Chapter 10
Saturday, 19th November, 1988
Harry de Groot.
Empty Hands and Empty Hearts
As I drove toward Double Bay, the news on the radio finished and a report on the Chinese triads operating in Australia began. These groups, who were involved in heroin shipments, illegal gambling, loansharking, and extortion, had mostly established themselves around Sydney. What really got me thinking was the assertion that, these triads were cooperating with other criminal groups. Could Ruslen be involved with Asian triads? Might the third missing woman, Lee Lin, be a link between the groups? It all sounded a bit farfetched, but then again, similar things had been happening in recent years, with the economic deregulation going on.
It was blindingly obvious that organising a phone tap on Ruslen would be a smart move. But we had already tried this and had come up with zilch. Now we believed that Ruslen was primarily communicating via pager, computer, and perhaps, public telephones. And at the present time, we had no method of surveillance for any of these.
I drove into the car park of the Double Bay Sailing Club and parked my Holden Commodore amongst the Mercedes, BMWs, and Jaguars. I obviously didn’t belong here. Not that I wanted to, as the obvious parade of wealth gave me a bad taste in the mouth. I think this is because flaunting wealth appears to be allied with selfishness and lack of generosity and empathy. I didn’t want to be that person and although it may sound like a cliché, I got into policing to serve others. I also think that the stories that my parents told me about their wonderful treatment by Australian police and immigration officers, when they migrated here from the Netherlands, after World War II, also had something to do with my job choice.
I bowled up to the door and paid the $40 to enter the charity auction. Ouch! Most of the seats were booked and had been purchased beforehand, but when I rang this morning, I was told that there were a few tickets at the door available. I stepped into the artificially cooled room and edged around the outside and took a seat near the back. Nobody rushed to greet me, or even looked in my direction; I imagine that I did not look like the right kind of person, and was therefore, uninteresting.
The first auction item was the right to name a luxury yacht that took rich American tourists out on the harbour. The flurry started, with the rhythmic monotone of the auctioneer and a growing sense of urgency. An exorbitant price was reached and on it went. So far, I had not seen Peter Ruslen’s mother, Kristina Ruslen, but I had my eyes peeled and my hopes up.
It was when a sable coat, donated by a Double Bay designer store, was held up, that lady Ruslen made her appearance. She stepped out from behind a blue silk curtain, like a queen, and went into battle to get that coat, seemingly, at any price. Of course, the matriarch ultimately won and she seized that dead, animal pelt, with relish. Smiling with lots of very white teeth.
Tall and queenly, with hair of white, fairy floss, Mrs Kristina Ruslen’s commanding presence was like a magnet to the whole room. But she also appeared to be popular too. The room smiled toward her and clapped at her success and she smiled back and mock bowed to her happy subjects.
Then, from the corner of my eye, I saw Peter Ruslen appear. He languidly made a bid on a Hermes bracelet, but his heart wasn’t in it, and he soon sat back down, as he lost to a toothpick of a woman whose facelift made me think that her real age was about 102. I think Ruslen saw me, though, as I noticed his eyes flash and his mouth tighten in anger. Or maybe, he just had wind? Anyway I had seen enough. Time to skedaddle.
Luckily the auction was over and the crowd all seemed to move at once, mostly toward a small room where some delicious looking canapés were set out, along with bottles of expensive champagne, on tables covered in snow white, cloths. Everything looked delicious but I couldn’t stand this lot any longer. The bloke next to me had kept flashing his Rolex about; a watch worth thousands, which does the same job as my $15 number and the woman behind had kept blathering on about a Chanel bag that she had hoped to make a bid on. Although, she didn’t want to spend any more than $1000, she said. This parade of vanity was getting under my skin and I battled the tide and fled out the door into the blinding sunlight, which reflected off the blue waters of the bay.
I was a paradise around here, but it was only for the rich, and I mean rich. Working hard won’t cut it. A policeman, teacher or nurse can’t afford to buy Double Bay real estate, and strangely, there is this general thinking out there, in less salubrious suburbs, that those who have money and power must deserve it. Or is it apathy? In reality, most of these people have inherited wealth and social connections, and they have set up the structures for that wealth and privilege to be transferred to their children. And no, I’m not a Marxist. I just see the unfairness in the system. I care about justice and fairness.
I looked out at the water and my eyes skimmed over the gigantic, luxury yachts glittering in the golden rays of sunshine. ‘Ad Astra’ that was the name of Ruslen’s expedition yacht. The information given to me had outlined how this sea craft had its own helicopter deck, full size apartment under the pilothouse and could accommodate 16 guests and 14 staff. I thought about those homeless people that I had passed at Taylor Square yesterday. Perhaps I was turning into a Marxist.
I left the beautiful bay side and drove toward the grime of the city. I passed ‘Light Fingers’, the brothel known to be owned by Ruslen that I had driven past only yesterday. My head spun like a wheel on my shoulders. I couldn’t believe it! In just over 24 hours, the building had become a used furniture store. I shook my head, I was feeling distinctly rattled. How could we nail these people who had us outclassed with money and connections and a willingness to do whatever it takes?
