The Naked Room (16 page)

For a moment, it looked as though she would accept, but suddenly she glanced over my shoulder and stiffened. As I turned to see what had attracted her attention, she jumped up from her seat. ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Prescott, I’ve just seen someone I know. Are you finished?’ she asked distractedly, gathering up her handbag.

‘Er, yes, but I need your—’Eloise bolted out the door, ‘—address.’

Left with my mouth open and feeling foolish, I stood up and hurried to the front of the café, but there was no sign of her. Cursing myself for being sluggish on the uptake, I returned to the table and stuffed my notes into my briefcase, picked up my handbag and left the café.

At least I had obtained more information for Townsville CIB. No one could hide that well for over eighteen months. The crew of the island ferry, trawlers, pleasure boats, and fishermen moored off the island. Someone, somewhere, knew the man’s name and where he had come from. I would catch up with Eloise Carpenter again very shortly.

As I walked to my car, depression descended again. My cold raged and I was about to override all my principles, the code I followed throughout my law enforcement career. I was going to conceal something which, if discovered, could actually compromise the case and get me severely reprimanded.

If my husband’s final investigations yielded what we suspected, then I had just been having coffee with my sister-in-law.

CHAPTER 25

On The Mountain

Eloise

Wednesday: 12.15am.

I pushed the car through the traffic as fast as I dared, slipping through amber lights, dodging jay-walking pedestrians and zipping recklessly past delivery vans. Three cars ahead, the small nondescript, silver something-or-other ploughed on.

I enjoyed having coffee with the always professional Senior Sergeant. Apart from when she was asking questions about Georgie and a possible lover, she was friendly and chatty. It was time out from fear, sort of. Under other circumstances we could have been friends, but she is a policewoman. She’s so good at making people want to spill their innermost secrets that I almost blurted out the truth about Ally’s abduction. But she would take charge. It’s her job and Ally’s already in terrible danger.

Susan Prescott’s mouth dropped open as I bolted from the café. I was sure I had seen Georgie’s lover drive past going toward the city. I had forgotten to mention the man’s square, bullish head. His image was fresh in my mind because I’d just been talking about him, and of course I saw him from only a few feet away the night he visited Georgie, but I would stake my life on it being him.

We crossed the William Jolly Bridge and set course for the northern suburbs. Mine was the third car back, but the cars in front of me peeled off at the next lights, so the small Mazda sedan was right in front of me. I could just see the odd shape of the driver’s head and the top half of his female passenger’s. She kept turning toward him; occasionally he would turn to look at her. Had he ever seen me with Georgie on the island? I know there were photos of us together in her house, so he might recognise me. I was determined not to let that creature get away without discovering his lair. Whether or not he was somehow connected to Georgie’s death, I had to know what he was doing in Brisbane. And so help me God I would somehow have him killed, if he was the one who had taken Ally. James would find a way.

I reached over to the back seat and grabbed my new sun hat, clapped it on my head, fumbled in my handbag for my sunglasses, then tipped the car’s sun visor down hoping it would hide me. My shoulders were hunched and stiff with tension, my hands locked in a death-grip on the steering-wheel.

The car phone rang, almost causing me to jump out of my skin. I had never been in a vehicle which had one as part of the normal equipment. My caller was James. Despite the fact that it’s illegal to talk on the phone whilst driving, I had to take a chance on the police catching me.

His voice was a cheep which broke up as I passed through mobile dead spots.

‘Eloise? Where are you? I…ring you at Pam’s place… no answer…where…coming back…’

Keeping my eyes on the car ahead, I screamed back, trying to talk like a ventriloquist so no one would see my lips moving and know I was on the phone.

‘I’m following a man I think is Georgie’s lover! ‘

‘Whaaaat? I can’t…you!’

‘I thought I saw Georgie’s lover.’ My voice wobbled perilously.’ You know, my friend who was murdered?’

His voice finally came through, loud and clear, nearly blasting my ears off. ‘Where was he?’

‘In the West End. This morning I met Detective Senior Sergeant Prescott at a café just down from Pam’s place. She asked me all sorts of questions about Georgie.’

I struggled to concentrate as tears welled up in my eyes. No matter what, I had to keep the other car in sight. Another driver cut in ahead of me. The small silver sedan sped up. Has he realised he’s being followed?

‘Go on!’ James shouted into the momentary pause, as I slowed behind the car in front.

‘She asked me if I knew anything about Georgie. Who she was sleeping with or who might have it in for her,’ I explained. The silver car was pulling far ahead. We were passing through an outer suburb and I swerved to miss a pedestrian who turned to give me the evil eye. In a burst of frustration and rage, I actually gave him the forks.

We cleared the tiny local shopping centre and the car in front turned off into a side road. I was immediately behind the silver vehicle again. Would he realise he was being followed? And if he did, then what would I do? As I drove, I filled James in on what had transpired in the café and when I told him I had almost confided in the Senior Sergeant, he was adamant and exhorted me not to give in.

The reception started breaking up as we reached the foothills.

‘What’s he doing now?’ asked James.

