Helga's Web (12 page)

“If he’s involved in this,” said Clements, “I think I’ll ask to go back on the beat. It’s likely to get too complicated for me. %

Malone opened the manila folder. The cuttings were all marked with the name and date of the newspaper or magazine from which they had been cut: none of them, he noticed, was more than six months old. The majority of the cuttings featured photos of Mr. and Mrs. Walter Helidon, together or alone; there were half a dozen of Mrs. Leslie Gibson, one of Mr. and Mrs. Gibson together, and a scowling one of Mr. Gibson alone; and a single photo of Mr. and Mrs. John Savanna, Mr. Savanna’s grey hair highlighted by the photographer’s flash bulb. Helga Brand’s portrait gallery was limited but interesting.

Clements looked over Malone’s shoulder, then made a clicking noise with his tongue. “I don’t like the looks of this, Scobie.” He put a finger on the torn check, then nodded at the cuttings. “Blackmail?”

“It would be a good bet.” Malone went across and sat down in the heavy lounge chair. There was a smell of perfume to

the chair, as if it had been the favourite chair of one woman for a long time. He got up, feeling he had been sitting in the lap of Helga Brand, and moved to another chair. He felt uneasy and he wished there were some way he and Clements could walk out of this flat and leave the case to someone else. He had already been engaged in one case involving politicians and he had sworn to do his best to avoid another. Years of experience had taught him that the criminal mind, though cunning, was fairly predictable; but the political mind, equally cunning, was something that, as with most voters, baffled him. In Australian politics it could be vicious; the stab in the back was an occupational hazard. He had seen politicians with independent minds who had bucked their party and finished up with independent heads, carried under their arms; he hated to think what might happen to a policeman with an independent mind, especially one who would link a Cabinet Minister with the murder of a call girl. It would not help if Helidon had a long memory: he might remember the constable named Malone from the Fraud Squad who had been to question him seven or eight years ago on some land dealings.

Malone looked up at Clements. “What do you reckon would be a nice easy beat to be posted to?”

‘Tve got mine picked out,” said Clements. “Place called Wilson’s Tank, out the back of Tibooburra. It’s got a population of two.”

“That’ll do us,” said Malone. “We’ll double the population in one go.”

“Go ahead with it as if it were a routine case,” said Inspector Fulmer. “Politicians, even Ministers, are liable to the law just like the rest of us.”

“I just thought I’d ask,” said Malone.

“You did the right thing,” said Fulmer, and Malone could almost feel himself being patted on the head. “But 111 take the responsibility. You and Russ Clements do the donkey-work and 111 see you get the credit if you wrap up the case.”

“I’m not worried about the credit. I was thinking about the boot in the behind if Helidon really had nothing to do with this and decided to get nasty.” After the police photographer and the fingerprint man had arrived and done their job, Ma-lone and Clements had put a seal on the front door of Helga Brand’s flat and come back to Division Y headquarters. Already feeling anxious and wanting someone else to make decisions for him, Malone had gone in to see Fulmer. “He may not have had anything to do with the girl, except on business. The check was made out to Helga Brand Proprietary Limited. Call girls usually don’t register themselves as companies. It would be a bit difficult listing their useable assets.”

“All right, Scobie. Enough of that.” Fulmer sat back, putting his hands together in the position that had earned him the nickname of Steeple-Fingers or The Bishop. He was a very tall, lean man who might have been handsome if he had allowed his expression to relax. He had thick black hair, deep-set eyes and thick black eyebrows that seemed to clamp the one severe expression on his face as a vise might. He had come into the police force thirty years before with rigid ideas about right and wrong and had never changed them; he had never been known to swear or tell or listen to a dirty story; and it was on his record that after six months on the Vice Squad he had asked to be transferred to something less sordid. Still, as Malone knew, he was a good detective and he had been promoted on his merits. But he would never make Commissioner and that was the one bitter disappointment of his life. He had learned too late that black and white were not the only rungs in the ladder that took you to the top. There were now too many men between him and the Commissionership and he would be too close to retirement

before he reached the rank from which the chief executive was chosen.

