Line of Sight

by David Whish-Wilson

  Even so, he would have to go through with it. Today was Louise’s seventeenth birthday.

  ‘Straight ahead?’

  ‘Go right.’

  They had breached the harbour mouth, passing a US aircraft carrier and a cruise ship docked at the wharf. Casey opened up the throttle and the boat lifted in the water. Salt spray flecked across Swann’s face as they picked up speed around the mole.

  ‘You should have finished me off when you had the chance,’ he said.

  He got no reply.

  He and Casey had started out the same but had gone different paths. Swann didn’t regret their falling out, only what had happened beforehand. Working together, they’d put dozens of crims away. Some had done long stretches, one or two hadn’t made it. Knowing what he did about Casey now, they couldn’t all have been guilty.

  ‘All right, that’s far enough. Turn her off and leave the keys in the ignition. Go downstairs, nice and slowly, into the cabin.’

  Swann took the keys and followed. They were settled a good distance offshore. He could see the Norfolk Island pines above Cottesloe Beach. The coast was clear of other vessels.

  In the cool darkness below, Casey stood with his hands on his hips, staring at Swann. There was no hint of fear in his eyes. Swann pulled open a bureau drawer, rummaged around. Bundles of dollars, American. He took out a passport, flicked through it. Hong Kong immigration stamps. He replaced the passport and stepped up to Casey, put the sawn-off under his chin.

  ‘How many of them were innocent?’ he asked.

  Casey sneered as if he’d been expecting it. ‘Need to work yourself up, eh?’

  ‘How many?’

  Casey looked down at the gun, back up at Swann. He snorted, spat on the floor. ‘Ancient fucken history. Do what you came here for.’

  That smile on his face. Swann struck him with the butt of the gun, grabbed a handful of hair and dragged him to his knees. ‘Where’s my daughter, dog?’ He thrust the sawn barrel into Casey’s eye. The other eye burned with hatred, and something else – a knowing.

  An answer.

  ‘Here’s how it’s going to be,’ Swann hissed. ‘I’m going to sink your gold – out there.’ He pointed across the ocean to Rottnest Island, its dozens of back bays and secret beaches. ‘Dead or alive, I want her back by tomorrow. Or you never see your bars again.’

  He dragged Casey up by his hair, pulled him out onto the deck.

  ‘Get over,’ he said. ‘Before I change my mind.’

  Casey spat blood from his broken mouth and backed away. He climbed up onto the gunwhale, blew more blood out of his nose, wiped his hands on his legs. Then he bent his knees and dived, and didn’t come up until he was far away from the boat, where he stopped to tread water and watch.

  Swann went back to the wheel and keyed the ignition, felt the dual inboards rumble before pushing forward on the twin sticks. The nose of the Lucy lifted as he surged towards the islands. He had a long afternoon’s work ahead of him.

  He had witnessed some strange behaviour in his time but this took the cake. He hadn’t expected the boat to take off after seeing Swann go aboard. He followed in the Valiant on the road that circled the river, watching from Point Resolution as the launch cut around the sand-spit at Point Walter then passed under the Fremantle Bridge. After that he had no choice but to drive to the northern mole and wait.

  Soon enough the boat rounded the mole and headed up along the coast. He parked at Leighton Beach but the launch kept going. He parked again at Cottesloe and saw it anchored offshore.

  He had a clear line of sight to the men on the upper deck, until they disappeared downstairs. Then one of them was in the water, the other watching from the boat.

  The launch lifted her nose as she headed out into the ocean. The man in the water swam to shore, emerging among the bathers on the crowded beach.

  He drove back to the northern mole, saw the wind change on the surface of the waves, the Fremantle doctor setting in. He got out of the car and sat on the bonnet. Fishermen cast off the rocks and reeled in herring, gardies, the odd snook. A US aircraft carrier passed through the channel and headed north, gigantic even on the horizon. Sailboats raced a course out on Cockburn Sound, the victory horn coming to him clear on the southerly.

