Slaughter Park

by Barry Maitland

  ‘It’s not relevant. Just tell me where she is. Her family will reward you handsomely, I assure you.’

  ‘I need to talk to someone who was there, on Maturiki with her, to make sure I’m on the right track.’

  Horn sighs, breaks off to speak to someone, then comes back on. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

  ‘Yeah, do that.’

  32

  It doesn’t take Kelly long to identify the MP. Husam Roshed, representing a western Sydney constituency, has a reputation as a scourge of corruption in the public service. Kelly has met him before, some years ago, but doesn’t expect him to remember her.

  ‘Of course I remember, Kelly. And I read all your articles in the Times. Always thought-provoking.’

  Kelly feels herself being charmed, and liking it. He suggests she come to Parliament House and meets her there at the security point on Macquarie Street, shows her into one of the rooms nearby.

  ‘This place has always been steeped in corruption. When Governor Macquarie told the British government that the new colony needed a hospital, they said go ahead, but we won’t give you any money for it. So he paid for it with a drug deal—he gave the builder a monopoly on the import of rum. This room was part of the principal surgeon’s house. So what sort of corruption are you interested in?’

  Kelly is a little disconcerted by his dark eyes, his easy smile.

  ‘Actually, I wanted to talk to you about the murder of Terry Palfreyman.’

  He nods, a little wearily. ‘Ah, Mr Palfreyman, yes.’

  ‘You knew him?’

  ‘Oh, yes, over a number of years. It began promisingly enough. He had recently lost his mining engineering business, but he had current knowledge of what was going on in the coalfields, and he pointed me in the direction of a corrupt deal between an official in the Department of Mineral Resources and one of the big mining companies. I raised questions in the house, there was an investigation and his information proved to be correct.

  ‘From then on things went downhill. He became more and more erratic and obsessive. He tried to involve me in his feud with the company that bought out his business, but then he was charged with arson. I told him I couldn’t help him. He ended up a crank, sitting outside here with a placard. It was a sad story. But I know nothing about his murder. How did you think I could help?’

  ‘So he didn’t tell you anything concrete? Anything that would provide a motive to kill him?’

  ‘Oh, he made plenty of accusations, mainly against Nordlund Resources, beginning with commercial fraud and bullying, and becoming wilder and wilder. It culminated with some crazy conspiracy where Konrad Nordlund murdered his brother, and was even mixed up in the death of Justice Belltree—remember that business?’

  ‘Yes, I do. But you didn’t think there was anything in his claims?’

  ‘Oh no, it was crazy stuff.’

  ‘You see,’ Kelly says, ‘everybody seems to assume he was mad, stumbling around annoying everyone with his crazy stories, and his death was kind of inevitable, like the final act of a Greek tragedy. But suppose, among all the wild rantings, he had evidence that really did represent a danger to someone?’

  ‘Do you have anything to support that?’

  ‘Apparently the killers turned his house upside down, as if they were looking for something.’

  ‘Is that so? You say “killers”, plural? I thought they were looking for a woman?’

  ‘Apparently a car with two men in it was seen coming from his street at that time.’

  ‘The police have told you this?’

  ‘No, I got it from asking around out there. The police have said very little, almost as if they don’t want to talk about this case.’

  ‘They’re probably overwhelmed by the Slater Park murders—Konrad Nordlund again.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘You didn’t hear him this morning? On talkback radio, 2GB. He’s been trying to put together a development proposal for Slater Park for years apparently, but the government can’t make up its mind to sell the land because of objections from local groups. He claims it was a disaster waiting to happen. He also had a go at the incompetence of the police.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Funny to actually hear Nordlund speaking out. Usually he keeps in the background, away from the media. Gets others to front for him, as he did for the redevelopment of Crucifixion Creek. But you know all about that.’

  ‘You mean through Ozdevco.’

  ‘Exactly, Maram Mansur. I know Maram—we went to the same school. His family and mine came from the same village in the Bekaa Valley.’

  ‘I did try to contact him, but he seems to have disappeared.’

