‘How about in the last few months?’
‘You mean because of the killer getting out of jail?’ Chloe said. ‘I was here when he opened the letter saying he might be coming out on parole. He started to freak out. I said he should tell them he was against it, but he ripped the letter to shreds and said that’d just be acknowledging it all over again, letting it affect his life again. I wanted to say
that it was still affecting his life, it seems to me that it’s never stopped affecting him, but he gets in these moods and he’s so touchy that there’s no point saying anything. That’s marriage though, isn’t it?’ She sounded chirpy, and patted her stomach. ‘Ups and downs, but you stick together.’
Ella didn’t know where to look. ‘So he never got in touch with the parole board?’
‘If he
did, he didn’t tell me.’
‘Did the prisoner ever try to make contact with him?’ Murray asked. ‘Send him a letter, anything like that?’
‘No,’ Chloe said. ‘I’m sure he would’ve mentioned that. But you can ask him when he arrives.’
‘Has anything happened recently that might make you think Marko was feeling threatened?’ Murray said. ‘Did he ever say he thought he was being followed,
anything like that?’
‘Before he went on the medication he used to say that,’ Chloe said. ‘It dropped off afterwards, and he’d only think it – or at least tell me – a couple of times a year.’
‘How about lately?’
‘No. But again, you can ask him when he gets here. Should be any minute now.’ She glanced at the door.
‘How were Marko’s moods lately?’ Murray asked. ‘Say, since
the letter?’
‘Well,’ Chloe said, ‘we’ve both been under a bit of stress. He tends to worry about money, and more so lately because he wanted to be in a house before we had kids, but it’s not going to happen and he feels bad about it. And also there’s this guy at my work.’ Her eyes welled up for the first time. ‘This plumbing contractor, Simon Fletcher. It started about four months ago. For
a while, he was just sending me flowers with no note and I thought it was Marko, but it wasn’t – when I thanked him that first time, he got angry and upset. And then they kept coming. It was freaky. Marko wanted to go to the police, but we just told the florist near work not to deliver anything. After the first couple of weeks, he started mailing notes to work instead, saying things like he loved
me from the moment he saw me, I was so beautiful, he knew we were meant to be together. He didn’t put his name on them though, so I still didn’t know. I was going to go to the police then, but this Fletcher came into the office and asked which of the bouquets I’d liked the best.’ She shivered.
‘What did you do?’ Ella asked.
‘I told him to get out. He said he just needed to express
his feelings, and wasn’t that what women wanted from men nowadays? I told him again to get out, that I didn’t want his flowers, I wasn’t interested, I was married. He said he respected a woman who respected her vows, then leaned over the desk like he was going to try to kiss me. My boss, Bill Simpson, came in and told him to get out, that he was fired from the job, and shoved him out the door. That
was about six weeks ago.’
‘Did you end up going to the police?’
She shook her head. ‘There didn’t seem much point. As soon as I knew it was him, it all stopped. And Bill improved security a bit so I felt safe there too.’
‘Have you seen or heard from Fletcher since?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Could it be him who died and had Marko’s wallet?’
‘No, it’s not him,’ Ella said.
Audra hugged her knees.
‘Has anything unusual happened recently?’ Murray said. ‘Hang-up phone calls, someone prowling the building? Damage to your car?’
‘We have had a few hang-ups,’ Chloe said. ‘But we’ve had trouble with our line on and off for as long as we’ve lived here, so I thought it was just people trying to call and not being able to get through properly. And there was
somebody lurking in the garden one night, but one of the other residents shouted they were calling the cops and whoever it was ran off. And the car’s in the garage every night.’ She peered at the clock on the wall. ‘They must’ve hit some traffic.’
Ella said, ‘Do you know a Daniel Truscott?’
‘He and Marko work together.’
‘Is there any reason why Marko would’ve been driving his
car this afternoon?’
Audra said, ‘I thought you said it was a train accident?’
‘Marko had a minor collision in that car in Ultimo this afternoon. He was taken to hospital, all the while claiming somebody was after him,’ Ella said.
‘I don’t understand.’ Chloe frowned. ‘Why would he have done that?’
Murray said, ‘Is there any reason he might want to catch a train to Bankstown?’
‘None that I can think of.’
‘You don’t have friends or family out that way?’
‘Nobody,’ Chloe said.
