The Tower (34 page)

McIver shook his head sorrowfully. ‘You should know I wouldn't do this.'

Troy's chest seemed to expand. ‘No?'

‘No.'

Troy believed McIver, and it felt as though something had been set free. The anger seemed to flow out of him, into the ground. For a moment he said nothing. Then: ‘I'm sorry.'

‘You're getting paranoid,' McIver said, smiling. ‘Still, a man with all your enemies, it's understandable.'

‘Kelly told you about Stone and me?'

‘Doesn't make much sense, removing you.'

‘Do you know what's going on?'

‘Haven't a clue,' McIver said. ‘I've got my own problems. When I got home I found I'd been burgled. The pricks took my Les Paul acoustic, most of my DVDs too.' Troy knew his movie collection had been large and much-loved. ‘The strange thing is, they left all the Clint Eastwood ones. Why do you think they did that?' Troy took a deep breath and McIver added, ‘There's no need to answer.' He cleared his throat. ‘After the locals had been, I called Kelly to tell her I was ready to come back to work.'

‘She let you?'

‘She's desperate. Blayney is still screwing her on staffing, with Rogers' support. It's almost like they want her to fail. She told me the news about you, so here I am. But I know nothing.'

Troy was momentarily disappointed. McIver had always known something, always had a clue. But now he was the one with the clue. Randall had given it to him only half an hour ago.

‘Let's go for a walk,' he said. ‘I've got something to tell you.'

The walk didn't last long. Troy explained what Randall had told him, and the news seemed to depress McIver. When they reached the Palace Hotel at the other end of the beach, he said he was tired and needed something to eat. They went inside and ordered some lunch. A song was playing loudly through speakers behind the bar. It was rougher than Troy usually liked, but catchy. He'd heard it before and tapped his fingers on the bar.

‘ “Water and Wine” by the Saints,' said McIver. ‘A top ten hit.'

‘You follow the top ten?'

‘Not usually. But a Saints' song is different.'

Troy had vaguely heard of the band. ‘It's been a while,' he said.

The lyrics were difficult to hear, but he'd made out the word ‘crime' twice.

McIver said, ‘With those drive-bys down south last month, it seems to have caught the public mood.'

The sergeant was looking pale. Troy told him he should go home.

‘Soon,' McIver said. ‘But tomorrow I come back to work. I'll make some calls tonight, see what's going on. Basically, Kelly's a dangerous woman because she's fighting for her own survival.'

Troy turned on his phone and checked for messages. He'd had it switched off since he'd left the station. Sacha Powell had called from the
Herald
. Wondering what she wanted, he told McIver.

‘That's quick,' the sergeant said. ‘Nice bit of work with the press on Sunday night, by the way. But I wouldn't make a habit of it.'

‘You think I told her I'm off the investigation?'

‘I'm just saying—'

‘I didn't.'

‘Well, someone must have.' McIver smiled. ‘It wasn't me.'

Troy deleted the message. There were a few others but none were important. Kelly had not called to say she'd changed her mind.

‘The media on this is driving them half-crazy,' McIver said. ‘With The Tower on the front page almost every day, this documentary coming up, the government's going insane. They want results, closure. All we've given them is more bodies. Another drink?'

They had another. McIver was emotional, and got into an argument with two English backpackers, who made a loud remark about convicts. He stood up, swaying, and the English backed off.

‘They're right, though,' he said when he'd sat down again. ‘This is a convict city.'

He seemed invigorated by the exchange.

‘That was a long time ago.'

McIver snorted. ‘We're an army of occupation. Never be anything more.'

‘Come on—'

‘S'why we have to stick together.'

‘Cops?'

‘Cops who've been through stuff like us. Up there last Sunday night.' He looked at Troy almost pleadingly, with eyes that were moist. There was a tipping point in his emotions when he was drinking, but they'd reached it much earlier than usual. ‘Mate,' he said, ‘ask me anything you want. You and me. Anything.'

Here we go, thought Troy, wondering if Mac was on painkillers.

‘You must wonder, I see you looking at me sometimes, wondering.'

‘I don't know what you're talking about.'

