‘Can you describe these items?’ I said. ‘Without confirming or denying what they are, of course.’
‘The items in question are cylindrical, around thirty inches long, twelve inches in diameter, and weigh in at approximately two hundred and fifty pounds each.’
What a wonderful age of miniaturisation we live in, I thought. Video cameras that fit in your hand, iPods the size of business cards, and nuclear warheads no bigger than beer kegs. A bit bulky, but at a smidge over a hundred kilos, easy enough for two or three strong men to handle.
‘Your eight missing sailors weren’t gym junkies, by any chance?’ I said.
‘They were all bodybuilders. Spent most of their free time in the weight room.’
‘Apart from the crewcuts and the rippling muscles, did these blokes have anything else in common? Regular meeting place? Similar hobbies or interests?’
The lieutenant nodded. ‘They had their duty rosters arranged so they could get together at least four or five times a week to rehearse, and always on Sundays, of course.’
‘Rehearse what, and why always on Sundays?’
She looked embarrassed. ‘Because, Mr Murdoch, the eight men involved make up our ship’s choir.’
SEVEN
The Sydney office of WorldPix International Photo Agency is located on the eastern side of an old wooden pier, a relic from the days when the harbour was a busy international shipping hub. The office looks like any other successful photo agency: open-plan, minimalist, floor-to-ceiling windows, award-winning pictures on the walls, computer workstations interspersed with lounge areas, a well set-up studio, and the ubiquitous pool table in the corner near the kitchen.
We’ve also got a small darkroom, just for developing and printing black and white. I’m the only one who ever uses it, and all the young guys who shoot exclusively on digital like to point and laugh. I’m pretty sure they’d call me a Luddite if they knew what it meant. While I shoot digital on assignment, for my personal work I find the traditional wet darkroom very relaxing. I enjoy splashing around in the developer and fixer fumes under the amber glow of the safelights, making prints that I know are going to last a lot longer than I will.
If you unlock the chemical-storage cupboard at the rear of the darkroom and then lean hard on the back wall, you hear a click and next thing you’re standing in a stationery cupboard, which opens out into the D.E.D. office – a nifty shortcut for us Dedheads who work on both sides of the business.
The Sydney HQ of D.E.D. fronts the western side of the pier, and the sign on the door reads WORLDPIX ARCHIVAL STORAGE – MANAGEMENT ONLY, which justifies Julie’s presence there from time to time. Publicly, Julie is the Sydney manager of WorldPix, enabling her to coordinate the assignments of the real WorldPix photographers and the D.E.D. operatives working undercover.
The windowless space used to be a secure document-storage facility, and we left it pretty much as we found it, just putting in the connecting darkroom door, a bathroom, a galley kitchen with a heavy-duty espresso machine, and a gun safe – everything the modern office needs.
By the time Peter Sturdee and I arrived, Julie had the computers booted up, the espresso machine humming and the conference table set up. I had a quick shower and shave and was grinding a batch of coffee beans when Lonergan and Lieutenant Kingston arrived in his big black Chevy Suburban. I couldn’t tell from our surveillance monitors whether the vehicle had CIA AGENT vanity plates, but with the tinted windows, multiple radio antennae, and the throb of a turbo-charged V8, it might as well have.
Lieutenant Kingston was in civvies now: khaki chinos, Converse one-star runners and a white polo shirt. She was carrying a large black zippered folder and a leather shoulder bag. The polo shirt confirmed my earlier assessment of perky and the shoulder bag made a solid, Berretta-ish thump when she put it on the floor.
She smiled, and I thought I detected a definite shift in her attitude towards me. I’d been checked out by sailors before, of course, but never by one that good-looking.
I returned her smile. ‘Coffee?’
‘Yes please. You have decaf?’
‘Nope. Just coffee.’
‘Soy milk?’
‘Fraid not.’
This wasn’t a good sign. But I had to make allowances – the poor woman had probably been raised on Nescafé and caramel frappuccinos.
She settled for a flat white, and once everyone was right for coffee we sat down at the conference table.
