Challis - 04 - Chain of Evidence (27 page)

She looked tired and bewildered. Shed
assumed that Gavin Hurst had been alive all these years, and had grown to hate
him because hed been taunting her. Now this.

Call me when the police have
finished interviewing you.

Unless Im in jail.

Ill break you out.

My hero. Pity youre my brother.

Call me, he said again.

I will, she promised.

On my mobile.

Okay.

There was a transmitting tower in
Mawsons Bluff. In fact, Challis got better mobile phone reception in the wilds
of South Australia than he did on the Peninsula. He kissed Meg and then hurried
Eve into his car and drove east on a road that had been subject to potholes and
bone-jarring corrugations back when he was a teenager driving to outlying sheep
stations to pick up a girl and take her to a dance. It was a fine sealed road
now, and passed through a rain shadow, leaving the grassy plains of the Bluff
behind and rapidly entering stony saltbush and bluebush countrythe change so
dramatic that God might have thrown a switch when your eyes were blinking. If
you kept going youd reach the vast northeast of the state, a virtually unpopulated
region of stone ruins, deep gorges, dry salt lakes and landmarks that named the
fate of European settlement: Mount Hopeless, Termination Hill, Dry Well Track,
Blood Creek Bore.

But Gavins RSPCA station wagon had
been found only twenty kilometres east of the Blufftwenty-one kilometres east
of the cemetery. Dry country, sure. Country you could walk out into, never to
be found, if you had your heart set on it. A country of hidden gullies and
undiscovered rocky caves decorated with ancient Aboriginal carvings and
paintings. But country that was still close to town. A daily Trailblazer bus
went along that road, before turning southeast to the River Murray towns.
Salesmen went along it, livestock agents, local farmers, tourists in cars and
buses. Gavin could have abandoned his car and hitched a ride with a stranger,
youd reason, if you believed hed wanted to stage his disappearance. Or hed
walked out into the dry country to die, youd reason, if you believed that hed
wanted to commit suicide.

Two reasonable hypotheses, both
widely held in the town.

Eve knew where the car had been
found, and directed him to pull over fifty metres past the twenty-kilometre
post. Youre getting a feeling, Uncle Hal?

She said it slightly teasingly. In
fact, he often did feel his way into the atmospherics of a place, and the skin
and bones of a victim or a culprit. There was nothing supernatural about it. It
was merely one mans imaginationalbeit an imagination honed by dozens of
murder investigations over the years.

Something like that, he said.

A warm wind blew, raising a
willy-willy on the dusty plain. Two wedge-tail eagles soared above, and
bleached, horned rams skulls gleamed in the reddish dirt nearby. They stood
there for some time, thinking, talking, reminiscing. It was not a lonely spot.
Several cars and a dirty Land Rover passed by, their drivers raising a hand in
greeting.

Eve said, I hate to think of him
being shot out here.

It might not have been here.

He could see her mind working. He
was shot somewhere else and they dumped his car here?

Yes.

That would need at least two
people, one to drive Dads car here, the other to collect the driver.

Its one scenario.

Challis pictured Paddy Finucane with
his sad-looking wife. He pictured Meg with the old man. Just then his mobile
phone rang.

Hal?

Megs tone was bright but he froze
inside. Everything okay?

It was as if all of the cares of her
life had evaporated. Everythings fine. The lawyer was terrific. He made them
promise theyd look at everyone Gavin brought prosecutions against.

Challis was less enthusiastic. But
youre not off the hook?

Well surely

So long as youre not behind bars,
sis, he said hastily.

She was disconcerted. Id better
go.

Bye, Challis said to the empty
air.

That was Mum?

Shes back home.

I should be with her.

Challis nodded and they drove back
to Mawsons Bluff. He ran Eve through the gauntlet outside her house and then
drove to the hospital, where he was directed to the cafeteria, an airy,
clattering room in the east wing. Minchin sat at a window table, staring out at
the scrubby trees that separated the town from one of the adjacent farms. Hed
pushed a partly consumed plate of lettuce, spinach, fetta, olives and bamboo
shoots to one side and was dreaming over a mug of black coffee.

Not fond of grass?

The doctor gave him a tired smile. Trying
to lose weight.

And bound to succeed if you dont
actually eat.

Yeah, yeah. Youre here about
Gavin?

Is he still in the morgue?

Minchin shook his head. The lab.

Meaning the forensic science lab in
Adelaide, three hundred kilometres south. Challis was disappointed: hed wanted
to view the body. But you did the preliminary examination?

I pronounced death, said his
friend.

Very funny.

Well and truly deceased.

Gunshot to the head?

Gunshot to the
back
of the
head.

Shotgun? Handgun? Rifle?

A single entry wound, single exit
wound with massive damage, so not a shotgun. And probably not a low calibre
handgun or rifle.

Gavin apparently travelled around
with a .22 rifle. Youre saying it couldnt have been the murder weapon?

Very doubtful.

Any fragments?

Hal, I dont have the resources to
determine things like that. Contact the lab.

I will. But you did match his teeth
to his dental records?

Yes, and there were a couple of
broken ribs, old knitted fractures.

Meaning?

Gavin was kicked by a horse about
ten years ago. I patched him up. Still have the X-rays.

In that case you neednt have taken
a DNA swab from Eve.

Just covering bases, Hal, you know
that.

Challis scowled and they brooded
together, two men whod once been close and had complicated ties to the dead
man.

So he couldnt have shot himself,
Challis said after a while, and he couldnt have buried himself

But someone could have shot him by
accident and panicked.