  ‘That’d be Maram—duck and run.’ Roshed rubs his cheek, thinking. ‘You know, for all his infuriating manner and crazy ideas, I always had the feeling that there might be a germ of truth in Palfreyman’s theories about Konrad Nordlund.’

  ‘Can I quote you on that?’

  ‘As long as you’re very careful how you put it. Maybe it’s time he and Maram felt some heat.’

  33

  Harry gets into a lift in the Gipps Tower and presses the button for the twenty-third floor. As he rises through the atrium he thinks about Jenny. Having found each other again, the parting in Marrickville was particularly painful, all the more so for Jenny since she’s desperate to be with her baby again. But they agreed that the only safe course was for her to stay on with Mrs Ngô until they can work out an alternative.

  The lift doors open and he heads to Horn’s office. The summons was a curt text: Come to my office 4:30 pm today re our matter.

  The receptionist takes him through to a small windowless meeting room, offers him tea or coffee, which he declines. He waits in silence for a while until he hears someone else arriving. Then Horn opens the door and shows in a young man. He is wearing an expensive black suit, dazzling white shirt with cufflinks, and shiny black shoes with red shoelaces.

  ‘Ah, Mr Belltree,’ Horn says, ‘I’d like you to meet Ryan Nordlund, Konrad’s eldest son. Ryan was at Maturiki at the time Amber left, and has agreed to tell you what he can.’

  They shake hands, sit, assessing each other. Ryan Nordlund smiles at the receptionist, asks for an espresso. Horn takes a seat at the head of the table, gestures at Harry. ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘Thank you. Can you tell me who else was on Maturiki Island while Amber was there?’

  Ryan gives him names, sounding bored. He perks up a little when his coffee arrives.

  Harry says, ‘Did she say why she was leaving?’

  Ryan shrugs. ‘A whim, I think. A sudden impulse. She’s like that.’ His voice is expensive private school.

  ‘There was no special reason for it? An argument? A fight?’

  ‘No, no, nothing like that.’

  ‘You said her uncle left for Sydney around then?’

  ‘The previous day, with a business colleague.’

  ‘How did they travel?’

  ‘Chopper to Pentecost, then private jet to Sydney.’ He says it with a casual smile, showing off.

  ‘But Amber and Karen Schaefer took commercial flights from Pentecost to Port Vila, then Port Vila to Sydney. It took them all day.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So why didn’t they go the previous day with your father in the private jet?’

  ‘Don’t know. She probably didn’t think of it. She doesn’t really plan things out.’

  ‘Did something happen between the time of your father’s departure and Amber deciding to leave?’

  ‘Nothing special.’

  ‘A disagreement of some kind?’

  ‘No, I’ve already told you, nothing like that. Amber has mood swings, up one minute, down the next. Impulsive. It’s her illness. She’s mentally ill.’

  ‘She must have told someone the reason. Surely you were curious?’

  Horn broke in. ‘I think Ryan has answered you, Belltree. What’s the point of these questions?’

  ‘The point i
s that I’ve tracked down someone who I think has seen Amber since she got back to Sydney, but he’s reluctant to talk to me. He believes that something happened to Amber on Maturiki and that she is frightened of her family. That’s why she’s gone into hiding. He won’t talk to me because he’s afraid I’ll betray her to them. So I need to know the truth, so that I can reassure him.’

  Horn shakes his head impatiently. ‘Waste of time. Tell me how to contact him and I’ll persuade him.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I’ll offer him money, Mr Belltree. It invariably works.’

  ‘No, not this time.’

  ‘Actually,’ Ryan says, looking thoughtfully up at the ceiling, ‘there was something, now I come to think of it. After Dad left in the chopper, Hayden, Tayla and I decided to go scuba diving out on the reef. Amber saw us and said she wanted to come too. I wasn’t at all keen, because she was on medication, et cetera, but she insisted, said it would be good for her burns. So she came, only when she went into the water she had trouble with the pressure in her ears, and we had to leave her below the boat to give her a chance to equalise. While she was there some kind of fish came up towards her. She thought it was a shark, though I don’t believe it was—they don’t generally come inside the reef. Whatever, it scared the shit out of her and she got hysterical. Karen had to medicate her, and that night she had bad dreams. I think that must have been what triggered her decision to leave. But look, between us, Amber’s off her head half the time, imagining things, frightened of her shadow. Not surprising really, given what she’s been through. Well, you’d know all about that, wouldn’t you, Harry?’

