Burn Patterns (21 page)

‘Richard Jewell was innocent. He was sad and lonely but he was a hero. It was the media who suggested he did it, because his personality and background didn't fit their idea of a hero. A classic case of bad profiling and it victimised a man who should have been applauded for doing his job.'

‘It does happen. You tossed people out of the volunteer fire brigade on those grounds.'

Iris grimaced. He was annoying, the detective. She quite liked him.

‘So, is Kochie a hero or the other?'

‘Yes, I've read his file. So, he was a hero once. Does he miss it?'

‘Yes he does.' Iris lifted her empty cup. ‘Do you want another coffee?'

‘No, three's my limit for the morning.'

Iris went to the coffee maker, chose a Rosabaya. She said, ‘You're married. Your wife suggested the coffee limit. You've got kids. You play sport. You went to a Catholic boys school and university. You admire your father enormously. He never went to university. He's very proud of you.'

Pavlovic studied her. ‘I'll have a glass of water. Correct. Every
single one. Nice party trick. Or I'm very shallow. So, why won't you answer about Koch?'

‘It feels disloyal. And I don't trust you.'

‘You shouldn't trust me. I'm investigating the murder of eleven people and the attempted murder of over a thousand. I'm not asking you to lend me money.'

‘Give me more information.'

‘This isn't a negotiation.'

‘Yes it is. I did my party trick to impress you so you might entertain the idea I could be valuable to the investigation.'

‘I know you can be valuable. I saw your work at the school with the boy who put out the fire, remember. Pegged him, cleared him in a minute. I'm impressed. A fan.'

‘You are reading my file.'

‘I've started, yes. It's more than one file.'

‘Chuck's really a suspect?'

‘Everyone is a suspect until the case is solved. Poor policing is when you concentrate on only one suspect, consequently work the evidence to fit.'

Iris brought her coffee back, indicated the recorder. ‘Off the record.'

He buttoned it off. He got up, went to the cupboard, found a glass, went to the tap and got his water. He was used to being in other people's houses. He knew where they put things.

‘Sorry,' said Iris, meaning the water. ‘Like a number of heroes, he is angry his life didn't turn out better, after his heroism.' Iris thought about Charles. ‘The world didn't reward him. In fact the event hurt him, both physically and mentally. His co-workers tease him because of his injury, and I'm sure he's crotchety. Well more than grumpy. Was he dismissed for punching a colleague?'

‘Sick leave, but yes.'

‘Is this the first time?'

‘No.'

‘Drinking?'

‘Yes.'

‘Has he been sent to counselling?'

‘Yes. He doesn't cooperate.'

‘He's angry that he's not been listened to over many years concerning Zorro.'

‘Could he bring Zorro into being? He has the technical knowledge.'

‘He does. In spades.' Iris considered Charles in this new light. ‘He's no longer married, is he?'

‘Not for years. Lives on a boat, apparently.'

‘So he doesn't have an alibi?'

‘No. Now he's put himself next to the Fire Lady. A pretty good way of getting the strokes, keep an eye on things, on the inside of the investigation.'

‘Just keeping an open mind, are you?'

‘I'm not saying he did it. I'm saying is he a possible?'

Iris thought about it before answering. ‘I don't think so. I don't think he's got the chutzpa to fly so close to the inside, to the heat, while doing it. He's not secretive. He's not compartmentalised or … you're looking for the personality type who makes a good spy. I don't think Charles fits. He's a puncher. We're looking for a sneaky waiter who spits in your food before he brings it to you, smiling.'

Pavlovic seemed to weigh the image before he said, ‘Do you want to step out for a cigarette? Don't mind me.'

‘I don't smoke.'

‘So when you were seeing James, in the hospital room, after midnight, why did you have a lighter in your bag?'

‘You never can tell when you might want to offer a light.'

‘This fire, the one in the hospital room …'

‘Yes. I was distracted and he got the cigarette lighter from my handbag.'

‘What were you distracted by?'

‘Notes. Things I was doing during the assessment. Perhaps I was more tired than I realised. He's a very clever pickpocket. He can also get out of handcuffs.'

