a formal black suit. Below-the-knees skirt and black shirt and jacket. A man would not have to spend twenty minutes the night before deciding what to wear to address the rank and file. A man would put on a suit and tie. A woman stands in front of the mirror and worries. Too brash? Too girlie? Too confronting? At the knees? Below the knees? Certainly not above the knees. Below the knees equals matron. On the knees … just a smidge below. High heels? Flats? Make-up? I like a bit of rouge but no rouge, not today. No perfume. I was up at five a.m. Clack-clack outside the house. Got to work at eight. And there we were, hello all, at nine-thirty in the morning …

  I strode to the podium. I was strong, forthright but not too strong or forthright because then I would be a bitch.

  ‘You know who I am and I know all of you. I have been on the beat for over twenty-five years and you know I am tough and fair and honest. What you want to know is this: Will she get pregnant? Will she get emotional and cry? Will she go mad when it’s that time of the month? If I have left anything out, let me know now.’

  Stunned looks from three hundred men. Did she just mention her period?

  It’s a cliché but you could hear a pin drop. Not one of the guys was prepared to register what I had said, so they sat there, frozen. You know, that thing that’s not to be spoken about. But I spoke about it, then, in front of three hundred men.

  ‘In my campaign to earn your support, because there is no effing way I will take this job unless I have your support, I want you to consider my past history here in the Service and know that I will work to your best interests. And no, let’s just prick [giggles] that balloon. I will not get pregnant. My lover is the Queensland Police Service and he can’t impregnate me [laughter] and no, I will not get emotional and cry because I did that a long time ago, during some dreadful years that I would rather forget about which gave me an inner strength that led me here, to Roma Street, to the pride of the uniform in which we all stand in today, with that wall of steel we all need to survive and move forward. None of us will forget the past, right? Where we came from and what moulded us into who we are now, right? How that relates to us on the job and, especially how that relates to our partner and kids when we get home. As your Commissioner, I will ensure that you and those who work for you have the space and the respect to have a – don’t you guys laugh at me – holistic world.’

  No-one laughed.

  ‘And the that-time-of-the-month thing?’

  I paused. I had rehearsed this.

  ‘Just don’t come anywhere near me.’

  I was in. I was embraced. Three hundred guys laughing and standing and applauding.

  —

  I GOT MANY congratulatory emails and a few cards through the mail.

  Mum, how about this? Is this good enough? First female part-Asian Police Commissioner in Australia. Are you proud of me now? Will this substitute for being a left-over woman? Will this do? Mum?

  One of the cards was from Billy.

  Hello Girlie.

  It’s Billy Waterson here and I hear you win the prize and become Commissioner! Well done to you. I always knew you would go far and while I may not have been your best teacher in the world, I hope that some of the time we spent together helped you get to this great position. The boys all tell me you are a very, very good and wise person now and I don’t doubt it.

  Silly old me when I last saw you, saying you’ll get nowhere and you know nothing and you being naïve. Oops. Sorry for that. One last word of advice, Commissioner. Don’t ever retire. Jackson had it right. Die on the job.

  Bye for now but if you ever feel like a beer and a T-Bone you know where to find your old mate Billy W.

  x

  —

  BILLY AND JACKSON, my predecessor, were old friends. Billy was, through patronage from the top office, allowed to stay on the job way after he should have retired. He was old when I worked with him in Homicide. He was ancient when he was finally eased out. Well into his mid-seventies. I did it quietly and gently and authorised the payment for a celebration party at the Hilton Hotel, in honour of his long service. I heard back that he said nice words about me in his speech and even went so far as to mention my outstanding work as a young rookie Homicide cop with dyed-blonde hair and Doc Marten boots, on a case that probably none of them in the room would remember.

  Was Jen guilty? The jury found her so. The killings stopped after we arrested her. Did Billy plant the knife? Sometimes crucial evidence turns up at the last minute. It happens. Would she have been found guilty if not for the knife? Who can say? That’s an alternative world, the world that spins in the opposite direction. Not the real world.

