7

I

MALONE DROPPED Paula Decker off at the Magee apartment to resume her watch.

“I looked through some of Mr. Magee's and Miss Doolan's tapes,” she said. “Great stuff. The Doors and Pink Floyd.”

“Never heard of ‘em.”

He drove on up Macquarie Street. There was a demonstration outside Parliament House and traffic was being let through at a crawl. The sergeant in charge of the police detail recognized him and saluted. The demonstrators, not recognizing him, booed him: he must be the enemy. He saluted them and, changing mood, they cheered him. It was a demonstration without fire in its belly, a march in the sun. Democracy at work, he thought; or at play. He drove on. He passed St. Mary's Cathedral; a bishop was out on the front steps, feeding the pigeons. An ordinary day, too good for murder and chasing greedy bastards.

He saw a bicycle courier who looked like Vassily Todorov. He tooted his horn, but the cyclist, if it was Todorov, was too intent on delivery. Head down and arse up he disappeared into the traffic ahead like a fish into a current.

When Malone got back to Homicide, Sheryl Dallen was waiting for him. “You look pleased with yourself,” she told him.

“I've just had fifteen minutes of looking at a normal world. What's new?”

“That South Coast murder—Constable Haywood. They've been on to us, asking us to make a few enquiries.”

“Where's Russ?”

“He said to tell you he was taking his wife to lunch at Leichhardt. The chill has lessened, he said.”

“And that didn't intrigue you? What he said?”

“I've learned to mind my own business about married men.”

“We're no different from single men, only tamer.”

“Yeah,” she said, unimpressed. “The enquiries. Seems there's a family down that way—” She looked at the note in her hand: “The Briskin family. Constable Haywood said he was gunna look in on them, they have a weekender on a back road just past Minnamurra. The local cops went out to see them, they said they hadn't seen Haywood. The locals accepted that. Then someone remembered the name, got on the computer and it turns out the father of the family had form as long as your arm.”

“They go back and talk to the family? To Dad?” They went back, but no one was there. One of the sons is in St. George's Hospital in intensive care, he was bowled over by some woman driver—Don't say it!”

“Never crossed my mind. Go on.”

“They could of left to go up to the hospital. Or back to where they live, in Hurstville. South Coast would like us to pay them a visit. It may be nothing, but just in case. I thought I'd go out there with Andy or John.”

He looked at his desk. He had over the past few days begun a desultory cleaning-out of his drawers, a reluctant leave-taking, though he would not have described it that way to anyone, except perhaps Clements. There were notes, some even yellowed round the edges: a reminder, Check the Hardstaffs, from a case of ten or twelve years ago. There was a calculator that he couldn't remember ever using. A photo, found right at the bottom of a drawer, of Lisa with a baby, Tom, in her arms. Detritus and memory mixed together. What, he guessed, you gathered as you went downhill from the middle of your life.

He stood up. “No, I'll come with you. I need a breath of fresh air.”

She looked at him curiously, but made no comment. She wasn't theatrical-minded, but John Kagal had remarked that the second act of the boss' career was coming to an end. So far she hadn't bothered to look towards the end of the first act of her own professional life. For women in the Police Service second and third acts were still just hopes.

“We'll go in my car,” he said. “You drive. Carefully.”

“When you were young, didn't you ever put your foot to the floor?”

“Only in fear. Never on the pedal. Drive carefully.”

She did, but only because of the traffic. It was thick and slow; heavy semi-trailers rode like elephants through it.

“Shall I put the blue light on, start the siren?” she asked.

“What'd be the point? What are we going to use—the footpath? Relax. Drive carefully.”

Hurstville lies about fifteen kilometres south of the harbour city. Once a suburb it is now called a city; the rest of Sydney still calls it a suburb. It covers a ridge that slopes away down to Botany Bay and, to the south, the Georges River. Originally the whole area was covered by thick forest; indeed, the main thoroughfare is still called Forest Road. The original settlers, other than the Aborigines, were timber-getters and charcoal-burners. The timber men could drive their axes into ironbark, blackbutt, blue and red gums and other eucalypts that made a great canopy over the ridge. The main settler was an army officer, John Townson, who was given a major land grant; in the early days of the colony of New South Wales land grants were given away as freely as luncheon vouchers in later times. As the world turned, speculators and developers moved in, the forests and their workers disappeared, and proper civilization, with its rules and regulations and back-of-the-hand bribes, had arrived.

The Briskin house was a blue-brick from the 1920s, a Californian bungalow, as it used to be called. As with most things Californian, that was a loose term. Very few of the voters in the 1920s knew what came out of California other than Mary Pickford and Charlie Chaplin. The street was lined with large tallow-wood trees that did their best to hide the ugly hodge-podge of houses on either side of the street. There were weatherboard cottages from before World War I; Californian bungalows; Italianate mansions on fifty-foot blocks looking vainly for an estate; and an in-your-face cubist house that looked ready to take off for another location, maybe Silicon Valley. The tree in front of the Briskin house was a solitary crepe myrtle in full bloom. It was trimmed, neatly, the branches clustered together pointing upwards, the blooms like rosy fists.

The house had a driveway leading up to a fibro garage at the rear. The lawn and the garden at the front of the house were neat; they could not have been otherwise with Shirlee living in the house. A polished copper sign beside the front door was also from the 1920s: Emoh Ruo: the supposed Maori, Malone remembered, for Our Home. Darlene and her brothers joked about it, but Shirlee never let it be removed. She had forgotten that it was Clyde who had brought it home, lifting it after he had burgled a house.

The grey Toyota was in the driveway, the bonnet up, when the unmarked police car drew up outside. Corey, cleaning the spark plugs, came out from under the bonnet to look at the big man and the woman getting out of the unmarked car. He smelled police at once: he didn't need the blue word on the side of their car.

