Getting Warmer (16 page)

Cato unfolded the visitor log printout for the two weeks preceding the murder and scanned the names. The bikies received visits from their wives, girlfriends, and known associates. No surprises. Wellard received visits from Cato and DI Hutchens in various permutations. Cato was dimly aware of a dull ache around his midriff and a wave of afternoon drowsiness. It would be nice to slip off to sleep.

No chance. He was wide-awake now.

Fourth from the top of page two: the afternoon of Friday 5th, four days before Wellard’s murder. A visit to Stephen Mazza, the kitchenhand who had found Wellard and dialled for help. The visitor was Ms Michelle Petkovic.

Cato felt brave enough to go for an early evening swim at South Beach. It was busier than he expected and certainly busier than he remembered from previous summers. Families had brought along picnics and fish and chips while the orange sun sank below a purple ocean, the surface brushed by a weak south-westerly. Kids raced in and out of the shorebreak, balls and frisbees floated through the air. Cato’s gut clenched in fear of accidental contact with the world. Physical vulnerability was a new sensation for him. He sank into the cool water and wondered how long it would take for those fears to subside. He scanned the silhouettes along the beach and heard the shouts and squeals of the children and the relaxed chatter of the adults. How long before he felt like them again?

He’d phoned his boss and passed on the news about the prison visitor’s log.

‘Shellie Petkovic?’

‘Yep.’

‘Fuck.’

‘Mmmm,’ said Cato.

There’d been a pause and a flapping sound like flags in the wind. Nice, his boss had found time for a sunset sail. Maybe he was networking. ‘Go and see her in the morning. Be a bit sharper. Not so much of the social worker any more, Cato. Bring her in if you think it helps.’

‘Could be a perfectly reasonable explanation,’ offered Cato, unconvincingly.

‘Yeah, Danny and his mate could have been a couple of Florence Nightingales performing emergency brain surgery. Let me know how you go.’

Cato dipped his head and dived down to grasp a handful of sand from the ocean floor. He let it slip through his fingers and filter
back into the water. Surfacing, he did a few tentative freestyle strokes to test the elasticity of his stomach muscles. It all felt tight and tender but he could also feel that this was doing him good. He resolved to do more. Maybe he could come over here every morning before work, or every evening after, and do a few laps from one groyne to the other. Regain that balance he needed in his life. Cato pushed aside those negative thoughts of other failed resolutions. He ducked under one last time. A cool breeze swept across the surface of the water. He shivered and swam to shore.

Lara’s bedroom window was open: the breeze lifted the curtains, and the subdued revelry of a Fremantle evening floated past. Lara and Colin lay cupped together. Beyond the Round House the ocean broke on the night sand. He kissed the back of her neck.

‘I’m worried about you.’

She clutched his hand tighter to her breast. ‘Why?’

‘Why do you think? That madman coming into your home, he could have...’

‘I’m okay.’

‘Has he told you what he was doing there? I mean, why you? And how?’

‘We haven’t been able to speak to him yet. I nearly killed him apparently.’

‘Remind me not to surprise you with a knife.’

‘Yeah, pity about the wine though. I could go a drop now.’ She could feel him stirring again. He pressed into her. She reached behind to encourage it. ‘Now I know why they call you Dirty Harry.’

‘You and Cato been comparing notes?’

‘Yeah, he only gave you seven out of ten in bed.’

‘What about you?’

‘Oh, eight maybe?’

He pressed her face down into the pillow, nuzzled against her nape, tugged at her hips. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you.’

There was a missed call on Cato’s mobile when he got home from
the beach. Andy Crouch. Cato returned it and they exchanged the usual retiree-extended pleasantries before getting down to business.

‘Kevin Wellard drowned in Mundaring Dam, late 1996.’

‘That right?’ said Crouch.

‘No body recovered.’

‘It’s very deep, I believe.’

‘Given his history, I think Kevin was Hutchens’ informant. Gordy was just the messenger boy.’

‘I can see why you might think that, Philip.’

‘You knew, that’s why you nudged me in that direction.’

A pause and a measuring of tone. ‘Your point?’

‘Kevin drowned in November, but according to the files the Squad was still getting good tip-offs for several months after that. Kevin didn’t die did he?’

‘Interesting theory.’

‘You guys hid him, gave him a new name, new life, new town. Were his mates getting suspicious? Where did you put him?’

‘Nothing to do with me, Philip.’

‘Who then?’

‘Remember the cryptic clue you solved for me?’