  Horn says, ‘Satisfied, Mr Belltree? Now let me have this man’s details.’

  ‘I’d like to speak to Karen Schaefer.’

  ‘Not possible. Ryan has been good enough to answer your questions. Time to get this settled. Give me the man’s details and I’ll sort it out.’

  ‘I don’t have his details, but I think I can find him again.’

  ‘Do that. Reassure him. Tell him Amber’s family will pay generously to have her returned home.’

  34

  Harry returns to Nicole’s house and another night with Abigail. She seems quieter, maybe getting used to him. He has three clear hours of sleep before she starts up. He’s more relaxed about it this time, more comfortable with the routine, and she settles again quite quickly.

  At breakfast Nicole, reading the paper, mouth full of toast, exclaims, ‘Kelly’s written an article about the Palfreyman murder.’ She scans it, then gives it to Harry.

  It focuses on the character of Terry Palfreyman, and the possibility that he wasn’t simply a mad nuisance, but an informed whistleblower who represented a danger to certain powerful figures, unnamed. She quotes Husam Roshed to support this view. If correct, it suggests that the police, whose investigation seems to have led nowhere, have been looking in the wrong direction. She also reports an anonymous Blackheath source as saying that a car with two men in it was seen leaving Palfreyman’s street at the time of the murder.

  At her office desk, Kelly is also reading her article. There’s always something different, more authoritative, about seeing her words printed in the paper or on the screen, with the smart typography and supporting photographs. The picture of Detective Inspector Velasco leading the case is particularly good. It’s an old photo that Kelly took at the time of Crucifixion Creek, and Deb looks harassed, not quite on top of things. That should get her going.

  Kelly’s phone buzzes. The receptionist in the front lobby tells her that two police officers are here to see her. Kelly asks for their names and is told Deb Velasco and Jack Anders. She says she’ll be right down.

  They’re in the lobby, looking impatient, and she takes them to a meeting room where she offers them coffee. Both shake their heads, then Deb slaps down a copy of the morning’s paper and barks, ‘If you had evidence relating to the Palfreyman murder you should have given it to us.’

  Kelly doesn’t reply, and after an awkward moment Anders, more conciliatory, says, ‘Pitching in with stuff like this without first talking to us isn’t going to make you any friends in the police service, Kelly.’

  ‘I’m sorry about that, Jack, but I’ve spoken to you several times since the murder, and you’ve given me nothing, so I decided I’d have to do a bit of investigating for myself.’

  Deb tries again. ‘I want to know who told you about the car with two men in it.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Inspector, I can’t do that. The person is very nervous and worried about consequences, and only told me on the strict condition that I didn’t tell anyone their name.’

  Anders says, ‘What time exactly did they see the car, Kelly?’

  ‘It was dusk. The light wasn’t good, but they definitely saw two men in a sedan leaving that street. They didn’t get the number or make, I’m afraid. I felt they were a credible witness. Maybe when you’ve got the killers locked up they’ll be willing to come forward.’

  ‘And who are these “powerful interests” that Palfreyman threatened?’ Deb says.

  ‘Well, I think that wouldn’t take a lot of imagination. Palfreyman was pretty outspoken about his theories, only nobody paid any attention. He had a longstanding feud with Nordlund Resources, of course—everyone knows that—but I certainly wouldn’t suggest in any way, shape or form that Konrad Nordlund was involved. Particularly since he owns thirteen per cent of this newspaper.’

  Jack Anders chuckles; Deb Velasco glares.

  Kelly says, ‘Have you spoken to Husam Roshed?’

  ‘Not yet. He seems to be unavailable at present.’

