Chapter 9

MANOLIS DROVE to the police station in Rex’s battered old pickup truck. It was unlicensed and unroadworthy. The gears crunched, the brakes felt spongy from lack of use, and none of the dashboard instruments worked. The cabin promptly filled with exhaust fumes – just as well there was no windscreen. The truck also emitted a strange, unnerving sound from under the chassis every time Manolis touched the brakes, like a copper pipe being rolled along a concrete floor.

On the drive to town, he must’ve counted a hundred kangaroos. Most of them stood by the roadside staring, others in the middle of the road, unflinching. He pressed the horn but it wasn’t working and emitted a dull whirr that only seemed to attract more roos the closer he got to town. It was an eerie feeling, zigzagging through such a large colony of ruggedly built roos.

When he wasn’t dodging wildlife, Manolis ruminated on the crumpled box of firelighters on the seat beside him. His fingers tensed on the steering wheel.

With the exception of a few more sombre-looking roos, Cobb’s main street was just as deserted as it had been the previous day. Shops remained closed, including the takeaway, which Manolis had hoped would be serving big country breakfasts. Ordinary business hours, it appeared, meant nothing in Cobb. That certainly wasn’t how Manolis remembered it; he remembered decorated shopfronts, crowded pavements, and his diligent father opening the milk bar at seven o’clock every morning without fail. Customers were arriving five minutes later.

Manolis pulled up at the station with dirt in his eyes and flies in his nostrils. Sparrow heard the loud backfiring outside, emerged. He flashed a pearly smile.

‘Wow,’ he said. ‘Now that car is a great cover.’

Manolis slammed the door hard. It rattled on its hinges, before coming loose and sagging at a crooked angle. Rex had told him it needed fixing, the hinge pins and bushings were due for replacing. It was on the repair list alongside the car’s engine, body, interior and electricals.

‘Where’d you park the Val?’ asked Sparrow. ‘Hide it under a pile of old rags in Rexy’s shed?’

Manolis didn’t respond, his irritation growing by the minute. Instead, he called for Fyfe as he stepped through the station, trying to summon him out from the oceanic depths of whatever bottle he’d crawled into.

Sparrow called back as he followed, ‘He’s not here.’

Manolis stopped and turned. ‘Where is he?’ He pronounced each syllable very precisely.

‘He’s not far. Sit. Coffee?’

‘No,’ he replied firmly. ‘Evidence locker. Now.’

Sparrow eyed his senior officer, whose gaze was unflinching. ‘Okay, mate. Right this way.’

Christ, thought Manolis. Was he the only cop in this wretched town who realised this was a murder investigation? Did no one in Cobb respect the badge, the thin blue line, not even the police themselves? Everything in town moved at half pace, including human evolution. He wondered whether they actually taught the topic in the local schools.

‘And what about a search of Molly’s house?’ Manolis asked. ‘Organise one ASAP, please.’

‘Righto.’

‘I also want to see the autopsy report.’ ‘Doc hasn’t finished it yet.’

Another bullshit excuse, thought Manolis.

Sparrow led the way down a long corridor that seemed to narrow the further they walked. The linoleum floor was covered in all manner of stubborn stains that someone had unsuccessfully tried to remove. Manolis picked up a scrap of discarded paper from the floor and recognised it as being from his notepad. It was the names of the boys who had vandalised his car that he had given to Sparrow the previous day.

The drunk tank was again empty, its door wide open. So was the door to the room where the evidence was kept. Manolis was shocked.

‘Lock’s stuffed,’ Sparrow said flippantly.

‘I see that. No one’s ever come to fix it?’

Sparrow scoffed. ‘You think the government gives two shits about us out here in Woop Woop? Nope. Outta sight, outta mind.’

‘But aren’t you worried about people tampering with evidence?’

‘Not really, nah. And besides, there’s locks on the front door.’

The evidence room had a large metal shelving unit against one wall. The shelves were bowed beneath the weight of overloaded milk crates containing an assortment of spanners, knives and misshapen wooden implements. A rack of shotguns sat against the opposite wall, with handguns tossed into a distinctive red milk crate. None of the items were tagged in any way or enclosed in sealable containers or bags. A filing cabinet stood against the far wall, its drawers half open, papers arranged haphazardly at all angles.

Sparrow stepped through the room with purpose and dragged back a shopping trolley parked in the far corner. It had a wonky wheel.

‘Here,’ he said. ‘Good to go.’

Manolis scratched the prickly new growth on his chin as he examined the trolley’s contents. There were two black garbage bags, one bulging more than the other.

‘Rocks in that one, tape in this,’ said Sparrow, pointing.

