8

FOR PEOPLE BUYING property, it’s location, location, location. For cops working an investigation, it’s walk, walk, walk, and talk, talk, talk. Cops in the ACT had walked thousands of kilometres since Wright disappeared, sacrificing their soles in several fruitless door-to-doors. Nor had the thousands of callers to our hot line delivered anything substantial. As a talker, I was mostly spared the walking, and that suited me fine. My first interview for the day was another Early Leaver — Susan Wright’s environment advisor, Marie Staples.

According to my political mate Stevo, Staples had studied science at Sydney University, where she’d belonged to various left-wing groups, including one that published the Progressive Green Quarterly. She’d even edited the magazine for a year and sold it on street corners around Sydney’s CBD.

But in her final year of study, Staples surprised her comrades by cutting all ties with ‘the movement’ and engrossing herself in her books. More were surprised when she graduated with straight As and got a job in the government’s National Environment Foundation.

Staples’ mum had been at school with Susan Wright. The two had remained close, so when Marie Staples later got a job in Wright’s office, some people accused the minister of nepotism. However, according to Stevo, Staples had a lot more going for her than good connections. In fact, she’d shone in Wright’s office, thanks to her deep knowledge of all things green and her great negotiating skills.

When Smeaton ushered Staples into the room, it was easy to see how she could win people over. In her late twenties, she was well formed and pretty, with a bob of blond hair that fringed her penetrating blue eyes.

I began by asking her where she’d spent her time at Wright’s party. She said that, like most of the staff, she’d hung around the reception area, filtering journos, and monitoring the various comings and goings.

When McHenry’s search team had interviewed Staples, she’d given one of the more graphic accounts of the argument between Susan Wright and Alan Proctor, so that’s where I went next.

Staples said that at about ten-thirty she’d noticed Susan Wright in a huddle with Proctor and Sorby in the corridor outside the minister’s office. The next time she looked, Sorby was gone, and the minister and Proctor had moved to the end of the corridor.

‘Did you hear what they were talking about?’

‘No. The music was way too loud, and, you know, the minister and Proctor were real heavyweights, so when they put their heads together, everyone gave them a bit of space.’

‘And what happened then? Once their heads were together?’

‘Well, you could tell things were getting testy between them. The body language. And the way they were looking at each other. Especially the way the minister was looking at him — so pissed off. And at one point she really let him have it.’

‘You mean she shouted at him,’ said Smeaton.

‘She didn’t shout really. There was just a lot of, like, emotion in what she said, and it cut through the other noise.’

‘And what did she say?’

‘It was, “That’s not going to happen”, or, “That won’t happen.” Something like that. She said it loud enough so that people looked at her. That’s when the two of them went into her office. Simon Rolfe was with us by then, and, being a typical journo, he said someone should put their ear to the door. We all ignored him, of course, but I would’ve given anything to have been a fly on the wall in there.’

‘And Alan Proctor came out a bit later,’ I said, ‘and told his assistant, Janet Wilson, to go down to his office and get him a file.’

‘That’s right. From his security cabinet.’

‘He keeps his files in a special cabinet?’

‘Yes. The sensitive ones.’

‘The dirt files,’ said Smeaton.

‘That’s what some people call them,’ said Staples.

‘And how did Janet Wilson get access to this cabinet if it was secure?’ I said. ‘Did Proctor give her a key or something?’

‘No, Mr Proctor can open his cabinet remotely with his BlackBerry. And he can use the BlackBerry to release individual files in the cabinet, too. We’ve got the same system in our office, but our files aren’t as, ahh, interesting as Mr Proctor’s.’

‘And Proctor’s files — they’re big and red, and look a bit like a box. What else can you tell us about them?’

‘Well, we call them files, but, as you say, they’re more like oblong boxes. They come in various sizes, and they’re locked into individual slots inside a secure cabinet. The whole system’s pretty much standard in the ministerial wing these days.’

‘Okay. So Proctor got this box file brought up to him, took it into the minister’s office, and closed the door. What then?’

‘They were in there for about fifteen minutes, then the minister came out and she had Proctor’s file with her, as you know. And that was it. She said a quick goodbye and left.’

I visualised the scene again: the minister with her hands full, pushing through partygoers, uttering perfunctory farewells as she headed for the door.

‘And you’re sure it was Proctor’s file she was carrying?’

‘Yep. A red, secured file from the PMO. We don’t see many of them up here.’

