Ken Cardinal didn’t want to look at the body. He could feel the chill in the ante room of the morgue, and he fought hard to control himself. The trolley was pushed towards him and the three men from the US Embassy by the coroner and an assistant. The sheet was pulled down. Cardinal grimaced. The face had been blasted away.
The more he looked, the more his fears surfaced. The height, the colour of his hair, and the shape of the body confirmed the Embassy people’s claim, based on fingerprints, blood type, and dental records, that it was Harold Ian Cardinal.
He examined a scar on his son’s right shoulder caused by an operation after a football injury and searched for another mark from a fall on his right elbow when he was only twelve. It was there, thin, long and almost indiscernible. He noticed a gold ring on the small finger of the left hand and examined it. It was engraved HIC. Cardinal stood back and nodded.
‘You’re sure?’ the coroner said.
‘Yes,’ Cardinal said, making an effort to keep his voice steady.
‘The police will want you to be certain,’ Bob Paton, the Embassy man from Canberra said to Cardinal. ‘Take your time. If you have any doubts, we can come back later.’
Cardinal shook his head.
A police officer who had entered the room behind them said, ‘You have no doubts at all?’
‘It must be him. The records say . . .’
‘I’m not concerned with the records,’ the officer said.
‘I want to know what you think.’
‘It’s him.’ Cardinal nodded again.
The police officer eyed Cardinal and the Embassy men around him. He seemed agitated. The coroner’s assistant began to cover the body.
‘You said there were other wounds,’ Cardinal said, glancing at Paton.
‘He was also shot in the back,’ the coroner said as the sheet covered the body again. Cardinal stared at the coroner.
‘I want to see it,’ Cardinal said. The assistant whipped the sheet back and flipped the body over. There was a hole about two centimetres in diameter near the base of the spine. Cardinal leaned over it and noticed other marks he had forgotten about. The birthmark like a tiny map of the US just under the right shoulder blade; the mole in the small of his back.
‘He was shot by two people?’ Cardinal asked, looking at all the other faces.
‘Most likely,’ the coroner said. Cardinal watched as the sheet went over the body once more.
‘It seems he was shot by two weapons,’ Cardinal said. He undid the buttons on a tight-fitting sports jacket to reveal the beginnings of a middle-aged paunch, against which even solid daily exercise was losing the battle. He turned to the officer. ‘The head looks as if it took a shotgun blast. But the spine wound is from a smaller gun.’
The officer nodded. ‘At about five paces,’ he said. ‘The head wound was at point-blank range.’
‘The shot in the back must have been first,’ Cardinal said, running a hand over his face. His ruddy, vein-streaked complexion became palid.
‘We haven’t ascertained that yet,’ the coroner said.
‘You don’t blow a person’s head away,’ Cardinal said, ‘and then shoot him in the back!’
‘There’s no telling with terrorists,’ Paton mumbled as he took Cardinal by the arm.
The trolley was pulled away as he and Paton walked towards an elevator.
‘There are a few details,’ Paton continued intimately, ‘but the most important is what you want to do with your son. You can either send him to New York or have him cremated here.’
‘I just don’t know,’ Cardinal said huskily. ‘What’s normal?’
They reached an elevator.
‘It’s better if he is cremated here,’ Paton said. ‘Having the body flying all over the place can be distressing for the family.’
The lift came, and Cardinal found himself alone with Paton.
‘Funny isn’t it?’ Cardinal said. ‘Harry was born twenty-five years after me. It’s wrong.’
‘We’re doing all we can,’ Paton said, staring blankly at the floor numbers as they flashed on and off.
‘We had little in common,’ Cardinal continued, ‘but in an odd way we were close. We fought a lot, but there were no grudges.’ He glanced at Paton who was trying to look sympathetic. ‘He was headstrong. He was probably doing something crazy when he . . .’ Cardinal paused.
‘We think he was doing something courageous,’ Paton said. ‘He was trying to stop the abduction of one of his colleagues.’
The lift stopped.
‘Have you any friends here you want us to contact?’ Paton asked.
‘Not really,’ Cardinal said. ‘There were a couple of Aussies I fought with in Korea.’
‘Do you remember their names?’
‘Willow Wilson and Ernie Stone,’ Cardinal said. ‘They both lived in Melbourne. But, hell, I haven’t been in touch with them for thirty years.’
They stepped out of the building into brilliant spring sunshine. Cardinal strode off, and the short, podgy Paton had trouble keeping up with him.
‘I could brief you now if you wished,’ Paton said. Cardinal shook his head. He had not slept for forty hours, and he wanted to be alone to think. He wandered back to the Sheraton Wentworth Hotel in Elizabeth Street.
His restless mind darted over what he knew of Harry’s work in search for some clues. Harry had been approached by some people from the federal government for an assignment in Australia, but he had shown perverse delight in keeping the details from his inquisitive father.
