The Bat

  Harry elbowed his way to the bar and ordered.

  ‘Coming up right away, blondie,’ said the barmaid in the Roman helmet with a deep voice and a mischievous smile.

  ‘Tell me, are you and I the only straight guys in this town?’ Harry asked, returning with a beer and a glass of juice.

  ‘After San Francisco Sydney has the biggest gay population in the world,’ Andrew said. ‘The Australian outback is not exactly known for its tolerance of sexual diversity, so it’s not surprising that all the queer farmer boys in Australia want to come to Sydney. Not just from Australia, by the way, there are gay people from all over the world pouring into town every day.’

  They went to another bar at the back of the room where Andrew called a girl behind the counter. She was standing with her back to them and had the reddest hair Harry had ever seen. It hung down to the rear pocket of her tight blue jeans, but was unable to conceal the willowy back and pleasingly rounded hips. She turned and a row of pearly-white teeth smiled from a slim, radiant face with two azure eyes and innumerable freckles. What a waste, if this isn’t a woman, Harry thought.

  ‘Remember me?’ Andrew shouted above the noise of seventies disco music. ‘I was here asking about Inger. Can we have a word?’

  The redhead became serious. She nodded, passed on a message to one of the other girls and led the way to a little smoking room behind the kitchen.

  ‘Any news?’ she asked, and Harry needed no more to be able to determine with some certainty that she spoke better Swedish than English.

  ‘I met an old man once,’ Harry said in Norwegian. She glanced at him in surprise. ‘He was the captain of a boat on the Amazon River. Three words from him in Portuguese and I knew he was Swedish. He had lived there for thirty years. And I can’t speak a word of Portuguese.’

  At first the redhead looked perplexed, but then she laughed. A trill of cheery laughter that reminded Harry of some rare forest bird.

  ‘Is it really so obvious?’ she said in Swedish. She had a deep, calm voice and softly rolled rrrs.

  ‘Intonation,’ Harry said. ‘You never completely get rid of intonation.’

  ‘Do you know each other?’ Andrew scrutinised them sceptically.

  Harry looked at the redhead.

  ‘Nope,’ she answered.

  And isn’t that a pity, Harry thought to himself.

  The redhead’s name was Birgitta Enquist. She had been in Australia for four years and working at the Albury for one.

  ‘Of course we talked when we were working, but I didn’t really have any close contact with Inger. She kept herself to herself mostly. There’s a gang of us who go out together and she occasionally tagged along, but I didn’t know her that well. She had just left some guy in Newtown when she started here. The most personal detail I know about her is that the relationship became too intense for her in the long run. I suppose she needed a fresh start.’

  ‘Do you know who she hung out with?’ Andrew asked.

  ‘Not really. As I said, we talked, but she never gave me a full rundown of her life. Not that I asked her to. In October she went up north to Queensland and apparently fell in with a crowd from Sydney there who she stayed in contact with afterwards. I think she met a guy up there – he came by here one night. I’ve told you all this before though, haven’t I?’ she said with an enquiring glance.

  ‘I know, my dear Miss Enquist, I just wanted my Norwegian colleague here to have a first-hand report and see where Inger worked. Harry Holy is regarded as Norway’s best investigator after all and he may be able to put his finger on things we Sydney police have overlooked.’

  Harry was overcome by a sudden fit of coughing.

  ‘Who’s Mr Bean?’ he asked in a strange, constricted voice.

  ‘Mr Bean?’ Birgitta eyed them in bewilderment.

  ‘Someone who looked like the English comedian . . . er, Rowan Atkinson, isn’t that his name?’

  ‘Oh, him!’ Birgitta said with the same forest-bird laughter.

  I like it, Harry thought. More.

  ‘That’s Alex, the bar manager. He won’t be here till later.’

  ‘We have reason to believe he was interested in Inger.’

