Текст книги "An Easeful Death"

A worrying aspect about the organised serial killer is that he learns from his mistakes and tends to get better each time.

De Vakey, The Pursuit of Evil

Stevie had chosen an East Perth cafe for her meeting with Tye. She’d arrived early and queued for a table with the crowd of casually dressed couples salivating for their traditional Sunday breakfast. Finally she’d been given a table for two by the window.

She watched him manoeuvre his car into the disabled parking bay just outside the cafe. His battered Falcon station wagon had seen better days. Patched with rust, sporting a cracked windscreen and a precariously balanced muffler, the old bomb would have won a yellow sticker if Stevie had still been in uniform.

Not wanting to spend any longer than necessary with him, she’d already ordered their coffees and his sat steaming across the table from her.

He smiled as he slid into his seat. ‘Hiya, babe.’ He’d aged since she’d last seen him. The environment in which he worked was reflected in his face; skin cracked as a clay pan, hair spiked as spinifex, a rugged look that could probably still drive women wild. But not her, she wasn’t even sure if she could meet the challenge of sitting with him at the same table. Her armpits prickled with the sweat of her unease and she hated herself for it.

After a sip of coffee he broke into a beaming smile.

‘Black, two sugars, you remembered. Maybe there’s hope for us after all.’ He gestured at her old bomber jacket and shot her an ironic wink. ‘That Suzi Quatro-does-grunge look is a turn on, but I still kinda wish you’d dressed yourself up like you used to. Heads turned when I walked with you on my arm, made me feel proud.’

Yeah, tarted up made me all the more easy to catch and pin down, you bastard.

She took a deep breath. Stay calm, she told herself, don’t provoke him, and above all don’t show him how shit scared you really are. ‘We need to talk about my daughter,’ she said, reassured by the steady sound of her voice.

‘But you’ll always look hot to me, babe, no matter what you wear. Do you still blub every night over those old movies? Me Bogey, you Bacall—remember?’

She gritted her teeth. ‘Tye...’

In a soft low voice he began to hum. Stevie’s stomach tightened at the familiar tune. She’d tossed Casablanca out of her collection the day she’d booted him from her home.

‘ You must remember this, a kiss is just a kiss, a sigh ...’

‘Wrong woman.’

He stopped. ‘What?’

‘It was Bergman in Casablanca, not Bacall.’

A cloud passed across his face, he’d always hated being contradicted. He made a quick recovery. ‘Gee I miss those nights. But you’ve done well for yourself, haven’t you? A sergeant in the SCS, I’m proud of you Stevie, I really am.’

Nestling into the director’s chair, the wooden joists squeaking under his solid bulk, he smiled again, not taking his eyes off her.

The chain of events ran through her head again. She couldn’t stop it. It was her corruption allegations that had pushed him over the edge, but the tension had been building since the news of her promotion several weeks before. At first his unenthusiastic response had been a puzzle; later she couldn’t for the life of her understand how she’d misread the signs.

What was it he’d said as he’d grabbed her by the hair, just before he’d raped her? You think you’re better than me, bitch? Well I’m going to show you just how bloody wrong you are.

She suppressed her shiver, keeping her own expression blank as she stared straight into his smiling eyes, the same beguiling smile he’d fooled her with five years ago. She realised then, with an inner shudder, how very much like De Vakey’s it was.

The heat rose in her face. ‘Izzy,’ she said.

‘I bought her something. Here.’ His teeth flashed as he reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a small velvet box. When she wouldn’t take it, he flicked the lid to expose a gold nugget on a fine chain.

‘This is what I spend most of my time at these days, digging these things out of the ground. It’s a filthy job, but it pays well. Izzy was asking me what I did the other day—’

‘You had no right to turn up like that,’ Stevie interrupted.

‘Give her this from me, will you?’ he said, as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘Then she’ll understand. When I told her about the nuggets, she thought I worked for KFC.’ He laughed. To a casual listener it might have seemed a joyful sound, but Stevie had heard it too many times before and it chilled her blood. ‘She’s a smart one,’ he went on. ‘I’m looking forward to getting to know her better. There’s something about the innocence of a child, isn’t there?’

She wrapped both of her hands around her coffee cup as if she were cold. The heat burned through her palms but she hardly noticed. ‘Why are you doing this to me?’ she whispered.

‘It doesn’t have to be like this,’ he said, his voice equally soft. He reached across the table and loosened her grip on the cup. ‘Don’t do that, you’ll burn yourself.’ His touch seared her skin more than the hot cup. She moved her hands away and stored them safely in her lap.

