Bad Seed

by Alan Carter

  ‘Because he knew there was nobody in here. Knew there was no point,’ said Cato.

  ‘No wonder they promoted you.’

  Cato’s mobile tinkled.

  ‘Latest?’ It was DI Hutchens, in a car, presumably on his way to another day at the Inquiry. This was his version of operational leadership.

  ‘Probably worth having another chat with Matthew, on the record and under caution this time.’ Cato told him why.

  ‘Good enough for me. See if you can batter a confession out of him and wrap it all up before tea-time. That’ll keep the hyenas yakking.’

  ‘Will do.’

  ‘And if Major Crime ring again, tell them fuck off from me.’

  ‘Yes, boss.’

  ‘When’s the PM?’

  ‘Later this morning. Ten. I’ll call in for a while but best let them get on with it given there’s four bodies to work on.’

  ‘Fair enough. While you’re up in town, let’s meet. This circus usually wraps up around four. You still haven’t told me about your relationship with the victims.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘There’s nothing for me to worry about here, is there? No conflicts of interest or anything?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Good. There’s a Dome over the road in the Trinity Arcade. See you there at four fifteen. Flat white, one sugar, your shout. Maybe a bikkie as well.’

  Cato left Duncan Goldflam and his mob to continue sifting through the forensic broth in the Tan home and headed back to the office. A team of detectives and uniforms was doorknocking the area. That was expected to take most of the day. The boffins had taken away the array of family PCs, Macs, iPads, smartphones and such, and were picking the bones out of them. The telcos were also doing their bit: logging calls received and made, durations and locations in the preceding week, timeline to be expanded as required. DC Thornton hovered by Cato’s desk.

  ‘You invited Matthew Tan in for a chat, yet?’ said Cato.

  ‘He’s just checking the availability of his lawyer, says he’ll get back to us.’

  ‘Get back to him. Tell him I’m just checking the availability of the Tactical Response Group. If he’s not in here by midday we’re going to come knocking. But keep it nice and polite, he’s in mourning.’

  Thornton seemed pleased with that.

  ‘And you had no further contact with Mr Sinclair from that day?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  Burke QC checked his notes. ‘October twenty-second, nineteen ninety-seven. A Wednesday.’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it.’ Carol Ransley, a farm girl if ever there was one, had been the office manager at Hillsview Hostel between 1992 and 1998. She’d retired early to care for an ailing husband who had since died. Fifteen years on, and pushing seventy, she presented as remarkably fit and mentally sharp. Hutchens had hoped she might have gone to seed, at least mentally. No such luck.

  Burke QC paused for a sip of water and enquired after Mrs Ransley’s welfare. She curtly let him know she was fine and keen to proceed.

  ‘At what point did you alert the authorities to Mr Sinclair’s disappearance?’

  ‘I gave it a couple of days.’

  ‘A couple of days?’

  ‘Look, to be honest he wasn’t the most pleasant fella to work for. We were a bit relieved to have a break from him.’

  ‘Really? Why?’

  ‘He was a creep.’ A titter in the public gallery. Hutchens saw Andy Crouch glance his way, grimly amused.

  ‘And how did that manifest?’

  ‘Manifest? He ogled the boys, bullied the female staff, and smelt funny. Don’t know how he got the job in the first place. He wasn’t right.’

  ‘We’ll return to that in due course but for the moment perhaps you can tell us what eventuated after those couple of days.’

  ‘Eventuated?’

  ‘Happened.’ Burke QC’s manner was becoming more clipped by the minute. He didn’t seem comfortable with ordinary folk who answered back. Hutchens stored that away.

  ‘Right. Well what eventually eventuated was that I called the cops.’

  ‘You called the police?’

  ‘That’s right. And they sent a couple of blokes along to look into it.’

  ‘What did they conclude?’

  ‘Nothing. Thin air. Big mystery. After about a week they reckoned we should advertise for a new warden.’

  ‘Do you remember the names of the two police officers?’

  ‘Nah, not both, just the main one that did all the talking.’

  ‘Yes?’

  A liver-spotted hand pointed to the back of the room. ‘Him over there, that Hutchens bloke.’

