The Girl Remains (Detective Corban)

by Katherine Firkin

  ‘Can I help—’ Leicester stopped, taking in the intruder who was now standing so prominently in the middle of his yard.

  ‘Sorry to disturb you. I tried knocking,’ Pippa lied, stumbling about for something more to say, but the sergeant was moving towards her, holding his hands out at an odd angle.

  ‘Fish guts,’ he explained, as he got closer. ‘Hold on. I know you.’

  Pippa pressed her lips together, feeling herself get smaller as the broad-shouldered man stood over her. She’d had the same feeling out on the cliffs that day: overwhelmed by his presence.

  ‘You’re the girl I ran into,’ he said, arms still extended out before him. ‘I need to wash this off. Wait a second.’

  Pippa did as she was told, standing awkwardly under a timber arch, which might once have been cascading with flowers. A quick scan of her surroundings suggested the woman she’d seen there yesterday was gone. Thank goodness.

  ‘Alright, so how can I help?’ Leicester returned, damp hands glistening.

  ‘I don’t really know how to say this and I’m sorry to just spring up on you.’ Pippa shifted uncomfortably. ‘But I was told this was the house where those three girls were staying in 1998. I urgently need to find Gypsy Chu.’

  Her words had an obvious effect, the man’s entire demeanour changing. ‘Excuse me?’

  Why did his expression turn so sour?

  ‘I know it’s a stretch, but I really need your help.’

  Leicester’s eyes shifted around her, as though making sure she hadn’t brought any accomplices. ‘You’re from the media,’ he said, acidly.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Who are you, then? And do you honestly think you’re the only one to come harassing me over the years? Give it a rest. That poor girl’s body was only found the other day. Have some respect.’

  ‘Please,’ Pippa felt her eyes well, ‘I’m not wanting to be any trouble. But I desperately need to find Gypsy Chu. Do you know where she is?’

  ‘You do realise you can’t go around stomping on people’s private property? I could have you arrested.’

  Pippa flinched. ‘I only hoped you might know where she’d gone? I’ve tried everything to find her . . .’ She stopped, thinking of the months of fruitless research. How was it possible that Gypsy Chu had disappeared into a fog? No digital footprint, no business records, no links to land purchases or mentions in phone books.

  Leicester crossed his arms in front of his hefty frame. ‘And why exactly would you think that I’d know where this girl was? It was over twenty years ago that she was here.’

  There was something in his tone of voice, an aggressiveness, that made Pippa scared. She had to show her cards before he booted her out.

  ‘Please. You might be my last chance.’ She pushed through the trembling voice, hating that she couldn’t say this without breaking down. ‘I think Gypsy is my mother.’

  ‘Well that was something else,’ Bianca beamed, greeting the detectives as they left the interview room, both visibly dazed.

  ‘Yeah, up until the part where he vomited everywhere, it was going great,’ Emmett quipped.

  Bianca laughed, reaching over and punching Lanh playfully on the arm. ‘Great job in there.’

  The young detective seemed nonplussed.

  ‘But where’s Flynn?’ Emmett looked around.

  ‘He’s in the office on the phone with Bryce Frederick.’ Bianca dipped her eyes, clearly not wanting to ruin their moment of success with bad news. ‘The super’s anxious the media will find out about the attack on Haigh. He’s worried it’ll look like we’ve “lost control” of the investigation, and he wants to get on the front foot. He’s going to release some details at a press conference in Melbourne in the next hour or two. So, we can probably expect a barrage of media back outside Warren’s place later this afternoon.’

  ‘Terrific.’ Emmett followed his colleagues through the passageway and out to the main workspace. They’d left Warren temporarily in the care of an officer and doctor, and he hoped the intermission wouldn’t drag out too long.

  ‘Do you believe him?’ Bianca asked, stepping aside so that Lanh could go ahead into the spare office.

  Emmett frowned. ‘It’s all very convenient, isn’t it? The body just turned up in his car? Why wouldn’t he have said that all along?’

  ‘I guess that explains the flimsy story about the vehicle being stolen, and why he drove it to the national park and set it on fire.’

  ‘Mm.’ Emmett pulled his phone out, staring at the flashing screen.

