St Kilda Blues (14 page)

Roberts had forgotten to fill the Triumph's petrol tank so they stopped at an Ampol service station out on Pascoe Vale Road. Berlin re-read the Marquet file while Roberts smoked and an attendant in a dark blue boiler suit filled the tank with petrol and then lifted the bonnet to check the oil and water. Full driveway service was becoming a bit of a rarity these days.

The Triumph's radio was up high with someone singing about going up, up and away in a beautiful balloon. Berlin reached across and turned it off. He'd like to be somewhere far away right now but he had his doubts about getting there by balloon, even a beautiful one.

Roberts dropped his cigarette butt on the service station's concrete driveway. ‘So why Melton, Charlie? Not that I mind a nice drive in the country.' He turned to the service station attendant who had just closed the bonnet on the sports car and winked. ‘Don't forget the windscreen, eh sport.'

Berlin looked up from the folder. ‘I went through all the reports last night. Every one of the girls was reported missing from a dance or a discotheque except for Melinda Marquet.'

‘Okay, that's what the report said. According to her mum and dad, Melinda was all tucked up in bed by nine in the evening like a good little girl and was gone the next morning. How's that going to help us with finding Gudrun?'

‘If the missing girls are all connected then we need to find a break in the pattern, Bob. If it's the same bloke doing all this then he deviated from his normal pattern. And that deviation might give us a clue. And there's something else.' Berlin opened the folder to the notepaper clipped to the back cover. ‘It says here that one of the Melton coppers, a probationary constable named O'Brian, got a slightly different story out of Melinda's sister Maud when he first questioned her. She said something about Melinda having a boyfriend and sneaking out to go to a dance. But when the detectives questioned her about it in front of her parents she just clammed up. After they found Melinda's body the girl refused to talk to anyone. And so far it looks like the blokes officially on the murder case haven't bothered to look into that angle.'

‘And what did she tell the Melton copper, exactly?'

Berlin closed the folder. ‘That's what I want to find out. We'll have a chat with this Constable O'Brian first and then a word with young Maud. Melton won't take us too long given the way you drive and the girl should be in school so we can see her without the parents present. So fix the bloke up for the petrol and let's go.'

While Roberts was inside paying, Berlin pushed the chromed button on the lid of the glove box and the wood-grain cover popped open. The thick brown envelope was still there, wedged in amongst the packets of cigarettes.

It was a quick trip out to Melton, especially with Roberts wanting to show off what the Triumph could do on the open road. Traffic was light since it was past nine and everyone was at work or in school. The highway ran through Melton township and on the way to the local police station they passed the Marquet family's furniture store. Sofas and chairs were set out on the footpath and sale signs were posted in the windows.

Roberts ran the car up to the kerb outside a small cafe. A public telephone box was just visible in a laneway next to the cafe and Roberts rolled the car round the corner and parked next to it.

‘Why don't I make a phone call to the local cop shop, Charlie? Get the constable to join us here for a cup of coffee while we chat, keep it nice and casual, eh?'

Berlin was about to argue but changed his mind. ‘Okay, let's do it that way. I'll get us a table.'

Roberts climbed out of the car. ‘Order me a coffee will you? White with one. I shouldn't be a tick.'

Berlin ordered a tea and a coffee and they were on the table when Roberts came into the cafe. There were tempting finger buns in a glass cabinet but Berlin decided not to eat until the interview was over. Roberts asked the waitress for a bacon and egg roll to go with his coffee.

The constable came into the cafe about five minutes later. He was much too young to be a policeman, Berlin decided, but they were all looking like that to him lately. The constable put his cap under his arm and stood to attention by the table. His eyes flicked back and forth between Berlin and Roberts before settling on the older of the two men.

‘I'm Constable O'Brian, sir. You wanted to see me?'

His hair was longer than Berlin liked to see on a copper but his black shoes shone and it looked like he had taken a moment to brush his uniform jacket and smooth out some of the wrinkles before heading over to the cafe.

‘Pull up a chair. It's Shane, right? Can we get you a tea or a coffee? This is just a chat, nothing formal. I'm Charlie Berlin and this is Bob Roberts.'

They shook hands before the constable sat down at the table. ‘I'll have a coffee, thanks, white with two.'

