by Garry Disher
Billy opened and closed his mouth, then screwed up his face in emotion. Exactly what emotion, Ellen couldnt say, but he did sigh and flop into one of the floral-print armchairs. Thank Christ for that.
Ellen froze. She knew something bad was coming. Billy?
Billy got to his feet again and rummaged in the refrigerator. He took out and replaced one drink can after another, finally settling on a Coke.
Did you have something to do with his death, Billy? Ellen said, watching him closely. Is that why youre relieved?
Me? Nah.
Then why arent you more surprised or upset?
I was scared of the prick, Billy said. We all were.
Ellen swallowed, then sat down opposite him. Go on.
He told me what to say. Coached me in how to answer questions. I never seen those guys in the photos before, but he told me I had to say they abused me.
* * * *
48
Time passed bewilderingly for Hal Challis. On Tuesday morning he contacted the funeral director and the Uniting Church minister again, telling them he had some repeat business for them, the joke falling flat. They settled on Saturday. After that he was rarely away from the phone, or the front door, as people from the town and the district dropped in or telephoned with their condolences.
Even McQuarrie called from Victoria. Very sorry for your loss, inspector.
Ellen must have told him. Thank you, sir.
Take as long as you like, but things are in a turmoil here, and we cant afford to have you running an independent inquiry in South Australia, now can we, Hal?
Nixon and Stormare told their boss, Challis thought, who then made a few phone calls. Perhaps the super fears Ill be even more uncontrollable now that my fathers dead. At another time he might have used that to annoy McQuarrie in subtle ways, but he was too tired. No, sir.
The day dragged on. Needing badly to fill time, he began to bundle together his fathers clothing for the local op-shop, but it was far too soon, and he lost heart. He went through his fathers desk, paid some bills. Thats when he found the will. The old man had no shares and only a few thousand dollars in the bank. Hed left his house to his children and his car to Eve.
At 3.30, Challis parked the old station wagon in the street outside Megs house. He checked in with her, then returned to the car, tied a purple ribbon around it, and waited on the verandah for Eve to come home from school. She appeared at 3.45, shuffling, head down, all of her striding, knockabout humour gone. She spotted the car, and froze. Challis called out to her.
She turned, shaded her eyes as he crossed the lawn toward her. Uncle Hal.
He kissed her. As you can see, I come bearing gifts.
Her eyes filled with tears. She tried to hide it by turning wry and scoffing. You expect me to drive that? Ill lose all street cred.
Challis drew himself up. Id be proud to be seen in this car.
Eve was sniffing, blinking her eyes, trying to smile. Mum said you lost your virginity in it.
Challiss jaw dropped comically. Suddenly Eve was wailing, crumpling. Challis held her tight for a while. Hush, he murmured.
I know he could be mean to you and Mum, but he was great to me.
I know.
They stood like that. Eve sighed raggedly. The Murray Challis memorial station wagon.
Thats the spirit.
They went inside. Meg was on the sofa, making a list of hymns for the funeral. How about Abide With Me? she said.
They both shuddered. No thanks.
They discussed the will. I dont want the house, Challis said. You can have my share. Maybe you can live there.
Mother and daughter were seated together on the sofa. They turned to each other in silent communication and then kissed. It was as if they had settled all doubts, and Challis, on the edges of their lives here, realised that they were going to be all right. They faced him resolutely. Meg smiled and said, Were happy here.
Then well sell the house and you can have my share.
No, Hal. Equal shares.
I had a word with the real estate agent. Its worth about $175,000, but he said potential buyers are thin on the ground. People are leaving the district, not flocking into it.
We might have better luck finding tenants, Meg said. The married housing on the sheep stations around here is pretty basic.
* * * *
Challis remembered Megs words when Lisa Joyce came to see him late afternoon. He ushered her through to the kitchen, saying, You and Rex dont want to buy this place for your stud manager, do you?
Lisa gazed around her. He began to see how shabby everything was. Not right now, Hal, she said, smiling kindly as though hed made a brave joke. I was really sorry to hear about your dad. He was a lovely guy.
Challis doubted that Lisa had spent more than five minutes with Murray Challis in her life, but he appreciated the compliment. Thanks.
She said, with a hint of stronger feelings, I suppose youll go back to Victoria pretty soon.
How to answer that? He was feeling the little disturbances hed always felt when he was around her. Theres a lot to do, he said lamely.
Her fingers lingered on his wrist as she went out. It was affection, commiseration and the gesture of a woman who had an unconscious excess of sexual energy.
* * * *
He was bucked up to hear Ellen Destrys voice that evening, the kindness and affection flowing from her, but shocked to hear that Kees van Alphen had been shot dead. I should come back, he said.
