Whispering Death (19 page)

Then Grace found
O All-Hymned Mother
, created in the late 1700s in the Old Believers' workshop in Holui village in the Volga River region of central Russia. It showed mother and child posing in vivid colours, a rich play in the folds of drapery, tender melancholy in the Virgin's face. Decorated with gold leaf and a thin film of tempera, it glowed on Grace's screen as if lit from within.

Not her icon, but pretty close; possibly from the same village.

‘Oh, that's so beautiful.'

Grace turned carefully. An elderly woman was looking over her shoulder.

‘Don't mind me, I'm just a busybody. You must be an art student.'

‘Yes,' Grace said, and she reached, very carefully, for the mouse and closed down the site, sighing, ‘and I've got an essay to write.'

30

On Sunday morning, Pam Murphy propped herself on one elbow and said, ‘I could teach you how to surf. I've got a spare wetsuit.'

One of the many appealing things about Jeannie Schiff was her laugh. Raucous, appreciative, all-conquering, it started deep inside her and set up a tremble in her breasts and stomach.

Pam punched her. ‘What's so funny?'

Stabbing a forefinger into her own breastbone, Jeannie said, ‘Me? Saltwater, flies, sand sticking where it's not meant to stick? I don't think so. The great outdoors, fresh air, sunshine? Not this cute little body.'

Pam stroked that cute little body with her free hand, watching the flesh give and restore itself under her touch. She stroked where sand was not meant to stick. Jeannie closed her eyes, moist and warm and ready to go again.

Pam leaned over and, with the tip of her tongue, picked a croissant flake from a nipple. ‘I could eat you up,' she said, and immediately felt stupid.

‘As I recall,' Jeannie said, ‘you already did that.'

Odd, thought Pam, how sleeping with a woman hadn't been the momentous, earth shattering event she'd thought it would be. It was simply nice, greedy, appreciative sex with someone who happened to be a woman. No big deal. Flesh on flesh. Good sex, thoughtful, skilled; slightly different mechanically. But the feelings stayed the same. Why was that?

‘Or a walk,' she said. ‘Bushranger Bay. Greens Bush.'

Jeannie Schiff stretched like a cat. ‘Honey, I don't do the outdoors.'

Pam flopped back on her pillow. ‘Our first disagreement. It's all downhill from now on.'

They seemed to click on many levels, including a sense of what was funny or absurd, but this time the sergeant from sex crimes didn't laugh. Leaning on one elbow, stroking Pam's inner thigh absently as if searching for the right words, Jeannie Schiff said, ‘I live with someone.'

‘I know, you told me.'

‘Just making sure.'

‘It's all right Jeannie, honestly.'

‘Fun, right? We're having fun.'

‘Fun,' Pam said.

She smiled and they kissed and Jeannie went to pee, loud enough for Pam to hear through the open en-suite door. Jeannie Schiff wasn't a man, certainly wasn't mannish, with her softness, her curviness, her clothes. But somehow she wasn't any different.

Pam thought about it. She'd slept with maybe ten men—be honest, she knew exactly how many—but didn't think she was very good at relationships. She was frank, upfront, what-you-see-is-what-you-get. Not good at subtleties and games.

Not keen to be hurt again.

Was she setting herself up for that? Would sleeping with a woman mean there was more at stake?

She couldn't see it, frankly. Pam Murphy was honest, open. Perhaps too trusting, but she was good at examining herself. She didn't feel a scrap of guilt or shame or childish daring. She didn't feel unmoored. No momentous shifting inside her head. She'd just had a few nights of great sex and companionship, that's all. No big deal. And no false promises.

Jeannie re-entered the room, shaking water from her hands, a glint of mischief as she came bounding in and dived across the bed, her flesh flexing nicely here and there. They had the rest of the day together and they had maybe a handful of other times before the case was closed and she went back to her architect in the city.

Pam blinked, zoning out a little as a brain zap passed through her, but it was almost like a familiar companion and all she wanted to think about was kissing and touching. So they made love, and then they cuddled, and then Jeannie Schiff had to go and spoil it a little.

‘It's okay, you know.'

‘What is?'