“I'm Detective-Inspector Malone and this is Detective-Constable Dallen. You are—?”

“Corey Briskin.” He was suddenly all caution, wiping grease from his hands as if it were some giveaway. Like blood. His mother was inside the house, tidying up an always-tidy house. Errol Magee, strapped to a chair, gagged now, was in the middle bedroom on the side of the house away from Mrs. Charlton's. “Something wrong? Me brother's not—?”

“The brother who was hurt in an accident? No, we're not here because of him. We're just following up enquiries about Constable Haywood. We understand you were contacted about him last night. His murder.”

Even Sheryl Dallen thought the approach had a sledgehammer in it. But she left it to the boss, he was the opening bowler. In the meantime she studied Corey, who looked more than a little nervous. Young guys, these days, never seemed to trust cops . . .

“The murder?” Corey batted that one on the back foot. “Yeah. We told the sergeant, the one who come to see us, we told him we hadn't seen him. The dead guy.”

Then Shirlee, who could see through brick walls, who would have been aware at once of the two detectives even if they had been no more than silent ghosts, came out the front door, down the steps and across the lawn to where Malone and Sheryl stood by the grey Toyota.

“Mum,” said Corey, jumping the gun, “these are two detectives—”

“From Homicide,” said Malone, still with the heavy approach.

“They're asking about the young cop who was murdered—” Corey was sending semaphore, Morse code, anything to stop Mum putting her foot in it.

“Dreadful.” Shirlee shook her head, looked mournful, as if she had lost a close relative. For Crissakes, Mum, don’t wipe your eyes with your pinny! “It's getting worse every week. Crime, I mean. Murder, things like that. I don't mean it's the police's fault—”

“Thanks,” said Malone and only a 747 going overhead silenced his sigh. He waited till the plane had gone, then said, “We'd like a word with your husband, Mrs. Briskin. Is he home or at work?”

Shirlee looked after the disappearing plane. “Bloody planes! They oughta move the airport.”

“Mrs. Briskin. Your husband—we'd like a word with him.”

“Clyde?” Corey had to admire his mother; they didn't come any better as an actress. “I'd like a word with him, too. He walked out on me, on us—when was it, Corey?”

“Four years ago,” said Corey, falling into step. “Don't mention him, Inspector. He ain't too popular around here.”

“What made him walk out?” asked Sheryl. “You don't mind us asking?”

“A woman,” said Shirlee, and made it sound like a witch or Madame Dracula. “It wasn't the first time. He was always a skirt-chaser. I dunno who she was, he just said he'd met someone else, packed his bags and he was gone. I haven't seen hide or hair of him ever since.”

Don’t pile it on, Mum. Corey stepped in before they fell into soap opera: “Why'd you wanna see Dad?”

“They thought he might've known Constable Haywood,” said Malone. “Your dad had been in trouble a coupla times.”

“He was never in trouble down the South Coast,” said Shirlee, who knew Clyde's record like an oft-sung anthem. “He wouldn't of know-en the officer.”

“You haven't heard from him since—since he walked out?” said Sheryl.

“Not a word.”

Then Mrs. Charlton, from next door, appeared at the side fence. She was an angular-faced woman with thin shoulders and big breasts, so that she looked like a pinnace under full sail, especially since her blouse was white. She sailed into other people's business, regardless of wreckage. “Something wrong, Shirl? Pheeny's all right, I hope? I heard about it on the news. You haven't lost him, I hope?” She was already donning black for the funeral.

“No, he's okay, Daph.” In Shirlee's best mind-your-own-business voice.

“They interviewed that lawyer, he's gunna start a first-class or second-class action, something like that. Alan Jones is on your side. For Pheeny and them little kids in the accident. You from the lawyers?” she asked Malone.

“No,” said Malone, “we're from the Hurstville council. We were looking for Mr. Briskin, but Mrs. Briskin says he's no longer here.”

“No, he's been gone—I dunno. How long, Shirl? Don't matter, he's gone and good riddance, wasn't that what you said? I told you I wasn't surprised when he took off, remember?”

“I remember, Daph.”

“What did you want him for? The council? He was always very good with the trees, I'll say that for him. That crepe myrtle, he planted that, didn't he, Shirl?”

“It's council business,” said Malone. “Now would you mind leaving us alone with Mrs. Briskin?”

Mrs. Charlton was evidently accustomed to rebuffs; she just sniffed, turned and was gone: sailing. Malone grinned at Shirlee.

“Have I ruined neighbourly relations?”

“You kidding?” Shirlee gave him a neighbourly smile: that is, one with reservations. “She'll be back soon's you're gone.”

“Why'd you say you were from the council?” asked Corey.

“If I'd said we were from the police, you think she'd have left us?”

“Good thinking,” said Corey and nodded appreciatively.

“So you didn't see Constable Haywood, not after his first visit,” said Sheryl.

“No, I come up here yesterday afternoon. My mum was already up here.”

“How'd you come? By car?”

“No, by train. We've only got the one car, this—” He patted the Toyota. “Mum had come up in it.”

Then Malone's phone rang. “Excuse me,” he said and moved away out to the footpath, stood beside the bunched fists of the crepe myrtle.

It was Clements ringing from the office. “Our girl Miss Doolan is back at her apartment. Constable Decker is down there, she just called.”

“How's Kylie? Knocked around?”

“Decker didn't say so.”

“Righto, I'll go straight there. We've got nowhere out here with this family, the Briskins. I think they're clean. They haven't seen our man, the father, in four years. It was a wasted trip.”

“You win some, you lose some.”

“That how it is with stocks and shares?”

“Don't rub it in,” said Clements and hung up.

Malone went back to the three by the grey Toyota. He had noticed that, though it wasn't new, maybe five or six years old, it was polished and—neat. “Righto, Mrs. Briskin. Maybe the detectives down south will want another word with you, but I'll tell ‘em what you told us. That you didn't see Constable Haywood yesterday.”

