Genius Squad (37 page)

According to Hamish, the twins were now scared to emerge from their bedrooms.

‘Trader’s going to flay them alive,’ he announced gleefully. ‘I’m glad
I
wasn’t stupid enough to go.’

‘So they didn’t end up asking him?’ said Cadel, who’d refused to accompany the twins upon discovering that they hadn’t sought permission for their night out at the cinema. (‘Why give Trader a chance to say no?’ had been Lexi’s attitude.)

‘Nope. They didn’t ask anyone.’ Hamish grinned. ‘And now they’re in
big
trouble.’

‘Trader’s got more important things to worry about than those two,’ Judith growled, spooning porridge into a plastic bowl. ‘He won’t even be here this morning.’

‘Why not?’ Cadel inquired. ‘Where is he?’

‘Hanging around the Coroner’s Court. And Cliff ’ll be watching number eleven with Zac. So it’s going to be me in charge of everything.’ Judith jabbed her spoon at Cadel. ‘That’s why I need you to help feed Sonja.
And
get her dressed. You’ve got about an hour before you can start eavesdropping.’

‘Is Dot here?’ Cadel asked.

‘Downstairs.’ Judith shoved the bowl of porridge into his hands, before wiping her own hands on her baggy blue jumper. ‘If you need me, I’ll be kicking a certain pair of slackers out of bed,’ she concluded.

Feeding Sonja wasn’t easy. Sometimes, if her spasms were very bad, two people were required for the job. On this occasion she managed with only one helper – Cadel – but by the time he had fed her and cleaned her up, brushed her hair and teeth, dressed her and wheeled her into the War Room, it was nearly half past eight. He didn’t have a chance to comb his own hair or clean his own teeth before Amy’s computer sprang to life, far away in her downtown office.

From that moment on, Cadel had to keep his ears cocked for any disturbing noises or comments from the GenoME branch. Other people had to fetch him food and drink. He couldn’t even empty his bladder without first appointing a temporary replacement. And when his mobile phone trilled, he had to beg for assistance while he spoke to Saul Greeniaus.

Tony obliged, as Cadel withdrew to a quiet corner.

‘
Just rang to see how you are,
’ the detective announced, through a fuzzy, unstable connection.

‘I’m fine,’ said Cadel. ‘Where are you?’

‘
At the prison
,’ Saul replied.

‘Oh.’

‘
Everything’s under control. You don’t have to worry.
’

Cadel wasn’t so sure about that. ‘Is – is Prosper with you now?’

‘
No
.’ Saul sounded terse and preoccupied. ‘
Is Ms Currey with you?
’

‘Fiona?’

‘
She said she’d drop by to see how you were
.’

Cadel could hardly suppress a groan. He screwed up his face, and clawed at his tangled curls.

Hamish glanced over, mouthing the words:
What’s wrong
?

‘She doesn’t need to drop in,’ said Cadel, trying to keep the edge of desperation out of his voice. ‘I’m fine. Didn’t she tell you? Everything’s fine.’

‘
Well, you can take that up with her.
’ Saul’s tone was noncommittal. ‘
Meanwhile you should stay where you are, and I’ll call you again when I’m done. You’re at Clearview House now, aren’t you?
’

‘Yes.’

‘
Good.
’

‘Saul – I mean, Mr Greeniaus . . .’

‘
You can call me Saul
.’

‘You’re not going to be handcuffed to Prosper, are you?’ Cadel’s dreams the previous night had been laced with this fearful image. ‘You’re not going to be driving in the same car?’

‘
I won’t be anywhere near Prosper English
,’ the detective assured him. ‘
I’m not a prison officer.
’

‘Oh. Okay.’

‘
I’ve gotta go now, Cadel. Say hello to Ms Currey for me. And don’t get yourself all worked up – there’s no need.
’

‘Yes, but . . .’ Cadel wanted to explain why the utmost caution was
vital
when dealing with Prosper English. But he quickly realised how futile such an exercise would be. No one else knew Prosper as well as he did. No one else could really appreciate how much of a threat the man posed. ‘Please be careful,’ was all that he could find to say, in the end. ‘You have to be really, really careful.’

‘
I will. It’s my job
.’

And Saul broke the connection, leaving Cadel to face a barrage of inquiring glances.

Apologetically, he delivered the bad news.

‘Fiona might drop in again,’ he said, and Judith cast her eyes up to the ceiling.

‘Oh, man,’ said Hamish. ‘Just what we need.’

‘Any particular reason?’ Judith wanted to know. ‘For Chrissake, she was only here yesterday.’

