by Garry Disher
This was a reprieve, and the cares dropped away from Pam Murphy's bowed shoulders and drawn face. 'Thanks heaps, Sarge.'
But Ellen held up a warning hand. 'That doesn't mean that at a later date the truth won't come out if the whole thing goes pear-shaped. You did do the wrong thing.'
'Yes, Sarge.'
'Still, better late than never.'
'Thanks, Sarge.'
As Pam went out the door, Ellen said, 'Did you hear about Brad Pike?'
'Sarge?'
'Dead as a dodo.'
Meanwhile, that Thursday afternoon Scobie Sutton was questioning Dwayne Venn. When the tape was rolling and Venn had been cautioned and had again waived his right to have a lawyer present, Scobie began, Challis to one side, distracted, looking deeply, darkly fatigued, the way he leaned one shoulder against the grimy wall. If there was a tide mark on the wall at floor-mop height, there was also another at shoulder height, where weary or frankly disbelieving detectives liked to rest their head and shoulders.
'Dwayne, take us through it again.'
'I already told you what happened.'
'This time for the tape.'
Venn looked sleepy yet wired, as if he'd been taking a drug cocktail for the past few days. He needed a shave and smelt badly unwashed under the white paper suit he'd been obliged to wear after his jeans, T-shirt and trainers had been taken away for testing.
'Well, Brad come round last night and—'
'He came to the house? Lisa Tully's house?'
'Actually the lease is in Donna's name.'
'Who lives there?
'Lisa and Donna.'
'Anyone else?'
'No, mate.'
'You were there too?'
'Just visiting.'
'Do you live there, Mr Venn?' Challis said suddenly.
'It's not, like, my place, but I like to pop in now and then, yeah.'
'Are you sleeping with Lisa? Donna? Both of them?' Challis demanded.
'Buggered if I'm telling you about my sex life. Look, me and Lisa and Donna come here in good faith, told you we solved the case you fuckers couldn't solve, and what happens? You want to know about my fucking sex life. No wonder you couldn't find Lisa's kid. She—'
'It's only background we're after, Dwayne.' Bloody Challis, Sutton thought. He put his hands up placatingly. 'So, tell us what happened next. You were at the Tully sisters' house when Brad Pike showed up, correct?'
'Yeah.'
'Then what happened?'
'We got talking and—'
'Were you drinking?' Challis said harshly.
'So what if we were?'
'Drugs? Dope, speed?'
'No way.'
'Dwayne,' Sutton said gently, 'the house was reeking with it.'
Venn folded his arms stubbornly. 'Brad brung some stuff with him. We didn't want any. It was him stunk the place up.'
'We're only trying to get the truth of what happened, Dwayne. If your judgement was impaired because of drugs, that could be seen as mitigating circumstances in court.'
A light seemed to come on in Venn's eyes and he narrowed them. 'Hang on, Pike come at me, tried to kill me. I had to defend myself.'
Challis snapped forward across the rocky table, hard and implacable. 'The evidence suggests otherwise. He was beaten about the head with a cricket bat or something similar and—'
'Cricket bat?'
Scobie, watching Venn at that moment, thought, this is a man who surrounds himself with Jim Beam whisky, a Harley Davidson motorbike, posters and artifacts of the American Indians—what does he know about cricket, a game for Englishmen? 'Or baseball bat,' he said. 'We found a broken one in the alley behind the house.'
'Never underestimate the stupidity of your local crim,' Challis snarled.
What's got into Challis? Sutton thought. Like a bear with a sore tooth. 'Okay, Dwayne, Pike attacked you. Then what?'
'I defended myself.'
'How?'
'Me fists. I got in a lucky one and he went down and hit his head on something. Maybe a bottle, that would explain the type of mark on his head.'
'Very full of himself. A man with all the answers,' Challis said.