Lonergan spoke first. ‘Washington, via Langley, obviously wants this resolved as quickly and as quietly as possible. I’ve had a flash authorising me to form an interim taskforce from the people in this room to track down the missing items. Crisis teams from the Navy, NSA, FBI, and other interested agencies will be flying in under the cover of a standard investigation into the accidental death of on-duty US military personnel.’
Of course they would be. The Americans liked to make a big deal about how the Russians weren’t able to keep their nukes safely under lock and key after the break-up of the Soviet Union, so having a couple of their own go missing would be embarrassing. But nowhere near as embarrassing as it would be if the nukes went off.
‘Until the crisis teams are on the ground and organised,’ Lonergan continued, ‘we run with the investigation, with a total security lockdown. The story released to the press is that an accidental fire in a small arms storage locker set off rifle and pistol ammunition, which was responsible for the casualties.’
He glanced at me. I shrugged. It was a bit more plausible than that fire-in-the-kitchen yarn. Our own people were busily working on a cover story for the LNG tanker that was cluttering up the harbour. Engine failure was the current favourite. How they would explain a chopper assault by special forces was their problem, and they were welcome to it.
‘Lieutenant Kingston here,’ Lonergan said, ‘is our liaison officer with the Navy.’
‘Okay,’ I said, ‘you want to go first, Lieutenant?’
She opened a folder. ‘Summing up what we know so far, under cover of a possible terrorist threat from a tanker moored in Sydney Harbour, and a reduced crew presence due to shore leave, eight crewman from the USS Altoona, acting in concert, illegally removed two items from the ship, by helicopter, under gunfire. The US Navy can neither confirm nor deny that these items were two W80 Model 26J RS/EVY thermonuclear warheads.’
‘I know this is probably highly classified information,’ I said, ‘but if I Googled the W80 what would I find out?’
Clare sighed. ‘Possibly that the Model 26J RS/EVY is a reduced-size, expanded, variable-yield modification of the W80 warhead, and that the maximum yield per unit is 150 kilotons.’
There was a long silence, which was broken by Peter Sturdee. ‘Exactly how dangerous are these bloody things? I mean, as in just standing around them?’
‘Since they may or may not be designated for deployment on submarine-launched cruise missiles,’ Clare explained, ‘the 26J uses supergrade, low neutron-emission plutonium to reduce occupational radiation exposure.’ She smiled. ‘Submarine crews on extended patrols are a little averse to having their testicles irradiated – hypothetically, of course.’
The men in the room shifted uncomfortably in their seats, and I wondered if Sturdee had hypothetically considered having his testicles irradiated after that second set of twins. Or at least disconnected.
‘As to why these items were removed,’ Clare continued, ‘that remains very much a mystery. The only common link we can find at this point in time is membership of an off-duty choral group.’
‘Ship’s Choir Nicks Nukes,’ Julie said. ‘Now, that’s a headline the Sunday Telegraph would love to run.’
Lonergan looked glum. ‘And it’s our job to make sure they never get the chance.’
That was how this was going to play out, of course. Priority two would be getting the nukes back. Priority one would be keeping a lid on the story.
Clare handed some manila folders to Lonergan, who passed them round
. ‘I thought these might be useful,’ she said.
The folders contained dossiers on each of the eight missing crewmen, with names, ID photographs, personal details and shipboard duties. These boys were all career crew and only two were from the same state. One was a chopper pilot, three were electronic-warfare specialists, two were helicopter mechanics, one a weapons technician, and the last was a culinary specialist – military speak for a ship’s cook.
‘Do you have any record of unusual activity by these choirboys during the last week?’ I asked.
Clare checked her files. ‘Nothing out of the ordinary. Just their regular work roster, rehearsals and gym time. And they were all back on board and accounted for by midnight last night.’
That made me sit up. ‘Back on board from where?’
‘They sang at Evensong at the First Church of the Lord’s Bounty in Martin Place, and afterwards at a private recital somewhere called Jindivik. Does that mean anything to anyone?’