‘I know you're not gay. I can always tell when someone isn't. It's okay just to have a bit of fun, you know.'

Well, screw you. Pam sat up and gave her lover a slap on the butt. ‘Stay as long as you like. But I'm going for a walk on the beach.'

A few kilometres to the east, Scobie Sutton was faintly irritable. ‘Well, what's it entail?'

Roslyn Sutton stuck her jaw out, bottom lip pouting. ‘You don't want me to do it.'

‘I didn't say that. It sounds like a big commitment, that's all.'

His daughter put her little fists to her breasts beseechingly. ‘It would be so much fun.'

Sutton was setting the table for lunch—cheese, tomatoes, bread, butter, olives, lettuce, tahini, sliced beef from last night's roast—and Roslyn was hovering with a handful of knives and forks. His grumpiness increasing, he slammed a plate onto the place mat in front of his wife, no response in her mute, helpless face. Beth should have been spending the day out, as she did every Sunday, but this time her mother and sister were coming here.

He took a deep breath, looked at Roslyn and said, ‘I can see it would be fun, but there are things to consider. How many performances?'

‘Four.'

‘When?'

‘Two weekends in November.'

‘How late are the rehearsals?'

‘Sundays between one and five, and Fridays between seven and ten.'

Scobie knew he'd capitulate. It wasn't as if his daughter wasn't a terrific singer and dancer.

‘What about netball?' he asked glumly.

‘I won't do it this term.'

‘What about your homework?'

That bottom lip again. ‘I'll fit it in. Plenty of kids do this every year, Dad.'

‘It's a lot of driving around for me. What if I'm working a big case—like now?'

‘You never let me do anything!'

Sutton made a mental list: lifesaving, netball, sleepovers, birthday parties, dancing classes…‘Ros, within reason, I have never denied you anything.'

There had been a time when he'd have said ‘
We
have never denied you anything.' A time when the burden had been shared. He snatched the knives and forks from Roslyn's sulky hands and dropped them in place around the table. The running around would leave him ragged with tiredness. Resentment would grow corrosively. Right at that moment, he hated his wife.

‘Please, Dad.'

Scobie drew in a breath. And just at that point a quiet voice said, ‘Let her do it if she wants.'

Father and daughter stopped what they were doing.

‘Mum?'

‘I can drive you around, I don't mind,' Beth Sutton said. She glanced at Scobie, a little steel in it. ‘No need to stare at me like that.'

*

Challis was trying to unwind. Uncertainty was an ever-present condition of his life and he was beginning to hate it. He wanted Ellen Destry close, he wanted to be able to speak his mind in public and generate debate, not opprobrium. He wanted simple pleasures, in fact, like seeing his house in full daylight occasionally. The place was always draped in long morning shadows when he left for work and a humped shape in starlight when he got back. And so he spent the first part of that Sunday morning with a newspaper, toast and coffee at his kitchen window, watching shadows wind back from his yard. 8 a.m. 9 a.m. 10. Sunlight of great clarity, silently foraging ducks, a great beckoning stillness. He pulled on his old Rockports and walked up the hill, passing the orchard, the stockbroker's weekender cottage, the farm dogs that saw him as a new threat each time he approached their boundary. Then down the laneway beyond the brow of the hill.

A second coffee on his return, and then the sunlight beckoned again. He needed to be out in it, mowing, weeding.

Then it was mid-afternoon and he decided to wash his car, which wore a patina of dust once more. He fetched the keys and got in, intending to drive around to the garden hose in the back yard.

Nothing. Not even enough juice to turn the starter motor over.

Challis was trying again when a car turned in from the dirt road that ran past his house. He got out, poised and wary. He didn't get many visitors—an occasional neighbour, lost tourist or someone looking to buy a hobby farm—and always, at the back of his mind, was the expectation that an enemy would come for him one day, someone he'd put away. Perhaps a posse of Ethical Standards officers, keen to stitch him up for embarrassing the government. He glanced around quickly. A shovel that he'd forgotten to put back in the garden shed; tree cover on the next property, a tangle of peppermint gums, bracken and pittosporums.

A grey Mazda. It pulled up behind the Triumph and the driver and his female passenger got out, the driver lifting a hand to him. ‘Hal.'