‘I agreed to this meeting to give you a way out, to save you grief, work out a compromise. I’ve got money now, Stevie, enough to get the best lawyer in the state on my side.’

He’d agreed to this meeting? He’d bloody asked for it! Under the table she twisted at a paper serviette, spearing it with her fingers, shredding it.

As he talked she listened for the telltale inflection in his voice, the precursor to one of his violent mood swings, but his tone continued in an easy calm. ‘My lawyer rang me this morning and drew my attention to the Sunday paper.’ There was a paper lying on the vacant table next to them. He reached for it and turned to page three. ‘I could almost hear him rubbing his hands together with glee on the other end of the phone. “I mean, really,” he said, “a dangerous, demanding job like she’s got, what hope has she of being granted full custody.” Then when I mentioned your loopy mother, who’d also be caring for Izzy, he almost came in his pants. I mean gee, your poor old mum. When I told him to leave her out of this, he told me to back off. If I wanted my daughter back I had to leave this side of things to him.’ He shrugged. ‘I’m really sorry about this.’

‘Yeah, you sound it.’ Stevie snatched the paper from him and read the headline. ‘Police re-enactment hopes to jog memories and catch impotent killer.’

‘We took the nameless female detective mentioned to be you—were we right?’

‘Don’t go there, Tye. None of your business.’

‘Monty needs his head examined. Advertising the reenactment in the paper like this will attract every sicko in Perth—or did this come after his suspension?’ Tye paused. He briefly broke eye contact. ‘And how is the old red-headed son-of-a-gun anyway?’

Tye’s jealousy of her friendship with Monty had always been a touchy point in their relationship, even when things were going well. She wondered how he knew about the suspension.

‘Was drinking with some old cop pals yesterday,’ Tye said as if she’d voiced her question aloud. Perhaps he’d seen the suspicion in her face. ‘They said he’d got into a bit of trouble: his watch by the body, off the wagon again, losing files. Doesn’t look good for Mont, does it? Though I can hardly blame him for doing the little cow in, she didn’t half give him grief.’

Stevie took the teaspoon and stabbed at the froth of her cappuccino. ‘Your friends talk too much. Who are you still mixing with, anyway?’

He ignored her question. ‘And I also hear James De Vakey’s been called in. Seems like everyone’s onto this psychological bullshit bandwagon.’ He looked into his coffee as if trying to suppress a smile, but she knew the expression was as calculated as everything else he’d ever done. ‘If you ask me, these profilers are sicker than the poor bastards they write about. You’d have to be, wouldn’t you think, to do a job like that? Guess they must really get their rocks off on it. Maybe it takes one to know one, have you thought about that? I’m glad it’s you not me. Hanging around with a bloke like that would really give me the creeps.’ He gave a mock shudder.

‘It’s you who’s sick,’ Stevie said, scraping back her chair. This meeting was going nowhere. ‘Let me know when you’re ready to talk about Izzy.’

Sliding the cafe door behind her with a thunk, she made the mistake of looking back at him through the glass. He smiled and mouthed, ‘Thanks for the coffee,’ and blew her a kiss.

When she got back home, nauseated, heart hammering, fingers still trembling, she found a message from Monty on the answering machine.

‘Stevie, I’m onto something, but for obvious reasons can’t leave a message. Sorry I couldn’t call last night, I had a bit of an accident and was laid up. My phone’s stuffed and I’m ringing from a public phone. I’ve got to go now. I’ll ring again later when I can hopefully give you some answers. Meanwhile, don’t trust anyone.’

She hurled abuse at the answering machine and slammed her fist onto the kitchen table.

***

With her mother and Izzy out together for the day, the house was quiet and the hours leading up to the re-enactment bled by. On any other day Stevie would have been glad of the precious time, but now she found herself at a loss. In the kitchen she turned up the oldies radio station as far as it would go and tackled the housework, anything to block the disturbing thoughts swirling in her head. Jeez, was there anything she wasn’t worrying about? Izzy, Tye, De Vakey, the re-enactment. What was happening to her? How could she have let her life get so out of control? And Monty. Oh God, Monty, she said to the kitchen sink. You seem to have got yourself into as much of a mess as I have. What a pair we are.

She scrubbed the bath and the toilet, changed the sheets and even made cupcakes for next week’s play lunches. She snapped the radio off when Jim Morrison began to sing about killers on the road with brains squirming like toads. The silence almost swallowed her.

