The Simple Death (19 page)

‘The pregnancy, you mean?'

‘Of course.'

McIver said, ‘We should have a drink to celebrate.' Smiled as Troy's face froze. Let a few seconds pass before he said, ‘Only joking.'

Thirty-one

L
eila punches in Carl's number. It's only been a day, but she needs to talk about the bottle.

‘I am so sorry,' she says when he answers, ‘about Julie.'

‘It's a terrible thing. They're saying it's sudden arrhythmic death syndrome, one in a million chance.' His voice low and stumbling.

‘Life's not fair, is it? She looked so peaceful. I think it must have happened very quickly.'

‘What they say, with SADS, you die without knowing you're dying. You'll be at the funeral?'

‘It's in Sydney?'

‘Her parents haven't decided. They'd probably like to have the grave, you know, where they can visit it. In Queensland.'

‘Let me know, won't you?'

‘Sure. I know she thought of you as a real friend.'

She recalls her own recent experience: all the clichés suddenly there to help you through. And they do help.

‘I need to ask about something else,' she says. ‘I gave Julie something the last time I saw her, and I need to get it back. She said she gave it to you for safekeeping.'

‘What's that?'

‘Can we meet to discuss this?'

‘Sure. Let's talk at the funeral.'

‘It's the bottle, Carl, I need to get it urgently.'

‘What?'

Oh boy, she thinks.

‘The Nembutal.'

‘I don't know what you're talking about. Sometimes Julie imagined things.'

Not this.
Not this
.

‘I still owe Julie some money, for looking after Mum. I know you were with her for some of the time. I'm happy for you to have that, Carl, if you'll give me back the bottle.'

There is a pause. Why did she say that? My God.

‘I don't want your money,' he says. Then: ‘You can have the bottle if you give me the diary.'

‘The what?'

He speaks with intensity. ‘Julie had a diary, like a story of her and me. I want to keep it as a record of what we had together.'

‘That's beautiful, Carl,' she says. ‘But I don't have it.'

‘I saw it at your house. Julie didn't bring it home, so it's still there.'

Leila hasn't seen it. ‘Even if it is here, you'd need to ask her parents for it.'

‘Like you should have declared the bottle at customs.' Ouch. ‘It has personal stuff in it, she can be quite explicit, I wouldn't want her parents reading it. Not you, either. Promise me you won't read it.'

‘Carl—'

‘Promise me. Please!' Now he is crying.

Grief hasn't taken her this way, but she knows it could have, if she'd been a different person.

‘I'll have a look,' she says. ‘But why would she leave it here?'

‘Jules left it around, sometimes she wanted people to read it, even though she knew they shouldn't. She was shy, couldn't talk about herself the way most girls can. I think it's just, people she liked, she wanted them to know more about her. She liked you, thought you were a friend. But it isn't appropriate, some of the stuff she wrote. Jules didn't realise that. There were issues. Promise—'

‘I won't read it, Carl,' she says gently, deciding the state he's in, there's no point expecting consistency.

He is sobbing now, and after half a minute she disconnects, unable to bear the sound. Wonders why she has cried so little since her mother's passing.

Thirty-two

C
onti and a local uniform brought Ian Carter in at 2.30 pm. He was unshaven and wearing a beige T-shirt over jeans, each item faded and well-worn, slightly tight on his muscly frame. Slung from one shoulder was a canvas bag Troy suspected had cost a lot of money. They went into the room next to 233 and Carter dropped his bag on the table and sat down. He pushed the chair back and looked at Troy, his limbs sprawled, handsome face scowling. Not happy.

Mac was back at Manly, but Troy and he had discussed a strategy for the interview. Puzzled, not accusing. Troy asked Carter where he'd been the night Mark Pearson was killed, and the doctor said he'd been doing volunteer work at the Crown Street Clinic. It treated HIV/AIDS patients. He yawned.

‘Roz Herron's the manager there,' he said, and recited a phone number. Conti wrote it down and stood up, looking at Troy. Carter said, quickly, ‘Don't tell David Saunders this, it's very important he doesn't find out about my work at the clinic.'

‘You're serious?'

‘He's very conservative. I'm gay and he does not approve of gays. Doctors' careers have been hurt before.'

‘But there are laws—'

‘Of course there are. It happens behind the scenes, you could never prove it in a court. But it happens. I'm warning you.'

Troy didn't know whether to believe him. Carter's face was expressionless, there was nothing in his tone to suggest he was really afraid of Saunders.

‘It's a public hospital, for Christ's sake.'

‘Christ is rather the point.' Carter sat up, leaned forwards. ‘There are reasons David didn't get made the CEO that go to his judgment being affected by his religious beliefs, all right? That's all I'm going to say.'

‘He must know you're gay?' said Conti.

‘As long as I don't make it an issue, I survive.' He looked at the two of them and shook his head, as though at some private joke. ‘You people, you really believe this stuff, don't you? Law equals justice.'

‘It's why we're here.'