After several teasing conversations, Cardinal gleaned that some US Strategic Defence Initiative – Star Wars – contracts had secretly gone to Australia. Harry was to be involved in a clandestine venture using his expertise in lasers. It meant a minimum of two years based in Sydney and work at the Lucas Heights nuclear reactor. But after a year, the Australian government changed, and the Star Wars contract was dropped. It seemed the prodigal would return home. It was about this time that he began to have money problems. He asked for help, and his father obliged to the tune of about five thousand dollars over a few months. Cardinal then feared that Harry might return to his drug habit, which he had started when he was at Stanford. He had been using cocaine heavily for some time and had drifted into drug dealing to pay for his costly habit. But then the pleas for money in letters and reverse charge calls from Australia stopped abruptly. Harry boast’ ed about a new – unspecified – job, still at Lucas Heights. He mentioned a salary increase and some new play things: an expensive sports car and a power boat. There was even talk of his buying the seven hundred thousand dollar house he was renting in Bronte.
Cardinal thought about his confused feelings for Harry, his only child. They had been drawn together eight years earlier when Cardinal’s wife had died of cancer. But, even then, it was a battle. They were polarised on so many issues that Cardinal had joked that Harry could not possibly be his progeny. Politics, particularly, was a sore point. Cardinal was apolitical but voted Democrat; Harry made Reagan look like a Marxist.
Cardinal had pushed him into Radley, a leading British private school, for two years and had made sure that he travelled widely through Europe. Just when Harry’s views seemed to have been tempered, Thatcher launched Britain into a nasty war with Argentina over the Falkland Islands.
Harry experienced the UK’s jingoistic fervour, and this kindled his passion for the US to smash somebody – anybody. When Reagan biffed Grenada, then Libya and Iran, Harry was ecstatic. But Cardinal was worried. He was a highly decorated Korean war veteran wary of over-exuberant American foreign policy. While Harry waved the flag and screamed for action from the safe confines of Scarsdale, New York, his father spared a thought for the guy on the front line. He had been there.
Yet, despite differences, Cardinal loved his son, and lived in the hope that he would bury his politics, marry and mature into a compassionate and good scientist.
The thought that this dream was dead depressed and tired him on what seemed to be the longest day of his life. He told the reception desk at the Wentworth to hold all calls, and was asleep within minutes.
Rhonda Mills let go an inner whoop of delight as she spotted the BMW pulling up in South Yarra’s Anderson Street and began walking towards Bill Hewson, her best Intelligence contact, as he got out of the vehicle. He was tall, thin and gaunt with a shock of fair hair, which, even as she watched, he gave an habitual push off his forehead.
Rhonda waved to him, but he ignored her as he slipped through the least conspicuous entrance — gate ‘C’ — to Melbourne’s Royal Botanical Gardens.
Mid-afternoon on a fine spring day, it was perfect for such a meeting. Rhonda, a TV investigative journalist, was blonde and attractive, with large green eyes and a button nose. Her figure vacillated between shapely and plump, depending on her discipline and diet. She had long ago capitulated to a penchant for fine food and wine, which, coupled with her thirty-seven years, threatened her career. It was one reason she had to keep up her professional reputation through contacts such as Hewson, who were invaluable for leads and expert verification on espionage or foreign political stories.
Rhonda followed Hewson through gate ‘C’ and was surprised not to see him waiting for her. She hurried along the right fork of an asphalt path that meandered around the gardens, featuring towering oaks, Chinese palms, English elms, and sprawling Moreton Bay figs.
Rhonda stopped when she was confronted by an angry black swan watching over its fair chicks. She retreated past a grass tree shaped like a huge bottle brush, only to feel strong arms wrap around her. It was Hewson.
‘Christ, three eyes!’ she snapped. She pushed herself free. Hewson smiled and touched the rim of his dark sunglasses, which he wore to hide a wandering eye.
‘I don’t like frights, thank you,’ she admonished him. She squinted at a sign near the grass tree. ‘Especially under a Xanthorrhoea australis.’
They strolled down the path and on to the central lawn, where young couples braved the crisp air by taking off sweaters to soak up the warm, late September sun.
Rhonda recited the generic names of the trees: ‘Myrtaceae . . . Rosaceae . . . Papilonaceae . . . Moraceae . . . Cupressaceae . . . Palmae . . .” She spotted a tourist, who seemed to be photographing a sprinkler on full blast.
‘Sprinklus maximus,’ she observed, and drew a rare laugh from Hewson.
‘Did you manage to find out what that ‘D’ notice was for?’ Rhonda asked.
‘You’re the only journalist we know who seeks info every time Canberra slaps on press censorship,’ Hewson said. He spoke in a voice that always sounded as if he had swallowed ground glass. ‘Who tips you off?’
‘Now, Bill,’ Rhonda smirked, ‘you know I never betray confidences.’
They passed a small Indian pavillion, almost hidden by the spring-flowering climber, Lincoln Star, and violet blue Japanese Wisteria opposite Tennyson Lawn. A Merton Hall schoolgirl was sitting alone inside having a casual cigarette.
‘Can you speak about the ‘D’?’ Rhonda persisted.
‘This is the most difficult one you’ve been onto,’ Hewson replied. He glanced at her and added, ‘I was wondering why you thought Lucas Heights might be involved.’
‘A hunch. A murder so close to the most important nuclear reactor in the country. It was worth a few phone calls to see if there was a link.’
‘Who mentioned murder?’
Rhonda looked away. ‘I was informed that a body was taken from the scene.’
They approached the kiosk on Ornamental Lake.
‘Perhaps you could tackle this from another angle. Try Missing Persons.’
At the kiosk, swans, ducks, coots, moorhen and sea gulls mingled with the tables on the lake’s edge. About twenty people were taking tea.
