The Tower (52 page)

It came to him as he lay next to her when it was finally over, holding her tightly: he had had to lose one part of himself in order to regain another. His job for his wife. The trade-off was cruel, he thought, running a finger down her back so that she giggled. You had to wonder if other people's lives were this complicated. But he had his family back, and the threat was gone. It was a good deal.

FRIDAY

Forty-eight

T
roy bought a copy of the
Herald
and read it as he walked home from his run. The story about Henry Wu's boat was on page three today. There was a photo of Kelly and two homicide detectives at the Water Police premises, inspecting the hull. The paper said it now looked like the explosion had been deliberate. There were no suspects, and Wu's body had not yet been found. The journalist repeated the information about strong harbour tides. Adjacent to the main story was a box headlined
TOWER OF DEATH
, with some photos and descriptions: Margot Teresi, whose funeral was to be held today; the two men from level thirty-one; Andrew Asaad; Sean Randall; and Henry Wu. At least they hadn't found out about Jenny Finch.

Troy thought about Randall as he walked. Although he dealt in death every day, it was a long time since anyone he knew had died. It was absurd, but he felt a tiny sense of gratitude to Randall, despite all that had happened. Having sex with the prostitute had been a terrible mistake, but it had shaken things loose and this did not feel completely wrong.

His phone rang. It was Susan Conti, now back at Kings Cross station, saying she'd just had a call from Kristin Otto. Turned out the United Nations woman had had a fling with Randall.

‘That's a coincidence.'

‘Not really. He learned about the brothel where one of our illegals went that night and told her, so she muscled in on the Immigration investigation.'

‘Making work for herself.'

‘Probably. Anyway, Randall rang her the morning he died. Called her at home and left a message. She thinks he called her mobile but it was off, so he called her place and left a message there.'

‘Which was?'

‘Cryptic. If anything happens to me, to tell you a name: the
Ocean
Pearl
.'

‘Me?'

‘ “Detective Troy, The Tower fellow”, is what he said. It's a freight ship—I checked.'

‘That all?'

‘Yes. She's been away, got back this morning and found the message. Called me because she had my number.'

‘Thanks,' he said. He should tell her to call McIver, but that would mean explaining he was off the investigation. She mustn't have heard. ‘I'll pass it on,' he said, and realised it was a poor choice of words.

She sounded a little puzzled as she said goodbye but he didn't care. He was thinking about last night, and Anna. It was what he had to do now, focus on the things that mattered, rebuild his life. He called McIver to give him Conti's piece of information, and got the voicemail. He asked Mac to call back.

When he got home, Anna was up and dressed, and kissed him on the mouth as he sat down for breakfast. He held her hand for a moment, but sensed her impatience to get away and continue with the preparations. Her parents' plane was landing in just over an hour.

‘I thought we could take both cars to the airport,' he said as he ate. ‘Then I can go to the building centre.'

When Anna met up with her parents, they always had a lot of family stuff to discuss. He'd found it was easier if he gave them some time. It would be a good chance to ask an expert about the extension project for the house.

They drove to the airport and met Charles and Mary at the Jetstar terminal. Charles was above average height, thin, balding and wore glasses. A retired accountant, he was a quick and eager man who'd always seemed to disapprove of Troy's choice of profession. Troy thought it must be something to do with the police Charles had known back in India, but he'd never been able to discuss it with him. The man was so polite it was difficult to tell what he really thought a lot of the time. Still, the two of them had come to enjoy each other's company. They spent a lot of their time together talking about cricket.

Mary was like Anna, a cheerful woman devoted to her three children. The others still lived in Brisbane, and it was her aim in life to get Anna to return. She and Troy usually argued about this once a day when they were together, but even so he got on with her well enough.

Troy walked slowly along the broad corridor at the terminal, carrying Matt and listening to the others chatting about Anna's brothers and their families. He rubbed noses with his boy, admiring his light brown skin. In this country, with all the sun, it was good skin to have. He told himself that despite the problems at work he had turned his life into something good. After all the bad times of his youth, it was something to be thankful for. You needed to remind yourself of these things. He remembered the feeling of Anna's body against his last night, and wondered if she would move back into their bed now. Of course she would. She'd have to, while her parents were staying. Maybe they'd make love again tonight.

He handed Matt over to Anna, and he and Charles recovered the bags and made their way to the cars, where Troy loaded the luggage into the back of Anna's station wagon. When they said goodbye she kissed him. It was a quick kiss, but not as quick as the ones he'd got used to; this was softer and longer. Just a bit, but enough. She got into the driver's seat and he waved them off. He watched her drive away and told himself he was going to make this work.

Forty-nine

W
hen he got home at lunchtime, the driveway was empty. Maybe they'd all gone down to the beach, although Charles might have stayed behind, he wasn't exactly a beach person. He got out of the car slowly, still thinking about what he'd learned at the building centre. The front door was open and he went inside. There was no one there. He looked into Matt's room and couldn't see Charles and Mary's bags, which was strange. In the bathroom, he saw that Anna's toiletries were missing. Quickly he went to the bedroom where he saw a note in front of the computer.

Goodbye Nicholas
, it read.
I know we've had our problems and I'm
sorry about that, but this is not something I can live with. I can never trust
you again. Anna
.

The screen of the computer was dark, but a flashing light told him it was on standby. He stabbed a key to reveal what was there, and winced as the image appeared.

It seemed much later but maybe it wasn't. He was standing outside, in the backyard, looking at the wall he would have to remove to add on the extra room. Realising this was stupid, he shook his head to try to clear it. Nothing changed.

He had to do something, talk to Anna. He tried to imagine what she must be feeling now, and knew he had to get in there, be part of it, before she shut him out forever. She was like that, one for decisions, final choices. For a brief moment it occurred to him that maybe it was for the best, that the marriage had not been working out, despite last night. But he pushed that away, almost panicking at the thought.

