The Delta Chain (16 page)

‘You flew a photojournalist over the Glades about two years back. He was looking for the boat that belonged to those hunters.’

Jensen nodded. ‘The guy that got taken by the ‘Gators…’ Jensen’s memory of the flight and of Kevin Farrow was vague. ‘He took quite a few pics…’ Jensen recalled being questioned by the police after the death, but there hadn’t been anything special he’d remembered.

Hank wasn’t sure why he’d bothered meeting Jensen. Then he reminded himself, as he had at various times throughout his career, that doing the legwork was part and parcel of investigative journalism. Following the trail, no matter how cold, looking under every rock and into every nook and cranny – somewhere there was a piece of the story that had been missed. He’d already talked with the detectives and read the case files. Maybe the warmth he sought along this cold trail didn’t rely on finding the missing photo – maybe it lay with what had become of the alligator gang.

‘What do you think happened to those hunters?’

‘Well, truth is this is a popular place. It’s become increasingly well travelled and visited. You can’t go hunting ‘gators, or anything else for that matter, without attracting attention sooner or later. No matter how organised you are.’

‘So you think, once the search escalated, these hunters decided to move on?’

‘Yeah. Once they’d killed that reporter the park was swarming with cops. They sent out fleets of choppers, and those dudes have sophisticated binoculars, heat seeking equipment, all sorts of shit.’ Jensen was chewing furiously on the gum and Hank found it distracting. He made a mental effort to look Jensen straight in the eyes to avoid the rolling jaw. ‘So I figure if they’re still in business they’ve moved somewhere more remote.’

If they’re still in business, Hank thought.

‘It’s not something you hear a lot about,’ said Hank, ‘this illegal alligator hunting. Do you know what kind of black market there is for these ‘gator skins?’

Chuck Jensen’s cheeks reddened. ‘Don’t get me started on that. Over in the third world countries there’s a roaring trade for our reptile skins, for all kinds of animal hide actually.’

Hank thanked Jensen for his time and got up to leave. ‘I read in the reports that you believed Kevin Farrow intended to send his roll of film straight into the newspaper.’

‘Did I? Don’t remember any details now, but yeah, he probably said something like that. I seem to recall he was a talkative type, very passionate about what he was doing. I liked that. I had no idea, though, he intended to go off backpackin’ to try and spot that boat.’

Jensen stood up and ambled, with Hank, to the door of his cluttered office.

‘Many of your clients take photos from the air?’

‘Sure.’

‘I know it’s unlikely these days, but do you get many who still use the old pre-digital cameras?’

‘Not many now. Why?’

‘Who would they use locally to develop film?’

‘There’s still a few places left in the city. Carroll and McMasters are good.’

A late thought occurred to Hank. ‘Did Kevin ask you who was good for enlargements, cropping, that kind of thing?’ Hank hadn’t seen anything in the police reports about investigating local photographic services firms.

‘Not that I recall.’

‘But it could have come up?’

‘I guess it could’ve. You thinking the boy sent his photo somewhere local?’

‘Just a thought,’ said Hank.

Jensen shrugged. ‘Why would he do that? He had his own photo mob back at his paper to handle enlargements and all that crap.’

‘Because people don’t always do what we expect them to do.’ Hank thanked Jensen a second time and they shook hands firmly.

Hank had phoned and introduced himself to Bob Sheckley, editor of the Everglades City Herald-Tribune, and Sheckley agreed to loan him a desk and a PC for a day. Sheckley was a workaholic who spent fourteen hours a day at the office, six days a week, smoked three packets of cigarettes a day and had a voice like gravel to prove it. ‘Just don’t go telling any other retired newsies about this,’ he’d said to Hank over the phone, ‘don’t want this place turning into a blasted nursing home for old codgers with ink in their veins.’

Another man might have been offended but Hank laughed. With his gravely tones, Sheckley hadn’t sounded all that much younger than Hank – and now, as Hank entered the newspaper offices and met the editor, he saw that Sheckley was late fifties and looked every day of it. 'Oh yeah,’ Sheckley said, ‘Mendelsohn – like the classical muso, right?’

Hank smiled. ‘Yes, but still alive.’

