That was all the boost he needed. He was ready when his mobile phone received a new text message.
Sorted?
Vyner sent back confirmation. Yes, the anonymous caller was dead and buried.
Andy Asche knocked off a few beers in the main bar of the Fiddlers Creek pub after footy training and got home late evening to find Natalie Cobb pacing up and down in his sitting room, Jet blaring away on the CD player, pity the old pensioner who lived in the adjoining flat. She must have found his spare key-on top of the fuse box; he’d have to re-think that-and let herself in. She was still wearing a suggestion of her Waterloo Secondary College uniform and it was clear to Andy that she’d been choofing a weed or dosing herself with E or ice or speed since the burglary they’d pulled that afternoon, and was pretty hyper there in his sitting room.
And paranoid. ‘I think this cop’s wife is spying on me.’
‘Who?’
‘Sutton, a dee at Waterloo. Know him?’
Andy didn’t know any of the detectives, or any of the uniforms except John Tankard, his footy coach. He went to the window and glanced out. Salmon Street was quiet, the bay dark and still beyond the mangrove flats. ‘What about him?’
‘His wife works for Community Health, looks in on me and my sister and my mum, but I know she’s a spy. Fucking cow.’
Pacing up and down, beautiful and agitated and stoned out of her brain. ‘Listen,’ she went on, ‘I need some dosh really badly.’
‘Already? What happened to the cash I gave you earlier?’
As if he didn’t know.
She doubled over then straightened, her fists tight against her breasts, beseeching him. ‘Andy, please, can’t we knock over another house?’
‘Not tonight we can’t,’ he said firmly. ‘People are watching TV, tucking the kids into bed. Besides, it’s too soon.’
‘Please, Andy. I’ll pay ya back.’
In the end he scrounged up $100 and she slowed down enough to offer to do him with her mouth, her hands, even her feet if that’s what he wanted. He smiled sadly. ‘It’s okay, Nat. You don’t owe me anything. Listen, we’ll pull another job tomorrow, okay?’
‘Where have you been?’ her husband demanded, the moment she set foot in the house.
Ellen removed her scarf and jacket unhurriedly and hung them on a hook beside the back door. She checked the time on her watch, still drawing out her movements: almost 9.30. The interrogation of Robert McQuarrie had taken an hour, the drive back to Waterloo-where she’d dropped Challis-and then home had taken twenty minutes. She was in a severely contestable mood anyway, without her husband setting her off. She’d badly wanted to punish Robert McQuarrie, and didn’t trust her feelings around Challis, which made her mad. And now here was Alan, getting right in her face.
‘Interviewing a subject,’ she said, moving around him.
‘I bet.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ she said, stalking by him into the kitchen.
‘You gave you-know-who a lift home, right? What, did he ask you in for a drink? Whip you up something to eat? Or maybe you stopped off somewhere first.’
‘Give it a rest.’
Her dinner, a congealed Thai curry from a can dolloped onto rice, sat mute and unloved on the table. The kitchen-table, benches, sink-was spotless. Ellen knew at once that she was expected to be full of praise and thanks. Instead, she wordlessly slid her plate into the microwave, set the timer and poured herself a glass of wine.
‘So, were you?’
‘Was I what?’
‘Out with Challis,’ said Alan tightly.
‘Yes.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I told you, we interviewed a subject. In Mount Eliza, if you must know.’
There was a pause, and into it Alan said, ‘Did you have to give him a lift home afterwards?’
She enjoyed being obtuse. ‘Who? The subject?’
His jaw and fists went tight, and it occurred to her that he’d hit her if she pushed hard enough. She felt neutral about that right now, as though it were an unimportant hypothesis to be tested one day.
‘Challis,’ he said in his strangled voice.
She gave him a reprieve. ‘He’s got a loan car.’
Unfortunately, she wanted to add.
The microwave beeped and she fetched her plate, which hissed and steamed. Alan watched her eat. She wished he wouldn’t.
‘Like it?’
‘Not bad.’
‘I waited, but got hungry,’ he said innocently, and she reckoned that she was supposed to see him, in her mind’s eye, as boyish, vulnerable and uncomplicated again, the lad she married. She ate. She was ravenous.
‘Saw the news. Still working the McQuarrie murder?’
‘Yes.’
Any contenders?’
‘A few.’
‘So no time off in the near future?’
‘No.’
‘I thought,’ he said, ‘that we could go up to town, spend a night in the Windsor, catch up with Larrayne.’
In and of itself, this sounded like a pretty nice idea to Ellen, but her instincts told her that Alan was proposing it because he wanted to keep her away from Challis and remind her that she had family responsibilities. Wifely responsibilities. And because he didn’t know her, or know her any more, he thought a romantic gesture would deflect her.
‘Impossible at the moment,’ she said, draining her wine.
‘You’re owed time off for yesterday. I’ve got Friday off.’
‘Alan, we’re in the middle of a major inquiry.’
‘You and Challis.’
‘And the others, several others.’
He held up his hands placatingly. ‘I just want you to look after yourself, that’s all-not run yourself ragged.’
Yeah, right, Ellen thought.
‘I mean, did you really have to rush off early this morning to pick up his highness? Why didn’t he call for a taxi? Instead, you have to detour all that way and pick him up. Where does he live again?’
Ellen told him without thinking, then checked herself and eyed him closely. But her husband was a plausible man, a good actor, and was absentmindedly flicking through the cane basket of household accounts. God knew what fresh hell he’d find there. She poured herself wine that she didn’t really want but which would occupy her hands and mouth for a while.
32
They formed three teams and early on Thursday morning hit the surgeon, the accountant and the funds manager. Six o’clock, no dawn light leaking into the sky yet, houses slumbering or only just stirring; an hour when heads are unclear and lips loose.
Challis and Ellen heard later from Scobie Sutton and the Mornington detectives that the surgeon and the funds manager had displayed plenty of genuine shock, dismay and outrage, so it was clear they hadn’t been tipped off by Robert McQuarrie. After the outrage had come shame and fear. They asked to be understood; they asked that their wives be spared the truth. The surgeon had attended the sex parties with his sister-in-law, the funds manager with his secretary. Their alibis were solid, and they confirmed that yes, they’d received photos of themselves in the post on Monday: no accompanying note, but, like Robert McQuarrie, they’d assumed someone at the Progress had sent the photographs and were fearful of blackmail and media exposure.
The accountant was a different kettle of fish, nothing like Robert McQuarrie, the surgeon or the funds manager. His name was Hayden Coulter and he lived alone in a rammed-earth loft house on a slope above Penzance Beach. The driveway was narrow and the turning circle awkward, so Challis did what he always did in unfamiliar places and unknown circumstances-parked the car so that it faced the road and allowed him and Ellen an unimpeded escape route.
Coulter greeted them at the door wearing a shirt and tie, trousers and carpet slippers. His face was clean and tight from the razor and there were comb tracks in his shower-wet hair. About forty, Challis guessed, and used to playing his cards close to his chest. He regarded them expressionlessly, invited them in out of the cold.