  ‘You’re not going to answer that?’ Bianca asked, softly.

  He hadn’t spoken to Cindy in almost twenty-four hours, and now, the thought of trawling over their issues was too much. He cancelled the call.

  ‘I think you should phone her back,’ Bianca murmured, opening the door to the office and going in.

  He stared at his phone. Maybe she was right? He dropped it back in his pocket and joined his colleagues. Later.

  ‘Any luck with witnesses?’ Bianca addressed the question to Flynn, who’d just ended his call with Bryce. ‘Not so far,’ the detective shrugged. ‘But a couple of Haigh’s flatmates have been interviewed. They mentioned that Haigh had been having some kind of fling with a British traveller, first name Pippa. Not sure if it’s relevant, but they’ve given a description of her and said she’s staying at the Rye Caravan Park.’

  ‘Have we got officers out to go and speak with her?’

  ‘Yep. Brabham’s coordinating all that. Poor bloke.’ Flynn shook his head. ‘He’s running a million miles with this. I think he feels responsible for Tobias being attacked.’

  Emmett was about to note that the junior officer shouldn’t have been out on patrol on his own, when he saw the waving hand of the station’s medico at the door. ‘Your suspect’s right to keep going. Whenever you’re ready.’

  That was fast. He gestured to Lanh, who immediately joined him in marching back to the interview room.

  ‘Feeling alright?’ Lanh asked, as Warren was led back in.

  ‘Piss off.’

  ‘How about we do this as quickly as possible?’ Emmett suggested. ‘It’ll make it easier on all of us.’

  Warren propped his elbows on the table. ‘What else could you possibly need to know? I told you I didn’t kill her. I told you the body was in my car. And I told you that someone dumped Cecilia’s clothes on Robert. It’s a set-up. I’m being framed.’

  ‘It’s not quite as simple as that, though, is it?’ Emmett assessed the man opposite. Was there any chance that Warren was finally telling the truth? Impossible to say. ‘If someone left the box of clothes with Robert Innisberg all the way back in 1998, how did they come to be at Dogs Head – and in your laundry basket – just a few days ago?’

  Warren sneered. ‘How the hell would I know?’

  ‘That would require someone to have found them and then made the extraordinary effort to—’ Emmett stopped himself. What had Bianca said? Women always know. Daphne had been cleaning out Robert’s things in the days prior to her death. Had she found the clothes? But why would she use them to frame Warren? To keep the focus off her husband? ‘Mr Turton,’ Emmett continued, ‘do you know what Robert did with those items after he’d received them?’

  Warren sighed. ‘I have no idea.’ He hesitated, letting his eyes drift around the room. ‘I’d asked him to keep the letters that I got – figured they might come in handy one day, and that they’d be safer with him than at my place . . .’

  ‘The threatening letters, with the magazine cut-outs?’ Emmett clarified.

  ‘Yes. But as for the other stuff . . .’ Warren shrugged. ‘I just presumed he disposed of it all somehow. The thing is, we never spoke about it.’

  Emmett scoffed. ‘I find that hard to believe.’

  ‘You can believe what you like, but it’s the truth,’ Warren’s expression hardened. ‘And for the record, I never wanted Rob to be involved. The whole reason I confessed was to protect him. And I certainl
y never wanted him to come forward as my alibi.’

  ‘You’re telling us he did that of his own accord?’ Lanh asked.

  ‘Completely. But god knows how he managed to convince Daphne to go along with it – she’d have known we weren’t together that night. And if I’d have predicted what it would mean for me and Rob, I’d never have let him go through with it.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Emmett prompted.

  Warren licked his lips, his face scrunching unattractively. ‘Robert seemed okay with it initially, but I think the guilt and deception got too much for him – I guess it never sat well with him, lying to the cops like that . . . He broke things off with me pretty much straight afterwards. And once I was released from custody . . . He didn’t want anything to do with me anymore.’

  Lanh leant forward, pushing a box of tissues to the other side of the table. Warren ignored it, sniffling loudly instead.

  ‘To be absolutely clear, you’re telling us that Robert’s alibi was false?’ Emmett pressed.