  ‘Alex had his eye on Inger, yes, he did. And not just Inger, most girls in this bar have at one time or another been subjected to his desperate efforts. Or Fiddler Ray, as we call him. It was Inger who came up with Mr Bean. He doesn’t have an easy time of it, poor thing. Over thirty, lives at home with his mum and doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. But he’s perfectly OK as a boss. And quite harmless, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  Birgitta patted the side of her nose. ‘He hasn’t got it in him.’

  Harry pretended to jot notes down on his pad.

  ‘Do you know if she knew or met someone who . . . er, had it in him?’

  ‘Well, there are so many types of guy that drop in here. Not all of them are gay, and there were quite a few who noticed Inger – she’s so attractive. Was. But off the top of my head I can’t think of anyone. There was . . .’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘No, nothing.’

  ‘I read in the report that Inger was working here the night we assume she was killed. Do you know if she had a date after work or did she go straight home?’

  ‘She took a few scraps from the kitchen, said they were for the mutt. I knew she didn’t have a dog, so I asked her where she was going. She said home. That’s all I know.’

  ‘The Tasmanian Devil,’ Harry muttered. She sent him a curious look. ‘Her landlord has a dog,’ he said. ‘I suppose it had to be bribed so she could enter the house in one piece.’

  Harry thanked her for talking to them. As they were about to leave, Birgitta said, ‘We’re really upset at the Albury about what happened. How are her parents taking it?’

  ‘Not too well, I’m afraid,’ Harry said. ‘They’re in shock, of course. And blame themselves for letting her come here. The coffin’s being sent to Norway tomorrow. I can get hold of the address if you want to send flowers for the funeral.’

  ‘Thank you. That would be very kind of you.’

  Harry was on the verge of asking something else, but couldn’t bring himself to do it with all the talk about death and funerals. On the way out her farewell smile was burning on his retina. He knew it was going to be there for a while.

  ‘Shit,’ he mumbled to himself. ‘Should I, shouldn’t I?’

  In the club all the transvestites plus a fair number of the other customers were standing on the counter miming to Katrina & the Waves. ‘Walking on Sunshine’ boomed out of the speakers.

  ‘There’s not much time for grief and reflection at a place like the Albury,’ Andrew commented.

  ‘Suppose that’s the way it should be,’ Harry said. ‘Life goes on.’ He asked Andrew to hang on for a minute, went back to the bar and waved to Birgitta.

  ‘Sorry, just one last question.’

  ‘Yes?’

  Harry took a deep breath. He was already regretting his decision, but it was too late. ‘Do you know a good Thai restaurant in town?’

  Birgitta had a think. ‘Mmm, there’s one in Bent Street, in the city centre. Do you know where that is? It’s supposed to be pretty good, I’m told.’

  ‘So good you would go with me?’

  That didn’t come out right, Harry thought. Besides, it was unprofessional. Very unprofessional, in fact. Birgitta gave a groan of despair, but the despair was not so convincing that Harry couldn’t see an opening. Anyway, the smile was still in residence.

  ‘That one of your more frequent lines, Officer?’

  ‘Fairly frequent.’

  ‘Does it work?’

  ‘Statistically speaking? Not really.’

  She laughed, inclined her head and studied Harry with curiosity. Then she shrugged.

  ‘Why not? I’m free tomorrow. Nine o’clock. And you’re paying.’

  6

  A Bishop

  HARRY
JAMMED THE blue light on top of the car and got behind the wheel. The wind rushed through the car as he took the curves. Stiansen’s voice. Then silence. A bent fence post. A hospital room, flowers. A photograph in the corridor, fading.

  Harry sat bolt upright. The same dream again. It was still only four o’clock in the morning. He tried to go back to sleep, but his mind turned to Inger Holter’s unknown murderer.

  At six he reckoned he could get up. After an invigorating shower, he walked out to a pale blue sky with an ineffectual morning sun to find somewhere to go for breakfast. There was a buzz coming from the city centre, but the morning rush hour had not yet reached the red lamps and black mascara eyes here. King’s Cross had a certain slapdash charm, a lived-in beauty that made him hum as he walked. Apart from a few late, slightly worse-for-wear night birds, a couple sleeping under a rug on some steps and a wan, thinly clad prostitute on the early shift, the streets were empty for the moment.