Berlin saw him glance over at the glass cabinet. ‘Let's get you a finger bun too, with butter? I'm paying.'

‘Gee, thanks, that would be real nice.'

‘Can you organise that Bob?' Berlin asked and Roberts walked across to the counter to place the order.

‘We're here about the Melinda Marquet . . . case.' Berlin had almost said ‘murder' but decided to soften the statement. ‘They said her sister Maud told you some things when Melinda first went missing but when the Melbourne detectives questioned her later she wouldn't say anything. So why don't you tell us what you remember about that morning and what was said?'

‘Okay, the call came in around nine on the Sunday morning. Melinda and Maud and Sally all stay in a sleep-out behind the house. It's one of those old one-room bush schoolhouses. Mr Marquet got it from some small town out the back of Bourke. Bought it at auction and had it hauled in five or six years back. Anyway, the girls were all supposed to be up and dressed for church by eight and there was no sign of Melinda. Her bed didn't look like it had been slept in.'

‘And they didn't call in till nine?'

‘Mrs Marquet called. Her husband was out looking in the bush round the house in case Melinda was there. He got back about fifteen minutes after me and Reg arrived.'

‘Reg?'

‘Senior Constable Suffolk. I called him as soon as Mrs Marquet telephoned. I was on duty by myself since it was Sunday and it's usually a bit dead.' He grimaced. ‘I'm sorry, I meant a bit quiet. I picked Senior Constable Suffolk up in the divvy van on my way out to the house.'

‘And when did you talk to Maud?'

‘A bit before her old man got back. She was in the sleep-out and Reg, Senior Constable Suffolk, was in the main house with Mrs Marquet and the rest of the girls.'

The waitress put a cup of coffee and a pink-iced finger bun on a plate onto the plastic-covered tabletop. Berlin waited till O'Brian took a sip of coffee and a bite of the bun.

‘And what did Maud say exactly?

O'Brian swallowed the piece of bun and licked icing off his upper lip. ‘She said Melinda was always back by sunrise and she didn't know what to do.'

‘Always back?'

‘She said she had a secret boyfriend and she'd been sneaking out to meet him over the past few Saturday nights but she was always back on time.'

‘Anything else?'

O'Brian shook his head. ‘Her old man came back around then and she didn't say much after that, not to him or Senior Constable Suffolk. And nothing at all about Melinda having a boyfriend.'

‘Why do you think she told you?'

‘Frightened, I suppose, and confused. They're a bit of an odd family, the Marquets, to tell the truth. Keep to themselves mostly. Maud goes to high school with my younger sister so she knows me a bit. Melinda turning up murdered in the big smoke really put this town into a bit of a tizz.'

‘Did Maud happen to say anything to your sister after it happened, after they found the body?'

‘I asked her about that but she said no.'

‘That was smart of you, to ask I mean. That's thinking like a detective.'

O'Brian grinned and took a bite of his bun. Berlin's mind flashed back twenty years to a cafe in Wodonga and an earnest young uniformed probationary constable named Robert Roberts.

‘We thought after this we might stop by the high school and have a chat with young Maud.'

‘Not there.' O'Brian said the words with a mouth full of bun. He swallowed, coughed and sipped his coffee. ‘Sorry about that. I was on crossing-guard duty at the primary school this morning, making sure none of kids got skittled by a truck. The younger Marquet girls said Maud was home sick today, upset tummy.'

Berlin glanced across at Roberts. ‘Looks like we have to go out to the house.'

Berlin pushed his chair back and stood up. He took a ten-dollar bill from his wallet and handed it to Roberts. ‘Can you pay the bill, Bob?'

While Roberts went to the counter of the cafe Berlin walked out the front door with Constable O'Brian and around the corner of the laneway to where the Triumph was parked.

‘Thanks for the coffee and the bun, DS Berlin, much appreciated.' He glanced over towards the phone box. ‘Did you want me to call Mrs Marquet and say who you are? I mean that you're on your way. The house is fairly isolated and she's probably pretty edgy given what's happened. You're both in plain clothes too. I went along with the detectives the last couple of times, want me to go out there with you today?'

‘No thanks, Constable O'Brian, we can find our way. But give her a call and say we're coming if you like.'

