Red Mist

by Angus McLean

  He rang off and headed towards the door, eager to get his notes made while the conversation was still fresh in his mind.

  ‘Hey.’

  Ace stopped and looked. The girl was crushing the butt under her boot, exhaling the last stream of smoke before approaching him. She adopted a cocky grin and kept her shoulders back to accentuate her assets.

  ‘How’s it going?’ she said as she reached him.

  ‘Good thanks,’ he replied. He could smell the cigarette smoke on her.

  ‘So I hear you drive that Chevy,’ she said, still grinning.

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘Pretty cool,’ she said, and extended her hand. ‘I’m Debs.’

  Ace shook her hand. She had a strong grip. He noticed the black polish on her nails was badly chipped.

  ‘Ace,’ he said. ‘Nice to meet you, Debs, but I gotta do something urgently. Sorry.’

  He gave her a smile and started to turn away. Debs’ face fell and she scowled at his back.

  ‘Oh yeah, nice one,’ she sneered, ‘too busy being the big detective to waste time talking to the plebs.’

  Ace frowned and turned back. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I just have something I need to do right now.’ He started to move off, then paused. ‘Oh, by the way, it’s a sixty-nine. Three-fifty V8. And yeah, it’s pretty cool.’

  She pouted. He gave her a grin and went on his way.

  ***

  The house where the Tamanivalu family lived was a standard four bedroom brick job in a cluster of similar homes in Mangere.

  The parents both worked long hours, so a lot of responsibility fell on the young shoulders of fourteen year old Jonah. Dad was a factory hand and Mum cleaned houses during the day and commercial properties on the weekends. Sunday was for church.

  The seven kids spent a lot of time either home alone or at the homes of friends or relatives. Jonah was the oldest one still at home-his oldest sibling, Teena, was back in Tonga looking after the grandparents, and the next one down, Joseph, was in juvie detention for burglaries.

  Dan expected to find Jonah at home at ten in the morning, and wasn’t disappointed. The kid had been off school for the last three weeks since his bashing, supposedly recuperating from the hiding.

  Having spoken to him a few times already though, Dan knew it wasn’t the bruises, the lumps, the black eye or the fractured cheekbone that kept him at home. It wasn’t the finger that dislocated when the thugs ripped his schoolbag from his hand. Hell, it wasn’t even the rib cracked by the last kick to the guts when they could have just run away.

  No, those wounds would heal. It was the psychological scars that kept him at home, cowering behind the locked door, not answering the phone. The shame of being beaten in the street in broad daylight and nobody helping him. The humiliation brought on his family by not standing up for himself, the loss of mana.

  The fear of it happening again.

  He took a minute to answer the door when Dan knocked. He let the detective in and they sat at the dining room table. Like most of the furniture in the house it had come from a charity shop. The 55-inch plasma in the lounge was on finance, as was the family’s van.

  School and family photos adorned the walls, a large crucifix hung on one wall above a framed picture of Jesus, and traditional mats covered the floor. Dan took his shoes off at the door. He normally didn’t, but it seemed the right thing to do at the Tamanivalu house.

  Despite being named after Tonga’s most famous citizen, Jonah was a diminutive boy who was more interested in books and maths than throwing a rugby ball around. He got good grades and his parents had high hopes for him to get a scholarship and go to university.

  He was softly spoken and avoided eye contact, but there was something in his character that spoke of strength and honour. From what Dan had learned from spending some time with him and his family, he was a great support to his over-worked parents, and his younger siblings adored him.

  The bashing and robbery had rocked the family to their core, and as soon as Dan had met them for the first time, he knew this was a case he wanted to keep. There was no way it would be sitting in the pile, waiting to be assigned.

  ‘How’re you getting on?’ Dan asked, accepting the cup of tea he was offered. It was weak and milky, but he appreciated the effort.

  Jonah shrugged and sat down at the table. ‘Still real sore,’ he said softly, his eyes downcast.

  ‘Going back to the doctor soon?’

  ‘I think next week. I’ll have to ask Mum.’ He lifted his hand. ‘My finger’s still sore. I have to go to physio.’

