Spiking the Girl (5 page)

•

Gemma made herself get back to work. She printed out her notes and information on the manufacture of synthetic diamonds and was reading them when she heard something. She glanced up at the CCTV monitor to see Spinner arriving. She let him in and went back to her chair. ‘I thought you weren’t going to come in,’ she said, swivelling round.

‘I’ve got that video to process,’ he said, patting the camera bag. ‘And I want to print out a couple of reports. Then they’re done.’

It was Gemma’s policy to present the evidence and her account at the same time at her office. That way, there was a definite incentive for the client to pay up. No pay, no info. Normally, she’d be feeling pleased about these small successes. Today, however, her bruised heart could not rejoice.

‘And I remembered this.’ Spinner passed her a clipping. ‘It was in last weekend’s colour magazine.’

Gemma opened it out and read. ‘Boyleford Brissett: the legend’. She glanced through it, then put it to one side and went back to finalising her notes and copying them onto the laptop. One day, she told herself, she’d practise doing everything straight onto it. But often a notebook was simpler and easier. She was aware of Spinner moving around in the office across the hall and the printer clicking and whirring. Later, he came to her door.

‘Boss, I’m getting some takeaway for tea. Want me to get you something while I’m out?’

Gemma looked at her watch. The afternoon had flown in the end: it was after seven. She hadn’t shopped for days. She knew exactly what was left in the fridge—a half bag of carrots, the carcass of a chicken that needed burial and a packet of drying prunes. Even the cheese and biscuits were running out.

•

When Spinner returned with some takeaway Thai, Gemma smiled and said, ‘Come and eat with me if you like.’

He followed her into the flat and she put a couple of place mats on the table with plates and cutlery. They ate in companionable silence, enjoying the flavours of the food.

‘Bloody hell!’ she said halfway through the meal, jumping up from the table. ‘I’m supposed to be at my music lesson!’ She had completely forgotten.

She flew round getting ready, cleaning her teeth, grabbing her music book. ‘Lock up behind you?’ Spinner nodded.

Mrs Snellgrove, teacher of the pianoforte and president of the Paddington Historical Society, opened the door with a gentle scolding for Gemma’s tardiness. ‘You’re a naughty girl, Gemma,’ she said, ushering her in, the free-swinging diamond at the bottom of her fan brooch glittering as it moved. ‘That’s twice in a row you’ve been late now.’

Gemma murmured an apology and walked through to Mrs Snellgrove’s living room, crowded with historic photographs from a hundred years ago, flat irons, kerosene lamps with delicate hand-painted shades and a collection of tin mechanical toys that had belonged to Mr Snellgrove when he was a boy.

Mrs Snellgrove opened the piano lid, diamond rings sparkling as she patted the piano stool, her late husband’s watch swinging on her frail wrist. Gemma pulled out her music and set it up on the piano while her teacher made herself comfortable in her cane chair.

‘That pendant,’ said Mrs Snellgrove, ‘it’s very unusual. The empty centre, I mean.’

‘It’s supposed to have a stone there but I lost it when I was on holidays.’

Mrs Snellgrove patted her shoulder and looked at the piano. ‘So I don’t suppose you’ve had much time to practise “Jungle Drums” and “Gingerbread Cakewalk”?’

‘Not really.’ Gemma felt about eight years old as her music teacher sighed and shook her head.

‘Well, then, let’s just start them again, shall we? Now, right hand first. Nicely curved fingers. One, two, one, two.’

When the lesson was finished and Gemma gathered up her music, Mrs Snellgrove hovered. ‘Gemma, my dear. I wonder if you could help me?’ she asked.

‘I’d be delighted.’ Gemma had become very fond of Mrs Snellgrove and her eccentric, loving ways.

‘My mother asked me, actually.’

Gemma recalled that Mrs Snellgrove’s mother still ‘did’ for herself in her small apartment at Dover Heights.

‘She’s ninety-two, you know, and almost blind. But she’s very active, knows her way round her flat, and we’re all agreed that the best thing is to support her in her own little place as long as possible.’ Mrs Snellgrove adjusted her pearls. ‘She lost her old pussy cat recently and I think she’s lonely and imagining things.’

‘Like what?’

‘She keeps insisting that there’s some sort of animal in her apartment. Ethne and I go there once a week to visit and do a quick whip around, although Mother really is quite able. We’ve checked the place out thoroughly. There’s simply nowhere for an animal to get inside. It’s a second-floor apartment. But Mother is adamant about this animal! She says she can feel it touching her legs.’

