Dirty Weekend (19 page)

Pulling the Richardson folder closer, I leafed through it, pausing at a clipping from a recent edition of
Police News
complete with candid photo taken at a Christmas party. I read how Earl Richardson had thrown a shindig at Balmain Leagues Club for some of his erstwhile colleagues in the police; the close-up shot of Earl showed him as a jovial host, holding a schooner of beer aloft.

‘I used that photo in the first twenty-four hours or so,’ said Brian, ‘until I had a better shot. Showed it round the street but no one had seen him the day Tianna was murdered.’

I looked closer at a blonde woman behind Earl in the picture and recognised her. ‘That’s the bereavement counsellor,’ I said, pointing her out to Brian.

He nodded. ‘I remember her. She was at the funeral.’

‘I wonder why you’d need a bereavement counsellor
before
your wife’s death,’ I said.

‘She’s associated with the Glebe morgue,’ Brian said, flipping through his notes on Jason Richardson, sorting them into some sort of order. ‘What do
you
make of young Jason?’ he asked.

‘He’s a lost soul leading an aimless life,’ I said, leaning back in my chair as I considered the young man who’d just left.

‘Do you think he’s a killer?’

‘You should be asking my brother that, not me,’ I replied.

‘Come on, Jack. You’ve been around longer than me. What’s your gut feeling?’

‘Jason’s the sort of kid who often ends up involved in criminal matters,’ I said, looking through the crime scene photographs. ‘Raised by a grandparent, few ties to the community, no girlfriend, a loner, on the road a lot, unemployed—he’s not on a good trajectory. You’d have to ask how he supports himself moving around like that.’

‘He reckons he’s on an extended working holiday,’ said Brian, ‘but he was very vague on names and places. Bit of bar work, fruit-picking, that sort of thing.’

‘He could hate Tianna for taking his mother’s place,’ I said. ‘I’d like to talk to the grandmother, find out a bit about his background.’ I wrote down her address on Sparrows Ridge Road some fifty kilometres from Heronvale out in the high country that surrounds the nation’s capital. Then I stood up to leave. Brian accompanied me, grabbing a drink of water from a cooler near the foyer.

‘He reminds me of someone,’ I said, pushing the door open, searching my memory. ‘That long blond hair and the surfboard on the top.’

‘Me too,’ said Brian. ‘Martin Bryant.’

The best thing to do when an emotional issue was pressing hard, I’d always found, was to swamp the brain with work and push the issue right out of the picture. Genevieve used to call me cold and heartless but my technique of pushing suffering away became a survival habit when I was growing up and a great asset in our marriage. So, although my heart was heavy with the way things were between Iona and me, and my memory filled with the primal vision of last night, I continued on to work, planning my speech to Sofia Verstoek in case we should bump into each other along any of the alleyways of Forensic Services.

When I got to the office, I looked through the manila folders containing the enhanced and enlarged photographs of the soles of the boots Damien Henshaw admitted to leaving at Tianna Richardson’s house. Next to these, in a separate sleeve, were the enlargements of the partial bootprint left in the soft dust near the murdered body of Tianna Richardson. I compared the images with the naked eye. It looked very promising, with similarities between the actual boot sole and its negative imprint. To take my mind off both Iona and the Brazilian, I unlocked the boots from the exhibit locker and readied myself for work in one of the examination rooms.

An hour later, after a thorough examination of the boots, I had no doubts. The bootprint we’d found at the crime scene was a faithful reproduction of the left boot of the pair we’d found at Tianna’s place. Again I went over the details, the fine cracks and scrape marks on the rubberised sole and their counterparts pressed into the soil in the photographic enlargements. In court I could say on oath that
this
print came from the sole of
that
boot, and I’d demonstrate my certainty with dozens of matching points.

But what really clinched it for me, and was highly likely to do the same for a jury, was what I found in the grooves of the soles of both boots. I dug this out carefully and bagged it. I’d give them to one of the other analysts for comparison with the other samples, and that way we’d have independent findings to present to a court. But I had no doubt at all what the results would be.

Then I cleaned up again, wrote up my findings so far, made a few phone calls—including one to Kevin Waites, confirming today would be suitable to meet at the Ag Station—then called Brian.

I picked up Brian from the station and we dropped round to the address where Damien Henshaw had said he was working. No one was there so we drove to his place and walked through long grass to knock on the door. In my right hand I held a large carry bag. A young woman in jeans and tank-top opened the door and let us in like a lamb, introducing herself as Kylie. I found myself wondering if Damien’s fiancée had a Brazilian.

‘Hey, Damo!’ she yelled as I took in the room. ‘Someone to see you.’

Immediately, I recognised her for a cleanskin; she hadn’t picked up on who we might be, nor Brian’s profession.

A collection of beer cans and liquor bottles were displayed around the old-fashioned picture rail, posters of polished popular singers hung on the wall and cushions were piled around the floor in front of a still warm open fireplace. Several ashtrays, whose contents I felt sure could prove interesting, completed the decor. A small kitchenette was attached, piled with unwashed dishes and pots. A cold breeze came through the louvres that formed its window.

