The White Tower (24 page)

Peter and I had been going to stay with a friend of the family, and my particular friend, Detective Sergeant Brook, who'd rented a house at Broulee for two weeks. When I'd told Brook about the changed plans, he'd been annoyed, and had plodded off to the coast on his own.

. . .

By three in the afternoon, the office at the back of the house throbbed with a steady pulse of hot, dry air. It moved across scorched grass, through walls, paying no attention to drawn curtains or the fan on three.

I checked that Fred's bucket had plenty of water, and walked over to Dickson for a swim.

Fred was getting on, not so lively now, especially in the heat. He seemed content to spend his days stretched out on the kitchen floor tiles, occasionally padding down the corridor to say hello, or let me know he wanted to go out.

At Dickson Pool, I pulled a cap over my short hair, tensing the muscles in my legs and pretending for a moment that I was eighteen again. I joined the serious swimmers in their lap lanes, though not the fast one, which had a sign at the end asking swimmers to please be realistic when they chose it. Clouds were massing behind Mt Majura, but the forecast that morning had been the same as always—fine and hot.

Water, and the slosh of my slow but steady freestyle, woke me up. Each down stroke, I studied the blue-tiled bottom of the pool through my goggles. I stopped at the shallow end to rest my forearms on the burning concrete, and felt pleased at the prospect of a long, uninterrupted evening.

Dollimore's phone call had been strange, no doubt about it, too intense for an expression of general curiosity. Canberra was on holiday, absent from itself, but something was beginning. I could feel it. I realised that the mischievous part of me, which came to the surface when I was less than fully occupied, like now, would love the chance to slide a splinter under Ken Dollimore's skin.

I'd been waiting until the sun was almost gone behind O'Connor Ridge before taking Fred for a walk. I liked the moment when the lights came on along the bike path, then in the houses that straggled up the hill. Half an hour or so in the warm dusk seemed enough for him. He didn't stray far from me, and his interest in the high school rubbish bins was in abeyance until the kids went back in February.

I made myself a light meal, then jotted down what I knew about Carmichael. The coroner was expected to find that his death had been caused by heart failure. He'd been well known for his progressive views on prostitution and pornography, and had played, if not the key role then a significant one, in changing the laws in 1992, several years after the ACT gained self-government. It was due largely to his efforts that brothels were legal in Canberra's light industrial zones of Fyshwick, Hume and Mitchell, escort work was city wide, and X-rated videos and magazines could be sold openly to anybody over eighteen. Our small national capital had become a centre for mail-order distribution of pornography to states with stricter laws.