Blood Moon ic-5

by Garry Disher

  ‘Keep your heads down.’

  ‘Don’t worry.’

  ‘What’s he doing?’

  ‘Getting back into his car.’

  ‘Be prepared to follow, but don’t panic him. I’ve called for a chopper.’

  ‘He’s already in a panic, Sarge.’

  ‘Don’t aggravate it, John, okay?’

  ‘Okay, Sarge.’

  ‘You drive, not your partner.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  She knew that Tankard had done an advanced-driving course; she didn’t know about Cree and didn’t have the time to find out. But when Pam Murphy gave the briefest recriminatory flicker just then, she guessed she’d trodden on toes. Couldn’t worry about that now: ‘All we do is track him, okay?’

  ‘Received.’

  ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘Heading for the roundabout.’

  ‘Tell them to let him through.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  Pam and Ellen were no more than two minutes away from Waterloo now. If Josh Brownlee headed for home, he’d pass them going the other way. But there were other possible exits from the town: further south toward Penzance Beach, or directly across the Peninsula to Mornington, on Port Phillip Bay. Pam said, ‘All we need to do is get him on a straight stretch of road, Sarge. Take him when there are no cars around.’

  ‘But how?’

  ‘Mobile take-out.’

  ‘You know how to do that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Ellen knew that the younger woman had received pursuit car training. ‘Does Tank know?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Ellen switched to the radio, saying, ‘John?’

  ‘Sarge.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Heading for Jamieson’s Road.’

  Pam and Ellen were on Jamieson’s Road. It was quiet and straight for long stretches. Pam braked immediately and did a U-turn. Ellen looked back over her shoulder. ‘We’re on Jamieson’s now.’

  ‘Facing which way?’

  ‘We turned around so he should be coming up behind us any minute. Where are you?’

  ‘Just behind him.’

  ‘Are both Waterloo cars on his tail?’

  ‘Affirmative.’

  ‘We do a mobile take-out. You up for that?’

  ‘Am I?’ Tank said. ‘Just say the word.’

  Ellen visualised the gleam in the eyes of the beefy young cop. ‘By the book, John. This isn’t the Grand Prix.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  The voices were quieter after that, calmer but more tense, as Pam Murphy mapped out the strategy and Ellen relayed instructions to the pursuit cars. ‘He’ll come up behind us. Pam will keep her speed down. Before he pulls out to overtake, your two cars need to come up fast behind him, one on his rear bumper, the other beside him. He’ll be boxed in and have nowhere to go.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  ‘John, you need to be the one to come alongside him.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  ‘If we meet oncoming traffic, drop back and let it through.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  ‘I’m hoping the chopper will give us plenty of warning if there is other traffic ahead.’

  Then there was silence, only the rush of their passage through the air and the muted howl of their tyres. Pam Murphy was driving at 110 km/h. She dropped back to 90, then 80, her eyes on the rear-view mirror, finally murmuring, ‘There he is.’

  Ellen had made radio connection to the helicopter by now, a spotter advising, ‘You have a clear stretch ahead.’

  ‘Start taking your positions, John.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  They said nothing. Pam dropped speed, then accelerated a little, keeping Josh Brownlee on their tail while the other cars came into position. The little Subaru was close behind the CIU car now, itching to pass. Then John Tankard’s voice crackled, ‘Permission to draw alongside.’

  ‘Permission granted.’

  Ellen, head craned to watch through the back window, saw the police car swing out from behind the Subaru and draw abreast of it. Brownlee glanced at it wildly, then at her, and then into his rear view mirror, for the second police car was now riding his rear bumper.

  She sensed his panic and shrieking fury. He had nowhere to go. Pam began to brake, slowing to 70, 60, forcing Brownlee to brake. He was firmly boxed in now, cars on three sides, a grassy bank on the fourth, and Ellen saw him thump the steering wheel with his fist. Still the tight knot of cars continued to decelerate, and then Josh Brownlee flicked the wheel and bounced the Subaru against John Tankard’s car. The Subaru yawed, overcorrected, and shot off the road, slamming into the bank. It bounced back onto the road, side-on, and metal crumpled as the trailing car smacked into Brownlee’s door.

