Blood Ties

by JD Nixon

  I was touched by the small gesture. He was proving himself to be a thoughtful man in a lot of ways.

  “Thank you, Sarge,” I said gratefully. “That’s so . . . so nice. Thank you.” I wanted to rip the packet open and stuff three of the delicious biscuits in my mouth again, but I forced myself to have the patience of a saint so I could savour them slowly back at the station. I clutched them possessively for the rest of the way.

  Back at the watch house, I was trying to sneak my precious Tim Tams to the kitchen when the eagle-eyed Senior Sergeant waylaid me.

  “What do you have there, Tessie? Looks like some Tim Tams.”

  Caught out, I glanced back at the Sarge and reluctantly laid the packet on the counter in front of Daisy. “A present from the Sarge,” I told her. She flashed him a quick smile and snatched the Tim Tams, slipping them under the counter.

  “I knew we’d finally get a gentleman here if we all prayed hard enough. Thank you, Sergeant Maguire.”

  “I actually bought them for Tess, but you’re welcome, Senior Sergeant,” he said, slightly acidic.

  I liked the way he wasn’t afraid to speak up for himself, even though he was the new guy and didn’t yet have a firm grasp on the local personalities and politics. It was as if he didn’t care about either, which was always refreshing in any working environment. He was a quietly self-confident man and I admired that.

  “Sorry, Tess. You’ve lost your Tim Tams for good now, but we can still find another treat for you around here,” he commiserated, sliding his arm around my shoulder.

  “What?” I asked, looking up at him in surprise, for once not minding his touch. I guess that meant that I was getting used to him.

  “Graham Mundy being interviewed,” he smiled down at me.

  Chapter 30

  We stood watching in the viewing room as Xavier questioned Graham. It was clear the interview had been going for some time, but also equally clear that Graham hadn’t been cooperating one little bit. Judging by his strained features, Xavier had really had enough of Graham’s relentless shouting and so had his duty lawyer, a very young man fresh out of university, who was clenching his eyes shut and rubbing his forehead as if he had a brain-splitting migraine. They were currently taking a small break from the interview while they all enjoyed a cup of tea, the recording equipment switched off. But Graham was letting his tea grow cold on the table while he continued ranting.

  “Will I go in?” I asked the Sarge. “Graham doesn’t like me and that might help.”

  “Only if you feel like it, Tess. You’ve already been through a lot today.”

  “Sarge, my Tim Tams were stolen from me. By a cop! Oh, you better believe that I feel like taking it out on someone. Why not my good friend Graham? He deserves it more than most.”

  I left him to burst into the interview room without any warning, startling everyone.

  “Shut the hell up, Graham!” I shouted, even louder than him. He shut the hell up straight away, brown eyes huge in his pale face. The two other men cast me grateful glances for the tiny slice of silence, no matter how temporary.

  “Not her. Anyone but her,” Graham whined immediately to his lawyer. “I can’t stand the sight of her.”

  “I can’t stand the sight of you either, you little creep,” I said stridently, thinking of my sore knees. I was the one with the grievance in this relationship, not him. “Why aren’t you cooperating in this interview?”

  He faltered, before continuing in a small voice, “I don’t want to go to jail. I didn’t hurt anyone.”

  “You spill your guts right now, Graham,” I said, banging my fist on the table, making him jump. “You’ve already told Sergeant Maguire and me a lot of damning things.”

  “You can’t make me,” he replied defiantly and started up the racket again. “It’s a violation of my human rights to interrogate me like this! I want a lawyer . . .”

  He paused, embarrassed, casting his eyes over to his lawyer who showed his annoyance at being so unappreciated by slamming his tea mug down hard on the table, flinging himself back in his seat and crossing his arms.

  Time for a change in tack. I regarded Graham thoughtfully as I sat down at the table, before turning to Xavier. “Do you know what, Detective Sergeant Guylen? I think we’re wrong. We’re barking up the wrong tree completely.”

  “What do you mean, Senior Constable?” he asked with artful surprise.

