The White Tower

by Dorothy Johnston

  ‘Niall. You’re freezing. Let’s walk.’

  ‘Take it out of commission,’ I told him.

  He said, ‘You are right, and everybody else is wrong?’

  Everybody else? He meant himself.

  ‘Decommission it,’ I said.

  ‘It’s not just my decision.’

  ‘If you say so, your word will carry the day.’

  ‘Do you remember Sally?’ he asked. ‘Her mother brought her to see me today. She’s looking fine and her mother is a different person.’

  Of course I remember Sally. I don’t know if he could see my nod in the dark. When I think about it, he didn’t look at me the whole time we were talking. The feeling between us, the closeness, the respect, all that’s left of that is in our antagonism. Is that why he wanted to meet me there, because he knew I’d have trouble reading his expression? It’s never worried him before.

  ‘The old Ventac would have saved Sally,’ I told him.

  ‘Our success rate’s gone up twenty per cent.’

  ‘It’s a machine,’ I told him. ‘A machine with something wrong with it. Next time it might kill a child.’

  He opened his hands again, not to me, but perhaps the gesture hadn’t been for me the first time either, any of the other times.

  He took my arm. I could feel his warm breath on my cheek. I shook him off. It’s not much of a resistance I know, but I’m glad I did it.

  ‘I won’t go on waiting for a tragedy to happen,’ I shot back over my shoulder. ‘I’ve written my own report and I’m going to publish it.’

  He let me get ahead of him. I hurried. He was soon out of sight.

  . . .

  I blinked and shook my head. It was hard to believe that there were people living in my street whose biggest worry that night was whether a late frost would kill their tomatoes. Ivan’s worn tracksuit smelt of sun and soap powder. Our office curtains were open on a dark backyard, a hills hoist. A blackbird began to sing.

  ‘His mistake,’ said Ivan, ‘was thinking he could fix things on his own.’

  ‘That’s what Eamonn said.’

  How alike Niall and Fallon must have been. And how different. I imagined the pleasure, the small Celtic jewel of pleasure, perhaps the last of his life, Niall had got from modelling his hiding place, the way it must have brought them closer, in his mind at least, even as Fallon was condemning and rejecting him. I had a flash of Bridget Connell, alias Sgartha, in the middle of the factory, in front of the bird car, her spiky hair, enormous claim on her own and other people’s fantasies. Had she seen herself as Niall’s protector? How did she shoulder her share of the responsibility, alone, in the middle of the night?

  On impulse, I forwarded all of Niall’s files to Sorley Fallon.

  Twenty

  We dozed for a few hours, then I checked my mail. No reply from Fallon.

  I rang Brook, who said that he thought he had enough for a warrant for Fenshaw, and that it would probably take about twenty-four hours to get.

  ‘Sorry to wake you so early.’

  ‘That’s okay. I’ve got my second wind.’

  ‘Second winds,’ I told him, ‘are blowing right through Canberra.’

  The phone rang while we were having breakfast. It was Robert Ferris from the Telstra Tower.

  He said the police had been back to the tower interviewing everyone. ‘We all thought that business was over and done with.’

  ‘Is there something you think the police should know?’

  ‘I saw you there one night,’ Ferris said. ‘You had your kids with you. I’ve a grand-daughter about the same age as your little girl.’

  ‘How did you know it was me?’

  ‘Olga Birtus told me what you looked like.’

  ‘Can we meet for coffee?’

  Ferris didn’t reply straight away, and I thought he was going to refuse, but eventually I got him to agree to meet me at the Botanical Gardens in the early afternoon. It was his day off, he was looking after his four-year-old grandson, and had already arranged to take the boy there. His wife would call by later and pick the boy up to take him shopping. I listened to these family arrangements, understanding that they were Ferris’s attempt to impose normality on an abnormal situation, wondering what had happened to make him seek me out.

