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I handed my statement to the officer at the front desk and asked if he knew of Sergeant Green’s whereabouts.
The clerk shrugged, asked my name and if the matter was urgent.
I decided not to give my name or tell him what it was regarding, and instead went outside and bought a latte and toasted banana bread from a coffee van in the car park. A cool southerly breeze had picked up and cast clouds into shapes that reminded me of confetti. My mind wandered and I recalled Constable Hunter telling me Paul’s wife, Vicki, worked at Henley’s Optometry. Once the coffee took effect and my stomach was satisfyingly full, I searched my phone for the address.
I cruised through minimal traffic to get there, and entered the shop.
A prim and proper man with pink, smooth hands busied himself stocking glasses in a revolving display cabinet.
I introduced myself, and when he asked my business, I mentioned Vicki Green.
He frowned. ‘Vicki Pearce? The assistant manager?’
I nodded. ‘Sorry, yes. Ms. Pearce.’
He promptly picked up a phone, punched a number, and whispered into the handset.
I wondered briefly why Vicki was going by another name when a woman of average height appeared from a back office.
She had shoulder-length, styled hair, which gave off an expensive air. Her high cheekbones and round eyes gave her an upper-crust look—like a young Sigourney Weaver, but with a softer jaw. She appeared pleasant enough, and shook my hand firmly.
I introduced myself and she nodded vaguely, tucking one stray hair behind her ear. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Paul may have mentioned you but I’ve been very busy.’
She stared at my face, and I touched it self-consciously.
‘Rough week,’ I said, apologetically. ‘I’m a private detective, and I’ve been talking to your husband about my cousin’s murder.’
Recognition sparked her eyes. She raised a finger and pointed at me. ‘Yes, I remember now. He mentioned a private investigator... must be you. I’m glad you came by. I have to give you something. Come through to my office. Paul wanted me to give you some paperwork to fill out after last night.’
She beckoned me through the doors, and I followed her down a carpeted corridor into a small office suite. Potted ferns took up various places around the room. A sofa lined the far wall, and a desk sat on the left. Posters displaying eyes at various stages of disease adorned the walls. A calendar pinned to the wall by her computer had last Monday circled in red. The word ‘solicitor’ was also written in red and underlined against that date.
Several framed photos sat on the desk, and one in particular stood out to me, in which a young man with blonde hair and the obvious facial features of a person suffering Down syndrome wore a flat cap on his head, and cooked sausages on a barbecue. He had a wide grin on his face.
Vicki rounded her desk and retrieved a stack of papers.
As she handed the blank incident reports to me, I noticed she didn’t wear a wedding band. I thanked her.
She pointed to the papers. ‘Don’t sign them. Your signature needs to be cited. Just do that at the station with Paul. That should be fine.’
‘I appreciate that.’ I pointed to the photo of the young man by the computer. ‘Handsome young man.’
‘That’s Rory.’ Vicki pushed some hair behind her ear. ‘That’s one of the last photos we have of him.’
I stared at the photo, finding it hard to believe that someone with so much life no longer walked the Earth. ‘Do you mind if I ask...?’
Vicki sighed. ‘It was an accident. He fell from a bridge.’
Dread washed over me like ice water,. Doctor Ashbury had told me about the boy with Down syndrome who jumped from a bridge. What were the chances? What were the odds, in a town this small, that two teenage boys with Down syndrome had fallen, or jumped, from a bridge in recent years? Rory was her son, and Paul Green’s son. Did that mean Rory was the boy Rob and George had abused on the beach? It fit into a logical and direct line that linked Rob, Rory, and Paul Green.
I almost said something, then stopped. The calendar said ‘solicitor’ in red, and Vicki wasn’t wearing a wedding band. Despite the small odds that she never wore a wedding band, the coincidence of the date of Rob’s murder and the same day being circled on Vicki’s calendar seemed too much. What did ‘solicitor’ mean? Maybe she’d filed for divorce? It made sense with the loss of Rory and the disintegration of the family. Paul would have reacted to the divorce with anger, and he had every reason to aim that anger at Rob.
‘Ms. Pearce, I need to talk to Paul. Do you know where is?’
She looked at me anxiously.
‘Vicki, your husband may be facing some very serious charges, and I need to know where he is. Right now.’
She hesitated. ‘I’m not sure where he is, exactly....’ She rubbed her hands together.
‘Ms. Pearce....’
She raised her hands, palms out. ‘I don’t know how to say this, so I’ll just say it. Paul and I aren’t on speaking terms. We haven’t been for a long time. Whatever he does is his own business. I can provide an affidavit, if it comes to that.’
‘I don’t think you understand. Two men are dead, and everything points to Paul’s involvement.’
She brushed her hair back with both hands and sat in the chair. Her pretences dropped and she spoke softly. ‘One day, Rory begged us to let him go to the ocean by himself. We didn’t like the idea but we let him go. He was eighteen, and needed a little independence.’ She paused and caught her breath. ‘They left him face down, crying, and your cousins got off scot-free. Rory never went outside again. He withdrew. He wanted to sleep in our bed, and started to have night terrors, seizures. We reported it to the police, but they couldn’t take his word because he couldn’t explain what had happened to him. Rory suffered every day until the day we turned his machine off.’
She wiped her eyes and shook her head. ‘I don’t know if heaven is real or just some bullshit fairy tale, but I need to believe Rory’s in a better place. I don’t have anything else.’
When she looked at me, it seemed as if she’d aged ten years. ‘Whatever Paul did, he did because he believed it was the right thing to do.’
