Chain of Evidence

23

The death of Ted Anderson on Isolation Pass, the earlier death of his wife from cancer, and the survival of their little daughter resolved themselves into the kind of small-town tragedy that on a slow news day will go national. The story was an ABC news item on Monday night and in the Adelaide Advertiser on Tuesday morning. Challis’s father took a gloomy interest in it, seated in the sunroom with a blanket over his knees, the newspaper in tented sections on the floor, the sofa, and the coffee table. ‘Suicide,’ was his verdict, gloomily expressed, as though he wished for the ways and means to speed his own death.

Challis privately agreed, for the town’s gossips claimed that Ted Anderson had been despondent in recent months. But Challis was feeling contentious, a reaction to the past few days spent cooped up with his father. ‘The Pass is a dangerous stretch of road, Dad.’

‘The poor man lost his wife to cancer. He wasn’t coping.’

‘That was five years ago.’

‘Still,’ his father said.

Challis felt a twinge of guilt. He hadn’t been here to see what his mother’s death had done to his father. Like Ted Anderson, the old man wished for death, his body obliging him slowly, but Ted Anderson’s method had been quicker and more absolute.

That afternoon, Challis wandered down to the police station, a small brick building behind the shire council offices. The walls and floor were a pale, institutional green, the reception desk high and laminated, the noticeboards rustling with wanted posters, a faded gun amnesty notice, and pamphlets regarding home security and driving offences. A civilian clerk said, ‘Help you?’

She was young. He didn’t know her. ‘Is Sergeant Wurfel in?’

Her jaws snapped. ‘Yeah.’

Challis said patiently, ‘Then may I see him?’

Her face cleared. ‘Okay.’

She disappeared through a door and returned with Wurfel, who gave him a flat cops’ look and jerked his head. ‘Come through.’

Wurfel took Challis along a short corridor to his office. ‘Take a seat. I asked around about you.’

Challis shifted a little in his chair. ‘I’m here as a civilian.’

‘Fair enough.’

Carl Wurfel was a familiar type to Challis: large-framed, a heavy drinker but not a drunk, tough and pragmatic but not necessarily a bully, probably divorced. He scared people and got the job done. He wouldn’t respond to cop talk from Challis.

‘If you know about me then you know that my brother-in-law disappeared out east a few years ago.’

Wurfel nodded.

‘I’m looking into it,’ Challis went on.

‘It was looked into at the time.’

‘You checked the file?’

‘Soon as I knew who you were.’

‘May I see it?’

‘Why?’

Challis eyed him carefully. ‘I need to see if there is anything in it that’s not in the Misper file at police headquarters.’

‘They gave you access?’

Challis nodded. ‘Last Friday.’

‘Wait outside,’ Wurfel said. ‘Let me make a call.’

Challis waited in the corridor; Wurfel beckoned him back a minute later. He was frowning. ‘I’ll let you see our file. But I thought your brother-in-law committed suicide?’

‘Most of the locals think so. He was a bit unstable.’

‘Your mate in missing persons told me your sister’s been receiving strange mail, as if he’s still alive.’

‘Yes,’ said Challis levelly.

Wurfel was about to say something more, then shrugged and went to his filing cabinet. ‘Here’s the file. You can read it here. No copying.’

‘Okay. Thanks.’

Wurfel remained in the office, ignoring Challis. He raced through his in-tray in a kind of habitual fury and made several abrupt phone calls while Challis tried to concentrate. The file was brief and told him nothing he didn’t already know. There was no mention of the letters that Meg had received, only a brief, handwritten update made several months after Gavin’s car had been found abandoned at the side of the road: ‘Suicide scenario not favoured by Mrs Hurst. Says her husband ran away.’ But there were two unrelated reports in the file. One a domestic disturbance callout to the residence of Gavin and Meg Hurst, another an interview with Meg following a report that she’d been assaulted by Gavin: ‘Mrs Hurst declines to press charges.’

Challis pushed the file across the desk to Wurfel. ‘Thanks, sergeant. I appreciate it.’

Wurfel grunted. ‘We gave the kid a verbal warning.’

Challis blinked, then understood. ‘Mark Finucane?’

‘He’s not a bad kid, considering the family he belongs to.’

‘I know all about the Finucanes,’ Challis said.

He returned to the main street and wandered, his mind drifting, but after a while the town began to impinge on him. People kept stopping to say hello, ask after his father and reminisce about the old days, when he’d been just another town kid and later, for a short time, one of the town’s three policemen. They didn’t dwell on this latter aspect of his past, and Challis was thankful for that, but, as he walked, he wondered what he’d gained and lost by moving away. Professional advancement, sure, broader horizons, but at a cost. Did he have a family now, or a community? He was remote from the former, and despite his years on the Peninsula, and in the police force, he inhabited the margins, not the centre. How much that owed to his not fitting in, and how much to not wanting to, he really couldn’t say.

He walked on. Small things-a voice, a gait, the hot-wood smell of a verandah post in the bright springtime sun-aroused in him powerful memories of his school days and weekends in Mawson’s Bluff, a time of idle, harmless vandalism, boredom and longing. He even found himself feeling the same hostility or indifference toward some people, the same affection for others.

And the same desire. He’d slipped into the Copper Kettle for coffee, and was standing at the cash register, when a lithe shape pressed against his back, arms encircled him from behind, and a voice breathed, ‘Guess who, handsome?’

He knew at once. He felt his body yielding, arching, his head tipping back and inclining toward her mouth, which reached up and pecked him on the hinge of his jaw. He turned around then. ‘Lisa.’