  ‘Oh, well, I think he would be worth talking to. He got very irritated with Palfreyman, but he does seem to feel that he had genuine information. Tell me, was Palfreyman’s house turned over? Could his murderers have been searching for something?’

  Both detectives stare at Kelly blankly.

  ‘You see,’ she says. ‘That’s all I’ve been getting from you—no comment. How about the mystery woman you wanted to interview? Any sightings of her?’

  ‘No comment,’ Anders says.

  ‘This isn’t some kind of police cover-up, is it?’

  Deb Velasco gets abruptly to her feet. ‘Come on, Jack. This is a waste of time.’

  They aren’t long gone, Kelly back at her desk, when she gets a call from the MP.

  Roshed says, ‘Excellent article, Kelly. Do you want to follow it up?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I’ve booked a seat for you in the gallery at question time in parliament this afternoon, two-thirty. I’ll be putting some questions to the minister. Should stir things up.’

  ‘Great. I’ve just had two cops from homicide here questioning me about my sources. They want to speak to you.’

  ‘Yes, I know. I’m keeping out of their way till this afternoon, then I’m all theirs.’

  ‘Well, I’ll look forward to question time then.’

  When she hangs up Kelly thinks about how else she might follow up on the Palfreyman murder. She has already investigated Fogarty online and in the Times archives, and has checked a string of references to him in crime stories dating back to the 1990s, but found only one mention of anything dubious—a report from his time in the drug squad, of a claim by a small-time drug dealer that he had been framed by Fogarty. She asks Brendon Pyle if he remembers anything. He’s not sure, promises to look into it, in a vague, preoccupied sort of way.

  35

  Harry pulls into a space in a rooftop car park behind Illawarra Road and walks down to Mrs Ngô’s shop. He fills up a bag with fresh fruit and vegetables, then goes through to the back and up the stairs to Jenny’s room. They embrace, Harry gives her the latest report on Abigail—her weight, her mood, the rash—and shows her Kelly’s article in the Times. When they’re ready Harry brings the car to the back entrance to the shop. Jenny gets in quickly with the bag of produce and they head to 32 Mont Street. The drug dealer is still sitting outside with his dog and littl
e bird, which is chirping up at the sun. In the hallway one of the Chinese students is standing in a doorway eating his breakfast with chopsticks from a bowl. They say hello and he nods silently and watches them as they climb the stairs.

  Amber is sitting by the open window, smoking, and a jar lid on the sill is full of butts. Zuckermann appears to be sleeping, and they pull the chairs over to the window to talk quietly with her. Outside a dazzling blue sky arcs over the jumbled tin roofs and backyards, the CBD towers in the background. Amber wears a short-sleeved top and the white scar tissue covering her left arm is covered with vivid pink scratch marks.

  Everything’s fine until Harry mentions seeing Ryan Nordlund with Nathaniel Horn. Amber stiffens in alarm. ‘You didn’t tell them anything, did you?’

  ‘No. I said it was important that I understand what happened at Maturiki to make you leave so suddenly.’

  ‘Ohhh…’ Amber groans as if in physical pain. ‘I told you to forget that. Why did you have to…’

  She seems on the point of tears, and Jenny takes hold of her hand and says, ‘We just want to help you. If Harry can get an idea of what frightened you so badly he can do something about it.’

  Amber shakes her head, sniffs. ‘Go on then, what did he have to say?’

  ‘He said that you went scuba diving with them on the previous day, after Konrad left the island.’

  ‘Well, that’s true. What else?’

  ‘That when you were in the water you saw a shark…’

  ‘Ha!’ Amber laughs bitterly. ‘The only sharks out there were Ryan and Hayden.’

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘I got sick, with the water pressure and stuff, that’s all. So when we got back to the beach Karen told me off and stuffed me full of junk that knocked me out cold until late that night, when I woke up and discovered that Ryan and Hayden had come into my room and raped me while I’d been unconscious.’

  Jenny gives a cry and wraps her arms around Amber, who begins to weep.

  When she has recovered a little, Harry says gently, ‘Amber, I’m sorry, but I have to ask. If you were unconscious, how do you know what happened?’