The Summertime Dead Read online

  Not long after, three Homicide Squad detectives arrived from Melbourne. The officer in charge was Detective Senior Sergeant Gene Fielder, his two junior officers Marco Quattrochi and John Risdale. All three wore similar grey suits, although Fielder’s was of a finer material, of a better fit and a shade darker. The suits made Cole think of a wedding and as introductions were made all round at the station he imagined the hand shaking might have been the congratulations dispensed among a bridal party.

  ‘Where are you staying?’ he asked Fielder.

  The Melbourne detective answered him with a bemused look. ‘The Casablanca. We’ve left our bags at the desk,’ he said. ‘The place looks an architectural highlight.’

  ‘Good move,’ Cole said. ‘The Motor Inn at the other end of town is a bit shabby these days.’

  ‘Even shabbier than the Casablanca?’

  ‘Shabbiness is in the eye of the beholder,’ Cole said.

  Fielder was a decade younger, but two or three inches taller than Cole and with a hint of an American accent in his voice. He was muscular but lean, clear-skinned and with hazel eyes and brown hair. He always seemed on the verge of a wry comment the way his lips worked up at the corners of his mouth.

  ‘I hear you’re a local,’ the detective swung around and asked Holloway, who had been standing to the side, hoping to stay out of the conversation. ‘How long have you lived in Mitchell, sergeant?’

  ‘All my life, I grew up here, except for when I’ve been stationed here and there,’ Holloway answered, but he felt as if he’d been caught out.

  ‘There’s no need to be embarrassed about it,’ Fielder said. ‘It seems a fine part of the world.’ He laughed. ‘Except for people killing each other of course. And I’m taking it you had no part in that?’

  Holloway reddened and mumbled, ‘You wouldn’t ever catch me doing the wrong thing.’

  ‘I guess we’ll see, sergeant,’ Fielder said, raising an eyebrow so his two Melbourne colleagues grinned.

  ‘I’ll show you where the files are,’ Cole said. ‘We’ve put a room with a telephone aside for you and you should find everything you want there. Anything else, let us know. Sergeant Holloway has prepared a brief.’

  ‘I’d better go read it then. The boyfriend – Furnell – he’s the one we’re looking at, right?’

  ‘At the moment. But there’s no evidence linking him to it yet and he’s made no confession. He says he doesn’t know anything about it.’

  ‘Well, I suppose he doesn’t want to make it too easy for us, does he? Where’d be the fun in it if every criminal automatically admitted to what they’d done?’

  ‘Personally, I wouldn’t mind it if they did do that,’ Cole said. ‘The taxpayer getting a proper return on our time or not.’

  Fielder pointed a finger at him playfully. ‘I like your style senior-sergeant. I’m glad you’re on the team with us. We’ll sort this joker out in no time.’

  ‘If it’s him.’

  ‘One thing I’ve learnt over the years,’ Fielder said, still with the twinkle in his eye. ‘Your first guess is usually your best guess, so why waste your time looking for reasons he mightn’t have done it?’

  As Fielder returned to his car to retrieve a file, Cole was left with the junior detectives.

  ‘It looks like you’ve got a good man there,’ Cole said, gesturing in the direction Fielder had gone.

  ‘You bet,’ Quattrochi agreed. ‘The boss is tops. We’ve been with him the last year and a half now. There hasn’t been a case yet that has got the better of him. Back home they call him The Finisher. And while he knocks these cases on the head we get some of the credit too, makes us look good.’

  ‘Which is to say, we bask in his reflected glory,’ Risdale added laconically.

  ‘Where are you boys from? Originally, I mean,’ Cole asked.

  ‘Me, I’m from Port Melbourne,’ Quattrochi said. ‘My Mum and Dad grew up there. I don’t think I even got out of the suburb until my first posting. Didn’t know the first shit thing about anything. I thought everyone was a brickie’s labourer or a storeman, or a dockworker or a crim.’ He laughed. ‘The boss certainly opened up my eyes to the big, wide world, I got to say that. Look at this suit,’ he added, tugging at the lapels of his suit coat. ‘My folks think I work for the fucking opera, dressed like this.’