‘What do you think?’

Mrs Snellgrove’s face became very still. ‘I think it’s the beginning of the end,’ she said. ‘The doctor wants her to go into a nursing home. She says that once old folk start seeing and hearing things, we just have to accept that the time has come.’ Mrs Snellgrove’s voice was sad. ‘Anyway,’ she added, brightening up, ‘Mother read about you in the papers and she knows you’re one of my students. She was very taken with the idea of one of those cameras you use. She told us that if you put a camera in her flat, she reckons it will prove there is an animal in there.’

‘We could do that for her,’ Gemma said, ‘and keep an eye on her.’

The look of relief on Mrs Snellgrove’s face as she nodded made Gemma smile. ‘Mother said that if you could keep an eye on men who were playing up, you could certainly find out what animal it is that’s bothering her.’

‘Let me know when you’re next visiting your mother,’ said Gemma, ‘and I’ll come along and set up the camera myself.’

•

Gemma spent most of the weekend keeping busy, trying not to think about Steve. On Saturday, she checked out Netherleigh Park’s website, searching the net for references to the disappearance of Amy Bernhard and making notes.

Sunday morning she went for a run around the cemetery, pausing at her mother’s grave and picking a bunch of wild yellow daisies that flowered around the graves in early summer. She lay them next to the headstone and stood there for a few moments before resuming her pace.

Later in the afternoon, she took herself to the movies, recalling the last time she’d been at the Ritz only a few weeks ago, with Steve sitting beside her, his arm around her shoulder, his hand stroking her neck.

She did some piano practice and watched television before going to bed, wanting to be up fresh and early for the start of the new week.

After breakfast—toast and the last scraping of the honey jar—the next morning, Gemma introduced herself on the phone to the mother of Claudia Page, making a time to see Claudia, best friend of Amy Bernhard and Tasmin Summers, after school that afternoon.

Then, as Angie had requested, Gemma drove to the Strawberry Hills police station, waiting outside while Security buzzed upstairs. Within minutes Angie appeared, carrying her smart maroon briefcase. Her auburn hair was newly cut in a gamine style that suited her wide-boned face and she was even wearing tiny pink pearl earrings with her white blouse and trim grey suit.

The two women headed for a coffee shop. ‘I can’t stay long,’ said Angie. ‘There’s a pile of files almost up to the ceiling that I’m supposed to be going through in my big joke spare time. To send to the Crime Commission for scanning the old ones into the system.’ She suddenly frowned, looking hard at Gemma. ‘You look awful. What is it?’

‘Steve,’ Gemma said. ‘We’ve broken up.’

They walked into the Baccarole, ordered at the counter, then sat in the furthest corner where they could see who might come in. Gemma pulled out her notebook.

‘Are you sure?’ asked Angie.

‘Sure as anything.’ Though she felt like crying, Gemma slapped the notebook down on the table. ‘I don’t want to talk about it right now.’

‘But Gemster, you have to. You can’t just break up like this. What happened?’

Gemma swallowed hard. She knew how relentless Angie could be when pursuing a line of questioning. ‘We went away for two weeks to the Bay. It was so nice. On the way back, Steve started talking about maybe buying something together—moving in together. So I had to think about whether or not I could trust him. The subject of Lorraine Litchfield came up and one thing led to another.’ She fiddled with the notebook. ‘I ended up screaming at him to get out. He reckons I’ve got commitment problems. Me—when he’s the one who’s out screwing other women!’

Angie started to say something then stopped.

‘No, go on,’ said Gemma. ‘Say it.’

‘I was going to say I think you’re being too hard on Steve. No, don’t blow up at me. He’s not out screwing other women, Gemster.’

‘I said I didn’t want to talk about it,’ Gemma repeated.

‘Sometimes the boundaries get stretched,’ said Angie, ‘with undercover work.’

Gemma picked up the notebook and opened it, pen ready. ‘Tell me about this other girl who’s gone missing from Netherleigh Park,’ she said, determined to change the subject. Then she noticed something as Angie searched through her own notebook.

‘You’re actually wearing make-up to work, Ange!’ Gemma exclaimed. ‘Eye shadow. And is that mascara I see?’

Angie blushed as she changed the subject. ‘How did you know Tasmin Summers’s name?’

‘Answer the question, Angie!’ Gemma started laughing. ‘Ange! You’re blushing! You’re wearing make-up and you’re blushing! Hey, you’d better tell your girlfriend what’s going on. And I want to know everything.’

