To the Sea Read online

  ‘No thank you, Sergeant. As a smartarse DI, I think I can handle myself.’ He walked down the corridor hoping he was right.

  Tony knocked on the commander’s office door.

  ‘Come.’

  Ryan was in civvies. He fancied himself as a sailor and today he was decked out in the full rig of poncy Ralph Lauren sailor gear. His office walls were covered in photos of his yacht with Ryan at the wheel or leaning over the side. He would be down at the docks by lunchtime tying it on with some of the Sydney to Hobart boys and telling tall sea tales. Tony doubted Ryan had ever sailed out past Storm Bay. Those espadrilles looked like they’d never left the Derwent. Possibly never even left the dock.

  ‘Morning, sir.’

  ‘Vincent.’

  Ryan looked up. He was still lean in his late middle age. Saw himself as the fit, handsome sportsman. But he was too short and his nose was too splattered across his narrow cheeks for him to ever have been handsome. His lips were thin and pale and his hair was too grey. Not salt and pepper, just pepper. And he was balding from the back. Never a good look.

  Tony knew from the deputy commissioner’s office that Ryan had opposed Tony’s appointment. His own unit and he got stuck with an appointment he had opposed. Tony always knew it would be hard working with Ryan and the man hadn’t let him down.

  Tony tried to find something in his commander he could respect, but Ryan was a bad cop. Probably bent, Tony couldn’t be sure, but definitely bad. Lazy, arrogant and brutal. He was on his third wife. No amount of anti-discrimination training was going to make Commander Neil Ryan any less of a prick than he had been all his life. Narelle hated him. Michelle Winter, one of Tony’s most promising constables, had requested a transfer to Burnie after Ryan had humiliated her one too many times. No one requests a transfer to Burnie.

  The commissioner and the deputy both knew Ryan for what he was. They couldn’t get rid of him but they could stack good people around him and hope that his damage could be mitigated. He only had a few years to go before he could be forced into retirement. Tony felt he was one of the goodies posted close to Ryan. He owed it to the brass to live up to their expectations.

  Ryan hadn’t turned his computer on. There were no papers on his desk. He wasn’t even pretending to be busy. He wasn’t out talking to his officers or checking files to see what had been happening over the past week. He’d come in to talk to Tony and he had been waiting. Doing nothing. No wonder Hobart CIB had a reputation for doing things in their own sweet time.

  ‘I haven’t got all day, Vincent. What’s on your desk?’

  ‘We have a missing girl, possibly drowned; two break and enters; a robbery of an electronics store; a pharmacy robbery that turned violent; a fatal car accident at Richmond; and the usual Christmas revelries gone bad.’

  ‘I hear that there has been a request from the North asking for your assistance with that car accident at Bicheno. Five dead, all Hobart kids,’ he said, no longer looking at Tony. ‘And I hear you’re not much help.’

  ‘I’ve made Constables Milne and Rhine available to assist with notifying the families down here and liaising between the families and the Coroner’s Office. I’ve told Steve Walker he can have them for two days if he needs them. We’re as involved as we need to be.’

  ‘And what about you, Vincent? Are you involved?’ Ryan was winding up now. ‘Why aren’t you working with the North on this? Dead kids. Grieving parents. It made the front page of the fucking Mercury yesterday and today, in case you hadn’t noticed. Bloody high profile case and, the way I hear it, you’re nowhere to be seen.’

  It was a Northern case, nothing to do with Tony. But he understood. Northern Commander Phil Blackwood had been griping to Ryan, probably on his yacht, about Hobart CIB not doing Northern Traffic’s job for them.

  ‘I’ve been working closely with Traffic Inspector Walker in Launceston, sir, and I understand he has all the assistance he needs.’ Steve didn’t need Tony. He really only needed Tony’s constables for a day or two for extra legwork and Tony had been happy to lend him two of his best. If Steve needed help with the accident, he could call traffic or uniforms. CIB wasn’t getting involved. This was just commander one-upmanship and fear of the press.

  ‘You don’t understand very fucking much, do you Vincent?’ Ryan stood up. ‘Five dead teenagers and you allocate two constables for family liaison. Why isn’t Taylor on to it? He’s the best fucking detective we’ve got in this office.’