‘Achilles?’

‘That’s the one. Very apt. Maybe you should ask your boss about his weak spot.’

‘You look nice in that shirt.’

Not a bad opening gambit for a conspiracy-to-murder suspect. Shellie sipped a glass of iced water and gazed at Cato. They were sitting in her back courtyard. The sun hadn’t yet climbed high enough to pierce the shade. The space was no larger than a ping-pong table but it was cool and the freshly watered plants gave off an aura that was lush and sultry.

‘Thanks,’ said Cato.

It reminded him of a previous occasion when she’d seemed transformed: just a few days after the T-probe incident. Bright, hypnotic. She’d put it down to a change of attitude.
I’ve decided that arsehole isn’t going to run my life anymore.
So did she start to put her plan into action a week or so later?

‘Shellie, why were you visiting Stephen Mazza at Casuarina last Friday?’

She put her drink down on the glass table. ‘None of your business.’

‘Bullshit, Shellie, he was the one who found Wellard dead just a few days later. You’ve got motive, he’s got means and mates. How do you know him?’

She paused, formulating her answer. ‘He’s an old boyfriend. We used to be close. I needed somebody to talk to.’

Cato shook his head. ‘Gordon messes with your mind big-time at Beeliar. Next thing we know you’re calling on your old flame in Casuarina. Bingo – Wellard’s history.’

She stared at the foliage clinging to the Colorbond fence.

‘Then the night before his murder you show up at my door. Acting all ... strange, emotional.’

‘Heaven forbid.’ She laughed bitterly. ‘I was upset. I was trying to make you understand what it’s like.’ A tear rolled down her cheek. ‘I
didn’t have the bastard killed, much as I might have wanted to. You can think what you like.’

‘It’s gone beyond what I think, Shellie. You’re officially a suspect now.’

‘So are you arresting me?’

‘No, not yet.’

‘You know the way out, then.’

Back in the office, Cato reviewed the Wellard case files once again but now his focus was Stephen Anthony Mazza. Cato could see from the photo why Shellie might have once gone for him; he was not a bad-looking bloke. He didn’t look like your Casuarina stereotype – the inbred inmate covered in tatts, teeth like tombstones. Mazza had a firm jaw, strong face, mop of curly dark hair, eyes not too close together. Mazza looked like a sensitive new-age tradie who had strayed: calendar material, Mr April with a pipe wrench. This was the man Shellie said she poured her heart out to. Did she still carry a torch for him? Cato found himself feeling slightly jealous. Silly, but there it was.

Mazza was serving four years for drunk driving which had resulted in a crash and death. He was due out at the end of the year. He didn’t seem an obvious candidate for a hardcore place like Casuarina, in with all the very bad boys. Cato wondered why Mazza wasn’t in a lower security pre-release joint like Woorooloo or Karnet. Was he a difficult prisoner? Had he upset somebody?

Mazza’s statement. He was heading to the kitchen around 4.50 for a five o’clock start. Just as he arrived, he noticed two figures leaving but only saw them from the back and was unable to identify them. Big, they were. He found Wellard almost immediately and raised the alarm. End of story. It was all very neat; if that’s the way you wanted things. For Corrections and for Hutchens, each overstretched and under-resourced, it would be a temptation to accept it at face value and wrap it all up. For Hutchens, there would be the added danger of questions being raised about the Beeliar Park charade and the waste of time and resources on a manipulative dipstick like Wellard. No wonder he wanted to avoid Cato’s conspiracy theory and not look
too closely at any suspicion of Corrections collusion. Would justice be served by seeking out the truth behind Wellard’s murder? In a strict philosophical sense, probably yes. In day-to-day reality, no. A shadow fell across Cato’s desk.

‘What happened with Shellie?’ Speak of the devil.

‘She said Mazza is an old boyfriend. She needed a heart to heart. The rest is none of our business.’

‘My arse,’ said Hutchens. ‘Bring her in.’

‘Why?’

‘What do you mean, why? We want to know if she arranged to have Wellard topped. You losing the plot, Cato? Gone soft?’

‘You said yourself, Wellard was a prick. Who cares?’

Hutchens tutted. ‘It’s our job, Cato mate. We can’t let our emotions or personal agendas get in the way of our professional duty.’

That was rich, coming from him. ‘So you’re happy to bring in Shellie and put her through the wringer to find out what happened but if it touches Corrections we lay off? To hell with that, you either want the truth or you don’t.’

