Babylon South (15 page)

She was one of the privileged; yet it had availed her nothing. She had finished up at the most democratic level, dead. He stepped over the body and pushed up the window; there was no balcony. Ten floors below, workmen were busy in Macquarie Street, preparing for the nation's 200th birthday celebrations that would begin in a couple of months. It was one of the most attractive boulevards in the
whole
country; and one whose mention suggested power, at least in Sydney. Up the street on the far side was Parliament House, the bear-pit where State politics were fought out behind an elegant colonial façade; on this side were the brass plates of the city's specialists, the medical oligarchy who believed in their own feudalism. There were few, if any, ugly buildings in its length; it was a street that, without effort, suggested dignity, even permanence in a city that was constantly changing. Murder had been done, even if only politically, in Parliament House; but that was to be expected. Otherwise, it was not a street for violent crime.

He pulled down the window, turned round as Clements came to the door. “The Scientific fellers are here, Scobie.”

“Get them started. What about the doc?”

“He's on his way. Oh, the doorman's come up, too.”

Malone went out to the living-room; or would Emma have called it the drawing-room? Garfield, the doorman, was there, fidgeting anxiously. He had freshly combed his sparse dark hair sideways across his sallow scalp; it lay on his head like a black lace doily on a melon. He kept putting his hands in his pockets and taking them out again. He was not accustomed to being surrounded by police.

“How did you come to find Miss Springfellow?” asked Malone.

“I brought her paper up first thing this morning, the same's I do with all the flats. That would have been just after eight, when I come in. She usually went for a walk over in the Gardens every morning about ten. I didn't see her this morning, but I didn't think nothing of it, it could of been too hot for her. Then about, I dunno, three-quarters of an hour ago, maybe more, a lady phoned me downstairs, a lady from, I dunno, somewhere, Pymble, I think. She said she was expecting Miss Springfellow for lunch, a Melbourne Cup lunch, and she hadn't turned up and she hadn't been able to raise her on the phone, would I go up and see if anything was wrong. I come up and I saw the paper was still outside her door. I knocked, but I got no answer. So I used me pass-key and I come in and I found her. I phoned you blokes and that was it. I still can't believe it. Not her.”

All this had come out almost without his taking a breath. He was a decent man, not a gossip, a
doorman
who respected doors that were closed; but he would talk about this for the rest of his life, beginning tonight. He could not wait till he got home to tell the wife and family. Miss Springfellow—murdered! Her, of all people: you wondered who might be next.

“Were you working last night?”

“Nup. I do me shift from eight to eight, four days a week. Next week I do three days. There's another bloke, Paul Kosciusko, same's the mountain, works with me.”

“So there's no one on after eight p.m.?”

“Nup. There's a security lock, a good „un—you'd have to break the glass in the doors to get in. All the tenants have their own key.”

“Did Miss Springfellow have any visitors before you went off last night?”

“Yeah.” Then he hesitated, as if he suddenly realized he might be pointing the finger at someone. After a moment he went on: “Her niece come in about five minutes before I went off.”

“The niece. Justine?” The doorman nodded. “How was she?”

“How'd you mean?”

“Did she look normal or was she upset or anything?”

“She seemed all right. I don't know her well—I've only seen her once or twice before. I've seen her in the papers, of course.”

“She wasn't a frequent visitor to her aunt?”

“Eh? Frequent? No, no. This was the first time I'd seen her in, geez, I dunno how long.”

“Did you call up Miss Springfellow to let her know her niece was coming?”

“We do that all the time—it's part of the security.”

“How did she sound?”

“I dunno. The same as usual, I suppose. She was always a bit cold, always a lady, but. I put Miss Springfellow, the niece, into the lift and then I knocked off.”

“So you didn't see her leave?”

Again the hesitation: “No-o. Look, I don't wanna put anyone in, Inspector—”

Malone
gave him a reassuring smile. “You're not, Joe. We don't arrest people just because they've been visiting someone. We need more than that. That's why all these fellers are here.”