‘Was he in handcuffs?'

‘Of course not.'

‘You wrestled with him?'

Iris felt herself blink before she said, ‘Yes.'

‘Was this before or after he set the fire?'

‘After I put it out.'

‘How long did you wrestle?'

‘He tried to get past me. I blocked him. Less than ten seconds I'd say. I let him light the fire so I could see what he did.' She smiled.

Pavlovic blinked. Twice. His lips tightened ever so slightly.

She added, ‘I will probably lose my job and my accreditation if you tell anyone.'

‘Do you always get away with shit like this?'

‘Detective, I never get away with shit. Ever. It always comes back. Will you tell me what you've got so I can help?'

Pavlovic studied her again before he finally said, ‘They stole the ether from a company called LabSup. They did it all by phone and paper. Deliver here. Pick it up here. Drop it here. Invoices and requisition forms. They knew what, how and even what kind of voices to use. They got stuff delivered. We have the paper trail but no human presence.' He took the time to study her before adding, ‘We are about to announce a raid on a lockup where forensics tell us he stuffed the containers into gymnastic mats.'

‘The gymnastic mats were delivered to the school in the same way?'

‘While the head of the sports program was on leave, so no one could contradict the order. The physical education staff simply pointed to a wall where they were stacked.'

‘Do you have any CCTV footage of the weekend?'

Pavlovic sat filtering through what he would and would not reveal to her. He finally said, ‘We have a dog walker, over a couple of weeks. We think he's casing the place. Disguised.'

‘A man?'

‘Disguised.'

‘The truck?'

‘Stolen from the school weeks before. Landscapers had been working on a wall. When it reappeared, it was familiar.'

Iris said, ‘No wonder they're concentrating on terrorist cells. It's almost military. Absolutely meticulous. I told Charles that profiling the school could almost be more important than profiling the bomber. Finding a motive for this school.'

‘Yes.'

Clearly they were pursuing that line. Iris recalled James was allergic to dogs, or he'd said so.

Pavlovic closed his notebook, put away his tape recorder. ‘Anything else you think of, or anything I can ask as it arises. Or thoughts on Koch.'

Iris said, ‘You aren't miscellaneous. You're investigating leads which are not connected with terrorism or organised crime.'

He shrugged.

‘The crazies.'

He nearly smiled.

Iris showed him out. As they reached the front door, he said, ‘Nice house.'

She laughed. Said, ‘It's a bitch to clean. Or so I'm told.'

Iris showered, changed into jeans and runners. She thought she might take the day off completely, in a way following Frank's instructions. Clear the mind, unsedated. She would shop, garden, iron clothes, cook. She'd make sushi, which she always found calming. However, after she'd put a load of washing into the machine, she found herself ringing Charles Koch.

‘Huh?'

‘Chuck, it's Iris. Where are you?'

‘On my boat.'

‘Can I come see you?'

‘Here?'

‘Yes, of course. I've had a visit from Detective Pavlovic. I may have more things to share.'

Charles gave his address, behind a marina, an hour down the coast. Iris drove along the old coast road, where new apartments had sprouted amongst the ageing industrial areas. The suburbs of smaller and smaller blocks formed an uninterrupted tapestry, all the way to what was once a coastal seaside retreat, now a city of retired people and their service providers.

Iris played Vivaldi. She thought about James. He had burned his own children. His mind unable to cope, yet striving to defend itself from the unthinkable, created a complex fantasy which allowed him to approach the incident, to come at but not face it. There are no children on Mars, no families. If he can get back to the spaceship he can save his fellow crew. It was a wrapping, not a solution. Unlike pus around a thorn, it did not lead to expelling the foreign body. James was trapped in replaying the incident
in its disguised form, trapped in a loop because he could never bring them back. His children, possibly his wife, were dead.

Iris followed her GPS, turning down before the Lochland Cut, driving between three-storey villas to the marina, where concrete jetties moored yachts and cabin cruisers with unimaginative names like
Livin Da Dream
,
Calm Seas
and
Nirvana
. She followed the main road to the end of the marina where a smaller track ran across the edge of the canal and around the back past abandoned boat trailers and an ancient beached dredger.