‘Who the hell do you think you’re talking to?’

Should he apologise or stand his ground? ‘Sorry. Sir.’

‘Fucking right you are. I’d appreciate it if you did what you were told for a change.’

‘So you want me to bring Shellie in?’

‘Yes.’

Fagin’s body had been released by the pathologist and he was to be dispatched from this world via Fremantle Crematorium. The sendoff was attended by a handful of street people. The greasy-haired thirteen year old, who may or may not have been his girlfriend, picked at a scab on her wrist while the duty priest talked about lost sheep. Outside, gum trees blistered in the late morning heat. Lara swept her gaze across the congregation: she recognised a few faces, people she’d busted along the way for petty theft and drug offences. These were Fagin’s family: just as well, for there were no signs of his actual relatives. He had been comprehensively disowned and
erased from their comfortable Cottesloe lives. Every time the priest referred to him by his proper name, Jeremy, the Artful Dodgers nudged each other and giggled. This ‘Jeremy’ was not the bloke they knew. Clarrie, a long-limbed Noongar didge busker, played for a few minutes in final tribute and then Fagin’s casket rolled through the red velvet curtain and everyone filed out. Lara wanted to be as far away as possible.

‘You caught that cunt?’ It was the thirteen year old. She lit a cigarette and blew the smoke out quickly like she was still learning how to do it. She offered a hand, awkwardly formal. ‘Chelsey.’

Lara shook it. ‘Lara.’

‘I know, Jez told me your name. So, you got him? I saw it in the papers. The African, is that him?’

Him. Dieudonne: the smiling assassin. ‘We are questioning somebody, yes. But it’s early days.’

‘What’s that mean? He going to prison or not?’

‘I hope so.’

Chelsey shook her head, unconvinced. ‘You think we’re shit. You won’t do nuthin’.’

Lara felt the need to make this skanky little no-hoper believe her. ‘I will.’

‘Yeah, right,’ said Chelsey.

Lara checked her phone and found a message from Hutchens.

DD is awake and receiving visitors

Dieudonne had a room all to himself in Fremantle Hospital. He also had two armed and very alert police officers at his door. Lara was once again struck by how slight he seemed. The doctor in charge had refused DI Hutchens’ earlier request to have the prisoner handcuffed to the bed. At the time the DI had tried his best to be diplomatic and persuasive.

‘Mate, you’re a fucking idiot. If you knew what this guy was capable of, you’d have him strapped to the gurney with a Hannibal Lecter mask on.’

The doctor was Sri Lankan; he didn’t seem to get the cultural reference and anyway had indicated he’d already seen enough of this
‘heavy-handed police repression’ where he came from. Handcuffs, he said, could interfere with emergency medical procedures and the armed guards should suffice. He also insisted on staying in the room to observe the ‘interrogation’ as he called it. Dieudonne was hooked up to the usual drips and monitors but apart from bloodshot eyes and some suturing on his head, he didn’t seem in too bad a shape. There was a library book on his bedside table: Tim Winton,
Cloudstreet.
DI Hutchens pulled up a visitor’s chair on one side of the bed and Lara stood on the other.

‘How you feeling?’ Hutchens enunciated a little too loudly, as if Dieudonne was deaf as well as African.

‘Very good, thank you sir.’ The voice was soft, polite and respectful and accompanied by a smile.

Hutchens dropped the decibel level and pointed at the book. ‘Keeping up the reading, I see.’

‘Yes.’

‘Goodonya. Missed out on school a bit, yeah? Making up for lost time.’

An affirmative nod from Dieudonne, ‘The hairy hand of God, sir.’

Hutchens was none the wiser. ‘Do you know why you’re here?’

Dieudonne lifted his hand and pointed. ‘My head.’ He looked at Lara and smiled again. ‘She hit me.’

The Sri Lankan doctor stiffened and glared at Lara. She decided to put him straight; she wagged a finger at Dieudonne. ‘You shouldn’t have tried to stab me, mate.’

Dieudonne gave a little laugh.

DI Hutchens opened a file on his knee. ‘There’s a number of matters we need to talk to you about, Dieudonne. Is that how you pronounce it?’

He nodded. ‘Very good.’

Lara hoped the DI wasn’t going to attempt a long interview under these conditions. When Hutchens closed his file again she realised he wasn’t.

‘But in the meantime I’m formally arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Jeremy Dixon and Santo Rosetti and the attempted murder of Detective Senior Constable Philip Kwong.’