Youre doing my job for me.

But
is
it your job, Hal?

What do you mean?

Those Adelaide detectives.

What about them?

They asked me about you.

What did you tell them?

Nothing to tell.

Did they ask
you
where you
were? And if you own a rifle?

Minchin opened his mouth, shocked
and appalled, then swiftly angry. Fuck you.

Rob, sit down, Im only asking
questions that youll be asked sometime or other, by the police or the coroner.

Just because I went out with Meg a
few times twenty years ago.

There was more to it than that, Challis
thought. Yes.

Yours is a pretty shitty job, you
know that?

Yes.

Do you know where I was when Gavin
disappeared? In the UK.

The UK?

Medical conference. On providing
distance health care.

In the UK?

Some of those moors towns are
several miles apart, Hal.

Challis grinned. True. So that lets
you off the hook.

Minchin was relaxing slowly. I
could have put out a contract, of course.

Let me jot that down.

They stared out at the drying
landscape, some wildflowers here and there, aroused by a short-lived springtime
rain before Challis had arrived in the district.

I have to do my rounds now.

They questioned Meg this morning,
Challis said.

Is she okay?

Well, shes not under arrest.

Should I, you know, call on her?

Challis weighed it up, even though
he knew the answer. Not yet.

You know, Hal, not once did I make
a move on Meg after Gavin disappeared.

Challis gazed at his friend. Did Rob
want forgiveness, understanding, absolution? Did he want permission to woo Meg
now? Meg had once bawdily confessed to Challis that she hadnt wanted Rob as
the family doctor, taking pap smears, squeezing her breasts for lumps. And
forget about him putting his hands on Eve. She didnt mean that Rob was creepy,
just a little inept, a little pathetic, as hed tried to go beyond first base
with her in the backseat of his car when they were growing up. There had always
been a kind of gingery, soft-fleshed lack of appeal about Rob Minchin, poor
sod. But that didnt mean he wasnt capable of murder. Challis said, I think
shell need plenty of time and space, Rob.

Point taken.

* * * *

35

Peter
Duyker, said Ellen Destry that same morning.

Faces tired, glum and plain
resistant stared back at her. Van Alphen hadnt even bothered to attend the
briefing. Kellock was flipping through and annotating a folder of reports and
statements unrelated to the Blasko case. She wanted to say:
What is it with
you people? Is it
because Katies a child? Is it because she wasnt
murdered?
Suddenly irritated, she rapped the display board with her
knuckles. Neville Clodes brother-in-law, she explained, her voice sharp and
loud.

There was a stir of interest. The
photographs were candid shots, taken with a telephoto lens by Scobie the
previous afternoon, and showed a fibro shack on stilts, tangled foliage, Duyker
carrying groceries into the house, a white van in the driveway. Duyker was
nondescript looking: medium height, average build, short brown hair. You wouldnt
look twice at him. Then Ellen pinned three booking photographs to the wall. Duyker
in 1990,1993 and 1998: fraud and indecent exposure, here and in New Zealand.

Neither prison nor age had wearied
him, Ellen thought, pausing briefly. Duyker was as forgettable looking now as
hed been in 1990. She focussed again. The indecent exposure involved minors.

John Tankard, looking as if he hadnt
slept, raised his hand. Have you shown Katie Blasko these photos?

Yes. I called in there yesterday
afternoon as soon as I had copies. She failed to identify Duyker or the van.
But the van is common, and the man whod abducted her was bearded.

So Duyker shaved it off or wore a
disguise.

Ellen glanced at Scobie. He also
looked tired, distracted, dark circles under his eyes. Scobie?

He seemed to shake himself awake. His
niece says shes never seen him with a beard.

Clode?

Shes never known him to have a
beard, either.

Can we get either of them on tape?
van Alphen asked, entering the room at that point. The Blasko kid might
recognise a voice.

Ellen was curious to see him avoid
the empty chair beside Kellock and sit opposite, beside Scobie Sutton. Maybe
Van wanted to distance himself from Kellock after the Nick Jarrett shooting.
Maybe he wanted to intimidate Scobie. She shrugged inwardly. Katie was doped
the whole time, she replied.

Bring Duyker in and get heavy with
him. Hell fold.

Scobie Sutton edged his chair away
from van Alphen and found the nerve to say, The same way you got heavy with
Nick Jarrett?

Kellock snarled, Shut the fuck up,
Sutton.

Scobie was shocked.

Boys, boys, said Ellen.

It was van Alphen who defused the
tension. Its okay, Scobes, he murmured apologetically, dont sweat it.

There were undercurrents. Ellen
couldnt work them out. We need more and better evidence, she continued. The
convictions against Duyker are old. We need to know what hes been doing since
1998, and who his friends areapart from Clode. What are his interests,
hobbies? What clubs does he belong to?

John Tankard shifted his bulk in his
plastic chair and gave her a look of unconvincing alertness and concern. Are
you thinking Duyker and Clode are part of the same paedo ring, Sarge?

Ellen kept her face neutral but
inside she was tingling a little. Was Tank their leak to the media? I wont
speculate, John, not without evidence. I especially dont want the media
speculating about paedophile rings.

Just thinking aloud, Sarge,
Tankard said. He swallowed and wouldnt meet her gaze.

And your instincts are valid, John,
she said warmly. She included the room in her gaze now. You know the drill,
people. I want surveillance on Peter Duyker: where he goes, what he does, who
visits him, anything and everything.