Sheckley roared with laughter, then got straight down to business. ‘Good. A sense of humour. My secretary will show you the spare desk, that is if she can find it amongst all that shit out there.’

Once he’d settled and switched on the computer, Hank entered the access number for AT&T and then the code for entering GNNS, the Global News Network Service. GNNS was a database created by a consortium of the international news agencies. It was subscribed to by news organisations all over the world. It contained hundreds of thousands of articles from newspapers and magazines and industry journals, all grouped under specific headings. Most importantly, the database had its own search engine, operating on the use of key words or terms.

Hank entered the terms ALLIGATOR HUNTING and ILLEGAL REPTILE HUNTING and set a time frame parameter of the past five years. To his surprise, a list of hundreds of article headings, their source and the date of their publication, appeared on the screen. At a glance he could see a large number were from South Africa and India. It was quite possible his search would need to include those countries, but for the purpose of getting started he wanted to simplify the parameters further. He typed in the instruction LIST ALL WITH THE EXCEPTION OF SOUTH AFRICA AND INDIA. Within seconds the list on the screen altered accordingly.

He thought of Chuck Jensen’s words ‘…I figure if they’re still in business they moved somewhere more remote.’ Hank clicked on to one of the articles, two years earlier, from the Everglades City Herald-Tribune. He read through this and several follow up pieces, acquainting himself with aspects of the sightings: ‘…a sleek river cruiser with an on-deck alligator holding pen, a boat that seemed able to appear and disappear with ease…’

Next, he read through selected articles from Baja and South America, the nearest and most logical places, in his opinion, to attract a gang of alligator hunters. There were reports of isolated incidents but nothing suggesting any link with the Everglades gang. He decided the best approach was to start at the head of the list, countries starting with A. He noted there were several entries from Australia, from the State of Queensland and the region called the Northern Territory, all from between six to eighteen months previous.

Hank clicked on to the first of these, an article in the Northern Territory News. He felt a flicker of excitement that began building steadily as he read. The article told of two unconfirmed sightings, one by an Aboriginal tribesman, the other sighting by a local ranger, of a sleek craft hoisting a crocodile on board with the use of a mechanised winch. Subsequent investigation teams despatched to the area could find no sign of the boat.

Australian crocodiles. They were a different species to the North American alligator, but part of the same reptilian family. They were of similar value to a professional hunter, dealing skins on the international black market.

He scrolled through the article again, re-reading key passages, then clicked on the next article, and the next. He had no doubt he’d discovered the place to which the phantom hunters had moved. He picked up the phone and dialled Jean’s number. She answered on the third ring.

‘Jean, it’s Hank. You’re not going to believe this.’

‘What? What is it?’

‘I believe I may have found where those hunters went,’ he said.

Hank’s next call was to the international telephone exchange, for information on phone numbers in Australia. He wanted to talk to the relevant authorities in the Northern Territory. It was the middle of the night in Australia so he’d have to wait until much later to place his calls. For the moment, he’d track down and make sure he had the right numbers.

Once he had those, Hank turned his attention to the issue of Kevin Farrow’s missing photograph. Flipping through the local directory, he saw there were only a few specialist photographic services firms. It was a dying trade. Carroll and McMasters, the company Jensen had mentioned, had a large ad in the directory.

He decided it was as good a place as any to start and placed the call.

‘I’m trying to track down a photo that may have been left for enlargement two years ago.’

The female voice on the other end of the line was crisp, professional and, Hank detected, a tad disinterested. ‘Your name?’ she asked.

‘I wasn’t the one who left the photo. The person’s name was Farrow. Kevin Farrow.’

‘Could you spell that, please?’

Hank held back his sigh of frustration. ‘F-A-R-R-O-W.’

‘Let me check on the computer for undelivered jobs.’

Hank tapped his fingers on the desk as he waited. It seemed a long wait- and then: ‘I don’t have anything listed under the name Farrow, sir. And for anything that far back we would’ve tracked down the customer anyway. Would you like me to check our archives?’

‘Archives?’

‘Photos for which we don’t appear to have a name or a forwarding address. I could have someone check the period you stated.’

‘Yes, please.’

‘What is this a photograph of?’

‘An aerial shot of a boat.’

