BRUNO PARKS IN THE driveway of Bill Webber’s house as if this is a social visit. It’s the way Pete Reynolds wants to play it. ‘We’re not going to mess him about,’ Reynolds says.
Webber’s file is sparse: an exemplary policing record and nothing wayward around the edges. He was born and bred on the coast. No family or significant other. His emergency contact is a woman called Ruby Fisher, which might be a girlfriend, but Reynolds isn’t sure. ‘I can’t say he’s ever mentioned one.’
Today, Webber’s place looks shut up tight.
To be sure, Reynolds pounds on the door. ‘Knock-knock,’ he yells.
After a minute, he heads back to the car. ‘No dice.’
‘Come on,’ says Bruno. ‘I’ve got an errand to run. Let’s come back.’
The errand is a call to Amy Owens from a phone box around the corner.
She doesn’t pick up.
Bruno talks to her answering machine instead. ‘Mike Nichols is sitting in an interview room upstairs at Surfers Paradise Station House. He’s fine, but he’s alone. Maybe you want to send a lawyer down. Call me back.’
He can’t say what he wants to say. He can’t make that recording. I did your bidding, now turn over the information you’re sitting on. Just the call itself—plain and simple—is a violation of the code. There’s nothing hazy about it. Colleen Vinton asked and he answered. It’s the first properly crooked thing Bruno has ever done on the job, and by Bruno’s way of thinking, a little is the same as a lot.
I’m corrupt now.
Back in the car, Reynolds tells him they’re going for a drive.
‘Whereabouts?’
‘Southport. You’re going to like this.’ Reynolds turns out onto the highway and heads north. ‘While you were on the phone, I radioed in Bill’s emergency contact, this Ruby Fisher. She lives on Falconer Street.’
‘I don’t know it.’
‘Have a look,’ Reynolds says, tapping the street directory on the bench between them.
The directory is open. The map looks familiar.
‘Oh shit,’ says Bruno.
Falconer is two streets south of Pohlman, five minutes’ walk from the O’Grady crime scene.
‘It’s not looking good for Bill,’ says Bruno.
Ruby Fisher yells at the two of them through the screen door of her house. ‘What do you want?’
They can’t see her. She’s just a voice echoing out.
‘We’re police. We work with Bill,’ says Reynolds.
A woman shuffles into view. She’s a white lady in her late forties, dressed in baggy cream capri pants and a blue striped shirt. ‘Sorry, sorry. I thought you were the Mormons. Is Bill all right?’
‘He’s fine,’ says Reynolds. ‘We’re just doing the rounds looking for him.’
Ruby invites them in. As Reynolds quizzes her on Bill and his whereabouts, Bruno scans the living room and kitchen. There’s a framed picture of Bill on the wall by the back patio doors. He looks young in the shot, Ruby with her arm around him. Across the room, Bruno can hear the woman explaining, ‘That’s right. He came to live here when he was six. Ronnie and I couldn’t have kids of our own and we figured adopting him would be near enough. His parents were killed in a robbery. Some nutjob broke in and tried to rob them and ended up killing them both. They found Bill hiding in a closet. That’s all I know about it. All I want to know.’
‘Is Ronnie your husband, ma’am?’
‘That’s right. He’s at temple. What’s this about?’
Reynolds spins her some yarn about Webber being off-duty and needing him back at the office. ‘If you see Bill, can you get him to call me? I’ll give you my card.’
‘He hasn’t done anything wrong, has he?’
‘No, ma’am. We’re just trying to track him down.’
Bruno searches other photos nearby.
Ruby and Ronnie on holidays.
Ruby, Ronnie and Bill at a rollerskating rink.
On the kitchen wall, taped beside a calendar is a faded polaroid of Bill and another kid. ‘Who’s this?’ says Bruno.
Ruby peers over. ‘Oh, that.’ She comes round the kitchen bench. ‘Let me see. That’s Bill and Sunny.’
‘Who’s he?’
‘A kid from the neighbourhood.’
‘Can I keep this?’
‘I love that photo of Bill. He never smiles like that. Will you bring it back?’
‘I think we can handle that,’ says Reynolds. ‘You can report it stolen if we don’t.’
The woman isn’t sold.
‘I’m from the Robbery Squad,’ says Reynolds. ‘I’ll be the guy who picks up the phone.’
She lets them take it.