Secrets & Lies

by Gina Amos

CHAPTER FOUR

  It was nine am. Ambah St John inspected her makeup in the mirror on the back of the sun visor before she stepped out of the car and walked towards the front gate of the dilapidated house. Her client, Suellyn Phillips, had phoned and said she couldn’t meet her this morning, something unexpected had come up, but she assured her that her mother-in-law would be at home and would be expecting her.

  The steel gate groaned as she pushed against it. A rusty hinge came away and landed on the ground in front of her and Ambah made a mental note to mention it to Suellyn the next time they met. After all, first impressions were important, especially in a buyer’s market. Ambah carefully closed the front gate behind her and walked along the brick path and across the verandah towards the front door. She knocked twice and waited, allowing enough time for the elderly woman to answer her knock. She knocked again but realised that the woman she had come to see didn’t seem to be at home. She was annoyed. Suellyn had assured her that the old woman would be expecting her.

  Rose Phillips was elderly and Ambah knew that most elderly people were early risers and most were forgetful. She was reminded of her own grandmother. Nana Rey was up and dressed and having her first cup of tea of the day by five every morning and in bed by six every evening. Ambah checked her watch and wondered if she should come back later, but she had a full day of appointments scheduled and this was the only opportunity this week she would have to inspect the house. She knew how anxious her client was to have the marketing campaign underway.

  She knocked again, this time a little louder. Still, there was no answer. From somewhere inside the house a cat whined. Ambah stood on the front steps and looked out at the street to check if any of the neighbours were watching before she made her way to the side of the house. She walked down the narrow side passage taking care not to scratch her black patent heels or snag her stockings. She walked on tiptoes through the overgrown weeds, sidestepped the empty paint tins, broken bricks and the plastic crates filled with empty beer bottles.

  Suellyn had given her a set of house plans and she had carefully studied them before leaving the office and now as she stood beside the house, she was annoyed with herself that she’d not thought to ask for a set of house keys as well. She couldn’t contact the old woman by phone to confirm their meeting – according to Suellyn, the phone had been disconnected years ago.

  Ambah raised her head and looked up. The kitchen window looked out across the next-door neighbour’s yard and she recognised that the leafy outlook would be a good selling point. From what she had seen so far, the property had potential, but she was eager to discover how the inside of the house presented.

  An empty, plastic milk crate lay on its side, propped up against a wheelbarrow filled with damp leaf litter which had fallen from the neighbour’s gum tree. She turned the crate on its end and pushed it down into the soft grass with her foot, stepped on it and dug her toes deep into the narrow points of her shoes. She slung her handbag over her shoulder and criss-crossed it against her body so it rested comfortably on her hip. Bracing herself against the brick wall of the house she stretched her body to its full height, a petite one hundred and sixty-four centimetres. Loose, paper-thin flakes of green paint from the window casement came away in her hands.

  Ambah tried to imagine what she would do if the old woman was at home after all and caught her peering through the kitchen window. How ridiculous she would seem.

  The windows were thick with dust. A layer of grime and lacy cobwebs covered the glass. A spider with a small, black body and long, hairy legs scurried across the pane and lodged itself in the corner of the window sill. Ambah watched it for a moment from the corner of her eye, keeping her distance, before she turned and cupped her hands against the glass pane. She narrowed her eyes and screwed them tightly, her eyebrows flexed as she tried to distinguish the features inside the room, but the morning sun made it difficult to make sense of the scene before her. As her eyes focused, a raw, primitive scream clawed its way up from the back of her throat, exploded and cut through the silence like a knife through a block of butter. Her eyes widened. This was the last thing she had expected, nothing she had ever done or seen before had prepared her for this.

  ‘Oh my God!’ Ambah’s face brushed against the window, trying to make sense of what she was seeing.

