by Robert Sims
She switched her thoughts to Huxley himself. He’d made a good impression on her, not just because he was attractive, but because he’d surprised her with his manner and personality. From a university professor she’d anticipated a dry, even condescending welcome.
Instead he was friendlier than she’d expected, more amenable, not pretentious at all.
Her mobile bleeped. She took it out of her shoulder bag. It was a text message from O’Keefe.
T-shirt bought in Bourke St mall. No luck with ID. Still looking for mask.
She smiled to herself. Detective Senior Constable Kevin O’Keefe was doing what he did best, pursuing each objective with plodding tenacity.
Rita put the phone back in her bag, and tried to relax as she sipped her coffee. Around her, groups of students clustered at cafe tables. The place was full of loud conversations - the clamour of burgeoning intellects among the coffee cups and donuts. The scene almost made her feel nostalgic. A decade ago she would have been at home here in the heady mix of idealism and naivety - a convergence of sharp-witted youths, intense young women, and post-adolescent boys. Outside the cafe, students were strolling back and forth from lectures, or heading for the restaurant or the bookshop, bags slung casually over their shoulders. Then a blind girl with a guide dog walked past. It snapped her back into action, like a visual reminder of the urgency of the manhunt.
Rita picked up her bag and walked through the heat and swirling dust towards the car park. Overhead the leaves of the gum trees lashed themselves in the gusts of a northerly and a flock of galahs swerved in pink arcs as they looked for a stable perch. As she rounded a brown rotunda of lecture theatres her mobile started ringing. It was O’Keefe again.
‘I’ve just got into the office, and a hospital’s got back to us,’ he told her. ‘There’s a patient with the type of injuries we’re looking for.’
‘Go on,’ said Rita.
‘She’s a thirty-year-old woman with concussion and wrist injuries.’
‘Is she a hooker?’
‘No, the complete opposite - a company executive who says she was knocked off her bike. It might be nothing.’
‘A company executive riding a bike,’ retorted Rita. ‘That’s dubious for a start. Give me the name and hospital.’
‘Kelly Grattan, and she’s at Epworth in a private room,’ replied O’Keefe. ‘By the way, if she’s the victim of a hit-and-run, she didn’t report it. In fact, there’s no report of an accident.’
‘Okay, anything else I need to know?’
‘The DNA result’s come through from the lab,’ he answered,
‘and like we thought, the offender’s not in the database. Strickland’s pissed about it. His best hope for a breakthrough just went down the pan. It also means Kavella’s in the clear.’
‘Not necessarily,’ she corrected him. ‘I never had him down for carrying out the attack himself. Kavella doesn’t leave messy crime scenes with a trail of evidence, he’s too clever for that. He’s a puppet master, a manipulator. Besides, his prints are on file and there was no match.’
‘But you still think he’s involved?’
‘Officially, no. We’ve been told he’s out of bounds so we follow up every other lead.’ She paused as she reached her car. ‘That means my next stop is another hospital visit.’
Rita drew the ward nurse aside to ask her about Kelly Grattan.
‘When was she admitted?’
‘Three nights ago,’ answered the nurse. ‘Just before nine.’
‘What are her injuries?’
‘A hairline fracture of the skull, concussion and a head wound that needed three stitches. She’s also got two sprained wrists, with lacerations and contusions to both hands.’
Rita jotted down the details, along with Kelly’s address in Toorak.
‘What treatment has she had?’
‘On admission, an X-ray and a CT scan, but there was no sign of bleeding or swelling of the brain. She was injected with a local anaesthetic before doctors sutured the wound on the back of her head. She’s on supportive treatment for the fracture, simple analgesics.
We’ve been keeping her in for observation, but she’s ready to be discharged.’
‘And she claims she was knocked off her bike?’ said Rita, tapping her notebook with her pen.
‘Yes. But she’s hazy about the circumstances because of the concussion.’
‘She didn’t give any indication that she was attacked?’
‘None at all. Is that what this is about, a road rage attack?’
‘Possibly,’ said Rita evasively. ‘Possibly not. One other thing, was she brought here by ambulance?’
‘No, she came by taxi.’
She thanked the nurse who pointed out a private room at the end of the ward. Rita walked over, opened the door and went in.