  I fetched my photocopy of the coronial report to check what it said about him. Hans Rowholt had been in charge of security the evening Niall Howley died, and Ferris had been with him. A third man was mentioned, Ian McFarlane, who’d been on duty at the security entrance. The police did not seem to have taken a statement from McFarlane.

  According to his testimony, Ferris had not heard or seen anything unusual. No visitor had been reported behaving suspiciously. He did not remember having seen Niall Howley. There’d been no one on any of the outside galleries when he and Rowholt had locked up at ten o’clock.

  . . .

  The Botanical Gardens consisted entirely of Australian native plants. They made me feel, contrarily, as though I was both inside a greenhouse, and wide open to the air. I remembered this feeling as soon as I stepped out of the car, recalling my visits to the gardens with Peter when he was a small boy.

  The air smelt cared for. It used to make me feel better just to walk along gravel paths between eucalypts and acacias with such air around me. While Peter ran up and down, I’d stand at the edge of the rainforest watching. One of his favourite games had been to run along the steep paths waiting for the sprinklers to come on. It didn’t always happen, but when it did he’d yell with delight, flinging his arms wide as though to catch the water.

  From the car park, you could see the line where the gardens ended and ordinary bush took over, the Telstra Tower’s needle point above the mountain.

  Ferris had arranged to meet me at the duck pond. It wasn’t really a duck pond, but when he suggested it I knew immediately where he meant. Duck pond suggested grassy English banks. This stretch of water, surrounded by large untidy casuarinas, was nearly always in shadow, and the black ducks, being wild and not domestic, were sometimes not to be found at all.

  When they were there, they quacked appropriately and ate the bread that children threw. The water was edged with mud and slippery rocks, but there was a wooden seat for parents. In the spring, if you were lucky, duck parents paraded their offspring and kept children entertained.

  I saw Ferris as soon as I rounded the corner of the car park. He was sitting on the wooden bench. It had to be him. There was no other grandparently figure in sight, and a boy in a red parka running madly up and down the grass was clearly in his care. I recognised him as the guard who’d appeared at the security door, while I stood at the lift well watching, the night Ivan and I had gone to the tower.

  He looked up and I waved. He didn’t wave back, but got to his feet and called the boy over to him.

  I smiled at the boy, who didn’t smile back, but stared up at me through a thick blond fringe. He was a comfortable-looking child. His parka was spotless, and his dark green tracksuit pants looked ironed.

  ‘James and I thought we might walk down to the swamp.’

  ‘Fine. That’s fine.’ I smiled again, to show that none of this was meant to be an ordeal. ‘Lead the way.’

  And lead the way they did. Walking, the family resemblance between the man and boy became more apparent. They both had the same square-shaped head on solid, rolling bodies. Though Ferris’s hair was grey, it was thick and plentiful. I imagined it as once having been a bright mop like his grandson’s, who gave a skip, then ran ahead along the path.

  ‘How long have you been working at the tower?’ I asked, glancing up again, wondering if he found its presence overbearing.

  ‘Seventeen years.’

  ‘How long have you been using your current computer system?’

  Ferris shot me a look, but he answered readily enough. ‘About two years.’

  ‘Was it hard to get used to?’

  ‘In many ways it’s easier. Saves duplication and a lot o
f stuffing around. But well, you know, computers. Half the time they’re down.’

  We reached the swamp. Our gravel path followed the edge of it, and there were a couple of small bridges. James was kneeling in the middle of one, peering into the water.

  I liked the swamp. With no large trees blocking the sun, it was one of the warmest spots in the gardens. On winter days, when it was too cold to play tag with the sprinklers in the rainforest, I used to bring Peter there. Once we’d seen a lizard solemnly eating daisies. Peter had talked about it for months afterwards. We’d gone back looking for it, but had never been able to find it again.

  Ferris said, ‘We had a bit of weather the night Howley died.’

  ‘What kind of weather?’

  ‘Spot of lightning. God moving the furniture around up top.’

