Signal Loss

by Garry Disher

  ‘I don’t believe you. Who would believe a story like that?’

  ‘His real name is Wayne Hall. He has a string of arrests and convictions for dishonesty offences going back many years. There are currently two arrest warrants out for him, one for fleecing that woman of her savings, and the other for falsifying loan documents in Adelaide. He gets around, old Clive. Sorry, Wayne.’

  Allie shrank, starting to believe.

  ‘Furthermore,’ Ellen said, ‘he doesn’t have a sister. There is no niece with leukaemia.’

  Allie stared at her car in the driveway of the yellow house.

  ‘I can’t believe it. Why are you doing this to me?’ Then she stiffened. ‘What’s happening?’

  A patrol car had pulled up outside the yellow house, then an unmarked car, uniformed and plain-clothed police piling out. Two uniforms ran to the rear of the property, one stood in the driveway, one on the lawn, and two detectives pounded on the door.

  No result. They knocked again. Unseen by them, at the side of the house a window slid open and a young guy slipped out. Tanned, gleaming and gym-toned in tight shorts and a tighter singlet top. He was Chinese, tall, with glossy black hair to his shoulders. A lithe, fast-looking kid who touched the ground and began to sprint.

  Stopped dead when he saw the uniforms at the front of the house. Put his hands up in surrender.

  ‘Clive’s boyfriend,’ Ellen murmured.

  Carefully looking past Allie, Ellen nevertheless sensed the pain and confusion on Allie’s face. Then Allie was shaking her head, her hair whipping about. ‘No, it’s not true.’

  ‘Allie, didn’t you ever ask yourself why Clive didn’t want to have sex with you?’

  ‘I don’t believe it, it’s a lie.’

  Ellen let the news sit and stew. She watched the action at the door. It opened. The detectives forced their way in.

  ‘Ellen, tell me the truth. That boy’s a housemate or something.’

  This was all taking too long. Ellen got out of the car and crossed the road. She marched past Allie’s car and onto the veranda, just as the detectives emerged, holding Clive by the elbows.

  ‘Found him under the bed, sneezing in the dust,’ said one of the men holding him.

  ‘That’d be right,’ Ellen said. ‘He is a bottom feeder.’

  They laughed. Clive, dressed in shiny blue tracksuit pants and a paunchy white singlet, like a 1980s Mafia hood, looked full of sulks. He spotted Ellen.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Hello, Wayne.’

  ‘You have no right. This is a conflict of interest.’

  ‘Shut up, Wayne.’

  Allie came running up. Clive brightened. ‘Allie, tell them, love.’

  Allie spat on him.

  37

  STILL AWESTRUCK BY COOLIDGE’S meltdown—‘You came this close to jeopardising a major investigation’—Challis and Murphy spent the next morning bugging the Loeb–Quine rendezvous site.

  Loeb had stipulated a park bench some distance from the jetty, barbecue shelter and skateboard ramps in Waterloo. Overlooking a belt of mangroves and the Westernport tidal flats, it was set in a copse of casuarinas, one of them so close its leaves brushed the back of the bench. Knowing from Quine that Loeb would pat her down and check the bench for a wire, they’d installed microphones and tiny video cameras in the casuarinas and a nearby rubbish bin, and a member of the surveillance crew was concealed under a weather tarp in one of the little rowboats and motorboats anchored offshore, aiming a camera with a telephoto lens and video function.

  With Janine settled on the bench by noon, Pam Murphy began walking the path behind the bench with a friend on maternity leave from the new police station at Somerville. Murphy pushed the woman’s toddler in a stroller while two CIU detectives tossed a Frisbee back and forth on the grass between the path and the main road. Challis was sitting with Ellen Destry on a picnic rug scattered with plastic cups and a cane basket. Now all they could do was wait. According to bayside police, Loeb was yet to leave his office.

  Challis, stretched out on the rug and warmed by the sun, thought he could almost forget he was a policeman. The air was mild, tangy with the smells of salt water and barbecued onions. Hovering gulls watching him for crumbs or sliding down the channels in the sky. The sea sucking around the exposed roots of the mangroves and crabs popping in the mud. He didn’t even mind the refinery smokestacks giving him the finger, beyond the stretches of tidal flats and bay waters.