  ‘DS Taylor is working with me on the missing person case.’

  ‘And what about the redhead? What’s she working on?’

  ‘DS Clarke is also involved in the missing person case.’

  ‘Let me get this straight. A teenage girl goes missing in the summer holidays for a few days and we have a DI and two DSs working the case?’ He was bellowing now. ‘How the fuck did anyone think you were inspector material? She doesn’t need three detectives looking for her. She’s probably just off with her loser boyfriend getting her brains fucked out as we speak and loving it. There are half a dozen missing person cases outstanding, Vincent, what makes this one so fucking special? Fancy her, do you?’

  ‘The young girl is missing, presumed drowned, but there is conflicting evidence as to her whereabouts at the time of her disappearance. We’re investigating every possibility in case she’s still alive. All the teenagers at Bicheno, sadly, are dead. Their deaths are not suspicious. They were drunk, they were speeding, they hit a tree. Northern Traffic has it well in hand. I made the decision to investigate the missing girl case in the hope of finding her alive but also to collect sufficient evidence should we find that she’s dead as the result of a crime.’

  ‘Don’t take that fucking tone with me. Is she dead or is she missing?’

  ‘We hope to know that by the end of today. The marines will have completed a comprehensive water search by then and all the forensic reports will be in.’

  ‘Yeah, I hear we’ve got a fucking armada on its way to Garnet Point on your instruction,’ Ryan spat.

  Tony said nothing. If Ryan wanted him to wind back the investigation and the search for Zoe Kennett, he was going to have to instruct him to that effect.

  ‘So, you aren’t going to reallocate your men to assist our colleagues up north?’

  ‘No, sir. I see no reason to make any changes.’

  ‘Oh well, if you see no reason to make any changes,’ Ryan snorted, his voice rising, ‘what would I fucking know? I’m just a fucking commander with thirty-five years’ experience. The press isn’t going to come gunning for your pretty little Italian head.’

  ‘It’s your call, sir,’ Tony said, speaking firmly and louder than he wished.

  Ryan said nothing. He had clearly raced into the office with Blackwood’s words ringing in his ears to show Blackwood what a good mate he was. In the force, it was all about your mates, but Blackwood just wanted to share the risk and the exposure if the car accident and the dead kids all went to shit in the media. He wanted to make it all about the kids being from Hobart and then to handball as much as he could to Ryan and the cops in the South. And Ryan had stupidly taken the ball and run in here with it. And now here he was looking like the fool he was.

  ‘If I were you, I would take a little advice,’ said Ryan, quiet and vicious. ‘Keep the redhead if you fancy her but you’d be wise to let Taylor go up north.’

  ‘Thank you for the advice, sir. I appreciate it, and I will consider it.’

  ‘Fuck off.’

  Tony walked out. He wasn’t angry. He had promised himself when he got this job that he wouldn’t let Ryan get to him. If he got angry now, he would never stop. If he started swearing, even a little bit, his mouth would tighten into that thin cop sneer which eventually would spit only filth and insults. He would manage his behaviour and his language like an alcoholic dealing with the permanent threat of relapse. He would be a good cop. He was happy to be known as a smartarse. It was the only insult they had for him.

  Paul was stan
ding near his desk when Tony returned to the office.

  ‘So, apart from being too young and stupid to be an inspector, anything we didn’t know?’

  Ryan had made sure the whole office had heard the key bits. A couple of uniforms were looking through the glass doors into CIB. Blood sports were popular in the force. Narelle was waiting for him too. She gave him a commiserating smile. ‘Did you win?’

  ‘Yes, DS Clarke, I did.’

  ‘Well then, in the immortal words of James Hetfield, nothing else matters,’ said Paul, grinning and clapping his hand on Tony’s shoulder.

  ‘I have some good news for you, boss. Bill Watson called,’ Paul continued. ‘He’s on his way down to Garnet Point with three boats and ten crew. All divers so they can rotate for continuous diving time. One diver’s a paramedic, and one boat is fully equipped with medical gear, in the unlikely event we find her alive. There’s a chopper on standby if we need it. It’s already done four hours searching for Bill and is ten minutes away all afternoon. He says the weather’s clearing and the forecasts for the rest of the day are good. I think he’s already down that way and diving. He has a pretty fair idea where Zoe might be. They’ll be at the Rosetta jetty by noon ready to be briefed further by you. That gives them ten more hours of daylight. He has charts for the entire south coast.’

