Chapter 35

THE VOICE OF reason told Manolis to ease off. He was pushing Sparrow’s engine too hard, the car’s side panels shuddering, threatening to break apart like a spacecraft on re-entry. White cockatoos scavenging by the roadside flapped and squawked in alarm as he shot past. Roos scattered, for a change, as if sensing his urgency and recklessness.

‘Slow down,’ he told himself. ‘Better late than not at all.’

He’d taken Sparrow’s keys in case the station was locked, unmanned. For the first time ever, he prayed it was. But he needed to get back to the laundry room before suspicions were raised. How long did it take to find a shirt?

‘Step on it.’

He saw it from a distance, as he turned the corner on two wheels. Outside the station, a white truck, door open. Finally easing off on the pedal and pulling up alongside, he saw fresh skid marks, could almost smell diesel exhaust.

Diffusing the engine gently, he eased from the vehicle with no sound, left his own door unclosed. He took three swift steps to the station doors, examined them. Locked, as expected. Fortunately, he had keys.

The racket could be heard from the entrance – swearing, clanking, complaining, banging. The single voice sounded on edge, panicked, distracted, the words emerging half-formed, simian. Manolis saw no one, only heard echoes bouncing down the corridor in the sour morning light. Moving catlike along the hallway, he drew his weapon, kept it down by his side.

‘Fucking hell,’ said the voice with an air of resignation.

It was coming from the evidence locker. Manolis turned the corner, stood in the doorframe.

‘What the hell are you doing?’ he asked.

The man spun around. He held a screwdriver in one hand, mobile phone in the other. Seconds earlier, the screwdriver had been wedged into the shopping trolley – Molly’s trolley – in a desperate effort to remove the washing machine token stuck inside the lock.

‘Are you tampering with evidence?’ Manolis asked.

Sergeant Fyfe did not respond. Dressed in jocks and singlet, obviously roused from a drunken slumber, he appeared grim and pale-faced. It was patently clear he wasn’t armed. The tendons in his neck stood prominent, knotted. His twitching pupils hinted at a racing mind, struggling to register what had just happened, and what should happen next. Manolis kept his arms by his sides, tensed, ready. The subsequent few seconds of dialogue remained unspoken, a conversation played out through silent but deafening stares.

Fyfe made the first move, dropping his phone, letting it shatter into pieces. He swung back to the trolley and continued to grind away at the coin slot with his screwdriver, as if Manolis was somehow invisible. The detective watched him a moment, partially through sheer disbelief at Fyfe’s complete disregard. In the end, he extended his arm, flicked his wrist and whistled. With the light catching the gun’s silver barrel, Manolis now had Fyfe’s undivided attention.

The sergeant stopped straining, relaxed his arms and held up his palms in mock surrender. ‘What, you gonna shoot me?’

‘Rather not,’ said Manolis. ‘Make a mess. But you can probably stop that now. I already know what’s jammed in the trolley.’

‘Yeah, but you need proof,’ said Fyfe.

Manolis fished around in his pants pocket, extracted the laundry token. ‘This is all I need.’

Fyfe focused on the metal disc gleaming between Manolis’s fingers like a ninja star. ‘Planting evidence, hey. Thass low.’

‘Well if it was good enough for you at the detention centre,’ said Manolis.

Lowering his hands and his gaze, Fyfe looked at the cold concrete floor, defiled with years of scratches and scuffmarks. He stared at it for some time, steadying his breathing, slowing his mind. Eventually, he started mumbling, cursing, blaspheming, a hateful mantra growing ever louder as his thoughts bubbled to the surface, spilled over.

‘I told ’em they shouldn’t have done it… Bloody told ’em, said to let it go…’

Manolis regarded him anew. ‘Who. Told who?’

He already knew the answer. He just wanted it confirmed.

Fyfe tossed the screwdriver against the dented filing cabinet, let it rattle and roll to a halt of its own accord. The trolley with its wonky wheel did the same, coming to rest on an angle in the middle of the room. Fyfe looked around, wanting somewhere to sit.

‘Christ,’ he grumbled. ‘Need a drink. Too old for this shit.’

He found the least full milk crate, emptied it of its contents – tools, knives, implements – and sat with a long, drawn-out exhalation that seemed to empty his whole body. His frame sunk with gravity, expanded, like a blob of jelly released from its mould.

With the casual flick of a wrist, and a firm ‘ahem’, Manolis reminded him of the cold metal object that was facilitating their conversation.

Fyfe waved his hand in dismissal. ‘Put that bloody thing away, city mouse. You’ll hurt someone. We’re just talkin’ here.’

‘So talk,’ Manolis said. ‘Who was on the phone?’

The sergeant wiped his dry mouth with a big country hand. ‘You know who.’

Retrieving Molly’s driver’s licence from his pocket, Manolis held it up. ‘So why her, why their own daughter-in-law?’

Fyfe swallowed hard, summoning the saliva to speak. ‘Politics,’ he said softly, no tone. ‘Bloody power and politics.’

The sergeant looked at Manolis with red-ringed eyes and spoke with the relief of someone in a confessional.

