Bitter Wash Road (32 page)

‘I spotted him as I was driving in.’

‘Any theories?’

‘Yes. He’s fucked in the head, pardon my French. Last summer he learns he’s not so special: his old man’s broke and he has to attend the local high school. And this morning? Take your pick: his mother’s suicide, me being around, the way his father and grandfather treat him, life at school...All of the above.’

‘Have there been other fires?’

‘Not that I know of.’ She stared at him. ‘That boy needs help, before it escalates. You can see how dry it is, and a hot summer coming up.’

‘Mr Latimer said he’ll find a counsellor for Craig.’

‘They all need it,’ Armstrong said, with honeyed bitterness.

‘In what way?’

‘Craig’s a pyromaniac in the making, Jack’s just sad, the old man is a bully and a sadist, and so is Ray. And lazy. He would sit around watching TV and drinking beer and expect me to cook and clean for him. I’ve got a farm to run. So has he, except he’s stuffed that up.’

Hirsch said, ‘His treatment of the boys.’

‘What about it?’

‘Do I need to inform children’s services?’

‘Ah.’ Armstrong paused, and shook her head. ‘Ray’s hard on them,’ she said, ‘but he’s not negligent. Not really.’

‘Mrs Armstrong, where’s the ring he gave you?’

‘You don’t miss much.’

Hirsch waited, and after a while Finola Armstrong said, ‘Like I said, the youngest boy is sad, and it turns out one of the things he’s sad about is the fact that I was wearing his mother’s ring.’

She gave Hirsch a look, a crumpling of defences. ‘I had no idea it was hers. I thought he’d bought it specially for me.’ She coughed and swallowed. ‘I challenged Ray. He said the ring was special, special to
him,
it had been his mother’s ring. I gave it back. Couldn’t wear it.’

They each stared at nothing. Finola Armstrong broke the silence. ‘That was probably the beginning of the end. The other big thing was money.’

‘Money?’

‘Something about his wife being due an inheritance but it hadn’t been released yet and could I tide him over with a loan? Or better still, we could get married and amalgamate our properties into one big one.’

‘While you cooked and cleaned.’

‘Exactly.’

Armstrong rubbed her palms on her thighs, embarrassed. ‘I know I went a bit crazy this year. You know, love is blind and all that, but at the same time I do have a head on my shoulders.’

She indicated the house, sheds and farmland with a little sweep of her hand, and Hirsch knew she had survived, even prospered, using her own wits. She was a good farmer, a good manager. She was canny. A partnership with the Latimers would not have been canny.

‘I’ve just been next door,’ Hirsch said, ‘and Mr Latimer said he’d be happy to pay for the damaged fence.’

‘I should hope so. But I imagine he wants to know if I’ll take further action. Tell him no. I’m well rid of that mob.’

Hirsch got up to go. She cleared her throat, and he waited. ‘I was at my sister’s when Alison Latimer died.’

Hirsch agreed that she was.

‘And Ray was in the lockup and his father was away with Craig and Jack.’

‘Yes...’

‘It’s just that Ray and Leonard kept reminding me of that, drilling it into me, as if it might be important.’ She shrugged. ‘That’s all. Thought I’d mention it.’

After a beat, Hirsch nodded. ‘Glad you did.’

~ * ~

28

HE RETURNED TO Vimy Ridge.

Kropp was there, waiting on the veranda, his police Explorer gleaming in the driveway. Hirsch said, ‘I suppose your mate called you?’

‘Don’t get on your high horse, son. The man’s a mess. His wife, and now this.’

Sounds from within, the wailing boy and the murmuring father. ‘Sarge, I’m dealing with it.’

Kropp ignored him, stared out across the landscape to the Razorback. ‘You went to see the Armstrong woman?’

‘Yes.’

‘And?’

‘Not interested in pressing charges. Expects Mr Latimer to pay for fence repairs.’