***

She’d still not heard from Monty when she arrived that evening at the ops van with only just enough time to scramble into her Linda Royce outfit. The denim miniskirt was tight and restricting, the shoes cut into her feet and forced her to walk with a painful wobble. After loosening her hair to let it flare around her shoulders, she trowelled on the make-up, coating her lips with layer after layer of lipstick and gloss.

A technician wired her with the mike and they did a test run. Satisfied that she had effective communication, she buttoned up the figure-hugging cardigan and stepped out from the van into the street.

Someone whistled. Startled, she turned to see Barry giving her the thumbs up. When he approached, he was all business.

‘Now don’t worry about a thing Stevie, everything’s under control. We have cameras on the crowd and armed cops out of sight watching your every move.’

She’d never realised how reassuring Barry’s voice could sound.

‘You do just what Royce did. Step out from the photographer’s place and start heading to the bus stop. See that old guy standing with Wayne?’

Stevie squinted into the floodlit crowd of onlookers lining the temporary barricades. Wayne was standing with a dishevelled old man with a long white beard and a tasselled red hat that gave him the look of a malnourished Father Christmas.

‘That’s Joshua Cuthbert, the dero whose prints were on the bottle. Wayne’s about to move him into position. We think he saw something that night but his mind’s so pickled it’s going to need a good jolt.’

‘What happens when I reach the bus stop?’

‘Pause for a moment or two, relax, then start walking again; be yourself, as if the re-enactment is over and you just want to stretch your legs. Keep walking till you get to the alleyway about thirty metres down the street then duck into it. If De Vakey’s right, our guy will be watching. If he is, and he sees you disappear like that, he won’t be able to help himself. Don’t worry, we’ve installed surveillance cameras and the TRG are close by. Oh, and before I forget, here, take this.’ The dead weight of the Glock dropped into her open bag.

‘Ready then?’ Angus moved over to them.

Barry nodded. ‘Yep. Good luck, Stevie,’ he called as Angus took her by the arm to the door of the photographic studio.

‘When the guy with the clapperboard says action, step out of the door and begin your walk.’ Angus stood in the doorway with her. ‘Don’t look at the camera or any of the onlookers, okay? They want this edited and ready for tomorrow’s early news, so try not to stuff up.’

She was still focusing her glare on Angus’s retreating back when another figure sidled up next to her. ‘Hello, I just wanted to wish you good luck.’

Stevie raised her chin, folded her arms and fixed her eyes on the man with the clapperboard.

‘Don’t I even get an acknowledgement?’ De Vakey said.

‘Unfaithful bastard,’ she said through the corner of her mouth. ‘Did Wayne give you Vivienne’s message?’

‘He did.’ He hesitated. ‘You don’t need a wedding ring to be unfaithful, Stevie. My wife and I—’

‘I know, I know, she never understood you.’ She allowed a bitter pause. ‘Don’t insult my intelligence, De Vakey.’

‘Lights, camera, talent, action!’ The man with the clapperboard shouted.

Through sheer strength of will, Stevie put De Vakey to the back of her mind and stepped into the street as Linda Royce.

How had the murdered girl seen it? An eighteen-year-old would surely feel wary about being alone in the dark at this time, or was she now complacent? She might not have been jumping at shadows as she walked, or hugging the brick wall to keep out of the wind and the roar of traffic as Stevie was now. Her thoughts were probably miles away from danger, thinking about the shoot. Had the photographer been pleased with her, had her make-up been okay? Maybe she’d been preoccupied with thoughts of her boyfriend, their skiing holiday and the money they’d saved.

Wispy fingers of fog tickled at Stevie’s face as she walked. Last Sunday had been clear, but now it was like seeing everything through gauze. Even the orange of the streetlights seemed muffled. Linda wouldn’t have had to take such careful footsteps. The lumps and bumps of the footpath would have been more obvious, the city buildings more defined, the lights of the passing traffic not so blurred.

God but her shoes were killing her. She stooped to loosen one of the faux leopard-skin straps. As she straightened, she shivered and pulled her cardigan closer to her body. Was he watching her now?

She smelled Joshua Cuthbert before she saw him. He was leaning into the arch in the wall where De Vakey had discovered the discarded bottle. After a moment she heard his footsteps shuffling behind her and risked a glance back. He stopped walking when he came to a rubbish skip, squatted on his haunches and began to roll a cigarette. This must have been his vantage point the previous Sunday: the killer would never have known he was there.

Stevie reached the bus stop without incident and lingered there for some minutes as per instructions. Then, exchanging thumbs up with the film crew as if it was a wrap, she took off her shoes and replaced them with the trainers she’d left on the bus stop bench.