‘She must be in love with Cadel,’ Lexi muttered, casting a sly look at Sonja. ‘I guess she’s not the only one.’

‘Don’t be stupid!’ Cadel snapped, but was distracted by Judith’s next question, which concerned the timing of this proposed visit. When exactly could they expect Fiona? Cadel had to confess that he wasn’t sure.

Judith sighed. ‘If we’re expecting your social worker,’ she said, ‘then we should send Sonja upstairs right now. We’ll never get her out of the War Room soon enough, otherwise. There won’t be time once the alarm’s tripped.’

‘But Sonya can’t sit upstairs by herself!’ Cadel objected.

‘Of course not.’ Judith seemed miffed at the very idea. ‘I’ll send Tony with her. And if this woman shows up, Devin can take your place under the earphones. But you’ll have to move like greased lightning – I don’t want a stickybeak from DoCS trailing around the house looking for you.’

Cadel agreed to this plan, since he couldn’t think of an alternative one. And after Sonja had been wheeled into the lift, he spent about an hour listening to clunks and clicks and creaks, interspersed by the occasional outbreak of uninteresting dialogue. If anything was happening at GenoME’s Australian branch, he decided, it certainly wasn’t happening in Jerry’s office. Nor in Amy’s, for that matter. He often heard her yawn and crack her joints between bursts of typing.

She answered the phone only once, to confirm a lunch date.

GenoME’s email traffic was equally tedious. Devin reported messages about interviews, supplies and accounts, but not a single mention of gas-masks, getaway cars or Prosper English. Cliff was no luckier. According to Judith, who had been receiving regular updates, he was in Zac’s van with a piece of Trader’s spyware, measuring vibrations on window-glass. Nothing he’d picked up so far impressed him as the least bit peculiar.

In addition to which, every GenoME staff member was at his or her normal post.

‘They must be using hired goons for the job,’ Hamish observed at one point. This was after Devin had remarked that it seemed to be business as usual at number eleven, judging from the email exchanges. ‘They must want alibis, or something.’

‘But if they’d hired someone, there would be some kind of record,’ Judith objected. ‘I would have found something in the branch accounts.’

‘Maybe the payments are being sent from America,’ said Cadel, drawn into the discussion despite himself. It was hard not to be distracted when so little was happening in Amy’s office. ‘Maybe Carolina has a private account that we don’t know about.’

If there was any kind of response to his proposal, Cadel missed it. Because suddenly the sound of a ringing telephone reached his ears – all the way from Jerry Reinhard’s office. Cadel listened, totally absorbed, as Jerry answered the call. Though he could hear Jerry’s muffled voice, he couldn’t distinguish any actual words. It was Jerry’s abrupt and urgent delivery that worried Cadel.

Normally, Jerry Reinhard spoke in a very soft, deliberate sort of way.

‘I think something’s going on – ’ Cadel began, addressing no one in particular.

Then the alarm buzzed.

There wasn’t a moment to lose. Ripping off the headphones, Cadel leapt to his feet. He didn’t stop to receive orders or ask questions. He didn’t even fling a warning at Judith. He simply charged into the lift at top speed.

When he charged out again, he found himself face to face with Sonja and Tony, who were waiting nervously in the kitchen.

‘You’d better hurry,’ Tony advised. ‘Or she might start peering through windows.’ It was a measure of his apprehensiveness, perhaps, that he had spoken at all – since he rarely ever did.

‘Something’s up at GenoME,’ said Cadel, who was bursting with the news. ‘Jerry’s beginning to freak, over there.’

‘Why?’

‘I dunno why.’ Without pausing to elaborate, Cadel headed for the front door. He pulled it open just as Fiona was about to press the doorbell again.

She looked almost as flushed and dishevelled as Cadel did.

‘Oh!’ She sounded surprised. ‘Hello. Sorry, have I interrupted something?’

‘No.’ Cadel’s reply was too quick, and he secretly cursed himself for it. But Fiona didn’t seem to notice.

‘Well – that’s good,’ she said. ‘So you’re not busy?’

‘Um . . .’ Cadel hesitated. ‘Sort of.’

‘I just wanted to see if you were keeping yourself occupied. Instead of sitting around wondering what’s going on at the Coroner’s Court.’ Fiona squinted over his head, into the murky depths of the house. ‘Is Sonja here?’

‘Yes.’

Fiona nodded. ‘So you’ve got someone to talk to?’