  He went through the details of the operation once more. The cane basket contained recording equipment, pre-tested for range and clarity. When he had enough on tape, he’d call in the others for the arrest, mostly using hand gestures and mobile phone communication. If Loeb was paranoid about bugging equipment, he’d be doubly conscious of men and women wearing earpieces.

  Then the call came: Loeb was on the move. Challis got to his feet, crossed the grass to the park bench, crouched with Quine and squeezed her forearm reassuringly.

  ‘Twenty minutes, Janine, okay?’

  She looked pale and tense, but then she probably always did, meeting the man who had such a hold over her. He squeezed again. ‘Okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ she croaked.

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER, ANOTHER call, this one from the shadow car as it peeled away after reporting that Loeb had arrived. ‘Black Range Rover, parked by the barbecue shelter.’

  Challis called Murphy. ‘Black Range Rover. Do you have eyes?’

  Above the wheel-squeak of her baby stroller, he heard her reply, ‘He’s just sitting. Wait, he’s getting out. He’s clearly jumpy. Looking around, giving everyone the evil eye.’

  Challis murmured, ‘Look and smile at your friend as you speak.’

  ‘I know how to do it, boss.’

  They were all tense.

  Then, ‘He’s on the move, heading your way.’

  ‘Dog?’

  ‘Affirmative. Some little yappy-looking thing on a lead.’

  CHALLIS HAD BEEN AWARE of a low ambient rattle in the air. His subconscious told him the sound was a small petrol motor, a mower, perhaps. After all, there were houses on the other side of the approach road, two hundred metres away. And the park itself was half a kilometre long, stretching from the skateboard jumps at one end to a bait shop, a motel and a handful of small engineering businesses at the other.

  It was background noise, that’s all. Meanwhile the audio on Quine was crisp and clear. He could hear the crepitation of her clothing as she moved and breathed, hear her clear her throat, hear the gentle tidal pull of the water.

  Until the mower came into range, drowning out all sound but the rattle of the engine and the churning whip of its blades in the grass and tiny stones and fallen tree debris. Challis, looking past Ellen’s shoulder, saw a shire worker in a yellow safety vest, astride a huge ride-on mower, appear from behind a stand of spindly young gum trees. His intention was clear: mow the broad stretch of grass where the Frisbee players stood. A twenty-minute job, at least.

  Challis glanced wildly towards the barbecue shelter. Loeb was not yet in view, but that would change in a matter of seconds. And he could see that he and Ellen were closer than Murphy and the Frisbee players. Leaning in to murmur in Ellen’s ear, he said, ‘Get him out of here. Nicely. Show him your badge.’

  ‘Putty in my hands,’ she said.

  The noise was deafening now. Ellen stood, a graceful articulation of legs and waist, and strolled across the grass, heading the man off. She stopped him with her hand up and when he cut the motor to a low idle, she stepped close to the machine, a friendly grin splitting her face. Challis saw her palm her ID quickly, then playact for Loeb’s benefit, although he hadn’t yet come into view. She looked in one direction, pointed dramatically, said something, repeated the action in the other direction. The driver tipped back his head and laughed. He pointed. Then he grinned and waved and revved his motor and headed back the way he’d come.

  Blessed silence.

  Ellen flopped on
to the blanket, nuzzling and kissing Challis, murmuring that she’d told the guy he could come back in thirty minutes.

  ‘You seemed quite animated, the pair of you.’

  ‘People say I’m an ice queen, but it’s a filthy lie,’ she said, tweaking his nose.

  A few more seconds of proving it a lie, and then Challis heard a crackling voice from the interior of the cane basket: ‘Hello, Ray.’

  THE WORLD CARRIED ON around them but, to Challis, time seemed suspended. He half-expected Loeb to flee, or attack Quine, or spot the watchers or the spy gear.

  Then, ‘Breathe,’ murmured Ellen, and it did the trick. He relaxed.

  Stretched out on the rug on the grass, he drew her against him so that her head was propped on his cocked hip. He stroked her hair, and listened, and watched from the corner of his eye.

  Loeb was suspicious, jumpy. He crouched a moment to peer under the bench seat, his dog licking his face. Then he eyed the moored boats, the shoreline in each direction, before turning to face inland, his gaze passing over Challis and Destry, over Murphy walking with her baby and best friend, over the Frisbee players, just then mock-wrestling for possession of their toy.