A young woman, propped up on pillows, turned from a TV and regarded her with a cool stare.
‘Who are you?’ she asked.
Rita took in the split lip, the black eye and the graze marks on the woman’s chin. Both wrists were strapped, several fingers were bandaged and there was wadding on her skull, but the injuries didn’t detract from her self-assurance. She had the air of a woman who was strong-willed and professional, well-groomed with neatly trimmed auburn hair, her face handsome even without any make-up. She wasn’t someone who would accept being beaten and mauled. A Gucci handbag stood on the bedside table. Lavish bouquets of flowers adorned the room.
‘I’m Detective Sergeant Marita Van Hassel.’
A fleeting shadow moved over the woman’s face, replaced by something more composed. ‘What do you want?’
‘I’m told you’re the victim of a hit-and-run,’ said Rita, opening her notebook. ‘I’m here to investigate.’
‘I see.’
‘If I could just check a few personal details first,’ Rita went on.
‘Your name’s Kelly Grattan, you’re thirty, have an apartment in Toorak, and you’re a company executive, is that correct?’
‘Yes.’
‘Which company and what executive position do you hold?’
‘I’m the business administrator at Xanthus.’ Kelly pressed the TV
mute button with some difficulty. ‘That’s a software company in South Melbourne.’
Rita wrote it down, underlined the word software, and said, ‘I haven’t heard of it.’
‘Well, you will.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘Because it’s about to hit the computer games market big-time,’
answered Kelly. ‘And because it’s owned by Martin Barbie.’
‘Martin Barbie?’ repeated Rita. ‘The TV star?’
‘Yes, there’s only one,’ said Kelly dryly, ‘though it’s hard to believe as he pops up everywhere.’
As Rita wrote down the name it seemed to be an exotic addition to her notes. Martin Barbie’s face was familiar to television viewers as the host of a reality TV show, and it was common knowledge he’d capitalised on his ratings to float publicity campaigns, sporting events and advertising. He belonged to a special breed - the celebrity entrepreneur. He was a man with an image and the brain to market it. But owning a software firm? He’d kept that quiet.
‘I thought he was just a self-promoter,’ said Rita. ‘I didn’t know he was into computer games.’
‘You’d be surprised,’ replied Kelly. ‘He’s funnelled his earnings into production companies, diversifying into games software and online services. Believe me, the Barbie media net is expanding. He’s unstoppable and incorrigible.’ She waved a hand at her bouquets.
‘Who do you think sent all the flowers?’
‘Very considerate,’ said Rita. ‘But I need to hear about the hit-and-run incident that put you here.’
‘There’s not much I can tell you,’ said Kelly. ‘I only assume I was knocked off my bike, I don’t actually remember. One moment I was riding along Toorak Road, the next I was sitting on the footpath with people helping me up and my bike
buckled in the gutter. They hailed a taxi and I came straight here.’
‘Did you get any of those people’s names?’ asked Rita.
‘Sorry.’
‘What about the taxi? Do you remember which firm?’
‘I wasn’t in any state to notice much.’
‘What did you do about your bike?’
‘It was wrecked. I just left it there.’
‘Where on Toorak Road was this?’ persisted Rita.
‘I can’t even remember that,’ shrugged Kelly. ‘Somewhere between Chapel Street and Orrong Road.’
Rita put a hand on her hip, not bothering to note this down.
‘That’s quite a distance. What on earth were you doing cycling at that time of night? It must have been well after eight.’
‘Yes, silly of me, it was getting dark. I’d been browsing in the shops, didn’t notice the time. I should have driven there but thought the exercise would do me good. How wrong can you get?’
‘Not much more wrong than that,’ said Rita. ‘Why weren’t you wearing a safety helmet?’
The question seemed to take Kelly by surprise. ‘I should have been …’ She hesitated. ‘I just forgot. Big mistake.’
‘Yes,’ Rita agreed. ‘There’s something else I’ve got to ask. Were you assaulted?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Did someone try to molest you - a man, a stranger, with a mask and chains?’
Kelly burst out laughing. ‘Absolutely not!’
‘Are you sure? After all, you were concussed.’