‘Uh-huh.’ Cadel had begun to feel increasingly awkward. He knew that the longer he stood guarding the threshold, the more suspicious his behaviour would appear.

He also knew that if he
did
invite her in, the whole of Genius Squad would throw a collective fit.

‘You don’t have to worry about me,’ he said, trying to inject a cheerful note into his voice. ‘I’ve been doing computer stuff. When I’m on the computer, I completely forget everything else. So I haven’t been thinking about Prosper at all.’

‘You haven’t?’

‘No.’

But Fiona wasn’t convinced. She studied him sceptically, and may have questioned him further if his mobile phone hadn’t rung.

As he answered the call, she stood patiently on the doorstep.

‘Hello?’ he said.

‘
Cadel?
’

‘Yeah.’

‘
It’s Saul
.
Are you still at home?
’

‘I’m at Clearview House, if that’s what you mean.’

‘
Who else is with you?
’

‘Why?’ Cadel’s heart skipped a beat. ‘What’s happened?’

‘
Just answer the question, please!
’

Cadel swallowed. He had never heard the detective speak so urgently before.

‘Uh – Sonja’s with me. And Mr Cheung. And Fiona. She just arrived.’

‘
Put her on
.’

Cadel took a deep breath. ‘Tell me what’s happened first,’ he insisted.

‘
I’ll tell you when I get there. Now put her on.
’

‘You’re coming here?’

‘
PUT HER ON, WILL YOU?!
’

Wide-eyed, Cadel handed the phone to his social worker. He had no doubt that Saul’s outburst and Jerry’s telephone conversation were closely linked. Something had happened. Something
nasty
had happened.

Cadel was desperate to return downstairs.

‘Yes. Okay. No, it’s not a big problem.’ Fiona was gripping the mobile so tightly that her fingers looked bloodless. Nevertheless, she was doing her best to remain calm. ‘All right,’ she said into the mouthpiece. ‘Yes, I will. Of course. Don’t worry.’ She signed off, and passed the phone back to Cadel. ‘Mr Greeniaus will be coming over in about thirty minutes,’ she informed him. ‘I’m supposed to stay until then.’

Cadel couldn’t stop his shoulders from slumping. Bad news was being piled on top of bad news – and he
still
didn’t know what happened. Except that Saul himself was alive.

But what about Prosper English?

‘There’s nothing we can do until we know what’s going on,’ Fiona pointed out, laying a hand on Cadel’s arm. ‘So why don’t we go inside and have a cup of tea, and you can show me that card trick again?’ With a lopsided smile, she added, ‘Who knows? I might even understand it the second time round.’

‘Oh,’ said Cadel. ‘Right. Yes. Okay.’ And he stepped back to let her in.

Because he didn’t really have any choice.

THIRTY-THREE

The next half-hour was torture.

Cadel knew that all hell must be breaking loose downstairs. Yet he had to sit glumly at the kitchen table, drinking orange juice and discussing his legal status with Fiona. At one point Tony left the room for five minutes (to make an urgent phone call, he said) but Cadel wasn’t in a position to ask about this call when Tony returned. He was merely able to deduce, from Tony’s slightly withdrawn expression, that the call had probably been made to Trader, or to Judith. And that the news at the other end of the line had been disturbing.

At last the doorbell rang.

Fiona wouldn’t let Cadel answer it alone. She accompanied him to the door, and was standing beside him when he admitted Saul Greeniaus – who looked terrible. The detective had shed his jacket to reveal a rumpled, sweat-stained shirt and a shoulder holster. His tie was hanging askew. His hair was in disarray, and his eyes were red-rimmed.

He stepped across the threshold briskly, before anyone had the chance to issue a formal invitation.

‘Don’t come near any entry points again,’ he warned Cadel, banging the door shut behind him. ‘Not unless I’m with you. And stay away from the windows too, if you can.’ Glancing towards Fiona, the detective added, ‘We’ll need to draw the curtains. All of them.’

Cadel was examining Saul’s face, which was full of grim lines and dark shadows. It told a very clear and frightening story.

‘Prosper’s escaped, hasn’t he?’ said Cadel. ‘You don’t know where he is.’

For a moment Saul didn’t reply. Seeing him hesitate, Fiona gasped. She covered her mouth with both hands.

Saul’s heavy gaze seemed weighted down with contrition and self-disgust.

‘I’m sorry, Cadel. We blew it.
I
blew it.’ A muscle twitched in his cheek. ‘There’s no excuse for what happened. But we’ll find him.’

‘What
did
happen?’ Cadel inquired, feeling strangely calm. Saul shook his head.