The Shadow Maker

by Robert Sims

  ‘I’ll get you another tea.’

  After making a call that at first alarmed her mother and stepfather, then reassured them, she was about to tell Loftus to book her into a hotel when her mobile rang. It was Byron Huxley.

  ‘I’ve just seen the news,’ he said, his voice full of concern. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m knackered, but I’m fine,’ she answered with a smile. ‘You don’t have to worry.’

  But he contradicted her. ‘Yes, I do. Where are you staying?’

  ‘I’ll book into a hotel,’ she began, but he interrupted.

  ‘You’re staying at my place, Rita. No arguments, please. And there are no ulterior motives, I promise. It’s very peaceful and well away from the city, a great place to chill out. Are you at the police complex at the moment?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ll be there in an hour, if you agree.’

  A wave of relief seemed to wash over her, along with something more tender.

  ‘Okay,’ she said.

  An hour later Huxley pulled up at the front entrance in his four-wheel drive. Rita was waiting for him. As she got in beside him, she gave him an affectionate kiss on the cheek.

  ‘What’s that for?’ he asked.

  ‘For coming to my rescue,’ she answered. ‘My knight in a shining Range Rover.’

  Ten minutes into the drive she was sound asleep.

  She woke up as they reached Huxley’s place outside the village of Olinda. It was built on a slope between the road and the forest.

  There was no garden, just a driveway, a garage and a modern split-level cottage in a space among the gum trees. The minimalist theme continued inside, with wooden walls and floors, suede furniture and little that was decorative. Not that it was needed, with picture windows and glass doors opening onto a balcony with forest views, the sunlight streaming through the foliage.

  ‘This is it,’ said Huxley. ‘Make yourself at home.’

  ‘I’m sorry, but I really need to sleep,’ Rita told him.

  ‘No problem. The bedroom’s upstairs. On this level you’ve got the bathroom, kitchen and lounge, and downstairs is the computer den.’

  ‘Only one bedroom?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, and it’s yours. I’ll be sleeping on the sofa.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Absolutely. And if you’re asleep when I get back from university tonight I won’t wake you. What about work tomorrow?’

  ‘I need to get back as early as I can,’ she answered.

  ‘Okay, in the morning you take the Range Rover,’ he said.

  ‘But how will you get to the university?’

  ‘I’ll use taxis. And here,’ he said, taking keys from an overhead cupboard. ‘My spare set of house keys to let yourself in when you drive back after work.’

  She laughed. ‘So this isn’t a one-night stand?’

  ‘You stay as long as you need to. Come and go as you please.

  Eat, sleep, go for a walk - there’s no better place to relax.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘But I’ve got to get going. I’m due to deliver a lecture in less than an hour.’ He bent over and kissed her forehead. ‘Catch up on your sleep.’

  She squeezed his hand in thanks.

  Moments later his Range Rover was crunching back up the gravel driveway before disappearing along the road.

  Rita wearily climbed the stairs to a broad attic bedroom with a high ceiling, skylights and French windows level with the forest canopy. She flopped onto a king-size bed, dozed fitfully for a few hours, then got up and helped herself to a chicken salad from Huxley’s fridge. After wandering barefoot around his home she decided it was pleasant enough, if rather Spartan. She tried watching TV but, unable to keep her eyes open, gave up and went back to bed before six p.m. This time she fell into a deep sleep.

  Before the forest birds began their chorus of calls and screeches in the morning twilight, Rita was already wide awake, her sleep pattern totally disrupted. She spent an hour trying to settle again without success, and as the early grey light seeped through the leaves, she rose, showered and dressed.

  Huxley was sound asleep under a duvet on his sofa. He’d left the car keys on the kitchen counter with a note saying, ‘Happy motoring!’

  She collected the keys with a smile, tiptoed out, got in the car and drove into the city ahead of the rush hour, allowing her time to call in at her house on the way to work.

  She lifted the police tape hung across her front door and let herself in. Somehow the place didn’t feel the same. Even the smell of the house was different. The dead body had been removed from the bedroom, but the stains still covered the bed, and the blood spatter had left an ugly residue on the walls and ceiling. She realised no amount of redecorating would remove those marks for her, they were indelible, and in that moment she was also aware that this, sadly, could never be her home again.