‘Tape?’ Manolis asked.

‘Yair, we found a twisted roll at the scene. Oh, and this.’ Sparrow thrust forth a Bowie knife that was so long it was nearly a sword.

‘Jesus. Where was this?’

‘Sticking out of the tree she was taped to. Wait, the file…’

Sparrow rooted around through the filing cabinet’s middle drawer until he retrieved a recycled manila folder, covered in biro and scribble. ‘Notes and photos,’ he said.

‘Thank you,’ said Manolis, flipping through the file. It felt incredibly light. He tapped the trolley with his other hand. ‘You run out of milk crates or something?’

Sparrow chuckled. ‘Actually, mate, that’s evidence too. Be hard-pressed dragging someone to an oval in a milk crate.’

Manolis instinctively snatched his hand away from the trolley handle. He glared at the constable with large, incredulous eyes.

‘Relax, I already dusted for prints,’ Sparrow said quickly. ‘Not a single one, not even on the rocks or tape or knife. Killer must’ve worn gloves.’

‘So, she was pushed to the sportsground in the trolley?’

‘Reckon so. There was a trench in the grass leading to the oval.’

How ingenious, thought Manolis. A trolley was the easiest, least suspicious transport available. A car meant the potential for hair, spit, blood, DNA, which could all be traced. A shopping trolley belonged to no one. And if anyone had come across the murderer and victim, well, it was probably just some drunk being wheeled home by a considerate mate.

Sparrow showed Manolis to the spare office at the back of the station. It had a small desk but no computer. There was a landline telephone with the number seven missing and a dead line. Sparrow flicked on the light switch. A fluorescent tube buzzed to life after a delay of several seconds, then flickered like a strobe. Sparrow struggled to lift the first garbage bag onto the desk, bringing it down with a loud thud. A succession of softer thuds followed as he emptied the contents. Manolis turned off the fluorescent tube and opened the window’s venetian blinds. Shafts of light fell across the desk, illuminating the rough, bloodstained rocks.

‘Her blood,’ said Sparrow. ‘And bits of her insides. Christ, talk about being stoned until you’re dead.’

Manolis took his first proper look at the murder weapon. He’d been hoping for something more distinctive, a unique colour or shape or texture. But as he examined the rocks one by one, it dawned on him that they could not have been a more ordinary collection of grey and white angular stones. The land was littered with a billion of the nondescript bastards. It was the most uninspiring weapon, and Manolis had known of people killed with teaspoons and ballpoint pens. The only thing that made the rocks in any way distinctive was the gruesome ritual they’d been used for.

Sparrow held up the gaffer tape. It was black, two inches wide, and still thick with supply. ‘You can buy these at the supermarket, this exact kind. They’ll be all over town. I got a few rolls at home myself. Hell, we even got some here at the station.’

‘So, you think the killer was a local? Or what are the chances of someone passing through town who bought tape from the shop?’

Sparrow leant against the doorframe, thought a moment. ‘Unlikely.’

‘Oh?’

‘The only things people stop for in Cobb are petrol and directions out of Cobb.’

Manolis picked up the rock nearest his favoured right hand, held it in his coarse palm, felt its weight. It was the size of a cricket ball but twice as heavy. He folded his fingers over the projectile and felt little stabs of electricity shoot up his forearm. He imagined throwing it with all his might at someone’s head from a short distance. Closing his eyes, he held the rock up to his face, pressing it hard into his cheek until his mouth contorted. Sparrow’s whole face did the same thing in slight horror at the detective’s unorthodox methods.

Jesus, thought Manolis. This was Old Testament shit. Not usually what he handled. Not usually what anyone handled.

He continued to feel the rock’s unforgiving weight. The clank of metal on wood broke his reverie. He opened his eyes to see the silver blade of the Bowie knife gleaming in the sunlight.

‘This here’s a bit more interesting,’ Sparrow said.

Manolis picked up the knife, blade in one hand, handle in the other. It was impressively heavy, particularly the handle. He held the knife at eye level, rotated it. It had a cross-guard to protect the user’s hands. The blade was as wide as the gaffer tape and as long as a wooden ruler. It was spotless, looked brand new. The beauty of it steadied him, grounded him.

‘Unfortunately, I reckon there’s at least one of these per house in Cobb, probably more,’ said Sparrow. ‘Blokes carry ’em round town all the time. They make no effort to hide ’em.’

Manolis sat back in his chair, the well-worn spring squeaking beneath his weight. He rotated the knife in his hand. ‘How do you conceal something so huge?’