  Apparently satisfied, he sat with Quine. He patted her down, a swift, asexual exploration of her neck, shoulders, breasts, stomach and upper legs.

  ‘You have it?’

  Challis watched the bugging equipment inside the basket. The green recording indicator swelled, receded, as the dog panted and Loeb and Quine talked and were silent.

  Then it picked up different sounds, Quine fetching a sheaf of papers from her bag. The paper rustled, crackled as Loeb took it from her.

  Then papery flicks and scrapes as he flipped through the material, sheet by sheet. He was puzzled. ‘These are aerial shots around Baxter. Look, there’s Peninsula Link, the Moorooduc Highway. I thought you said they had shots of Colin’s farm?’

  ‘I don’t know anything about this kind of thing. It’s double-Dutch to me,’ Quine said. ‘You asked me to get the file, that’s the file.’

  More wordless sifting. ‘Even the dates are wrong.’

  Loeb was a soft, heavy man, losing his hair, losing his looks to flab, but Challis could hear a gravelly rasp as his voice hardened. ‘Are you sure this is the right file?’

  More rustling noises as Janine Quine apparently leaned in. ‘Look at the label, Hauser, surveillance monitoring.’

  ‘And these GPS coordinates,’ Loeb said. ‘It’s not Inverloch. I’ve been fishing down there enough times to know the GPS coordinates. I don’t understand, Janine.’

  Inverloch. It was a coastal town south-east of Phillip Island, but where had Challis heard it mentioned recently? Ah: Bernie Joske.

  Perhaps the cameraman under the tarp moved then, or a passing boat set off a line of wavelets, Challis didn’t know, but Loeb saw something out on the water, a lens flash perhaps, for he stiffened, snarled, ‘You bitch,’ and slammed his fist into the side of Janine Quine’s head.

  She toppled onto the ground, uttering a soft moan of pain, but by then Loeb was running, leaving the dog. He seemed to know to avoid Challis and the others. He ran along the path away from where he’d left his Range Rover and towards a thicket of trees that bordered a small industrial estate—where Challis had not thought to base backup police. And for a flabby man, he was fast and light enough on his feet, and he had a head start.

  A moment later, the dog was streaking after him, lead bouncing on the grass.

  Then the mower appeared. The driver had been watching from a screen of trees, he told Challis later. His was an uneventful life, he said, the same every day, so he got a real kick out of watching a police operation. And then he got to be a part of it! He saw the guy hit the woman—‘What a cunt act’—and could see he might get away, so he’d climbed aboard and come rattling and screaming into view, cutting the guy off.

  Loeb, startled, dodged one way and then the other. He backpedalled, tripped over the dog, fell heavily onto the footpath.

  Murphy and the Frisbee players fell on him.

  Ellen thanked the driver.

  Challis, amused, called Lily in the general office and asked her to find out what linked Raymond Loeb to Inverloch.

  38

  ON FRIDAY, WORD CAME FROM South Gippsland police: Loeb’s brother-in-law was in custody for possession of stolen farm vehicles, machinery and equipment, with many of the serial and other identification numbers matching the list supplied by Challis. The brother-in-law, Lance Merchant, reportedly belligerent and abusive, had also been charged with resisting arrest.

  After securing the okay to take part in the interrogation, Challis and Murphy made a fast trip around the northern part of Westernport Bay and down the coast to Inverloch. By the time they arrived, Merchant was calmer, aware that he was facing jail time.

  ‘Ray called me in a panic, said he had the tax man on his back and would I help out by storing some gear for him.’

  ‘Some gear,’ Challis said.

  Merchant shook his head in disgust. ‘Turned out he meant tractors, utes and trailers…I had to send all me spare drivers and low-loaders to collect it all. Two return trips.’

  ‘You didn’t think it odd he had so much stuff stored on another man’s farm?’

  ‘I didn’t know it wasn’t his place! I thought he got in too deep, one of his deals, and needed some breathing space.’

  Merchant owned a farm-supply business, a sprawl outside of town. Sheds, offices, baled hay and grain sacks undercover; tractors, ploughs and combine harvesters in a dusty yard fronting the highway. Challis said, ‘I put it to you that you have been on-selling vehicles and machinery for Raymond Loeb from the very start.’