‘Nothing, just driving…I’m still a few cars behind him. How did the eBay buying go?’

‘Well,’ he replied dryly, ‘I could shower you with diamond rings, priceless paintings which aren’t at all our taste.’

‘Uh oh, he’s turning off and stopping! I’ll have to keep going!’

‘El!…Eloise…wa—
’ I’d lost James’s voice for good this time.

I swept past the silver sedan, peering at my quarry out of the corner of my eye as I drew level with his car window, then flicked my eyes to the left and back to the front as he turned his head to glance at me. I caught a fleeting glimpse of him and his passenger’s face as I drove. He was wearing sunglasses and looked reasonably innocuous, but I would recognise him again. His passenger certainly would know me, but the Lexus’ tinted windows may well have obstructed her view. I drove steadily into the mountains, not daring to turn around, sick at heart and ready to collapse.

Then I almost “blew it.” Suddenly the little car appeared, only a few hundred metres behind me. My legs started to shake again; my heart pounded. He had to know I was following him or was he simply moving over to let my car pass? The Lexus was faster than the Mazda; maybe he was a courteous driver. A mad snort of laughter burst out of me, but my hands trembled on the wheel as I realised my immediate predicament. Had the hunter become the hunted?

I drove on, looking for somewhere to turn off and hide. In the movies the heroine escapes or finds a place to park in the city when she needs it. I didn’t have the nerve to duck down a driveway. What if the owners were at home? I could always pretend I was lost, but if the place I chose belonged to him, the outcome didn’t bear thinking about.

I might have to drive the long way home across the mountain range, around the big dam and through provincial towns to get back to the city. ‘Keep focused, don’t panic. You can do it!’

I had been sitting bolt upright clinging to the wheel like a little old lady; I made a conscious effort to relax my shoulders and neck. What to do, which way to go? Perspiration trickled down between my breasts; now I wanted to go to the loo. The car behind me was inexorably closing the distance. In my rear vision mirror I could see them sitting side by side, their very immobility menacingly purposeful.

Talking to myself kept me calm. ‘They might not know who you are, after all, this is a Lexus and you never drive anything this glamorous. Pretend you’re a householder returning from the city with the groceries, just ambling home after having lunch out, to get the ironing done before the kids get home from school and the husband comes in from work.’

Easing my stiff fingers, I carefully flexed first one then the other, whilst glancing into the rear vision mirror. They were still behind me. The reflection of the trees and light on the windscreen gave their car a faceless appearance. It was like looking into a space helmet knowing something from ‘Alien’ was inside. I focused on the road ahead and put my foot down on the accelerator, looking for a side road where I could turn and vanish. ‘How far are they going to go?’ I muttered, checking the rear vision mirror again.

No silver car.

The Mazda had been only a short distance behind me. I debated whether to keep going or turn around. If they turned off they might not have realised who I was, or were they waiting for me in a driveway, ready to pounce?
‘Keep going,’
advised sanity. ‘Find out where they went,’ urged madness. I pulled to the side of the road and rested my head on the steering wheel, trembling all over and sick with despair.

The passenger in the silver Mazda had been one of my dearest friends for twenty-five years: Pam’s mother, Rosalind, who was supposed to be minding my cottage and animals on Masters Island.

CHAPTER 26

A Wedge Between Friends

Pamela

Wednesday: 9.00am.

I stepped out of the lift and paused. Unusually, the place was deserted near the dressing rooms. I tried not to run as I navigated the silent corridors leading to the concert hall, my feet echoing around the building. The clanking of a cleaner’s buckets in the ladies loo reassured me a little as I passed, but suddenly the thought occurred that maybe rehearsal was being held somewhere else. The usual noises were not coming from the auditorium, but when I arrived on stage, the orchestra was seated.

My fellow musicians eyed me uneasily as I threaded my way between music stands and chairs to my designated place. The normal racket of eighty chattering, laughing people getting ready for rehearsal, was absent. There were no jokes, no betting on the coming week-end’s football outcomes or, ominously, gossip. Even the two most placid of men, Bob and Hans, emitted an aura of quiet agitation.

Jess’s appearance shocked me. She’s so beautiful that when she comes into a room, men point their noses in the air like gun-dogs and snap to attention. But now her eyes were huge smudges in her pale face and her hair was knotted untidily, with strands flopping around her shoulders. Sensing my gaze, she looked up, but gave me no acknowledgement. Her eyelids flickered, and then she stared at her score without expression. I remembered the fear in her voice when I told her about Georgie’s death and felt uneasy.

Brie appeared to be lost in thought. Lines of tiredness and worry etched his face, making him appear older than his twenty-eight years. He turned his head to speak to someone and I was shocked by the dark marks on his throat and a cut on his cheekbone. Had he been in a fight? Or were they the signs of enthusiastic sex? Surely not.
But had he been lying to us all along?

