Worse than Death (Anna Southwood Mysteries) (13 page)

Chapter 14

Graham came in at about six, looking exhausted, and I poured us both a drink.

“Graham, I want to get into that tomb,” I said. “There’s something there, and I’ve got a horrible feeling I know what it might be.”

“What?” he sank gratefully back into the sofa cushions.

“You’ll think I’m mad, but… Graham, I think Kylie’s body’s there.” I said it in a rush.

“You’re joking.” He sat up straight. “What on earth gave you that idea?”

“It’s a hunch,” I said indignantly. “Like proper detectives have. No, listen, it makes sense. But I can’t work out the details. Rex must know she’s there, but he couldn’t have done it. He was in Perth — the police checked that out.”

“Perhaps he hid the body for a mate,” he said. “If there
is
a body. He could have master keys to the crypts — it’s his building firm that put them up, isn’t it?”

“Yes, and he’s got shares in a Liverpool undertaker’s, too. He’s got all the access. But why would he do it for someone else? If only he hadn’t been in Perth.”

“Are we absolutely certain he was? What if he changed flights with someone else? The airline wouldn’t know, as long as the seat was filled by someone.”

I stared at him. “That could work.” I thought for a minute. “But they wouldn’t still have the records, would they? So that we could see if we recognised any names on the next day’s flight list.”

“Doesn’t matter, does it?” he said. “It shows how it
might
have been done.”

“Yes. But why would Rex have done it? What’s the motive?”

“Sex, probably. She was a bit of a tease, wasn’t she? And he’s into teenage prostitution, too, isn’t he? According to Lorna. Perhaps he likes them young. What was it she called him? A forty-carat slime?”

“That’s it!” My voice squeaked as I made the connection. “That’s what’s been niggling at me. That’s what Carol Johnson said.” Graham looked surprised.

“No, not about Rex. She just said it must have been someone outwardly normal, but underneath a slimy monster. It’s the word ‘slimy’. I knew something rang a bell — Lorna, talking about Rex, the first time I asked her about him. It has to be him,” I said. “It has to. If Kylie’s body is in that crypt, then Rex must have put it there. Why else would he visit it every week?”

“It’s a big ‘if’, Anna,” Graham said. “What if you’re wrong?”

“No. I’m right,” I said, with more confidence than I felt. “It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

“Well,” Graham said, “I’m bushed and I’ve got an early call tomorrow.” He left, saying he’d call in at the same time the next day. I picked up the phone and dialled Glenn Sheedy’s number.

“Good one, Anna,” he said, wheezing away. “The drugs boys are very happy. I’ve got a lot of those favours owing to me now. Need any yourself?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact I do,” I said. “But first, Glenn, I hear word that Birkett was the informer. Is that your fine Italian hand?”

“Irish as the day is long,” he said cheerfully. “Why? You don’t mind if he goes down, do you? Pays a few scores.”

“Yes,” I said, but it made me uneasy. It was getting out of hand. “Glenn, is there any possibility of opening a tomb at Liverpool cemetery?”

“Jesus,” he said. “You sure come up with them. I dunno — you have to get an exhumation order, go through the Coroner’s court. It’s a big deal. What is it? More drugs?”

“What? Oh — no, just a nasty nagging curiosity.”

“I’ll need a bit more than that,” he said. “To convince the Coroner.”

I told him what I thought and waited. “Well,” he said, “I’ll go for it, Anna. You were pretty good on the powerhouse. It’ll take some fast talking, though.”

He said he’d ring me back, and I put the phone down and looked at my list again. I screwed it up and made a new one:

Kylie: disappeared after dinner with Rex and Beth.

Beth: disappeared after dinner with Rex.

Leonie: doesn’t care if she goes to prison or not. Why?

Rex: perhaps wasn’t in Perth. Visits crypt. How? Why?

Joe: out that night? or the night before? Rex’s car?

*

When I’d finished and stared at it for a while, I sighed and went upstairs to contemplate a dreary selection of canned and frozen food. I fed Toby and ran a deep bath. Still wrapped in a towel, I had a couple of drinks and picked at some cold lasagne. I felt scratchy and lethargic, as if I was coming down with something. I went to bed early and slept fitfully, half dreaming, half thinking about what might be in Mr Digrigorio’s tomb, and what deep shit I’d be in if there was nothing but the old man.

Lorna called the next morning, waking me to the realisation that I felt dreadful.

“Seen the news this morning?” Her voice was excited.

“No. What?” I hadn’t opened the paper for days, I realised, not even to do the crossword.

“Birkett’s been found dead. Out by the powerhouse. Shot, then dumped in the river. The newsboys are calling it a gangland killing.”