  Dan nodded. ‘If Mum and Dad are working mate, let me know and I’ll take you to the doctor, okay?’

  Jonah nodded silently, his deep brown eyes flicking up to Dan’s then quickly looking away. ‘You don’t have to,’ he said. ‘It’s okay.’

  ‘All good mate,’ Dan grinned. ‘It’s all part of the service.’

  Jonah gave a flicker of a smile. ‘How are you, anyways?’ he asked. ‘How is your wife?’

  Dan felt himself smile. The kid was so sincere it gave him a twinge in his chest. ‘We’re good thanks, Jonah. She’s a good lady, and I still don’t know what she’s doing with me.’

  He grinned, but Jonah didn’t. The kid nodded solemnly instead.

  ‘I think because you are a good man, Detective Dan,’ he said softly.

  Dan looked away, embarrassed. He feared for a moment that he would either blush or cry. Young Jonah was not the usual sort of customer he dealt with. He unzipped the black leather folder he’d placed on the table.

  ‘Because the guys that attacked you were about your age,’ he began, ‘I’ve got some yearbooks for you to have a look at. They’re from the nearest high schools, and I’ve tagged the pages that are most likely to have the kids about your age.’

  Jonah nodded his understanding.

  ‘Just have a flick through them,’ Dan said, ‘they may be in there, or maybe not. I don’t know.’ He shrugged. ‘But it’s worth a shot, since we don’t have an ID yet.’

  Jonah slid the first book across and started to go through it. Dan sipped his tea. It was terrible. He threw it down as quickly as he could, working on the same theory he applied to medicine. Jonah took his time, carefully studying each page that Dan had marked with a Post-It note. Dan waited patiently.

  He tapped out a short text to Molly as Jonah moved on to the second book. Dan was signing off when Jonah put his finger on a photo and spoke quietly.

  ‘Here,’ he said. He showed the photo to Dan, pointing out a league team. His finger was on one of the kids in the front row. ‘He’s one of them.’

  Dan noted the name-M. Fenton. The kid would be about fifteen now, he estimated.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he asked.

  Jonah nodded firmly. ‘Totally. I know it was him, I saw his face.’

  ‘Which one was he?’

  Jonah touched his ribs. ‘The last one,’ he said softly. ‘The one who broke my rib.’

  Dan nodded. ‘Nice one mate. Keep looking, see if you recognise any of the others.’

  He took forms from his folder and began to record Jonah’s statement of identification. Identifying a crook from a school year book wasn’t as solid as a formal line up, and he wouldn’t want to rely solely on that in court, but it was acceptable. Known as an informal ID, it was a useful tool when the investigator had nothing else to work with.

  After another half an hour Jonah had exhausted the books. He had managed to ID a second boy from a different photo, and looked quietly pleased with himself. Dan finished writing up the statement, got Jonah to read it then initial each page and sign the last page, and signed it himself.

  ‘Good work mate,’ he said, rising to his feet. He tucked the books and statement back into his folder, feeling a surge of excitement now. It felt like the investigation had just gained some momentum.

  Jonah accompanied him to the door and waited while Dan laced his shoes up again. He extended his hand solemnly as Dan stood up.

/>   They shook hands.

  ‘Thank you, Detective Dan,’ the boy said.

  Dan noticed that the boy looked him in the eye, and stood a little prouder.

  ‘No worries at all mate,’ Dan told him. ‘It’s all down to you, not me.’ He clapped Jonah on the shoulder and grinned. ‘Don’t worry Jonah, we’ll get these little mongrels. You just be strong, okay?’

  Jonah smiled, and finally he had a bit of a spark back in his eye. ‘I will,’ he said.

  ‘Good man. I’ll be in touch.’

  Dan left him and walked back to the car. He heard the door close behind him and the deadlock clunk into place.

  Maybe soon, he thought, he won’t need to do that anymore.

  ***

  The morning had been set to a soundtrack of South African pop music, some even sung in Afrikaans, punctuated by Ailsa’s personal calls and loud cursing at the incompetence of other people.