  Hutchens could swear he heard Andy Crouch chuckle.

  Cato’s file on Matthew Tan was shaping up nicely and he hadn’t even formally cautioned him yet. There was the matter of the young man’s violent criminal record, assaults on previous girlfriends and a restraining order against him, along with some early results from the doorknock and from the examination of computers from the Tan household. It was a good starting point and Cato should have been feeling fairly cocky. But while Matthew himself was a blank, there was a pre-emptive smugness oozing from the lawyer, ‘Hooray’ Henry Hurley – or was that just Hurley’s permanent expression? Cato had crossed paths with him before, he was the lawyer of choice for those that could afford him. Cato feared an ambush. He decided to send DC Thornton out from the trenches first, just in case.

  ‘What kind of car do you drive, Mr Tan?’ asked Thornton.

  ‘BMW 3 Series, black, new.’

  ‘Nice,’ said Thornton. ‘It was parked outside your parents’ home on Sunday night. The night of the murders.’

  Matthew blinked at the final word. ‘They’re my family. I told you already. I visited them that night.’

  Thornton looked at his notebook. ‘And you told my colleagues you left by about nine p.m.?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But your car was still there at midnight.’

  ‘I’d had a couple too many glasses of wine over dinner. I got Lily to pick me up. We were meeting some people in Freo.’

  ‘Hers is a Hyundai i30, silver, right?’ A nod that turned into a ‘yes’ for the benefit of the recording. ‘And when did you return to get your car?’

  A show of thinking. ‘Midnight, one-ish? I’m not sure. The grog had worn off by then.’

  ‘Did you notice anything unusual when you returned?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Cars parked nearby, lights on in the house, anybody around on the street. That kind of thing.’

  ‘No. The lights were off. I assumed everybody was asleep.’ A choking sob on the last word. Henry Hurley patted his client’s arm consolingly.

  ‘Mr Tan is clearly very upset. Is this really necessary right now?’

  ‘Yeah, sorry,’ said Thornton. Back to Tan. ‘Do you remember the routes you took returning for your car and then heading back to your girlfriend’s house?’

  Matthew told them. Any CCTV along the way would be checked for corroboration. Cato cleared his throat as a signal that he was incoming. Thornton gave way.

  ‘Tell me about your folks. How do you get on with them?’

  Matthew had been staring at the tabletop. He lifted his eyes to Cato’s. ‘Did.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  A shrug. ‘Not real close to Dad. I think I was a bit of a disappointment to him.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘You must know all this already, Uncle Phil.’ DC Thornton shifting in his seat and a sideways glance; an amused curl of the lips from Hurley. That would be one of their angles of attack when it came.

  ‘For the record, Matthew.’

  ‘Sure, of course. As you know, Dad’s got, had, a strong work ethic: successful businessman, pots of money, good provider. He saw me as a lazy, spoilt, useless bludger.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘I’m only nineteen. Bit early to write me off, don’t you think?’

&n
bsp; Cato thought about his own parents and their disapproval of his career choice when the expectation was medicine or law: the lawyer kind of law, not cop. ‘Fair enough. How about your mum?’

  A smile and a filling of the eyes. ‘We were really close. She understood me, defended me whenever Dad was having a go. Didn’t judge. She was … warm.’ The tears rolled down his face.

  Cato nodded. ‘So why did you send her an email last Friday calling her a “fucking bitch”?’

  En route to the post-mortem, Cato picked up a chicken roll and a Mars bar. He had just polished off the former and was about to unwrap the latter when his mobile went. He slotted it into the hands-free cradle.

  ‘Lara. Hi.’

  If she was still feeling tetchy about Hutchens putting up the barricades, her voice didn’t show it. ‘Thirty hours and counting. How’s the investigation going?’ She made the word ‘investigation’ sound like some hobby of Cato’s.

  ‘Fantastic.’

  ‘Great. Had the PM yet?’

  ‘Heading there now.’

  ‘Need company? Somebody to hold your hand in case you spew?’

  ‘No, I’m good, thanks.’

  ‘Cool, no sweat, we’ll take a look at the professor’s report when it’s ready.’