I gripped the handset. “Rex. It must be Rex.”

“Sounds like it. Listen, Anna, I’ll make a few phone calls and then come over. Okay?”

“Okay.” I wandered into the kitchen but my stomach shrivelled at the thought of food. I poured myself a glass of wine and took two Panadols. I was well into the bottle when Lorna arrived. I was also shivering, hot and cold by turns.

“Hi. You look terrible.” She stood on the doorstep, dishevelled and energetic.

“Thanks. Any more news?”

“About Birkett? Yeah.” We went up to the living room and her eyebrows rose at the row of empty bottles.

“Trent’s coming tomorrow,” I said defensively, and we both started laughing.

*

“He had his passport in his pocket,” Lorna said later, after she’d forced me to eat some toast and drink a black coffee. “And the cops at Liverpool are being very cagey about something. There’s a warrant out for Rex.”

“Already?” I was still thinking about whether Glenn had got the exhumation order and whether they’d find Kylie Johnson.

“Well, they found Birkett’s body last night. But I think from their excitement this morning they must have got something else as well. Perhaps he left a safeguard confession somewhere. They reckon he died yesterday — kids found him on their way back from school.”

I wondered if it had been the boys we’d met. God, I thought, that was only the day before yesterday. Time sure went quickly when you were having fun.

I managed to tell Lorna a shaky version of what else had been happening, and after a few jubilant remarks about the story she’d get out of this, she left and I went back to bed.

*

The phone woke me again the next morning and it was Lorna again.

“Birkett had left a signed statement with a solicitor,” she said. “It was to be opened in case of sudden death. It names Rex and gives details of drug shipments — times, dates, prices, everything. Rex will go down for fifteen years for this, at least. And so will a few others.”

“Have they found him yet?” I imagined the terror Birkett must have felt, knowing he’d been set up. And I wondered how Rex was feeling now, being hunted.

“No. And his yacht’s missing. The harbour police are onto it now. Run, rabbit, run.” She was triumphant.

I made an attempt to reply sensibly, but my head was full of cotton wool. When I’d hung up I made coffee and crawled back to bed. I wished I’d never heard of the Channings. In fact, for one of the few times in my life I wished I was dead — or someone else entirely. I fell into restless daytime sleep until I was woken by Trent crashing about in the kitchen.

“God, you look awful,” he said when I staggered out “Go back to bed and I’ll bring you broth and stroke your fevered brow.”

I did, and half an hour later he brought me delicious chicken and tofu soup. He also tidied the bedroom, put a vase of early jasmine on the dresser, and actually patted my forehead. I went back to sleep.

The phone woke me again in the late afternoon and I answered groggily. I felt like death. It was Glenn.

“Well, they’re going to do it,” he said. “They’re opening the tomb this afternoon, probably as we speak. This better be good, mate, or I’m really on the line. Want to come to the post-mortem?”

“No thanks. Jesus, Glenn, I hope I’m right. Any news of Rex?” I felt as if my voice came from a long way away. It seemed to reverberate hollowly into the phone.

“That’s really what I rang about,” he said. “They haven’t found
him
, but they’ve found where he’s been.”

“Where?”

“The yacht’s floating out of control a few miles outside the Heads. No sign of Rex, but there’s a suicide note.”

“Suicide?” I sat up.

“Yeah. Couldn’t face a prison term, it says.” Glenn sounded as convinced as I felt. “Believe it when I see the body, myself. Catch you later.”

I lay back in bed, sweaty and really ill now. My head was bursting. I managed to get up and crawl downstairs to put the phones on the machine, then took two aspirin and fell into bed again, unplugging the bedside phone. I slept the clock around this time, waking at 7 a.m. feeling much better. Toby was sitting on my chest, kneading vigorously and making little guttural sounds. He hadn’t been fed since Trent had left.

I went into my spotless kitchen and fed him and then put coffee on. I felt peaceful, as if everything had finally come under control, almost as if some clarity had come from the fever, but I knew it wasn’t over. Beth was still missing, but I thought I could work out most of what had happened now — just the broad picture. I’d need to see Leonie Channing again, but that would have to wait. Meanwhile I had a strong urge to be somewhere else, somewhere where I could take long walks away from everything and cleanse my head.

When it was a respectable hour I rang Lorna and told her I was going away for a day or two. I gave her the number of the hotel in Austinmer, left a note for Graham asking him to feed the cat, and put a message on the machine for Evan if he called. I packed an overnight bag and put it in the hall while I rang Glenn.