Carter shook his head and Troy saw contempt. The doctor said, ‘David's not supposed to be like that, I know. But he is.'

Troy nodded to Conti. When she'd left the room he pushed the mortality stats for Oncology across the table and explained what they were. Carter flicked through the paper.

‘Eighteen months ago we started taking some more serious cases from other hospitals,' he said, shoving it back to Troy. ‘Plus when BRISTOL came in, the annual period changed from calendar to financial, so this year's figure is an estimate obtained by doubling the first six months. Wait another six months and it'll probably be back to normal.'

This wasn't what McIver thought, but he might be wrong. He'd acknowledged as much himself. After consultation with the Department of Health, a copy of the stats had been sent for analysis to the state's Clinical Excellence Commission. Until they heard back, they needed to tread carefully.

Carter was looking at the wall, his lack of interest apparently profound and genuine. Then he scowled and switched his gaze to Troy.

‘What, you thought I killed Mark to cover up some poor stats? They're given to everyone, including the mortality committee.'

‘Well—'

‘You think we're killing patients too?' Carter laughed. ‘Look, cancer will do that to you anyway, it doesn't need our help. I watched these people die, I understand what was wrong with them. There is no way those deaths are suspicious once you understand them, no matter how many there are.' He shook his head. ‘In the ward you're surrounded by medical experts, with an intimate knowledge of the state of health of every patient. We discuss each death. I can't think of a worse place to try to murder someone.'

Troy hadn't meant to suggest that, and he wondered if he should point this out. But for the moment it was more useful to sit back and watch the way Carter's mind moved.

‘Anyway,' the doctor said after a silence, ‘it was me suggested to Mark he get the figures. I told you that.'

‘You hadn't seen them before?'

‘I would have. We see lots of figures. There were no alarm bells.'

Troy nodded, wanting to ask a lot more. But it was too soon. He said, ‘We're just checking everyone's alibi. It's routine.'

‘You brought me in for that?'

Conti came back into the room and said Roz Herron was at lunch but was expected back any minute. She sat down and Carter stared at her, his eyes growing cold, and then turned to Troy. ‘It's a shame you didn't deal with Dirk Wainwright's killer with such enthusiasm.'

It was a few seconds before Troy got it. Wainwright had been killed at a gay beat at Tamarama Beach and the initial investigation had been botched. Local detectives actually interviewed the killer in the first twenty-four hours, missed two important pieces of evidence, and let him go. It had taken the suicide of Wainwright's mother three years later to have the investigation reopened and the murderer caught.

‘I'm sorry about that,' Troy said.

He knew Carter was manipulating him, but there was nothing else to say: he
was
sorry.

‘Dirk was my friend,' said Carter. ‘I dealt with the police on behalf of the family, they were just like you.'

‘That's not fair,' said Conti. ‘We're not all the same.'

She reddened and Carter began to laugh, and it went on for a long time. At some level, Troy thought, the man was under a lot of strain. But there might well be a legitimate reason for this. From what he knew of Carter, several reasons. Finally the doctor calmed down, shook his head angrily.

‘I'm the head of Oncology at a major teaching hospital, and you interrupted my day off to bring me here for something that could have been done by phone. You'll be hearing about this.'

He looked hard at Troy, who wasn't going to be bullied. On the other hand, they didn't want to annoy the hospital, which so far had been cooperative. McIver had emphasised that.

He said, ‘The main reason we brought you in was to request your fingerprints and a DNA sample. We're doing this to everyone who was at the party at Pearson's last week. I'm sorry if this wasn't explained to you before.' Troy looked at Conti, who was stone-faced, and back at Carter. ‘Will you do this for us?'

‘Okay.' Carter raised his hands. ‘Let's get it over.'

He ran his hands over his pale face and Troy wondered why he'd calmed down so quickly. He added that question to the others he had about Carter. They were only trivial matters, but at least they were there. In an investigation, questions were a sign of life.

While Conti was taking a Buccal swab of saliva from the doctor, there was a knock on the door and a plainclothes came in. She placed a sheet of paper on the table in front of Troy. Roz Herron had called from the clinic and confirmed Carter had been there on the night of Pearson's death. She'd volunteered the opinion Dr Ian Carter was a saint.

SATURDAY

Thirty-three

T
he police have come to talk to Leila about her mother's death. There is a knock on the door and through the window she sees Ben Farrell with two detectives walking up the gravel drive. She is wondering why she heard the knock before they reached the door. She wakes up.

Three in the morning, and although it was a dream, the noise was real. And, as if her sleeping mind had kept notes and passed them on, she knows it was not a knock but the sound of breaking glass. There is another person in the house.