  A hip-hop ring tone pierced the silence. Beads of perspiration had already formed on her forehead, a strand of bleached hair fell across her eyes and her heart thumped as her pulse climbed. She unzipped her handbag and grabbed her phone with both hands. The caller ID read ‘Mum’. She answered it. ‘I can’t talk now Mum, got an emergency. I’ll ring you back.’

  ‘Ambah, what’s the matter? I...’ her mother called down the phone. Ambah pushed the ‘end call’ button and punched 000 into the phone. With shaking hands, and legs that felt like jelly, she tried to keep her balance on the crate as she spoke to the emergency operator. She took a deep breath, silently reminding herself it was important that she remained calm. She was trying to sound as if she had control of the situation, but it was no use. Her speech was halted, she was breathless, agitated. ‘...15 Eden Street and please, please hurry,’ she heard herself say before the milk crate slipped from underneath her. She fell to the ground, landing on her knees. She rolled over into a sitting position and pressed her back hard up against the brick wall of the house. Grabbing her knees, she brought them up to her chest and touched her cheek with the palm of her hand. Her cheek was hot and sticky with blood.

  Sirens screamed in the distance. But Ambah knew she had to take another look before the police and the ambulance arrived, if only to convince herself of what she had seen. She kicked off her shoes and stepped back onto the crate. She did not want to lose her balance this time and wedged the crate firmly against the house. She grabbed the window-ledge tightly with her sweaty palms and looked again through the window at the lifeless body of the woman she assumed was Rose Phillips. The woman’s head lolled to one side, her arms hung loosely over the side of the kitchen chair at an awkward angle.

  Ambah had never seen a dead body before; she was still young enough not to have been affected by death. She was repulsed by the greenish-red tinge of the woman’s flesh. She bit down heavily on her lower lip and tasted her own salty blood.

  The sirens were close now. Ambah stepped off the crate and pushed her feet back into her shoes and made her way around to the front of the house. She ran her hands through her long hair and straightened her skirt.

  ‘Over here!’ Ambah called out to two police officers as they walked towards the front gate. Jill Brennan and her partner pulled on their black leather gloves.

  ‘Hello. I’m Senior Constable Brennan and this is Constable French. And you are?’

  Ambah gave her full name and a brief description of what she had seen before leading the officers down the side of the house.

  Ambah and Brennan stood back and watched as Daniel French stood on his toes and looked through the window. He was lanky, somewhat awkward and she estimated that he was at least one hundred and ninety centimetres tall. Jill Brennan on the other hand, was short and petite but had an air of confidence and maturity about her that Ambah recognised in herself and other women of her generation. She looked like she didn’t take crap from anyone.

  The morning sun was bouncing off the filthy window, throwing shadows back at him. The young police constable cupped his hands against the window pane just as Ambah had done ten minutes earlier and he saw the old woman’s body slumped against the kitchen table. Jill joined her partner and climbed onto the milk crate and stood next to him, balancing herself on one leg with her arm resting on his shoulder.

  ‘We’re going to have to cordon off the front of the house with tape and while you’re at it Dan, call in another police truck - we’re going to need some assistance here to protect the scene.’

  ‘I’ll have to ask you to remain outside,’ Brennan said to Ambah as she opened the screen door and pushed her shoulder against the fron
t door which was unlocked. As Brennan made her way down the hall towards the kitchen, the two paramedics took their cue from her, and followed close behind. Jill Brennan had a feeling that this wasn’t going to be a good day, and she was right, they all smelt Rose Phillips before they saw her.

  ‘No need to resuc,’ someone joked. Jill covered her mouth and nose with the back of her hand.

  Rose had not finished the cup of tea she had been drinking. A thick film of grey mould floated on the surface of the liquid and the silence in the room was interrupted only by the persistent buzzing of flies. Ants had eaten the crumbed remains of an iced biscuit and the woollen coat Rose was wearing smelt of mothballs. Two empty packets of pills lay on the table. A sleek, grey cat sneaked out from the laundry, jumped onto the kitchen table and turned up its nose at the remainder of the mouldy tea in the cup.