Garfield looked around the room at the Scientific men, the photographer and the two uniformed officers. He had followed the government medical officer into the apartment and now he and Malone had to stand aside as two men from the funeral contractors came in with a stretcher. Murder has its own bureaucracy.

“Geez, I didn't know it took so many of you.”

“Union rules,” said Malone and saw that Garfield wasn't sure whether to take him seriously or not. “If Miss Springfellow had any other visitors, after you'd gone off, how would they get in?”

“They'd speak to her on the intercom and she'd just press the button in the flat here. It's out there by the front door.” He nodded back over his shoulder. “It's a standard system, the same as you find everywhere else.”

“Righto, Joe. Could you give Sergeant Clements a list of all the other tenants?” He looked over at Sergeant Greenup. He always respected protocol; he never gave orders to another officer's men. “Jack, could you have your chap go down and start asking them if any of them heard any shot or saw anything suspicious?”

Greenup looked at his constable, a good-looking boy who had all the alertness of a young pointer: he looked as if he might go bounding down the fire-stairs looking for a scent. “Okay, Gary, you've always wanted to be a detective. Now's your chance.”

“If someone comes up with something,” said Malone, “bring „em up here. Be polite.”

“Yes, sir.” The young policeman went off, nose held up to the wind, followed by the doorman, who went with some reluctance. It would have been something to tell the family tonight, to explain how the police worked.

“He's a good boy, that Gary,” said Greenup, who was content to remain in uniform; detective work meant broken shifts and too many hours. “You might keep an eye on him. He's got more intelligence than he knows what to do with.”

“
We don't want him with us, then,” said Clements and put on his dumb look.

Malone turned as the police surgeon came through the door from the bedroom. He was a red-faced, balding man with a large belly and he preferred corpses to be found on beds rather than on the floor; like an overweight penitent, he always had difficulty in getting up from his knees. He was dusting down his trousers now as he stopped in front of Malone.

“Two shots to the chest, Scobie, one right through the heart, as far as I can see. Death would have been instantaneous. Both bullets are still in the body. The empty cases are missing. What sort of killer housekeeps after a murder?”

“Any idea when she died?”

“I'd be guessing at this stage—I'll let you know after the autopsy. But I'd say between ten and eleven o'clock last night, give or take an hour or so. Can they take the body now?”

Malone glanced at Clements. “Okay?”

“The Scientific guys have done their bit. Yeah, it's okay.”

The police surgeon went back into the bedroom and Malone nodded at the framed photograph and the leather-bound book Clements was holding. “What have you got there?”

“I'll tell you later,” said Clements and looked at Malone warningly.

The GMO came back, followed by the two funeral men, the green-shrouded body of Emma Springfellow on the stretcher between them. As they passed the door of a room off the living-room, the man at the front of the stretcher pulled up sharply. The man at the rear kept walking for a pace, driving the stretcher into the front man's back. Emma Springfellow made her last involuntary movement, sliding forward on the stretcher to kick the bearer in the behind, something she would never have done while she was alive.

“For Chrissakes, Des—”

“There's a TV in there.” Des, a beefy man who looked as if he might have started carting carcasses in an abattoir, twisted his arm to look at his watch; Emma rolled to one side and for a moment looked as if she might slide off the stretcher. “The Cup's just about to go.”

Everyone
in the room, the Scientific men, the photographer, even Jack Greenup, looked at Malone. He looked at Clements, sighed and grinned. “I don't think Emma would have minded. She was going to a Cup lunch anyway.”

The funeral men took the stretcher into the room, which seemed to be a den, put down Emma and stood aside while all the other men crowded in beside them. Malone stood in the doorway, Emma Springfellow's shrouded corpse at his feet. Someone switched on the television set and the picture came on the screen.

“They're off! Just in time!”