She reaches for her mobile on the bedside table and dials emergency, gets up and keeps her voice low as gently she shuts the door. When she's given her details, she disconnects and goes back to the table and opens the drawer. Inside is a sharp hunting knife in a sheath, found in her mother's room after she'd died. It's one of those clues she's come across this past week, suggesting Elizabeth was not quite the woman she thought she knew. She puts her phone down, removes the knife from the sheath, and goes back to the door, suddenly angry that some stupid man is daring to burgle the house of a dead woman. People at the funeral warned her this might happen; she thanked them and forgot about it. There were other things on her mind. There still are, and she knows as she opens the door she is not behaving as she normally would. But the police will be here at any moment.

The door squeaks faintly and this is intensely irritating: she'd assumed it wouldn't, because it hadn't made a noise when she closed it a minute earlier. The noise must be audible throughout the house, and she wonders if the intruder will come up. From the top of the stairs she sees a flicker of torchlight in the big mirror down in the hall, then hears the front door open with a bang and someone running on the gravel outside. The burglar must be as scared as she is. She waits, listening, and after a few minutes a car comes up the street, fast, and stops outside. Leila realises she is still holding the knife, and replaces it in the drawer.

When she comes downstairs, now with a dressing-gown over her pyjamas, there are two uniformed police in the hall. They identify themselves and tell her the intruder came in through a window in the dining room.

‘No security system?' the male officer says.

‘No.'

This appears to give him a certain satisfaction. Leila sees that the door to the cellar is open and goes to close it. The female officer grabs her hand.

‘You left that open?'

‘I don't remember.'

The woman produces some sort of stick and approaches the open doorway, calling into the darkness as she fumbles for the light switch. Turning it on, she disappears down the stairs, followed by the man. Leila looks around the empty hall, gazing blankly up at the white gloss paint and the mock Tudor beams, and pulls the collar of her dressing-gown around her neck more tightly. Soon the officers reappear.

‘Lot of wine you've got down there,' says the man. ‘Must be worth a bit.'

‘You didn't find anyone?'

‘We'll just check upstairs.'

‘I don't think that's necessary.'

‘We have to be sure.'

Leila shrugs and wonders if she should offer them a cup of tea. Her heart is pounding now, as it wasn't in the minutes after she woke up. Emotion postponed for tranquillity.

When they've finished their search, they decline the offer of tea.

‘We can get someone down here if you like,' the man says. He is chewing gum: he is trying to hide it, but you can tell. She wonders if all police chew gum. ‘Dust for fingerprints and that. Leaves a lot of mess.'

‘There's not much chance of catching them, is there?'

‘To be honest? Bugger all.' The man shakes his head solemnly, feeling her pain. ‘We can help you put something against the broken window, keep you secure until you get it fixed.'

‘There's twenty-four-hour glass people,' the woman says. ‘But they're a real rip-off. You want to do it during the day, get a few quotes.'

‘Thank you.'

They go into the dining room and the officers move chairs about. Leila sweeps up the glass on the parquet floor, and then helps the police turn the big table on its side, slide it on the Persian rug so it is up against the broken window.

‘You will think about getting a burglar alarm?' says the male officer, puffing a bit after the exertion with the table.

‘I'll give it my serious consideration.'

She wonders if Ben Farrell has talked to the police about his suspicions, if these people are aware she is possibly a criminal. But the male officer is just standing there looking at the furniture, moving his jaws. Maybe he's interested in antiques as well as wine.

The female cop says, ‘Have any strangers been here the past week or two?'

Leila thinks for a moment about a police investigation that would involve interviews with all the people who'd been in the house since her mother died. People such as Stuart Emery. She is about to shake her head when she remembers the wine man. Tami gave her the name of a fellow who used to run a local wine shop until Dan Murphy's drove him out of business. Paul Gorman is his name, and he ekes out a living as a consultant. Leila called him two days ago and he agreed to come by and do an evaluation of the wine in the cellar. He wasn't sure when he could make it, so she left a key out for him, hidden beneath a pot around the side of the house. In case he called after she's gone back to work.

All this she now explains to the police, repeating that Gorman is aware of where the key is. The male officer shakes his head sadly while the woman pulls out a notebook and takes details.

‘Is any of the wine valuable?'

‘It might be.'

‘Any Grange?' says the man.

‘I believe so.'

‘Some of that's worth over a grand a bottle.'

Leila shrugs.

‘Maybe we should get crime scene down here anyway?' says the female officer.

The man looks at the table up against the window.

‘We'll have a talk to this bloke,' he says to Leila. ‘Let you know if there's anything.'

When the police leave, she goes back to her room and puts a chair against the door. It has a lock but she's never seen the key. Getting back into bed, she tries to read, but her mind keeps drifting. A few times she shivers, despite the heat of the night. It isn't the burglar worrying her but the police. Their presence has made her realise how concerned she is about Ben Farrell's threat. She feels angry with herself for this cowardice, but can't fight it, decides tomorrow after she's found the diary she'll go home, back to Rose Bay. That will be more convenient anyway, for when she starts work on Monday. This is the last night she will spend in this house. Her brothers will be upset, but if they want it cleared in a hurry, they'll have to come do it themselves.

The prospect of telling them this lifts her spirits.