  ‘Shit, what a mess.’ The paramedics covered their faces with masks.

  ‘Got any idea what’s happened here?’ Brennan asked the more senior of the two. The name tag on his uniform said Cooke; he looked vaguely familiar.

  ‘Hard to say. I'm no expert, but by the look and smell of her, she’s probably been dead for a couple of days. Turn the light on will you fellas? It’s so dark in here we can’t see what we’re bloody well doing.’

  Brennan flicked the light on in the kitchen. She flicked the switch again. On, off, on, off.

  The police truck door was wide open. French was leaning inside to grab the roll of blue and white crime scene tape from the back seat when Detective Senior Sergeant Rimis approached the truck.

  ‘What’s happened here Constable?’

  French spun around and faced his superior. Rimis flashed his ID.

  ‘An old woman dead, Sarge. Senior Constable Brennan’s inside.’

  Rimis nodded stiffly and instead of going inside, he walked off in the direction of the next door neighbour’s house.

  ‘The lights aren’t working. Check the power will you, Dan?’ Daniel French was on the front verandah about to walk back inside when he heard Brennan call out to him. He checked the power board on the wall next to the door.

  ‘Looks all okay, the circuit breaker hasn’t tripped, maybe the power’s been disconnected.’ He closed the screen door behind him and walked into the kitchen to join his partner. ‘Better watch what you say, there’s a Detective Senior Sergeant snooping around outside. I don’t know what he’s doing here but he’s gone to talk to the next-door neighbour.’

  Jill nodded and tightened her short ponytail with her fingers. ‘Dan, can you check with all the electricity suppliers, find out what’s going on with the power, and while you’re at it, go back out to the truck and grab a couple of torches. It’s so dark in here. I’ll take a look through her belongings for some ID and any details of the next of kin.’

  ‘I can give you the details of the next of kin, officer.’ Ambah St John emerged from the dark shadows of the lounge-room. ‘The woman is the mother-in-law of my client. I’ve got her details and a business contact address for Mr Phillips, Rose Phillip’s son, here,’ Ambah said, as she tapped her phone and handed Brennan her business card.

  Brennan took the card and studied the real estate agent standing in front of her. She was a young, attractive, peroxide blonde, and her left ear was missing an earring. Her black stockings were laddered and a thin line of red lipstick smudged the side of her mouth. Limp strands of hair fell across her face, her cheek was grazed and the dried blood on her face gave her the appearance of a street kid. Jill had seen plenty of those since joining the force, especially on the night shift up at the Cross.

  Brennan looked at the pen and pocket-sized spiral note pad in Ambah’s hand. It was obvious she was taking advantage of a bad situation. She had been poking around the house, taking an inventory. Brennan didn’t feel sorry for the young woman standing in front of her anymore. More like a piranha than a real estate agent. Brennan thought she would have covered the dead woman’s body with a lampshade if this had been an ‘open house’.

  ‘That’s helpful, thanks. Do you want the guys to have a look at you? Looks like you’ve had a nasty fall.’

  ‘No, it’s just a scratch,’ Ambah said, as she touched her cheek gently with her fingers.

  ‘I need to get your details. You’ll have to come down to the station so we can get a full statement. Here’s my card. I also have to ask you if you’ve touched anything?’

  ‘No, of course not,’ Ambah replied, offended by the police officer’s insinuation.

  ‘Can I also ask you again Ambah, to step outside?’

  ‘Okay.’ Ambah was ready to leave anyway. She had seen everything she needed to see.

  French escorted Ambah to the front door and made sure she left this time. When he walked back down the hall he called to his partner, ‘Hey Jill, what'll we do with the cat?’ He poked his head around the corner of the kitchen with the cat cradled in his arms.

  Jill smiled at her lanky off-sider. She liked Daniel French, he was easy going and dependable. Just the sort of traits she valued in a partner. ‘Have a look in the cupboards, see if you can find something for the cat to eat, then ring the RSPCA and explain the situation. The family can decide what they want to do with it.’