  When Cole turned to Risdale, the other man said, ‘I’m a Melbourne boy too. My old man was a copper as well until he retired early for medical reasons.’

  ‘The medical reasons being some pisspots ganged up on him one night outside a pub and beat the shit out of him,’ Quattrochi interjected.

  ‘But he said he’d done his time, and he had,’ Risdale pressed on. ‘You know when your time’s up. The old man just wanted peace and quiet after that, potter around in his yard planting tomatoes and wondering when it was going to rain. And that’s the way I want to go, too, try to make some hay while the sun shines, if you know what I mean. Eventually get out on an early retirement while I can still do something with it.’

  ‘They’re already talking about promotion for us,’ Quattrochi said proudly. ‘So we keep our heads down and our bums up. Take the lead from the boss, hey John?’

  ‘Yep, as he guides us into a land of milk and honey,’ the other man agreed.

  When Fielder returned, he said to Cole, ‘I couldn’t find what I was looking for. We’ll need to unpack at the motel and sort ourselves out first. This Furnell. Have you interviewed him since the bodies were found?’

  ‘Not yet. I wanted to see what you wanted to do first,’ Cole replied.

  ‘Okay then. Bring him in and get another statement while we organise ourselves at that dump up the road.’

  *

  The Casablanca Motel was a single-storied row of drab rooms facing Main Street. It wasn’t two stone’s throws away from the police station, but Fielder insisted they drive to it. Built of cream brick with new aluminium windows the motel stood out from the weatherboard houses either side of it, the houses a clue as to what had been demolished to make way for it.

  Fielder had never been to Casablanca, had never even seen pictures of it, but he guessed it couldn’t have been anything like this. An idea of tall palms and desert vaguely came to mind, an idea quickly dispelled as they inspected the motel’s environs. Besides the rooms themselves the only other facility the motel offered was a small kidney-shaped swimming pool behind the parking bays at the rear of the establishment. Bleached grass spread around the pool and spiky bottlebrush bushes sent red filaments floating on it. Not much further back from the grass were the wooden paling fences of other people’s properties.

  The receptionist Tilly Beecroft had fussed her hair up into a bird’s nest and applied red lipstick heavily. It wasn’t every day that real detectives from the city came to stay and she liked the look of these men in their suits. Fielder noticed the faded film poster taped to the wall behind her, Bogart and Bergman gazing down at Tilly’s bird’s nest with only minimal interest.

  She noticed him looking and said, ‘I suppose you’ve seen the film?’

  ‘No, I haven’t,’ Fielder said.

  ‘Oh, it’s wonderful,’ she assured him as she thumbed through the register. ‘You must see it. A man like you …’ she said, her eyes raking his suit. ‘… would appreciate the stars and glamour I’m sure. Are you American?’

  ‘I was born there.’

  ‘See? Aren’t I as sharp as a tack, Mr Fielder? Didn’t I see it straight away?’ She sighed with satisfaction. ‘My husband always said to me I know a person as soon as he walks in the door.’

  ‘Well, there’s no disputing we’ve walked through it,’ Fielder said, reaching out to slide the register across to himself.

  ‘Would you gentlemen care to sign the register now then?’ Tilly asked, ‘You can do it later if you like.’

  Fielder drew a pen from
his top jacket pocket and they signed their names.

  ‘It’s been a dreadful business these murders,’ Tilly continued. ‘But I’m sure things will be sorted out quickly now we have real policemen in charge. Oh, I’m not blaming Sergeant Cole or any of the men here of course, but it’s not every day you have murders is it?’

  ‘Not usually,’ Fielder said as they took their cases from behind the counter.

  Tilly handed each man a key attached to an overly large wooden tag, their room numbers hand painted in white.

  ‘I’d just been saying …’ Tilly began but the detectives were already walking through the door and out in the sunshine to their rooms.