‘Alan.'

Challis didn't relax, not fully. Ellen's ex-husband was a big man. Relations between them had always been awkward.

‘Hope we're not interrupting anything.'

‘Just pottering,' Challis said.

‘I don't think you've met Sue Wells, my significant other.'

When Ellen had heard about the girlfriend she'd said sourly, ‘I bet she's young, no brains, boobs out to here,' but Challis saw a short, round, greying woman aged in her forties, wearing faded baggy jeans and a tired smile.

He shook her hand. ‘We spoke on the phone. How's Larrayne holding up?'

‘Sleeps a lot,' Wells said. ‘A bit teary sometimes, other times angry, but basically she's fine.'

Alan Destry shifted on his solid feet. ‘That's why we're here, Hal. It was great what you did. I can't thank you enough.'

Challis rolled his shoulders, looking for an escape. ‘Coffee?'

‘Just had afternoon tea in Flinders. Need to get back before the weekend traffic gets too busy.'

Challis felt a fugitive regret for the leisure time that had been lost to him over the years, and envy for the early stages of love, when there is only promise, not heartache, in the air. He missed Ellen.

As if reading his mind, Alan Destry said, ‘Heard from Ells?'

‘Most days.'

‘Good, good.' Destry toed the ground uncomfortably, then glanced at Challis. ‘Read what you said in the paper.'

Challis was silent, gave a short nod.

‘Took guts.'

‘Fat lot of good it's done me, or the rank and file in general.'

Destry had run out of steam. ‘Well, we won't keep you.'

‘Actually,' Challis said, ‘would you have a set of jumper leads in your car? Flat battery.'

Alan Destry was more comfortable with dead batteries than live emotions. ‘Gis a look.'

With Challis behind the wheel, ready to turn the key, Destry raised the bonnet.

‘Rats.'

Challis got out. ‘Your leads won't fit?'

‘No,
rats
. Furry animals with sharp teeth.'

Challis peered in. Holes in the radiator hoses, exposed wiring, and rat droppings and flecks of chewed rubber and insulation scattered on and around the engine.

He saw it as a sign. When the others had gone, he washed, polished and photographed his creaky old car, fired up the Internet, and posted it for sale.

Finally it was evening and he could log on and talk to Ellen, who was in Glasgow. Her tiny image on the screen was a tonic as he outlined his day. ‘So in the end I went over and fetched your car.'

‘Good.'

‘Thought I'd buy an old MG this time.'

‘Like hell. Describe the view from your window,' Ellen said. ‘Describe it exactly. I want to see it in my mind's eye.'

Challis told her about the play of failing light and deepening shadows on the stretch of lawn and trees between his house and the road, surprising himself. ‘After years of report writing, I didn't think I could be so poetic.'

‘Oh I miss that, I miss you…' ‘It's only been a few days,' he said.

‘I know.'

‘How's the sex crimes business where you are?'

‘Same crimes, same criminals,' she said. ‘Probably more sex slavery and human trafficking. Same police culture.'

Meaning that most police officers were male, and many believed at least partly that the victims of sexual assault brought it upon themselves in some way. The conversation drifted on to other things, Challis watching his liquidambar—what Ellen called his star tree— merge with the greater darkness all around it. A car crawled past at the end of his driveway, headlights probing the pines, bracken, blackberry canes and pittosporums lining the road. He knew it was a local car. Newcomers went faster, somehow failing to take into account that the road was narrow, the dirt and gravel surface treacherous, the bends blind.

He said, ‘Thought I might do a bit more work to your house during the week, if I can find the time.'

Fix the home invasion damage, in fact. There was an awkward silence, and Ellen said, ‘Look—'

‘Larrayne's been staying there,' he said, in an attempt to tease out what Ellen had or hadn't been told.

‘So I understand. Look, Hal, you don't have to fix my house up, though I am grateful, honestly.'

‘Honestly.' One of those tricky words.

31

On Monday morning Jeannie Schiff tossed Pam Murphy the keys to the silver Holden and said, ‘You drive.'

Great, a city trip in peak hour. One of these days, Murphy thought, we'll have autopsy facilities here on the Peninsula.