McIver waved a hand dismissively, almost knocking over his glass. ‘A good detective like yourself. A good man.' Again he waved his hand. ‘So ask anything you like about me.'

It was a sincere request, Troy could see. He had no idea what had prompted it, but he knew McIver was serious. The sergeant was pissed, sweating and tired. But something was on offer here, and couldn't be refused.

‘The Perry case,' he said.

‘Good pick.' McIver paused and thought about it. ‘So you've heard about that?'

‘It's part of the mythology.'

‘I see. And you want to hear the details?'

‘As you're offering.'

McIver nodded: a deal was a deal. ‘There was a chapter of the Wolves at Guildford, same as your mate Asaad, when I was on general duties at Parramatta, long time ago. This biker called Perry was selling drugs to single mums and forcing them on the game when they couldn't pay. He liked the single mums.' As he spoke, McIver seemed to come more alive; the memories were feeding him. ‘This fucked up their lives and one killed herself and her kids and I got—I got . . . Want another beer?'

Troy shook his head and McIver gestured to the barman, who looked dubiously at Troy but started to fill a glass.

‘Louise Daly her name was. You remember some and not others.'

McIver stopped talking and frowned at a backpacker who'd been trying to listen in. The man moved away. ‘So my sergeant and me, we fitted the prick up with a serious drugs charge. This girl called Jasmine, she came to us for help, showed us what Perry'd done to her. Man was a complete animal, said she'd testify, support our story. So we thought we were very clever. It went to court and then Jasmine turned on us. Some of the Wolves had paid her a visit.'

‘Didn't you have her in witness protection?'

‘Of course. She got bored, got out the back one night and left her baby with the bored officer who was supposed to be guarding her. Called a friend and they met at a pub. She came back to the house later, said she was sorry. We only found out down the line some of the Wolves had turned up at the pub with the friend.' McIver looked pained by the recollection.

Troy said, ‘Her change of heart only became clear in court?'

Mac nodded. ‘There she was in the box, fitting us up, saying she'd seen me plant the gear.'

‘The jury wouldn't believe it, surely?'

McIver looked closely at Troy, who smiled. Reassured, he said, ‘Created doubt, that's all it takes. But then Perry disappeared, and that was the end of that.'

‘Disappeared?'

McIver waved a hand airily. ‘He moved to New Zealand.'

‘Who scared him off?'

‘Mates in the Armed Holdup Squad.' He finished the beer and rubbed his face. ‘They had a word.'

It must have been quite a word, Troy thought. He felt like another beer, but he had to drive. McIver was slipping off his stool. Troy took his good arm, and slowly the two of them walked out of the bar. On the footpath outside, McIver stopped and looked at Troy. ‘Would you have done it?'

‘Different times.'

‘What if it happened now? Your choice, to do or not.'

‘No other options?' Troy said, looking out towards the sea, not wanting to have this conversation. The old Armed Holdup Squad had been notorious for the corruption of some of its members.

‘No other options,' McIver said.

Troy took a deep breath. ‘No,' he said.

McIver grinned as though he'd said something funny. He held out his hand for Troy to shake.

‘The other shoulder's hurting like buggery,' he said. ‘I hate this sling.'

‘A sling's okay.'

‘No. It makes you look like an invalid. It's like a sign of vulner—' He seemed to have trouble with the word. ‘You know.'

They walked towards the taxi rank. McIver looked in the direction of the sea, breathing in its smell. ‘You still do Nippers?'

When Troy moved to Maroubra, he'd joined the surf club and trained to become a volunteer lifesaver. Each summer now, he spent some of his weekends on patrol at the beach, and taught kids on Sunday mornings.

‘Sure.'

‘Some men would rather lie in.'

Troy looked at all the people swarming around them. People like him. He knew he needed them. The meaning of his life came from the fellow-feeling they gave him, and which he had for them. He recalled something from the Bible. Faith without works is dead.

McIver shook his head. ‘We'll have to see which way it goes,' he said vaguely. Then, coming alert again, ‘You and me, we have something. Don't deny me again.'

There were tears in his eyes. At first Troy couldn't believe it. McIver was crying. Awkwardly he put out an arm and held him stiffly.