‘Okay, I’ve made a note of that. I could give you a call back in an hour or two, as soon as a lab assistant is free to make a search.’

Hank thanked her and then phoned the other photo service firms in the directory. In each case he left his name and number, asking the firms to check for an unclaimed enlargement of a boat on a river.

Hank knew it was a hell of a long shot. But there was logic at the core of his search: if Kevin had left the picture with a firm before heading off to the Everglades, then the enlargement could still be sitting somewhere, in a file. Even if it had been discarded after being unclaimed, the negative could have been stored. What didn’t make sense was that Kevin hadn’t, perhaps, left his name and contact details.

When the answer came it was perhaps so incredibly simple as to be obvious.

After making the calls, Hank took a break and poured himself a coffee in the newsroom kitchen. The return call from a guy named Gary at Carroll and McMasters came through as he seated himself back at his desk. ‘Have a photo enlargement here, sir, that you enquired about. Aerial shot of a very nice river cruiser.’

‘Any idea who it belongs to?’ Hank asked.

‘No, sir. There does appear to have been one of our usual labels attached to the file, that would’ve had that information, but it must’ve been faulty and slipped off. And clearly the customer hasn’t been back to collect.’

It has to be the one, Hank thought. ‘I’d like to come across and take a look.’

‘Sir, there is an outstanding bill associated with this order.’

‘I’ll fix that up. ‘

‘Very well, sir. I’ll have it waiting for you at the front desk.’

Hank hurried out of the newsroom. A moment later, cursing his own stupidity, he returned to the desk, jotted down Carroll and McMasters address on a post-it note, then hurried from the newsroom once more.

Kate found her mother in the room that once belonged to Greg and which was now a guest room. Roslyn Kovacs stood at the built-in alcove bench that served as part desk, part mantelpiece. Family photos of Greg adorned a portion of the bench. In her hands Roslyn held an illustrated plate that had long been a fixture in the small room, a picture of Jesus assisting the weak and oppressed.

Kate’s hand came to rest on her mother’s shoulder and her mother’s fingers reached back and interlocked with those of her daughter. ‘I believe that in the end, the Lord was with Greg’s spirit to help him through those final moments,’ Roslyn said. With her other hand she brushed away a tear. She turned and looked into Kate’s eyes. ‘You’ve drifted from the church, haven’t you?’

‘It’s just that I‘ve been so busy, Mum.’

‘That seems to be the modern man and woman’s answer to everything in life nowadays. Everyone is so busy all the time.’ She took both of Kate’s hands in hers. ‘Your father and I tried to instil a sense of faith and what is right in all of you children.’

‘I know that, Mum.’

‘Don’t drift too far, Kate. In the end our souls travel to a good place or a bad place and we need guidance. Deep down you know that, don’t you?’

‘Deep down I know it, Mum.’

Adam felt a lump in his throat and a deep, restless sorrow for what he knew Kate was now feeling. He knew, because he’d experienced exactly this with Alana’s death. He recalled words he’d encountered recently: ‘Sometimes coincidence plays cruel tricks on our lives.’ Where had he read that? Probably one of those pop psychology articles in the Sunday papers. And yet there was an uncanny, bitter truth to those words. Long ago his sister had drowned and now the most baffling case he’d encountered as a detective involved three drownings – reminding him every minute he worked on it of Alana’s death. And having lost his sister he could empathise with Kate’s loss of her brother. Coincidence playing cruel tricks?

Adam was staying in one of the guest rooms at Kate’s parents’ home in the beachside suburb of Cronulla, south of Sydney. He wanted to stay on, remaining close to Kate through this difficult time, but she insisted he return to his work in Northern Rocks after the funeral. The funeral was scheduled for the day after tomorrow.

On the flight to Sydney he’d sat with Kate and she’d avoided the subject of her brother’s murder. She’d told him more about her readings of Rhonda Lagan’s diary, and the council plans she’d obtained. She explained about the discrepancy, with the council approved plans including a rear docking area and a private road leading to the dock. There was an unused, dirt road running through the forest from a point further along on the main road. But the rear dock was unused and there was no lower level. And yet Rhonda’s suspicions seemed to infer secretive, after hours activity in that area.