I was feeling extra despondent now, not only because the threads of my investigation were evaporating before my eyes but because of the background anxiety about my ex-wife, Linda, and what she might do.
At the same time, I was thinking about Lee Lin, and a possible connection to the triads. What really made me take this avenue seriously was the fact that, the owner of the brothel at which Lee Lin worked, had been forced into a kneeling position and clubbed to death, around the time that she had disappeared. This style of execution is common in the world of Chinese crime.
We had been alerted to Lee Lin’s disappearance by immigration authorities, who had made an impromptu check of her working and living arrangements. The laundry owner, a Mr Chin, had folded pretty quickly under pressure, stating that he was being strongarmed into providing legitimate cover jobs for imported prostitutes, by his landlord. When asked who this landlord was, however, he had suddenly gone mute and unable to speak English. Later that day Mr Chin was found dead in his gas-filled car, behind the laundry. Sedative drugs were also found in his system. Medical experts had found it impossible to say whether this was a murder or a suicide.
However, earlier that day I had accompanied the officers who had made a search of Lee Lin’s room, at the back of the brothel; little more than a dingy cupboard, really. Her bed was neat and clean, covered in a black and red quilt. Her rickety, timber cupboard had been jam packed with evening gowns, and many were very expensive. I found that interesting. But even more enlightening, was her shoe collection. All her shoes were size 5 and either red or black in colour. Half of those pairs were of the Paragon brand. Lee Lin really liked black and red.
When we had checked the ownership of the building, where the laundry and brothel were located, we had encountered a tangle of complexity. The financial maze took us through tax havens and shell companies, ultimately, to a dead end.
Lee Lin had been connected to the millionaire, Peter Ruslen, after her photo appeared in the newspaper as a missing person. Various random people had called into a hotline set up by police, describing how they had often seen a women that resembled, Lee Lin, in the company of Peter Ruslen, and two other women, at restaurants and nightclubs. Pretty soon we found that Tabra Hayden and June Roze, who were missing as well, were also linked to Peter Ruslen.
Suddenly I wanted to take another look at Lee Lin’s room, in the brothel again, to see if I could find anything hidden under a lose floorboard or somewhere else. So I turned sharply into Cleveland Street; soon enough, I was parking the car and marching up the car bogged street and striding past the laundry and whipping into the side alley and storming up the stairs. When I got there, I found that the red light had been removed and the door had been boarded up. It was like the place had been deserted for years.
I went downstairs to the laundry, but it was also closed down. I rubbed a bit of the dirty glass and peered inside. The room was empty. A bare cement floor stared back.
I decided to head home.
As I let myself through the door to my flat, the phone was ringing. Without thinking, I picked it up.
‘I’m telling you now loser, leave my wife alone. You had your chance with Linda and you buggered it up. Go and get your own woman!’
The phone was slammed down hard in my ear and I was left listening to the mocking dial tone. So Linda had called her husband and done a number on me. But I wasn’t convinced by his anger. It sounded forced to me, like his heart wasn’t quite in it. I had to wonder if there was trouble in paradise on that front. Perhaps, John had begun to see the real Linda. But having had that thought, I felt bad; because I knew that there were reasons for Linda’s insecurity and unstable moods and behaviour. She had experienced neglect and family trauma as a child and it was likely that she had some kind of personality disorder. She refused go to a doctor or shrink though, so that was that.
I poured myself a beer and stepped out onto my little balcony. I looked out over the backyards which stretched out around the tall building in which I lived. I could see the black, snaking roads in the distance, and people walking and running at the local park like busy ants. I sighed and sat down on the strange looking 1950s patio chair that had come from my parent’s garage. What I needed was a new angle, a new line of attack. Then the phone rang.
Well that put a new slant on things! The missing person’s team, who had been investigating June Roze’s bank account, and her financial transactions, had just reported to Sargent O’Brien, that they had finally got some information out of June Roze’s bank manager. It appears that the old boy had needed his arm twisted a little extra, to share the fact that, an unusually large amount of money had been deposited into Roze’s main bank account about one year ago. After this time, there had been frequent account activity; mostly purchases from expensive clothing and shoe shops. There had also been several more large deposits at intervals in the following months, which had stopped only days before June Roze disappeared. This account had, however, been dormant until the last few days, when suddenly, various purchases have been made on a credit card, linked to that account. These purchases appeared to consist of designer clothing and shoes bought from luxury boutiques in the city. And, an overnight stay at the Regent Hotel, near the Rocks - only last night. Most bloody interesting!
I jumped up, ran inside, grabbed my keys and slammed the door on my way out, frightening Mrs Ginger, my elderly neighbour who had just come home from her weekly shampoo and set. I apologised profusely, as hope rose in my breast. There was a good chance that a five star hotel of that size would have CCTV footage.
I jumped back in the car and headed out toward the glowing city.