Rhonda remained quiet for several seconds. She worked through Hewson’s oblique remarks. It was always the way with ASIO contacts. Clues to pieces in a jigsaw were about all you ever got, and you had to work hard for them. You wondered if it was the truth and why the clues had been given in the first place.
‘When you say Missing Persons,’ Rhonda began cautiously, ‘do you mean from Lucas Heights?’
They stood near a table. Hewson was not interested in having a snack. He looked uncomfortable in full view of the people in the kiosk.
‘I mean missing persons,’ Hewson repeated. They reached Eel Bridge. An Indian woman in a cobalt blue sari was leaning over the rail throwing breadcrumbs to the eels congregating in the water below. Hewson looked at his watch. This was the sign that he was not going to give any more. He turned and began walking towards the pine lawn.
Rhonda tried a long shot. ‘A year ago there was a rumour that the US had got us into the Star Wars programme. Has this incident got anything to do with that?’
‘We are not involved in the US Strategic Defence Initiative.’
Hewson quickened his step up the eastern lawn and back towards gate ‘C’
‘I must be going,’ he said.
When they reached Anderson Street, he shook hands with her, and leant forward to kiss her cheek.
‘I’m confused,’ she said, ‘at a higher level, of course,’ and then watched a little helplessly as he drove off in the BMW.
Cardinal awoke at 4 pm from a dreamless void, but the torrent of waking thoughts made him wish he was dreaming. He wondered if the faceless body would haunt him forever. The most pressing thought was his need to visit Harry’s house.
Cardinal showered and dressed in faded-blue jeans and sneakers. He made black tea in an attempt to help himself over his jet-lag. Then he went out wearing his favourite white ‘Bogart’ hat, and hailed a taxi. The ride west from Elizabeth Street in the city’s heart to Bronte, next to Bondi, took fifteen minutes. Gardyne Street, where Harry lived, swept down to a park, then a surf beach. A score of surfers and surf-boarders were braving the cool, late afternoon to catch waves. The surf was up.
Cardinal left the taxi at the top of a steep climb. As he walked down and checked numbers, an Asian girl carrying a camera came out of a house and marched briskly down the road away from him. Cardinal took little notice until he realised that she had been at number 53A, Harry’s house.
By the time he reached it, she was well on her way down a sloping lane to the beach. Cardinal shielded his eyes and watched her until she was out of sight. He pushed open the gate, which was practically unhinged, and hesitated at the sight of sixty high steps to the front of the federation-style brick house, built, he imagined, around 1910, on the nob of a small hill. The front lawn, which was more like a wall, hadn’t been cut for months.
No one answered his knock at the front or back doors. He peered in through a kitchen window and could see a surfboard. He tried windows and, when he could not get in, decided to track down the Asian girl. He walked to the beach and spotted her taking photos. He moved closer but still could not place her nationality. She was dark and sensual, if a little plump, and wore tight jeans and sweater. Her face was a saucer shape, her eyes wide and her lips full. Her expression had an overall vulnerability, and she seemed evasive, if not secretive.
The girl had watched him for some time. He was the only person on the beach apart from the hardy surfers.
‘I saw you come out of number 53,’ Cardinal said, pointing up to the street. ‘Do you live there’
The girl looked apprehensive as she stood on rocks only a few metres from Cardinal.
‘Could I speak to you,’ Cardinal said. ‘I’m Harry Cardinal’s father.’
The girl was taken aback. She took a few steps towards him.
‘Did you know him?’ he asked.
‘I lived at the house. Harry was a good friend.’
Cardinal frowned. ‘You were his girl?’
The girl blinked and seemed reluctant to answer. ‘We only lived together for a few months,’ she said.
Cardinal threw out his hand. ‘I’m Ken Cardinal,’ he said in an effort to relax her.
‘I am Kim Lim.’
‘You’re Indonesian?’
‘Few people guess right.’
Cardinal frowned. ‘Was it serious?’ he asked, ‘I mean, were you planning to marry?’
Kim hesitated. ‘We had discussed it.’
‘Then you must feel the loss I do,’ Cardinal said, dropping his head.
‘Yes.’
‘Could I have a look over the house?’ he asked. ‘I just want to see how Harry lived.’
‘It’s very messy,’ she said, as they began to walk from the beach. ‘The police went through it.’
‘I’ll have to sort out his things,’ Cardinal said.
‘I recognise you now,’ she said with more composure. ‘Harry showed me photos. He was very proud of you.’
‘In a strange way we were close,’ Cardinal said. He trudged up the steep lane to Gardyne Street, and then on to the house.
‘Would you like . . . will I make coffee,’ Kim said as they entered the living room. She disappeared and Cardinal wandered around the room. Several excellent portraits held his attention. Some were of Harry, who was blessed with robust good looks. Others were of a raven-haired Eurasian. Still more showed the two together enjoying themselves in beach shots. Cardinal looked closely at some framed photos. One was a prized snap of Harry with General Pinochet in Chile, which even now filled Cardinal with rage. Another, with Harry’s mother, brought tears to his eyes. He had to remind himself that both were dead.
Cardinal turned around to see Kim standing behind him. She had put his coffee nearby on a Japanese table without him hearing a sound.
‘They’re yours?’ he asked.
She nodded.
‘They’re excellent of Harry,’ he said. ‘Could I have some? I could have prints made. And who is that girl?’