  Inside Unit 12, the room furthest from reception, Fielder threw his case on the bed and loosened his tie. Besides the bed there was little of note in the room: a bench that doubled as a desk and a place for the small television, and another bench by the bathroom and a tiny refrigerator. He eyed the single chair, the television and glass ashtray on the larger bench. He turned on the television but all he could find was clouds of static and inaudible conversation somewhere behind it. He turned it off.

  If he had ever been in the habit of swinging a cat, Fielder thought, this room wouldn’t have been the place to do it.

  He smoked a cigarette before undressing and taking a shower.

  Under the streaming water he thought of his father who had been an American serviceman stationed in northern Australia during the war. Never having travelled outside of the United States and being an outgoing man, his father spent his leave periods in Brisbane and Melbourne. Through the prism of wartime he liked everything he saw and after hostilities were over he returned to Melbourne with his wife and teenage son to live. And that was that, his father was fond of saying when anyone asked him the reason for his migration to Australia, as if it explained his entire family history while excluding the possibility of any questions. And this being Australia, no one ever expressed any interest in delving into his personal story anyway – it wasn’t nice to snoop.

  Post-war the country was flooded with migrants. Keen to fit in, his father became in many respects more Australian than the Australians, spending most nights at the local watering hole and only staying conscious long enough afterward at home to eat his evening meal before collapsing into bed.

  His mother must have had a bad time of it with the old man, Fielder thought. She must have missed home, must have wanted to return to California. Growing up he harboured his own dreams of going back to America, but parts of Victoria reminded him of California and he made friends easily enough, like his father quickly adapting to his surroundings. More than that, being American gave him a certain cachet, especially with girls, a cachet he soon learned to exploit. It was only when he got a girl pregnant that his father bore down hard on him and made him join the police force thinking it would impose on him a discipline that he couldn’t exert himself.

  Where had that girl gone to have the baby? he wondered. They’d never told him.

  But it was only a fleeting thought as he stepped out of the shower and dried himself off, feeling the air close and warm around him.

  He sat on the bed and lit another cigarette.

  Chapter 4

  While the detectives were busying themselves at the Casablanca, Cole and Holloway drove to Ray Furnell’s petrol station and garage at the western end of Main Street.

  As they went, Cole said, ‘We’re a few players down for our cricket team on Saturday. Everyone’s off somewhere else doing God knows what to God knows who. Summertime hey? How about you come out of retirement and fill in for us, Terry?’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind a hit. The season’s nearly over though, isn’t it?’ Holloway answered.

  ‘Just about, but don’t let that stop you. It’s all pretty casual. Look at me, nearly fifty. You don’t have to be Bradman.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be that. But maybe next summer, after I’ve had some practise. I don’t know how long it’s been since I last played.’

  ‘Fair enough. But I’ll keep you to that. Next summer, Terry. Don’t think you’ll get out of it,’ Cole said, jabbing his finger playfully at him.

  ‘Next summer,’ Holloway laughed.

  ‘Now comes the bad bit,’ Cole said as they approached the garage.

  Furnell was standing on the garage’s apron beneath the great Golden Fleece sign, wiping his hands on a greasy rag as they pulled up. He was staring at their car as if he’d been waiting for them.

  ‘Morning Ray,’ Cole greeted him, watching sunlight glint off the Golden Fleece sign. ‘You might have heard about the youngsters we found yesterday. We’re sorry it’s come to that, and for your boy.’

  ‘More than that,’ Furnell said, his eyes narrowed. ‘Now I suppose you want to talk to him again?’

  ‘We have to.’

  ‘You think he’d do something like that? To his first girlfriend?’

  ‘That’s what we’re going to find out, at the station. If he’s in the clear there’s nothing for anyone to worry about.’

  ‘How many times you interviewed him already?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter how many times, Ray. You know we’ve got a job to do.’

  ‘But he had nothing to do with it. Can’t you see it?’

  Holloway stepped around to stand beside Cole. The air had a sharp edge they both felt.