If only he'd told her himself, he'd have had more of a chance. Or maybe not. Last night was affecting the way he was seeing things now; it was necessary to remember the long drought before, the barrenness. It got to you, wore you down, you started to die early. He needed to remember these things or else this might drive him mad.

Inside, he found his phone and turned it on. There was a message from McIver but not from Anna. He called her and got her voicemail, begged her to call him. Then he left the house and got into the car, hardly aware of what he was doing. He put it into gear, surprised he was able to function—he didn't know if he'd closed the door of the house—and started to drive. He just drove, he had no idea where he was heading, except that he did, of course. When he came out of it after a while, he saw he was almost at the airport. Somewhere overhead, planes were moving across the sky. He almost missed the turnoff but made it, and realised he was more alert now but this was not a good thing. Everything had become more difficult; for a few seconds he even forgot how to operate the car and felt a sense of panic—was he driving on the right side of the road? It was as though he was drunk, but another part of him wasn't, and he reached the car park entrance telling himself he could do this, go inside the airport, find Anna, talk to her, about her, then Matt. She couldn't take his son away.

He parked carefully and sat in the car, watched a group of people walk by, a boy pushing the luggage trolley awkwardly while a man and woman tried to hug and kiss and walk at the same time, a teenage girl with them looking embarrassed but happy. Suddenly Troy wanted to weep, it seemed like the thing that needed to be done, but no tears came. He looked up at a plane that had just taken off and wondered if it was the one, or if they were still in the terminal. Realised it was the wrong time to talk to Anna. If he'd told her what was going on himself, he'd be owed something. But now, looking at it from her point of view . . . he was going in circles.

The terrifying thing was how quickly it all collapsed on you. You think there's a man, Nicholas Troy, who has a job and a family that are important to him, you could even say they're part of him. But who would have thought that if you took them away you'd find they were
all
of him, there was nothing left. Almost nothing, just a shell that looks like a man but is barely able to function. All of a sudden everything is questionable, even the past. Why had he married someone from another culture? For some reason Little's comments about Indians came to him, now of all times. And what he felt was ambiguity, followed by a wave of anguish. Maybe if he'd married someone more like himself? It was foolish, of course, but it was there and you had to wonder where it had come from. Troy clasped the steering wheel, wondered if he was capable of driving home.

And everything goes at once. His parents. No, they'd gone a long time ago. But their absence was pressing in on him now, when he could least deal with it, and this was strange. Everything was strange. Then there was Luke, who'd been one of his compass points. Now he was gone, too. With the sickness, Luke was definitely gone.

He wondered what was left inside him, what he still felt. If he was going to rebuild himself, he needed a place from which to start. He searched the emptiness, hoping to find an emotion. Henry Wu flashed through his mind a few times, and after a while he decided to think about Henry Wu. Good old Henry. The fact Anna had received the film, what did it mean? Troy thought about this for what seemed like a long time.

It could have been sent by an employee, or accomplice. But why would they? Troy sat there, thinking about what had happened, the strangeness of the explosion on the boat, the fact Wu's body had not been found. He took the pieces of what had happened apart and put them back together in different combinations, added the sending of the film this morning, and finally it came to him. ‘You bastard,' he said, seeing it now. He looked out the window, angry that he'd missed it before. Wu was still alive.

It took a while to accept, but he saw that it was true, the man was out there somewhere, living and breathing. And he found the realisation invigorating, it gave him something to cling to. A tiny rock in the ocean where he had been drowning.

Troy turned on the engine and carefully drove out of the car park. He paid the fee, functioning well enough now he was thinking about Wu. The possibility of revenge was running hot inside, giving him strength. Wu was smart, he'd looked at the bomb and turned it from a threat into an opportunity. Get rid of Randall, who knew too much, fake his own death. Get away.

Troy realised he was the only one who knew this. The knowledge made him feel better, the pain inside him receded a little. He had to find the man who had destroyed his marriage, his family and his life. There was no one else to turn to. It was between the two of them now; the police structure he'd relied on for so long had let him down. Anyway, by sending the film to Anna when it was no longer necessary, Wu had made it personal, in the way things had been personal once upon a time, before Troy had become a cop. He could do this. Wu thought he was a fool, lacking in ingenuity and imagination. But Wu did not know him.

The man needed to be stopped, and Troy had the right to do this, he'd been given that right by what had been done to him. It came to him that he'd also been given the opportunity to right this wrong with Conti's phone call this morning, the divine accident of it, her not knowing he was off the investigation. And McIver being busy when he'd called to pass on the information. The name of the ship was a gift from fate. The ship on which Wu would leave Australia. Henry Wu had been given to him, to deal with. After only a few minutes, he saw how it could be done.

He stopped in Maroubra Junction and walked around, looking for a public phone. When he found one he rang Dutton and asked if he still needed the piece of information about the docks investigation. At first Ralph said nothing, perhaps too surprised to speak, and then it poured out of him.

‘Mate, oh mate, that is lovely. Oh I am extremely grateful. I don't want to rush things but any chance you could find out today?'

Troy had already found out. ‘It has to be today,' he said.

‘Okay. Good. Excellent.'

‘You said you'd give me something in return. Anything.'

‘Mate, of course, anything. Within reason of course.'

‘I don't want much.'

‘Well, have something, mate. That's how these things should work, you're doing me a big favour here. Take something for yourself.'

Troy waited for him to run down but he just ran on, almost babbling. Maybe he was in mild shock from the call.

‘What I want,' Troy said, ‘is a gun.'

There was silence.

‘You've already got a gun. Mate?' Said in a pleading tone.