If Clare had been on the bridge of the cruiser as it came up the harbour she might have noticed a neat little point on her left with a number of palatial mansions built right down to the water’s edge. There were some pretty glitzy places on Point Piper, but the jewel in Sydney’s waterfront crown was Jindivik, a 1930s Spanish Mission-style extravaganza that was even more opulent than Elizabeth Bay’s famed Boomerang.
When people talk prime waterfront in Sydney they talk Point Piper and Jindivik. And when they talk Jindivik they start at about 35 million dollars. As anyone who watched tabloid television or kept up with the Sunday papers’ social pages knew, the current occupant was the Reverend Laurence LaSalle Priday, former business tycoon and white-collar felon and now head of the First Church of the Lord’s Bounty.
The church itself was located in Martin Place, smack in the middle of the financial district, in what was originally the headquarters of the Rural Colonial Bank. No dicking about in the leafy outer suburbs for this preacher. The fully restored, heritage-listed, eight-storey pile was built back in the days when money was no object, and today, prime CBD acreage doesn’t get much more prime.
But what the hell was the Reverend Laurence LaSalle Priday doing entertaining a ship’s choir on the night before what was shaping up to be some pretty unholy business?
‘Okay,’ I said, ‘we need to start somewhere. Carter, see if you can track down exactly who brought the LNG tanker into port and how. Clare and Peter, you head back to the cruiser and turn our missing choirboys’ bunks and lives upside down and inside out. Look for anything at all that links them together. Julie will coordinate everything from here; it all goes through her. We haven’t got time to be doubling up or tripping over ourselves. And Julie, hit your network and see what you can dig up.’
Julie had extensive contacts in local and overseas intelligence services, and in the military, law enforcement, law breaking, and some other areas that were just plain weird. In five minutes she’d be researching on the Net, emailing, phoning, and for all I knew flashing a heliograph or sending smoke signals from up on the roof.
‘I’ll be on my mobile if you need me, Jules,’ I added.
Lonergan looked at me. ‘Where’re you headed?’
‘With two missing nukes in the hands of God knows who, I think now is the perfect time for me to seek some spiritual guidance.’
EIGHT
When she opened the door I wasn’t sure if she was the Reverend’s wife or his daughter. Then I remembered Julie’s briefing: the stunningly gorgeous nineteen-year-old brunette is the daughter, the totally gorgeous 23-year-old blonde is the wife. Totally gorgeous was a bit of an understatement: Mrs Louise Priday was a knockout. The Reverend Laurence LaSalle Priday had so much to be grateful for.
Mrs Priday was barefoot and wearing very short shorts and a pale-pink midriff shirt knotted under her breasts. The knot was straining a little at holding everything in. Her stomach was flat and tanned and toned and so dammed tight I bet bullets would bounce right off it. She pulled the huge wooden front door back and invited me in, after first eyeing me like I was the last lamb chop at a barbie. Flirtatious was an understatement for Mrs Priday, and no matter how hard I tried to keep my mind on the job as I followed her down the hall, the back view of those shorts was extremely distracting.
We entered the biggest reception hall I’d ever seen in my life. Whole forests of old-growth trees must have given up their lives for the panelling in this room alone.
‘My husband should be back shortly, Inspector Murdoch,’ the Reverend Mrs Priday said.
The fake police ID comes in handy in a situation like this, or when someone gets curious about the concealed pistol under my left armpit.
‘Can I offer you a little something in the meantime?’ She smiled and gave me that look again. Downright predatory.
I settled for a glass of water, and Mrs Priday ushered me out to the sunny terrace and disappeared back into the house to organise it.
The terrace was bigger than my whole apartment, and 35 million gets you a rather nice view. It included a curvaceous brunette in a bikini sunning herself on a slatted wooden deck-chair, sipping a Goodie watermelon juice. This would have to be the teenage daughter. She glanced up from her book and smiled. It was a really lovely smile.
‘I’m Cristobel,’ she said, sitting up and closing her book.
‘My name’s Alby, Alby Murdoch,’ I said. ‘I’m just waiting for your dad. Good book?’
‘It most certainly is, Mr Murdoch. The very best book, in fact.’ She held it up.
The combination of a King James Bible and a Tiger Lily bikini was pretty arresting and I found myself lost for words.