‘You left the party straight after the minister,’ said Smeaton. ‘And we’ve got you driving out of the Senate-side carpark at 11.27pm — a few minutes before the minister exited the building in her car. You got out of there pretty quickly, didn’t you?’

‘Yes. I use the stairs rather the lift,’ she said. ‘And why did I leave straight after the minister? Well, I was tired, and I’m not much of a drinker. So I went home and was asleep by midnight. Sadly, there’s no one you can check that with.’

Sad indeed. I put my eyes into neutral and lingered on hers. She stared back, waiting for the next question.

‘And where were you between eight o’clock on Tuesday night, and eight on Wednesday morning?’

‘I was at home. Alone again.’

‘Okay, just one more thing before you go. What can you tell us about Ron Sorby’s relationship with Susan Wright? Did they get on, as far as you could tell?’

‘Mmm, I’m not sure. They seemed fine to me. Why, what’s been said?’

‘Nothing. He was her senior person, that’s all, so their relationship is naturally of interest to us.’

Staples nodded, seeming to accept my explanation. And that was it for her — another Early Leaver without an alibi. With an environment minister dead, a former radical environmentalist had to rate a high level of interest from us. I escorted her from the building, intent on delving deeper into her past.

Smeaton brought in some coffees, and then collected our next Early Leaver, Proctor’s deputy, Penny Lomax. Lomax made good eye-contact during introductions, and there was nothing passive about her handshake, either. I figured her as a person who was used to dealing with new and threatening situations. Or maybe she was just well prepared for this one. The only evidence of nerves was the way she constantly readjusted her glasses as we talked. But she was polite and to the point, and she was very pretty.

Stevo hadn’t known much about her — just that she’d worked for a senior government backbencher before she’d joined Lansdowne’s staff. Lansdowne had been communications minister at the time, and Lomax’s computer skills had helped her leapfrog other contenders into the job. According to Stevo, Lomax and Proctor were close — so close, in fact, that she’d even been touted as a possible candidate in the election after this one.

Like Staples, Lomax had spent most of her time at the party in reception. But unlike Staples, she downplayed the stoush between Proctor and the minister. I figured it was loyalty talking, so I moved on and asked about the file.

‘Do you have any idea what was in it?’ I said.

‘No, I don’t,’ she said.

‘I understand it came from a special cabinet in Alan Proctor’s office. Do you have access to that cabinet?’

‘No. I work with some of those files, but Alan’s the only one who can access them at will.’

‘With his BlackBerry.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Do the files stay locked once they’ve been taken out of the cabinet?’

‘No. They’re not secure once they’re out of their slots.’

I let that penetrate for a few seconds, then nodded at Smeaton.

‘So, Miss Lomax,’ he said, his long, thin fingers drumming on the table. ‘You left the party immediately after the minister. Can you tell us why you chose to go at that point?’

‘I didn’t leave immediately after her,’ said Lomax. ‘I left immediately after Alan. He’s my boss, and when he goes, I can go.’

‘And you beat the minister out of the building,’ said Smeaton. ‘In fact, you got out so fast I’d say you broke a few records.’

‘I like to get home,’ she said. ‘I’ve got a great job, but I love my sleep, too.’

‘So you went straight home?’ I said.

‘That’s right.’

‘Can anyone vouch for you?’

‘No, I live alone. I don’t even own a cat.’

The word ‘cat’ stopped me in my tracks. Lomax’s eyes stayed locked on mine as she waited for the next question. She was ready, but not tense. Like a tennis player anticipating the return of the ball, she was intent on staying in the game. There was nothing in the cat reference.

‘You’ve worked for Alan Proctor for what, now?’ I said. ‘Three years, is it? I know politics is a very combative business, but have you ever seen him exercise perhaps a little too much vigour when it came to tackling a political problem?’

‘If that’s your way of asking whether Alan’s capable of murder,’ said Lomax, ‘let me say that if I were trying to picture the sort of person who might have done this to Mrs Wright, Alan would not feature.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I don’t think he’s capable of violence. He’s just not made that way. I mean, he hates football because it’s rough. And he can’t watch those real-life medical shows on TV. He’s just too squeamish. So Alan Proctor and murder? I don’t think so. It’s not in him.’

It sounded like loyalty talking again, and even if Proctor was averse to violence, anyone was capable of anything, given enough motivation and the right opportunity. I took a deep breath, considered asking her more about Proctor, but then decided against it. I’d find out for myself soon enough.