  Despite Huxley’s insistence on her using the Range Rover, Rita had a better idea. After changing into clothes more suitable for work, she packed an overnight bag and got in her own car to drive to the office. From there she’d phone up one of the specialist chauffeur firms to ferry Huxley’s car out to the university. That way they’d each have their own set of wheels.

  At police headquarters Jim Proctor was coordinating the search for Tony Kavella and Brendan Moyle which, for the moment, was taking precedence over the Hacker investigation. All available officers were being drafted into the manhunt, including Rita. She was again teamed up with Kevin O’Keefe, as they waited to hear what roles they’d be assigned.

  ‘We have to consider both men armed and dangerous,’ Proctor told the pool of detectives. ‘It’s just over twenty-four hours since they went on the run, so we’ve still got a good chance of apprehending them. We moved fast enough on Sunday night to keep a watch on key transport routes, including the highways, so I’m pretty confident they’re bottled up somewhere in the metropolitan area. We know Kavella’s got a hide-out somewhere, but he has to emerge at some stage. Every relevant location familiar to Taskforce Nero is under observation, so many of you will be going out this morning to relieve officers who’ve been on all-night stake-outs.’ He gave a nod of appreciation before continuing. ‘This is an immense team effort and I want to thank you all for getting in so early, but let me add a final note of caution. While it’s crucial to stop these two fugitives getting away overseas, they know they have little to lose by trying to shoot their way out. Keep that in mind. Now let’s get on with it.’

  As officers were being dispatched, O’Keefe nudged Rita.

  ‘Okay, boss,’ came his gruff voice in her ear. ‘How do we get in on the act?’

  ‘We’re about to find out,’ she said.

  Proctor approached them, clipboard in hand. ‘There must be things about Kavella you know that I don’t,’ he said. ‘Where do you think he’s likely to surface?’

  ‘If he’s planning to go into exile,’ Rita answered, ‘he’ll try to say a personal goodbye to his family. That’s his only allegiance, other than to himself.’

  ‘Well, the homes and offices of the brothers and brothers’ wives are staked out, and so is the mother’s home.’

  ‘Has anyone tried talking to Nina?’ asked Rita.

  ‘No, we’re keeping a discreet distance from family members,’

  answered Proctor. ‘You think Kavella’s mother would cooperate?’

  ‘Nina is the one person who holds emotional sway over him, and she’s also his number one critic,’ she said. ‘She’s never forgiven him for throwing away his academic prospects and turning to evil, as she puts it. She’s quite religious and active in the local Orthodox church.’

  ‘She knows you?’

  ‘Yes, she poured out her heart to me a couple of times.’

  ‘Then do it,’ said Proctor. ‘Go talk to her. But you two watch each other’s backs. And Van Hassel, requisition another gun.’

  O’Keefe was behind the wheel of the unmarked police car as Rita directed him through a Gre
ek neighbourhood in the suburbs.

  ‘It’s just gone ten o’clock,’ she said, ‘so we might catch Nina at the cemetery.’

  ‘How come?’ asked O’Keefe.

  ‘She puts fresh flowers on her husband’s grave each Tuesday to mark his time of death.’

  O’Keefe drove through the cemetery gates and parked.

  ‘You wait here,’ Rita told him.

  She got out and walked through the mottled clutter of tombs and monuments until she reached the grave. The fresh flowers were there, but no sign of Nina Kavella.

  Rita went briskly back to the car.

  ‘We just missed her,’ she told O’Keefe. ‘Let’s try the church, it’s just up the road. She might have gone there if she’s on flower duty.’

  O’Keefe drove out of the cemetery, covered the short distance through the next intersection and pulled over opposite the church.

  It stood behind iron railings and a row of poplars, its whitewashed stone walls topped by a gold cupola, reflecting the sunshine. To either side were front gardens of suburban houses, with vans and station wagons in the driveways. The only other vehicle was a black Mercedes limousine with dark tinted windows, parked outside the church gates.

  ‘This time I’m coming with you,’ said O’Keefe.