Angie looked up at the waitress arriving with their coffee and Angie’s raisin toast. ‘I’m starving,’ she said, grabbing a piece and pushing the plate towards Gemma.

‘What’s his name, Angie?’ Gemma insisted.

‘His name’s Trevor.’ She dropped her voice to a tremulous whisper.

Gemma blinked. ‘Please!’ she said. ‘Not Trevor.’

Angie’s eyes flashed. ‘What’s the matter with Trevor? You’re such a snob, Gemster. It’s a loyal, devoted, down-to-earth man’s name.’

‘Okay, okay. Although imagining a gorgeous Trevor is straining my brain. So who is he?’

‘Trevor Dawson. One of the tactical guys.’

‘Oh, that Trevor.’ She also remembered something else. ‘You said never again, Angie. No more muscleheads, you said. You pleaded for me to remind you about it if you ever so much as looked in that direction again!’

Angie wasn’t listening. ‘He was my protection last week, when I was negotiating. Would you believe—a crazy Cypriot, a knife-wielding eighty-one-year-old grandmother and a 280-kilogram bloke who wouldn’t take his medication.’

‘All in the one house?’

‘All in the one week. One after the other, smartarse.’ Angie couldn’t stop smiling. ‘It kind of went from there.’

‘I’m already worried about where it went! “Bloody mongrel bastard dickhead” were some of the kinder names you called the last guy.’

‘Trevor’s not like that. He’s really sweet. He’s sensitive. He writes poetry.’ Angie grabbed another slice of raisin toast. ‘Gemster, you’ve gotta love him.’

Gemma raised an eyebrow. ‘Ange, I don’t think loving a poetry-writing special weapons operative called Trevor is in my repertoire.’

‘You just have to start learning,’ said Angie and sipped her coffee, all misty-eyed. ‘Gems,’ she said, ‘I’m hopelessly smitten.’

‘Ange. It’s only been one week. Can’t you get unsmitten?’

Angie pulled out a folded piece of paper and passed it to Gemma. ‘Take a look at this. This is the first poem he wrote to me.’

‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more gorgeous. Rough winds shake the darling buds, but you are a bud, darling, that I want to shake, rattle and roll.
’

Gemma looked up from her reading to see Angie’s starry eyes. ‘Isn’t that just so sweet?’

‘I’m sure I’ve heard something like it somewhere before.’

‘Oh, you!’ Angie snatched it back. ‘Your problem is you’re too cynical.’

Gemma was astounded. ‘Me, too cynical? Compared with you, I’m bloody Mother Teresa!’

Angie’s mobile rang. She picked it up, listened for a moment and hung up. ‘I’ve gotta go. That was Eastern Beaches. Someone’s just found some skeletal remains in a bushland reserve near Botany. They’ve secured the place and they’re waiting for Merv. I’ll go with him.’

‘Who’s he?’ Gemma couldn’t resist. ‘Trevor’s evil twin?’

‘Major incident response vehicle.’

‘Let me come. Sneak me in. This could be related to the Netherleigh Park case.’

‘I can’t. You know that.’

‘I could be a SOCO from the bush. Getting city experience.’

For a second, Gemma could see her friend was considering it.

‘You’d never pass the ID check,’ Angie said. ‘Someone would pick up your name somewhere along the line, there’d be questions asked and I’d be shot.
I’d
end up in the bush. It’s not like the old days, girl. You know that.’

Angie put her briefcase on the table and waved away the money Gemma proffered. ‘I’ll get this,’ she said. ‘You mind the bag.’

Gemma couldn’t resist peeking. Inside was a folder with the name of the missing girl, Amy Bernhard, printed down one side. She slid it out and teased out some of the contents. She started to read the printed-out statements.

My name is Claudia Zahra Page. I am a Year 10 student at Netherleigh Park in the same class as my friend Amy Bernhard. I last saw Amy on the morning of the second of December when I was on the bus going to school. Tasmin and I were down the back and I saw Amy at the front of the bus .
 
.
 
.

Claudia had been the name of the student playing those high-velocity scales during her visit to Beatrice de Berigny, Gemma remembered. She wondered if it was the same Claudia she’d organised to interview later today.

‘Hey,’ Angie said, coming back to the table. ‘You shouldn’t be reading that.’

‘But, Ange, I can help. Now that there’s a second girl missing, you’re going to be stretched as buggery.’

‘Too true, but I’m also brief officer at the moment. I’d be fried if any of this goes astray. Give it here.’