Moments later, Damien walked in, hair sticking up all over his head, tousled from sleep. As soon as he saw us, he was immediately alert and hostile, shooting a look at Kylie, who hovered in the doorway of the hall leading towards the bedrooms before disappearing.

She reappeared a few minutes later with her mobile phone and her gleaming brown hair tied back in black velvet ribbon. ‘Got some shopping to do,’ she said cheerfully and, waving to us all, she left the house.

Damien Henshaw’s wary eyes panned between me and Brian.

‘Dr McCain wants a word with you, Damien,’ said Brian, eyebrows high, manner mild. ‘He’s found something that he thinks you might be able to help him with.’

Although what I was about to do wasn’t strictly by the book, I’d always believed that good drama shouldn’t only happen in the courtroom. On several occasions back in the state police, I’d seen confessions happen after some particularly interesting theatre.

I lifted up the carry bag and put it on a low coffee table, pushing aside several unwashed glasses. Then, drawing out his bagged boots, I said, ‘Damien, these are the work boots we found at Mrs Richardson’s place—your boots, the ones you wanted to pick up when Detective Kruger and I were at Kincaid Street.’

‘Can I have them now?’ His question seemed guileless enough.

‘Unfortunately, no,’ said Brian. ‘Dr McCain will need them for some time yet.’

‘How long?’

I pulled out the photographic impressions of the left sole, which I’d printed off slightly enlarged for better visibility.

‘Damien,’ I said, ‘that’s what the bottom of the left sole of your work boot looks like.’

He knew something bad was in the offing but didn’t know yet how bad. He seemed to diminish, to pull himself back as if waiting behind his defences to see what might happen next.

‘So?’ But his manner was no longer the careless, take-it-or-leave-it of our last encounter.

‘If you look closely, you’ll see where I’ve drawn little white arrows—lots of them—to demonstrate all the areas of abrasion and individual scrape marks.’ I paused, watching his face carefully as I drew out my second photographic impression. ‘And this is the photograph of a footprint—a bootprint rather—that Detective Kruger and I found a couple of metres from the body of Tianna Richardson. In the car park of the Blackspot Nightclub.’

I held them up together.

‘Snap!’ Brian called.

Damien Henshaw’s eyes darted from one photo to the other. ‘But there are thousands of boots like that!’ he said. ‘All my mates wear these work boots. It could be anybody’s bloody boot!’

I shook my head, as if in disappointment. ‘Damien,’ I said, deciding to help him a bit, ‘you don’t get it. There are tens of thousands of this sort of work boot in circulation. But only
you
have worn these particular boots in a certain way. With this sort of evidence, it’s not the soleprint—as you say, they’re
almost
identical with thousands of others. I say “almost” because there are always tiny irregularities that show up at high magnification. But as well as those microscopic differences, only
you
have scraped them on this or that sharp object and left a little mark in just that place.’ I pointed to the first photograph and its enlargement of one small jagged tear on the sole of the boot. ‘Which in turn,’ here I pointed to the second photograph, ‘leaves a perfect negative imprint of itself, just like the stamps your teacher used to give you in kindergarten.’

I paused to let it sink in, then said, ‘Your boot,’ and, pointing from the first photo to the second, ‘your bootprint.’

I watched his face closely, reading puzzlement, then frowning disbelief.

‘
Every sole is an individual,’ Brian was saying. ‘It’s like a fingerprint.’

‘You’re lying! You’re just making it up to frighten me!’

‘We don’t have to make anything up, Damien. And neither Detective Kruger nor myself have to lie.’ I tapped on the two photographs. ‘This bootprint is a silent witness. Evidence that cannot lie. That cannot perjure itself.’ Locard had added a caveat after these words, but I didn’t quote it just then. Instead I placed the two photographs down beside the bag on the coffee table.

‘Well?’ Brian asked. ‘You’ve heard what Dr McCain’s just told you. Have you anything to say to us?’

‘What we need to know, Damien, is how come your bootprint got to be there? Just a little distance from the murdered body of a woman you’ve been screwing?’ I added, in a very matter-of-fact tone.

Damien Henshaw had been rendered speechless. I’d seen this a couple of times before and a couple of times it has happened to me. I knew from my own experience in moments of shock how the brain scrambled to make sense of incomprehensible data. But I couldn’t speak for him. This could be the shock of the innocent person when confronted with some appalling accusation. But, equally, he could have been rendered speechless at how we’d tracked him back to his crime. I knew I needed to keep an open mind. Many years ago, when a young detective, I’d confronted a suspect with footprint evidence, telling him we’d found his bootprint outside the victim’s bedroom window. The man had hanged himself in prison that night. A clear admission of guilt, everyone said. I wasn’t so sure. Because I hadn’t yet scrutinised his boots. That case still haunted me and now it was being brought to life again by the similarities with some of the evidence we were building up against Damien Henshaw. Later, when I
had
examined the hanged man’s boots .
 