  ‘Okay,’ agreed Rita. ‘But this is a place of worship, so let’s treat it with respect.’

  They crossed the road and walked up the path to the church steps.

  ‘Let me check it out first,’ said Rita, ‘just to see if she’s in there.’

  She disappeared through the doors.

  O’Keefe walked across the lawn to the side of the church, as much out of instinct as anything else, to see if anyone was around. He heard a cough, then saw a bulky figure in a dark suit emerge from the back of the church. It was Brendan Moyle, who was busily zipping up his flies.

  As soon as Moyle caught sight of him, he turned and bolted like a runaway bull, using all his momentum to hurdle a paling fence into someone’s backyard, with O’Keefe hard on his heels. The detective clambered over the fence in pursuit and sprinted after Moyle through vegetable plots of beans and pumpkins, then through a scatter of wildly clucking hens. The chase ended when Moyle wheeled around the side of a garden shed, pivoted and pulled out his gun, aiming it at O’Keefe, who stopped in his tracks.

  ‘Enough!’ shouted Moyle. ‘Or I’ll blow your fucking head off !’

  ‘Don’t be an idiot,’ said O’Keefe, panting heavily.

  The commotion brought a man in singlet and shorts out of the shed.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he demanded.

  ‘Fuck off !’ said Moyle, and the man backed away.

  At the same time, two old women in black shawls emerged from the house, a madly yapping poodle darting between them to race headlong at Moyle, snapping at his leg. He gave the dog a kick, but it sprang back at him, barking viciously. He turned and shot it. The dog bared its teeth, snarling, so he shot it again.

  In that instant, O’Keefe lunged at him, grabbing his gun arm.

  Moyle swore loudly as the two men buffeted and thumped against each other, wrestling for control of the weapon, crashing through dustbins and a tangle of laundry on a Hills hoist.

  Heads were appearing over neighbouring fences.

  ‘I’m gonna kill you!’ yelled Moyle, as their two bodies banged into the side of a chicken coop, the gun discharging and blasting a hole through O’Keefe’s thigh.

  He let out an involuntary cry as he chopped the weapon from Moyle’s hand, then limped sideways, blood running down his leg.

  Moyle snatched up a long-handled garden hoe. ‘I’m gonna kill you then gut you!’

  But as Moyle thrust forward with the hoe, O’Keefe grabbed it, yanking it towards him, bringing Moyle stumbling forward into a headlock. They twisted and swayed, their combined weight pressing against the wire cage. O’Keefe saw the flash of metal as Moyle got hold of the knife in his boot and, with a powerful jerk, he snapped Moyle’s head around. There was a loud crack of bone as his neck broke. Moyle convulsed as the dead weight of his body collapsed through the wire into the chicken coop, where it lay motionless, his lungs expiring, his head flopping underneath at an impossible angle.

  ‘I’m a policeman!’ O’Keefe yelled to the residents, pulling out his radio. ‘I’m calling for backup, but I’ve got to get back to my partner.’

  He shouted instructions into the radio, hobbling away as fast as he could, leaving a trail of blood through the vegetable garden. Kavella must be inside the church, and Rita would be at his mercy.

  Rita was talking to Nina Kavella in the nave, where the elderly widow was arranging flowers in front of the Byzantine images of the altar screen. The walls around them were decorated with icons and murals, the smell of incense hanging in the air.

  ‘I don’t really want to know what my son has done now,’ said Nina.

  ‘It’s too disappointing. He’s been a lost soul since his father died.’

  ‘He’ll try to escape overseas because this time his lawyers won’t be able to stop him going to prison,’ explained Rita.

  ‘He shames our community,’ said Nina, with a nervous glance behind her. ‘Like he has for years.’

  ‘I think he’ll try to say goodbye to you.’

  ‘You think so?’ said Kavella, stepping from behind the altar screen, gun in hand.

  ‘Tony!’ protested his mother. ‘It’s desecration for you to enter the sanctuary.’

  ‘I didn’t have much choice,’ he said, edging through the Holy Doors, his gun aimed at Rita’s chest. ‘Where did you think I was hiding?’