  ‘We weren’t together on the Tuesday night when Cecilia disappeared, but he knew I was innocent, so what does it matter? And I’d been with him on the Monday, and for a few nights prior to that actually, so he was only fudging the truth a little.’

  ‘This was when his wife was away?’ Emmett remembered Daphne mentioning something about staying at her sister’s place in Rye.

  ‘Yeah, Daphne’s sister was recovering from a knee operation, so she’d been helping her out that week. Rob and I had the place to ourselves. It was probably the nicest few days of my life . . .’

  ‘Until it was the worst.’ Lanh nodded, sombrely. ‘So, when did you actually leave Robert?’

  ‘Daphne was coming back on the Tuesday, so I got out early, leaving sometime around 8 am . . .’

  ‘And you have no one who can actually verify your movements during the hours that Cecilia disappeared?’ Emmett did his best to keep the growing mistrust from his voice.

  ‘Hold on,’ Lanh cut in, an odd look on his face. ‘Go back a step. You said you left the church early on the Tuesday morning?’

  ‘Yes.’ Warren nodded.

  ‘Which way did you drive?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Which way did you drive from the church in Sorrento to your place on Koonya Avenue?’

  The realisation hit Emmett now, too. The bus stop sighting. The woman who’d seen Cecilia in a white sedan on Melbourne Road.

  Warren looked uncomfortable, shifting in his seat before responding.

  ‘Well, I guess I may as well tell you now.’ His eyes glanced at the door, before staring at the table. ‘I drove along Point Nepean Road, past the bus stop where I saw a blonde teenager trying to hitchhike.’

  ‘This was Cecilia?’ Emmett asked, so there could be no confusion later on.

  ‘Yes.’ Warren licked his lower lip, then cleared his throat. ‘She was all over the place, drifting onto the road, unsteady on her feet, and I saw she didn’t have shoes on. I thought to myself, “This kid’s high or something,” so I pulled over and offered her a ride.’

  ‘And?’ Lanh pressed. ‘What did you do next?’

  ‘I asked her where she wanted to go and she said Melbourne, so I laughed and told her to get out, said I wasn’t going all the way to bloody Melbourne for her. Then she told me she’d been staying at Leicester’s place on Koonya Avenue, so I decided to take her back there.’

  ‘And that’s why another witness saw her in your car on Melbourne Road,’ Lanh murmured, more to himself than anyone else.

  ‘Suppose so,’ Warren shrugged. ‘I dropped her at the gates there and went up to my place. I didn’t think anything of it until I heard she was missing the next day. I freaked out a bit then, ’cause I knew I was one of the last people to have seen her.’

  ‘And was that the last time you saw her alive?’ Emmett asked.

  ‘Nah. I saw her later that night, too. Her and her friends were making a racket as they passed by my place, and I went out to tell them off. I was actually pretty pissed to see her going out in the evening when I knew what state she’d been in only that morning. I told her it wasn’t safe to go skulking around at night, and I even told her I’d tell Leicester Reyes about what they were up to, but of course none of the girls listened to me.’

  Warren leant back in his chair, letting his head drop so that his eyes were staring at the ceiling.

  ‘Used to eat me up, that bit,’ he muttered, still staring above him. ‘Imagine if I’d just rung Leicester at the station and put an end to the whole thing there and then? None of us would be sitting here now, would we?’

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  His reaction had not been what she’d expected, and Pippa was now sitting stiffly on a wooden chair, nervously sipping lemonade as she watched Leicester pace inside, his phone pressed to his ear, walking backwards and forwards in front of the glass door.

  Her admission that Gypsy was likely her biological mum, that she’d been adopted out at birth, and that she’d come looking for her after losing both her parents in the robbery, had prompted a barrage of questions. How do you know she’s your mother? Have you had a formal test done? Does she know you’re looking for her? Aren’t there adoption agencies that can help?

  Pippa had done her best to answer them all, even showing him the letter that she kept on her person at all times, tucked safely in her travel pouch.