‘A friend . . . to both of us.’ She sat down and sipped her coffee.
‘What’s her name?’ he said, taking a seat.
‘Hartina Van der Holland.’
‘Do you have her number or address?’
‘I think she is on holiday,’ she said, her edginess returning. Cardinal felt uncomfortable.
‘Could I see the rest of the place?’ he said, putting down the coffee, which was lukewarm. Kim seemed reluctant.
‘I don’t care what state the place is in,’ Cardinal said.
‘But the police. They have been through . . .’
Cardinal stared at her. ‘I’m his father!’ he said.
She got up. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, leading him to the stair. ‘So many people, so many times.’
‘Who was Harry renting this from?’ he asked.
She turned to him in surprise at the top of the stairs. ‘It’s not rented,’ she said with a frown. ‘Harry bought it.’
Cardinal looked incredulous.
‘How do you mean?’ she asked, ushering him into the bedroom.
‘Did they get him a low interest loan?’
‘He never mentioned that sort of thing to me.’
‘What did it cost?’
‘Seven hundred and fifty-five thousand.’
You know that much, Cardinal thought, but said, ‘He must have had a substantial loan. I can’t believe he had that kind of money.’
Kim made no effort to elaborate, but led him up the stairs to a newly renovated, pine-panelled bedroom. It had a three metre square skylight, and a balcony with a superb view of Bronte beach, shouldered by sheer cliffs either side of it, which looked from that aspect like a golden carpet leading to the awesome, dark blue Tasman Sea.
Kim waited at the door as Cardinal picked up Harry’s tennis racket and his video camera. Then he ran his hands over a silver neck-chain and medallion, inscribed, H I C. There was a gold cigarette case, a digital watch that carried telephone numbers, and a Gucci leather wallet. Cardinal inspected it and unfolded fifteen credit cards.
‘I recognise a lot of these,’ he said. Then he frowned. ‘None of his research books seem to be here.’ He looked sideways at Kim. ‘He always used to bring his work home.’
‘Harry liked to read a lot,’ Kim proffered non-committally.
‘His diary,’ Cardinal said, ‘where is it?’ Kim looked blank. She stepped into the room.
‘I don’t know.’
His eyes searched hers, and she recoiled under the intensity.
‘Perhaps he stopped writing one,’ Cardinal said softly, ‘but he did have one from his late teens.’
‘The Americans took books, I think,’ she said.
‘What Americans?’
‘From the Embassy.’
‘They took things?’ Cardinal said. ‘They had no right!’
His anger upset Kim. She scurried downstairs. Cardinal followed her into the kitchen and apologised.
‘Not my fault he’s gone,’ she said, trembling, her cool cracking for the first time. Cardinal softened his manner, and they returned to the living room where he admired her work again. It seemed to calm her.
‘Do you live by photography?’
‘I try,’ she said, ‘but I work freelance. It is hard to compete. I work at The Pitts restaurant at lunchtime.’
‘In the city?’
‘Pitt Street.’
‘Are you going to stay here?’ he asked.
‘I want to move, when I get other accommodation.’
‘There’s no hurry.’
‘Thank you,’ she said, with the first hint of warmth since they had met, ‘but I want to leave.’
Cardinal was sympathetic. He stared at her. ‘Any idea how it happened?’ he asked.
Kim shook her head. Perhaps too quickly, Cardinal thought. He kept looking at her.
‘Didn’t the police tell you?’ she said and seemed near to tears again.
‘Not much.’
‘They just told me he was . . . dead,’ she said, ‘that it was terrorists. They were not caught. The American said it was a matter of . . .’
‘National security,’ Cardinal said, as he got up to leave. ‘National goddamned security!’
Night had fallen by the time Cardinal wandered down the steps towards the road to meet a taxi. He could hear the surf, now distant and relaxing, because it was the only sound, until he noticed the taxi moving up the winding road. Cardinal was distracted by the flash of a cigarette lighter in the front seat of a van eighty metres away as the taxi passed it.
Cardinal flicked the end of a cigar into the gutter and got into the taxi. He gave instructions to the driver without taking his eyes off the van, which he could not remember being there earlier. Cardinal kept watching, but it did not seem to follow. After going about a kilometre, Cardinal saw it moving under a street light, its headlights off. It seemed to be tailing him. By the time he reached the Wentworth Hotel in the heart of the city, he was sure of it. Cardinal paid the driver and asked if he could read the van’s registration number, but they both had difficulty. He moved into the lobby, and just caught a glimpse of the van easing down a side street and out of sight.
Jimmy Goyong settled into his spot high on a ridge overlooking the Bididgee Aborigines’ most revered area in Arnhem Land, some 400 kilometres east of Darwin, in the Northern Territory. He was a stooped, wrinkled man in his sixties, and his deep-socketed eyes seemed permanently bloodshot. His hair and wild beard were nearly completely grey.
Jimmy was the Bididgee’s finest artist. At one time he worked exclusively in oils, but in the last few years he had limited himself to crayon sketches. Jimmy liked to draw just after dawn, when he was sober, and to catch the early morning sunlight.
He set up a makeshift easel, placed paper, a half-metre square, on it and then spent several minutes lining up a telescope to focus on a group of boulders, standing in front of Mount Brockman. Just as he was ready to start drawing them, he was surprised by the sound of a helicopter coming from the nearby Ginga uranium mine.