  ‘How long were the computers down for?’

  He didn’t answer me directly, and avoided meeting my eyes. ‘We’re used to storms up there. Can’t shut up shop just because of a bit of weather. There’s a UPS—uninterruptible power supply to you. Cuts in when something happens to the main power supply.’

  ‘What happened that night?’

  ‘Computers were jammed. That’s what the technical blokes said. They couldn’t figure it out. Got their knickers seriously tangled.’

  ‘What time was this?’

  ‘Still working on it by the time I went home. Then next morning that kid’s body was found.’

  ‘Why didn’t the police take a statement from Ian McFarlane?’

  Ferris sat down on a wooden bench facing the swamp. His face looked heavy suddenly, and miserable.

  ‘Hans Rowholt and I have worked together for a long time. Then with Ian—Ian’s a much younger bloke—we kind of made a team. We started out as government employees. About eighteen months ago, security was handed over to a private company.’

  ‘To Swift.’

  Ferris nodded. Even while intent on what he was saying, he kept his eyes on James.

  ‘They cut costs, cut the number of guards, relied more on computers running the system. For security to work properly you need backup, and I don’t just mean electricity. That night we were short-staffed. It was the middle of winter. People were sick. There was no one to replace Ian when he went off duty. He told Hans he thought we should close, send everybody home. Computers were going arse over turkey, excuse the expression. Hans was inclined to agree with him. He rang Sydney and they said, what’s the problem? Couldn’t see it. Told Hans he had a job to do and just get on with it. Ian said his wife was sick and there was no way he was working a double shift. He walked out.’

  ‘Leaving no one on duty at the security entrance?’

  ‘Hans told me to take over.’

  ‘And the doors leading to the broadcasting platform?’

  ‘Ian left them in the default position.’

  ‘How long were they like that?’

  ‘About fifteen minutes.’

  ‘Why didn’t McFarlane tell the police? If he’d lost his job, what did he have to lose?’

  Ferris raised his chin aggressively. ‘Ian may have told the Swift bosses to get stuffed. But he wants to go on working in security. Why shouldn’t he? He’s a good bloke, knows his job and honest with it.’

  ‘They came to an agreement?’

  ‘I don’t know what was said. All I know is that Ian resigned and moved straight into another job.’

  ‘And the technicians?’

  ‘Should be fired for incompetence tomorrow. I mean who shut themselves in the basement for hours on end?’

  ‘What about the outside galleries?’

  ‘Hans said the kid must have already been out there.’

  ‘But you know differently.’

  There was a long moment before Ferris answered.

  ‘Someone had been in the technician’s lab, the one behind the broadcasting platform. Some of the furniture was moved.’

  ‘Who told you?’

  ‘One of the technicians. He said he had to tell someone, and he knows my opinion of Litowski.’

  ‘I’m surprised no one blew the whistle earlier.’

  ‘Hans was “retired”. It was suddenly his fault that we were understaffed. Litowski was given the top job and we were told to take our cue from him. We were also warned what would happen if we didn’t. I mean, how’s it going to look for Swift next time they tender for a job? Oh, they’re the company that let a nutter into a secure area of the Telstra Tower, so he could jump off and break his silly neck.’

  ‘What were you told to say?’

  ‘The kid had climbed over the fence and jumped.’

  ‘What did you think?’

  ‘At the time I didn’t have any idea that he’d been somewhere else.’

  ‘What about the storm?’

  ‘It reduced visibility and made a lot of noise.’

  ‘And the computers?’

  ‘A minor problem. Had it fixed in no time. We kept quiet because we didn’t want to lose our jobs. And frankly, at the time I couldn’t see that it made much difference. The kid was dead whichever platform he’d jumped off. But if someone pushed him—’

  James chose this moment to lean too far over the water for his grandfather’s comfort. Ferris walked smartly to the bridge, but he didn’t yank at the boy as I might have done if I was tense and upset. He knelt down beside him and spoke softly.