O'Brian put his cap back on, straightening the brim as per regulations and Berlin smiled. The boy smoothed his uniform sleeves and pulled at the bottom of his jacket. He had something else to say and Berlin waited.

‘That sleep-out I mentioned, DS Berlin – where the older girls sleep. When you're out there you should probably take a squiz at it.'

‘Any particular reason?'

‘Trust me. And once you're inside the main house you might want to ask to use the dunny.'

‘I should trust you on that one too?'

O'Brian nodded.

Berlin decided there was something about the young policeman he liked. ‘Keep your eyes open, don't you, Constable? And your ears.'

‘I try to.'

‘Like I said earlier, Shane, this was just an informal chat. But down the track, if you get promoted to the big smoke and need someone to talk to, need some advice about the job or just someone to vouch for you, give me a bell. If I'm still a copper, that is.'

O'Brian acknowledged the offer with a slight dip of his head.

Berlin climbed into the parked sports car and waited. He wondered if he had any right to offer career or life guidance to anyone, considering how both his son and Bob Roberts had turned out.

In the Triumph's side mirror he saw Roberts walk up to the constable. As they shook hands he reached for O'Brian's right elbow and leaned in towards him. A truck full of sheep was rumbling past out on the high street but the two men were still close enough to the rear of the sports car for Berlin to make out his words.

‘Thanks for all your help, mate, and like I said on the phone, there's no need to mention this little visit to anyone. Let's just keep it between the three of us, okay?'

The steel wheels clattered over a set of points in the rails and the second-class carriage shuddered and lurched sideways. A girl walking towards the lavatory at the rear of the carriage lost her footing in the aisle, falling forward towards his seat, her hand finding his left shoulder to steady herself. He looked up from his book.

She smiled at him as she straightened up. ‘Oops.'

‘Oops,' he said, smiling back at her.

He had a nice smile, warm, friendly and totally lacking in guile. Smiling was important. Girls, especially the young ones, liked a man with an open, genuine smile and his was a good one. He practised the smile in a mirror every morning after brushing his teeth. The smile and a friendly twinkle in his eye said he was a good bloke, a nice feller, someone who could be trusted with a man's car or wallet or his wife. A man's daughter was an entirely different proposition, of course, if she was around the right age.

The girl had a seat a dozen rows ahead of him in the second-class carriage. She stayed standing beside him, and he remembered her taking the stool next to him in the rocking buffet car several hours earlier. She'd commented on his pie and chips on the heavy china railways dinner plate. He'd smiled then as well. She'd added that his apple pie with vanilla ice-cream looked good too and he'd nodded in agreement, though to him it was all just food, just fuel to keep him going. He ate because he had to, the taste and smell and look of his meals meaning very little to him.

Her right hand was resting on the seatback now, close to his head. He could smell perfume. He knew his sense of smell was weak so she must have been doused in it, must have splashed it on. Had she done it for him?

‘Good book?'

He closed the pages to show her the title,
How to Win Friends and Influence People
.

‘My old man used to read that,' she said. ‘He was in sales. You in sales?'

He nodded. It was always easier to nod and agree, whatever the question. But it was also important to talk. Normal people had conversations. Conversation wasn't his strong point but he was working on it and the book was helping a lot. If the girl was going to keep standing there, perhaps she wanted to have a conversation. She was around eighteen, he guessed. She was wearing one of those new miniskirts, the top of her thighs almost level with his eyes. Did she want to go and do sex in the lavatory? he wondered. He'd heard that girls on trains sometimes did, especially these days. It was quite a disgusting idea. He realised he probably should say something nice and studied the girl's round face, and the short haircut that framed it.

‘You look like Cilla Black.'

The girl blushed. ‘Really, do you think so?'

He nodded and smiled, even though he was quickly getting bored with her.

‘Thanks, I love Cilla. I've got all her forty-fives. I like your gear. You don't look like a salesman.'

‘Thank you.' He was pleased. He chose his clothes after carefully studying the newest pop magazines. It was important to be ‘in'. But not too in, not too groovy, not too noticeable, not too memorable. Stylish, but blending in, that was best.

