by Robert Sims
Rita drove her car into the cobbled bluestone alley that ran behind the houses, then stopped, unlocked her back gate and pulled into her backyard, which had just enough room for a shed, an almond tree and a parking space. It wasn’t until she was climbing the back step that her senses went on to high alert. Something was wrong.
What was it? A sound came from inside her house. It was the static of voices and applause. The TV was on. But she was certain she’d switched it off.
Steadying her breathing, she slid the key into the backdoor lock and silently opened it. After easing the door shut behind her, she stood motionless, listening. Then, over the inane banter of the game show, came the distinct rattle of the venetian blind beside her. The kitchen window was wide open and there were scratches in the paintwork where someone had prised it open.
Reaching out with her right hand, she drew the carving knife from its metal scabbard, crept out of the kitchen, and walked softly down the passage to the open doorway of the lounge. The smell of cigarette smoke drifted in the air. Rita tried to swallow but her mouth was dry.
Focusing her attention, she drew a deep breath, raised the knife and moved swiftly into the room to confront the intruder, but there was no one there. She moved quickly through the rest of the house, and when she was sure it was empty she returned to the lounge, put down the knife and switched off the TV, her blood still pumping fiercely. As her eyes adjusted to the light filtering through the venetian blinds, she noticed a dab of cigarette ash on the coffee table next to her armchair. It lay there like a subtle token of menace.
That night a storm blew in from the west. The air was still humid but the sudden downpour eased the heat. Rita lay in her bath listening to the rain drumming on the tin roof. The sound was comforting but she still couldn’t relax. There was too much adrenalin in her system. Her brain wouldn’t switch off.
She’d locked and bolted the doors, wedged shut the windows, and collected her police-issue gun which had been stowed in the floor safe. Then she’d cooked herself a meal which she’d thrown out half-eaten. Later she ran herself a bath, lit candles around it and drank some Scotch while she soaked in the soft glow. It didn’t work.
She couldn’t get rid of the tension.
The fact that someone had broken into her home was preying on her thoughts. After carrying out a detailed check through the house she’d realised nothing had been taken by the intruder. The purpose seemed to be intimidation. Her first thought was Kavella and his henchmen, or even a bent cop in his pay. The same tactic - a breakin with no theft - had been used before against the anti-corruption detectives known as ‘toe-cutters’. It was a way of delivering a warning to back off. But this felt different somehow. It wasn’t just the TV left on and the open window that bothered her. Other things had been moved, drawers opened, papers shifted. The feng shui touches she was testing in her bedroom had been disturbed.
The intruder had been prying through her things, and she realised she’d dealt professionally with this type of blatant intrusion before.
The pattern fell under the category of stalker, and it cast doubt on her initial suspicion of Kavella. The observation only increased her sense of unease and left her running one scenario after another through her mind as the candle wax dribbled onto the tiles and the bathwater cooled. Her thoughts beat down on her as steadily as the rain on the roof.
The man with the bronze mask lay awake, unable to sleep. He got out of bed, pulled on a polo shirt and jeans, went down to his car and drove towards the nightlife of St Kilda.
It was a scene he was familiar with - when the restaurant and cafe clientele had mostly dispersed. That’s when a different mood took over. Along with the after-hours ravers and revellers, the clubs and bars attracted a drift of streetwalkers, junkies and kerb crawlers.
By the early hours the roads along the seafront exhaled a dank air of vice. Pushers in the car parks. Hookers in the shadows. Rowdy pavement drunks. It was why he came here. The streets felt lurid and edgy. A place for anonymous pick-ups.
His wheels rumbled over the tramlines as he cruised past the gaping mouth of Luna Park, his gaze prowling through the figures passing by. He was on the lookout for solitary women - the sort that would suit his purposes. He’d found them here before, the hard, desperate street whores. Because their brains were often fried with drugs they were so much easier to bend to his needs. They were halfway senseless already.