  “Look at him,” I said, casting a scornful eye over Graham. “He’s nothing but sound and wind. It’s definitely not him who masterminded this swindle, after all. I mean, think about it.” I leaned back in my chair. “Don’t you think that Graham here is a bit . . . unevolved? I just don’t see how it’s possible for someone like him to be able to even think up a plan like this, let alone carry it out.”

  “True,” said Xavier in a considered tone. “His mother, his uncle, and his former neighbour have all told us that he’s weak and rather stupid. That he would never amount to much. And they’d know better than anyone. I’d ask his girlfriend her opinion . . .” Significant pause. “. . . but he doesn’t have one.”

  “I’m not stupid, no matter what they say,” Graham denied sullenly, resenting the girlfriend crack.

  “You know what I think?” I asked Xavier. “I reckon that it was Uncle Stanley responsible for the whole swindle and that Graham here was just his gofer. We know that Uncle Stanley is a very smart man. He’s a lawyer, after all. And what’s Graham? He’s only a paralegal. And probably not even properly qualified to do that.”

  Graham grew defensive. “There’s nothing wrong with being a paralegal. There’re lots of smart people who are paralegals.” He glared at us. “And I’m going to do the course one day. I am. I really am.”

  “Sure you are, Graham,” I said, in my most pitying tone. “One day. Maybe. But that would be a bit too much like hard work though, wouldn’t it? And that’s not really your kind of thing, is it?”

  Xavier slammed his notebook closed. “You’re right, Senior Constable. We’re interviewing the wrong person. I’ve been wasting my time. Graham is just Stanley’s patsy. We need to talk to the brains of the operation, not the legs.” He shook his head in wonder. “You really have to admire Stanley’s intelligence for coming up with such a tight plan. It was almost genius.”

  “He sure is a smart man,” I agreed. “You almost feel compelled to respect him for his clarity of thinking and planning.”

  “I’m the brains, not Stanley,” shouted Graham, leaning forward on the desk, froths of saliva at the corner of his mouth. “I’m the one who found the other pieces of land, not Stanley. Uncle Stanley had no fucking idea about them, even though he’s been administering that fund for years! It was me, not him!”

  Xavier turned his attention to Graham again, a disbelieving, almost kind expression on his face. “Don’t try to big-note yourself, Graham. It’s over. We’ve realised you’re not smart enough to be the main man.”

  “But I am responsible,” he insisted, his eyes shifting between us compulsively. His lawyer laid a wary hand on his arm that Graham immediately shook free.

  Xavier looked over at me. “What do you think, Senior Constable?”

  I shook my head derisively. “Nah. He’s not smart enough. He can’t even tell the difference between an accelerator and a brake. Let’s go interview Stanley.”

  We both stood up as if to leave.

  Graham began to talk, trying to convince us that he was the criminal mastermind behind the swindle. His lawyer warned him to remain quiet, but he no longer wanted to, and rudely told the man to shut up. It was as if a lifetime of being derided as hopeless and stupid swelled up uncontrollably inside him, no longer able to be contained, his strong need to prove himself overcoming his natural caution.

  The interview started again formally and I sat back not asking any questions because of my conflict of interest, leaving it all to Xavier. When Xavier asked beforehand, Graham’s lawyer waved his hand to indicate that he had no objections to
me remaining in the room during the interview even though I’d eventually be a witness for the prosecution in his client’s trial. Being smart though, Xavier made him say it in the recording. I smiled at him in appreciation. I liked a careful partner. He smiled back with appealing charm. I smiled again. I liked a cute partner even more.

  Everything spilled out of Graham in a tumble. He’d taken advantage of his Uncle Stanley’s illness to defraud Miss G, even admitting that he’d been considering it for years. After long, boring searches at the Titles Office for another client, he’d discovered that there were huge tracts of land owned by the Greville family around Little Town that were unknown to anyone, because when they were originally purchased, they’d been registered under the name Gravel, not Greville.