  Loyalty

  ‘THANKS EVERYONE, FOR BEING ON THIS EMERGENCY CALL at such short notice. As I’m sure you’re all aware, our minister, the Attorney-General, has expressed very strong reservations about the decision we took in paroling Jennifer White yesterday, and last night he instructed me – and us – to return Ms White to prison. Which, of course, we cannot do unless she breaks any of the circumstances of her parole. I have, as of this morning, been advised that she spent the evening with her sister and family and is currently attending a meeting with her parole officer in Southport on the Gold Coast. She will be going to Westaway House as agreed and then, I am told, will be looking for employment. Clearly there are no reasons for her to be returned to prison. I have made this clear to the minister again this morning, but he remains adamant that she must not remain in the community. I am holding this call to advise you of the situation and, quite frankly, to let you know that we might be sacked from the parole board in an illegal, in my opinion, and totally inappropriate measure.’

  No-one spoke.

  ‘Does anyone want to say anything?’ I ask.

  No-one said anything.

  —

  ‘TELL ME SHE’S back in prison.’

  ‘Minister, as I told you last night, I cannot, nor can the police, put her back in prison unless she breaks the terms of parole.’

  ‘You have until the end of the day.’

  New World Order

  ‘I WAS EXPECTING YOU YESTERDAY.’

  ‘Yes. My apologies. My sister picked me up and I stayed with her in Brisbane. Because the terms of the agreement state that I have twenty-four hours to register with you in person and it’s now about twenty hours since I was released, I thought that would be okay. Sorry, I didn’t mean to cause any problems.’

  He might have been thirty years old. Probably late twenties. He had pimples, and shuffled papers on his desk. This boy is my ruler for the next part of my life. He will ordain my future.

  His name was Gary.

  The parole and probation office had the sterile, functional atmosphere of government spaces that dehumanises a person the moment they step through their doors. Prison chic. Bland wall colours, bland lino on the floor, bland plastic seats. At least the police stations were old, brick, Victorian, crumbling, harbouring the crush of miseries for over a hundred years. They had personality. Not this place, located on the ground floor of a glass-and-concrete building jammed between a Korean restaurant and a second-hand bookstore boasting over one hundred thousand books. The main highway, which spanned the coastline, was a block away.

  The street windo
ws were frosted white. The small waiting room was designed for minimum comfort. An angry-looking woman sat behind a solid plexiglass wall. You tell her who you are and she tells you to wait on one of the plastic chairs until finally the door to the side opens and your name is called and you go into a small, lifeless room with no windows and are told what you cannot do.

  No drinking, no smoking, no crime of any sort, not even jaywalking. Report in to the office once a week and we will also do spot checks on you. Advise us when you secure a job and a new place to live; we must have your address and employment details at all times. If you begin a relationship with another person, you are legally obliged to reveal to them that you were convicted of three murders and spent twenty years in a correctional facility. If you fail to make this admission you will be in breach of your parole and, furthermore, we will check, we will visit this person at his, or her, place of work and ask if you have informed them of your past.

  ‘Anything you don’t understand?’ asked Gary.

  ‘No. Thanks. I understand everything.’

  ‘Good. Day one: let’s do a urine sample and make sure you’re clean.’

  The Crucible

  NEWS, ‘FAKE’ OR OTHERWISE, REFLECTING A SET OF FACTS OR ‘alternative facts’ is no longer the domain, as it was in 1999, of print. At three minutes past five that afternoon, just in time for the free-to-air TV news broadcasts, which were still watched by over two million Australians every night, a series of tweets burst into the ether, from the Twitter account of the Courier Mail.

  —

  SLAYER KILLER RELEASED BACK

  INTO COMMUNITY

  Families of the three victims of notorious Slayer killer, Jennifer White, were shocked to learn today that the woman convicted of the 1999 crimes has been allowed to go free.

  ‘Nobody told us,’ said Lynne Gibney, the wife of the first victim, James Gibney. ‘You would think the parole board would have advised us or maybe even asked us what our feelings were. It’s a total disgrace.’