  My darling Pippa, it started. I wish it wasn’t like this, but you need to know your history, and why I can’t keep you as my own. You were part of an incident, a horrible event that happened on the other side of the world, in a small town called Blairgowrie. I won’t burden you with the details, but know that it’s not your fault, and if I could keep you, I would. I love you. Your mum forever, Gypsy x

  Her adoptive parents had hidden the item away, along with the swaddle she’d been wrapped in, and her birth certificate.

  Finding it had been liberating for Pippa – proving she wasn’t as alone as she’d thought – but hunting down answers and getting herself all the way over here had been tough. At first, she’d been content just being in the same country, to know that her mum was somewhere out there, that one day she might recognise a face in the crowd as hers. But then the news of Cecilia’s remains had made headlines, and she’d felt compelled to get to Blairgowrie.

  She heard a crash – the back door slamming.

  ‘Okay.’ Leicester was rubbing his hands together, as though highly agitated. ‘I don’t want to get your hopes up, but I might have some good news for you.’ His lips seemed to have developed a nervous twitch, twisting side-to-side. ‘I’ve managed to find Gyspy Chu, and she’s on her way from Melbourne to meet you.’

  The words were too much to handle, and Pippa broke down on the spot, the glass of lemonade spilling over the table as she dropped her chin to her chest, sobbing uncontrollably.

  The man placed a tentative hand on her back. ‘It’s okay, sweetie. I’ll do what I can.’ He patted her firmly. ‘We’ll get you reunited.’

  They’d managed to steer the interview to the crucial moment, and Emmett’s anxiety increased. At any moment Warren could close up, refuse to keep cooperating. They couldn’t afford to put a foot wrong.

  ‘There’s something I’m struggling with.’ He tried his friendliest expression, as though the issue was his alone. ‘You say you found Cecilia in the boot of your car, yes?’

  Warren scowled. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Now, some twenty years later, her remains have been recovered from the beach, only metres from where she was last seen. Agree?’

  ‘You know the bones were on the beach.’

  ‘Okay,’ Emmett rubbed the back of his neck, ‘we also know that your car was incinerated in the Point Nepean National Park. How did that come to be?’

  Warren shrugged. ‘I drove it there and set it on fire.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘She’d been in my car. I’ve watched enough cop shows to know you lot would be able to find her DNA in the fr
ont seat. Plus there’d been witnesses saying they’d seen her with me. Those reports were all over the news, “a mysterious white sedan” they called it. Fuck. What was I supposed to do? Go to the cops and say, yes I was driving her around but then I just happened to find her dead body in the boot a few days later? No one was going to believe me. Not with my record, especially. I was freaking out.’

  ‘So you drove your vehicle to the national park and set it on fire? I understand that part,’ Emmett deliberately paused, reaching for his water glass and taking a sip. ‘But what I’m struggling to understand is what happened to the body. Cecilia’s remains weren’t burnt at all. What happened to her after you found her in your boot? Did you bury her somewhere?’

  A grave expression settled on Warren’s face. His cheeks hollowed.

  ‘When I found her that Saturday I drove straight to the church. I didn’t know what else to do.’

  ‘You gave her to Robert?’ Lanh interrupted, breathless.

  ‘I didn’t give her to him,’ Warren snapped. ‘He was fucking furious with me. Totally freaked out. I begged for his help to dispose of the body and he refused.’

  ‘He sent you away?’ Emmett asked.

  ‘Sort of . . .’ Warren’s mouth twisted, the colour in his face all but gone. ‘I did something I’m not proud of.’ His voice dropped to an almost inaudible level. ‘I drove back there that night and threatened him. I couldn’t move her on my own, and I didn’t know what the hell to do. So, I told him I’d tell Daphne about us, expose the whole sham of their marriage to his congregation if he didn’t help. It was a cowardly thing to do, but I was desperate.’

  ‘And did that work?’ Emmett softened his tone.

  Warren nodded, giving a slow, exaggerated sigh as his shoulders slumped.

  ‘He drove with me to St Andrews and we buried her there. He knew of a spare plot in the cemetery, and it seemed like the easiest and most decent thing to do.’

  Emmett’s mouth turned dry. He looked to the one-way mirror where he knew there’d now be a frenzy of activity, Bianca and Flynn trying to organise an immediate search of the church grounds in Rye.