Peter Corris - Appeal Denied

‘What about your informant of undisclosed gender?’

‘I’m sorry about that. Must’ve sounded like a prick. I didn’t know how much to tell you until I got your reaction. It’s a woman, Constable Jane Farrow-very junior, very concerned.’

‘Why’s she talking to you?’

‘D’you want another drink?’

‘No. C’mon, let’s get this straight.’

‘I met her at a party three weeks ago. Turns out she likes small men. Gregory is also a small man and she liked him, too. Not as much as before.’

‘Before you?’

‘Yeah, but more so since the investigation into Lily’s murder.’

The light dropped as the clouds moved west and blocked out the weakening rays of the sun. In a way, against what I’d been feeling just before this latest titbit of information, I wanted to get clear of Townsend, the house, the city, the country if need be. Use up some frequent flier points and get as far away as… where? Norfolk Island? Lord Howe? Wouldn’t help.

‘Has she told you who the IT guy is?’

‘No, but she might.’

‘What happened to DS Williams? I thought he was in charge. He’s the one who talked to me initially.’

‘Apparently he’s out of the picture. There’s your next starting point.’

I still didn’t like his one-upping style. He was dedicated but quite what to was hard to say. I agreed to work with him as best I could-finding out about Gregory, having a talk to Williams, while he got what he could from Constable Farrow. We exchanged numbers and agreed to stay in touch. I was sure he was holding something back but so was I. Lily had used my computer from time to time, and recently. And she’d always carried a thumb drive with her.

I had a few words with various people as I made my way out and found Tony sitting by himself, staring at his orange juice. He was stone cold sober, so the drink was exactly what it seemed.

‘She was so good to me, Cliff. Always there, even when I was doing fucking stupid things.’

‘I know.’

‘I can’t believe she’s gone. It just doesn’t seem right.’

‘It isn’t.’

‘I’ve been thinking. You’re a detective, right? I’ve phoned the cops a couple of times but they don’t tell me anything. Maybe you can find out

‘I’m on it already, Tony. I’ll let you know how it goes and I know I can call on you if I need any help.’

He nodded. ‘Yeah. You bet.’

The party was winding down but a mob of stayers was settling in. Coffee was being served and I stopped to get some and eat two more sandwiches, thinking that after a bit of a walk I’d be okay to drive. As I was finishing the coffee a middle-aged man approached me.

‘Mr Hardy, I’m Patrick Henke.’

We shook hands. ‘I seem to know the name,’ I said.

‘Ms Truscott’s solicitor.’

‘Right.’

‘This is a terrible thing, terrible. Such a… such a very able woman.’

‘Yes, well…’

‘She mentioned you a few times over the past couple of years as I handled some things for her. I’ll be sending you a formal letter, but since you’re here it seems appropriate to tell you now. Ms Truscott’s will divides her estate, which consists of a considerable number of very solid shares and her house in Greenwich, between her brother Anthony and yourself.’

I walked the Hunters Hill streets for over an hour without knowing where I was or where I was going. I was stunned by what Henke had told me. It made me rethink my relationship with Lily. It had seemed to me to be equally loose and open-ended on both sides. But perhaps it wasn’t. I’d never given a thought to leaving anything in my will to anyone other than my daughter Megan. All it’d amount to was the Glebe house. That was worth a fair amount even in its neglected state, but I wasn’t planning to shuffle off for quite some time. Lily would have thought the same, but she’d made a different decision.

I wondered if Henke had told Tony. Probably not, given Tony’s fragile state. I wondered how he’d take it.

Why hadn’t she told me? Was she waiting for me to say something along the lines of putting our relationship on a different footing? It made me wish we’d talked more about ‘us’, something we almost never did, as if we were both afraid that to talk about it would spoil it. And now it was spoilt well and truly. Again, I felt guilty: I hadn’t paid proper attention to her work, and now it seemed I hadn’t paid proper attention to her feelings.

But one thing was for sure: licence or no licence, I was going to give the investigation into who killed her everything I had.

I got home late, tired and depressed. There were a few messages on the answering machine-one from the bank about my MasterCard, a couple of condolences. Hilde Stoner had rung to apologise for Frank and her not making it to the funeral. They liked Lily a lot and had wanted to be there, but there was some kind of crisis with their son Peter, who was aid-working in Asia with his wife and their infant twin girls. Hilde and Frank were waiting on a phone call. Understandable.

I went upstairs, looked at the computer but couldn’t find the motivation to turn it on. Not now. I opened the wardrobe in the room that doubles as a study and guest bedroom and saw some of Lily’s clothes-a couple of pairs of pants, a blouse, a dress, a jacket. Her toothbrush and a few bits of makeup were in the upstairs bathroom. There’d be a few of her books lying around. I’d be willing to bet I’d find a pair of shoes kicked under a chair. Probably some knickers and tights in the dirty clothes basket.

I was overseas in the army fighting for freedom when my mother died. My sister told me later how disposing of her clothes and other things had broken my father up, even though they’d been at odds with each other for decades. Different in every way. It’d be the work of a few minutes for me, but I had some idea now of how he must have felt. The emptiness was making me think back further than I cared to go. Filling in the spaces. It’d been a strange household to grow up in, requiring deception and negotiation between the parents every step of the way. Perhaps it had stood me in good stead for my profession.

I drank some wine and didn’t taste it. I had no appetite. Lily had given me a book for my birthday- 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die. I sat with it on my lap, turning over the pages, looking at the pictures. It helped: I thought about some of the films- Casablanca, The Magnificent Seven, The Third Man, Rocco and His Brothers, Chariots of Fire, Manhattan — and the images took me away from where I was and what would never happen again with Lily and what I was going to do next.

Eventually, the tiredness became terminal, but, after the day’s events, I was afraid of dreams and disturbances. My most recent injury-of many-had been a badly sprained ankle when I’d attempted a triple jump, something at which I’d once been a good performer, on the sand at Byron Bay. Showing off for Lily. The ligaments were damaged and the ankle hurt like hell for a couple of weeks. Ian Sangster had prescribed some sleeping pills, which I’d taken for as long as I’d needed to. Now I found a few left over in their foil in the bathroom cupboard and took one with a light scotch and soda. I tidied up a bit, erased the phone messages, put the movie book on the shelves and made it up the stairs to bed. Just.

Hilde rang in the morning to say that the crisis for Peter and his family in Bangladesh was over.

‘Good news,’ I said.

‘How are you making out, Cliff?’

‘I’m okay. I need to speak to Frank. Is he around?’

Frank came on the line. I said, ‘What can you tell me about Vincent Gregory?’

‘What do you need to know and why?’