Peter Corris - Wet Graves

Wren gave a sniff and tapped the sheet. “You didn’t mention any of this when you made a statement at Woolloomooloo a couple of days ago.”

“Come on, Ralph,” the inspector said. He was ten years older than me, close to twenty older than Wren, and he used his rank and the age differential like a heavier champ using his weight against a contender. “Let’s stick to the point. First thing is to pull up those bodies, if that’s what they are.”

“Water police,” Wren said. “Cheeky bastards.”

“And you’ll have to take me along to identify the spot,” I said. “Sorry, Mr Wren, Mr Lucas.”

“Loomis. Are you sure you’re up to it, Mr Hardy? You seemed a bit unsteady back there a while ago.”

Loomis was smarter than Wren and he knew it. He’d just managed to tone down my insolence. “I’ll be all right,” I said.

“Good.” Loomis rubbed his hands together. “Think I’ll leave you the paperwork, Ralph, and take a turn on the water myself. Get on the blower to the floaties, will you? And Ralph, we don’t want any reporters or cameras. Got me?”

Wren left the room and Loomis escorted me to the canteen, where we drank coffee and ate surprisingly good toasted sandwiches. He was a relaxed and pleasant man and I felt myself relaxing in his company. I realised that I’d been wound up tight; Loomis knew it. He blew on the surface of his coffee and waved to a colleague across the room.

“How’s Meredith?” I said.

“Doing well. I heard you called in on him the other day.”

“He saved my bloody life. You know about the Tobin thing?”

He nodded. I guessed that crooked cops, former and current, weren’t his favourite people. “This is a bizarre case. The bridge has been up for nearly sixty years. Why would anyone suddenly take it into his mind to start killing the sons of the builders?”

I shook my head. “Answer that and you’ve got him.”

“You’ve got no clues, you say.”

“Too many bloody clues. One way and another you can put together quite a list of the people killed or seriously injured on the job. It’d run to a hundred, maybe more. Someone connected with one of those people is the most likely candidate. It’s before the migrants came here and started doing all the hard yakka, remember. They have names like Smith and Jones.”

Loomis drank some coffee gloomily. “People who take phoney names often don’t use their imagination. You’ve got a list like that, have you?”

“Partial only.”

“Any names like Goulburn or Bathurst on it?”

“I don’t remember. My notes’re in my car.”

“Hang on. More coffee?” I shook my head and the inspector went across to a wall phone. He spoke briefly into it, got more coffee for himself at the counter and returned. “Your car’s in the basement. I’ve taken the liberty of asking an officer to bring us your notes.”

“You’re buying the food.”

He drank some more coffee and relaxed in his chair. “If this breaks the way we think it will, it’s going to be a big story. How much of it do you want, Hardy? What’s the extent of your interest?”

“Doesn’t extend very far,” I said. “I’d like to be able to handle my client’s identification of her father, if it’s him down there, before any of the media get hold of it. That’s about it. I’d like to feel that Meredith got his share of the credit for the detective work. I took my lead from his interest in missing persons cases with a bridge connection. He was on the right track.”

“Fair enough. More than fair. The trouble is, there’s not going to be much credit to spread around unless we catch the killer.”

“That’s your department. I was hired to find someone. It looks as if I’ve done it.”

“It does, it does. Ah, here we are.”

A female constable appeared at Loomis’ elbow. She ignored me and handed him my notebook and accompanying bits of paper. Loomis lifted his bum off the seat in gentlemanly fashion. “Thank you, constable.”

The policewoman said, “Yes, sir,” turned smartly and left the canteen.

“Can’t get used to it,” Loomis mused. “Especially the guns. Well, let’s see what we have here.” He spread the papers out, sorting them rapidly and efficiently. His hands alighted on the photocopies. “Lists of names. Christ!” It was the first aroused response I’d seen from him. I leant forward and saw that he was looking at the blotchy, grainy photocopy of the picture of the riveter doing his stuff on a narrow ledge a couple of hundred feet up.

“Scary,” I said.

“Mmm.” Loomis ran his eye down the list I’d copied from the Veterans of the Bridge pamphlet. “See what you mean. Smith and Jones. Nothing…”

“Geographical?”

“Right.” He pushed the papers across to me. I patted them into some sort of order and put them in my pocket. “It’s got to be someone who only recently found out that he had a grievance, or only recently acquired the means to do something about it.”

I was impressed. “Death notices early this year. Match ‘em up with the names of the dead and injured.”

“Slow and messy. Have you considered that there could be other people under threat?”

“Of course I have. What about Paul Guthrie? His father helped to build the bloody thing.”

Loomis shook his head. “From what you’ve told us, this nut has singled out the actual construction phase. Still, you could be right. You evidently admire Guthrie, feel some responsibility to him. Does that affect your position?”

I munched on a last crust from my toasted ham and cheese sandwich and swilled down some cold coffee. It was mid-afternoon. Too early for a drink, but I’d have succumbed if one had been available. “How d’you mean, inspector?” I said.

“Are you really trying, Hardy? Do you want to stop this maniac? Aren’t you embarrassed about the way he fooled you? Watched you while you looked under the bridge?”

“That’s a point,” I said. “He’s a bridge freak. Rows on the harbour. You’ve got the manpower to look into those things. I haven’t.”

“Sent you off on a wild goose chase? Diverted you while he cleaned up his room and bashed an old woman to death?’

I stared at him. “What do you want me to do?”

His high forehead wrinkled. The wrinkles ran all the way up to where his hairline used to be and beyond. This was deep thought being demonstrated. I was aware of a growing hostility between us. “How about this dinghy, sailboat or whatever he was in?”

“What about it?”

“Did it have a name, for Christ’s sake?”

“I thought of that, inspector.”

“And?”

“I didn’t notice.”

“Some detective,” Loomis said.

We boarded the water police launch at the pontoon dock I’d seen during my previous excursion on the water. Loomis exerted his heavy charm on the uniformed sergeant and two constables running the boat, and also spread it around the two frogmen, who jiggled and slapped their hands together as if they could hardly wait to get out of this unnatural environment and into their true habitat. They had lights similar to the one Ray Guthrie had used but stronger-looking, and one of them had a waterproof tool kit at his feet. Loomis took a careful look around before giving the signal to move out towards the bridge.

“I don’t see any reporters or camera crews, do you, Hardy?”

It was an olive branch of a sort; we’d hardly spoken since the police station. Loomis had concentrated on making efficient arrangements, and I’d worked on steeling myself for something nasty.

“Looks clear to me,” I said. “This shouldn’t take long. I’m told it’s only fifteen metres deep.”

Loomis smiled. “Is that all? Christ, look at the muck in the water.”