Audra said, ‘Was it at Bankstown that, that…’
‘No,’ Ella said, then went on gently, ‘Chloe, we need to ask you: has Marko ever tried to hurt himself?’
‘No.’
‘Clo,’ Audra said.
‘Oh, okay. Yes,’ Chloe said.
‘When was that?’
‘Years ago.
We’ve talked about it since though. After he started the medication he said he’d felt really low but he’d been afraid to tell me because he thought I might leave him. He said he realised it was the depression making him think that. I told him I love him no matter what, and that I always want him to tell me how he’s feeling, especially if he feels so bad. I said we’re a family, and nobody suffers
alone. He said he once took an overdose of sleeping tablets, but that was before we met, and he woke up a day and a half later covered in his own mess. He said that before he started the medication he’d thought that maybe we’d both be better off if he was dead, but that he was afraid of pain and couldn’t think how to do it, seeing as an overdose wasn’t going to work. I made him promise that he would
tell me if he was ever thinking about it again. He said he would. But since we found out about the baby, he’s been completely thrilled. When we were at the twelve-week scan he said he couldn’t believe he’d ever thought about killing himself, that he would’ve missed out on this, and how terrible that would’ve been.’
Audra burst into sobs and rushed from the room.
Chloe stared after
her, then checked the clock again. ‘He’ll be here any second, I promise.’
Ella looked at Murray, feeling weak and useless and sick at heart. They were going to have to take Chloe to the morgue and let her see Marko’s body for herself.
*
On the drive to Glebe Morgue, Chloe cradled her belly and sang under her breath. ‘
Hush, little baby, don’t you cry.
’ Ella saw in the rear-view
that Audra sat with her head against the other door, wiping away tears and occasionally reaching out a hand that Chloe didn’t take. The headlights of the oncoming traffic glared, and the car felt cramped and stuffy. Ella swallowed and reached for the aircon switch.
‘
Daddy’s going to sing you a lullaby.
’
Murray looked stiff and awkward in the passenger seat, and they exchanged a miserable
look. They’d updated Langley, who’d grumbled but was checking into Fletcher.
‘
Hush, little baby, don’t you cry
.’
Ella parked in the dark, quiet street at the back of the morgue and turned off the engine. They got out and crossed the footpath. Ella pressed the buzzer by the morgue door and a friendly faced young man in scrubs opened it.
‘We need to see a body,’ she said in a low
voice. ‘Meixner?’
He nodded. ‘Come in. I’ll get things ready.’
They went in and waited under humming fluorescent lights.
‘
Daddy loves you and so do I.
’
Audra tugged Chloe’s jacket tighter around her, but couldn’t button it over her belly. Chloe pulled the jacket open again and smoothed her hands over her shirt.
‘Chloe, honey,’ Audra said. ‘You know that Marko’s not
with Henry.’
‘He is.’
‘Then why hasn’t he called you back?’
‘Maybe they’ve gone to the pub. Pubs are noisy.’
‘He doesn’t go to pubs. You know that better than anyone.’
‘They’re stuck in traffic. There’s been an accident and he’s helping. He likes to help people.’
‘Clo, look at me.’
‘His phone’s flat. He’ll call when he can.’
‘I’m trying to help you.
You need to understand. Prepare yourself.’
‘
Daddy’s going to sing you a lullaby
.’
Audra turned to the wall in tears. Murray was staring at the fire exit map. Ella gazed at the floor, her heart aching.
The man returned. ‘Follow me, please.’
They went in pairs down the corridor behind him. Audra tried to take Chloe’s arm but she pulled away.
‘
Hush, little baby
,’ Chloe
whispered. ‘Daddy’s stuck in traffic.’
Ella couldn’t count how many times she’d done this, how many backs she’d stared at, how many times she’d held strangers while they wept. Hearing Chloe sing to the baby like this, though, put tonight in a whole different realm. She rubbed the unhappy goose bumps on her arms. Murray glanced over and gave her a tiny smile, as if he knew what she was feeling
and was feeling it too.
They stopped at a curtained window. Audra pulled Chloe close, wrapping both arms around her. Chloe kept her face out of the hug and turned to the glass. The staffer disappeared into the room and Ella heard the click of the door closing, then the scrape of the curtain sliding back. Marko lay on a trolley with a sheet pulled up to his shoulders, hiding his injuries.