“Report to me each day on how you’re progressing. Don’t wait till things get too sticky.” He allowed himself a moment of surmise, something he rarely did: “It would be interesting to see the reaction in high places if you had to arrest a Minister for murder.”

Malone said nothing. Only the Police Commissioner and two senior Superintendents knew why he had been sent to London two years ago; politics had been behind that case and when the expected outcome had not eventuated, politics had seen that everything was conveniently buried. Malone knew that it was only the justness of the Commissioner that had prevented himself from being buried somewhere out in the bush, maybe even at Wilson’s Tank. Though right now that looked a desirable posting.

“But be discreet,” Fulmer went on, every inch the bishop; Malone waited to be given absolution. “No comment to the Press at all. It might be an idea not to let on to our public relations boys that you know anything. That will save them having to cover up if the reporters worry them.”

“Will you tell the Commissioner?”

“Naturally. Til see the Superintendent and he and I will go and see the Commissioner together.” He demolished the steeple of his fingers. “You have nothing to worry about, Scobie. Just approach it as a routine case.”

“But discreetly?” said Malone drily.

“Naturally,” said Fulmer, who had a tin ear for nuances.

Malone left Fulmer’s office, collected Clements and drove out to Pymble where Walter Helidon lived. It was a suburb he rarely visited, either officially or socially: it was off his beat on both accounts. It was a suburb as solid and respectable as a law court; judges and lawyers were liberally sprinkled among its population; at Christmas the garbage collectors were said to go their rounds chanting “Fiat Justitia” instead

of the usual season’s greetings. The Helidon house looked a little more palatial than the others in its street, but it was still eminently respectable.

“I have a cousin lives up here on the North Shore,” said Clements as they got out of the car. The North Shore was a region that had no definition, only a cachet; it had nothing to do with any shore and, by rough estimate and depending on where one lived, began some five or six miles from the shores of the harbour. “He always makes it sound as if he comes from another country.”

“Well, let’s hope we don’t have to extradite Helidon.”

Two cars stood parked in the red gravel driveway, a pale blue Mercedes and a small white Renault. Malone with a jolt suddenly recognized the smaller car, but it was too late to draw back now.

“Don’t recognize anyone,” he said cryptically, and Clements looked at him blankly. They went up on to the wide verandah surrounding the house and rang the bell. A maid opened the door, a young pretty girl with an Italian accent and a look of instant fright at seeing two burly men standing on the doorstep.

“It’s all right, love,” said Malone. “We’re harmless. We’d like to see Mr. Helidon.”

“Mr. Helidon, he not at home—”

“Who is it, Rosa?” Malone recognized Norma Helidon as soon as she came through into the large entrance hall behind the maid. The pictures in the cuttings, he thought, did her more than justice; in real life she looked strained and older, a good ten years older. But then maybe she had aged suddenly, since the photos were taken. She might even have aged in the last week.

Malone introduced himself and Clements. “Just a routine inquiry, Mrs. Helidon. We’d like to wait for your husband—”

Norma Helidon hesitated, then managed her hostess’ smile and waved them into the hall. Only then did Malone notice

Lisa standing in the living room two steps down below the level of the hall.

“Hello, Mrs. Pretorious—”

“Miss Pretorious/’ said Lisa. “I’m not married— yet.”

“You’ve met?” said Norma Helidon.

“Miss Pretorious came to us once for some information. Still in public relations?” He looked at Lisa, wondering if he was doing a good job of appearing only casually interested in her. Behind him he could guess at the expressions chasing each other across Clements’ face: the big fellow would never put Olivier, or even Lassie, out of a job.

Lisa nodded, her own face as cool and blank as that of a girl who did not think much of policemen. “Constable— Moloney, isn’t it? We met some time ago,” she told Norma Helidon. “He is the only policeman I’ve ever met with an inferiority complex. Remember that, Mrs. Helidon, and you’ll be safe. I’ll call you tomorrow about those press releases.” She nodded coolly to Malone and Clements and went out the front door. The maid closed it behind her, then disappeared towards the back of the house, leaving Malone and Clements alone with Norma Helidon.