“Bingo,” he said. “You should set up as one of them mediums, Anna. Just as fuckin’ well. The Westmead Coroner was spitting chips. The Liverpool boys were sweating a bit, too.”

“Yes?” I said weakly, crossing my fingers.

“Two bodies in the coffin,” he said. “One an adolescent girl. Been beaten to death by the look of it. They’re checking it with Kylie Johnson’s dental charts now.”

“Glenn,” I said, “I think Rex did it. And I think I know how he faked his trip to Perth, too.” I told him what Graham had worked out.

“Doesn’t matter much,” he said. “If they can’t pin that on him, they’ve got him for the drugs. And probably Birkett, too. Not that that’s much good to anyone now that he’s
dead
” He gave his cynical laugh.

“It matters to me,” I said. “And to Joe Kominsky and his mother.”

“You’re a sticker, Anna,” he said, chuckling. “Well, gotta go. I’ve got a few cases of my own to worry about here.”

I picked up my bag and set off down the Princes Highway.

*

After a day of walking on the beach, staring into rock pools and sitting under the coal-seamed cliffs of that part of the coast, I went back to the hotel for a counter tea of fish and chips on the outside terrace. I’d stayed here a couple of times with Clyde, who’d had big ideas of buying the rundown pub and developing it for some sort of convention centre. He probably would have, too, if he’d lived, but I liked it as it was, dilapidated and gloomy, with hardly any services.

The bartender came out as I was finishing my beer and said there was a phone call.

I followed him to the one phone behind the bar and jammed a finger in my ear against the noise of the television.

“It’s me,” Lorna said. “They’ve found Rex’s body. Well,
a
body, anyway. The face is blown away and there are huge gashes all over it. Hands are missing. Could be sharks, though the head’s a shotgun job.”

“Lorna! I’ve just had dinner.”

“Sorry. Anyway, the corpse was dressed in Rex’s clothing, wearing his medallion, same blood type, etcetera, etcetera. Waddya reckon?”

“I don’t know. What do the police think?”

“Well, they haven’t found the gun, but it could be at the bottom of the harbour. I gather they’re willing to accept it as Rex. Closes the case nicely for them, and probably saves a few scandals, too.”

“You don’t think it’s him.”

“Dunno. If it isn’t then he’s disappeared. Almost as good — he’ll never be able to come back.”

“Who could it be if it isn’t Rex?”

“Well, a mate of Birkett’s — Jack Rowley — has gone missing, too, according to my info. Could be your Jack Robinson. Apparently he’s been talking about Hong Kong…”

We said goodbye and I went up to my shabby room with its huge windows overlooking the ocean. I fell asleep to the sound of surf crashing on the rocks.

Chapter 15

I checked out early the next morning and drove back towards town. The day away had served its purpose — I felt in control again, and relatively clear-headed as I navigated the winding, cliff-edged roads, with their breath-taking vistas of the National Park coastline.

At Blakehurst I stopped at a public phone booth and rang Leonie Channing. She was suspicious, but her voice also sounded less vague. She finally agreed I could call in on her.

I took the turn-off to Liverpool and tried to organise in my mind what I was going to say to Leonie. I thought I had a pretty good general idea of what might have happened now, but I still didn’t know why. I would have to completely reassure her that Rex would never come back, if I wanted any answers from her.

As I got out of the car in front of her house, Evan appeared from behind a parked van. I went over to him.

“Nothing much,” he said. “But I did get a look at this morning’s mail. A letter from Tasmania, Launceston, in what looked like childish writing to me.”

“Tasmania.” That made me thoughtful. “Thanks, Evan. You don’t need to stay now.”

We arranged to have a drink the next day and he left, whistling.

*

Leonie was in the same slatternly slippers and housecoat when she came to the door, but she looked ten years younger. Her eyes were clear, she had put on light makeup, and she no longer dragged her feet as she led me down the hall. The kitchen had undergone an even more radical transformation. The washing-up was done, the cat-food bowls were clean and set on fresh newspaper, There were no magazines or dirty ashtrays cluttering the table.

She must have noticed my look of surprise.

“Spent all morning cleaning,” she said, her rather harsh voice probably as animated as it ever became. “Started yesterday, as soon as I got back from identifying him.”

Good, I thought, that’s that. “You’re sure it was your ex-husband?”

“Yes.” She gave me a cunning look. “He’s left all his money to Beth.” I didn’t think it was a non sequitur. She motioned for me to sit at the table while she put on the inevitable kettle.

I took a deep breath. “Mrs Channing, she’s alive, isn’t she? You know where she is.”

She put cups of the same awful insipid coffee on the table, but this time the milk was in a jug and there were saucers and spoons. She sat facing me and then she shrugged.

