14

MCHENRY WASN’T AROUND when I got back to the room, so I immediately checked in with the analyst, Ruth Marginson. A lot of people had recognised Jean at Mad Dog’s, and some of them would have recognised me, so I’d been planning to tell McHenry about my ‘chance’ encounter with Jean as soon as I could. Now that Marginson was my only option, I took a seat next to her desk and gave her the story.

‘Did you discuss the case with her?’ she said when I’d finished.

‘She raised it, as you’d expect. But I didn’t get drawn in. One thing I did learn, though. She thinks she’s being followed.’

‘And is she?’

‘Well, she hasn’t seen anyone. It’s just a feeling she’s got. I’ll go down in the morning and see if I can spot anything around her place.’

‘And you just ran into her, you say? And she invited you for a drink?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Okay, let’s leave it for now,’ she said, turning back to her screen. ‘But make sure you write it up.’

McHenry would have told Marginson that I’d wanted surveillance on Jean, so I couldn’t blame her for being sceptical about my story. But at least now I was covered to a degree. And if McHenry wanted to look into the encounter, the only person he could talk to was Jean — and I doubted he’d do that.

I went back to my desk and wrote up the contact. With that done, I tried to clear my head of the whole thing, but a vague feeling of dread was still hanging over me hours later when I crawled into the rec room for some shut-eye.

At first light next morning, I was back on Giles Street, looking for places from which someone could spy on Jean’s apartment block. The most obvious spot was the garden I’d used the night before, but the tan bark there was so compressed that I hadn’t even left an impression on it.

A lush garden a few doors down provided a view of both Jean’s driveway and the footpath in front of her block, but there was nothing to indicate that anyone had loitered there recently, either. I could have draped the area in tape and called in Forensics, but it was best to leave that decision to McHenry.

My stomach was grumbling by the time I finished up, so I stopped at a café in Manuka and checked out the morning papers over breakfast. They all led with previews of the Wright funeral, and each front page had something on Proctor’s disappearance. Having the stories side-by-side like that seemed to imply that Proctor would soon share Wright’s fate. The media were preparing the public for the worst.

I drove back to the station and called Steve Newings, the deputy registrar for Births, Deaths and Marriages. I wanted him to dig out a couple of death certificates for me — one for the PM’s nephew, Mick Stanton, and one for poor old Dennis Hanley. I planned to talk to the doctors who’d certified them, just to make sure they had died in the way people said they had.

Next, I called all the vet clinics on a list Marginson had supplied, and asked them to check their stocks of ketamine for any slippage. They all promised to let me know within twenty-four hours. McHenry walked past while I was on the phone, which made me wonder about the Lansdowne interview, but I wasn’t going to ask him. If I turned out to be a non-starter, I’d deal with it. In the meantime, I’d concentrate on what I had in front of me.

I was going through a list of Marie Staples’ radical uni mates when the department’s profiler walked into the room. Alan Thorne was small and fit, with dyed-blond hair tied back in a ponytail, and a pair of tortoiseshell glasses perched on the end of his nose. He’d studied criminal profiling at Qantico, then done a doctorate in behavioural analysis at the ANU. I’d read his doctoral thesis, and the cop in me had dismissed it as an over-complicated explanation for why bad people did nasty things, mostly to other bad people.

The room was packed for Thorne’s appearance. McHenry must have known it would be, because he had even organised sandwiches. He thanked Thorne for joining us. Thorne thanked him for the invite, and said he’d been through PROMIS, and was impressed with our thoroughness to date. Then he lifted his notes to his nose and launched into his spiel.

‘First up, let me explain that, in analysing this case, I’ve assumed that the people who killed Mrs Wright now have their hands on Mr Proctor. So let’s get down to business. As many of you will know, when building a criminal profile we employ the same six questions that journalists commonly use — who, what, when, where, how, and why.

‘Let’s begin with the “who” in this case. Both victims were associated with the government. They knew each other. Were they specifically targeted? Given their association, I think that’s probable. Now, if that’s correct, then, in purely definitional terms, the perpetrators here are not serial killers. That is, for them this was more than a case of inclination meeting opportunity. Rather, they’re spree killers — people who are driven by a single overwhelming impulse to commit a number of murders.’

It gave me a bit of a lift to hear Thorne echo what I’d said to McHenry. I glanced across at the boss, hoping to catch his eye, but he had his head down, taking notes. Regardless, I knew that Thorne’s words would register with him.

‘The second and most important part of the “who” question comes under the heading “Who dunnit?”. And, in addressing that, I think we can broadly say that the people we’re looking for here are very organised. Or at least one of them is. Mrs Wright was not an easy target. She was lured, or entrapped, and then captured. Later, she was despatched and dumped. All of the above required considerable planning and effort.

‘The perpetrators were probably familiar with her routine, including her usual route home. They knew about her after-work party, and maybe they were even there. And the document they leaked to the media demonstrates a desire to do damage to the government. In other words, at least one of the perpetrators is well informed and probably highly intelligent — just as you’d expect of an organised, violent offender.’

‘Just to interrupt for a moment, Alan,’ said McHenry, causing Thorne to lower his notes. ‘Leaking a document like they did, during an election campaign, not only demonstrates some knowledge of politics. It was a very political act, in and of itself. So is it possible we’re looking for some sort of militant political types here?’

