The Simple Death (33 page)

Sixty-three

L
eila stops in Darlinghurst to get the cash, continues up Oxford Street, three lanes in each direction. She drives past the bookstores, Ariel and Berkelouw's, keeping her speed down so the driver of a BMW behind honks and pulls into the outside lane and races past. The wide road curves to the left and climbs past Victoria Barracks until it reaches Paddington Town Hall, where it levels out for the run through the shopping strip. There are side streets every few hundred metres so she takes it easy, there is no rush. She finds herself behind a delivery van which is double-parked, and just sits there for a while, looking out for Carl on the busy footpath, checking her rear-view mirror for any sign of Troy's blue car.

It is only then she realises she is in a different car to the one she described to Carl. And to Troy. It doesn't seem possible she could have overlooked this, it is so completely and obviously absurd: she's never done anything so stupid in her life.

‘I'm not myself,' she murmurs, and reaches into her bag for the phone.

As she turns it on, it occurs to her that if she's made this mistake she might have made others, ones she isn't yet aware of. Perhaps Troy was right when he said her plan was too dangerous. She dials his number.

The passenger door opens and Carl reaches across and grabs the phone. He gets in, slams the door, and yells, ‘Go! Go!'

Leila can't see the phone anymore.

‘I was trying to call you,' she says as she swings out and drives past the delivery van.

Carl puts the phone to his ear, listens for a moment, then hurls it out the window. He strikes Leila's head, an awkward blow that still hurts as it glances off the side of her face and bangs her chest. Leila goes into a mild state of shock, things starting to move slowly, although she is aware of Carl shouting at her. Then she is back, almost normal again, except she is frozen inside and fighting not to cry.

Through all this she somehow manages to keep driving the car.

‘You know what this is?' he yells, waving at his lap.

Half hidden beneath a bag with the words
The Sydney Morning Herald
—
Start a Conversation
is one of those boxy pistols you see on TV. He is pointing it at her thigh and says, ‘If I pull the trigger, do you know how much it will hurt?' Pause. ‘Fucking turn left here.'

She turns down Queen Street.

Glancing into his hot eyes, she sees that he is mad. Not just now, but always, sees he was like this before but she never spotted it, thought she was so intelligent, but she overlooked what might turn out to be the most important thing in her life. Knew evil existed, but never really expected to meet it. Even the cops, the stupid cops, have been ahead of her. Wonders what else she'd missed, in her life.

He can read her mind, because he says, ‘You know what I thought, when I was staying at your house that time, and when we used to visit that old fart Stuart?'

‘Tell me, Carl.'

‘I thought how fake your lives are, like you're living in a film set. Everywhere people like you move, there are serfs scurrying around just off the set, out of sight, nurses and gardeners and people who wash your dishes and clean up your dirt and your shit, but you never see them.' Clearly he's given it a lot of thought. ‘You move along these tubes, got your own freeways and railway lines to take you between the nice places in the city, never see the kids being abused everywhere, the mentally ill. There's whole suburbs out there filled with people who never make it. All pushed away into public housing, jails, schools that don't work. It's like, everywhere you go, you're in this . . . this tube.'

Hidden depths, Carl
, she thinks, but keeps quiet. Saying all this seems to calm him down, and she just drives, following his occasional directions. Trying to keep herself under control. It might be better if she could draw him out about what he's done, she's seen people do it on the screen, get the criminal emotional and vulnerable. But for the moment she is barely capable of driving properly. The sudden awareness of her own arrogance, the danger into which she has placed herself, is interfering with her normal functioning, like a virus running through a computer.

Similes won't help you now, she says to herself after a while. It is a long while—they turned left back at Edgecliff and are just entering the Cross City Tunnel. But then, thinking about similes is normal, maybe she is getting some of her mind back.

She looks at Carl. ‘Where are we going?'

‘You've been in a trance, Leila. I told you, I want to go home. Go left here.'

They turn into the Harbour Tunnel.

‘We're going to Brisbane?'

‘Toowoomba. I don't think we'll make it all the way, you and me. We'll go as far as we can.'

He nods, but not to her, seems to be going into himself. The walls of the tunnel flicker by. She realises he hasn't even asked about the money she's brought.

‘I figure they'll be waiting for us,' he says, his voice slower now, ‘maybe at a bridge somewhere up the coast. Bet you never thought that's how it would end.'

She has to ask, ‘Why a bridge?'

He grimaces and puts his right hand across his body as though to touch his stomach, then stops and withdraws it. He sighs.

‘The fuck do I know.'