Kropp nodded. ‘Okay, this is how it pans out. A passing motorist flicked a cigarette out the window, setting off a grass fire. Local units attended, and with the help of neighbours the blaze was quickly extinguished. That’s the public face. Privately, the kid gets counselling, the blokes manning the trucks get a six-pack of beer each, and everyone’s happy. All right?’

‘How do you know I haven’t already managed to negotiate most of that? You think because I’m a dog and a maggot I’m not also a good policeman? Fuck you, Sarge.’

Kropp blinked. ‘I beg your pardon?’

‘You heard.’

Kropp looked amused. ‘Fair enough. Now, let me sit with my friend for a while. You head on back to town.’

‘I’ve still not spoken to Mr Latimer about his wife. He won’t return calls, he won’t open the door to me, and I’ve had enough. No more bullshit from him, and no more from you, Sarge. For Christ’s sake, five minutes after his wife dies, he moves his girlfriend in? How broken up can the guy be?’

The men stared at each other. ‘The super asked me to prepare a brief for the coroner and that’s what I’m trying to do,’ Hirsch said. ‘If interested parties refuse to speak to me, how does that look? It looks like guilt, it looks like having something to hide. I don’t care that Ray Latimer is your mate, stalwart of the football club and all-round good bloke, or that he suffered a tragic loss: I am not leaving until I’ve sat down with him and asked my questions.’

After a gap in time, Kropp said, ‘I worked with Marcus Quine, you know. In the early days, Port Adelaide.’

Hirsch said nothing.

‘He got the job done.’

Hirsch said nothing.

‘But he did cut corners.’

Was that an admission that Hirsch had got it right about Quine? He continued to watch the sergeant.

‘But in the end,’ Kropp said, ‘I don’t care if a fellow police member swindles the Children’s Hospital and violates a busload of nuns. You do not betray him.’ Kropp didn’t wait for a reply but banged his way into the house, calling, ‘Ray? You there?’

Surprised, Hirsch followed his sergeant, catching up just as Kropp rapped his knuckles on the bedroom door, calling, ‘Ray? It’s Bill. We need a quiet word about Allie.’

Hirsch grabbed his arm. ‘Sarge?’

‘What?’

‘Butt out.’

Kropp shook him off. ‘What, you don’t think I can do the job properly if a friend’s involved? Wake up to yourself, mate.’

‘Sarge, if you sit in on my interview with Mr Latimer, my report will say so. If you say one word to, or for, Mr Latimer during that interview, my report will say so. And what Superintendent Spurling or the coroner make of that I can only guess, but it won’t look good.’

‘You’re a grade-A cunt, son,’ Kropp said.

‘Sarge.’

Kropp stomped out, a heavy man, brutally unhappy. The front door slammed. Hirsch heard the Explorer roar and kick up a little gravel.

~ * ~

Latimer insisted on using
his study, a dim, unloved cave, the lone armchair a long way from the desk. ‘Mr Latimer,’ Hirsch began.

Latimer started talking. ‘No one will tell me when or even whether I’ll get the inheritance. Do you know? If the inquest shows she shot herself while of unsound mind, that won’t affect the inheritance, right? It’s unrelated? Only I know some insurance policies won’t pay out on a suicide, but this isn’t an insurance policy, it’s an inheritance. The state can’t touch it, can they?’

Hirsch blinked. He was always meeting men and women who had the emotional intelligence of a slab of concrete, but it never failed to surprise him. ‘Mr Latimer, you agreed to talk to me about your wife. I can’t advise you on the legalities or otherwise of an inheritance.’

But if you killed her I’ll see you don’t get a penny of it.

‘I’ve got nothing to hide,’ Latimer said.

‘Very well. What was Alison’s state of mind in the last few weeks and months of her life?’

‘Depressed. Irrational,’ Latimer said. His dark, hard man’s good looks contracted. ‘Made our lives a living hell.’

‘In what way?’