  The number of herring fishermen dropped off as the day wore on. By mid-afternoon others started arriving, longer rods strapped to their roof racks. Many of the men waited in their cars, drinking and smoking, listening to the cricket, getting out and preparing for the evening tailor run only when the sun sank closer to the ocean.

  Stretched out on the bonnet of the Valiant, he felt the sun lose its heat on his face. Boats started returning from the islands, the smaller craft pitching about on the swell and the larger ones cruising through the harbour mouth, cutting back on their engines and sending waves against the rocks. Most of the tailor fishermen were down there now, casting upwind into the chop.

  He sat up and looked through his binoculars at the line of yachts and launches that stretched right back to Rottnest Island. There it was, following in the wake of the old ferry.

  He got off the bonnet and yawned and took his seat again behind the wheel, put the binoculars away in their case. The scalloped sun cast a bronze net as it slid beneath the waves. He brought the ignition wires together and pumped the gas, rolled back across the gritty road.

  Partridge entered the converted courtroom on Monday morning with a tight smile. The place was packed with spectators and journalists, who rose to their feet amid whispers and the scraping of plastic chairs. The Sunday paper had reported a ‘leak’ that the royal commission was being shut down, and supported it with comments from Sullivan and Barth. Both men stated that the commissioner had exceeded his brief. They made mention of unauthorised investigations, the possibility of defamatory action being taken by the police union on behalf of three officers, all charges of corruption being unsubstantiated.

  Partridge had called Carol from his hotel room, the last call he would make on this phone, which, it occured to him now, was probably bugged. She confirmed the rumour: the governor was on a plane back from Europe, due that afternoon. It was within his powers, albeit unprecedented, to order the commission to cease its inquiries. He simply had to sign off on his order and the commission would be disbanded.

  Partridge took his chair and adjusted his microphone. ‘Please be seated.’

  He looked across the rows of rubbernecks and saw their morbid curiosity and could not bring himself to begin. He looked over at Sullivan and saw the smugness in his eyes and could not bring himself to begin. Then he looked at Superintendent Swann and saw not the shamed man he’d expected but someone determined to see the verdict through. A look of understanding passed between them as Partridge took up his gavel.

  On his return to Melbourne, Partridge intended to sue for a follow-up royal commission, this one at arm’s length from the local-mates club that passed for a government here. A commission that had the power to seize documents and subpoena witnesses, a commission that was genuine in its endeavours to investigate Superintendent Swann’s allegations. Since those allegations involved cross-border criminality, there were sufficient grounds to argue for an interstate commission of inquiry.

  Wallace stepped up and announced Helen Tempest as the next witness. Her name sent a squall of whispers around the gallery. Partridge saw Swann close his eyes as she passed by him, open them again when she took the oath.

  ‘Yes,’ she said in response to the first question, ‘I was a close friend of Superintendent Swann’s for a period of a year, in Albany, when I was posted there for my first duty. In the beginning it was a very pleasant …’

  Swann looked a little shocked by what he saw. The woman was turned slightly away from him but seemed to sense his gaze. Her honey-gold hair was long enough to sweep across her cheek but did not conceal her eyes, which were full of regret. It was clear to Partridge that she didn’t believe what she was saying.

  ‘Mr Wallace,’ she said.
‘This is difficult for me.’

  ‘Go on, Miss Tempest. You’re doing very well.’

  ‘One day I was in the station staff room when Superintendent Swann came in. We were alone, and he …’

  Her story was perfunctory and brief. Once excused by Wallace she immediately walked out of the room. The QC’s job was done. He returned to his table, shuffled some papers and placed his hands on his lap.

  Partridge cleared his throat. ‘Do you have anything to add, Superintendent Swann, before I commence my remarks?’

  Swann nodded and stood up. He looked up to the ceiling, down again, and spoke clearly into the silence. ‘I would just like to remind you all that Ruby Devine was the mother of three children. I hope that one day they will know justice.’ He sat down again, his hands flat on the table before him, ignoring the whispers from the gallery, the hum of surprise that the man hadn’t tried to defend himself.

