Felicity Young: An Easeful Death

Baggly nervously smoothed down his moustache. The light caught the shimmer of sweat on his forehead as he looked desperately from Monty to De Vakey. ‘I’m no paedophile. They were never under age.’

‘The rags won’t give a shit: fifteen, sixteen, not much in it, is there?’

De Vakey stepped over to refill Baggly’s glass. Monty allowed Baggly to toss down another gulp before going to the phone on the side table. He lifted the receiver and started punching in the numbers.

‘Wait,’ Baggly said in panic. ‘You’ve no evidence! This is all conjecture!’

Monty put his hand over the receiver. ‘The press don’t need evidence, it’s just another juicy scandal for them. I’m ringing one of Michelle’s old journalist friends, telling her my suspicions. She can do what she likes with them.’

‘No!’ Baggly cried, putting his head in his hands and rocking from side to side in his chair.

‘Is that you, Sherrie?’ Monty said into the phone.

‘Wait, put it down, I’ll tell you what I know. Please, no press,’ Baggly begged.

‘Sorry, Sherrie, something’s come up, I can’t talk now.’ He put down the receiver and turned to Baggly. ‘Are you ready to talk? You’ll need to go to Central, I’ll get someone over to escort you.’

Baggly blew out a shuddering breath. ‘You’ve been plying me with booze. Nothing I say will be admissible.’

Monty found himself filled with a sudden, uncontrollable rage. He grabbed one of the bottles from the drinks trolley and hurled it at the wall. Baggly almost fell off his chair as the glass shattered behind him. Monty grabbed him by the shirt and yelled into his face, buttons popping under his fists. ‘You don’t get it, do you, you quivering lump of lard! Right at this moment I don’t give a shit what’s admissible and what’s not. I just want some fucking answers and I want them now!’

Monty felt De Vakey’s hand on his arm. He let go of Baggly and stepped back, breathing heavily, but calm again.

When Baggly found his voice he touched his gaping shirtfront. ‘I need to change.’

Monty reluctantly agreed; he didn’t want the roughing up of a suspect added to the other somewhat dodgy circumstances surrounding Baggly’s arrest. He watched Baggly haul himself unsteadily to his feet and said to De Vakey, ‘Go with him, keep a close eye on him. I have to make a phone call.’

De Vakey nodded and followed Baggly into his bedroom.

Monty used Baggly’s lounge-room phone to call Wayne. He gave him a summary of events and asked him to collect Baggly and arrange the interview at Central.

‘By the way, Mont,’ Wayne said. ‘I suppose it’s not important now, but for the record, I followed up on Justin’s hospital visit to Martin Sparrow.’

‘Shoot.’

‘It seems he has a thing going for Sparrow’s nurse—used Sparrow as an excuse for going to see her. That was the sole reason for his visit to the hospital.’

Monty glanced at Justin sitting on the sofa with his head in his hands.

‘Poor kid. It’s not been his day has it?’ Wayne added.

‘How did the re-enactment go?’

‘The dero said he recognised Baggly’s car. I thought it all seemed a bit far-fetched until now.’

‘How’s Stevie? Is she okay?’

‘I haven’t been able to reach her and I need to tell her something important. I had someone double-check Tye’s alibi and it turns out the mine supervisor was lying through his arse. Tye—’

A shot cracked out from Baggly’s room. ‘Oh God, no!’ Justin sprang from the sofa in a panic.

Monty’s stomach flipped. ‘I’ll ring you back.’ He slammed down the phone, grabbed Justin by the shoulders and pushed him towards the door. ‘Get the hell out of here. Go to the neighbour’s and wait there.’

The urgency of his tone had the desired effect; the boy bolted.

Monty found De Vakey standing in the doorway of Baggly’s bedroom, mouth open, hands outstretched as if he might still be able to stop what had already happened.

Baggly’s body lay sprawled on its back near an open chest of drawers, a pistol on the floor near his outstretched arm. It looked as if he’d already started his own autopsy, the single shot through the mouth having lifted the top of his skull like the lid of a hard-boiled egg. The frozen look of surprise on his face suggested that even he had not expected to make such a good clean job of it.

De Vakey stayed where he was, shaking his head from side to side like a man coming out of a trance. ‘The gun was in his top drawer, it happened so quickly...’

Monty felt for Baggly’s carotid pulse out of instinct and shook his head. He rocked back on his heels. The wound looked surgically neat, but the mess must have landed somewhere.

A shuddering sigh drew his attention back to De Vakey who was slowly sinking down the wall into a sitting position.

‘Oh Christ,’ Monty whispered, knowing the image of the gore-splattered profiler would stay with him for the rest of his life. He took De Vakey by the arms and pulled him to his feet. ‘You need to go to the bathroom and clean up,’ he said.

‘I should have stopped him,’ De Vakey gasped, pale with shock.

‘You couldn’t have stopped him, neither of us could. Now go and clean up. It’s obvious what happened here, we don’t need any more evidence.’

Monty turned away to find himself confronted by an equally disturbing sight. Justin was walking rigidly towards him up the hall with all the grace of a zombie.

‘Go wash up,’ Monty said to De Vakey before focusing his attention on Justin. ‘You shouldn’t be here.’ He looked at the boy and softened his voice. ‘I’m sorry, your father’s dead, son.’ Taking him by the arm, he guided him back into the living room.

‘It’s my fault, it’s my fault,’ Justin repeated over and over.

Monty sat next to him on the sofa, ready to hold him back if necessary. ‘I know this is a terrible shock for you,’ he began, ‘and it’s not over yet. I need to ask you some important questions. You have to clear your mind of this mess and answer me as best you can.’

Justin dropped his head in his hands. Monty took him by the shoulders and gave him a gentle shake. ‘Do you hear me, Justin?’

He took the choked sigh to indicate a yes and handed Justin his handkerchief. After allowing a few seconds for nose blowing, he took from his wallet a photo he’d found at Dot’s. ‘Do you know this man?’

Justin looked at the picture of Tye Davis for a moment, closed his eyes and nodded.

‘Who is he and how do you know him?’

‘Frank Dixon, he’s a friend of Dad’s. He sometimes comes over to the house. Sometimes Dad meets him at the old power station.’

Monty frowned ‘The power station?’

‘Dad has a key. The guy’s in demolition or something and was interested in looking around the building. Dad was hoping to get the council to contract Dixon into knocking it down once all the red tape has been cut through. He hates—hated—that power station.’

‘Can you tell me anything else about this Frank Dixon?’

Justin sniffed. ‘Dad used to act kind of funny when he came over, almost like he was scared of him. He had an old bomb of a car and sometimes Dad let him borrow his. Sometimes I had to let him use my van.’

‘When did you see him last?’

Justin was interrupted by De Vakey’s reappearance. ‘Phone call for you, Stevie’s mother.’ De Vakey handed Monty the phone and took his place on the sofa next to Justin. Monty stepped into the hallway.

‘Monty, is that you? You haven’t been answering your phone. Stevie’s was on the kitchen table and I got De Vakey’s number from it. I was hoping you’d be together.’ Dot spoke rapid fire, as if wanting to get the explanation over and done with.