It was comforting to be herself again; the re-enactment stage was over, let the games begin. She held her breath and walked to the mouth of the alleyway. Was he here? Had he already separated himself from the crowd to wait for her here in the shadows? De Vakey’s voice echoed unwelcome in her head. A female police officer, this could be just the challenge he’s after. She remembered the flush of animation as he spoke and then Tye’s words, worse because they were the verbalisation of her own irrational suspicions. Maybe it takes one to know one, have you thought about that? A shiver scampered up her backbone.

She turned into the alley. It was long, narrow and dark, with little illumination filtering in from the main street. With visibility so poor her ears strained for any incongruous sound. Even her muted footsteps sounded loud as they bounced back at her from the walls. The putrid smell of garbage mingled with the fog and the smoke of her breath. Her pace slowed as she tried to see past the shadows of empty crates and garbage bins.

A noise, the clanking of tin.

A rat scampered for safety into the shadows. ‘Shit,’ she exhaled into her collar mike.

She skirted an overflowing drain, only to slap into another puddle; oily water sloshed around her feet and splashed a riffling newspaper. The end of the alley was in sight now. The lights were getting brighter and she could see the street ahead clearly now.

Almost safe.

She wasn’t sure what came first, the hand on her arm or the click of the spotlight. Whatever, she reacted on sheer instinct, slamming her elbow into her assailant’s side then pivoting around to smack him on the side of his face with her weighted handbag. At the same time something resembling a dead animal was loosed from his head and sent flying across the breadth of the alleyway.

In the blur of confusion and bright lights, police in tactical response gear stepped out from the shadows. Angus appeared, talking on a radio, calling an end to the procedure.

Stevie’s cry of surprise rapidly turned into a night-shattering cackle, part relief and part sheer delight. She doubled over, consumed by howling gulps of laughter, not even trying to stifle what everyone would think was an overreaction to the stress of the re-enactment. Then Barry saw it and joined her with his own guffaws. Even Angus couldn’t suppress a smile as he scooped the dislodged toupee from a puddle of water.

Stevie’s gaze turned to her ‘assailant’. James De Vakey was rubbing his jaw. He gingerly reached for his head, his expression of shock turning into one of embarrassed horror.

She was gripped by another fit of laughter. Even with her eyes closed, she could still see printed in her mind the meagre fringe of hair and the gleam of the spotlight on the extensive bald patch.

‘That was a foolish thing to do,’ Angus said, hauling him to his feet and handing him his dripping accessory. De Vakey snatched the hairpiece from his hand and quickly pocketed it. ‘You of all people should have known how tense she would be in this situation.’

De Vakey rubbed the side of his head, keeping his eyes focused on the ground. ‘I thought it was over. I wanted to make sure she was okay.’

Stevie had never expected to hear De Vakey so rebuked or sound so embarrassed. She turned on her heel. They might not have caught the killer tonight but at least she’d accomplished something. The thought filled her with a satisfying warmth. Who was it that said that revenge was best served cold?

As she made her way back up Wellington Street with Angus, De Vakey called out, ‘Be careful, Stevie, he could still try, and it’ll be when you least expect it.’

Stevie made no reply. Only when she was sure she’d left her laughing fit in the alley did she trust herself to ask Angus how it all went.

‘The ABC director thinks the footage will be good. They’ll start showing it on TV tomorrow. Cuthbert doesn’t seem to have remembered anything, but someone else might. And as for the stake-out in the alley, well, it was worth a try, wasn’t it?’

Angus’s professional demeanour and his refrain from comment about the toupee almost started her off again. She grinned and nudged him in the ribs. ‘In more ways than one, eh?’

They’d just reached the tramp’s position by the skip when a blue Commodore pulled up alongside them. Baggly’s beady gaze slid down Stevie’s body in sync with his electronic side window.

‘Any luck?’ he asked.

Angus repeated what he’d told Stevie.

‘Good, it sounds as if the footage has come out well. We’ll need to scan the crowd shots carefully. Well done, Hooper.’ With an easy acceleration, his top-of-the-range Commodore purred away up the street.

At the same moment a mittened paw clawed at Angus’s coat sleeve. Angus looked at the derelict with uncharacteristic impatience; so far all he’d given them was a fast food bill.

‘That car, that car,’ Joshua Cuthbert said, pointing to Baggly’s disappearing taillights.

‘Well, what about it?’ Angus said.

‘Same car, different driver.’

Angus folded his arms and sighed.

The old man ignored Angus and said to Stevie, ‘I don’t know much love, but I know me cars.’