  Partridge drew his robes about him. His heart beat steadily in his chest. For what it was worth, he would take his lead from Swann’s example. He had no intention of letting them close down his commission. He would finish on his own terms.

  ‘Depending on the events of the coming day,’ he began, ‘my official report will be handed to the governor in due course. Needless to say the following remarks will be expanded upon therein.

  ‘This royal commission is at an end. According to the terms of reference that define it, I can only find that the reliability of Superintendent Swann’s testimony and good character has undoubtedly been called into question in this courtroom, by his colleagues, by expert witnesses, and most damningly today, just moments ago. And yet, despite the weight of that testimony, I remain unconvinced that this unreliability diminishes the necessity, as I see it, of relieving the public of their fears regarding official corruption in this state. Certainly as long as the murder of the unfortunate Mrs Devine remains unsolved, public anxiety as to the nature of the rumours currently circulating will continue to grow.’

  He paused to catch his breath, his hand steady on the gavel. ‘Before I conclude I would like to place on record the fact that I have asked the Premier of Western Australia to widen the terms of reference of this commission, and he has refused, without satisfactory explanation. Such an unwillingness to address the extremely narrow, one might even say obstructive, terms placed on this commission – terms which in my mind have impeded my ability to carry out my proper duty – will, I expect, only add to the public perception that the government of this state is reluctant to get to the heart of the matter.’

  He raised his gavel in the eerie quiet and brought it down.

  At the sound of the judge’s gavel the shooter stood. He waited patiently for the line of people along his row of chairs to drain into the aisle. He enjoyed his frustration at their bovine indecisiveness. He enjoyed the smells of armpit and hair oil, the egg-sandwich breath of the man next to him.

  Out they ambled, into the brightness of the morning, silent and unsettled, witnesses to an absurd spectacle which they plainly hadn’t appreciated. Nothing in their world had changed, and he could see from their faces that they hadn’t understood.

  At the doorway he turned and looked back into the hall. Already the judge’s bench was being dismantled – the black tablecloth had been removed and the table legs kicked down. Extension cords were wound fist over elbow towards the ports in the wall. The PA amplifiers came next, off their shaky legs, up-ended onto a trolley. A milk carton filled with the cords was placed on top and wheeled out behind the folded-up tables. Soon a boy in shorts and sandshoes, soles squeaking on the linoleum, began hefting the first row of chairs, one on top of another, and carrying them out in piles of five.

  For a moment he was the only one in the hall. He felt like shouting, if only to hear his echo. He had been in many courtrooms, but this was one to remember. He reached across and flicked off the lights, one by one. Who was there to stop him?

  Horizontal slabs of grey shade marked the glass bricks near the ceiling. He heard the squeaking sandshoes returning and closed the double doors behind him, moved on silent soles out into the sun.

  Soon he would be in Marko’s GT Monaro and driving north. Soon he would be out on the ocean. Soon he would be getting a good night’s sleep. But first he had a job to do.

  Swann sat on the vinyl couch in his hotel room, waiting for the phone to ring. His hands were shaking. He was breathing too fast and had already vomited twice. The room reeked of his desperation and failure.

  He had taken the map of Australia down from the wall, packed away the red and blue thumbtacks, stowed the letters in the same bag. He kept one of the flyers out on the coffee table, Louise’s face looking up at him, smiling and innocent, the one bright point in an otherwise bleak view. How beautiful she was. How perfect.

  He made himself look away from her and at his watch. Nearly twenty-four hours since he’d put the word on Casey, sunk the gold bars in twenty metres of water at the back of Cathedral Rocks, off the western end of Rottnest Island. He made himself do the maths again, the numbers that he knew would bring on Casey’s call: 4375 ounces at a hundred and forty dollars an ounce – more than six hundred thousand dollars. Sixty years of the average copper’s salary. Too good to leave on the ocean floor.

  But the phone sat silent on the table. He could feel his pulse thumping in his head, the nausea rising in his stomach again. He lit another cigarette, poured himself a finger and tossed it down with shaking hands. The silence in the room fizzed in his ears.