‘I think I’d remember that ! But if it comes back to me, I’ll let you know.’
‘You do that.’ Rita wrote in her notebook, tore out the page and placed it beside Kelly’s handbag. ‘That’s my mobile number.’
‘Thanks,’ said Kelly, smiling. ‘I’m impressed by the level of police concern.’
‘Part of the service,’ said Rita. ‘When do you get out of here?’
‘I’ve decided to discharge myself as soon as the doctor does his rounds. I’ve got urgent business to attend to.’
‘With Martin Barbie?’
‘The man himself,’ said Kelly. ‘He’s due to have a crisis on his hands.’
Rita wondered about the comment. It seemed to have a double meaning. As an afterthought she pulled out the Plato’s Cave smartcard.
‘Ever seen this before?’
There was a fleeting reaction, something like a brief flicker of recognition in Kelly’s eyes, but Rita couldn’t be sure.
‘No,’ said Kelly firmly. ‘Means nothing to me.’
Strickland’s scowl was setting in. It wasn’t directed at anyone in particular, not even Rita and O’Keefe, sitting across the desk from him. It was more an involuntary response to a growing list of frustrations.
‘So, effectively, you two haven’t come up with anything either,’
he was saying. ‘That means not a single lead has panned out. This investigation is already starting to drag.’
‘Look on the bright side,’ put in O’Keefe. ‘At least it’s not headline news anymore.’
‘Until the next victim,’ said Strickland grimly. ‘Then we’ll have every hack and his dog on our backs.’
They were sitting in the untidy surroundings of his office, where Rita had just briefed him on her trips to the university and hospital.
‘Kelly Grattan’s story bothers me,’ she said.
Strickland massaged a temple, still scowling. ‘But it rules her out as the offender’s first victim.’
‘Completely,’ agreed Rita. ‘But it doesn’t add up.’
‘You haven’t even checked it out.’
‘That’s just it, I can’t. Not one aspect of it. She’s given me an uncheckable version of what happened to her. I know she’s lying.’
‘For Christ’s sake, women lie out of habit!’ Strickland snorted.
‘That doesn’t mean she was attacked.’
‘Sexism aside,’ Rita remarked, ‘look at it another way. The injuries and timing are consistent with an assault. But if she’s got a strong reason to conceal it, she’d come up with just the sort of unverifiable crap I had to listen to. I mean, a woman executive cycling to window-shop at night in Chapel Street! Excuse me, that’s bullshit.’
‘Okay, okay, she got up your nose with a dicey account,’ Strickland conceded. ‘But it doesn’t make her a victim and, more to the point, it doesn’t give us a witness.’
‘Maybe she’s got amnesia,’ said O’Keefe. The other two looked at him to see if he was joking, but they couldn’t tell. Then he added,
‘Or maybe she’s just a businesswoman who doesn’t want sex assault on her CV.’
‘The way I see it,’ Strickland went on, ‘is we just keep grinding away. I’ll keep Bradby’s team looking for the car, Higgs and his crew working the street angle, while you two start checking software companies. And you’re gonna check out this other Plato’s Cave, right?’
‘A new boutique brothel in Collingwood,’ Rita explained. ‘I’ll drop in tomorrow.’
‘Fine. But the smartcard could turn out to be the best lead after all. If we pin down its source it might give us a direct line to the offender.’
‘Fair enough,’ said Rita. ‘And I’m going to begin with Xanthus. Even if Kelly’s injuries are just coincidence, it gives me a starting point.’
Strickland rubbed his eyelids tiredly. ‘Why does this make me nervous?’
‘Because you’re twitchy?’ Rita offered.
‘No, because I know what you’re like,’ he countered. ‘You’ve already got your wrist slapped for going after one prominent target.
I owe you a favour, so I’ll protect your back as best I can. But if you try to interrogate someone as high-profile as Martin Barbie, you’ll stir up a shit-storm beyond my control.’
‘Relax,’ she told him. ‘I’m just doing background checks at this stage, and so far nothing’s been flagged up. No MX-5s owned by him or his employees. But something in Kelly’s attitude has aroused my curiosity. Barbie’s hosting an awards ceremony tonight at Crown Casino and I plan to be part of the audience, no more than that.’
