Garry Disher - Chain of Evidence

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Chain of Evidence

[Inspector Challis 04]

By Garry Disher

Scanned & Proofed By MadMaxAU

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Downhere in Victoria he was the Rising Stars Agency, but hed been Catwalk Castingup in New South Wales, and Model Miss Promotions in Queensland before that.Pete Duyker figured that he had another three months on the Peninsula beforethe cops and the Supreme Court caught up with him again, obliging him to moveon.

Gorgeous, he said, firing off afew shots with the Nikon that had no film in it but was bulky andprofessional-looking, and emitted all of the expected clicks and whirs. For hisother work he was strictly digital.

The mother simpered. Yeth, shesaid, reminding Pete of that old Carry On movie, the doctor with his stethoscopesaying Big breaths and the tarty teenager in his consulting room saying, Yeth,and Im only thixteen. He fired off a few more shots of the womansfive-year-old. The brats lank hair scarcely shifted in the breeze on the topof Arthurs Seat, the waters of the bay and the curve of the Peninsulaspreading dramatically behind her, the smog-hazed towers of Melbourne faintlyvisible to the northwest. Just gorgeous, he reiterated, snapping away.

She wasnt gorgeous. That didntmatter. Plenty of them were gorgeous, and had factored in to his plansover the years. This one had skinny legs, knobbly knees, crooked teeth and aghastly pink gingham outfit. It hadnt taken Pete very long to figure out thata mothers love is blind, her ambition for her youngster boundless.

Golden, Pete said now, fitting awide-angle lens from one of his camera bags, the bag satisfyingly battered andworn, a working photographers gear. That last shot was golden.

The mother beamed, a bony anorexicin skin-tight jeans, brilliant white T-shirt, huge, smoky shades andhigh-heeled sandals, her nod to the springtime balminess here on the Peninsula.Hers was the ugly face of motherhood, the greed naked. She was seeing aportfolio of flattering shots of her kid and the television work that wouldflow from it, all for a once-only, up-front charge of $395 plus a $75registration fee. In about a weeks time shed start to get antsy and call hismobile, but Pete had several mobile phones, all of them untraceable clones andthrowaways.

He looked at his watch. Hed led herto believe that he had to rush back to Melbourne now, to update a clientsportfolio, the kid who played little Bethany in that Channel 10 soap, A Twistin Time.

Youll hear from me by next Friday,he lied.

Thankth, said the mother as thekid scratched her calf and Pete Duyker drove off in his white Tarago van,erasing them from his mind.

The time was 2.45, a Thursdayafternoon in late September. The primary school in Waterloo got out at 3.15, sohe was cutting it fine. There was always Friday, and the weekend, but thelatter was risky, and besides, the impulse was on him now, fine and urgent, soit had to be today.

He drove on, heading across to theWesternport side of the Peninsula, winding through townships and farmland, manyof the hillsides terraced with vineyards and orchards. Not entirely unspoilt,he thought, spotting an ugly great faux-Tuscan mansion, and here and therewhole stands of gum trees looked dead. Pete racked his brains: dieback it wascalled. Some kind of disease. But the thought didnt dent his equilibrium, noton such a clear, still day, the air perfumed and the Peninsula giddy withspringtime growth all around him: orchard blossom, weeds, tall grass going toseed beside the road, the bottlebrush flowering.

He reached the coastal plain andsoon he was in Waterloo. Pete was a bit of a sociologist. He liked to get thefeel of a place before he went active, and he already knew Waterloo to be atown of extremes: rich and poor, urban and rural, privileged and disadvantaged.You didnt see the wealthy very often. They lived in converted farmhouses orarchitectural nightmares a few kilometres outside town or on bluffs overlookingthe bay. The poor lived in small brick and weatherboard houses behind the townscouple of shopping streets, and in newer but still depressing housing estateson the towns perimeter. You didnt see the poor buying ride-on mowers, reinsand bridles, lucerne hay or $30 bottles of the local pinot noir: they ate atMcDonalds, bought Christmas presents in the $2 shops, drove huge oldinefficient V8s. They didnt cycle, jog or attend the gym but presented to thelocal surgeries with long-untreated illnesses brought on by bad diets, alcoholand drug abuse, or injuries from hard physical labour in the nearby refinery oron some rich guys boutique vineyard. They were the extremes. There were a lotof people who ticked over nicely, thank you, because the state or localgovernments employed them, or because rich and poor alike depended on them.

Earlier in the week Pete had driveninto town via the road that skirted the mangrove flats, but today he droveright through the centre of Waterloo, slowly down High Street, reflecting,spotting changes and tendencies, making connections. He wouldnt mind bettingthe new gourmet deli might flourish, but wasnt surprised to see For Sale signsin the camping and electronic shops, not with a new K-Mart in the next block.It made him mad, briefly. His instincts were to support the little man.

He drove on, passing a couple ofpharmacies, a health food shop, bakery, ANZ bank, travel agency, Salvation Armyop-shop, the library and shire offices, and finally High Street opened onto theforeshore reserve: extensively treed parkland, picnic tables, skateboard ramps,a belt of mangroves skirting the bay, and an area given over to the annualWaterloo Show, not busy today but all of the rides and sideshows would be infull swing on the weekend.

Pete passed the Show, making for thefar end of the reserve, where he parked beside a toilet block that hed scoutedout earlier in the week: grimy brick, odiferous, no disguising what it was. Hewent in, checked that he was alone, and changed into a grey wig, grey paste-onmoustache, white lab coat and black horn rims with clear lenses. Then he droveto Trevally Street and parked where the sunlight through the plane trees casttransfiguring patterns over himself and his van. He wasnt a smoker, but hadbeen known to toss other mens cigarette butts at a scene, to throw off thecops.

Now Pete waited. He waited by thevans open door, a clipboard in his hand. Time passed. Maybe she had detention,or after-school care, or was dawdling on the playground. He walked to thecorner and back. Surely shed be along soon, dreamily pumping the pedals of herbike, helmet crooked on her gleaming curls, backpack bumping against her downyspine.

Of course, she might not come, buttwice now hed watched her take this detour after school. Rather than ridestraight home she had made her way along Trevally and down to the waterfrontreserve, to the magic of the Waterloo Show, with its dodgem cars, Ferris wheel,the Mad Mouse ride, the Ghost Train, fairy floss on a stick. The Show was amagnet to all kinds of kids, but Pete had chosen only one kid. He paced up anddown, the van door partly open, listening to the bees in some nearby roses.

But then she appeared. Just as hedimagined. He stood and waited as she approached.

Finally she was upon him and hestepped into her path, saying, Your mum was taken ill. She wants me to takeyou to her.

She gave him a doubting frown, andquite rightly, too, but his lab coat spelt doctor, nurse or ambulance officer,and he was counting on her natural impulse to be at her mothers side. Itsall right, he said, glancing both ways along the street, hop in. Ifnecessary, hed show her the fish-gutting knife.