He opened the book again, hoping she would take the hint. He didn't want to do sex in the grimy lavatory with its smell of carbolic acid and a toilet bowl that opened down to the steel rails and wooden sleepers flashing by under the carriage. She was also too old for him to cut. Besides that, there wasn't time to do it properly with their destination only an hour away and the risk of discovery much too high. A railways lavatory was no place for doing sex or for the other thing. Sex he didn't care for all that much but the other thing was another story all together, and the other thing took time if you were going to do it right.

The girl finally took the hint and moved back to her seat after a brief goodbye. She seemed a little hurt by his lack of interest. He closed the book and stood up, reaching for his leather bag in the brass overhead luggage rack. He rested the bag on his lap after he sat down, so he could feel the dagger hidden in its base, nestled close to his groin.

Time to do it properly was always the problem with the other thing. He needed a safe place, a secure place, a place where he could come and go unnoticed, a place where the screaming would go unheard. So far the cave had been the best place. He'd had a week there, just him and the girl from the roadhouse. The memory caused the heat to rise and he pressed the bag down harder into his lap. He glanced out the train window at the flat, dry country. Sometimes it was just so exhausting living this life.

How many years had he been on the road now? How many jobs had he had in small towns? Abattoirs were always the best – anonymous places filled with loners and wanderers like himself. The money was good, paid in cash, and best of all he got to practise his knife skills. He'd done some time in canneries in fishing towns too but he didn't like the smell and filleting tuna was nothing like boning out a steer.

Small towns were good but they couldn't be too small. You got noticed in really small towns, noticed by the cops and nosey neighbours, and getting noticed wasn't good. The bigger country towns were best, places you could blend in, take the time to get a feel for the locals, quietly suss out the weak and the lonely and vulnerable.

Cafes and roadhouses on the highway were usually the best places to go looking. Places with young, unhappy waitresses, girls working after school serving greasy hamburgers to fat, unwashed truckies in stinking blue singlets or creepy travelling salesmen in crumpled suits looking for a mixed grill with tea and a slice of pavlova to follow. And to follow the pavlova some furtive, sweaty sex in the back seat of a company-supplied Ford Fairlane parked somewhere out on a lonely bush track. Ideally, you would take a girl after a salesman had spent time chatting her up over his dinner, making it obvious what he was looking for, getting noticed by staff and locals. Better still if the salesman's smarmy charm worked and the girl was seen driving off with him.

If the salesman was a decent bloke and dropped the girl home or back at work afterwards then she was safe for the moment. But if he was a cold bastard like a lot of them and just dumped her, left her standing bewildered out on a gravel track with her knickers bunched up in her hand, then she was fair game. Fair game for a helpful bloke with a nice smile and a twinkle in his eye. And by the time the ravaged body was found and the salesman tracked down by the cops and interviewed and beaten bloody for claiming innocence and eventually cleared, the quiet young bloke with the nice smile and the brown leather bag had long since moved on.

The
clickety-clack
sound of steel wheels on iron rails increased briefly as the connecting door at the end of the carriage opened and closed. The conductor worked his way down the swaying centre aisle, putting his hands on the seatbacks for balance.

‘Melbourne in an hour, Spencer Street Station and the end of the line. I'll be locking up the dunnies in thirty minutes in case you have to go.'

A few moments later the girl brushed past him as she made her way towards the rear of the carriage and the lavatory, She was giggling, and grinned as she looked back over her shoulder. A minute later a young sailor in white bell-bottomed trousers and a white shirt came after her. He looked a little embarrassed. The name ‘HMAS Cerberus' was visible on his cap band. Cerberus was the Royal Australian Navy's training depot for new recruits.

He heard the noise of the lavatory door slamming shut then a click as it locked. The heat under the leather bag, under the dagger, was still there and stronger now. The young sailor and the girl were probably doing sex right now. Was she enjoying it? he wondered. If the carriage had been less crowded, if he had been stupid, if he had been the one to follow her inside, she would have had a totally different kind of experience. And it would have been a lot more pleasant for him than for her.

He remembered something he had read somewhere, something about Cerberus. Cerberus was a three-headed dog who guarded the gates of Hades. The idea of a three-headed dog didn't appeal to him but having his own private Hades was a concept that had interested him for some time now. He had long ago decided that, despite what the conductor had said, Melbourne wouldn't be the end of the line for him; it would be a new beginning.