A storm crackled in the night sky as Rita parked her car and hurried along the river promenade to the awards ceremony. The tops of buildings gleamed like geometric crystals in the flashes of lightning.
And high above the riverbank, reflecting the glare, was the cylindrical tower of the casino complex, rising like a citadel amid a sprawl of clubs, cinemas, gambling halls and theme bars radiant with neon.
By the time she made it into the reception venue proceedings were underway. Rita flashed her badge at a security guard and slipped into the auditorium through a side entrance. There in the spotlight, standing before the podium, was Martin Barbie. He was gazing down over a sea of faces from the advertising industry, delivering the opening address. This was the first time she’d seen him in the flesh, but it was obvious he had presence. Still in his early thirties, Barbie was well-built and broad-shouldered in his tailored dinner suit, his face tanned and chiselled like that of a sporting hero. As a television personality he was supremely polished, as a businessman, sharp and disciplined. But Rita suspected that, more than most, Barbie knew appearances were deceptive. Glamour, charm, the lure of the superficial were his stock in trade. Even his surname was deceptive, an anglicised version of the original. Although he’d been born in Australia, his father was Estonian, with a fierce reputation and a questionable past. In Rita’s opinion, it was unlikely that Barbie had emerged from his childhood unscathed.
He’d been invited to speak on the values of modern salesman-ship, and no one was more expert at proclaiming the gospel of the media, extolling the virtues of mass communications. Tonight he was in an evangelical mood, despite the fact he was preaching to the converted.
Rita accepted the offer of a chair from a waiter and settled down to listen.
‘I feel at home here,’ Barbie was telling them. ‘I feel a sense of community. A sense of
purpose. We share a vision.’
He paused, saw the message was getting across.
‘And what could be more appropriate than to gather here, in the middle of a vast entertainment centre. No matter what the palaeo-traditionalists of our society say, it’s from places like this we project future lifestyles.’
Heads nodded in agreement above rows of dinner jackets.
‘I remember the barrage of criticism when this complex was built.
They said it was crass, in bad taste. They opined that the elegant charms of the city were being sacrificed to the vices of the consumer society. Reactionary rubbish. These are the arguments of people who feel nostalgia for an era that produced ice boxes, gramophone records, Bakelite phones, two global wars, and a depression. The sort of people who advocate an authoritarian society. Everybody in his or her determined place. Minimum skills. Limited prospects.
Basic income. The economics of intolerance. Well, if it comes to a choice, I’ll take the consumer society any day.’
A ripple of laughter.
Barbie gave a nod of appreciation.
‘Take a stroll around the amazing facilities of this complex and what do you see? The dynamic of social wealth? Certainly. The tangible rewards of a free market economy? Definitely. Or, as its critics suggest, a temple to mammon? Perhaps. Undeniably it’s devoted to the secular - a place where people can shop, dine, party, enjoy a concert, a cabaret, take in a movie, try their luck at the gaming tables. Commerce at every turn. But I’ll tell you what you see here above anything else. Something fundamental. Human happiness. People spending money and having fun. Individuals satisfying their needs in a way no earlier society could grant. If that’s a consumer paradise, then great. If it’s a neon temple to the god of entertainment, why not? After thousands of years of struggle, human beings deserve it.’
A wave of spontaneous applause.
Rita couldn’t help being impressed. Even though she objected strongly to his theme, she could see he was delivering it with charismatic flair. That in itself was a rare talent.
Barbie hurried towards his closing remarks, his voice resonating with conviction.
‘All of you here tonight play a role in pushing the boundaries of human fulfilment. For all the bad-mouthing it gets, advertising is one of the driving forces of social motivation and development. And more than that. It’s art. It’s psychology. It’s mind games - the semiotics of the future - or to borrow an idea from John Lennon, it’s the projection of images onto the blue screen of the cosmos. So congratulate yourselves. Be proud of what you do. The images you manipulate are more than marketing tools. They project reality. They reinvent it. They change our perception of the world. They help open up a frontier of individual freedom unattainable in all the centuries past. Forget Babylon and Byzantium. Forget the British Empire. The past is a place dominated by the hierarchy of indulgence.