“It won’t do any harm to speak now,” I said. “He’s gone.” I took the plunge. “He can’t hurt her any more now, can he?”

She spooned sugar into her coffee and sat staring into the cup.

“Were you working for him?” she asked suddenly.

“Yes, for a while. But I’d sacked him.”

She laughed. “He wouldn’t like that. It’s a wonder he didn’t come after
you
, too.”

I didn’t tell her he hadn’t had time, that I hadn’t realised what Rex might really be like until the last minute.

“Where’s Beth?” I asked, sipping my weak Nescafé.

“She’s safe. She’s out of it.”

“Tasmania?”

For a moment she looked frightened, then she shrugged again.

“How did you know? Well, it doesn’t matter now. She’s with my sister — she’s just moved there.
He
doesn’t… didn’t… know where to…”

“But how did you get her out of Sydney? The police must have checked the airport.”

She looked smug. “She flew to Melbourne under a false name, then booked another flight from there. It was her idea. She’s smart like that. We paid cash — I had money saved up. It was easy.”

“Mrs Channing, why? It was Kylie Johnson, wasn’t it? Did Rex kill her? Did Beth know?”

“She’d just worked it out,” she said slowly. She went on, her voice filled with hatred. “If he’d left her alone she would’ve probably never realised.”

“Oh shit,” I said as the last pieces fell into place. I muttered into my cup. “He was molesting Beth, wasn’t he?”

She was silent, and when I looked up I saw that her shoulders were shaking. She was crying. I went round the table and awkwardly put an arm around her. She stiffened and sat up straight, sniffing. I squatted on the floor beside her.

“I didn’t know,” she said. “It’d been going on since she was a little kid. I didn’t know.” There was a flat appeal in her voice, as if she didn’t expect to be believed. “And then, then she told him he’d have to stop or she’d tell me and we’d take him to court. That’s when he threatened her. He said he’d kill her if she told, and that’s when she started putting two and two together about Kylie. When he dropped her back that night she waited till she was out of the car and then she… she
accused
him. She ran straight inside and told me. We sat up all night talking and making plans.”

“But he must have known she’d tell you,” I said. “Why didn’t he do something?”

She smiled grimly. “He must have been pissing himself. He did ring the next afternoon, after she’d gone, and I told him she had the flu. I suppose he thought she couldn’t have told me, or I would have said something.”

I looked at her with admiration.

“And you went on not saying anything,” I said. “Even when they accused you of murdering her. Even when you might have gone to prison.”

“It was worth it,” she said. “As long as I knew she was safe from that filthy bastard, I didn’t care what happened to me. If I’d said anything he would have found a way around it. He had friends who were cops. He’d be all right in court — he could talk his way out of anything. He’d say it was all my idea, that I was mad. He’d have got her back, somehow. He had money.”

I stood up. “What will you do? They’ll drop the case, now. You’ll be free.”

“I’ll go to Tasmania too,” she said. “But I’ll wait here till we’ve got our hands on his money. Then I’ll join Beth and we’ll buy a nice house near my sister. We’ll change our names, forget all this. Start again where no one knows us.”

I wished her luck and she stood up and began to edge me towards the door. Her face had become hostile again — I thought she was a woman who would hate anyone seeing her to be vulnerable. Her goodbye was brusque. She clearly never wanted to meet me again.

*

I got home to find Graham having coffee with the Colonel. Oh God, I thought, we
still
hadn’t done anything about his phone calls.

“Anna,” Graham said, a peculiar smile on his face, as if he was restraining himself from howling with laughter, “the Colonel has something important to tell us.”

I was about to apologise profusely to the old man, but he held up his hand in a dignified way.

“No. I have to confess,” he said. “I’ve been sleeping badly over it.”

“Confess?” I glanced wildly at Graham, but he looked grave and wouldn’t meet my eyes.

“I made up the last phone calls,” the Colonel said in a grim voice, looking straight ahead. “Bit bored, I suppose. Not enough to do. Liked you youngsters, liked the interest you took the first time. Deeply sorry.” He’d gone a dark red in the face.

I stared. “Oh dear,” I said weakly. I went on in a tentative voice: “Look, you don’t have to have an excuse like that to call in, you know. You’re always welcome for a coffee.” I had an inspiration. “And now that Graham’s rehearsing, I’m sure there’d be the odd thing to do around here, if you were interested. Just going through the mail, that sort of thing.”

He was embarrassing in his thanks, and we arranged that he’d come in a couple of mornings a week and see what there was to do. I sighed inwardly at the thought, but I was sorry for the lonely old thing. Perhaps I could put him onto investigating electronic surveillance equipment — we still had the brochures somewhere, and it would get him out a bit.