‘Don’t forget the assaults on me, sir, at X-Wray Cafe and in my home.’

‘Yeah. Her too,’ said Hutchens. He turned to the doctor. ‘Can we have him now?’

The doctor shook his head. ‘He is not in any condition to be released to you yet. We have to do more tests to confirm that there is no brain damage and to make sure his condition has stabilised.’

‘When then?’ said Hutchens.

‘I’ll give you an update tomorrow, Inspector.’ The doctor left.

Hutchens muttered something undiplomatic under his breath and turned back to Dieudonne. ‘There are armed police stationed at your door and around the hospital. They have authority to shoot you if you present a danger to them. We’ll be back to see you tomorrow, mate.’

‘Very good,’ said Dieudonne through that dazzling smile of his.

‘Am I under arrest?’ Shellie Petkovic’s question was to DI Hutchens who was leading the interview, but her eyes were on Cato.

‘Not at all, we’re just having a chat. Trying to clear a few things up.’ Hutchens smiled reassuringly. ‘So, tell me why you were visiting Stephen Mazza, Shellie.’

Hutchens was enjoying being in the thick of things: it had to be better than budget meetings and Safer Streets strategising. The interview room was the same colour as the decor in the detectives’ office: baby-shit yellow according to one of the baggier-eyed constables trying to juggle work and new parenthood. Even without air conditioning, the thick stone convict-built walls held a chill of their own. Shellie shivered in her thin cotton T-shirt. ‘He’s an old friend. I wanted to talk to him about stuff I was feeling.’

‘What stuff was that, Shellie?’

She shrugged. ‘Wellard. Bree. The business out in the bush.’

‘Do you mean down at Beeliar Park?’

‘Yes.’

‘What were you feeling?’

Her eyes flashed. ‘What do you think?’

Hutchens leaned forward. Father figure. ‘Shellie, I’m sorry. I
know it’s not easy but it’s our job to find out what happened. I need to understand the nature of your talk with Mazza.’

‘Why?’

‘Because it’s our job to find out who killed Gordon Wellard and why.’

‘Like it’s your job to find out who killed Bree, and why, and where she is?’

‘It’s not that simple, Shellie.’

‘It is to me.’

‘The sooner you answer the questions, the sooner you can go.’

Her shoulders slumped in resignation. ‘I was feeling like shit. I wished Wellard was dead. I was sick of everything. Is that what you’re after?’

‘What was Mazza’s response?’

‘He said I needed to let go.’

‘That it?’

‘Yes.’

‘You were in there for an hour and that’s all he said?’

‘We talked about other things. Old times. News and gossip.’

‘Did you ask him to kill Gordon Wellard?’

‘No.’

‘Did he offer to take care of Wellard for you anyway?’

‘No.’

‘This doesn’t look good you know, Shellie.’

‘Are we finished?’

Cato was sent back to Casuarina to have a chat with Stephen Mazza.

‘Shellie and you go back a long way, then?’

‘That’s right,’ said Mazza.

The tradie-gone-bad image was accentuated by a five o’clock shadow. He looked like he was managing to keep himself in reasonable shape inside. It could go either way: some came out lean and mean and others came out looking like Kung Fu Panda. Cato sucked his stomach in.

‘So what did you talk about when Shellie came to see you?’

‘Old times, where she was at, stuff she was going through.’ He opened his palms. ‘Life in here.’

‘Specifically.’

‘Word for word?’

‘As best you can.’

‘She asked how I was going. I said not bad, considering. I asked how she was going. She said fucking awful. She told me all about that bullshit with Wellard in the park. Whose brilliant idea was that?’

‘Not mine,’ said Cato. ‘Go on.’

‘You lot, messing with people’s lives. It’s not on.’

Cato cleared his throat. ‘What did you say to her when she told you about that?’

‘What I just said then: it’s not on.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Wellard’s a piece of shit. She needed to try to forget him and move on. He was never going to give her what she wanted. He liked having that power over her.’

‘Did you offer to sort him out for her?’

‘No.’

‘Did she ask you to kill him?’

‘No.’

‘Did you arrange to kill him anyway?’

‘No.’

‘The morning you found Wellard, tell me what happened.’

‘It’s in the statement. I started work in the kitchen around ten to five. I saw two blokes leaving as I arrived but I couldn’t identify them because they had their backs to me. I found Wellard. Raised the alarm. That’s it.’

‘How far away from you were those two blokes?’

‘Fifteen, twenty metres maybe?’