  Molly ignored her and kept her head down, managing to get through a stack of work. Apex was not the biggest player in the field but they certainly had plenty of work on, even if some of it didn’t meet the client’s expectations. Dealing with grumpy customers was one of the facets of Molly’s job, and she had surprised herself at her ability to placate them. The hardest part was getting her own colleagues to admit their mistakes and fix the situation.

  Finally lunch time rolled around and Ailsa made a show of sighing and locking her computer. ‘Just popping out,’ she said, pulling on her brown suede jacket with the fringed sleeves. ‘Won’t be long.’

  Molly knew that wasn’t even close to being true. Being a Friday it meant she would drive to nearby Farro to do some shopping, go to Panmure to get Burger King, and take fifteen minutes longer than she should.

  Ailsa paused before leaving her desk, and gestured towards her radio. Some guy was warbling a cover of a Billy Joel classic. ‘Want me to leave it on?’

  Molly glanced up, expressionless. She wasn’t sure if there were many uptown girls in Pretoria, but it sounded like this bloke had found one. ‘Ahh, no,’ she said.

  Ailsa flicked the radio off and threw her bag over her shoulder before heading for the door. Molly watched her blue Sentra pull out, and sat back in her chair. Her eyes hurt from staring at the screen for so long, but it was the only escape she had right now-an oasis in a desert of agony, Dan would probably call it.

  She took her glasses off and rubbed her face. More than the invoices, orders and emails she’d been working on, her head was buzzing with the mystery of the alarm deactivations.

  She didn’t know why someone would be coming and going at odd times, or who it could be, and she couldn’t shake the feeling that the answer was staring her right in the face.

  Staring her right in the face. Staring across the office, Molly’s tired eyes fell to Ailsa’s desk. Her instincts were telling her to snoop. Her conscience was telling her to keep out of someone else’s affairs. Was it just the fact that she didn’t like Ailsa that was driving her to snoop? She had no reason to suspect her colleague of anything. It hardly seemed fair or right to snoop on her.

  But her gut was spurring her on.

  She stood and crossed to Ailsa’s desk, taking a moment to scan it for anything obvious. A signed confession maybe, written in blood. There was only a tube of hand cream, a dirty coffee mug, and the usual stationery detritus she expected to find.

  Molly paused, took a deep breath, and slid open the top drawer. A drawer organiser with paper clips, pens and Post-It notes. A rag-eared copy of a six-month old Woman’s Day. More hand cream. A half-eaten slab of Black Forest chocolate. A pay slip, with the employee number 216760.

  She opened up the pay slip, seeing Ailsa’s name and home address on it. She noted that Ailsa was paid two dollars an hour more than her. Not surprising, given her schmoozing with Renee. She found the employee number in the far right column.

  It matched the number used to access the alarm panel. Molly felt her heart thump in her chest. She wasn’t sure what it all meant, but she knew it was a clue. She stepped over to the photocopier and slid the pay slip onto the screen. It seemed to take an age for the machine to whir, glow and hum before it spat out the copy.

  Molly quickly replaced the pay slip in Ailsa’s drawer and was about to close it when she noticed a yellow Post-It pad jammed down the side of the drawer organiser. She pulled it out, seeing Ailsa’s spidery scrawl on the top page. It was a name and a date of birth.

  Alice Smith. The date of birth made Alice thirty two years old. Molly figured that Ailsa was about the same.

  She stepped over to the copier again, her pulse racing, and ran off a copy, using the copy of the pay slip as a backing sheet to speed the process up. The phone started ringing as the copier finished, and she rushed to get the Post-It pad back into Ailsa’s drawer.

  Grabbing at the phone, she managed to knock the handset off her desk and disconnect the call. She flopped into her chair again, feeling safe at the sanctuary of her desk. At least she wouldn’t be seen snooping round if she sat here. Her heart was racing and her palms felt sweaty.

  She uncapped her bottle and took a long draught of water. She was convinced now that she’d stumbled onto something.

  She just didn’t know what.

  Alice Smith. Who was she, and why did Ailsa have her name written down? Molly checked her watch. She had time up her sleeve. She swivelled back to her PC and opened up the internet.

  She typed in the name by itself and got 102,000,000 hits. The first was for an American singer she’d never heard of. At first she thought maybe the note was a reference to her, but a quick check showed the singer to have a different birthdate. She scrolled through a couple of pages without anything jumping out.