  Jill returned her attention to Cooke who was standing next to the woman’s body. She smiled at him. ‘Good idea not to disturb anything.’

  ‘We’ll be careful, don’t worry.’

  Rimis walked through the front door and down the hall into the kitchen. The first thing he noticed when he entered, apart from the smell of Rose’s decomposing body, was the empty bottle of Scotch on the draining-board next to the kitchen sink. ‘Looks like the old lady enjoyed a drink.’

  Jill Brennan didn’t hear him enter the room. She looked up from her notebook, startled.

  ‘Highland Park – an expensive drop for someone who looks like they were down on their luck.’ Rimis flashed Brennan his ID. ‘We’ll need to call in the Crime Scene Police. Give them a call will you?’

  Jill realised that Nick Rimis wasn’t interested in pleasantries as he picked up the empty whisky bottle from the drainer and looked at the label.

  ‘There’s one thing I do know, Brennan, and that’s an expensive bottle of Scotch when I see one.’

  Brennan looked over her shoulder at the bottle on the sink and made the call.

  ‘Looks like she topped herself. Have a look around for a note and check her bedroom. You might also want to check who her doctor was and find out what meds she was on. Then you and French can go and notify the next of kin.’

  Brennan gathered up the bottle and the empty packet of tablets and placed them in a large plastic zip lock bag and marked the label with the time, date and location.

  ‘What’s this?’ Rimis bent over and picked up the corner of the business card from under the table with the tips of his fingers. ‘Ambah St John. Residential Sales Consultant.’

  ‘The real estate agent must have dropped it when she was snooping around.’ Jill Brennan rolled her eyes. Rimis handed her the card and she put it inside the file beside the one Ambah had already given her.

  Ambah St John was standing on the nature strip looking back at the house when Kevin Taggart walked up to her. He stood quietly beside her for a moment before he offered his outstretched hand and introduced himself. As if on cue, a bank of clouds, thick with moisture drifted in from the south and a flash of lightning raced across the sky in the distance. A heavy raindrop landed on Kevin Taggart’s nose. He wiped it away, turned and looked at Ambah. She was staring back at the house, deep in thought.

  ‘She probably died from pneumonia,’ Kevin announced. He was waiting for her to agree with his theory or at least to make a comment. ‘There are charities and community groups who look after people in trouble. Pride, particularly when you’re old, is a dangerous trait. Don’t you think?’ He realised she’d not been listening to a word he said, he had seen that look before on other women’s faces. She brushed past him and walked towards
her car.

  Ambah wasn’t interested in what Kevin Taggart had to say, she thought he was a creep. She had been looking at the house and mentally going through a list of prospective buyers. At the moment she was only interested in the commission she would receive from the sale and knew she wouldn’t have any trouble selling the house; she already had someone in mind and knew deceased estates sold quickly. Potential buyers always thought they were getting a bargain and 15 Eden Street would be no exception. The fact that Rose Phillips had died in the kitchen wouldn’t make any difference, she thought, or would it?

  Ambah hobbled over to her parked car. The heel of one of her shoes had snapped when she slipped on the front steps as she was leaving the house and her awkward gait reminded Kevin of Charlie Chaplin. All she needed was a walking stick to complete the picture in his mind. He watched as she slipped behind the steering wheel of her black Audi and threw him a backhanded wave. Ambah knew all the rules of selling real estate and one of them was that it didn’t pay to get off side with the neighbours, no matter what you thought of them. She pushed her sunglasses back onto her head and put the car into drive. Even though she had been shaken by the morning’s discovery, the thought of a large commission soothed her nerves. After all, no big deal, the woman was old, and everyone has to die sometime.

  ‘Pride goeth before a fall and a haughty spirit before destruction,’ Kevin called after Ambah as she drove up Eden Street and turned left into Parklands.