I felt as though I was under siege. The television channels were full of the news of Ally’s disappearance. Early last night, Aunt Eloise phoned to say she was staying with James. Ally’s agent phoned, as did her accountant, who pretty much only crawls out of the woodwork around taxation time, and just about every friend she’s ever made. Skype ran hot with calls from overseas as conductors, musicians and ex-boyfriends phoned or wanted to chat. My email had to be emptied several times and my snail mailbox bulged with cards. Friends ringing the doorbell day and night have contributed to the manager of the units where I live complaining about the other tenant’s privacy being compromised. ‘Your lease is up next month, Miss Miller. We might have to consider our options,’ he rumbled spitefully. My eyelids twitched with exhaustion. I’m not good at keeping secrets, and “worry” has morphed from hobby to habit.

Sir James McPherson lurked at the piano talking to James Kirkbridge and John, the orchestra manager. Their faces looked haggard under the brilliant stage lighting. I sensed someone behind me and flicked a glance over my shoulder. Michael was crowding my personal space. Something alien glinted in his eyes, but then it was gone. He turned away, every line of his body saying,
‘Shuttered. Don’t pry.’
I felt as though I had climbed down a ladder and unexpectedly found a rung missing. Embarrassed, I turned back to my music.

Because Sir James was fart-arsing around talking to some of my colleagues, I allowed my mind to drift, inevitably, to the past.

After we graduated from the Conservatorium, Ally and Jess’s careers surged ahead. Fortunately my CDs are good sellers; old ladies in nursing homes are particularly partial to them I am told. ‘So cheerful, dear’ one wrote, but solo performances drive me insane. My nerves get so shot before a concert, the stage-hands leave a bucket next to the entrance just for me, Puking Pam. But as part of a large orchestra, I adore my career.

Would I be completely fulfilled if I had someone to love and who loved me? All my life, I’ve sensed an empty space beside me, with no understanding of why it should be so. The part of me which feels missing returns strongly in times of stress. Bobby, my imaginary childhood friend, filled a gap which even Ally was unable to do. Sometimes I still manage to summon him up from wherever he is domiciled while my back is turned.
Am I such a desperate that I have to rely on a phantom? So alone that even as an adult, I revert to a childhood imaginary friend.

Most of the men I date are either divorced, getting over a relationship or commitment-phobic, and almost all shorter than I am. It’s no joke being 183cm and nor are the “funnies” people make about it.

Brie dated me a couple of times after we met, but when Jess joined the orchestra he lost interest. At first I was hurt, but to be honest, hadn’t seriously believed anything would eventuate from our three or four casual dates.

I rarely saw either Jess or Brie socially during their relationship. I think they only got out of bed to go to work, but as fast as it began, the affair burnt itself out. He was the one to break it off and I couldn’t help feeling just a little bit pleased. Yeah, I’m a vengeful hag. I saw him first, Jess. Not that that made any difference in the long run.

The percussionist Michael Whitby joined the orchestra from the Melbourne Symphony. My friendship with him appeared to be progressing well, when Guess Who loomed on the horizon? Overnight, he scudded out of my orbit into Jessica’s. Once again I felt abandoned, bereft and unattractive. Damn, stop whining, Pam. Get over it.

Now, Jess has found someone else while keeping Michael dancing on her g-string. ‘I’m keeping him to myself, Pammie,’ she confided, ‘but this time it’s the real thing!’

Each time the phone rang my heart jumped, but every call broke my heart. I had lost my friend, the only sister I would ever have. We were born on the same day, in the same hospital, Ally ten minutes or so after me. I try not to visualise the desolate years ahead, the birthdays we might never share, the bridal and baby showers we may never throw for each other if the worst has happened to Ally. Fear for her safety threatens to send me spiralling into a mass of pain from which there might be no escape.

‘Miss Miller? Are we to have the pleasure of your company, or are you planning on just being a pretty face?’

I jumped, sending my music score flying and kicking my instrument case across the floor. Sir James stood on the podium with his hands on his hips, glaring down at me, his baton clasped firmly in his left hand, sticking out at a mad angle like the tail of an animal. The orchestra waited with breathless anticipation for him to tear me to pieces. Embarrassed, I squatted and dragged my case back beside me, scrambling to pick up the sheets of music scattered around my feet.

‘Er, I’m sorry, Sir James, won’t be a moment.’

‘That’s all right, Miss Miller.’ He flashed a savage smile. ‘We’ll wait. After all, we have nothing better to do today.’

Somehow I got back onto my chair without causing any more trouble, picked up my flute and waited for his cue. I was startled when he glanced at me sympathetically before looking down at his score and raising his arms. I gathered myself, grateful for the glorious, comforting music of Bach.

Wednesday: 4.30pm.

By four o’clock we were all shattered; nobody wanted to linger. The stairs echoed with the sounds of racing feet, the lift shot up and down like a demented bathescope. Musicians burned rubber in their haste to get out of the underground car park.

Sighing, I picked up my gear and turned to leave. Jess, Michael and Brie were standing by the door waiting for me. Michael was reading something on a small piece of paper, but I sensed it was an excuse to avoid eye contact with us. As I walked slowly toward them my eyes met those of Jess and then skipped to Brie. A vibe passed between us, a feeling all was not as it seemed.

Suspicion had driven a wedge through our friendship the size of a Mac truck.