Using the telescope, which he had bought from the sale of his paintings and sketches, he focused on the horizon until he could see the metal beast coming in his direction. It hovered over the Green Ant boulders in front of Mount Brockman – both sacred areas – and then landed close.
Jimmy kept his eye to the telescope. The rotors sent red dust swirling, which settled as the machine stopped. Two men emerged and Jimmy recognised one of the men as Bull Richardson, the owner of the Ginga mine and an influential businessman in Australia’s north; an enemy of his people. Jimmy could have sketched the man’s portrait blindfolded, so distinctive was Richardson’s granite head and the short basin cut with a centre parting. His neck was the same width as his cranium, and his thick-rimmed glasses added to his look of indestructibility.
Jimmy turned his attention to the other man and began to sketch his features on a pad. He was a round-faced Asian wearing dark glasses and dressed in a grey safari suit. He listened as his big companion waved his hands. He seemed to be lecturing him. Jimmy drew the sometimes grinning, sometimes poker-faced stranger from several angles, and his attention drifted from Richardson. Jimmy did not see him scouring the ridge with binoculars and only realised he had been spotted when he noticed that the Asian was looking in his direction. Jimmy was startled. He abandoned his telescope and made a run for cover in nearby caves. He looked back once to see the two men hurrying for the chopper.
It roared to life. Jimmy stopped to look back. Richardson and the Asian were climbing aboard. Jimmy started to run again but tripped and fell flat as the chopper took off. Within seconds it was hovering above him. Jimmy recovered and stumbled into a small cave as the machine hung suspended fifty metres above.
The rush of wind stirred the bush. The chopper lowered gingerly to a plateau and sent dust swirling into the caves. Richardson jumped out. Head lowered, he marched to the ridge. He smashed the easel to pieces, grabbed the telescope and hurled it into the valley below. Then he trotted towards the caves. Richardson stood in front of them, and hesitated. He glanced at the chopper and finally ambled back to it. Moments later it wavered uncertainly until it was above the caves again, and then accelerated away.
Jimmy emerged from the cave and returned to the ridge. He was distressed to find his telescope gone and the easel destroyed. He collected the paper that was scattered around but could not find his sketches. Richardson had taken them.
Cardinal was angry. The grim set of his jaw and determined sway of his big frame said it all to Bob Pa ton, who had to waddle fast to keep up with him as they entered a building in Macquarie Street opposite Sydney’s Botanic Gardens. Paton had been deferential to Cardinal to the point of being unctious, yet he still hadn’t told him any more about Harry.
In the lobby, Paton examined a notice board and found a company called ‘Horizon Enterprises’ on the tenth floor. They took the lift.
‘Why aren’t we at the Consulate?’ Cardinal snapped.
‘This is connected to it.’
They entered Horizon Enterprises – a suite of plush offices – and were ushered into a large boardroom. A tall man was standing with his back to them looking through a window at the dark green gardens running down to Farm Cove. He turned and stepped over to his visitors and was introduced to Cardinal as ‘Don’ Blundell. He was lean, with patrician features that were dominated by a long nose. His eyes were close and small. When he squinted, they disappeared beneath his ragged eyebrows.
Blundell was about forty-five, and looked fit. His double-breasted reefer jacket and monogrammed tie hinted at a degree of narcissism. But there was an undeniable toughness about his face.
They shook hands. Blundell offered Cardinal a seat at his polished teak desk, which was spotless and clear, except for a computer and one thin folder.
Paton hovered, wedged himself into a chair and unwrapped a Wilhem II as if he were there as an observer. He seemed unnerved by Blundell who ordered coffee in an authoritative voice through an intercom connected to his computer.
‘We are sorry about your son,’ Blundell said. ‘He was a patriot. He was doing very important work for his country.’
‘I want to know how and why he died,’ Cardinal said, sweeping aside the condolences.
‘He died in a noble cause, we can assure you of that, Mr Cardinal. The president would declare him a national hero. But his feats, I’m afraid, cannot be made public. His work was sensitive and bound by strictures of national security.’
Cardinal winced at the phrase. ‘You haven’t told me anything,’ he said.
Blundell leaned forward on his desk as coffee was served by a trim male assistant.
‘You must understand our position,’ Blundell said, opening his hands to Cardinal. ‘What happened to your son is a matter we can’t get into.’
‘Can you tell me who killed him?’
‘We are not sure. It’s under investigation.’
‘But you must know if there was one or two involved. I was told it was terrorism. You must have some ideas!’
‘We do. But we can’t discuss them.’
‘Not now?’ Cardinal began, his anger rising, ‘not ever?’
‘I don’t know.’
Cardinal glanced at Paton, who had balanced his coffee cup on his belly, and looked uncomfortable.
He put his coffee down, leaned back in his chair and cracked the knuckles in each hand. It was disconcerting, even for Blundell.
‘I have to know what happened to my son,’ Cardinal said, struggling to keep his voice steady. ‘It is my right.’
‘It really isn’t possible at this time.’
Cardinal sighed. ‘What did you people take from my son’s house?’
‘Under the circumstances, we had to make a search,’ Blundell said, reaching for the intercom again. He asked his assistant to bring in Harry’s ‘effects’. The man appeared moments later with a fat envelope. Blundell handed it to Cardinal.