“Give ‘em our condolences,” said Shirlee. “Good cops oughtn't be lost like that.”

Neither Malone nor Sheryl Dallen saw Corey roll his eyes.

II

“His—Nibs—” Shirlee was making an upside-down cake, a family favourite. She pushed a can of pineapple rings towards Corey. “Open that . . . We've gotta get rid of him.”

“Mum—” Corey ran an electric can-opener round the rim. “I'm in enough shit—okay, okay, I'll wash me mouth out. But I'm in it up to here—” He ran his finger across his throat. “I've done in two people, I didn't mean to, it just happened. I'm not lining up for something deliberate, not on him—”

“I didn't mean that. She opened a packet of shredded coconut; she had her own recipes, always had had. She looked at all the cookery shows on TV, but went her own way, adding bits and pieces. “He's no good to us dead. But we'll have to move him from here. Them cops might come back again. Then there's that old stickybeak next door . . . No, we gotta move him.”

“Where?” He had the practical sense of the hopeless.

“I dunno. For the moment,” she added; she would think of somewhere. “We gotta talk to Chantelle.”

“Mum, bloody Chantelle's left all the dirty work for us. We're in the shit, not her.” She didn't tell him to wash his mouth out; she continued mixing the cake. “If it hadn't been for her, we wouldn't of got into this.”

“We done it for the money, not to please her.”

“Yeah. If we let Errol go, what's she gunna do? Get another job in IT, make a mint? While Darlene and me've been losing money, taking time off?”

“We'll talk to her.”

“Yeah,” he said flatly and pushed the open can of pineapple rings towards her. “What we gunna have on it? Cream or ice-cream?”

“Whatever you like.”

“I'll ask our mate what he likes. He doesn't think much of your cooking.”

“He's lucky we're feeding him.”

Corey stood up, pulled on a blue hood, went out of the kitchen and down the hallway to the third bedroom. “How you feeling, sport?”

Errol Magee was strapped to a rocking-chair, one of Darlene's scarves wrapped round his mouth and tied at the back of his neck, gagging him. Corey took off the gag and Magee said, “You bastard. I fucking near swallowed my tongue.”

“That would have solved our problem,” Corey said to himself.

“What?”

“Sorry, sport. But we couldn't trust you to keep your mouth shut, you might of started yelling your head off and then I'd of had to clock you. Tonight for tea we're having upside-down cake, pineapple. You want cream or ice-cream on it?”

“Why? You going to send me out for it?”

Corey grinned inside the hood, shook his head. “You're on your own, sport. You're not shit- scared any more, are you?”

“No, I'm just pissed off. You getting anywhere with the ransom?”

“Not so far.”

“What were you going to do with it? I mean your share?”

“I dunno.” He sat down on Darlene's bed. “I used to be a dreamer, when I was a kid. I got outa the habit, I guess. Probably bought a bike, a BMW or a Honda, gone travelling. You ever seen the rest of Australia?”

“Only from the air.”

Corey stopped dreaming before it had begun, got serious. “Things are getting complicated, sport. They've kidnapped your girlfriend Kylie.”

“They've what?” Magee tried to sit up straight, just set the chair rocking.

Corey leaned forward and steadied the chair. “Or she's done a bunk. It was on the news this morning. Alan Jones and John Laws are making stars of you, you're right up there with Tom and Nicole. You're the only news on talk-back radio.”

Magee was frowning, deeply troubled. “Something's happened to Kylie. She wouldn't just disappear, not of her own accord.” He looked across at Corey. “You're having me on.”

“Mate, have I lied to you yet? But you lied to us. Where's that forty million you've salted away?”

“That's bullshit. Propaganda. You dunno what banks and receivers are like. They're always talking about missing funds, loot that's been salted away somewhere. It's easy, it covers up their own mistakes. I'm telling you, there are more liars and rumour-mongers in business than there ever are in sport or the entertainment game. I didn't know it till I started to move up the ladder, it was a real eye-opener. Forty million!” He coughed a sneer, almost believing what he was saying. “You think I'd still be hanging around for the receivers to move in? I'd be outa sight, overseas, with a new name.”

“You sound disappointed you're not.”

“Wouldn't you be?”

“Sport, you think that's where your girlfriend is? She's found out where the money is and she's over there trying her luck. She bright enough for that?”

The thought horrified Magee for a moment; then he knew it was an impossibility. Kylie couldn't add up a grocery account. If American Express didn't send her a bill every month she would think the world was a giveaway.

“No, no way. She wouldn't have a clue—” He had said too much.

“She wouldn't have a clue where you've put the money? Sport, you've just told me you do have forty million—”

“No, no! For Crissakes, will you stop harping on it? I meant she hasn't a clue about business—she thinks American Express runs the world. If she's missing, someone's grabbed her—”

“Who, for instance?”

Magee took his time. “I'm guessing and you're not going to believe me—”

“Try me.”

“The yakuza.”

“Who?”

“The yakuza. Japanese gangsters, like the Mafia.”

The blue hood fluttered as if a wind had blown through it; Corey was laughing. “Errol, I think you're going off your head—”

“You blame me? Cooped up like this, tied up like a fucking chicken? No, I'm telling you the truth. Or guessing at it. The yakuza own the Kunishima Bank. I only found out a week ago.”

Corey leaned back on his elbows on the bed. It was a neat room; Shirlee came in every morning after Darlene had left for work and made it neat. Darlene had never been the sort for posters on the walls, not even as a teenager; Mum would have removed the posters of pop stars and suggested she get neatly framed photos of INXS and Whitney Houston. Foulmouths like Eminem and other unwashed wouldn't have been allowed in the house, tacked to the wall or framed. A Hans Heysen print of gum trees in central Australia, a region as remote from Darlene's imagination as the Siberian tundra, hung on one wall. It had been chosen by Shirlee and it hung perfectly straight, the sidebars of its frame absolutely parallel to the junctions of the walls.