'Fuck you. I come here in good faith and—'
'The pathologist said that Pike was asphyxiated,' Sutton said. 'From the way the blood is smeared against Pike's face she thinks a plastic bag was used. We haven't found the bag yet, but we will, just as we'll find traces of the bag on Pike.' Giving Challis a sharp, sidelong glance as he said it, as if to say, I can come on strong too, just back off for a while, okay?
Venn said stubbornly, 'I'm not saying no more.'
At least he hasn't asked for a lawyer yet, Scobie thought. 'Then what happened?'
Venn looked at him sulkily. After a few seconds of that, he deigned to answer. 'Before Brad passed out he told us what he done with Lisa's kid.'
'You believed him?'
'Well, yeah. It was a deathbed confession,' Venn said, enunciating 'deathbed confession' carefully, apparently pleased with the expression.
What a dickhead, Scobie thought, and he began the recitation: 'Dwayne Venn, I'm arresting you on suspicion in the murder of Bradley Pike on the fifteenth of—'
Venn's jaw dropped. 'You can't do that. We come here in good faith and—'
John Tankard said, 'I can't get it out of my head.'
'I know,' Pam said.
She was driving, taking him home, a comforting presence beside him. Every now and then she said, 'I know,' smiling kindly. How could he resist the power of her kindness, her weary compassion? She wasn't judging him, coming on hard and sharp like Kellock back at the station a few minutes ago, Kellock half pleased that Munro was dead but mostly worried about what the press would say, police involved in another fatal shooting.
'I just shot. It was instinct. Pure instinct, Pam. Pow, just like that.'
Funny how his feelings seesawed. One minute he wanted to hide or die or cry all day, then a surge of elation.
'I mean, God…'
'You probably saved both our lives,' Pam said.
Now his feelings were going the other way again. Everyone patting him on the back like he was this quick-shooting, quick-thinking hero, when really he'd more or less panicked again, got in a lucky shot. The gun hadn't felt good in his hand. It was a lucky, panicky shot.
And he'd killed a man.
'Oh God,' he said, and put his hands over his face.
Thank Christ they'd been obliged to take his gun into evidence. He didn't want to see another gun as long as he lived.
They reached his flat and as she parked against the kerb he said, 'Look, I need to be alone, no offence, I just—'
'If you're sure, Tank,' Pam said, giving him a brief hug and thanking him again for saving their lives.
So his feelings soared again.
Then she was driving away quickly, too quickly, and he wondered how genuine she really was. Bitch.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
It was early evening and the phone rang and his wife said, 'Hal, I'm so miserable.'
Challis said nothing. He listened to time tick away. He didn't want to encourage her.
'If it wasn't for you I don't know what I'd do. I've always needed you.'
This time he reacted. 'No you haven't, Ange. There was a time when you didn't want or need me at all.'
'Don't be like that.'
'Like what?'
'All mean.'
He said nothing. He was a fool to have said anything.
'I just lost my head for a while back then, that's all. Besides, you were always working, never home. But I soon got my head together. It was you I've always really wanted.'
'Ange, it's too late.'
He hadn't said that to her before. Or not so directly, for fear of her fragile state. But now he didn't care about that.
She wailed, 'No it's not.'
'We divorce, we go our separate ways.'
'No.' Then she unravelled further. 'No, you can't do this to me.'
>
He said gently, 'I have to.'
'I'll kill myself if I can't have you.'
She'd said that before, she'd go on saying it. He said goodbye, replaced the receiver on the wall mount, and five minutes later Tessa Kane rang. His nerves were on edge when he answered.
'I'm trying to get an angle on the Janet Casement thing.'
'It's not a thing. She's not a thing. There is no angle. Someone hated her enough to kill her, and it's tragic, okay?'
'Who got out on the wrong side of the bed this morning? And there is an angle, Hal. You said it yourself, someone hated her enough to shoot her, which raises two questions: one, are you saying Munro didn't do it? Two, whether he did or didn't, why was she shot? Come on, Hal, I need a good story here.'
'Tess, you've had wall-to-wall good stories for the past fortnight.'
'Fine, I'll go elsewhere.'