He left, straightening his shoulders in true military fashion, and we collapsed on the couch, laughing. It was a great relief after the tension of the last day or so.

*

Later in the afternoon we sat in my garden — Lorna and Graham and I — and put together the rest of it. Glenn had rung and said the body had definitely been identified as Kylie Johnson and her parents were flying up.

The forensic experts could no longer tell, of course, if she’d been raped or not, but she’d probably died of strangulation — small bones in the neck were cracked. They thought it was likely the broken jaw had been inflicted after death. They weren’t sure when the other head injuries had occurred.

“I guess she just went a bit too far with her teasing,” Lorna said. “And he couldn’t stop. He probably didn’t mean to kill her.”

I looked at her with surprise.

“Making excuses for Rex? That’s not like you.”

“Jesus!” Graham said. “How old was she? Twelve?”

“He’d been doing it to Beth practically since she was a baby,” I said. We were all silent for a moment, absorbing the reality of it.

“She must have arranged to meet him,” Lorna said. “Where? In one of the mobile homes?”

“I think so,” I said. “But they must have organised it before that last dinner. He must have told her to copy her dad’s keys. He was on night shift, she could have done it during the day when he was asleep and Carol was at work.”

“Why’d she agree?” Graham said. “She must have known what she was in for.”

“I don’t think so.” Lorna was thoughtful. “She was probably just flattered and excited that he was interested. She was a flirt — she probably didn’t realise just how far it would go.”

“No.” I could imagine it — the promise of a picnic perhaps, champagne and hamburgers, and a romantic illicit night in one of the little houses. Even her mother thought she was a bit of a tearaway — she could have seen it as an act of rebellion. Perhaps she’d already had a taste of sex, but at the last moment she was frightened — Rex was so much older, and stronger.

“I think you’re right,” I said to Lorna. “I don’t think he did mean to kill her. He thought they’d get away with her excuse of being at Beth’s — Carol wouldn’t have checked up normally, not if she’d come home at the right time next day. And he did look kind of… sad, at the crypt. He put flowers there for her every week.”

*

Lorna and Graham left and I went upstairs. My flat felt empty, sterile and bleak, and so did my life. I put Chopin on the stereo, hoping his liquid music would warm up the rooms, then got out a new bottle of wine. I’d just taken the first sip when the phone rang.

“Anna, it’s Paul Whitehouse. I owe you an apology, I guess, for not taking you seriously. And also thanks.”

“That’s all right,” I said weakly. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Well… at least let me buy you dinner…”

“Okay. When?” I lifted the glass to myself in the mirror, waiting tensely.

“Are you free tonight?”

I could have played hard to get, but I didn’t. I put the phone down and grinned at my reflected image.

After trying on several of my new outfits I settled for an old pair of black silk pants and last year’s long-sleeved green T-shirt. I corked the bottle of Riesling and opened one of Bollinger. I looked at my cigarettes, then threw them and the lighter into the bin. Paul didn’t smoke. I took a pink-stemmed flute of champagne out to the balcony and sat in the dusk watching the sky darken, and the water turn to glittering corrugated slate while I waited for Paul.

A mellow path formed across the sea from the rising full moon, seeming to pass under the bridge with its twinkling beacons. The lights of small boats winked on as they came and went in the busy harbour, weaving through the ferries. I thought of the hundreds of lives out there on the water, men coming home to wives, couples heading for a romantic evening, women, children, old men, all absorbed in their own unknowable lives, and it came to me suddenly, like a memory, a comfortable anti-climax, what the Channing case had really been about.

We’d been so caught up in the public face of things — the conspiracies, the power-mongering, drugs, bent police, the vice and corruption — and none of these was the real story. That had been private, domestic, personal. It was really very simple — two people who’d once loved each other and then hated. A man who couldn’t control his twisted desire for his own sort of love, and a mother who would have given up her own life to protect her young.

I thought of Leonie’s hostility that morning, and then I thought of Paul. I didn’t know if it would go anywhere, but I was going to give it my best shot. I was going to go on with the agency, too, I realised, and no more pretending that it was a game, or setting up Graham as the front man. I’d been knocked about a bit emotionally by this case, but I’d also learned something about myself, and my insatiable curiosity about others had been satisfied to some extent. I didn’t even care if Rex
was
in some bar in Hong Kong, toasting the memory of Jack Robinson, or Jack Rowley, or whatever his name was. I was even prepared to remember the negative attraction I’d felt for him. People were all complicated, even the worst of them.

The night was turning cold and I went inside, calling to Toby.

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