He spotted one at a trestle table in the gaudy red and yellow glare outside McDonald’s. She was sitting alone, like a human takeaway
- fishnets, stilettos, cleavage. A tired leather handbag rested on the table beside her. She was drinking coffee from a paper cup, her eyes busily scanning for customers. He slowed down to pull over, but as she got up and came towards him a police patrol car swung onto the Esplanade behind him. He couldn’t risk being stopped or recognised, so he changed gears, eased back onto the accelerator and signalled a left into Carlisle Street. Luckily the police didn’t follow him. Lucky for the woman, too. She turned back, disappointed, never knowing how close she’d come to being bludgeoned and maimed.
After the first one he’d got a taste for it. The physical damage he’d inflicted had gone beyond anything he’d done before. It was like an epiphany - he’d been surprised by his own violence and a powerful sense of release. The media coverage and public outrage only served to inflame his need for more of the same. Yet no one could possibly understand why, except perhaps the profiler. That’s why he’d visited her home while she was out, to get a feel for her presence, to make himself comfortable in her personal space.
As he’d relaxed in her armchair, smoking, checking out her collection of books and DVDs, watching her TV, he’d sensed a strange affinity. This woman had nothing in common with the prisoners he’d left behind or the she-devils he was hunting or the enemies who were hunting him. Detective Sergeant Van Hassel was a cut above the rest, operating at a higher level, full of insight and empathy.
He saw her more in the role of a muse, or an oracle, or even an Amazon - a worthy participant in what was unfolding. In the meantime, the hunt must go on.
He drove past a group of prostitutes leaning by a bus shelter, smoking, beckoning for business. No sale. More than one meant witnesses. Further on he turned into the shadowy side streets around the Botanic Gardens. As he completed the circuit he came face to face with another patrol car, its lights flashing, its officers in the process of arresting a girl and a motorist. The police watched him as he passed by, their eyes reflecting more than a casual interest. Though they let him pass, the encounter was too close for comfort.
He headed back towards the highway, his taste for savagery unsatisfied, the bronze mask still concealed in the laptop case beside him. His first conquest had readied him for more, but tonight was not the night for the next.
Rita wore her powder blue trouser suit to work the next morning.
It was light and cool in the heat and comfortably hid the holstered
.38 on her hip.
Within minutes of arriving at the police complex she was downing a triple espresso, hoping the caffeine would help her brain focus on the clusters of data scrambling across her computer screen. She felt the strain of a bad night’s sleep, frayed at both ends by insomnia and a sense that her home had been violated. But she wouldn’t report it, for reasons of self-respect as much as anything else. Anyway, with nothing stolen, the breakin was personal rather than criminal, so she decided to tell no one about it, not even Jack, who would probably overreact and slap some sort of curfew on her. She refused to be restricted or intimidated, and instead would become more vigilant and carry a gun. Last night she’d put it under her pillow.
The computer updates told her there was no breakthrough in the investigation. No obvious suspect had emerged, the check on MX-5s continued to draw a blank, and there was still no sign of the key witness, the offender’s first intended victim. The DNA results hadn’t yet come through from the forensic services lab, though Detective S
ergeant Higgs was already compiling a list of regular street clients he wanted DNA-tested. Meanwhile, O’Keefe had tracked down the St Kilda sex shop where the bondage gear had been bought, but the manager could add nothing to the description of the wanted man.
O’Keefe plonked himself on a chair next to Rita’s desk.
‘No luck yet with the bronze mask,’ he said. ‘It’s not stocked by any of the sex shops.’
‘Then Emma Schultz could be right about it being theatrical,’
she said. ‘Try theatre and costume shops. What about the T-shirt?’
‘I still haven’t found where it comes from,’ O’Keefe answered.
‘But that could be a good sign. It’s looking more like an upmarket item, from a designer outlet maybe.’
‘Good, keep looking,’ she said.
‘Okay, boss.’ He gave her a wily look. ‘I hear you hit a dead end with the smartcard.’