  As someone who’d dabbled in family history research, I knew that transcription errors were common in the early days of the country because of varying levels of literacy and different accents in those providing the information and those recording it. What was surprising though was that throughout the generations nobody except Graham had cottoned on to these errors. Everyone had assumed that the empty paddocks in town, that in reality belonged to the Grevilles, were already government land, including the later Grevilles themselves. I suspected that Miss G’s father, drunken old Mr Greville, had been more than careless with family documents and probably the proof of their ownership had been buried in other paperwork over the years, if not destroyed. Someone really should go through all those boxes of documents in Miss G’s library, I thought, but I sure wasn’t going to volunteer.

  Graham admitted to desperately peeking on Miss G in the hopes of getting his hands on the title to that block of land on Mountain Road. He’d negotiated up to selling point with the Department of Defence on behalf of Traumleben Pty Ltd, but without the legal means to make the sale an actuality. He repeated his story about having a massive temper tantrum when he couldn’t find the title, trashing Miss G’s lounge room in the process, but his voice held no shame at all this time. In fact he giggled stupidly, proud of himself, while he told us. I stiffened in anger, about to say something cutting, only to feel Xavier’s fingers tapping my hand under the table. I gave him an imperceptible nod, appreciating the warning not to speak.

  Graham continued his stream of confessions. He admitted to wanting to get his hands on Miss G’s diaries, having heard her discuss them with Uncle Stanley on a number of occasions. He then admitted peeking on Mrs Villiers as a red herring and to leaving the footprints under her window to be obvious about it, bragging this time that it was his idea, not Uncle Stanley’s as he’d previously told the Sarge and me. He also confessed to finding the suitcase of money in Miss G’s garden shed where he’d hidden on the first Friday night I’d turned up to search her yard. He could hardly believe his good luck, he smirked. I shook my head in disgust at his greed. Finding a cool hundred grand would have been enough for most people. Not Graham though. He’d stashed the suitcase himself in the rickety shelter where it had later been found by Valmae Kilroy on the vacant ‘government’ land that, he admitted, was in fact even more unknown Greville land.

  He further owned up to the safe-cracking in our office, after watching in frustration as Valmae removed his stash, showing his first streak of real emotion in the whole interview by expressing the deep aggravation he’d felt when he discovered that the safe was empty. He admitted to spying on me, hoping that I had either the money or the diaries at my home. Finally, he admitted to setting up Traumleben Pty Ltd using his incapacitated father as a front. He boasted the whole time he confessed, particularly about fooling the Sarge and me with his naive nephew act. I squirmed with discomfort as Xavier gallantly tried to gloss over that failure in the recorded interview.

  When Graham had finished talking, exhausted, and had been taken back to the holding cell, Xavier and I congratulated ourselves on the successful interview.

  “I’d be happy to partner with you any day, Tess,” he said. “You should think about ditching the uniform for the glamorous life of being a Wattling Bay detective. I’m sure the Inspector would take you in a flash.”

  I knew she would because she’d offered before, but at that moment I noticed the Sarge waiting for me, sitting patiently among the hustle and noise of the watch house, checking his text messages. He glanced up expectantly, shoving his phone into his pocket as we came out and jumped to his feet. I gave him two thumbs up and he gave me a lovely, sincerely pleased smile in response. I looked up at Xavier and not without a lot of regret, I’ll be honest.

  “Thanks anyway, Mr X, but I think I’ll stay with my little town for a bit longer. I have a new partner to break in and he’s going to keep me busy for a while.”

  “Shame,” he said, smiling. “I think we could have a lot of fun together, Tess.” His expression as he said that made me think he wasn’t only talking about work. I appreciated the compliment, considering how awful I looked at the moment. In return, I smiled back at him and without another word, abandoned him for the Sarge.

  “Let’s turn off our phones and get the hell out of this place,” he suggested.

  It sounded like a great idea to me, but the Inspector arrived in a storm of anger just as we were leaving, everyone nearby dodging and ducking to avoid her attention. She honed in on the Sarge and me straight away. When I dared to ask her if they’d had any luck recapturing Red, she shook her head in frustration and assured me it would only be a matter of time before he was tracked down. But she said it in such a tone that I felt sorry for everyone involved in the pursuit who hadn’t delivered a hogtied Red to her office that afternoon. And on a personal note, I wouldn’t be able to rest easy until he was behind bars again. There was general consensus that he was the one Bycraft we’d all prefer to be safely locked away. He was crafty, enterprising, dangerous and recklessly bold. Just like his ancestor, Mountain Ted.