‘Poor ol’ Rexy. He ran his little tourist park for years. Good little business it was, honest and true, but it was dyin’ a slow and painful death. So was the whole town, really. So he did what any loyal citizen would do – he ran for local council. He won, became mayor. Happy days. But then, the brown house loomed. Some people wanted it, some didn’t. Rex didn’t, but his opponent did. In the end, it decided the election. People thought it would turn our busted-arse town around.’

Manolis nodded knowingly. ‘Let me guess. They were wrong.’

‘Been payin’ attention.’ Fyfe showed yellow teeth. ‘Good.’

He explained that Rex returned to the tourist park, but the issue burned inside him.

‘As time went on, he saw he was right. That bloody place was eatin’ our town alive. Shops were goin’ broke, the extra traffic was ruinin’ the roads, services and medicines and fresh food were in short supply. And crime was risin’.’

‘Wait,’ said Manolis, cocking his head to one side, ‘when’s the next election?’

Fyfe rubbed his eyes, screwed up his nose. ‘Later this year. Rexy plans to run, of course.’

Manolis blinked hard. ‘Well given what’s happened to Cobb, he’d be a shoo-in. So why stone a poor woman to death? And why single out Ahmed Omari?’

A grin crawled across Fyfe’s blotchy face. ‘As guarantee. Couldn’t risk it bein’ close. As for Omari, this is where it got messy…’

Fyfe looked away, tugging a thickened, gnarled earlobe reflectively. He explained that the idea came to Rex following an argument with Molly after he’d discovered she was helping Ahmed with his visa negotiations.

‘Poor Rexy felt betrayed, ashamed. Vera did too. Their kids were dead, their business was buggered, they had only Molly left. So they invited her round for tea last Friday night and confronted her for helping the reffos. But she didn’t want a bar of it.’

‘So he stoned her to death in retribution?’ Manolis was stunned. It seemed like a completely disproportionate and extremely violent response, no matter the provocation.

‘Nah,’ said Fyfe. ‘Not even Rexy’s that bad.’

‘Then what, how did she die from stoning?’

Fyfe smiled lightly. ‘Well,’ he breathed. ‘You’re half right…’

He explained that Molly had begun to leave.

‘She was really upset and wasn’t payin’ attention. As she was backin’ away, she tripped and fell on a step, and hit the back of her head on some concrete.’

Manolis stared into space a moment, before blinking hard. It seemed to trigger his brain into action, his thoughts swiftly filling in the blanks. He was familiar with new ‘one-punch’ alcohol laws, which had come about from drink- or drug-fuelled assaults ending in death, often from a person’s head hitting the pavement. The punch would concuss the victim, but it was the impact against the concrete that killed them, often from extensive bleeding on the brain.

‘Molly fractured her skull and died instantly,’ Fyfe said solemnly.

Manolis found himself subconsciously lowering his weapon, as if removing his hat out of respect for the dead. One by one, the pieces fell into place. The scenario Fyfe was describing explained both the trauma to the back of Molly’s head and the lack of blood at the crime scene. She hadn’t died there, beside the oval; she had died much earlier and elsewhere.

‘Rexy said that he and Vera tried to help the poor girl, but there was nuthin’ they could do. Nuthin’ anyone could’ve done. It was then that Rex got the idea for the stonin’.’

‘So,’ Manolis said tentatively, ‘Rex stoned a dead woman to death?’

Patting his distended gut, Fyfe said, ‘Thass what he told me. Made the best of a bad situation. Ultimately, Rexy only has the town’s interests at heart.’

Manolis let the reasoning settle inside his brain. Finally, he asked, ‘So why’d you get involved, why help? Why not leave Rex to swing in the wind?’

Fyfe looked at him sternly, bullet-hole eyes. ‘Why? Cos I hate the bloody brown house too. They’re the real criminals here, not poor Rexy. Town’s gone to shit ever since that place opened. Nuthin’ but trouble – we police are run off our feet. I thought this might end things once and for all, close up shop. But all we’ve been doing ever since the bloody stonin’ is puttin’ out spot fires.’

Fyfe’s description made Manolis realise he’d been away from the tourist park too long. He needed to get back, to make the arrest. He was confident that Sparrow could handle himself; he was bold and pugnacious. But Rex had proven to be more than capable too. Manolis had to go and take Fyfe with him if necessary.

The station’s front doorhandle rattled. White light poured in as the solid wooden door creaked open. Manolis listened, unsure of who to expect. The rasping voice he heard was familiar, guttural and ragged. ‘Bill? Bill, mate, you here?’

Fyfe called back. ‘Geoff? Zat you, mate?’

The man’s features upturned slightly. ‘Yeah. Wanna make another report. Two more of me chickens, last night. Thievin’ cunts.’

Turning towards the door, Manolis was about to approach the farmer, tell him to go away, come back later to make his report, when he felt a sharp whack against his wrist and arm. It had been preceded by a near-instantaneous rumble, too quick to register. The impact of the hurtling shopping trolley made Manolis drop his weapon. It was seized upon by Fyfe, who now stood, barrel pointed squarely at Manolis’s broad target of a chest.

‘Yeah no worries, Geoff, mate,’ Fyfe called out. ‘Er, just a bit busy right now. I’ll come by later on, see for myself.’ He sneered at his new bunny with undisguised satisfaction.

Old Geoff the chicken farmer stood silently a moment, grey cogs creaking inside his brain, before ultimately shifting his weight and shuffling outside.