“You've got a problem, sport.”

Magee nodded. “Yeah—with you and them. I think I might be safer with you.”

“Don't build your hopes . . . What about your wife? She's turned up, did you know?”

“Yeah.” Magee said nothing more.

“Did your girlfriend know about her?”

“No.”

“Did your wife know what you were up to? Siphoning off that forty million?”

“Jesus, will you drop that!”

“Then why are the, whatd'youcall'em, the yakuza? That it? Why are the yakuza after you? That how they usually play the game, kill off bankrupts?”

Magee ignored the question. “What are you going to do with me?”

Corey sat up. “We're still making up our minds, they don't come good with the ransom.”

“You'll top me?” Magee tried to sound casual, but he was suddenly deathly afraid.

The blue hood stared at him. “It's on the cards.” Then: “What's the matter?”

“I wanna go to the toilet! Quick!”

III

Tajiri, driving a Honda Legend, dropped Kylie off at the Macquarie Street entrance to the apartment block. By that time they had reached an air of affability, each certain of his and her judgement of the other. For Kylie, though he had threatened to kill her, he had an attitude of politeness about him that was a contrast to that of the men she was accustomed to. She would not trust him not to kill her, but over the past hour she had gathered together resources she hadn't realized she had possessed. The selfish are often the last to realize their own core.

Tajiri, for his part, had come to accept that risks had to be taken. Miss Doolan, a woman he would hate to be married to, had convinced him that she had had nothing to do with the kidnapping of Errol Magee. He had left her in the warehouse and gone out to his car and phoned Kenji Nakasone, like his father, a collector of wisdom. The latter had told him of the visit by the crude detective, Malone, and for a few minutes they had discussed whether the police were a threat and decided they were not. Then Tajiri had suggested that they should let Miss Doolan go.

“Does she know who you are?” asked Nakasone.

“No. I shan't be coming back to the office and I am booked out on Qantas tomorrow afternoon for Tokyo. I'm going home, Kenji,” he said and sounded sentimental.

“I envy you, Tamezo. I'm tired of the crudeness here.”

There was crudeness back home, especially in politics; but Tajiri didn't mention that. He was also not without humour: “Come on, Kenji, you enjoy it. Think of the time it saves in business, being crude. And with the women.”

“Were you crude with Miss Doolan?”

Only when I threatened to kill her. “No, not at all. I think she can be trusted. She is only concerned for her own welfare.”

“Like most women,” said Nakasone, thinking that was wisdom. “Let her go. Don't go back to your apartment, the police may be watching.”

“Where will I go?”

“Try Cabramatta, it's full of Asians, so I read. The police don't know one of us from another. Be Korean.”

“You're joking, Kenji,” said Tajiri and hung up.

So now they were drawing up outside the apartments at Circular Quay. Kylie looked at him, then smiled, empty as a salesgirl's smile. “It's been an experience, Mr. Ikura, that's all I can say.”

“For me, too, Miss Doolan. Let's put it down to that—experience. Do we keep it to ourselves?”

“Who are you going to tell? The bank?”

“That was a lie, Miss Doolan,” he said, lying with ease. “I don't work for Kunishima. I work for an organization that won't forgive Mr. Magee for stealing from it. When you see him again, tell him that. He'll understand. Be careful, Miss Doolan. It was a pleasure meeting you.”

She stared at him, suddenly chilled again. A couple of joggers went by, a man and a girl running through agony to be healthy; she had never been a jogger, just a treadmill walker at gym twice a week. She didn't know it, but her own face suddenly looked as strained as that of the girl jogger. She got out of the car, stumbling a little as she realized there was little strength in her legs. Somehow she crossed the pavement and went in through the revolving door of the apartment block, her mind spinning like the door. Mr. Ikura drove away, out of her life, she hoped.

When she entered the apartment she was relieved to find it empty, though she was not sure who might be there. She dropped into a deep chair, kicked off her shoes, put her head back and closed her eyes. When she opened them Caroline Magee, the bitch, was standing in the doorway of one of the bedrooms. The main bedroom, where she and Errol slept, for God's sake!

“What the hell are you doing here?” She sat up straight, but didn't rise.

“Stocktaking. Supervised by Detective Decker—” She looked across the big living room to Paula Decker, who had come out of the kitchen. “All above board, as they describe it. Right, Paula?”

“Right.” Paula was fed up with these bloody Magee women, but she managed to remain professionally calm. “Where have you been?”

Kylie stayed in her chair, still unsure of her legs. She looked from one woman to the other as she marshalled her lies: “Visiting friends.”

“Balls,” said Paula, who didn't mind using male terms. “We tried all your friends, we found them in your address book. You went to see someone at Kunishima. They're not your friends. Nor Errol's, either.”

Kylie ignored her, looked instead at Caroline Magee. “Stocktaking? Of what? Have you been going through my things?”

“I wouldn't bother,” said Caroline, suggesting Kylie's things weren't worth a garage sale. “I don't think you understand the situation. I am Mrs. Magee. Errol and I separated, but it was never a legal separation. We were never divorced. I'm entitled—”

Then there was the sound of a toilet being flushed in one of the bathrooms. Kylie started up from her chair. “Who's that? Is Errol back?”

“No,” said Paula. “It's your sister Monica.”

“What's she doing here?”

“She was concerned for you. Are you surprised?” said Paula with almost a sneer and went out to the kitchen, taking out her mobile to ring Clements at Homicide.

Then Monica came into the room. She wore a floral-print dress, a sleeveless white cardigan and carried a white handbag on a long strap over her shoulder. She was the least well-dressed of the women, including Paula Decker; she was the one with her prospects behind her, but she wasn't defeated. She stopped abruptly, put her hand to her mouth, then rushed at Kylie and embraced her.