  Outside a terrace cafe the owner stood hosing down the pavement and Harry smiled his way to an impromptu breakfast. As he was eating his toast and bacon, a teasing breeze tried to whisk away his serviette.

  ‘You’re up at sparrow’s fart, Holy,’ McCormack said. ‘It’s good. The brain works best between half past six and eleven. After that it’s mush, if you ask me. It’s also quiet here in the morning. I can hardly add two and two with the racket after nine. Can you? My boy claims he has to have the stereo on to do his homework. He gets so distracted if it’s bloody quiet. Can you understand that?’

  ‘Er—’

  ‘Anyway, yesterday I’d had enough and marched in and switched off the sodding machine. “I need it to think!” screamed the boy. I said he would have to read like normal folk. “People are different, Dad,” he said, pissed off. Yup, he’s at that age, you know.’

  McCormack paused and looked at a photograph on the desk.

  ‘You got kids, Holy? No? Sometimes I wonder what the hell I’ve done. What rat-hole did they book you into, by the way?’

  ‘Crescent Hotel in King’s Cross, sir.’

  ‘King’s Cross, OK. You’re not the first Norwegian to have stayed there. A couple of years ago we had an official visit from the Bishop of Norway, or someone like that, can’t remember his name. Anyway, his staff in Oslo had booked a room for him at King’s Cross Hotel. Perhaps the name had some biblical connotation or other. When the bishop arrived with his retinue one of the seasoned prostitutes caught sight of the clerical collar and harangued him with a few juicy suggestions. Think the bishop checked out before they’d even carried his bags up the stairs . . .’

  McCormack laughed so much there were tears in his eyes.

  ‘Yeah, well, Holy, what can we do for you today?’

  ‘I was wondering if I could see Inger Holter’s body before it’s sent to Norway, sir.’

  ‘Kensington can take you to the morgue when he comes in. But you’ve got a copy of the autopsy report, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes, sir, I just . . .’

  ‘You just?’

  ‘Think better with the body in front of me, sir.’

  McCormack turned to the window and mumbled something that Harry construed as ‘fine’.

  The temperature in the cellar of South Sydney Morgue was eight degrees, as opposed to twenty-eight degrees on the street outside.

  ‘Any the wiser?’ Andrew asked. He shivered and pulled his jacket tighter around him.

  ‘Wiser, no,’ Harry said, looking at the earthly remains of Inger Holter. Her face had survived the fall relatively well. On one side the nostril had been torn open and the cheekbone knocked into a deep hollow, but there was no doubt that the waxen face belonged to the same girl with the radiant smile on the photo in the police report. There were black marks around the neck. The rest of the body was covered with bruises, wounds and some deep, deep cuts. In one of them you could see the white bone.

  ‘The parents wanted to see the photos. The Norwegian ambassador explained that it was inadvisable, but the solicitor insisted. A mother shouldn’t have to see her daughter like that.’ Andrew shook his head.

  Harry studied the bruising on the neck with a magnifying glass.

  ‘Whoever strangled her used his bare hands. It’s difficult to kill someone with that method. The murderer must be either very strong or very motivated.’

  ‘Or have done it several times before.’

  Harry looked at Andrew.

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘She has no fragments of skin under her nails, she has none of the murderer’s hair on her clothes and she has no grazing on her knuckles. She was killed so quickly and efficiently that she never had a chance to put up much of a fight.’

  ‘Does this remind you of anything you’ve seen before?’

  Andrew shrugged. ‘When you’ve worked here long enough all murders remind you of something you’ve seen before.’

  No, Harry thought. It’s the other way round. Work long enough and you see the tiny nuances each murder has, the details that distinguish one from another and make each one unique.

  Andrew glanced at his watch. ‘The morning meeting starts in half an hour. We’d better get a move on.’

  The leader of the investigative unit was Larry Watkins, a detective with a legal background, on a swift upward curve through the ranks. He had narrow lips, thinning hair and spoke fast and efficiently without intonation or unnecessary adjectives.