She knows why we are here, Malone thought. For a career hostess she was much too ill at ease. But the reason for their visit had to be kept under wraps until Helidon himself came home; Malone was cautious enough to know that this was one case where protocol had to be observed. Norma Helidon waved them to seats and all three of them sat down, the policemen as stiffly and uncomfortably as their hostess.

“My husband has probably been delayed. Parliament rises tomorrow for the Christmas recess, you know.”

The three of them sat for an hour, tossing the conversational ball that bounced awkwardly every time it was missed, and it seemed to be missed on every second throw. They talked about the weather, gardens, the dullness of both police work and politics, and even about the Blue and Red Ball.

“I don’t suppose you go to that sort of function much, Sergeant. Do the police have balls?”

Malone kept a straight face, while Clements suddenly found something of intense interest in the garden outside. Then mercifully there was the sound of a key in the lock of the front door. Walter Helidon came in, pulling up sharply when he saw the two strangers sitting in the living room with his wife. All three rose as he came down the steps into the living room and Norma Helidon went to her husband and took his arm, almost seeming to lean on him.

“We’ve come about a certain Miss Helga Brand,” said Malone after he had introduced himself and Clements. “Did you know her, Mr. Helidon?”

Helidon, in the few steps it had taken him to come down from the hall into the room, had collected himself. Malone recognized the control: Helidon had been too long a politician to be caught by the question fired from the hip. He looked at Malone closely. “Haven’t we met before?”

“Yes,” said Malone reluctantly; he did not want the issue complicated this early. “Several years ago. I was on something different to this.”

Helidon’s face stiffened and beside him his wife blinked, as if she had just been reminded of a long-forgotten memory, one that had been deliberately locked away. Helidon said, “About this girl. Yes, I knew her, but only in a business way. Has there been some trouble?”

“She is dead,” said Malone, and watched Mrs. Helidon instead of Helidon: she went pale behind her expensive makeup, her hand dug into her husband’s arm. “You might have read about her. She was the girl found down at the Opera House.”

“Of course I read about it. Anything the newspapers have to say about the Opera House lands on my desk.” He gently freed his arm from his wife’s grip, took off his glasses and polished them. Again Malone recognized the control: any

small action or gesture to distract the attention while the mind got into the right gear. But the smooth-cheeked face gave nothing away; the eyes were as steady as those of a police marksman. He put the glasses back on and said, “But why come to me?”

“We found a torn-up check of yours in her wastebasket, Mr. Helidon. Made out to Helga Brand Proprietary Limited.”

“That was part of a business deal.” Helidon moved across to a small table beside a big leather chair and took a pipe from a rackful of pipes; he methodically and unhurriedly began to fill it from a tobacco bowl beside the rack. “She had come to me for some financial backing on a boutique she wanted to start.”

“Who recommended her to you, sir?”

“I did,” said Mrs. Helidon. “She had acted as a model for me at a charity function and had spoken to me casually about it. The boutique, I mean.” She, too, was in control of herself now. She had retreated to a red velvet chair, sat stiffly there like a woman on a throne. Even society queens go in for the regal touch, Malone thought. Then he chided himself: Come off it, Malone. Don’t start acting like your Old Man, dragging the old class bit into this. Cops are supposed to be apolitical and asocial. But he could feel a resentment building up in him against the Helidons that so far lacked any real definition or cause.

“Did you know her well, Mrs. Helidon?”

“No-o.” The denial was just a little too drawn out. “I assumed my husband would look into her background if he wanted to put some money into her boutique. I just thought the idea had possibilities at the time. Women in Sydney now have more money to spend than they have ever had in their lives before.”

“I’m sure they have,” said Malone, trying to sound as if he were grateful for the information; he wondered how his old

mum would respond to it. “Did you look into her background, Mr. Helidon?”

Helidon had his pipe filled now but made no attempt to light it. He stood in front of the large marble-faced fireplace; behind him the mantelpiece carried a chorus of very expensive Christmas greetings: Division Y never got cards such as these, not even from reformed crooks. “I don’t see the point of all this, Sergeant.”