‘It’s very hot today, isn’t it Mr Murdoch? Is Louise getting you a drink?’
I nodded. ‘Nice place you’ve got here,’ I said.
‘We are blessed. A generous benefactor donated this wonderful home for the use of the church, and Daddy feels we should live here as an inspiration to others.’
The way she said it sounded totally genuine, even a little touching. By sheer force of will I took my eyes off Cristobel’s tanned, lithe body and looked out over the harbour. In the distance I could see Fort Denison and the moored tanker, which was now surrounded by police and Navy launches.
‘Nice view,’ I said. ‘Must have been a bit of a scare this morning, though?’
Cristobel shook her head. ‘We saw the tanker and heard about the proposed evacuation order on the radio, but Daddy said there was nothing for us to worry about.’
That was interesting. While half the city’s emergency personnel were panicking about the possibility of a great big bang, the Priday clan were happily sipping their fruit juice and coffee without a care in the world.
‘You studying any part of the Bible in particular, Ms Priday?’ I asked.
‘I help Daddy with his sermons sometimes, and right now we’re looking at the story of Jonah.’
‘And the whale,’ I said.
‘Exactly! Did you know we had a pair of whales right here in the harbour this year, Mr Murdoch? I think whales are the most wonderful of all God’s creatures.’
That pair of whales, like thousands of Japanese tourists, had chosen Sydney for their honeymoon. I’d photographed them getting hot and heavy in the waters near the Opera House, and WorldPix had made a stack of money syndicating the images internationally.
Cristobel stood up and tied a tropical-print sarong around her waist. ‘I’ll see what’s keeping Louise with your drink, Mr Murdoch.’
With that body and in that bikini I should have been thinking lustful thoughts, but she was just too damned wholesome. Plus I was wondering why the Reverend had dismissed the evacuation order. Was he just a father reassuring his daughter, a man of the cloth putting his faith in the Lord, or was there some other reason?
Louise and Cristobel wandered back out onto the terrace a few minutes later, side by side and smiling, their arms around each other’s waist. Louise handed me a tall glass full of ice and Cristobel filled it wit
h Italian sparkling mineral water from the bottle she was carrying. She beamed at Louise. ‘Isn’t she beautiful, Mr Murdoch?’
‘What wonders God hath wrought,’ I said.
Cristobel stared at me. ‘Are you saved, Mr Murdoch?’
I shook my head. ‘Bit of a lapsed Presbyterian, actually. I was expelled from Sunday School for disruptive behaviour and I sort of lost interest in religion after that.’
‘You shouldn’t say something like that to Cristobel, Mr Murdoch,’ Louise said. ‘She might just decide to take you on as a challenge.’
‘Is she making any headway with you?’ I said, and immediately felt a little embarrassed for saying it.
Louise smiled. ‘With Cristobel’s guidance, I have come to understand the reasons for some of my earlier indiscretions.’
I’d seen some of those indiscretions, as had anyone else who’d bought the June 2003 issue of Bloke. They’d also seen a whole lot more besides. Bloke wasn’t the kind of magazine anybody bought for the articles, and the pictures left nothing to the imagination. Apparently there were even some Macquarie Street gynaecologists who put their subscriptions down as tax-deductible research.
The Sunday gossip columns had had a field day when the middle-aged convicted fraudster and the spunky young centrefold party-girl became pen pals, in the truest sense of the word. And when Priday was finally paroled, Louise was waiting at the gate. The fact that the marriage had now lasted three years surprised everybody.
There was a melodic toot and the crunch of tyres on gravel, and we headed out to the driveway to greet the master of the house.
Back in Sunday School I was taught that when God talked directly to one of the faithful it was to ask them to help the sick or the lame, or to lead His people out of slavery. These days the first thing the Almighty appears to request is that His spiritual representative here on earth set himself up with some really smooth wheels. And wheels don’t come any smoother than the sleek, silver-grey Mercedes-Benz Maybach 57S that the Reverend Laurence LaSalle Priday was driving. A particularly nice automobile, and one that got you very little change from a million bucks.
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