  ‘Look, I have no issue with you guys coming in as soon as you like.’ That glance of Henry Hurley’s, the personal interest angle of attack they would take. Once Cato brought up the abusive email from son to mother it had gone ‘No Comment’ after that. At the end of the session Hurley had a ‘gloves are off’ demeanour about him as he guided his apparently distressed client out of the interview room. Some objective, expert, arms-length overseeing from Major Crime was probably a good idea and sooner rather than later. ‘But you know the boss as well as I do.’

  Cato had his own misgivings about Hutchens being distracted by the hostel inquiry right at the time he needed to be focused on a major murder investigation. Headline Hannah from Police Media was doing a fair job of feeding the ravenous press pack but already the seasoned hacks were wondering aloud why their favourite Major Crime hotshots weren’t in on it yet. Hutchens couldn’t have it both ways. If he was out of the game then some other big boys, or girls, needed to be in.

  Lara stayed as bright and bouncy as Tigger. ‘Sure, mate. My boss is pretty relaxed for the moment. She knows DI Hutchens has a lot on his plate with the Inquiry. Doesn’t want to add to the poor bloke’s burden.’ Code for kick him while he’s down. ‘In the end we’re all on the same team, good versus evil.’

  Somehow she made it sound like a threat. ‘Right,’ said Cato.

  ‘Meantime you might want to take a look at some of Francis Tan’s business deals. He’s been keeping some interesting company.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I’ll send you an email. Regards to the professor.’

  Cato pulled into the hospital car park. It reminded him he had a bone to pick with the parking ranger. He gobbled down his Mars bar and headed for the mortuary.

  Professor Mackenzie, a petite Glaswegian with rosy cheeks and an accent right out of Braveheart, pointed Cato to a bulky A4 envelope on a nearby desk as she finished zipping young Joshua Tan back into his body bag.

  ‘A hard copy of the reports on the mum and dad plus photos, toxicology, et cetera: the rest to follow later today by email. Time of death estimated at somewhere between ten p.m. and about two a.m. If I can narrow it down any further from subsequent tests, I’ll let you know. Indications are that Mrs Tan had sex that day but so far nothing suggesting any of it was improper. In summary it looks like they both died from being hit with that spanner you found in the wheelie bin; the blood traces, indentations and wounds correspond.’ She slid Joshua Tan back into his drawer. ‘Same with the young lad. Mother and son had defence injuries. Particular ferocity applied to the mother, especially the face. Obliterated. Mr Tan didn’t even get to wake up, luckiest of the lot I suppose.’

  Cato found himself thinking about Genevieve Tan, about the birthmark on her hip, about college days and happier times. About how infatuated he had been with her. He also thought about the savagery applied to her and about the anger in Matthew Tan’s email. Matthew, bouncing a solid steel ball off baby Jake’s head and never saying sorry.

  ‘What about the daughter, Emily?’

  ‘Next cab off the rank.’

  The professor opened a body drawer and got to work. Cato retired to the gallery and checked phone messages while the preliminaries were done. The Y-incision, the snapping of ribs, the cranial saw, the peeling and cutting and weighing were all things he was happy not to witness.

  ‘This might be of interest to you, Philip.’

  Cato looked up from the square metre of floor tiling he’d been examining for the last ten minutes. ‘Yes?’

  ‘The young lady was pregnant. I’d estimate two months.’

  5

  ‘No confession yet, then?’ Hutchens blew on his coffee and munched absent-mindedly on a king-sized Anzac dotted with Smarties.

  ‘Not as such.’ They were in a city-centre Dome: kids with silly hats serving so-so coffee. Outside in gloomy bus shelters, commuters braced against the wind tunnel of St Georges Terrace. Cato had left his car near a station on the Fremantle line rather than try to park in the city; life was too short and pay too meagre. Cato filled his boss in on the day’s developments, starting with the doorknock.

  ‘So his Beemer’s still parked there within the murder timeframe?’

  ‘Yep,’ said Cato.

  ‘And he’s come up with a story and you’re checking it.’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘What’s a nineteen year old layabout doing with a car like that?’