His eyes and mouth were closed, his brown hair combed back, his skin pale. He looked younger than he had under the train.
Audra started to sob. Ella watched Chloe stare at him, her eyes wide and uncomprehending.
‘Is this your husband?’ Murray asked gently.
‘No.’
‘It’s him,’ Audra said. ‘Oh God.’
‘It isn’t,’ Chloe said. ‘It’s not. It looks like him but it’s not.’
‘Chloe –’
‘It’s not him! He’s stuck in traffic!’ Chloe smacked her palms on the glass. ‘It’s not him! Take him away! Don’t make me look!’
‘Chloe, it’s Marko.’ Audra put her hands to her sister’s cheeks and turned her head to face her. ‘It’s him, baby.’
‘No, no, no, no.’
‘It’s him.’
‘No.’ Chloe reached for the window as she sank to the floor. Her fingers left
damp streaks on the glass. ‘No.’
Audra dropped to her knees beside her. Chloe wailed in her embrace. Ella blinked back tears and saw Murray doing the same. The man inside the room hesitated, then drew the curtain closed.
‘Marko!’ Chloe screamed, then gasped and clutched her belly. Audra grabbed her arm. Chloe folded over onto herself and gasped again.
Ella’s heart constricted
and she turned to Murray, but he was already on his phone.
*
‘Find who did this,’ Audra said to Ella as the paramedics loaded the sobbing Chloe into their ambulance. The baby was fine as far as they could tell, and Chloe’s pain had eased, but nobody was taking chances.
‘We intend to,’ Ella said. Beside her, Murray nodded.
Audra grasped their wrists. Her fingers were cold
and hard as steel, her eyes even harder. ‘Find who did this,’ she said again. ‘And make them pay.’
After the ambulance left, with Audra in the front seat, Ella and Murray got into their car.
‘Marriage vows declare you’re together until death separates you,’ Ella said, her scalp tight and her skin clammy from all the tension. ‘You think this Fletcher might’ve decided to help matters
along?’
Murray called Brad Langley, and put him on speakerphone to summarise what Chloe had told them about Meixner and about Fletcher.
‘A previous attempt and on medication?’ Langley boomed. ‘Sounds clear-cut to me.’
‘We need to talk to this Fletcher and to Canning too,’ Murray said.
‘The wife know about Meixner telling police he’d been followed?’
‘No, she didn’t,
but she’s pregnant, so he probably didn’t want to worry her.’
‘Or he knew she’d recognise it as a sign that he needed to go to the nuthouse.’
Ella saw Murray’s jaw tighten.
‘How’d she take the news?’ Langley asked.
‘Not well,’ Murray said. ‘She’s gone to hospital.’
Ella couldn’t resist. ‘I’m sure she’ll feel better once we catch her husband’s killer,’ she said loudly.
‘As I said, previous attempt and medication –’
‘Yes, I heard you,’ Ella said.
The line went silent. She squeezed her nails into her palms to stop herself digging the hole any deeper.
‘So,’ Murray said, in a conciliatory tone, ‘we thought Canning first, then Fletcher.’
‘Sounds like a job for tomorrow when you’re on shift.’
Ella couldn’t stand it. She got out of
the car, shut the door, and walked into the centre of the empty street. Langley’s penny-pinching attitude made her furious. Yes, they were on overtime, but this could be a murder just as easily as a suicide. Marko and Chloe and the baby deserved every effort. Finding the truth was what mattered. What better reason to spend money was there?
The high cloud in the night sky glowed with the
city’s lights. Out there somewhere was the man who may have pushed Marko into the path of the train. Almost six hours had passed already. It was plenty of time for that man to be getting rid of evidence, working out his alibi, putting lots of kilo-metres between himself and the scene, and they couldn’t afford to let him have any more.
Murray got out of the car and leaned against the door.
‘We can talk to Fletcher.’
‘But not Canning? Jesus.’
‘He said Fletcher’s got convictions for stalking and assault, so he gave me his address and some names to rattle him with.’
That was good news, but still. ‘He’s forgotten Canning’s conviction for murder, has he?’
‘He said that because he’s already been checked by the Ryde officers and had alibis for when Meixner thought
he was being followed, he can wait until tomorrow.’
Ella glared up at the stars. ‘Great.’