“Oh God, where have you been? I kept thinking the worst—”

“I'm okay, Monny. Really, I'm okay—”

“We were outa our minds, Clarrie and me—”

“Clarrie?”

“Yeah, Clarrie! Okay, he was concerned for me—but he was concerned for you, too!” Suddenly she let go of Kylie, stepped back and sat down as if certain there was a chair behind her; there was. She wiped her eyes, looked slowly around her, then back up at her sister. “But you don't have to worry, do you? You've got it all—”

“No,” said Caroline Magee. “She hasn't, Monica. There's an old saying I've heard men say—two-thirds of five-eights of fuck-all. Excuse the language. But that's what she's got. What we've both got. Errol's got the lot, if he's still alive.”

“I never met him,” said Monica. “I'm glad now that I didn't.”

“He's a bastard, but he's not a monster,” said Kylie and looked accusingly at Caroline. “You married him. You must of seen something in him.”

Caroline was cool, unoffended. “Of course I did. I think it was his ambition. It was a sort of—of aphrodisiac. What woman wants to marry a no-hoper?”

“Too many,” said Monica; then looked defensively at her sister: “But not me.”

Then Paula Decker came back into the room. “Inspector Malone will be here soon. You'd better get your story sorted out where you've been, Kylie. We've been buggered about on this case and I think Mr. Malone will be running out of patience. Now, coffee, anyone?”

“I'll help you,” said Monica and headed for the kitchen, as if it were the only place she would feel comfortable.

Kylie and Caroline were left alone. Caroline remained standing, leaning her buttocks against a low sideboard; one might have gained the impression that she was the one who lived in the apartment. Kylie dropped back into her chair, still unsure of her legs. Caroline, the intruder, looked around her.

“Errol and I lived in two rooms in London, in Fulham. We went to work by bus, used to eat a couple of times a week at McDonalds. A big night out was at an Angus Steak House. You know London?”

“No.”

“He never took you away?”

Kylie was reluctant to answer; but she wasn't going to learn anything about this bitch if she kept her mouth shut. “We had just the one trip. He took me to San Francisco and LA. He went to London two or three times, he never took me. Did he look you up?”

“Yes.”

“What happened?”

“You mean, did I go to bed with him? Relax, Kylie, I had someone better at the time.”

“But not now. Is that why you've come home?”

Caroline smiled. “Don't start asking questions. You'd better get used to answering them. We all want to know where you've been.”

Out in the kitchen Monica was saying, “Will you look at this! It's like those incredible kitchens you see in magazines, never a grease spot, nothing out of place! Oh, I'd love to show this to Clarrie! He'd be baking more cakes than Sara Lee.” Then she smiled at Paula. “Do I sound bitchy? Envious?”

“Envious, yes. But not bitchy. What woman wouldn't be envious of a kitchen like this?”

“Not Kylie. She ever built a house of her own, that'd be the last bit added. From the time she was about ten she thought KFC and Pizza Hut made kitchens out of date. At school she thought cookery classes were a punishment. She thinks TV cookery shows should only be on at three o'clock in the morning.”

Paula watched as Monica set out cups and saucers on a tray, looked for biscuits. “Monica, who's the happy one?”

Monica paused with a cupboard open, looked sideways at Paula. “Me or Kylie? I am. Kylie will never be happy because she's never gunna get what she wants.”

“What's that?”

“I dunno. And I don't think she does, either. Trouble is, I've got two daughters who are starting to think like her. Nobody's satisfied any more.”

When they went back into the living room Caroline, oblivious of their entry, was saying, “Did you love him?”

Kylie thought a while, then said, “No-o. But I liked him.”

“Not enough,” said Monica. “Coffee. And you could afford better biscuits, for God's sake. Iced Vo-Vos!”

“Heritage stuff,” said Paula and smiled round one of the biscuits.

Malone and Sheryl Dallen arrived twenty-five minutes later. Sheryl had driven with the blue light on the roof and the siren wailing, grinning at the look on Malone's face.

“Keep your eye on the road,” Malone had said, feet ankle-deep in the floor.

“You want me to slow down?”

“No, I just want to get there and belt Miss Doolan about the head.”

But he knew as soon as he entered the apartment that he was on ground as thin as a salt-pan crust. Some men: fashion designers, hairdressers, psychiatrists: some men flourish in female territory. Other more prosaic but wise men tread carefully. Malone looked around at the five women and decided, even though two of them were working for him, to take a light step, at least to begin with.

“Miss Doolan, you've been missing. Have you told anyone where you've been?” He looked at Paula Decker, who shook her head. “Care to tell me?”

“I don't know it's any of your business,” said Kylie.

“Oh, I'm getting tired of that one. Till we find out who killed your maid Juanita, anything you and anyone connected with you, anything you do is our business. If you don't tell me where you've been, I think we'll take you in—” Sheryl Dallen and Paula Decker were standing behind Kylie; nothing showed on their faces, but they knew he was bluffing. “It's called helping us with our enquiries. We might let the media know. Now would you like to pack a bag or be sensible and open up?”

“Be sensible, Kylie,” said Monica and put down the cup she had been holding. “Don't be so bloody stubborn!”

“What would you advise her to do?” Malone looked at Caroline Magee.

“Miss Doolan would never accept advice from me,” said Caroline and sounded as if she wouldn't offer Miss Doolan a rope if she were drowning.

“Miss Doolan,” said Malone, “did you spend the night with Mr. Tajiri?”

She stared at him, puzzled. “Who?”

“He works for Kunishima Bank. A medium-sized bloke, slim, with wavy hair—a bit unusual for a Japanese.”

She hesitated, then said, “He said his name was Ikura.”