‘I didn't even know what was happening before it was over,' McIver said. ‘Then woke up two days later and thought I'd had a bad dream. But now this. Few times a day. It's not the alcohol.'

He spoke with great effort, as though he'd prepared these exact words. Then he pulled away from Troy and reached blindly for the door of the taxi.

Troy drove to the police youth club in Daceyville and found someone there to talk to, ended up staying quite a while. They gave him a tour of the place, and by the time he'd finished the day was almost over. When he finally reached home he found Anna in the kitchen, cooking dinner. She turned and gave him a hug, expressed concern at what had happened. He ran a hand down her back, closing his eyes, resisting the urge to compare the feel of her with the woman from last night. She pulled out of his embrace, and said she had to get the food in the oven. He told her about his day, and as he spoke she nodded, frowning in concentration at a recipe book propped up on the bench. The conversation was running down and after a bit he just stopped and she didn't seem to notice.

He went into the lounge room to sit on the floor and play with Matt. Later she came in and asked if it was all right for her to go out after dinner to a Bible study group at ChristLife. He said it was fine.

‘Liz and Mark asked us over for a barbeque on Saturday,' she said. ‘I said I wasn't sure, but now you'll be here I'll say yes. And the Duttons are coming on Sunday.'

He nodded. At Homicide, when you weren't busy working on an investigation, the weekends were free. Life had to go on. The dead owed that to the living.

He stayed up for a while after Anna came home, thinking about the events of the day, not feeling tired. Finally, after eleven, he decided it was time to try to sleep and went to have a last look at Matt. The door to the bedroom was closed, which was not unusual. Anna had started closing it a week or two ago. But when he went to open it, he discovered it was locked too. A rush of fury went through him and he had to restrain himself from yelling at her to open it. Still, after last night he had no right to be angry with her anymore. Suddenly feeling very tired, he stumbled off to sleep alone in the big bed.

Twenty-eight

R
andall didn't know how it had happened, but they were arguing. He hadn't known Kristin long enough to have a major argument with her, so it seemed all wrong. But her strange behaviour demanded confrontation. Going through his wallet had been a joke, almost. But not this.

‘I didn't give you a key to my place so you could go in and search it,' he said, trying to remember why he had given it to her, someone he'd only known for a few weeks. It was the way she talked to him, the way she put things: she'd made it seem natural.

‘What have you got to hide?'

‘It's not that.' She'd turned up at his flat that night, an hour before they'd arranged to meet, well before he'd got home, and gone through his stuff. ‘You haven't even given me a key to your place.'

‘What's in the cabinet in your room? It has a most solid lock.'

They'd gone over this already. He'd told her the cupboard contained travel documents, plans and mementos of past jobs. One locked cupboard in his entire apartment, for Christ's sake.

‘And that disgusting book.'

‘There's nothing wrong with it.'

‘I read some of it. I found it obscene. Everyone knows it's obscene.'

He put some spatchcock in his mouth so he wouldn't have to speak, and stared at her. Apart from being pale, her skin was incredibly smooth. He didn't know if that was an Icelandic thing, but it was almost like plastic. Her features were nothing special, her mouth rarely smiled, but he was still entranced by her skin, especially where it stretched over her cheeks, from the jawline to the bones beneath her eyes.

And then her hair, a colour somewhere between blonde and white. In many ways she was ordinary, even disappointing, but these two qualities, skin and hair, were so extreme they made her a type, and Randall had long been fascinated by types.

‘And what a title,' she said. ‘
Atlas Shrugged
. Pompous capitalist crap.'

‘Ayn Rand had a lot of good ideas.'

‘She was a libertarian bitch, and an appalling novelist. I'm distressed that you can enjoy that muck. You do enjoy it?'

‘I do. The businessman as hero. You think what you do is important, and so do I.'

Kristin stood up, furious, and threw her napkin down onto the plate. It hit her wineglass, which teetered. Randall put out a hand and steadied it. Things like that mattered, objective reality: stopping a glass from falling. She stormed away from the table, almost running into a waitress carrying a stack of plates. Randall watched the apologetic dance and then Kristin was gone, but only to the toilets, not the front door.