FIVE
J
ane woke to the ringing of her mobile. She stumbled out of bed and groped in the darkness for her bag. The screen said the number was blocked.
‘Don’t answer,’ Laird said from the bed. ‘You know it’s Deb.’
‘The witch’ll just leave me a voicemail.’
‘Which you can delete. Turn it off and come back over here.’
‘I have to get going anyway.’
He switched on the lamp. The ringing stopped and a moment later the message beep sounded. She scrolled through the phone’s system and deleted it without listening to it.
Laird reached for her hand and she let him pull her back onto the bed, and kissed him, then got up again.
‘You’re cruel,’ he said.
‘Dayshift in the morning.’
‘At least grant me dinner again tomorrow
night?’
She smiled at him. ‘Sure.’
She dressed and picked up her bag. He got up and pulled on boxers, then walked downstairs with her. The streetlight shone through the pane beside the door and she held him close and kissed him in the glow.
Outside, the street was quiet and cool, a breeze rustling the leaves of the trees in the gardens and along the footpaths. She shook off the
irritation of the phone call and focused on how nice it was to be out at this time and to know that she was going home to bed. She didn’t have to respond to anyone’s call for help, she wasn’t going to struggle on, exhausted, through the rest of a nightshift, then see the sun rise with gritty bloodshot eyes. She walked to her car swinging her bag and her hips, feeling Laird’s gaze on her, and as
she unlocked the door she waved. He waved back. She knew he stayed there watching as she drove off, and just before she reached the corner she put her arm out the window and waved again.
When she’d left Steve, she’d thought she was done with relationships. She didn’t need anyone, she was happy and content on her own, and when a couple of her divorced friends got into it with new men she’d
seen how the baggage on both sides tangled everyone up. Three months ago she’d met Laird, and changed her mind. They’d talked about baggage: she’d told him about Steve and Deb and the kids, he’d mentioned a long ago divorce and a more recent separation that was being kept quiet for his ex’s sake. She was in LA, trying to make it as a fashion designer, and just didn’t need the hassle, he said. Jane
had Googled him a few days later and found a year-old photo of him and the blonde Lucille, and nothing since.
Because they both had to cope with the pressures of their work, him with the added stress of being high profile, they’d agreed to keep the relationship low-key and to themselves. It suited her right down to the ground, and something about the privacy made it all that much more thrilling.
Her phone rang again. Number blocked. ‘Hag,’ she said while it buzzed away on the seat. After a moment it stopped, then the voicemail beeped again. She lowered the window again and breathed.
Shake it off, shake it off.
The drive from Laird’s house in Bondi to hers in Maroubra took nine minutes on the quiet night streets. Traffic made such a difference in this city; a daytime run, even
on lights and siren, could take double that. She found a parking space on the street twenty metres from home and walked under the streetlights along the footpath, then swung open the small gate to the path that led through her garden to her front door. Something crunched under her feet as she neared the patio, and she slowed. It was too dark to see, the shrubs she’d planted for privacy blocking
the streetlights, and she turned the face of her phone to cast a glow on the path. Glass.
She looked up. The overhead light was smashed, the stained-glass panels in the front door also shattered.
The wrought-iron bars she’d had installed over the panels on the inside were intact, of course, as was the new lock. She unlocked it and stepped inside, careful of the shards on the tiles,
and turned on the light. A sheet of paper rubber-banded around a rock lay in the mess. She closed and locked the door, picked the rock up and smoothed out the paper.
YOU HAD YOUR CHANCE. NOW KEEP AWAY FROM HIM YOU BITCH.
She re-scrunched the paper with a hard fist, then dropped it and the rock on the floor.
Steve’s phone went straight to voicemail. ‘You better sort your shit
out,’ she snapped. ‘No more promises, no more gunnas. I swear, Steve, I don’t care any more. This is it.’
She hung up and stamped upstairs to bed.
Whether or not she’d manage to sleep was another matter.
*
Simon Fletcher lived in Granville, in a narrow street between the railway line and the Great Western Highway. Most of the buildings were light industrial, with just four
houses in a row remaining, all battered weatherboards, all in darkness. Ella drove past then turned around. A white work van with plastic piping strapped to the roof racks was parked at the kerb.
‘I know that place.’ Murray pointed to the house next to Fletcher’s. ‘Bikies used to live there. Real charmers.’