‘Finally, Miss Lomax,’ I said, ‘can you tell us where you were between eight o’clock Tuesday night and eight on Wednesday morning?’

‘I spent Tuesday organising a marginal-seat visit for Alan,’ she said. ‘I finished that at about six. Then I went home, made some tea, and I was in bed with a book by nine. Then on Wednesday morning, I was back in at work by seven.’

And that was that. I thanked her, and Smeaton escorted her out.

James Manton was the next Early Leaver. He was a bright young guy with Jesus-length hair and a well-groomed beard. He’d advised Susan Wright on world-heritage issues. He said he’d spent the party drinking beer with the boys in the open-plan office out the back. He wasn’t aware of any ‘aggro’ between the minister and Proctor on the night, and he said Sorby and Wright had always got on just fine, as far as he could tell. As for why he’d left the party so soon after the minister, he said he’d promised his mum he’d be home by midnight, and he was. And he was also home with her when the body was dumped.

After Manton, I went back to the room and found a cup of takeaway coffee sitting on my desk. I looked around to see who I should thank for it, but no one eyed me to claim the credit. Probably McHenry, I thought, though he was out. Sitting next to the coffee were two documents I’d ordered up. One was a restraining order that had been taken out against Wright’s former senior staffer, Dennis Hanley. It had been issued around the time he died in a head-on. The other was the police report on his death. I resolved to drink the coffee before I opened the documents, and was raising the cup to my lips when reception called. Janet Wilson was waiting to be collected.

Wilson wasn’t an Early Leaver, but as one of the three people who’d handled Proctor’s file on the night of the party, she was a must-see. When I got down to the foyer, she was busily hunting through her bag. She was a small, compact woman in her late twenties, with long, crinkled hair smeared with too much product. She jumped when I said her name, but quickly recovered. We shook hands and she followed me to the lift.

Once we had her seated and settled in the interview room, I got her to tell us about her night at the party. She, too, had spent most of her time in reception, and, yes, she’d seen what she called the ‘kerfuffle’ between Mrs Wright and Mr Proctor, though she hadn’t heard a word of it. And she confessed that when Mrs Wright left the party early, she’d thought the minister was being very rude, and she’d said so to a few people.

Despite her nervy manner, Wilson answered our questions fluently, and the longer the interview went, the more relaxed she became. Of course, I was building up to the question of Proctor’s file, and as soon as I raised it, she stiffened again and clasped one hand firmly in the other.

‘When Proctor sent you down for the file,’ I said, ‘how did you know which one to get?’

‘That’s easy,’ she said, too forcefully by half. ‘Each file has a dedicated slot, and there’s a light that flashes above the slot that’s been freed.’

‘And once a file’s out of its slot, it’s no longer secure, is it? Anyone retrieving a file can open it — if they have the opportunity, and if they feel inclined. Did you feel so inclined that night, Mrs Wilson?’

‘No. I never. It’d be … it’d be the wrong thing to do. Those files are full of very confidential material. And they’re for Mr Proctor’s eyes only.’

‘Mrs Wilson, this is a very serious matter, so I’m going to ask you again. Did you look at that file as you brought it up to the party?’

‘No, I did not,’ she said.

Her eyes were locked on mine, but her mouth was slightly open and her bottom jaw was quivering. The quivering might have indicated that she was hiding something, maybe even lying. It might also have been her usual reaction to pressure. Regardless, we had bigger fish to fry, so I thanked her, and Smeaton saw her out. As I sat there mulling over the interview, I made a mental note to request the CCTV footage for the file’s journey from Proctor’s office up to the party.

The next interviewee on our list was another Early Leaver — the office receptionist, Helen Stannage. Stannage was a big woman with a fleshy face and dull, brown hair. She groaned as she lowered herself into a seat opposite us; but once she was settled, her eyes met mine with such intensity that she took on the look of a woman half her weight and age.

As with the others, we covered her general actitivities at the party first. She’d spent the whole night at her desk in reception, checking invites as guests arrived. She seemed proud that she’d sent a number of blow-ins on their way. Given her no-nonsense manner and her size, I doubted that any of them had put up much of a fight.

Stannage said she hadn’t seen the argument between Proctor and her minister, and had been surprised when Mrs Wright left the party so early. When I asked why she herself had left just minutes later, Stannage said that with her boss gone, her job was done. She wasn’t much of a party person, and she had teenagers at home.

‘And you went straight home to your kids?’ said Smeaton.