  It was one way of concluding the pursuit. There was damage done, cuts and bruises, but no one was seriously hurt. No one died. The police cars could be put together again. Ellen and Pam tumbled out of the CIU car, feeling exhilarated. They joined Tankard and Cree, Cree calling tow trucks and an ambulance using his mobile phone, Tank securing the shotgun.

  ‘Everybody okay?’

  ‘Sarge.’

  Ellen, still exhilarated, put the issue of the paperwork out of her mind. She put her actions in Adrian Wishart’s house out of her mind. Instead, she hugged Pam Murphy, and then she proceeded to arrest poor, pathetic Josh Brownlee, who was sitting there in the grass, weeping and holding his bleeding scalp.

  ****

  40

  By now it was early afternoon. Scobie Sutton had spent the morning obtaining CCTV and speed camera coverage of the Nepean Highway. Assuming that Adrian Wishart had joined the Nepean as far south as Frankston on Wednesday afternoon, that was a lot of ground to cover, but all he needed were time-stamped images revealing the guy had driven to and from his uncle’s place at the times claimed in his formal statement.

  Meanwhile he was still waiting for Ludmilla Wishart’s phone and credit card records, and he was trying to locate Peninsula-based CCTV and speed cameras. So far all he’d got were frowns and scratched heads. It was as if the local bureaucrats had never been asked to provide that kind of information or cooperation before-and perhaps they hadn’t.

  An hour passed. His eyes hurt. The grainy images jerked and flickered until one vehicle began to look like another and the locations merged. A second hour, a third. He was due to collect Ros from school and take her to netball soon. He couldn’t rely on Beth to do that kind of thing any more. But Challis was breathing down his neck, wanting to know where Ludmilla Wishart had been, wanting to know where her husband had been.

  He almost missed it, the beetly little Citroen zipping through a Nepean Highway intersection. He checked the time: 12.17. That matched the uncle’s account. According to Terry Wishart, Adrian had arrived at his shop after twelve-thirty but before one o’clock. Then they’d gone to lunch at Terry’s local RSL.

  Scobie rubbed his eyes. Now he had to track the Citroen’s return journey. Ludmilla had been seen alive at around four or four-thirty, and according to the post-mortem report, murdered late afternoon or early evening. Adrian had reported her missing at 8 p.m., claiming he’d left the city to drive back to the Peninsula at around 5 p.m. Scobie decided to map movements and times as though Wishart had lied. How long would it take him to return to the Peninsula, track down his wife, then murder her? More than an hour-maybe as much as ninety minutes, or even two hours. So he might have left his brother as early as three o’clock, three-thirty.

  Scobie’s window was suddenly very wide.

  Time passed and his eyes felt scratchy, as if he’d been in a sandstorm. He knuckled them. That didn’t help, only aggravated the problem. He made several trips to the men’s bathroom to splash water on them. He even went to the sick bay and searched futilely for eye drops, until a civilian collator took pity on him. She belonged to their church. Of course, she asked about Beth.

  ‘I haven’t seen her for ages, Scobie. Is everything all right?’

  ‘Everything’s
fine,’ Scobie said.

  ‘I heard she’d joined another denomination,’ the woman said carefully.

  If Scobie had been a different kind of man he’d have said, ‘Fuck you.’ He thanked the woman and returned to the monitor and the tapes.

  Eventually he was convinced: Adrian Wishart had not driven back along the Nepean between 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. In the hands of a good lawyer, that might seem like compelling evidence, but Scobie knew there were other routes back to the Peninsula, and other means of transport.

  He’d have to start all over again.

  ****

  41

  A doctor came to the police station, examined Josh Brownlee-cleaned a small cut and gave him some painkillers-and cleared him for interrogation. Now they were in one of the interview rooms in the corridors behind the reception desk, Josh and a solicitor hired by his parents on one side of the plastic table, Pam Murphy and Andrew Cree on the other. John Tankard was holding up the wall behind them. There were only four chairs in the room and Cree, the slippery little prick, had got in first. Tank watched and listened, his back and legs aching. At times like this he felt his excess weight in every bone. Ellen Destry might have been there too, but she’d left it up to Murph, saying she intended to go back and search Josh Brownlee’s bedroom and computer.