“And you spent the night with him?”

“Spent the night with him? What are you talking about?”

“Righto. Where did he take you?”

“I dunno.” Her voice was unsteady, flattened; she was suddenly unsettled again. She sat in a chair, her hands gripping the arms as if the chair was charged. “Some warehouse—it was empty. There were two other guys—Australians. They wore ski-masks. But he didn't.”

Monica, about to tidy up cups on a tray, housekeeping to keep her nerves under control, stopped and looked at her. “Why did you go with him, for Crissakes?”

“He told me Errol wanted to see me. Then they—” Her hands tightened their grip on the arms of the chair; the last eighteen hours were spilling out of her, weakening her. “They put a pad over my face—I passed out—”

“You're lucky you're still with us,” Malone told her. “Tajiri, or Ikura, whatever he called himself, he's yakuza. A Japanese gangster, like the Mafia. Did you know that, Kylie?”

“Of course not!” She shivered, her hands scratched at the chair-arms, then clutched each other in her lap. “He threatened to kill me—he was going to bash me—”

Monica dropped the tray; a cup smashed. Malone said, “And he would have, Kylie. Why didn't he?”

She put her hands back on the arms of the chair, as if she had to hold to something solid. She didn't look around her, but straight at Malone, who had sat down opposite her. She had suddenly changed, the police were here to help her: “Somehow, I dunno how, somehow I convinced him I didn't know anything about Errol's kidnapping. It was almost as if—as if he decided I wasn't worth killing. But he's gunna kill Errol when—when they find him.” She could hardly believe what she was saying. “If they do—”

“Not if we find him first. When we pick up Mr. Tajiri, will you testify against him?”

Kylie said nothing; it was Monica who said, “For God's sake, Kylie, do something to help them! It's not always gunna go away because you're ignoring it!”

“It's easy for you to say—”

“I know it is and I know it isn't easy for you. But Jesus wept—for once in your life stop thinking about yourself!”

This was family. The others were just tableau: silent judgement. At last Kylie looked back at Malone: “I think I could take you to where he held me.”

“Good!” Malone stood up, turned to Paula Decker: “Get on to the strike force, tell ‘em to pick up Tajiri, either at Kunishima or at his flat. You stay here, keep an eye on Kylie when Sheryl and I bring her back.”

“I'll stay, too,” said Monica, and all at once looked as at home as she might at Minto; she was big sister playing parent again. “Don't argue, Kylie. I'll call Clarrie—he can bring pizza and one of his apple pies. I looked in your fridge—there's nothing there but milk and orange juice. All this—” she waved an arm about her “—and an empty fridge!”

Somehow Kylie managed a smile. “You're on your own, Monny.”

Monica put out a hand, touched her sister's shoulder. Malone and the other women turned away. Paula Decker went into a bedroom to phone Police Central and the strike force. Caroline Magee picked up her handbag and followed Malone and Sheryl to the front door as Kylie, excusing herself, went into a bathroom.

“You're not staying, Mrs. Magee?” said Malone.

“I don't think Miss Doolan and I will ever be mates. She's just lucky she has a sister like Monica.”

“You have no family?”

“I told you, I have a brother, but I've lost touch with him.” She smiled at him as Sheryl held open the front door for her. “Why the interrogation, Inspector?”

“It's habit. Police work is all questions.”

“What about answers?”

“Oh, they come. But answers always start with questions. An old Welsh philosopher said that.”

“You read philosophy?”

“No, he's my boss. Why were you here?”

They were out on the landing opposite the lift. Sheryl had pressed the lift-button and they stood waiting. Caroline, in the green suit she had been wearing yesterday, leaned back against the dull gold wallpaper of the landing. It was as if she knew the right background for her: she looked elegant.

“I was looking for that forty million that is supposed to be missing.”

“Looking for it here?”

“Inspector, what do you know of money?”

“I know how to hold on to it, so my kids tell me. Go on, educate me.”

“When money was coin they used to take the loot away in sacks. When they invented paper money, there was still physical evidence, it was there. Then came cheques and then came electronics. I work in a stockbroker's in London, I know.”

“Go on.” The lift had arrived, but they ignored it.

“Errol has got that money of his salted away somewhere in a bank, the sort of bank that has secret accounts. I've been going through all Errol's computers, because he would have sent it electronically. Five out of every six dollars or pounds or whatever that go through the economy on any given day goes through computers. There's a clearing house in New York, it's called the Clearing House Inter-Bank Payments System, CHIPS for short. It pushes through just on two trillion, trillion, dollars a day. Errol's forty million, say a million at a time, wouldn't be noticed.”

“So how do you hope to find it?” The lift doors had closed and the lift had gone.

“Somewhere in the computer world there's a hard disk with Errol's secret account name and number on it. IT made his fortune, but now it's going to bite him in the arse.”

“You have to find the password?” said Sheryl, who knew more about computers than her boss ever would.

“Yes,” said Caroline. “That's all I have to find.”

“How about Greed?” said Malone.

She smiled, not letting him get away with it. “The first word I tried.”

The lift doors opened again and Caroline leaned away from the wall and stepped into the lift. Malone said, “We'll be in touch, Caroline. Take care.”

“I always do,” she said as the doors closed on her and her smile.

“I wish I had that sort of class,” said Sheryl.

“No, you don't. If you did, I'd have you transferred to Tibooburra.”

“A class place, if ever I've heard of one.”

“Have Immigration check when Mrs. Magee arrived back in Sydney. Then bring Daniela Bonicelli and Louise Cobcroft to the office. I want to talk to them about computers . . . Ready, Kylie?”

“Yes.” She had come out of the apartment. “I guess so.”

“Righto, let's go and see what we come up with.”