‘Yes, I did,’ said Stannage, wiping beads of sweat from her upper lip. ‘My husband left us a few weeks ago, so my youngest has been a bit, you know … stressed.’

‘And Tuesday night through to Wednesday morning?’ he said. ‘Where were you then?’

‘At home. With my daughter. You can ask her if you like, but I’d rather you leave her out of this, if you can.’

‘We’ll let you know. Now, on another matter, we’re looking at people who’ve worked for Mrs Wright over the years, and I understand you were with her when Dennis Hanley was her senior person.’

Stannage’s jowly face slumped at this turn in the conversation.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I knew Dennis. But he’s been dead for years. What’s he got to do with this?’

‘We’re just interested,’ I said. ‘What can you tell us about him?’

‘Dennis? What’s there to tell? He messed up over the Mondrian thing, lost his job, and not long after that, he died. It was all very tragic. And extremely hard on his wife and kids.’

‘Do you know if he blamed Susan Wright for what happened to him?’ said Smeaton.

‘No. He blamed Mr Lansdowne, for some reason,’ she said, the sweat running freely down her face now. ‘Maybe it was because Mr Lansdowne’s nephew worked for Mondrian. And, of course, Mr Lansdowne was the minister who set up the inquiry into the affair, so that might’ve been it. The thing is, those five were so tight before that voucher business — Mr Lansdowne and his nephew, and Mr Proctor, Dennis, and Mrs Wright. So it was really sad to see Dennis cut adrift like that.’

‘And how’d Hanley take it when he lost his job?’ said Smeaton.

‘As you’d imagine, not well,’ said Stannage. ‘In fact, he went quite strange. He’d show up at the Hyatt for Friday-night drinks and give everybody a bit of stick, like he thought he was still boss, y’know? But nothing too bad, unless you were sitting with Mr Lansdowne’s people.

‘Then a month or so after he lost his job, he went into the ministerial carpark and sprayed shaving cream down the side of Mr Lansdowne’s car. They took out a restraining order on him for that. Then he had his breakdown. And the next thing I knew, he was dead in his car.’

‘Do you know what happened to his wife and kids?’ I said.

‘Margaret died a couple of years after he, he … you know, died,’ said Stannage. ‘Some idiots at the time said it was the shame that killed her, but I know for a fact she had cancer.’

‘And the kids?’

‘The older one, Sylvie, she’s dead now, too. I can’t remember what happened to her exactly, but it was a couple of years after Margaret died. And Tom, the boy, I haven’t seen him since Margaret’s funeral. In fact, that’s the last time I saw either of the kids. Sylvie was really angry, I remember. But no one blamed her — losing her parents like that.’

‘And Tom?’ I said, prompting her.

‘Tom? He was … well, Tom was not easy to connect with at the best of times, if you know what I mean. But I’m sure he was hurting in his own way. I’ve got a photo of him and Sylvie at home somewhere. I could dig it out, if you think it might help, and make some calls — see if anyone knows where Tom is now. It was all too sad.’

‘It’d be good if you could do that,’ I said. ‘Get us a photo and make some calls. And sooner rather than later would be best.’

Before Smeaton escorted Stannage out, I asked her about Susan Wright’s relationship with Sorby; but, as with her colleagues, she wasn’t aware of any problems between them. When she’d gone, I read through the old restraining order that had been issued against Hanley. If the gossip was true, he and Wright had been having it off. Cue political scandal. Then came the inquiry that turned his life to shit. Soon after it, he’d died. Then the wife died, followed by one of the kids. And Wright, who’d prospered in the wake of the scandal that destroyed the Hanley family, had now turned up dead as well.

So where was Tom Hanley? Stannage’s contacts were probably our best bet for finding him quickly. If they failed, there were school records, bank accounts, Medicare, and lots of other ways to track him down.

I trudged back to my desk and logged on to PROMIS. I was flipping between screens when McHenry came up behind me, clamped a hand on my shoulder, and dropped a document onto my keyboard. It was an interim report from the vet who’d examined both the fur on Wright’s clothes and the dead cat from the crime scene. The report said that while the fur on the clothes had come from a number of cats, it was possible that some of it was from our crime-scene cat. That animal, a tortoiseshell, had been female, about eighteen months old, and it’d had at least one litter before it was neutered. Our forensic vet had also established the cause of the cat’s death. She’d died in the same way as Susan Wright — of carbon monoxide poisoning.