‘What is your position at the Embassy?’ Cardinal asked.
‘I have a special roving commission in the area.’
‘For whom? The state department?’
‘The United States federal government, Mr Cardinal.’
‘So you’re not attached to the Embassy in Canberra or the city consulates?’
Blundell shook his head.
Cardinal turned to Paton. ‘Then I want to speak with the ambassador,’ he said.
‘He’s in Canberra,’ Paton said. He offered Cardinal a cigar. He declined and pulled a gold case from an inside jacket pocket. He took out one of his own cigars.
Paton wriggled in his seat to see the brand. ‘Cuban?’ he said.
‘Montecristo No 5,’ Cardinal nodded.
‘You can’t get them in the States,’ Paton remarked.
‘I buy them from a tobacconist in St James’s in London.’
‘I’m afraid the ambassador will refer you to me,’ Blundell said impatiently. ‘It really is better if you leave this investigation to us. You’ll be informed the moment there’s a breakthrough.’
Cardinal lit the cigar and stared at Blundell, weighing him up. ‘I’m going to find out why this happened to Harry,’ he said with steely conviction, ‘whether you like it or not.’
The uneasy ambience turned chilly as Cardinal stood up. Blundell and Paton rose with him.
‘You must stay out of this,’ Blundell warned, ‘for your own good. We’re dealing with vicious animals here.’
‘So you say,’ Cardinal said, ‘but this is not Chile. I’ll get the answers I want before I return home. That’s a promise.’
Cardinal retreated to his hotel room to think things through. At home there were many avenues. He could get hold of congressmen who patronised his gallery. There was the government lobbyist who had fought with him in Korea. There was always the good old New York Times. He didn’t know any investigative reporters, but he was on first-name terms with the art critic. Cardinal had to talk to lawyers. He knew scores; he was, after all, one himself. Perhaps he would end up in a law suit with the state department. Or would it be the CIA?
Cardinal tipped out the contents of the envelope. There was no diary or passport. There were some letters from Cardinal and one bank statement, which was not illuminating. It showed that Harry had credit of three dollars and forty-eight cents. In the bound bundles were his driver’s licence and a notebook with nothing but formulas in it. Harry’s research books were not there. Cardinal examined a sealed letter. On the front was scrawled just one word: ‘Will’. Cardinal hesitated before opening it. He turned it over and over and put it aside. He looked through other items and then reached for the Will again. He tore open the envelope. Harry had left everything to his father, including the house and all its contents, and his car.
There was a condition. None of the items in his estate was to be distributed until exactly one year after his death. There was no further elaboration. At first Cardinal did not dwell on it, but as he rummaged through Harry’s things the idea nagged at him. Why a year?
He strode into the piano bar, where he downed a couple of whiskies. At seven he moved into an adjoining restaurant and sat alone in a sea of empty tables. Cardinal ordered a steak and more whisky. He was feeling aggressive, determined to find out the facts about Harry. On the rare occasion he was fired up like this, he was a big eater. He also like to drink. By the time he had finished the meal, half a dozen other diners had entered the restaurant.
When the sweet trolley drifted in sight, Cardinal was tempted. A waiter noticed his interest and proudly pushed the trolley to him.
‘Monsieur?’ he said bowing. Cardinal contemplated the fifteen varieties of cake and waved a hand over the trolley.
‘I’ll have the lot,’ he said.
The waiter stared. He bent forward, inclining his head. ‘Monsieur?’ he asked once more.
‘I’ll have everything.’
‘Are you sure you would not like a selection, Monsieur,’ the waiter said. Cardinal laughed and appealed to the heavens.
‘I want,’ he began in mock Bostonian English, ‘each and every one of them, uh, please.’ He chopped the air for emphasis. All heads turned to see the waiter’s reaction.
‘As you wish, Monsieur,’ he said pleasantly, with a glance towards the heavens. He demonstrated a certain savoir-faire as he prepared fifteen plates. Cardinal’s table was cleared, and the delicacies were laid out in neat lines. He bustled off to the kitchen for more cutlery. The chef was at the swinging door.
‘They’re selling well tonight, Maurice,’ the waiter said o the cook as he spun out of the kitchen. ‘Isn’t it nice to have your handiwork appreciated.’
‘Cochon!’ Maurice grunted and returned to the stove.
The waiter hovered near Cardinal as he ploughed into the cakes.
‘Would you care for anything else, Monsieur?’ the waiter asked, bowing and pushing the replenished dessert trolley to him again.
Cardinal shook his head and asked for a double whisky. He noticed a group of four at the next table. They were bemused by his gluttonous performance.
‘Have some,’ he smiled, and when they looked dubious, he added, ‘I haven’t touched many of them.’
One young woman giggled and accepted a strawberry tart. Another reached over and took a slice of mango pie. Their male companions got adventurous and several dishes ended up at the next table. The waiter hoped he would gain some measure of revenge by slapping the bill for two hundred dollars in front of his customer.
Cardinal retired to a piano bar and sat listening to a band playing melancholic Brazilian numbers made popular about the time of Harry’s birth. It depressed him. Yet his resolution about uncovering the truth was unshakable. There would be no turning back.
‘Dead ends.’