  ‘It’s sacrilege,’ said Nina.

  ‘I’m sorry if I interrupted your last farewell,’ said Rita.

  ‘I’m not,’ returned Kavella. ‘Because now I can take care of some unfinished business.’

  He raised the gun to fire.

  ‘Tony, no!’ shrieked his mother.

  As Nina raised her hands, begging him to stop, Rita flung herself behind the woman, pulling out her .38 as she did so. Kavella was jostling to get a clear shot when he lost his footing on the white marble steps. Rita stood up straight, gun held steady in both hands, and while Kavella propped himself up to fire, she shot him through the throat. Even as the first spurt of blood sprayed from his neck, a second bullet, fired by O’Keefe leaning in the doorway, hit Kavella full in the chest. To the sound of the gun blasts, and the screams of his mother, Kavella crumpled to his knees, blood pouring from his wounds, his body pitching forward to smack against the marble floor, where it lay contorted in death, bleeding over the altar steps.

  Within minutes, the church, its grounds and the neighbouring gardens were swarming with police and crime scene officers. The surrounding streets were cordoned off, with traffic diverted and eyewitnesses herded towards patrol vans.

  A priest was trying to comfort a hysterical Nina on the pavement outside the church, while an ambulance arrived to carry O’Keefe off to hospital, his leg treated by medics as he gave a verbal statement to a fellow detective. Rita did a detailed walk-through of the shoot-out with Proctor, who nodded gravely, staring coldly at the corpse lying in a vast pool of blood. It wasn’t the conclusion he’d hoped for.

  ‘Okay,’ Proctor said at last. ‘I’ve got a clear picture of what went down.’ He looked at his watch. ‘But it’s past midday and we’re about to hit a feeding frenzy by the media. I want you out of here.’

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ she asked.

  ‘Head straight back to the office, give your report in writing to Jack Loftus, then go off duty. There’ll be some internal flak over this as well.’ He put his hand on her shoulder. ‘It’s best for you and O’Keefe to keep your heads down for the next day or two. So if there’s anywhere you can lie low, I suggest you go there.’

  ‘There is,’ she said. ‘And I will.’

  It was mid afternoon before Rita was able to leave police headquarters.

  ‘This will keep the bureaucrats at bay
for now,’ Loftus told her, patting the printout of her detailed report. ‘Time for you to head for the hills.’

  ‘Thank God,’ she said. ‘I feel completely knackered.’

  ‘By the way, the crime lab’s retrieved the burnt remains of smartcards from Kavella’s fortress, so we might have unearthed a link to the Hacker after all.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘This Huxley chap …’ he said as an afterthought. ‘How serious is it?’

  ‘I’m not sure myself,’ she admitted. ‘But if you’re hinting at what I think you are, the answer is he’s been a perfect gentleman.’

  ‘Well, that’s a rare species these days,’ grunted Loftus. ‘You certainly need someone who’s caring and thoughtful after what you’ve been through the last couple of days.’

  ‘Thanks, Jack. You’re not too bad at it yourself.’

  ‘Call me tomorrow when you’ve recuperated a bit.’

  As she got into the lift to go down to the basement car park, she called Huxley.

  ‘Was your Range Rover delivered to you?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, thanks,’ he answered. ‘It’s parked outside my lab.’

  ‘Good. I’ve finished for the day and I’m about to drive up to Olinda and crash out again. You have no idea how blissful that seems.’

  ‘Why?’ he said. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Don’t ask,’ she replied. ‘Just watch the news and decide if you still want me as a house guest.’

  ‘You needn’t doubt it for a second.’

  They were taking his wife’s BMW to the airport because Barbie didn’t want to park his Lamborghini there. He was driving. Giselle was in the passenger seat talking about her catwalk assignment in Japan. She was flying out to Tokyo for a one-day fashion spectacular, being shown live on television. He was taking the Cityflyer service to Sydney for a series of business meetings.

  ‘What styles will you be modelling?’ he asked.

  ‘A lot of high hemlines by the sound of it. The latest thing seems to be full-on sex appeal - bolted stilettos, thigh-high stockings, tight corsets and micro-minis. Lots of micro-minis.’