Thorne removed his glasses and considered the question for a moment.

‘I think it’s much more likely to be an avenger,’ he said finally. ‘Someone whose life has gone bad, who blames the government for it, and who’s organised others to help him exact his revenge. It’s a simple but common explanation, I’m afraid. These people murdered Mrs Wright, but I believe that any government target would have suited them just as well. And it means that things look bleak for Mr Proctor, too. You see, the government will continue to irritate our avengers, and now that they’ve embarked on this course, I fear they’ll continue with it until they’re caught. Or killed.’

‘Are you saying the prime minister’s at risk here, too?’ I said.

‘Certainly at risk,’ said Thorne. ‘Very much at risk. I see his security’s tighter than ever, and so it should be.’

McHenry finally looked around at me, and I was surprised to see that he was scowling. Maybe I was getting a preliminary blast for my contact with Jean. Or maybe he was still smarting over my prodding of Lansdowne. Whatever it was, I blanked him out and concentrated on what Thorne had said about people with a grievance.

‘Alan, you’ve no doubt read our interview with Tom Hanley,’ I said. ‘The guy’s barely functional, and, on the face of it, not a fit for the profile you’ve worked up here. But is there any way he could be involved?’

‘Only as a support player,’ said Thorne. ‘But, of course, if he is a support player, who’s he supporting? As I’ve said, it’s likely to be an organised violent offender, with an anti-social personality disorder. His or her profile could include sexual aggression, poly-substance abuse, sexual perversion, and possibly even a history of mutilating animals — all characteristics that the FBI lists as possible markers for this sort of personality.’

‘One of them certainly ticks the box on mutilation,’ said Smeaton. ‘Given what they did to the cat.’

‘Possibly, except that the cat wasn’t mutilated,’ said Thorne, eyeing him over the top of his glasses. ‘In fact, it was treated in much the same way as Mrs Wright, which brings us to the question of “what”. What was the cause of death? Well, it was highly unusual. That, too, tells us something about our perpetrators, even though what it tells us contradicts the personality markers I’ve just outlined. Because one must say that the killers were unusually gentle with Mrs Wright. She was anaesthetised before she was gassed. Her body, when it was dumped, was not presented so as to shock or offend. She was not sexually interfered with. She was fully clothed. Her dignity in death was maintained. That’s why I believe this was not so much an act against Mrs Wright, but more an attack on what she represented. So, anomalies abound, but nothing’s ever neat, is it?’

The prime minister had given me a verbal whacking when I described Wright’s killers as gentle, so he would have hated Thorne’s description of her death as dignified.

‘Moving on to “when”,’ said Thorne, jolting me from my thoughts. ‘When did the crime occur? Was there anything significant about the time of day, the month, or the year? Well, yes, of course there was. We’re nearly at the end of an election campaign, and two significant actors have been removed from the stage. Clearly, not a coincidence. Clearly, connected to the motivation of the perpetrators, as I’ve said.

‘The next question is “where”. Where was Mrs Wright murdered? If you can answer that, you’ve probably found the killers. And where was she abducted? Another big unknown. The third part of the “where” equation is “Where was she dumped?” That we do know. By the lake, of course. So, did the lake mean something to our killers? Or to Mrs Wright? Well, forgive me if I digress into the language of symbolism here, but, in the absence of firm evidence, it’s as close a reading of these actions as I could come up with. Lakes feature in the mythology of a number of ancient cultures, where they’re generally linked to a transition to death. In Greek mythology, for instance, the god Dionysus descended into the underworld through a lake.’

‘If we’re talking about symbolism,’ said Smeaton, ‘any idea what the cat means?’

Thorne stroked his chin with his thumb and forefinger while he considered the question.

‘The cat clearly had special significance to at least one of the perpetrators,’ he said at last. ‘Perhaps they were telling us that the cat’s life was of equal value to the minister’s. As to your question about symbolism, that’s very interesting. The cat was a symbol of cleverness in some ancient cultures. And cats have always been considered remarkable for their powers of transformation. They have fast-dilating pupils. They’re able to sheath and unsheath their claws at will. And they can turn from a sleepy bundle of fur into a beast that lashes out without conscience. It’s why different cultures have radically different takes on the cat. I mean, it’s an animal that was sacred to the ancient Egyptians, but it’s never been very popular with Buddhists; in their tradition, the cat was the only creature, other than the snake, that failed to cry when the Buddha died.’

Thorne let that one sink in. Then he scanned his notes briefly before removing his glasses. He was coming to the end of his spiel.

‘Finally, there’s the “why” of it,’ he said. ‘What motivated the murderers? Why did they do it? Well, in the end, it could be that they think they’re protecting themselves. Or someone they love. That is, their motive is survival. Their other motivation could be the pursuit of happiness. Happiness achieved through an act of revenge against someone who has harmed them, or their loved ones, in the past. There are any number of permutations to these two motives, but I feel the truth lies with one of them. Or somewhere in between, perhaps. Keep them in mind as you continue your investigation, and they’ll help steer you towards the perpetrators.

‘I’ll put these thoughts and some substantiating materials up on PROMIS. I hope they help you in this important task. Now, are there any other questions?’

No hands went up, so Thorne re-scanned his notes to make sure he’d covered everything. Satisfied, he put the notes back in his briefcase, thanked McHenry, and walked from the room.