  ‘Good question. Probably paid for by the parents. We need to look at the money thing: it’s come up in emails between Matthew and his mum, and Major Crime think Francis is a bit iffy in his business dealings.’

  ‘Still sniffing around are they? They should mind their own fucking business. Go and buy a nice set of matching ties or something.’ A bite of the bikkie.

  ‘It makes sense. You’re otherwise engaged, they’ve got the experience. I haven’t.’

  ‘Bullshit. You know your stuff. You’ve taken a few scalps. You might take a while, go round the houses, sniff the daisies, but you get there.’

  Cato realised there was probably a compliment in there somewhere if he went looking.

  Hutchens picked a blue Smartie off his Anzac and put it to one side. ‘Neighbours heard nothing?’

  ‘What neighbours? You’ve seen it. Most of that part of the suburb is still a building site. The lot next door on one side is only half-built, across the road it’s just sand, and the other neighbour is semi-retired and didn’t have his hearing aid in. His wife was off visiting the rellies down south.’

  ‘Port Coogee.’ Hutchens snorted. ‘Why are the Tans living there anyway?’

  ‘They like it?’

  ‘But I thought they were filthy rich. Why take up residence in Legoland?’

  Cato hadn’t got around to thinking about that but, on reflection, Hutchens had a point. The suburb aspired to be exclusive and, in terms of value for money, it was certainly expensive: a cramped collection of off-the-peg McMansions. Okay, if you liked that sort of thing, but compared to the Tans’ previous residences this was indeed, well, not Bicton.

  ‘I grew up down that way,’ Hutchens said. ‘Used to fish and swim along that beach before it became private property. It was fine as long as you stayed away from the PCBs they dumped from the power station.’ Hutchens fiddled with his teaspoon. ‘Up and down the coast, everywhere you look it’s Samesville. They should ban those fucking white-shoe tossers from building those crappy plastic shitholes.’

  Cato suspected an element of anger displacement. ‘So how’s the Inquiry going?’

  ‘Shit. There’s something brewing, some trap they’re getting ready.’

  ‘When are you up?’

  ‘Tomorrow or the day after; they’re behin
d schedule. Who knows?’

  Cato studied his boss. He seemed taut, on the verge of snapping. Cato almost felt sorry for him. He finished off his report with the preliminaries from the post-mortem confirming the ferocity of the attack on the mum, Matthew’s email, and Emily being pregnant.

  ‘Thoughts?’ said Hutchens.

  ‘We’ll take a look at Emily’s boyfriend, see if he knew she was expecting, and how he felt about it. The violence on Genevieve Tan still makes me think it’s Matthew.’

  ‘Sure, he definitely warrants a look, but chucking an email tantie with your mum is a big step from slaughtering your family.’ Hutchens finished his coffee. ‘Tell me where you fit into all this.’

  Cato did.

  Hutchens yawned and checked the time on his mobile. ‘So you and her had a thing going at uni but she ended up with your best mate?’

  The man had a way with words. ‘Yes,’ said Cato.

  ‘And you reckon Matt’s a little psycho because at the age of six he chucked a bocce ball at your baby boy and didn’t say sorry?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Hutchens frowned, popped that last blue Smartie in his mouth. ‘You really need to build a bridge, mate.’

  Cato collected his car at Karrakatta station. His mobile went off just as he was coughing the Volvo into action.

  ‘Clock’s ticking,’ said Lara Sumich. ‘Checked your emails recently?’

  ‘I’m trying to maintain a healthy work-life balance. Thought I’d do it back at the office.’

  ‘We’ll be moving in first thing tomorrow.’

  ‘Says who?’

  ‘My boss.’

  ‘Has she talked to my boss about this?’

  ‘Doesn’t need to. She’s bigger than him. But yes, she has anyway.’

  ‘What’d he say?’

  ‘Fuck this, that and the other. My boss reckons he needs a new dictionary.’

  ‘So what’s the point of this call?’

  ‘Courtesy. I sent through some info about Tan’s business dealings that has come to the attention of the ACC.’ Australian Crime Commission. ‘One associate in particular is booked on a flight out of Perth tonight that will have him in Shanghai by morning.’