.
 
.

I stopped myself in my tracks with that one and swung my attention back to the moment. I looked hard at Damien Henshaw. Right now, was he running through a series of plausible lies? Lies that might get him out of this? Or was he completely devastated by evidence he had no way of disputing? I didn’t know, but I was determined to keep up the pressure.

‘How did you do it, Damien?’ Brian said. ‘And why did you kill her?’

I saw the colour rush back into his face. ‘You can’t do this! Just rock round to my place like this and start accusing me of murdering people!’

‘You haven’t heard the worst of it yet,’ Brian said.

Damien Henshaw’s panic-stricken eyes darted from me to Brian, from the photographs back to us.

‘How is it that in the grooves of those boots,’ I said, tapping the first photograph, ‘I found coarse grey sand particles? How do you explain that the only other place I’ve found that coarse grey sand is deep in the wounds of two murdered people?’

‘Two people?’ he shouted. ‘What are you talking about? You can’t accuse me like this!’

‘We’re not accusing you of murder—
yet
,’ Brian said. ‘We want to know if you have some sort of explanation. We want to hear your side of things. This is your
chance
.’ Brian made it sound as if Damien was in the running for some sort of prize.

But Damien, hunched forward, head in his hands, kept slowly shaking his head. ‘I can’t believe this,’ he said, over and over.

‘How come?’ Brian said, keeping the pressure up. ‘How come your bootprint turns up in dust at the Blackspot? And how come Dr McCain finds the same grey sand in your boots that the pathologist found on the bodies of
two
murder victims?’

‘Two murder victims! What are you talking about? It’s not possible! I wasn’t there! I was at the pub. I told you. You can ask Kylie and the others.’

‘Maybe you were,’ said Brian. ‘But you weren’t there all night. That pub shuts at midnight.’

I was aware of the front door opening and Kylie suddenly arrived back in the room, carrying some groceries. Her smile faded. She didn’t know exactly what was going on, but she knew it wasn’t good.

‘What’s happening?

‘Tell them, Kylie,’ said Damien. ‘Tell them that I was at the pub the night that woman was killed. And then I went to your place.’

Kylie stood frozen. After a few moments she lowered the shopping to the floor and straightened up again, finally taking in the situation.

‘Are you the police?’

Brian flashed his badge. She barely glanced at it.

‘Tell them, Kylie,’ Damien repeated. ‘Tell them how I was with you that night.’

‘Yes!’ she shouted, matching his emotion. ‘He was! He was at the pub with us all and then later he came back to my place—’ Her speech faltered, the aspect of her face subtly altered as she raised her hand then dropped it.

‘
Tell them
!’ Damien’s voice was desperate.

Brian and I watched as a silent subterranean drama played out between the two young people. ‘He was with me that night,’ she said, repeating Damien’s words in a flat voice. Then she turned and, almost tripping over the bags of groceries, went to the front door. She wrenched it open.

‘Kylie?’ Brian’s voice halted her mid-step. ‘Has Damien told you about Karen Fleiss?’

In the small living room, the atmosphere almost crackled. I shot a look at my colleague. Who the hell was Karen Fleiss and why hadn’t he told
me
about her?

‘Who?’ asked Kylie, giving words to my own question, looking from her boyfriend to us, then back again. All the while Damien stayed slumped in his seat, slowly shaking his head.

‘Why don’t you tell her, Damien?’ Brian persisted. ‘She’s your girlfriend, sorry,
fiancée.
She has a right to know what you did. Karen was your girlfriend too, once, wasn’t she?’

‘What are they talking about, Damien?’ Kylie’s voice was a whisper as she went over to her boyfriend. ‘
Tell me.
Who are they talking about?’ she said, voice rising.

‘I think you should tell her,’ Brian continued, glancing my way.

‘It’s none of your fucking business!’ Damien shouted, agitated. ‘It’s none of anyone’s bloody business. I was acquitted!’

‘Acquitted?’ Kylie was standing in front of him, hands on her hips. ‘What did you
do
?’

‘I didn’t do anything! This stupid bitch reckoned I’d raped her. The police charged me. I had to go to court. And it was thrown out. That’s all there is.’

‘Seems like Damien’s not going to tell you the whole story. So I will,’ said Brian, looking from Kylie to me and then back to Damien. ‘Some time back, a girl called Karen Fleiss was found wandering naked and hysterical on the roadway near where she lived. She said Damien Henshaw, who was then sixteen, had offered her a drink and smoked some dope with her in a disused house on the building estate where they lived. When he put the hard word on her, she said no. She was
fifteen.
He raped her.’

‘She
said
!’ Damien yelled. ‘It wasn’t rape. She was too scared to go home when it got late. She said her father would belt her. So she made up this fucking lie about some rape or something.’