  He shouldn’t be alone right now, didn’t trust himself if things went wrong, but he couldn’t be with others. He’d never been in more danger. Either Casey would deliver Louise’s location in trade for the gold or they’d rush the door, torture the bars’ whereabouts out of him. His revolver was loaded and sitting by the flyer. It took all his strength to avoid picking it up.

  When the phone finally rang he stared at it stupidly. Then made himself pick it up.

  ‘It’s me, Frank.’ Helen’s voice. Small, uncertain. Then silence. He sighed, nearly broke down. It had hurt to see Helen perjure herself. One day he would find out why. But not right now.

  He forced himself to speak. ‘Helen, I … Look, I’m sorry, but …’

  He heard a deep breath on the other end of the line, a sigh like his own. When she spoke again she sounded like a different person, her voice freighted with determination. ‘Listen to me, Frank. Louise was at Ruby’s house on the night she was killed. You understand what I’m saying?’

  Oh, Christ. He felt tears come to his eyes. His daughter was the babysitter. Doubled over, he began to rock, couldn’t breathe. What that meant, for Louise.

  ‘Frank, she isn’t dead. She’s alive.’

  Shaking his head. Still not breathing.

  ‘She’s in Queensland – I just spoke with her. Louise is safe. She’s coming home.’

  So this was what Casey had over Helen. What had made her speak against him in court. She’d done a deal to protect his daughter. When he tried to speak, only air came rushing out, keening. The unreality of it all. What he hadn’t dared to dream.

  ‘Casey told me to call you,’ she was saying, and then her determination faltered. ‘He’s here now.’

  Swann clenched his jaw, swallowed on the surge of anger. Helen was still in danger. Louise was still in danger. He covered the phone while he controlled his breathing, but could still barely manage a whisper.

  ‘You tell him this. When I see Louise myself, in person, I’ll let him know. Where it is.’ He took in more air. ‘And Helen … thank you.’

  ‘Frank, I’m so sorry —’

  The phone went dead in his hand. The knot in his stomach turned to water. He sat on the couch holding the receiver as if it were a hammer, the cord wrapped around his wrist, weeping through his shouts of joy.

  The river smelt of seaweed and black mud, just like it had when he was a kid. Every now and then a crow moaned from down by the water. And just like when he was a kid he felt the excite
ment of lying in wait.

  He had scoped out the house and learned there was no security. The Valiant was parked in the dirt alley at the back, where the night cart used to collect the dunny can through a hole in the outhouse wall. The outhouse was gone now but the alley gave him a good means of escape, unseen. All he had to do was open the gate down the side fence, climb the back wall and drop into the alley.

  Protected from the neighbours’ view, he had been standing under cover of some eucalypts for two hours now, but that didn’t trouble him. It felt good to stare into the dark-green foliage with its tints of blue. Behind the screen of leaves he could see the marks left by borers as they worked the trunk. He looked closer and saw the spitfire larvae that had colonised one of the branches. Spider webs were laced about the leaves. He couldn’t see any spiders but there were ants massed in the webs.

  He inhaled the ancient decay off the riverbank and imagined the sepia shallows of the foreshore where the mullet spawned and the flathead lay in wait and the water became progressively cooler the deeper you walked. He pictured the bleached sand at the banks where old rope and jellyfish and chunks of polystyrene lay tangled in the matted paperbark roots and where the tracks of feral cats and pelicans and seagulls spotted the darker sand below the tide line.

  He heard the low-revving engine long before the car turned into the driveway and stopped. A door opened and the driver got out. The hinge on the mailbox creaked.

  He thought of those other occasions when he’d pulled the trigger, the faces of those untouchable mongrels he’d shot for his own reasons and not for money, because they deserved to die and nobody else was going to do it. When he killed like that he was the nightmare of every evil bastard, because he couldn’t be controlled, he couldn’t be bought, and he couldn’t be understood.

  He thought of the bagpipes that would be played at this man’s funeral, the speeches from the politicians and senior colleagues, the newspaper headlines that would tell nothing of the truth.