  An armada and a chopper. Tony looked at his watch. Eleven o’clock already. Ryan had slowed them down. They were all at their desks quickly packing up the things they needed. Narelle was quietly singing the Metallica song. Paul looked over at Tony, propped his foot up on his desk and broke into a wild air guitar. He sang the chorus with Narelle. Way too loud.

  ‘You’re idiots,’ said Tony, laughing against his better judgement. If Ryan came out now and saw them messing around and laughing, he would explode. They needed to leave.

  ‘Well, sir, I’m your idiot. I heard you fighting for me in there.’

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Tony.

  ‘I need to quickly visit forensics before we leave town,’ said Narelle. ‘Just a couple of reports I’m waiting on. Five minutes.’

  Tony nodded and Narelle took off for the stairs.

  ‘Hey boss, you called the coroner yet?’

  ‘No. I’ll call him from the car.’

  Tony knew it made no sense but he thought they still had a chance of finding Zoe alive. He would tell the coroner that she was missing presumed drowned because, after nearly four days, he must, but Charlie’s story could not be ignored. If the coroner wanted his own guys down there, he could organise it himself. He wouldn’t. Not today. Not on a Saturday, the day before New Year’s Eve. The morgue would already be full with the car crash kids.

  Tony knew Eva Kennett was not a credible witness but her words had wedged in him somewhere and, in spite of every possible rational explanation for Zoe Kennett’s disappearance, he wanted her mother’s explanation to be the real one.

  Tony had forgotten about the Falls Festival traffic and it had taken him the better part of an hour to get to Sorell. He wasn’t going to spend another hour in crawling traffic along the highway to the Garnet Point turnoff and so, as he left Sorell, he clipped the blue light to his car roof, turned on his siren and drove most of the way on the wrong side of the highway as far as the Lewisham turnoff. He knew the back roads well enough to get to the Garnet Point road on the other side of Carlton River. Another patrol car had fallen in behind him. Off to Falls, no doubt, but happy enough to follow the precedent set by a detective. He watched as they continued on beyond his turnoff, siren still blaring, blue lights flashing.

  At Rosetta, he saw Jack and Eric on his way through the house to the front verandah. Jack had a pile of mobile phones, cameras and a laptop in front of him on the kitchen table. He’d be a while. Eric was talking with Edie, Con and Max and taking notes. Ben fell into step beside Tony in the lounge room and followed him along the verandah.

  Tony saw Sadie and Cecile sitting at a small table out on the side verandah shaded by the old black-trunked pine trees. The clouds had blown away overnight and it was a clear summer’s day with that sharp burning sun of Southern Tasmania. He’d heard it was because of the hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica but whatever the explanation, the sun burned hotter here than anywhere else he’d ever been. Skin burned pink within minutes and a few hours in the sun meant peeling skin and blisters for everyone except the darkest of complexions. Zoe would be burning badly if she was still alive out there.

  Tony stopped at the corner of the house. His attention was drawn out to the water, as it always was at this place. He struggled to keep his thoughts on land. His eyes scanned the huge horizon. The now familiar islands dotted the shimmering vastness. Birds criss-crossed the bright sky. It was quiet. He regretted telling Paul that he could go out today. He wanted to be out there. But he realised, he wanted to be out there alone. Not with Bill and the dive crews. Their boats were too big. Too loud. Zoe was somewhere quiet, tucked away from the brightness and the blare of this day. Again, when he thought of her out in the water, she was alive. It was never her drowned body waiting to be found. Tony could feel Ben against his leg. He reached down and patted the old dog’s soft head.

  ‘Where is she, boy?’

  Ben nuzzled Tony’s hand but kept his own eyes on the water.

  Sadie and Cecile were sitting at a little table on the corner where the front and east side verandahs met. It was a quiet, shaded spot, and one in which Tony thought the two sisters had probably spent many hours and years sitting together.

  ‘Excuse me.’ The two women looked up, surprised to see him so close. ‘I was wondering if I could follow a couple of things up with you both.’