IV

But they came up with nothing. Kylie, with some hesitation, at times not sure of direction, led them to the warehouse. A big sign said the place was for sale or lease; the agents were in Redfern, a bullet's flight away. Sheryl rang them, said she was looking at the warehouse for a client. The agent, with that hunting dog's nose for a sale that they have, arrived ten minutes later. Business must be slow: he arrived with a screech of tyres.

He was a gangly young man with a large mouth and teeth that would have brought a gasp of admiration from a horse. He displayed all the teeth, not in a smile, when Malone told him they were police.

“Police? What's going on? There been a break-in?”

“Who owns the place?”

The agent was fumbling with the locks on the main door.

“It's been repossessed. A bank has it now. The Kunishima Bank.”

“We've heard of it,” said Malone. “What are they like to deal with?”

“Oh, fine. Very meticulous. But what's the problem here?”

“We got some information that some stolen goods might be stored here.”

The teeth came out again, still no smile. “You got no idea what goes on, these empty warehouses. We had one place, they took it over for a rave party—no permission, how's about it, nothing. The local coppers came to us next morning wanting to charge us—” They were inside the building now. “There. Empty.”

It was, indeed, empty; but for the two chairs still standing in the middle of the big expanse like props in an existentialist drama with no actors. On the floor there was a solitary paper cup.

Sheryl walked down to the office at the end of the building, while Kylie said, “The two men who wore the ski-masks, they brought me a cup of water—I was pretty shaky—”

“Guys with ski-masks?” said the agent; he seemed unable to keep his teeth hidden, they were there like his words, “What's going on?”

“You'll get a report,” said Malone in a tone that implied there would be no report. Then as Sheryl came back: “What've you got?”

She held up a pizza carton and two paper cups. “There'll be dabs on these—”

“Good,” said Malone. Thanks, Mr.—?”

“Brown. Bill Brown.” He handed Malone a card. There it was: Bill Brown. Not even William. Malone felt kinder towards him. “Let me know what's going on. I'll have to let our clients know.”

“Kunishima? Never mind, Mr. Brown. We'll let ‘em know. Thanks for your time and trouble.”

Once back in the police car Malone said, “Kylie, I don't want you to move out of your flat—” He grinned; she looked wan and afraid. “Apartment. I want someone there with you all the time. Your sister, if you like, but also a policewoman. Understand?”

“I'm still trying to get my mind around all this—”

Sheryl, at the wheel, said, “You're safe now. That's all you've got to keep in mind. You're safe.”

“I hope so,” said Kylie, but didn't sound convinced. “But what about Errol?”

V

Strike Force RLS didn't find Tajiri at the Kunishima Bank nor at his apartment in Kirribilli.

“I went with them to the bank,” Clements told Malone. “That guy Okada, he never turned a hair. Sure, Mr. Tajiri had worked at the bank, but they had terminated—that was the word he used, terminated—his contract only yesterday.”

“Why?”

“His work was unsatisfactory.”

“What did you say? Give it to me expurgated.”

“I was very restrained. But Mr. Okada was even more restrained. I've met deaf-and-dumb crims who gave out more than he did.”

“Did you see Nakasone?”

“No. Okada was the only one to front. I asked if Tajiri had been terminated because he was yakuza and Okada didn't blink. He said, no, Mr. Tajiri had been allowed to go because he was unsatisfactory. I asked what sort of work he'd done and he said Tajiri had been the director of human resources. I laughed when he said that—I always laugh when I hear it—and he gave me a nice smile. But that was all he gave.”

“They've recruited two of the girls from I-Saw. Did he tell you that?”

“No, he volunteered nothing. I did ask him if Kunishima would want their forty million back before the I-Saw shareholders got their cut, if any.”

“What did he say? You being a shareholder.”

“He said, unfortunately—that was the word he used, unfortunately—unfortunately that was not the way business worked. The bank had to look after its shareholders.”

“The yakuza?”

“He didn't say that and I didn't ask.”

“I admire your restraint.”

“Thank you,” said Clements, with his middle finger raised. “Changing the subject, the morgue is releasing the Magee maid's body tomorrow. She's being buried tomorrow afternoon.”

“Who by?”

“A coupla sisters have arrived from the Philippines. And Mr. Todorov has arranged everything. He's sending the bill to I-Saw.”

“It'll be put with all the other bills . . . How are things with Romy?” “She's taking me to dinner tonight. Says I can't afford to take her.” “They know how to twist the knife, don't they? Good luck.”

Clements went out to the big main room, Malone began gardening the paperwork on his desk and half an hour later Sheryl brought in Daniela Bonicelli and Louise Cobcroft.

“Ladies—” He rose from behind his desk, glad of the interruption. Lisa didn't need to know, but good-looking women were a better distraction than shoals of paper.

“We're not happy,” said Daniela, no longer the coquette of the other night, “bringing us in like this. What's going on?”

“Take a seat.” Malone gestured at the two seats opposite him. He had decided not to use the interview room with its accusing eye of the video recorder; these women were not suspects. Or he hoped not. He nodded to Sheryl to take her place on the couch under the window. “We're only interested in your welfare.”

“I'm too ladylike to say it,” said Daniela, “but you know what I think of that remark.”

“You ladylike, too, Louise?”

“I'll wait till I hear what you have to say.”

Both women today were in black, the business colour at the turn of the century. Daniela was in a suit with a pink shirt, Louise in a slacks suit with a cream shirt. Each had a shoulder-strap handbag that looked as if it could carry all the arsenal of business. Louise also carried a thin laptop. But no bottles of spring water and not a mobile in sight . . .

“You've already started at Kunishima?”

“No,” said Louise. “Tomorrow.”

Malone leaned back in his chair, looked at Sheryl, then back at the two women. “Daniela, Louise—have another think about what you're getting into. Kunishima aren't taking you on because they're short of staff or because they want your wizardry on computers. You're bait to get Errol, Mr. Magee, to come out of hiding.”