'You do that.'
'I'll speak to you when you're feeling more civil.'
'Fine.'
She didn't say anything but broke the connection and then McQuarrie called. 'Good result, Hal.'
'Yes, sir.'
'One more mongrel off the streets.'
As if to say that Munro had been roaming the streets shooting innocent people. 'Yes.'
'Good for our clean-up rate: four murders, one culprit.'
'Sir, I have grave doubts about that.'
'Don't be silly Hal. Do us all a favour. Look at the common denominators: a shotgun was used, and one disaffected man, who owns a number of shotguns, had a reason to kill all four victims.' The superintendent paused. 'All right, indulge me. How do you see it?'
'I think Janet Casement's killing was opportunistic. I think the fact that a shotgun was used in the other killings is coincidental.'
'You're not saying three killers, one for each scene?'
'No. I think there were two.'
'Can you prove it?'
'I don't know. I'm working on it.'
'Image is important, Hal. Image matters. So does morale. If your leads don't pan out, it's not going to be the end of the world if Munro is saddled with all four deaths.'
Challis had been dealing with politicians like McQuarrie for all of his life. Something happened when you got too senior, within reach of Force Command. You stopped policing and started politicking.
Seven forty-five, mid-evening. The three calls soured Challis, spoilt the air for him. He could be in St Kilda within an hour, and have more chance of learning something about Trevor Hubble than if he called during the day, when people might not be at home.
He locked the house and drove out of his gate, heading for the highway. It was good to be on the move but, inexorably, Kitty Casement was there in his head again. The preliminary post-mortem results had come in that afternoon and were as expected: she hadn't been poisoned or bludgeoned before she was shot. She had no fatal illnesses or diseases. Her stomach contents revealed that she'd eaten a sandwich some hours earlier and nothing since then. So, cause of death was a shotgun wound to the occipital region, most likely a contact wound, given the massive but localised damage to bone and tissue.
Fortunately they knew who she was, for the damage to her facial bones, tissue and teeth would have made it next to impossible to reconstruct her face or to match dental records.
Blood type O, about half of the population.
Challis sighed, shook Kitty out of his head, determined to get something positive from the evening.
By twenty to nine he was on Beaconsfield Parade, buoyed by the lights on the water, the streaming cars and the hint of cheerful seediness in the guesthouses and flats that faced the bay. He found Duke Street, found a young woman at home at Hubble's old address.
Her name was Sienna. Just Sienna. She was an artist.
'Oh, he moved back to England,' she said, showing Challis into a sitting room. He glanced around: glossy hardwood floors, thick woollen rugs, black leather sofa and armchairs, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. A hint of linseed oil in the air, and he guessed that she had a studio in one of the other rooms.
'Do you know where in England?'
'He's a Londoner, I think. He was homesick. Went back there with his girlfriend a couple of years ago.'
'You bought this house from him?'
Sienna folded her thin arms and shook her head emphatically. 'I already owned it—with my husband. Trevor Hubble rented it from us.'
'You moved in when he left?'
'Not quite. His friend took over his lease.'
'His friend. Do you have a name?'
'Something Billings.'
'Could I see a copy of the lease?'
Sienna looked embarrassed. 'It was all pretty casual. We didn't draw up a new lease for this Billings—I mean, he was Trevor's friend and very personable and everything. He always paid the rent on time, in cash, didn't trash the place, seemed like a nice guy. Silly of me, I suppose, but I trusted him.'
'Where is Billings now?'
'I don't know. He left kind of suddenly and I don't have a forwarding address.'
'When did you move in?'
Sienna kicked one foot and played with an earring as she watched Challis. 'Late October last year.'
Around the time that Trevor Hubble had returned to Australia and the Floater was found, he thought. 'You weren't interested in finding someone else to rent the house?'
'My husband and I had just separated, so when Billings said he was moving out, I moved in.'
'What about his mail?'
'There's never been any for him. I get some for Trevor from time to time, but I don't have an address for him either.'