  Tank listened to Murph run through the preliminaries for the benefit of the tape, and then watched her tap her folders and reports into alignment, taking several silent seconds over it, both to give herself time, he presumed, and to unnerve Brownlee.

  ‘Josh,’ she began.

  If Brownlee were older, or looked less pathetic-a cut on his forehead, nose swollen and traces of caked blood in his nostrils-she might have called him ‘Mr Brownlee’. Right now, to everyone in the room, he was just a sad kid named Josh.

  ‘Josh, let’s start at the beginning,’ Murph went on. Tank could see from her posture how tense she was, and it was excitement, not the fear of failure. ‘You attended Landseer as a day student, not a boarder?’

  ‘Yes,’ mumbled the boy.

  ‘You did Year 12 last year, not this year?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Josh stared at the table top, pouring his misery into the layers of it already there, expressed in scratches and stains over the long years.

  ‘Yet you attended Schoolies Week this year, as though you were still in Year 12?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Tank wondered if the solicitor, a middle-aged woman, had seen her own kids go through ali kinds of adolescent shit. Maybe she believed in owning up and atonement; she was making no attempt to halt Murph’s flow.

  ‘We’ll go into the question of why you did that later. As a Year 12 student last year, did you have any dealings with the chaplain at your school, Mr Lachlan Roe?’

  ‘Not much.’

  ‘But you knew him, knew who he was?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Have you had any dealings with Mr Roe since that time? This year, I mean?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘None?’

  Josh showed a glimmer of spirit and looked up at her and down again. ‘You said it yourself, I’m not at school any more.’

  ‘Let’s go back to Monday evening of this week.’

  Josh shrugged sulkily.

  ‘Can you account for your movements, Josh?’

  He shrugged again. These kids are great shruggers, thought Tank.

  ‘Just, you know, hanging around.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘You know, with other kids.’

  ‘Other kids,’ said Murph heavily. ‘Kids younger than you? Kids who were in Year 12 this year? Or do you mean kids like yourself who had a ball last year and wanted to do it all again? Kids who didn’t want to grow up? Or maybe you were hanging out with the toolies this year?’

  Josh flushed dangerously and the solicitor laid a gnarled, be-ringed hand on his forearm to caution him. ‘Really, Constable Murphy,’ she said, ‘where are you leading us? What crime are you investigating here? My client has been charged with traffic and firearms offences, and as you know, there are mitigating circumstances, such as the attack on him Wednesday night.

  Pam smiled sweetly and gathered her thoughts. ‘Josh, did you or did you not encounter Mr Roe at or near his house on Monday evening?’

  Josh swallowed. ‘Don’t think so.’

  ‘It’s only a few days ago.’

  ‘I think I said hello.’

  ‘It is alleged, Josh, that you had an altercation with him. What do you have to say to that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It’s even possible that he provoked you in some way.’

  She’s trying to give him an out, Tank thought.

  ‘I put it to you that there was a scuffle, Josh, and Mr Roe was accidentally knocked unconscious. Isn’t that right?’

  Tank watched as the kid struggled with this version of the truth, which put a gloss on the incident so that he wouldn’t feel so bad about beating the crap out of the chaplain. Seeing a kind of relief suddenly flood Josh’s face, Tank realised he was nearly there. Wanting to amp up the pressure on the kid, Tank stepped away from the wall and, with a quick, complicit, flirty smile at Murph, said, ‘You gay, Josh? Did you try to pick him up? Vice versa?’

  The fallout was extreme, the solicitor hard and protective, Murph furiously throwing down her pen and Josh shrieking, ‘No! No!’ and throwing himself at Tank. Tank wrestled the kid into his chair again, saying, ‘Looks like I touched a nerve, eh, Josh?’

  The solicitor said furiously, ‘Constable Tankard, you’re provoking my client needlessly. He’s been in a car accident-’

  ‘Cleared by the doctor,’ flashed Tank.

  ‘-and so I suggest we stop this charade immediately.’