  Merchant shook his head adamantly. ‘One-off favour, mate.’

  Challis said, ‘Lance Merchant, you are still under caution and not obliged to say anything, but I am further charging you with accessory to murder and—’

  A cheap trick, but it worked, Merchant falling over himself to sell his brother-in-law down the river and weasel his way out of further trouble.

  SATURDAY AND SUNDAY CHALLIS spent at Dromana, providing moral support for Ellen, who was looking after her sister. Allie spent the weekend ricocheting between self-loathing, weepiness, sibling grievance and hatred of men.

  It was exhausting and almost unrelenting, but occasionally Allie would storm off, leaving them in an edgy kind of peace, which they tried to lighten with gardening and nonsense conversations.

  ‘A heavy enamelled cooking pot, French, would be a very thoughtful Christmas present,’ Ellen said.

  ‘I’m happy with my old pots and pans,’ Challis said.

  She threw a clod of dirt at him. ‘Meanwhile, what would you like?’

  Challis had never had a clear notion of material objects he lacked, or desired. ‘A new car.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Book voucher.’

  She threw another clod. ‘I am not getting you a book voucher. You need new pants, new shirts, a new jacket…’

  Challis winced. Dread settled in him.

  On Sunday morning, with Ellen and Allie sniping in the kitchen, he did the laundry. Badly, it seemed: discovering that none of the women’s garments had a clearly defined top, bottom, neckline, waist or hem, he’d apparently pegged them out all wrong.

  Better to be elsewhere. He wandered down to the beach and stared out at the tones of pink and grey in the sea and the sky. Felt himself relax. Life was in fact pretty good, notwithstanding his fucked-up car and his partner’s fucked-up sister.

  When he got back, he found Ellen emerging from the house with her keys. ‘Hop in.’

  ‘Where are we going?’

  Ellen grinned. ‘We’re going to get lost.’

  ‘From Allie?’

  ‘Lost, lost.’

  SHE MEANT THE ARTHURS SEAT MAZE. Speeding up the hill to Arthurs Seat and down to the maze, she explained that her senior constable, Ian Judd, had been watching their rape suspect, Mitchell Pyne.


  ‘Pyne doesn’t set foot outside his house all weekend, then suddenly gets in his car and comes here.’

  Challis looked around him doubtfully as she pulled into the car park. ‘People do visit mazes, Ells.’

  ‘I don’t think Mitch is a maze kind of guy,’ she replied. ‘And who comes to a maze alone?’

  She found Judd’s white Skoda, and Judd emerged as she parked alongside. She was amused to see her detective in cargo pants, T-shirt and sandals. His glasses, scratched and filmy, caught the sun.

  ‘Our boy’s bought his ticket, but all he’s done so far is enjoy the view.’

  They went in and paused a while, staring across at the main arena, a vividly green maze stretching across a hillside slope on the other side of a depression. People were streaming in, swallowed up then occasionally glimpsed within, their voices calling hollow in the still air.

  Meanwhile Pyne, wearing a two-day stubble and jeans, runners and a khaki shirt with multiple pockets, stood downslope from Judd, Destry and Challis. At a glance, he was just another tourist, but Challis sensed he was tightly wound. He wasn’t there for the entertainment.

  ‘Waiting for someone?’

  ‘I’d say so,’ Judd said.

  They strolled downhill, passing close to Pyne. Feeling the man’s suspiciousness, Ellen tucked her arm tightly around Challis’s waist and leaned her cheek on his upper arm, while Judd, trailing them, blew his nose, trumpeting into a handkerchief.

  They went on, in all their ordinariness, hoping Pyne wouldn’t pay them a second look.

  HE STAYED PUT SO THEY WATCHED him from below, screened by trees and other people, their faces and bodies in dappled light. Twenty minutes passed. Pyne was nervily vigilant, scanning every adult who passed him. Then, shortly after 1 p.m., a young family drew near him, the mother fussing over two small children, the father carrying a blanket and a picnic basket. The father did a double-take. ‘Mitch?’ he seemed to say. Pyne mirrored the double-take. Challis, Judd and Destry saw him shake the other’s hand and clap him on the back. Then Pyne was introduced to the woman and the children; hands were shaken.