  Fiona wanted me to stay to be interviewed over the court incident, but I’d really had enough for one day and wanted nothing more than to go home. Promising her that I’d return tomorrow to be interviewed, the Sarge and I escaped back to Little Town.

  In the car, I glanced at him with heartfelt gratitude and admiration. He’d risen in my estimation by immeasurable amounts today. “That was great thinking to ring me on my phone, Sarge. It gave me the distraction I needed to escape. Impressive teamwork.” I was a little teary as I said that, thinking of what might have been. Blinking furiously, I shifted my eyes to the window, barely taking in the bland view of endless paddocks.

  He reached over to pat my hand, not missing the emotion in my voice. “You’re the smart one though, for pretending the call was from Jake. And to hand the phone to Red Bycraft. That was even better thinking, Tess. It made him relax his guard. And I agree with what you said. Impressive teamwork today.”

  I pulled a self-deprecating face. “Not so impressive though when you think about how easily Graham Mundy fooled us.”

  “True,” he admitted. “But he’s an interesting mix of big criminal thinking and frightened, awkward personality. I’m still struggling to imagine him as a criminal mastermind. Look how easy it was for you and X to manipulate him into confessing. That’s not a mature mind.”

  When we returned to the station, I followed the Sarge, wearily limping up the stairs, my only thought to take as many painkillers as the doctor allowed. But when I reached the door of the back room, I stopped in absolute shock. Sitting proudly on top of each of our desks was a brand new, shiny, latest model computer, the ancient printer replaced with a new combined printer/photocopier/scanner. I turned to him, my eyes wide with amazement, mouth even wider, to find him gazing at me, arms crossed, with a self-satisfied smile on his lips.

  “Sarge! Where did these come from? How did you manage to get them? Where did you find the money?” I asked breathlessly, sitting down in front of mine and running my hands over it lovingly before turning it on. It loaded up instantaneously.

  “A word in the right ear can make all the difference,” he replied
enigmatically.

  I spent a happy half-hour playing with my new computer, and then, even though I was exhausted, did some real work, knocking off a few reports, shortening my ‘to do’ list. I watched in awe as the paper glided obediently and silently from the new printer. It was becoming dark when I decided I’d done enough for the day, pushing back my chair and stretching painfully.

  “I suppose I’ll be back in court next week for the committal hearings for the new charges against the three Bycrafts and for Graham as well,” I complained. “I barely get to spend any time in Little Town anymore. They should have a mobile courtroom that comes here every week, just for me.”

  He smiled at that. “Never mind. Perhaps we’ll head into a quiet patch in town for a while.”

  I snorted in disbelief. “There’s a whole town full of Bycrafts out there just looking for mischief, Sarge.”

  “Tess . . .” he began, uncharacteristically hesitant. “Things have been very stressful since I arrived and I don’t feel as though we got off to a good start together.”

  I gazed at him questioningly. I didn’t think we had either. Especially when our relationship had begun with me trying to arrest him.

  “It’s Friday night and you’ve had a hell of a week and a real shit of a day. I’d like to cook you dinner. It’s not much of a consolation but . . .” He petered out, fidgeting uncomfortably, regarding me with something I thought was akin to hope. I think he was as nervous as he would be asking a woman out for the first time on a date, waiting for her answer.

  But I was so surprised, I didn’t know what to say. My brain wasn’t giving any useful instructions to my mouth. I stared at him, silent.

  He took that as rejection and turned away. “You’re probably busy anyway. Maybe another time?”

  My brain finally kicked into gear. Jake was working, Dad had his girlfriend visiting tonight, Gretel was busy, Fiona was busy, Abe was busy, and I had no other plans. I would only sit at home lounging in front of the TV or even worse, dutifully practising the guitar. I remembered how much he’d helped me when I was being dragged by the car and that tormented expression on his face at the courthouse when we both thought I was going to die.