You cant, Hal. Bury your father.
But
Youre better off out of it. Its become a feeding frenzy for the media. McQuarrie keeps popping up in front of the cameras. And any minute now, were going to have a team from Melbourne down here, crawling all over us. Stay away, Halnot that I dont wish you were here.
I wish I was there, too.
The pause was awkward. It rang with implications.
* * * *
49
On Wednesday morning Pete Duyker was released on police bail. Ellen had charged him with fraud, knowing nothing else would stick. She didnt like it, and, with Scobie Sutton, stood outside the police station, watching Sam Lock usher Duyker into his car. Lock gave them a complicated smile. Complicated, Ellen thought, because the lawyer side of him had not seen more serious charges laid against his client, and the father-of-young-children side of him was afraid that he was aiding a paedophile.
Meanwhile, van Alphens will-o-the-wisp evidence had been thoroughly discredited. She sighed and turned away, overwhelmed. She wanted to find van Alphens killer, she wanted to put Duyker away, and she wanted to console Hal Chains.
Scobie Sutton was saying something, one hand shading his eyes against the sun. Masses of rain yesterday, masses of sunshine today. She forced herself to concentrate, and heard him say, Everythings clean, including his computer.
Maybe he wasnt involved in the abduction, Ellen replied, or someone else borrowed his van, but I bet he was at the house, I bet he made videos or took photos.
Scobie nodded. They stood there glumly, the spring air mild and scented, imagining how the case would have played out if Katie hadnt been found but killed by Duyker and her body disposed of.
Back to work, Ellen said, and they re-entered the station. Talk to the vice squad and missing persons. We might be able to match faces in recent kiddie porn with those of children who have gone missing or been abducted or found murdered in recent years. We might also find visual clues that help identify the men involved, men like Clode and Duyker.
But theyd sell that stuff to Asia, Europe or the States.
Its global, Scobie.
They passed the Victim Suite. The door was open, the room empty. Think well see Billy again?
Ellen shook her head. Hes long gone. Hes either on the other side of the continent, running scared, or hes been paid off, or hes dead.
Has he got a record?
Ellen had searched the databases. No.
They continued on to CIU. Have the sh
ooting board officers finished with you, Scobie?
He gave her a hunted look. Yes.
And?
It will go on my record, failure to follow correct procedure.
What will their report say? They cant do anything about van Alphen now, but will take action against Kellock?
Scobie said irritably, I dont know, Ellen, all right? Im not privy to their findings.
Scobie, I dont want any messing up of forensics in regard to the Blasko investigation.
You dont have to talk to me like that, Scobie said chokingly, and he stalked off. When she reached CIU, he was muttering covertly on the telephone.
* * * *
Shed scarcely made a start on the paperwork cluttering her desk when Superintendent McQuarrie called. I hear you let our cop killer go.
This aroused conflicting emotions in Ellen. She twirled in her chair, the phone held to her ear. McQuarrie was too neat and precise a man to use the term cop killer. He was trying out the phrase, trying to sound tough or ingratiate himself. Also, his tone was accusatory. Did he ever praise? Would he ever praise her? Had he ever praised Hal Challis? Finally, the man had spies and cronies everywhere. She couldnt blame Kellock: it was his job to keep his superiors abreast of things. Still, McQuarries tone was reminding her yet again that the police force was made up of many wheels. Her own was small and barely revolved, it seemed to her. It didnt exist within, or intersect with, the wheels that mattered.
Sir, we didnt have enough evidence to hold Mr Jarrett.
Gunshot residue?
None.
Then someone from his appalling family carried it out.
They all have alibis, sir.
Good ones?
Yes, sir.
She was tired of calling him sir.
Jarrett could have washed off the GSR. Hows his alibi?
Solid, sir. We have a witness who heard a shot at eleven oclock last night and...
This fine, upstanding person didnt think to report it?
Sir, its the estate. At the time Sergeant van Alphen was shot, Laurie Jarretts daughter was being examined by a doctor and a nurse in Casualty at the Waterloo hospital. Laurie was with her the whole time. It checks out.
Convenient. What about Jarretts wife, the kids mother?
Shes in a drug rehab clinic in Perth, heroin addiction, court ordered after she was arrested for burglary and shoplifting offences.
Divorced? Separated?
Never married. She left home when Alysha was born.
Making Laurie a heroic single dad, snarled McQuarrie. It makes me sick.
She suspected he meant the loose family arrangements you found these days. She felt like reminding him that his own family wasnt squeaky clean, that his own son had taken part in suburban sex partiesthen reflected sourly that sex parties were probably seen as an acceptable aberration of the upper classes, whereas children born out of wedlock to addicts was seen as a condemnatory characteristic of the lower classes.