‘Didn’t look after herself. The place was a mess. Forgot to cook or shop. Screaming her head off at us one minute, crying how sorry she was the next. Then in the last few days this sort of calmness came over her. I can’t describe it.’

‘She was happy?’

‘I wouldn’t say happy. More...like she’d come to a decision.’

‘A decision to leave the marriage now that she had an inheritance to fall back on.’

Latimer shook his head. ‘That wasn’t it. More like she’d decided to end it all.’

‘Not upbeat, happy, looking forward to the near future?’

‘Who have you been talking to? That bitch across the road? She wasn’t here, Allies parents weren’t here, you certainly weren’t here. I was. Craig was. Ask him.’

‘And Jack?’

‘You leave Jack out of this. He’s just a little kid. He’s not... strong.’

Unlike Craig, thought Hirsch. ‘Did your wife threaten suicide at any time in the last weeks and months?’

‘No. But she had tried once before.’

Had she? Hirsch was having doubts. There was no direct evidence, only hearsay. ‘Was she depressed by nature?’

‘Up and down.’

‘What was her relationship with your father like?’

Latimer bristled. ‘What relationship? What are you implying?’

Hit a nerve there, thought Hirsch. He spelled it out: ‘From all accounts, she had a close and happy relationship with your mother. She had a close and happy relationship with Mrs Street across the road. That’s what I mean by relationship. Was she close to your father or did they quarrel? I understand he’s a...forceful man.’

‘My father loved her like she was his own. If she was nervy around him that says a lot about her, not him.’

‘Did he urge her to pay the inheritance into the business rather than leave the marriage?’

‘My father’s not the type to interfere like that. His view was I was well rid of her. She was splitting up the family, taking Jack away with her. Craig chose to stay with me.’

‘Well,
did you
urge her to reconsider? The farm’s struggling, you told me that yourself. The inheritance would have helped carry you over until prices improve or we get some rain.’

Latimer curled his lip. ‘And you know something about farming, do you? Look, we’re not that far gone. It’s all cyclical anyway. You wouldn’t know that, being on a regular salary.’ He grinned crookedly. ‘Plus your other perks.’

Hirsch bit. ‘Mine? Or do you mean all police officers get perks?’

‘You. I know all about you. Happy to skim the cream until it goes bad, then you dob the others in to save your own skin.’

Hirsch smiled. ‘So your wife’s inheritance
wouldn’t
have been a godsend? Surely it would have eased the pressure? Craig could have returned to his boarding school. Apparently he was happy there.’

‘A hundred and sixty thousand dollars doesn’t go far, not if you’re on the land. All I wanted to do was save my marriage, not grab Allies inheritance.’

‘But you just said she made your lives a misery.’

‘Only at the end, it would’ve blown over.’

‘If she did make your lives a misery, perhaps it was because you had other women.’

‘I still loved her.’

‘Really? You told Mrs Armstrong
last year
that the marriage was over.’

‘I never said that. She misunderstood.’

‘You were quick to move her in.’

‘Not that quick.’

Hirsch let the silence build for a while.

‘She’s being magnanimous about the fire.’

Latimer shrugged.

‘She could have pressed charges against your son.’

Latimer grew heated. ‘Didn’t take her long to shoot through on me, though, did it? Didn’t stay around long once the shit hit the fan. And have you seen the state the fence was in? Half-falling down, and now I suppose she wants me to spend top dollar fixing it.’

Hirsch was fascinated. ‘I think the engagement ring was the final straw.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘She thought you’d bought it specially.’

‘It was my mother’s ring. Do what the hell I want with it.’

‘You gave it to your wife.’

‘Of course. Then when she left me I got it back.’

‘She left it here when she went to stay at her parents’?’

‘Yes.’

‘But she had a close and loving relationship with your mother and it would have meant a great deal to her to wear the ring.’

‘Who knows what went on in her mind. Can we stop now?’

‘Returning to the inheritance.’

‘Do we have to?’

‘At the start of the interview you seemed quite concerned that you might not get it. But now it’s no big deal?’