There was no sign of bikes now. Ella got out of the car. The front gardens
of the houses were tall with grass and weeds, the roof lines were sagging, a smell like musty furniture in the air. Traffic droned on the main road and a train clattered past behind the buildings, but the houses were silent, almost eerily so. Her heart quickening in her chest, Ella found herself glancing along the street and around the overgrown gardens. Plenty of dark shadows. Plenty of hiding places.
The rotting ruins of a paling fence lay across the worn track to Fletcher’s front door and she could see where it’d been trodden into the earth. They stepped onto the uneven floorboards of Fletcher’s verandah, and Murray knocked on the doorframe.
Ella heard mutters inside the house, then a bare bulb burst into life over the door and cockroaches scattered across the wall. She touched
her gun.
The locks turned, the door opened the width of the security chain, and one resentful eye looked out.
‘Simon Fletcher?’ Ella said.
‘Yes.’
‘Police,’ Murray said. ‘We need to talk.’
‘Gawd’s sake.’ Fletcher closed his eyes, then took the chain off and opened the door. He wore baggy blue tracksuit pants and a paint-spattered, once-white T-shirt. He was about a
metre eighty-five tall, had dirt-brown short hair and an average build. Ella thought back to the station CCTV.
Maybe.
‘Where were you this afternoon?’ she said.
‘On a job, then at the pub.’
‘Can anyone verify that?’
‘My offsider Daley, then the fellas at the pub.’ He put a hand inside his T-shirt and scratched his stomach. ‘What’m I sposed to have done?’
‘What’s Daley’s
surname and address?’ Murray said.
‘It’s a bit late at night to go visiting, isn’t it? Whyn’t you let the boy get some sleep? Like you should be doing with me?’
‘Just tell us,’ Ella said.
Fletcher eyed her and said nothing.
‘Or would you prefer to come to the station and have this chat there?’ Murray said.
Fletcher sighed. ‘His last name’s Jones and he lives in a
unit in Auburn. I don’t know the exact place because he only just moved there.’
‘And what pub were you at?’
‘Thorn and Thistle in Pendle Hill.’
‘What time did you leave?’
‘I don’t remember.’
‘Was Daley there with you?’
‘No, he was home with his girlfriend and baby.’
‘Who’d you drink with?’
‘Whyn’t you just ask me if I did whatever it was then I can
tell you I didn’t?’
Ella said, ‘Where’s your job site?’
A cockroach ran out from a crack in the floorboards and Fletcher kicked it off the verandah with his bare foot. ‘A building site in Seven Hills.’
‘What time did you leave there?’
‘Jesus, I don’t know. Four?’
‘Who hired you?’
‘Fuck’s sake,’ he said. ‘You want to know what time I took a shit as well?’
‘Just the name of the person who hired you,’ she said.
‘Henderson Contractors, okay? Jesus.’
‘So you left Seven Hills at four,’ Murray said. ‘Where’d you go then?’
‘To Bunnings, then to the fucking pub,’ Fletcher said.
‘Times?’
‘I don’t know. Bunnings at twenty past, the pub at ten to? I don’t know.’
‘Got a receipt?’
‘Pub doesn’t give them.’
‘Funny guy,’ Ella said. ‘From Bunnings.’
‘I didn’t buy anything. I was checking prices. As for what I did at the pub, I imbibed copious amounts of alcohol and participated in a number of games of pool. Happy now?’
‘You miss your neighbours?’ Murray said.
‘Who?’
‘Or do you all get together for a barbecue sometimes, talk about the old days?’
‘The fuck are you on about?’
Murray tilted his head at the house next door. ‘Bikers.’
‘Noisy bastards, revving and music all hours of the night. Called the cops on them myself once. Plumbing’s not just digging a trench, you know. I need to think. I need my sleep.’
Ella said, ‘When did you last see Chloe Meixner?’
Fletcher put his hands on his hips. ‘Ages ago.’
‘When?’
‘Whatever she says
I did, I didn’t.’
‘When?’ Ella barked.
‘I don’t know, six weeks? When Simpson kicked me out of the office.’
‘When did you last try to contact her?’
‘Same time,’ he said. ‘That was it. You think I’d try again when there are plenty more fish?’
‘You put in a serious effort,’ Murray said. ‘All those flowers. Seems to me you’d be more determined after such an investment.’