‘The blokes at the abattoir compete for who has the biggest blade, but they’re harmless. It’s the jobless pricks on ice you gotta worry about. Angry, paranoid lunatics slash anything that moves.’

Manolis paused in thought. ‘And where was this found again?’

‘Stickin’ out of a tree.’

‘She wasn’t cut?’

Sparrow shook his head. ‘Not from what I saw.’

Manolis made one final examination of the knife before placing it back on the desk. He wondered why it had been left at the scene.

Sparrow wheeled in the shopping trolley. ‘From the supermarket. Same place what sells the tape.’ Like the rocks, the trolley bore no distinguishing features. It was metal, slightly rusted, with swivel wheels. ‘They even left their dollar coin in the lock.’

Manolis bent down, leant in, squinted. ‘So they have.’ He tried to pull it out but couldn’t.

‘Jammed tighter than a nun’s nasty,’ said Sparrow.

‘Did you fingerprint the trolley?’

Sparrow shook his head. ‘No point. It’d be covered. We found some long strands of hair twisted around the bottom, probably hers. But that’s it.’

‘Was she carrying anything, any personal belongings? Purse or wallet or keys or phone?’

‘Nope.’

Manolis stopped. ‘Doesn’t it seem strange she’d go out without at least one of those items?’

Sparrow thought a moment. ‘Not really, I wander round town all the time without any of those things. Maybe it’s only strange in the city.’

‘And you say someone pushed her to the oval in the trolley? She was probably drugged, unconscious or semiconscious.’

Sparrow nodded. ‘There was a trail of flattened grass from her body to the trolley, which was tipped on its side.’

Manolis paused. He knew the answer but still asked the question. ‘What about DNA samples, can we collect those?’

Sparrow gave a small sarcastic laugh. ‘Sure, mate. Absolutely we can. I’ll send them down to the boys in our forensic lab, chop-chop. They’ll work around the clock to get us an answer.’

Manolis considered the resources at his disposal in the city: controlled laboratory conditions, microscopes, sequencers, all state-of-the-art machines, cutting edge. He was certain that evidence from regional homicides was usually sent to the city for DNA testing. But it was likely a lengthy process, and Sparrow, in a roundabout way, was right: the trolley could have been contaminated with half the town’s prints and DNA.

‘So, that’s it?’ Manolis asked. ‘That’s all there was?’

‘The rest was as nature intended,’ Sparrow replied.

Manolis picked up the thin manila folder that he’d carefully balanced on one corner of the desk. He opened it and saw a collection of square photos of poor quality, randomly arranged in different orientations, some on their side or upside-down, others backwards.

‘What’s this?’ He squinted. ‘Are these… are these Polaroids?’

He took a second to arrange the photos in order, like unshuffling a deck of cards. Before his eyes flashed his first sighting of the bloodied and broken head of Molly Abbott. The photos were spattered red and black. Manolis’s fingers felt grubby. He wanted to wipe them.

‘Yair, Polaroids,’ said Sparrow. ‘It’s the easiest way.’

‘Jesus. I haven’t seen Polaroid photos in twenty years. Didn’t realise they still made the film.’

‘Can’t develop photos in town no more since the pharmacy closed,’ Sparrow said matter-of-factly.

‘And the station doesn’t have a digital camera?’

Sparrow let out a wry laugh. ‘We had one years ago, but it broke and was never fixed or replaced. The Polaroid’s more reliable.’

Manolis scanned the images. They were gruesome, even for the eyes of an experienced homicide detective. And he had seen bodies that were decapitated and dismembered. Part of his reaction came from knowing the brutal way she had died. The rest came from the eerie style of photography that made the images look like a faded memory.

Next, Manolis consulted the sketches of the crime scene, as there was only so much he could glean from photographs. The drawings had been done on scraps of paper. An elevation view was drawn on the back of an old mechanic’s receipt blackened with grease stains; someone had bought spark plugs. The field sketches were bereft of measurements and looked like they’d been done by a five-year-old. Manolis analysed the pencil-drawn diagrams, rotating them in his hands. The papers were much-handled, grimy and creased. The field notes, written on the back of a serviette, were just as illegible, as if the author had had a seizure.

‘Are these your notes?’ Manolis asked.

Sparrow swished his hair. ‘Sarge’s.’

‘Can you read this chicken scratch?’

Another swish.

Manolis re-examined the sketches and notes, then closed the folder with a snap. The rocks remained on the desk. He considered the room for a moment and tapped two fingers to his lips, searching his rabbit thoughts, while Sparrow searched his holey pockets. After finding a cigarette and lighter, he was just about to bring the two items into contact when Manolis said:

‘Right. Take me to the scene.’