  Tank opened his mouth to reply. Murph snarled, ‘Shut it, Tank, okay?’

  No one saw the slow smile that Andy Cree gave him. Tank felt hot and explosive, but subsided against the wall, not meeting anyone’s gaze.

  Meanwhile Murph was saying, ‘Josh? Do you want to have a break?’

  The solicitor said, ‘Yes, he does.’

  Josh said, ‘No, I don’t.’

  The solicitor threw up her hands theatrically but sat back as if to say that if her client was set on acting against his best interests, what could she do about it?

  ‘All right, Josh; let’s go back to Monday evening. You admit to meeting Mr Roe?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Tank wondered what game Murph was playing. There were too many undercurrents for him. The whisper around the station was that Josh Brownlee’s DNA had been found on Roe’s clothing, so why wasn’t she blindsiding him with that, asking him to account for it? Maybe-it came to him suddenly-the DNA sample she’d obtained from him hadn’t been authorised, and so she couldn’t use it legally. She wanted an admission. But how did it fit in with all the other stuff, the rape on Saturday night, the whispers of sexual assault at last year’s Schoolies Week, Josh found naked on the beach Wednesday night, and all that shit with the shotgun?

  ‘Did you talk to Mr Roe?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘What about?’

  Josh scratched abstractedly at the top of the table as if looking back through days, months and years of misery. The solicitor said, ‘What does this have to do with the misdemeanours with which my client has been charged?’

  Pam ignored her. ‘Josh?’

  ‘Stuff.’

  ‘Your brother Michael went to Landseer, correct?’

  Josh trembled and his face spasmed in grief. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did he have contact with Mr Roe?’

  Josh exploded. ‘Mister Roe! Why do you keep calling him that? Why do you give him that kind of respect?’

  ‘He’s lying in a hospital bed, Josh, beaten so badly he could die.’

  Tank knew that wasn’t true. The doctors had confirmed that Lachlan Roe would live. He’d be a vegetable, but he wasn’t going to die.

  ‘Good! He deserves it!’

  Pam asked what th
ey all genuinely wanted to ask: ‘Why, Josh?’

  ‘For what he did to Mike.’

  ‘Your brother?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Michael went to him for advice last year? At school?’

  ‘Yes? cried Josh. ‘The bastard had just been appointed chaplain. All this crap at assembly, all these politicians were there, how great the school chaplaincy program was, how great Roe was, how he’d offer guidance and support.’

  Murph said gently, ‘But he didn’t, did he, Josh?’

  ‘He killed my brother!’ Josh said shrilly, face distended, spittle flecking the table.

  ‘Something he said to Michael? Something he did?’

  Josh wrenched his head from left to right, not meeting their gaze, his neck tendons standing out like rods under his skin. ‘Mike was gay.’

  He didn’t say anything after that, and Tank tried to put it together. Murph said, ‘Michael was upset or confused about his sexuality?’

  ‘Yes,’ whispered Josh.

  ‘Did your parents know?’

  ‘Fuck no! You don’t know what they’re like.’

  ‘Did he confide in you?

  ‘Not much,’ said Josh miserably.

  ‘But you knew.’

  ‘He left me a note! He fucking wrote me a letter, then took an overdose and killed himself

  Pam reached across the table and held his hand. ‘Do you still have the letter?’ she asked presently.

  ‘No,’ Josh said, eyes sliding away, returning his hand to his lap, so that Tank knew he was lying. Maybe Sergeant Destry would find it.

  ‘What did it say?’

  Josh leaned forward tensely. ‘He’d gone to Roe for help. He wanted to know how to tell Mum and Dad and me he was gay, how to broach it.’

  Josh stopped. Murph said, ‘What advice did Roe give your brother?’

  The tears spilled down Josh’s face. He said, very distinctly, ‘The bastard told Mike that being gay was an abomination in the eyes of God and all right-thinking people. He said Mike should be ashamed and beg forgiveness and change his ways. He said Mike was sick, a sick person, with sick thoughts. He said Mike made his skin crawl.’

  Even Cree seemed affected. Pam said, ‘And your poor brother had nowhere to turn?’