‘Dead end or dead on,’ she answered. ‘It could go either way. I’m off to Monash this morning to try and find out more about it.’
‘The reason I mention it,’ he continued, ‘is because I found this on my porn tour.’
He placed on the desk in front of her a pink business card with a name, address and phone number on it. The business name was Plato’s Cave.
Rita was taken aback. ‘You’ve found another Plato’s Cave?’
‘It’s a new brothel touting for business,’ O’Keefe answered. ‘I wondered if there was a connection with your smartcard?’
‘I doubt a brothel could afford the technology,’ she said. ‘But leave it with me. I’ll add it to my travel list.’
Rita’s mood was more upbeat as she drove around the leafy fringe of the Royal Botanic Gardens, thanks to the caffeine lift and getting out on the road. She was also looking forward to her encounter with Byron Huxley, the hunky professor.
She joined the surge of traffic on the South Eastern Freeway where it followed the course of the Yarra River. With the glare of the morning sun in her windscreen, the wheels drumming smoothly and the needle nudging the speed limit, she headed towards the outer suburbs as she hummed along to the plaintive angst of Chris Isaak wailing from her CD player.
Monash University had a hinterland feel to it. Tower blocks and brown-brick architecture straddled the campus behind maturing gum trees. It was set amid a monotonous sweep of outer suburbs stretching towards the Dandenong Ranges. The surrounding landscape typified the seamless residential sprawl that fanned out from the city, ribbed with a neat grid of streets, homes and gardens.
Rita left the highway, parked and made her way through the knots of students. The place had a drowsy, placid air.
The woman at the faculty office directed her towards a seminar room. The door was open. Rita looked inside. A dozen students sat at computer terminals around a rectangular table. Byron Huxley stood in front of a flipchart, explaining what his students were looking at on their screens.
He was even better-looking in the flesh than in the photo on his website. The young professor was fit, lean and roguishly handsome with his tousled black hair and engaging manner. While his appearance seemed at odds with that of a leading academic, he was completely at ease with his students. In his sandals, Bermuda shorts and Pavarotti T-shirt he could have been the antipodean version of Renaissance man, his briefcase beside him stuffed with scientific textbooks, a squash racquet and a beach towel.
‘This is just the beginning,’ he was telling his students, ‘in the development of neurocomputers. Once we’ve integrated digital electronics with living neurons we’ll have the potential to build cybernetic systems far more powerful than our present silicon ones.
We’re talking about machines built around living neural networks
- living brains, if you like. It’s inevitable.’
One student asked, ‘Isn’t that playing God?’
‘Interesting question. Yes - you’ve spotted the ethical minefield, and that means it’s beyond the remit of science. And beyond the scope of this seminar, which has already overrun.’ The students started shuffling their folders together and reaching for bags. ‘We’ll continue from this point next week.’
Rita waited for the undergraduates to file out of the room before going in.
‘Professor Huxley?’ she asked.
He looked up from the notes he was shoving into the briefcase.
‘Yes? Can I help you?’
‘I certainly hope so. I’m Detective Sergeant Marita Van Hassel.
I left a message.’
‘Yes, of course.’ He zipped the bag shut. ‘We’ve got a half-hour window while I set up an experiment for the next tute. It means a trip down to the computer lab, if that’s all right.’
‘Sounds delightful.’
‘Only if you’re a cyber nut,’ he said, smiling. ‘Your message mentioned something about encryption. If I crack it do you get to make an arrest?’
‘Possibly.’
‘I know what case you’re working on,’ said Huxley. ‘I saw you on TV - you’re the profiler. So, Detective Sergeant Van Hassel, if you want specific information it’s no good being evasive.’
‘I can tell you’re used to talking to students,’ she retorted, causing him to chuckle.
He led her downstairs to a large room crowded with hi-tech machines, computer screens, accessories and heavy duty cabling.
The space was cool and shaded from the day’s brightness. Thin streaks of sunlight gleamed at the edges of the closed blinds on the windows.