Rhonda expressed her frustration as she and Hewson walked to the tiny inlet beach harbouring Royal Brighton Yacht Club on Melbourne’s Port Phillip Bay. He smirked.
‘Are you slipping?’ he asked. Rhonda pulled her coat collar up against a howling wind that had yacht riggings groaning.
Hewson smiled but did not respond.
Rhonda tried a sympathy tack. ‘I always wanted to be a TV journalist, badly,’ she said, crestfallen. ‘I’ve realised my ambition. I’ve become a bad TV journalist.’
The joke was not special, but as usual her timing was sharp.
Hewson laughed and put his arm around her shoulder. ‘C’mon, you’re doing okay,’ he said. His expression hardened. ‘The only reason I’m seeing you again so soon on this is because I’ve got a posting early next year.’ He removed his arm.
‘Bill, that’s terrific!’ Rhonda said, sounding effusive. ‘Where?’
Hewson didn’t reply at first, but he seemed pleased with himself. He smiled.
‘It’s a break for me,’ he said, ‘a big one.’
‘C’mon, Bill, I won’t tell anyone.’
‘You had better not,’ he smiled. ‘China.’
Rhonda’s congratulations were sincere, but she felt disappointed at the prospect of losing such an important source. They reached the sand and continued to trudge into the wind.
‘I can give you two leads,’ he said. ‘You could find them yourself, if you had a few years. So it covers me.’
Squawking seagulls protested about the invasion of their private beach as Rhonda waited.
‘I would follow up on the terrorist angle,’ he said, ‘and the way to do it, is to find out how they could have got in and out without detection.’
Rhonda frowned.
He added, ‘It would be best if you tried to discover which foreign group may have been used to slip in and out of Sydney in the past few days – on legitimate business.’
Rhonda’s expression brightened. ‘There was an Indonesian trade delegation here,’ she said in amazement. She kept her eyes on him.
‘Remember what I said about Missing Persons?’ he said, as they stopped walking.
‘What should I try next, the Bureau?’ she said. It was an attempt to humour him.
Hewson looked at his watch.
‘Bill, please!’ she implored.
But he was already walking back to his car in nearby Bay Street.
‘Go away!’ Cardinal moaned. ‘Go away!’ The phone kept ringing until he fumbled for it. It was a police officer informing him that his son’s car had been impounded.
‘What do you want done with it?’ the officer asked, and Cardinal remembered the voice. His head ached. Discordant tunes jangled in his brain.
‘Guess I should pick it up,’ he said. ‘Want to clear up his affairs soon as possible.’ He switched on a light, found a pen and scribbled an address with directions for a drive south of Sydney.
‘Do I know you?’ Cardinal asked, his throat sounding like he had swallowed glass.
‘I had to witness you identifying your son’s body,’ the officer said. ‘See you at around six tonight.’
Cardinal took a taxi on the Princes Highway for Lucas Heights on Heathcote Road, thirty kilometres south-west of Sydney. The reactor was strategically placed in bush-land between a military reserve and Sydney’s National Park, and far enough away from the city to avoid complaints from the larger population.
His head still felt as if an axe had been wedged in it, and he wore dark glasses to hide his bloodshot eyes.
The white dome of the HIFAR nuclear reactor loomed on the horizon as Cardinal found the Lucas Heights Police Station. It had been newly erected to handle the growing number of disturbances from both protesters and local residents who didn’t like the reactor. The locals were worried about radiation leaks and pollution whereas the protesters’ ranks were filled with those who were strictly against reactors. The station’s boundary walls were high and fortified, and the building itself had a reinforced concrete base, which protesters claimed hid a nuclear bunker.
Cardinal was greeted by the plainclothes officer, Senior Detective Ted Maylin. He had taken charge of the handing over of the car – an early model white MGB. He led Cardinal to a garage where he examined the vehicle. Maylin, a tall lean man with a dour expression, stood back saying little.
‘Has it been cleaned?’ Cardinal asked.
Maylin shook his head. ‘That’s the way it was found,’ he said, ‘pretty well spotless.’
‘Was he in it?’
‘The body was found partly buried some fifty metres from the vehicle.’
Despite the depressing nature of the information, Cardinal was encouraged by the fact that Maylin had been this forthcoming. The Embassy people and Blundell between them had not told him this much.
‘Where? I’d like to see the place,’ Cardinal said.
Maylin looked at his watch. It was after six, and light was fading. ‘It might be better to see the area in full light,’ he said.
Cardinal shook his head. ‘I just want to see where it happened.’
Maylin shrugged. ‘We’ll have to drive,’ he said moving towards a police car in the garage.
‘Can we go in this?’ Cardinal asked.
Maylin frowned as he came over and handed him the keys.
‘Could you drive, please?’ Cardinal said, taking off his glasses. ‘I want to take in as much as I can.’
The bulkier Cardinal had some trouble easing into the MG, and Maylin had difficulty in mastering the gear shift on the drive to a clearing five kilometres from the reactor along the road to Sydney. They drove off the road along a dirt track and stopped.
‘The car was found camouflaged under those trees,’ Maylin said, pointing to his right, ‘the body over there.’ He waved his hand to the left. Cardinal insisted on seeing the rough grave. Maylin led the way through the scrub.
‘Were they in a hurry or what?’ Cardinal said, as he walked around a shallow hole.
‘The body was found with most of the torso exposed,’ Maylin said.