  She tried again, adding “nz” after the name, but still got 788,000 hits. Four pages in, nothing seemed obvious. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack. She hit Facebook instead, and found another haystack. She threw in Ailsa’s name instead and found her easily.

  Like most users Ailsa had an open profile, and seemed to be friends with everyone. Molly was quietly certain they weren’t actually all her friends. She started going through the names, but it seemed to be a never ending list of randoms.

  ‘Don’t we have a social media policy?’ came a voice from behind her.

  Molly jumped so hard she nearly stood up, and felt her cheeks catch fire. Renee was only a metre behind her, looking over her shoulder at the computer screen. There was no way he had not seen what she was doing.

  ‘Sorry,’ she blurted, clicking desperately at the little X to close the window. Her hand seemed to have lost all coordination and the little X was still loud and proud. ‘I just...’

  ‘Just having you on, Molly,’ he smirked, and gave her the double finger pistols. Doubles, all to herself. What a treat. ‘I don’t mind if you use part of your break time to catch up on funny cat videos.’

  Finally she hit the target and the Facebook window closed. Renee started on a spiel about some cat video he’d seen recently. The cat was just so funny as it kept swiping at a baby on a chair, then the baby screamed, the cat fell off the chair in fright, and Renee had apparently just about wet his pants with laughter.

  It was all too hilarious. Molly actually managed a titter, but it was more from nerves than her boss’ fantastic rendition of a cat video off the internet-accompanied by actions, including a scared-cat-face. She was so relieved by his distraction that she even managed to graduate from a titter to a chuckle.

  Renee wiped his eyes and let out a “Whoooooo” as he caught his breath. Maybe he’d nearly wet himself again.

  ‘Anyway,’ he said, regaining his composure, ‘can you let me know when the courier gets here, I’m waiting on something quite urgent.’

  ‘No problem.’ Molly pretended to wipe her own eye, just to keep the vibe of the show going. ‘I’ll give you a call.’

  ‘Thanks buddy.’

  Renee gave another finger pistol-just the one this time, there was no need to overdo
it-and disappeared. Molly shook her head to herself, scooped the copies she’d made off her desk and folded them into her bag.

  It was all getting very odd.

  Chapter Nine

  The school’s dean had confirmed that they had an M. Fenton in attendance, but refused to give up any identifying details without either the parents’ permission or a court order.

  Dan thanked him for his lack of assistance and went to social media instead. Within a few minutes he identified Mykel Fenton and a bunch of his mates, complete with photos. By identifying family members on Facebook he was able to get the address of the kid’s family home from NIA.

  ‘Boom,’ he said triumphantly to nobody in particular, ‘the wonders of technology.’

  Buck was on the phone, but gave him a questioning look. Joe was typing something up. Dan stood up and caught his eye.

  ‘Let’s go, Irish,’ he said, grabbing the stab resistant body armour from beside his desk. ‘We’ve got a baddie to find.’

  ‘Vesting up?’ Joe asked, watching Dan shrug into his SRBA.

  ‘Vesting up,’ Dan confirmed. He clipped the belt buckle securely shut and adjusted the gear hanging off it. ‘Mean streets out there mate.’

  Minutes later the red Commodore eased to a halt at the curb.

  The street itself was not bad, considering the neighbourhood. Many of the front yards had gardens, painted fences and mowed lawns. The veneer of respectability was there, the appearance of decency.

  But scratch beneath the surface and it came away pretty quickly.

  A brindle boxer roamed loose in the street. Tagging scarred a power box up on the corner. A pair of sneakers hung over the power lines outside a house with an overgrown front lawn. A picket fence had a couple of broken palings and a couple more missing altogether, giving it the appearance of a meth addict’s dentures.

  One house had a stereo blasting from the garage where several sullen looking youths sloped about, watching the cops with open hostility as the Commodore cruised past them. The house they were at had a front window boarded up with cardboard, proudly advertising Budget nappies.

  One of the youths quickly pulled the garage door down when he saw the D car, but Dan still saw the tail end of a Subaru parked in there before it disappeared from view.