He slung his briefcase onto a desk and dropped into a seat in front of a keyboard.
‘Grab a chair.’
Rita sat down beside him, looking around as he logged on.
He glanced at her. ‘Welcome to my world,’ he said. ‘Sorry about the mess.’
‘Looks like a cargo hold from Star Wars. What exactly have you got down here?’
‘A few generations of digital electronics, mainframes, robotics.
Various scanners. And rats.’
‘Rats?’
‘In cages down the far end. We use them for experiments in communication between silicon circuits and biological neurons.
Amazing what happens when you implant an array of electrodes into a specific part of a rat’s brain. It can learn thought control.’
She shook her head distastefully. ‘Great. Like a few other rats I know.’
He laughed. ‘Okay, detective, show me what you’ve got.’
She raised an eyebrow as she handed him the plastic card, though it didn’t bother her at all that he was flirting.
‘The crime lab’s best guess is that it’s a sophisticated smartcard,’
she said. ‘But they thought you might be able to tell me more.’
‘Plato’s Cave - how very erudite,’ he commented. ‘Shouldn’t you be in the Philosophy Department?’ He slotted the card into the wall of electronics that faced them. ‘Let’s see what it’s hiding.’
She watched Huxley lean forward, his fingers nimbly tapping the keys, as moving holograms, geometric graphics and rivers of encrypted data flowed over the screens above him. Every now and then he glanced up, his eyes quickly scanning the test displays, before punching in more commands. Eventually he sat back, put his hands behind his head and gave a nod of admiration.
‘Your crime lab’s right,’ he said. ‘It’s a super-super-smartcard, certainly cutting edge, with heavily encrypted data.’
‘Can you decode it?’ she asked.
He shook his head. ‘No. But I can give you an educated guess about its use.’
‘That would be welcome. It’s more than I’ve got so far, Professor Huxley.’
‘Call me Byron. It makes me feel less like a boffin.’ He folded his arms. ‘What do you know about VPNs - virtual private networks?’
‘Aren’t they a sort of intranet, for use by a business organisation?’
‘You’re in the right neighbourhood. A VPN allows external access through intranet portals. It provides remote users w
ith secure access to the internal network. That is, people can use the web to get into it, thanks to cryptographic tunnelling protocols. Are you following me?’
‘I think so,’ she answered.
‘Good. The most crucial aspect of a VPN is security and its authentication mechanisms. These can include a login, a card key, even biometric data like fingerprints or iris patterns.’
‘Let me get this straight,’ she said. ‘Are you telling me this card would let me log in to someone’s private network?’
‘Essentially, yes. But the card isn’t enough. You’d also need all the security components and a computer configured to connect to the VPN before you could get in. Even then, you’d be treading on thin ice.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘The card’s got more than silicon in there. It’s also got a bit of nanotechnology and a micro wireless connection, so I’d guess the login is constantly changing.’ He hit the keyboard and the screens froze. ‘This Plato’s Cave is very private. No one wants you to get in.’
He handed the card back to her.
‘Any idea where it was made?’ she asked.
‘There are a few places around the world where it could’ve been produced, Melbourne being one. The software firms here are up with the best in the world.’
‘Is there anything else you can tell me?’
‘Not off the top of my head. But I’ll give you a call if something else occurs to me.’ He smiled. ‘I’ve got your mobile number.’
There was a glint in his eye as he said it.
Rita sat in the cafe at the Campus Centre drinking a strong black coffee and digesting the information Huxley had imparted. Along with his scientific analysis he’d given her a new lead to follow. It would mean knocking on the doors of the best software firms around the city; with any luck, one of them could identify the card’s provenance. Of course, there was one glaring flaw with that approach.
If Tony Kavella was indeed the customer, the firm would probably deny all knowledge of him, the card and its manufacture, so even if it had been made in Melbourne, there was a good chance it would be a fruitless quest.