  ‘Of course, Detective,’ said Sadie. ‘Please sit down.’

  They’d been drinking coffee but the little cups on their tiny saucers were empty and cold. Tony noticed that the green china was so fine it was almost transparent. He could see the pink shadow of Cecile’s fingers through the little cup as she tapped it restlessly. The cups and saucers were rimmed with muted gold borders. A dark green vine was hand painted around the cups and the vine dangled small scarlet and cream flowers. The cups were elegantly shaped like tiny Grecian urns. The ornate gold handles balanced the cups perfectly. They were two of the most exquisitely beautiful things Tony had ever seen.

  ‘I want to follow up some things which have come up during our investigation. I understand that Zoe speaks Irish. Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ said Sadie.

  ‘Does your entire family speak Irish?’

  ‘I speak a bit,’ said Sadie. She sounded tired. ‘Do you, Cecile?’

  ‘No. Neither do Carl or Edie.’

  ‘What about your father?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But Zoe does,’ persisted Tony. ‘I’ve been told that Zoe and your mother speak to each other in Irish most of the time. Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Sadie.

  Both women sat looking at the empty cups on the table. It was surprisingly cool under the old pine trees. Tony could hear the faint whistling of the needles above him in the soft breeze.

  ‘So Zoe and your mother speak a language not spoken by the rest of the family?’ Neither woman answered. ‘And neither Zoe nor your mother was born in Ireland or, as far as I am aware, have ever lived in Ireland. Is that correct?’ He looked up sharply from his notebook. ‘And before you give me a one-word answer, I’m looking for an explanation as to why your mother and Zoe speak a foreign language that is not shared by the rest of the family.’

  Sadie blushed. Cecile gave Tony a dismissive look.

  ‘My mother was in her late forties when Zoe was born,’ said Sadie. She spoke in the tone of one about to begin a long story, resigned and a little bored at having to tell it from the beginning. ‘The four of us were all long gone from home and my father was busy with his practice. It was natural for our mother to speak to Zoe in her native tongue. Our mother may not have been born in Ireland but her mother and grandfather were
and the family always spoke Irish. Our mother was an only child in an Irish-speaking household. It was my mother’s first language and it became Zoe’s first language too. There’s no great mystery.’

  ‘Thank you. In speaking to some of Zoe’s friends, they tell me that Zoe was pretty much an only child. Their impressions are that she saw very little of you and her other siblings. One friend thought that you all lived on the mainland. Another says she didn’t know Zoe had any siblings. Friends who spend a lot of time with Zoe at her house in town and here at Rosetta say they never met any of you and Zoe didn’t talk about any of you.’

  The two women looked at each other. Sadie looked stricken. Cecile’s face was like stone. She was an attractive woman but Tony doubted that she smiled much. Happiness was not a familiar enough experience to have left its mark on her structurally perfect face.

  ‘I’m wondering how well either of you know your sister.’

  ‘That’s a horrible thing to say, Detective,’ said Cecile.

  ‘It wasn’t intended to be horrible. Given the age difference, it’s not that surprising.’

  ‘I knew my sister well,’ said Sadie. ‘We all did.’

  ‘Did you know that Zoe had a boyfriend until recently?’ asked Tony.

  ‘No, I didn’t. I find that hard to believe, actually.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘I’m sure we would’ve known. Zoe would’ve talked about it. My parents would have met him. I think you may be being strung along there, Detective.’

  ‘No, I’ve met her boyfriend and Zoe’s close friends confirm the relationship and that the two had been together for five months,’ said Tony. He sounded relaxed but he could see he was pushing buttons.

  ‘Relationship sounds like a bit of an over-statement,’ said Cecile.

  ‘It appears to have had every feature of a relationship,’ said Tony.

  Sadie was playing with the empty cup on the table. Cecile twitched.

  ‘Zoe may be a lot younger than you but she’s not a child,’ continued Tony. ‘Why wouldn’t a popular, pretty seventeen-year-old girl have a boyfriend? The more pertinent question is, why do all her friends and their parents, even her teachers, know about it but no one in Zoe’s family does? You can see why we’re left wondering what else you don’t know about Zoe.’