They began to walk back to the car. Cardinal stopped and stared at the ground where the body had been.
‘What did you make of his wounds?’ Cardinal asked so quietly that he had to repeat himself for the detective.
‘Like you,’ Maylin said, choosing his words, ‘I was baffled.’
He began to walk to the MG. Cardinal followed, deep in thought.
‘Could you take me to the reactor?’ he said, as they drove away.
Maylin seemed untroubled by the request, and in a few minutes they were near the high front gates of the reactor.
Cardinal had been looking at his watch.
‘I guess you know when my son checked out of here?’ he said.
‘Ten am.’
‘Exactly?’
‘It was in a book all employees had to sign on and off in.’
‘Actually put their initials too?’
‘A full signature was required each time. This is a top security establishment. Has been since 1986.’
Cardinal sat in silence. His eyes fixed on the reactor’s dome.
‘So the official story is that Harry left here at ten and was murdered at . . .’
‘He was found at five the same day.’
‘Seven hours later, but the murder must have occurred soon after he left, because the clearing is only a few minutes away.’
‘No one knows exactly.’
They began to speed back to the station.
‘It’s unlikely he would have toured around for any length of time,’ Cardinal said, glancing at Maylin. ‘The most obvious scenario would be that he was side-tracked into that clearing and killed.’
‘As you say, the most obvious.’
Cardinal remained silent until they pulled up at the station gates. ‘Could I see the guy who actually found him?’
‘I remember you at the morgue being a little pissed off at something,’ Cardinal said.
Maylin got out of the car and Cardinal followed. The gate opened automatically.
‘I brought you out here to claim the car and sign papers,’ Maylin said. ‘I was told you had power of attorney over your son’s property here.’
‘Yeah. If he had gotten sick, or . . . if he died.’
‘Normally I would need proof of that power. But your Embassy seems to want things expedited.’
‘Is that what irritated you?’ Cardinal said, as he was led into the station.
‘That was part of it,’ Maylin said. ‘I sort of resented the way your people muscled in and gave their version of the events as the official one.’
‘What was the other version?’
Maylin pushed some papers in front of him and asked him to sign them. ‘I can’t answer any more questions, Mr Cardinal.’
Cardinal felt the throbbing in his head returning. ‘I used to be a cop,’ he said as he put down the pen.
‘In New York?’ Maylin said, his expression lighter. He handed over the car keys.
‘Harlem.’
‘That must have been tough.’
‘I didn’t bother much about it then. Now I wouldn’t go near the place.’
‘How long were you a cop?’
‘Six years,’ he said. ‘I must admit it was just a job to get me through night school.’
‘Doing?’
‘Law.’
‘You in practice?’
‘Not any more,’ Cardinal said. ‘You married?’
‘Yeah. And I’ve got two kids,’ Maylin said.
‘Hang on to them,’ Cardinal said. Maylin’s lugubrious expression returned.
The phone rang and the detective answered it. In a one-way conversation, Maylin gave negative responses to a string of questions. He scribbled a name on a pad.
‘Bloody Melbourne reporters,’ he mumbled, ‘they even ignore ‘D’ notices these days.’
Cardinal was standing a few paces from Maylin’s desk. ‘Thank you for all your help,’ Cardinal said, stepping forward to shake Maylin’s hand. He came close enough to Maylin’s desk to make out one word on the pad – Mills.
It was dark when Cardinal drove the MG back at a crawl towards Sydney. He was nervous of driving at night on the ‘wrong’ side of the road and in a right-hand drive car. The gears on the high-revving MG didn’t help either, for Cardinal had been used to automatic vehicles. The battle preoccupied him, and it was several seconds before he realised that the van that had followed him the previous night was behind him again. It’s lights were on high beam, making it impossible to read the number plate. This time the driver wasn’t so shy. And the van was edging close. Cardinal struggled with the gears and shuddered to an increased speed. The van accelerated. It nudged the MG’s rear bumper. Cardinal looked for a chance to slide off the road, but the trees to his left were a blur. As he approached a sharp bend, Cardinal fought the steering wheel and slid his car into the oncoming traffic lane. The move made the van driver cautious. He hesitated a second before deciding to follow, but pulled back to safety as a truck rounded the bend. Cardinal just managed to slip back into the correct lane as the shocked truck driver sounded his horn. Cardinal accelerated into top gear and kept his foot down until he reached the busier outer suburbs. He kept checking the car mirrors, but the van was not in sight.
Cardinal took a nerve-steadying drink in the Wentworth’s piano bar. He couldn’t trust his own Embassy, and he couldn’t be certain of the local police. If he had seen the van’s number, he may have had something to report. But he had just managed to avoid serious injury, if not death.
Cardinal began to wonder why he had become the target for surveillance and an attack. He had, after all, done no more than any other father would faced with a similar situation.
Cardinal wandered to the lift and his room. The door was unlocked. He pushed it open. His belongings were strewn over the floor. Cardinal edged in and checked the bathroom. The culprits had gone. He began to pick up his clothes, but suddenly dropped them, and began rummaging through his briefcase. His son’s photographs, wrist watch, wallet, ring and neck-chain had been stolen. Only his will and bank statements had been left.
Hours later, Cardinal thought the items taken suggested that those responsible were trying to expunge all memory of Harry. Except for evidence of his demise.