She grinned and released him.

‘Lovely to see you,’ he said.

She continued to grin. He was a little discomposed. A part of him meant what he’d said, for she was as lovely as he’d remembered, still slight, nimble, direct, her dark hair cropped short, her dark eyes bright with affection. Another part of him remembered her directness and how uncomplicated and selfish her ambitions had been.

‘Join me?’ he said.

‘What are you having?’

‘Coffee and a muffin.’

Another customer was already waiting, but Lisa, smiling apologetically, called to the counter hand, ‘I’ll have the same. Strong coffee.’

‘Yes, Mrs Joyce.’

‘You have to tell them to make it strong, Hal.’

Challis forked out more money and they found a table beside a window. There had been nothing like the Copper Kettle when they were growing up. The decor suggested sidewalk cafй bohemia, and you could consume anything from a soy latte to a smoked salmon baguette. It was evident that the locals patronised it, too: he saw shopkeepers, farmers, housewives, visiting salesmen, kids on their way home from school.

‘Sorry to hear about your dad,’ Lisa said.

‘Thanks.’

‘Is he, you know…’

‘Meg thinks he’ll go soon, but he’s so pigheaded he could rally for a few weeks or months, or even go on like this forever.’

Lisa nodded. ‘My parents are still going strong. Rex’s are barely hanging on.’

Her wealthy husband’s parents had retired to the town, signing everything over to their son. Challis wondered if Lisa had been behind that. Rex Joyce’s parents had seemed old and frail twenty years ago. As Lisa said, they must barely be hanging on now.

‘How is Rex?’

Lisa told him. He scarcely took it in, finding attractive-all over again-her fine, animated features and gestures. She was very alive there, on the other side of the little table. Their knees touched, and their shoes, once or twice. But he did take in the fact that Lisa was disgruntled. Rex Joyce was a drinker. He remembered that Meg had told him that.

‘And you?’ she asked. She gave him a lopsided look. ‘Are you over all that…business?’

She meant the fact that Angela, his late wife, had tried to have him killed. Lisa’s voice and manner suggested that despite everything else she had or might have done to him, she would never have wanted to kill him. He nodded, feeling tired suddenly. It was as if he was being confronted by past mistakes-mistakes in matters of the heart, first with Lisa and then with Angela. He said bluntly, ‘It would never have worked, you and me.’

She wasn’t disconcerted. She patted his wrist. ‘In fact, it didn’t work. But it was fun.’

He grinned. She returned it, and said lightly, ‘Involved with anyone at the moment?’

Her gaze was direct, amused but merciless. He met it, thinking rapidly. Lisa was acting on him; the old chemistry was still there. But old instincts were kicking in, too. He remembered that Lisa Acres was not someone you confided in. If she listened it was to store information that she might use one day-against you, or to her advantage, or both.

‘Cat got your tongue, Hal?’

That tugged at his memory, too. He’d often been mute with her, back when he was eighteen, mainly out of simple astonishment: he’d never met anyone so vain, unreliable, bored and easily distracted. All those careless, shrugging explanations for missed appointments and unreturned phone calls. Reproaches never worked because she was unaccommodating, unconcerned about hurting him and unable to make concessions. But her sauntering walk, sleepy smile and softly rounded, flawless brown skin had made up for all of that, over and over again.

She saw all of this passing across his face and a brief, peevish expression flickered on hers, as if she was like everyone else and wanted to be loved. Her gaze slipped to the table.

He sipped his coffee and said inanely, ‘How’s the drought affecting you and Rex?’

‘The drought? For God’s sake.’

The tightness persisted between them. Presently Lisa said, ‘I see Eve in here sometimes. A whole gang of them. Nice kids.’

‘Yes,’ said Challis, relieved.

‘I feel sorry for her.’

‘Eve’s okay.’

Lisa reached across and placed her hand over his and it felt hot and alive there. ‘On the surface, maybe.’

He withdrew his hand. ‘Did you know Gavin?’

Lisa sipped her coffee. ‘This is all froth. Gavin? Not really. He was not someone you got close to.’

Challis had to acknowledge the truth of that.

‘Well, I’d better go,’ Lisa said, getting to her feet and bending over to kiss him. She swept out of the place as though she owned it, as she’d always done.

He sat for a while, reluctant to return to his father, and checked his phone, which had been turned off. One message. He dialled, mood lightening, and said, ‘Only me, returning your call.’

Last night Ellen had been elated: Katie Blasko had been found alive. Today the elation was still apparent in her voice, but Challis also heard resolve. She now knew what sort of crime and criminals she was investigating. ‘Hang on,’ he told her, ‘I’m in the local cafй, and I don’t want to upset the natives.’

Smiling thanks as he passed the front counter, he stepped outside. ‘I’m back,’ he said.

They talked for a while about the possibility that a paedophile ring operated on the Peninsula. Like her, he’d heard the rumours. ‘Or it was an isolated incident,’ he said.

‘Which makes it harder to investigate,’ Ellen said. She paused. ‘Such a brave little kid. I hated interviewing her, making her dredge it all up.’

‘I know.’

Challis did know. Sad, broken and fearful children walked through his dreams sometimes. In many cases he’d avenged the harm done to them, but not nearly often enough.

He walked, listened, made suggestions. Talking like this, about work, and its logical steps, was a blessing, an antidote to the fog he was feeling here in the Bluff. ‘You’re a tonic,’ he said, after she’d kidded him about something.

There was a pause. ‘Am I?’

Then, as he was beginning to think he’d gone too far, she said, ‘You are, too, Hal.’