She cast her mind back to her interrogation with Laurie Jarrett. Deciding against a lawyer, hed opened up finally, seeming almost genial. For the first time, Ellen glimpsed what it was like for him. He was an old-style crim, who didnt use or condone drugs. He stole to make money, an income, not to feed a drug habit, unlike his sons, cousins, nephews, de facto...He was loyal to his family, bailed them out, but sometimes that love must have been sorely tested.
He still could have ordered the hit, McQuarrie was saying now.
Ordered the hit was another expression that sat oddly in the super. Well keep checking, sir.
You sound doubtful. In fact, you have doubtful outcomes mounting up all around you, Sergeant.
He sounded cocky and provocative. He was the kind of man who hated and feared womenthe hate and the fear being one and the same thing, really, for he hated women because they made him fear them. She said nothing, but a kind of black light suffused her. If hed been there with her shed have struck him. Instead, she hit him another way. Speaking of doubtful outcomes, sir, she said, did you know that Sergeant van Alphen had been coaching a witness, a street kid called Billy DaCosta, to give false evidence against the men we suspect of abducting and abusing Katie Blasko?
There was a silence. Then, in a constrained voice, McQuarrie said, Is he connected to the Jarretts, this DaCosta person?
Ellen had checked. No, sir.
How can you be sure? The Jarretts are behind this. Its a revenge killing, of a police officer, and wont be tolerated.
Sir.
Its too big for you, for your team.
Sir.
She felt oddly relieved as McQuarrie went on to tell her that Homicide Squad officers would come down from the city to take over the investigation into van Alphens murder. They have the resources and the expertise.
Sir.
Leaving you free to do whatever it was you were doing before this.
As though Katies abduction and abuse were minor things, easily forgotten. In his mind, McQuarrie probably thought that hed successfully undermined Ellen. She had a creepy sense of the forces at work around her.
* * * *
50
The days passed and she made no headway. The urgency had gone from the investigation. Not even the van Alphen murder could galvanise anyone, for when the Homicide Squad detectives took over the case, they immediately shut Waterloo staff out. There were four of them, three men and a woman, young, sleek, educated and close-mouthed.
Commandeering one of the conference rooms, they interviewed all thirty of the staff based at the stationuniformed officers, probationary constables, Ellens CIU detectives, collators, civilian clerks and cleanerstheir manner clipped and impersonal, arousing resentment.
On Friday they interviewed Ellen. They seemed cynical with her. Doubting. Probably because shed had charge of the investigation for the first few hours, she thought.
I didnt really know him, she told them.
You had him digging around in that abduction case.
He was assigned to desk duties pending the inquiry into the Nick Jarrett shooting, Ellen said. He wanted to be useful.
So useful he left his desk and operated in secret.
They were well informed. Ellen said, Unfortunately he didnt confide in me.
Did he like little boys?
I have no idea.
He was shacked up with a street kid.
She supposed that their besmirching van Alphen was part of a strategy. They wanted to know if van Alphens hidden interests and activities had made him a target. They wanted people to be outraged, and talk.
As I understand it, she said carefully, he was protecting a witness.
Do you still understand that to be the case?
Ellen shrugged. The witness claimed that hed been coached by Sergeant van Alphen, so I dont know what to believe.
Hissy fits, sudden flare-ups of temper, biting, scratching and kicking. It can get quite volatile, the gay scene.
Ellen wasnt going to let them provoke her. We dont know that he was gay. We dont know that he liked little boys. Theyre not even the same thing. Look, I know you have to examine every contingency, but why this one? It impinges on my case. Why arent you looking at the Jarrett clan?
Like you said, well look into everything.
Ellen watched them expressionlessly, their four clever faces staring back at her, giving nothing away. Shed scarcely registered their names or ranks. Not even gender factored here. The four detectives were interchangeable. I expect, or at least request, full co-operation from you, she said firmly.
They said nothing.
If your investigation into Sergeant van Alphen turns up anything related to child abductions or the activities of a supposed paedophile ring on the Peninsula, then I want you to pass it on to me, she continued. Formal or informal witness statements, names and addresses, case notes, jottings, files, computer records, child pornography, phone numbers scribbled on napkins, anything at all.
And if this material also relates to his murder
?
Then we overlap, Ellen said. She hesitated. Is there anything? Have you got suspicions?
She wanted them to articulate her suspicionsthat van Alphen had been protecting paedophiles, hence his sloppy police work and indifference regarding Alysha Jarrett. That hed intended to betray Billy DaCosta by claiming Billy had lied to him, which would have raised doubts about information given by genuine victims. That, even so, the members of his paedophile ring had killed him to shut him up. Killed Billy, too.