‘Whatever,’ Fletcher said. ‘I haven’t been near her.’
‘What about her husband?’ Ella said. ‘There he is, standing in your way. You ever met him?’
‘No.’
‘Didn’t run into him tonight?’
‘Fuck off.’
‘You told her you liked that she respected her vows,’ she said. ‘But you also said she was meant to be with you. Don’t expect us to believe that the thought of getting
the husband out of the way never crossed your mind.’
‘Youse are full of shit.’
‘You have trouble letting go, don’t you?’ Murray said. ‘The name Rosalee Griffiths ring a bell?’
Fletcher stared at him. Such piggy little eyes, Ella thought.
He said, ‘That wasn’t – that was a set-up.’
‘You followed her from home to work and back again, and when you were sprung by her
flatmate peeking through her windows you punched him out,’ Murray said. ‘You spent three months inside. Remember?’
A flush crept up Fletcher’s cheeks. ‘So what? I did my time, and that was ages ago anyway.’
‘Four years,’ Murray said. ‘Doesn’t fit my definition of ages.’
‘I did my time,’ Fletcher said again. He put his chin up and his shoulders back. ‘I’m going inside. Unless
you have a warrant, don’t knock on my door or speak to me again.’
He slammed the door in their faces and the light over the door went out.
Ella stumbled along in the darkness behind Murray, across the broken palings and out to the footpath. ‘You think he was the guy on CCTV?’
‘He might be too tall.’ He opened his door. ‘We should talk to that offsider.’
‘I agree, but I
bet Langley doesn’t.’
Murray got out his phone and called Langley. Ella crossed her fingers as he explained where things stood.
‘I can’t see any urgency on that,’ Langley said. ‘It can wait for your dayshift. Go home.’
Murray hung up. ‘You hear that?’
‘We sleep, and the clock ticks.’ Ella rammed the key into the ignition. ‘Great.’
*
The next day dawned grey
and wet, and Ella got ready for work to the sound of the gutters overflowing onto the concrete paths below. She’d slept badly, but at least had been able to wake this morning of her own accord, not jerked from sleep by the blare of radios and shouted conversation of men on the building site next door. If this rain kept up, they might stay away for days.
She looked out the kitchen window
at the sodden worksite. She missed the single-storey home that had been there before, and wasn’t optimistic about what would replace it. The trend in the area was two-storey McMansions, all plaster facades and enormous windows. She didn’t spend much time in her tiny backyard, but the thought of big tinted windows overlooking it got her back up.
The rain hammered the windscreen as she drove
to the office, feeling bleak over the hours they’d lost and the restrictions Langley might put on them today. His focus on clearing older cases was insane; the warmer a case, the better the chance of solving it. The detectives on those older cases hadn’t managed it then, so why take people off a fresh one to try again now? She stared at the queues of tail-lights and thought about Chloe and the
child who would never know its father outside of photos and stories. Catching the killer wouldn’t bring Marko back, but it was
something.
And that was the important thing, surely? It put her on the side of good in the world; it meant she was doing her best.
She wondered if that’s how Callum felt when a patient died, that at least he was there, trying, doing his own best. She should call
him. So he’d been cranky for no good reason last night – big deal. Life was too short.
She parked under the office building and dialled his number as she walked to the lifts, a lightness in her chest as she listened to it ring.
‘You’ve called Callum. Please leave a message.’
Voicemail. Dammit. She hadn’t considered this.
Speak or hang up?
He’d see her number anyway. ‘Hey, it’s
me. Just checking in. Hope all’s well.’
What are you, a grandma?
She shut her eyes. ‘I’ll try you again later.’
She rammed her phone into her bag and punched the lift button with her fist. Yes, life was too short, but she also wanted to seem cool and in control.
Hope all’s well. Jesus
.
The office bustled with people. Ella sat at her desk and phoned Audra. ‘How’s Chloe?’
‘They’ve
admitted her,’ Audra said. ‘Just to be on the safe side.’
‘How is she otherwise? And how are you?’
‘It’s sinking in for us both.’ Her voice cracked. ‘Have you arrested anyone yet?’
‘Not so far. The investigation’s progressing though.’ The words were hollow. She wished she could promise that they’d catch the bad guy soon. She wished they had more people so they had a better chance
of doing so. ‘I’ll keep in touch.’