Iris parked near a torn wire fence at the entrance of a boat repair business. She smelt raw kerosene, diesel smoke, rotting seaweed. She looked into the boat repair, at the yachts in dry dock. A worker moved a mast on a forklift in the distance. She spied Chuck's yellow ute a little way up inside the fence.

The ute was parked between a tiny yacht and a small power-boat, both up in wooden cradles, dry and high. A power cord and a hose led up to the powerboat.

Iris called, ‘Hello.'

Charles came from behind the cabin, called down to her. ‘You found it, huh?' He wore torn pants, a firefighter t-shirt.

‘Looks like your directions were good.'

‘Come on up.' He pointed to a wooden ramp constructed along the side. Chuck stood at the back of his boat, admiring the mishmash of stored and disassembled yachts as if it were a regatta in full sail. He swung around to Iris as she stepped onto the deck as though surprised. He gazed out again, inviting her to share what he saw.

Iris said, ‘Detective Pavlovic says you're back in the room, off suspension.'

Chuck gave a shy smile. ‘Yeah. I took some of your ideas to them.'

‘Oh?'

‘I wasn't going to get access to old cases from here. The wi-fi is a bit patchy.' He pointed towards the marina. ‘I get it from the
Majestic
. Not always in port. Once they heard you were working with me, they took Zorro more seriously. Maybe I'm just the errand boy.' He pointed to a director's chair. ‘You want a beer?'

‘Water if you have any.' Iris sat, watched Charles limp down into the cluttered cabin. She had meant to ask Detective Pavlovic if the dog walker limped.

Iris closed her eyes a moment to listen to the growl of the forklift and the intermittent throb of boats re-entering the marina. She could hear seagulls, someone hammering on metal. Iris squinted at the interior of Chuck's cabin, making out plastic storage boxes, clothes, and takeaway food wrappers. A laptop sat open on a table next to a pizza box with an empty whisky bottle. Iris realised she was searching for evidence of electronics, plastic piping, maybe big cylinders marked stolen ether.

Charles came back up to the deck with a bottle of water and a manila file. ‘The tap water is drinkable, not very cold.' He handed her the bottle, sat in the other director's chair next to a plastic storage box with an ashtray and an open can of beer in a stubby holder on the lid. He fished about in a cavity along the side of the boat, came up with a cap, which he held out to her. ‘The sun's got a bit of bite to it.'

The cap said Pro Dive. Iris put it on. ‘Aye aye, captain.'

He squinted at her, looking for the niggle. ‘I'm doing the boat up. It's going slower than I thought.'

‘How have you gone with past cases?'

‘Jesus. You only put me onto it yesterday!'

‘Yesterday?' Iris thought about the many things that had happened since she last saw Chuck in the pub near the port. When she tuned back in he was watching her with an expectant smile.

‘What?' she said.

‘I got some hits on the Passiona.'

‘Where?'

‘I ran a check. They've got like a keywords software. They're entering old cases. Taskforce has analysts and go-fors and computer nerds. It's still slow, but this is what's already popped up.' He patted the manila file on his lap.

‘Can I see?'

‘I'm telling you.'

‘I might be able to see – patterns.'

‘Will you let me lay it out?' Charles was not giving up the file.

‘Sure.'

‘So, firstly we got a pattern. Early December. The school and two years before, the old people's home in Riverside and four years ago the backpackers was also in December. I plug December into their software search, we come up with another old people's home in between the backpackers and the Riverside fire. They put it out, which gives us a list of inventory including unexplained faulty alarms and … a Passiona can.'

‘Any fingerprints?'

‘Being run. We ran Decembers going way back, even smaller fires.'

‘When he was learning.'

‘Like you said. Seeing what he likes, practising. There's a couple of house fires. The computers are grinding away right now.'

‘Are you working in a team on this now, Chuck?'

‘I've got my own remit. Take things as I see them. Bounce stuff off you.'