  I walked across and showed him photographs of Fenshaw and Colin Rasmussen. Ferris said that the police had been back at the tower asking about them. He didn’t recognise either man.

  I left him to finish his outing with his grandson.

  I rang Brook from my car. He’d got the warrant for Fenshaw in record time.

  ‘Isn’t talking but. He’s got a lawyer with attitude.’

  I relayed what Robert Ferris had told me, wondering why I hadn’t pursued the one fact that had been staring me in the face that first morning at the tower. Mikhail Litowski had been promoted after Niall’s death.

  ‘More warrants,’ Brook said dryly, ‘though nicking some of those security cowboys will be fun.’

  . . .

  At home, I made myself a sandwich and checked my mail again. Fallon had sent me a memo, written by Alex Fenshaw to the hospital board, arguing that Niall was mentally unstable. The bizarre manner of his death proved this. Niall’s testimony could not be considered that of a sane person. A further inquiry into the Ventac 2 was unnecessary. It would be an unwarranted cost in time and money. Earlier inquiries had been exhaustive and conclusive.

  I rang Ivan at work. ‘Fallon’s got into the hospital records.’

  ‘The sneaky bugger.’

  ‘He’s a better hacker than either of us.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know about that.’

  Twenty-one

  It was almost three o’clock. I walked across to Lyneham shops, thinking to buy a treat from the bakery for afternoon tea, and meet Peter at the school.

  There were a number of small rituals associated with picking children up from school, which, as a new parent five years ago, I’d quickly learnt. Parents of the younger children waited in a straggle around the playground equipment. In high summer they stood in the scant shade offered by school buildings, in winter hugged uninviting bricks for warmth and shelter against the rain that slanted off the Brindabellas.

  Parents who waited at the senior entrance did so less obviously than those at the junior section. Many had driven, and remained in their cars. Those on foot stood a little way back from the doors and seldom looked at them. They chatted to each other, or stared into space.

  It was blowy and warm. Sun bit through the new prunus leaves that lined the walkway to the school’s main entrance. I always knew when the bell was about to ring, but still it was a shock. Momentarily deafened parents watched their kids pour out the doors, a mass of blue shorts and yellow T-shirts.

  The second wave pushed through the doors, the third, and finally the stragglers. I turned around thinking I must have missed P
eter. But surely he would have seen me.

  I went right up to the doors and stared through them, unable to see much more than my own reflection. Maybe Peter’s teacher had kept him in. With another backward glance, I pushed past a group of laughing girls and hurried along the corridor to Peter’s classroom.

  It was empty apart from his teacher, who was standing at her desk piling folders on top of one another.

  ‘Mrs Hyles? Have you seen Peter? He wasn’t at the front.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I think he left with the others.’

  ‘Did you see which way he went?’

  She was sorry but she hadn’t noticed. ‘Let’s check to see if his bag’s still there.’

  The rack was empty except for a single yellow sweatshirt.

  ‘He probably went out the back doors. You know what kids are like.’

  There were four, if you counted the toilets five, doors Peter could have used. I’d only been a couple of minutes in his classroom, but by the time I got to the back of the school, the yard was practically deserted.

  Four boys were dribbling a basketball. Some girls sat in a huddle on the steps, poring over a piece of paper. I demanded to know if they’d seen Peter.

  They looked up at me with the dull contempt of children used to adults asking stupid questions. One said, ‘Who’s he?’

  I realised they were year six and that my son was beneath their notice.

  I didn’t stop to explain, but rushed up to the boys, who shook their heads. Next I overtook a couple of girls who lived around the corner, one a tall blonde with the shy, superior air of girls who develop early. She thought for a moment then said no. I was almost at the high school now. I spotted a yellow T-shirt in the distance, heading for Mouat Street. I chased it for twenty metres before admitting to myself what should have been obvious.