The two women looked at each other, smiled, shook their heads. Then Daniela said, “You're crazy. Errol doesn't have the slightest interest in us, he couldn't care less, the bastard. And if he's been kidnapped, why would his kidnappers, whoever they are, worry about Louise and me?”

“You know Kylie Doolan was kidnapped?”

“Yes—” Both women sat up a little straighter. Then Louise said, “I thought it was her own stunt—”

“No, it was no stunt. She's back home, we've interviewed her. She was kidnapped by a man named Tajiri who, up till yesterday, so the bank says, was the director of human resources at Kunishima. Director of human resources, presumably, meant he was in charge of kidnapping.”

“You're a card, Inspector—”

“No, Daniela, I'm dead serious. A senior executive from Kunishima kidnapped her, threatened her, then eventually let her go when she convinced him she didn't know where Mr. Magee was. Mr. Tajiri, the director of human resources, is a yakuza, a gangster. We have an ASM out on him.”

“ASM?”

“All Stations Message. We'll pick him up. If he hadn't kidnapped Miss Doolan, he'd still be at Kunishima and you'd be working for him. You'd be willing to risk that?”

Daniela frowned, looked less confident now. “The yakuza? You're sure?”

“You've heard about the yakuza?”'

She nodded. “One of our Japanese clients, a big firm of lawyers, we found out they did a lot of business for the yakuza.”

“What happened?”

“Jared, Mr. Cragg, and I discussed it, then we took it to Errol.”

“And what did he say?”

“What we expected. He said I-Saw was in the IT business, not the morality business. We just went ahead supplying them.”

Malone looked at Sheryl. “Wouldn't you like to have Mr. Magee in here for a few minutes?” Then he looked back at Daniela and Louise. “How much have Kunishima offered you to go to work for them?”

“Enough,” said Daniela after a glance at Louise. “They asked what we got at I-Saw and they matched it.”

Malone looked back at Sheryl. “We're in the wrong game.”

It was her turn to take up the bowling: that was what he was telling her: “Louise, Daniela—when you were sleeping with Errol—”

Daniela's eyebrows went up in question of Louise: “You, too?”

Louise nodded. “Off and on. We all knew about you—”

“Thanks,” said Daniela and looked prim and insulted.

“Did he ever mention anything about retiring?” Sheryl said. “Going overseas to live?”

“Daydreaming?” Louise shook her head. “Errol never daydreamed, all he was ever thinking about was the next day. Why?”

“We're trying to trace the forty million he stole. Not us at Homicide—the strike force that's looking for him. He would have transferred the money electronically. To some secret account overseas—he could never hide that much money in this country. There would have been a password—” She glanced from one woman to the other. “Did he ever have a secret word with either of you? The way some—some lovers do?”

Malone tried to remain impassive, as if heard this sort of talk every day. What secret words had Sheryl exchanged on a pillow?

Daniela looked at Louise again, as if they might have been lovers with secret words. Then she turned back to Malone, who kept his face straight. Then finally back to Sheryl.

“Yes, I guess there were some. But not words you'd put on a computer.”

“Like on a porno website? Errol and I never used that sort of stuff,” said Louise and tried to look virtuous.

Suddenly Malone laughed; he couldn't help himself. “Righto, girls. Let's say Errol never gave you a hint of what he was doing or where he was sending the money. But was Kunishima going to have you playing code-breakers?”

“I don't know.” Louise was now beginning to look dubious. She had been holding the laptop on her knees, but now she put it down, as if it, too, might contain secrets she didn't want to know. Malone wondered what was on the hard disks in it, but he wasn't going to bother asking. “I think they may just have wanted to keep an eye on us. Mr. Nakasone told me he knew I'd had a—a relationship with Errol. I thought we'd kept it pretty—well, discreet. Unlike you,” she told Daniela.

“I was never sneaky about it—”

“Ladies—” said Malone warningly. He wanted these two women on side; he didn't know when he might need them. “Did either of you ever handle any money transfers for Errol? To overseas banks?”

“We were never in finance,” said Daniela as if that was a foreign country. “I did programs for legal firms. Here and overseas.”

“I was the ideas programmer,” said Louise. “Dreaming up new stuff. I worked with Jared Cragg most of the time.”

Malone took his time, then said, “Don't go to work for Kunishima.”

Daniela gave him a hard stare. “You're asking us to give up top money when jobs in our business are getting scarcer and scarcer.”

Malone waited for Louise to say her bit: “Are you trying to scare us, Inspector?”

“Yes,” he said flatly.

“I'd listen to him,” said Sheryl, bowling from the other end.

“Unless you'd like to take the risk and work as a mole for us.” Malone saw Sheryl glance at him at that; but he wasn't trying to recruit Daniela and Louise, just frighten them. “Would you?”

“No,” they said in the one voice.

“Good. Tell Kunishima you've decided not to take the jobs. Tell ‘em you decided that on our advice.”

Both women looked dubious again; Daniela said, “I don't know—”

“Daniela, we're not playing games.” But he was, of course: on Okada and Nakasone and Tajiri, if he was still around. “Errol's maid was murdered, Miss Doolan was kidnapped, we have no idea where Errol himself is or if he's still alive—”

“We'll tell them,” said Louise, picked up her laptop and stood up.

Daniela hesitated, then stood up. “Give my love to Tom. He's a nice guy, he'll go a long way.”

In bed or in business? “I'll tell him. Take care, both of you.”

Sheryl escorted them out through the main security door and he watched them go, seeing them even after they had gone. Two women of the new millennium: emancipated, confident, well paid. Yet still vulnerable to the danger that had beset their mothers and their grandmothers. Men . . .

“What am I thinking?” he said aloud.

“I dunno,” said Sheryl back in his doorway. “What are you thinking?”

He retreated behind a grin and a shake of his head.