'You never saw Trevor Hubble again?'
'Far as I know, he's still in England.'
Challis shook his head. 'In fact, he came back just before you moved in here.'
Sienna didn't know what to make of that, and looked at him as though he'd subtly accused her of something. 'Oh, well…'
'Yet there's evidence,' Challis said, 'that he was living here during the period he was supposedly in London.'
She looked bewildered. 'How do you know?'
'We've tracked down credit card statements, phone and electricity bills…'
'Perhaps Billings paid the bills in Trevor's name,' she mused, 'but surely he wouldn't use Trevor's credit card?'
Challis merely watched her.
'Look, all I know is, Trev said goodbye and moved back to England in 1999. Billings moved in, and I didn't hear anything about Trevor returning to Australia. His girlfriend did, but Trevor didn't. She only lasted in England a few months.'
'Did you see her again?'
'We got kind of friendly when she lived here with Trev. It was always she who brought me the rent. We'd natter, you know. Then when she came back from England she asked me if it would be all right if she took a room here. It was all right with me, but Billings didn't like the idea. He'd been friendly with her when Trevor was on the scene, but now he was quite cold with her.'
'Do you stay in touch with her?'
'She moved to Queensland.'
'But do you stay in touch?'
'I've got her number somewhere.'
She crossed to a small cabinet and took out an address book, scribbled a number on a scrap of notepaper, and handed it to Challis. 'Look, can you tell me what this is all about? I should have asked you at the start, but I didn't want to seem as if I was poking my nose in, but now my curiosity has got the better of me,' she said, half embarrassed, half imploring, running out of breath as though she knew that something bad had happened to people she'd known and trusted.
'We think we've found Trevor Hubble's body,' Challis said. 'He'd been murdered.'
Her jaw dropped. 'Where? Here in Australia?'
'Yes.'
'When?'
'About the time that Billings moved out of this house.'
He could see her thinking about that. 'Was Billings pretending to be him?'
Challis's gesture said that he didn't know but she'd probably made a good guess.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
He'd tried the number for Hubble's girlfriend last night, in the car, driving back to the Peninsula in a settling fog, and got a sleepy, surly voice saying she'd left Queensland and moved to Melbourne. Challis scrawled her new phone number into his notebook but didn't call. It was late by then, too late to call.
So he thought he'd try from work on Friday morning, but just as he'd brewed the coffee and was reaching for the phone, Ellen Destry appeared in his doorway and said, 'Got a minute?'
Challis closed his notebook and gestured to the chair on the other side of his desk. 'My time is yours.'
'You've never thought Munro shot the Meddler and his wife, right?'
'Right.'
'Do you think he shot Janet Casement?'
'Everyone else seems to think so.' Challis folded his arms and leaned back in his chair. 'The super practically told me so. "Good result, Hal," he said, in that glorious way of his.'
Ellen gave him a grin, her face losing its seriousness, becoming briefly ironical, likeable, disrespectful. Then it faded and she said, 'I think we can put Carl Lister in the frame.'
Challis nodded slowly. 'Go on.'
'He's a loan shark on the side.'
'Uh-huh.'
'This next bit's in confidence. It involves one of the uniforms and I don't want to get this officer into unnecessary trouble.'
Challis stared hard at her, then shrugged. 'It's your call, Ells.'
'Pam Murphy.'
'She's a good officer,' Challis said.
'You keep saying that. The thing is, well, she seems to have stuffed things up a little.'
'Go on.'
'She borrowed money from Lister to buy a new car. Couldn't meet the repayments, so Lister kindly came to an arrangement with her.'
Challis frowned. 'Sex? What's that got to do with the shootings?'
Challis saw Ellen shudder. 'I can't imagine Murphy agreeing to have sex with that creep. No, in exchange for information, Lister went easy on the interest payments. Basically, he wanted police intelligence on the local drug scene.'
Challis swung in his chair and stared moodily out of the window, toying with his coffee mug. 'You think Munro owed him money too?'