Excitement throbbed in the room as, six hundred miles away, twenty-one horses thundered round Flemington racetrack, today's altar for the nation. Only Emma and Malone remained unexcited: she because she was beyond all odds, he because he had no interest in horse-racing, not even in the Melbourne Cup. He was lucky he had his rank, otherwise he might have been arrested for being un-Australian.

“You beaut!” Clements stepped back as his bet, Kensei, went past the post a head in front. His heel caught under the stretcher and he would have sat on Emma if Malone hadn't caught him. He looked down between his legs at the green plastic shroud. “Sorry, old girl.”

Nobody else had backed Kensei. They all looked morosely at the grinning Clements. Des, the stretcher-bearer, said, “How much did you have on him?”

“Just ten bucks,” said Clements. “I'm not a betting man.”

Everybody began to file past him and Malone. Des and his mate picked up Emma Springfellow and she left her apartment for the last time, going out head first, no way for a lady to depart.

When they were alone Malone said to Clements, “For a non-betting man, you know how to pick the ponies.”

Clements grinned. Then abruptly he sobered and held up the silver-framed photograph. Two men in bush trousers and shirts, rifles held in the crook of their arms, stood with a foot each resting on a huge crocodile. In the bottom corner of the photo a neat hand had written:
Roper River, June 1963. With
much
love.

“The Roper River—that's in the Northern Territory.”

“That's it. You recognize the two guys?”

“The one on the right, that's Walter Springfellow. The other one—no, I don't think so.” He knew who it was, but, unaccountably, was reluctant to say so.

“It's him! It's the Commissioner. Twenty-four or five years younger, but it's him, all right.”

Malone made a pretence of studying the photo. “Yeah, it's him. Who wrote the inscription—him or Walter?”

“Walter, I think. Here, have a look at this.”

Malone took the leather-covered diary, opening it where Clements had placed his finger. It was an expensive Italian edition, the paper too good for mundane social jottings; Emma seemed to have used it as much as a journal of her thoughts as a record of her daily events. Her handwriting was almost copperplate, small but with character and written with a thin-nibbed pen; no biro for her.

Malone read the entry for Tuesday, October 20:

They buried the last of Walter today; with it they buried the last of my love. Even after all these years I cannot believe I shall never see him again. But, of course, I shan't . . . Venetia's old lover made a reappearance. One supposes he felt an obligation to—as Walter's supposed friend. I had a scene with Justine, who could be his bastard. I am ashamed of myself for letting it happen in public, but sometimes true feeling has to break out. I had to speak for Walter
—

The entry broke off with a scratch, as if she had not been able to control her pen.

Malone looked at Clements. “Put these in your murder box, put the lid on it and lock it in your desk.”

Clements's concern was a mirror of Malone's own. He went to a desk against one wall, fumbled in several of the drawers and came up with a large manila envelope. He put the photo and the diary in it. “What do we do next?”

“
You're the expert on form. Tell me how we're going to pick a winner on this one.”

III

They left the Scientific men still working in the apartment and went out to the lift. Going down, it stopped at the seventh floor and the young constable got in. “Nothing so far, sir. Most of the tenants are out. Those I've seen say they heard nothing—they said they'd have been watching TV about then. They're a pretty elderly lot here, sir—they'd have the volume turned up pretty high, I reckon.”

Malone grinned, holding the lift door open as they came to the sixth floor. “You should hear my kids when they watch TV. What's your name?”

“Gary Sobers.”

“You're kidding.”

The young constable returned Malone's grin. “No, sir. My old man thought Gary Sobers was the greatest cricketer he ever saw. Our name's Sobers, so he called me after him.”

“You play cricket?”

“With a name like mine? Would a guy named Joe DiMaggio play baseball in the States? No, sir, I stick to golf.”

Crumbs, I'm old. I played against Sobers and now here's a kid who was named after him.
“I'll be back at Homicide in an hour. Call me there and let me know what you've dug up.”

Sobers got out of the lift and the two detectives went on down to the ground floor. Clements said, “You trust the kid? I think we should get some of our own guys down here.”