  ‘Or social antennae,’ Andrew said, not mincing his words. ‘A very able investigator, but he’s not the person you ask to ring the parents when their daughter has been found dead. And then he starts swearing whenever he’s stressed,’ he added.

  Watkins’s right-hand man was Sergey Lebie, a well-dressed, bald Yugoslav with a black goatee that made him look like Mephisto in a suit. Andrew said he was usually sceptical of men who were so fussy about their appearance.

  ‘But Lebie isn’t really a peacock, just very meticulous. Among other things he has a habit of studying his nails when anyone talks to him, but he doesn’t mean it to seem arrogant. And then he cleans his shoes after the lunch break. Don’t expect him to say much, not about himself or anything else.’

  The youngest member of the team was Yong Sue, a small, skinny, pleasant guy who always wore a smile above his bird-like neck. Yong Sue’s family had come to Australia from China thirty years ago. Ten years ago, when Yong Sue was nineteen, his parents went back to China on a visit. They were never seen again. The grandfather reckoned the son had been involved in ‘something political’, but he wouldn’t venture any deeper. Yong Sue never found out what had happened. Now he provided for his grandparents and his two younger sisters, worked twelve-hour days and smiled for at least ten of them. ‘If you’ve got a bad joke, tell it to Yong Sue. He laughs at absolutely everything,’ Andrew had told him. Now they were all assembled in a tiny, narrow room in which a noisy fan in the corner was supposed to provide some air movement. Watkins stood by the board in front of them and introduced Harry to the others.

  ‘Our Norwegian colleague has translated the letter we found in Inger’s room. Anything interesting you can tell us about that, Hole?’

  ‘Hoo-Leh.’

  ‘Sorry, Holy.’

  ‘Well, she had obviously just started a relationship with someone called Evans. From what the letter says, there is good reason to assume that it’s his hand she’s holding in the photo above the desk.’

  ‘We’ve checked,’ Lebie said. ‘We think he’s one Evans White.’

  ‘Uh-huh?’ Watkins raised a thin eyebrow.

  ‘We don’t have much on him. His parents came here from the US at the end of the sixties and were given a residence permit. It wasn’t a problem at that time,’ Lebie added by way of enlightenment. ‘Anyway, they travelled round the country in a VW camper, probably on the diet of veggie food, marijuana and LSD that was the norm in those days. They had a child, got divorced, and when Evans was eighteen the father went back to the US. The mother’s into healing, Scientology an
d all sorts of spiritual mysticism. She runs a place called the Crystal Castle on a ranch near Byron Bay. There she sells stones of karma and imported junk from Thailand to tourists and soul-seekers. When Evans was eighteen he decided to do what an increasing number of young Australians do,’ he said, turning to Harry: ‘Nothing.’

  Andrew leaned over and muttered in a low voice: ‘Australia is perfect for those who want to travel around, do a bit of surfing and enjoy life at the taxpayer’s expense. Ace social network and ace climate. We live in a wonderful country.’ He leaned back.

  ‘At the moment he has no fixed abode,’ Lebie continued, ‘but we think that until recently he was living in a shack on the outskirts of town with Sydney’s white trash. Those we spoke to out there said they hadn’t seen him for a while. He has never been arrested. So I’m afraid the only photograph we have of him is as a thirteen-year-old when he got his passport.’

  ‘I’m impressed,’ Harry said without any dissimulation. ‘How did you manage to find a guy without a record from one photo and a Christian name in a population of eighteen million in such a short time?’

  Lebie nodded to Andrew.

  ‘Andrew recognised the town in the photo. We faxed a copy to the local police station and they came up with this name. They say he has a role in the local milieu. Translated, that means he’s one of the spliff kings.’

  ‘It must be a very small town,’ Harry said.

  ‘Nimbin, just over a thousand inhabitants,’ Andrew interposed. ‘By and large they lived off dairy products until Australia’s National Union of Students took it into their heads to arrange what they called the Aquarius Festival there in 1973.’

  Chuckles rippled around the table.