  Cole told him, ‘Please call him out, Ray. We need to see him. The sooner this is cleared up the better, especially for Lee.’

  ‘Our so-called government getting messed up in bloody Vietnam. Murders right here. The world’s gone mad. This town too.’

  Furnell trudged into the garage’s shaded interior where an old Hillman Two Tone sat hoisted over the grease pit. The boy climbed out of the pit with a face like death.

  ‘I’m going with him,’ Furnell said.

  ‘It’d be easier for Lee if you stayed out of it, Ray,’ Cole said. ‘The Homicide Squad have just arrived and you don’t want them thinking you’re getting in the way. It won’t work in the boy’s favour. There’s a job to do.’

  Cole indicated the police car to the son and the boy in his oily overalls walked to the vehicle and sat glumly in the back seat.

  Lee Furnell said nothing on the short drive to the station. When Cole glanced back at him he saw the boy staring out the window at the town like it was the last time he’d see it.

  They took him into the interview room where Cole and Holloway sat across from him.

  Cole led the questioning with Holloway taking notes.

  ‘You understand how serious this is now?’ he said. ‘One of your mates and your girlfriend have been killed. Murdered. You want to say anything to change the story you gave us earlier, Lee?’

  Furnell could barely look at them, only shaking his head in reply.

  ‘No,’ he finally answered.

  ‘So, this is how it looks from where I’m sitting now,’ Cole continued. ‘You finished work at the garage late when your father finally let you off. You were cranky that he’d made you stay on when you should’ve knocked off hours earlier and been with your mates at the dance. And with Rosaleen. When you finally got there she was nowhere in sight. So you asked around. You found out she’d gone off in a car with Max Quade. And that really got you – one of your mates off with your girl.’ Furnell moved uneasily in his chair but didn’t look up. ‘Your old man mucking you around first, and then one of your mates making it even worse. And here’s what we believe happened next. You got steamed up and jumped into your car looking for Quade and Rosaleen. You knew where they might be and it wasn’t long before you found Quade’s car by the lake with him and your girlfriend in it. You went back and got a rifle – or there was one in your car already – and you made them both get into yours and you drove them away, maybe some place you’d been before. You shot Max Quade, but you were most angry at Rosaleen weren’t you? And that wa
s why you killed her in the brutal way you did.’

  ‘I didn’t have nothing to do with it. With Rosy,’ Furnell answered sullenly.

  ‘Where did the rifle go, Lee? Should we start dredging the lake? Or did you toss it into an irrigation channel somewhere?’

  ‘I didn’t shoot no one. I don’t even have a .22.’

  ‘Who said it was a .22?’

  Furnell glanced up.

  ‘That’s what I heard yesterday, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Who said that?’

  ‘I dunno. Just someone.’

  ‘Let’s forget about the rifle for a minute then. Let’s go back a step. You’ve got your own car, the one your Dad gave you. Did you ever take it to the lake with Rosaleen?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ he admitted. ‘A lot of people go there.’

  ‘What’d you do there?’

  ‘Talk.’

  ‘And maybe have a drink there?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, what did you do with your girlfriend there besides drink and talk?’

  The boy shrugged.

  ‘A bit of kissing and that,’ he answered reluctantly.

  ‘And what was the and that?’

  When it seemed he wasn’t going to answer Holloway leapt in, ‘You’re going to answer the question, lad.’

  ‘Well,’ the boy said. ‘I’d give her a feel up under her jumper. I told you that before.’

  ‘And that was it?’ Cole said.

  ‘Pretty much. She wouldn’t let me do anything else.’

  ‘Only she did with Quade and that was what got you riled, was it? Maybe you even saw her going all the way.’

  ‘I didn’t see anything.’

  ‘What did you see then?’

  ‘I told you. I wasn’t there.’

  ‘Alright then. Tell me again what happened after you went to the Civic Centre and couldn’t find Rosaleen Faraday. Where did you go?’

  The boy pulled his hands out of his pockets.