Autumn Maze

‘Minister,’ said Tucker, gold watch held aloft as if about to clock Sweden in a sprint to Parliament House. ‘It’s getting on, we should be moving—’

Sweden looked at Zanuch, ignoring Malone. ‘Is that all then, Bill?’

Zanuch, too, ignored Malone. ‘For now. But there’s bound to be other questions, if it is a homicide—’

This time the tongue was trapped firmly inside Malone’s teeth. It was Clements who said, ‘It’s homicide all right, sir. The deputy director of Forensic was sure of that.’

‘They make mistakes—’

‘Not this one, sir. She’s my girlfriend.’

Chapter Three

1

All the men had gone and the three Bruna sisters were alone. Said Rosalind, ‘You two didn’t show much concern over Rob’s death.’

‘’Lind,’ said Ophelia, ‘your stepson was a shit.’

‘Why did Cormac give him a job then?’

‘Because he wanted a favour from your Derek, something political. You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Or your son’s.’

Rosalind did not question that. She and Juliet nodded understandingly; they were, after all, Roumanian, though long removed. They had arrived in Australia when Juliet was six months old, Rosalind five years old and Ophelia ten, but there were centuries of intrigue in their blood. Their mother, Ileana, had come of a family noted for its political chicanery; she had died of sunstroke six months after her arrival in Sydney, sad to depart but happy in the thought that her daughters would grow up in a community where the politicians of the time were as buyable as those back home. She had been ten years older than her sculptor husband, Adam, and, though not expecting to go so soon, had told him she would die before he turned to chasing younger women. He, distraught at the thought of losing her, had asked for advice on how to bring up their daughters. She, with her last breath but still aware of the world’s opportunities, especially amongst the native barbarians, had murmured, ‘See that they marry rich.’ The sisters had done their best to honour their mother’s wish. The blood of their mother’s family ran like liquid gold through them, their vote was always buyable if the price was right.

‘Did Derek arrange it? The political favour?’

‘I suppose he must have. Cormac doesn’t tell me everything that goes on, though I’m often tempted to ask.’

Ophelia was the impulsive one of the three sisters. On the spur of the moment she had asked Cormac Casement to marry her; a spur of a different sort had been that he had as much money as her dreams were made on. They had gone to bed on their second meeting, she experimenting with an older lover, wondering if his technique would be so simple as to be puritanical; he wondering if his heart would stand up to the demands of what the feminists called a ‘woman in her post-menopausal prime’. Each had surprised the other and a month after they had met she proposed. He, not given to impulsiveness, further surprised himself by accepting.

‘But Cormac did say something last week that I didn’t take much notice of. He said Rob was up to something and he’d have to speak to him.’

‘Rob was always up to something,’ said Juliet. ‘Or up something.’

‘Don’t be vulgar,’ said Rosalind, who could be as vulgar as any gypsy when her temper got away from her. Aware of this, she had cultivated a cautiousness that sometimes made her seem much more callous than her sisters. ‘He liked girls, but that’s healthy. Or it used to be.’

Juliet, who even as a child in a bath had liked to make waves, said, ‘’Lind, he liked women, not just girls. Any age. His fly was permanently unzipped.’

Ophelia, who could catch a nuance as if it were floodlit, said, ‘You too?’

The two sisters, the youngest and the eldest, exchanged glances, then both looked at Rosalind. ‘He got me into bed four or five times,’ said Juliet. ‘He was a marvellous lover, so long as he kept his mouth shut. He always sounded like that loud-mouthed football commentator. He would give a description they could hear down in Melbourne. As if I didn’t know what was going on. What about you, ’Phelia?’

‘The same. I always felt I was in the middle of an All Blacks-Wallabies scrum.’ She knew that rugby was played in Roumania and, though she had no interest in the game, she went to rugby internationals with Cormac because he had in his youth been a representative player and still followed the sport. She never went to rugby league matches, that was the peasants’ game. Her mother would have approved of her discrimination. ‘Twice was enough. I blew the whistle after that, told him the game was over. Well?’

The eldest and the youngest waited for Rosalind to comment. She sighed, then nodded. ‘Me, too. His stepmother.’ She was less Roumanian than her sisters, almost as if a Methodist had somehow got into the bloodstream. At times she even displayed a conscience, something her husband found disconcerting. ‘Just the once. Too noisy. It’s the first time I’ve been cheered for what I was doing to someone.’

‘Did he ever suggest he might tell Derek?’

‘Never. Derek would have killed him—’ Rosalind broke off sharply and she frowned. ‘God, why did I say that?’

‘Do you think Derek found out?’ said Juliet, scooping up some small waves.

Rosalind shook her head vigorously. ‘He would have spoken to me first. He’s like that. He can be sweet, but he’ll always blame the women for everything.’

‘Balls,’ said Ophelia, who had fondled more than her share. ‘It takes two to seduce.’

‘Did Cormac suspect anything between you and Rob?’

‘No. When he told me he thought Rob was up to something, I wondered for a moment if he meant with me. But Cormac, dear old soul, can be read like a book – there wasn’t a glint of suspicion about me. I’ve never understood why they say the Irish are like the Roumanians and vice versa. They’re children, really.’

Her sisters nodded: innocence had never bothered them. At their convent school in Rose Bay the nuns had been convinced that, in succession, all three of them were headed for Hell. The sisters had been unperturbed. That was where most of the rich finished up, anyway.

‘So who killed Rob?’ said Juliet. ‘Or would it be better if we didn’t know?’

2

When Malone and Clements came out of The Wharf they turned into the side street. Two council workers in overalls were cleaning the pavement, scrubbing it with hard brooms. The Crime Scene tapes had been removed and there was no sign of any police. Two young girls paused on the other side of the street, shuddered and moved on, heads close together in a whisper, as if the council workers were gravediggers throwing the last sod on Rob Sweden.

One of the sweepers leaned on his broom and looked at the two detectives. ‘You guys stopped for a bit of ghouling?’

Malone had never heard the gerund before; the recession had brought the educated to the gutter. ‘We’re police, not ghouls.’

‘Sorry.’ He was a young man, young enough to be the son of his fellow worker, who looked as if he had been sweeping the streets all his life. ‘This job is shitty enough, without having to clean up something like this.’

Malone looked up at the stack of balconies above them. ‘They must’ve tossed him out wide so he wouldn’t hit the lower balconies.’

‘It was a neat throw,’ said Clements. ‘Three feet further out and he’d of landed on any car parked here.’

The young cleaner was still leaning on his broom, an occupational habit. ‘Are you guys always so clinical about something like this?’

Malone wanted to tell him how they felt when they investigated the murder of a child or a woman, but all he said was, it’s like you and your street sweeping, it’s a job.’

‘You put your finger on it, mate.’ The older worker had stopped sweeping, leaned on his broom with the ease of long practice. ‘I keep telling him, don’t ever look too hard at what your broom picks up. Right?’

‘Right,’ said Clements, and he and Malone grinned at each other and walked back down the short hill.

‘Where to now?’

Malone paused on the corner, looked along Circular Quay and up at the tall tower of the Casement building. ‘While we’re down here, why don’t we drop in on Mr Casement? Young Sweden worked for him.’

They crossed the road, stopping to allow a group of Japanese tourists, herded together by their guides as if the local natives were expected to attack at any moment, to make their way towards a waiting cruise ferry at one of the wharves. Clements, a man who couldn’t help his prejudices, shook his head but said nothing to Malone. The latter, who fought his inherited prejudices and usually won, just smiled at the Japanese and was rewarded by the bobbing of several heads.

‘Our salvation,’ he said.

‘Japs?’

‘Tourists.’