She is glancing in the mirror on the outside of her door, hoping he won't see her, hoping for a police car. Not sure what to do if she sees one. Bang the car off the wall of the tunnel, would she be brave enough for that? Would it even be a good idea? It comes to her that if she has to think about it like that, she is unequipped for the situation, not an action person. Really she is just one of the crowd, a ruminant. For some reason she thinks of the Getty, all the people moving through it slowly with their catalogues, and she thinks of cows. Thinks of being beaten by Lewis and feels a stab of anger.
I am not a cow
. Feels the need for some action to prove she is alive, but she might have left it too late.

They emerge onto the vast strip of the Warringah Expressway, the broad slope up from North Sydney, a confusion of concrete and macadam running for several kilometres and broken up by flyovers and off-ramps and the occasional lay-by over to the left, where the expressway is cut into a low sandstone cliff. There is a blue car behind her now, like the one Troy was driving this morning. She looks at Carl and he has his eyes closed, his face damp with sweat and his breathing heavy. It doesn't seem possible, but he might be asleep.

‘Keep in the middle of the lanes,' he says.

Sixty-four

H
is phone rang.

‘Troy here.'

There was a bang and sound in the background, like traffic. But no voice. He disconnected and it rang again, this time an employee from Morning Star, the insurer of the education department's fleet. She gave Troy the location of the car Scott was driving. Troy handed the phone to McIver and raced out to the Ford, getting a radio link as he gunned it through the narrow streets of Paddington and down into Darlinghurst, striking New South Head Road just before the tunnel into which Scott's car had gone a minute earlier.

‘She stopped for a minute in Oxford Street,' McIver said, coming over the radio. ‘We have to assume Burns is in there with her.'

Other unmarked cars had already been scrambled to follow Scott. Troy put his light on and cut into the Harbour Tunnel, raced up the right-hand lane, using his lights to clear the way. By the time he emerged on the freeway he could see the Lancer ahead. Mac handed over to an inspector from the Tactical Operations Unit, who told him which of the surrounding vehicles belonged to police. They hadn't been able to get enough vehicles there in time, so they needed Troy too. The inspector described how they would box in the Lancer and force it to stop. Already, as much of the surrounding traffic as possible was being diverted by use of automated signals and signs, and roadblocks were being set up at the off-ramps.

‘Lucky it's not rush hour,' Troy said to himself as he accelerated and took up the position he'd been allocated, on the left of the Lancer. He looked across to check that Burns was in the car with Scott.

Sixty-five

W
hat is it?' says Carl.

He opens his eyes and looks around. Leila has been trying to identify the other smell in the car, the one mixed in with Carl's sweat. She realises it is blood.

‘Are you hurt?' she says.

‘Jesus. We're boxed.'

Not quite. Leila has been watching, before Carl opened his eyes, as cars have come up and formed a line behind them and then dropped back, forcing the traffic behind to fall away. It is the honking from the protesting drivers that has alerted Carl. Now there are cars on either side of them and one behind, unmarked police cars she thinks, but none in front. They all fly past an off-ramp, and she sees lights flashing among a bunch of vehicles at the top. Looking in the rear-view, she watches as two cars also with red and white lights work their way up the right side of the almost completed box.

Carl pulls the gun from beneath the bag, pointing it at her. She wonders what she can do. She wants very much to do something.

‘Drive faster,' he says, opening his window.

They pull ahead of the blue car on their left, and she thinks maybe she should crash the Lancer into some sort of object if the opportunity appears, slam it to the left so Carl will be injured more than she. Then the blue car is back alongside even though she is driving at almost a hundred and twenty kilometres an hour, the Lancer with its modest engine shaking with the effort. One of the cars with the flashing lights is ahead of them now, starting to drop back to complete the box.

‘Bastard!' Carl yells, but it is not at the car in front. His head is turned towards Troy's car and he must have seen who is in it. Transferring the gun to his right hand, he points it out the window and fires. The blue car disappears, Carl grabs the wheel and pulls it towards himself, and now they are out of the box and he let's go of the wheel, points the gun at her again and yells, ‘Go!'

There is something coming up on the left with incredible speed, maybe a bus shelter. Pushing down hard on the brake, grabbing his right arm with her left to push the gun away, she slams the car into it.

Sixty-six

T
he bullet shattered the window next to Troy's head and passed through the car, smashing the passenger window too on its way out. Glass hit the side of his face, some of it bouncing around his eye, and he braked heavily, swinging the car into a space that suddenly appeared on his left. As he stopped he saw that the freeway widened for several hundred metres to accommodate a bus stop. He heard an almighty crash as the Lancer smashed into the aluminium and glass shelter.

Getting out of his vehicle, he shook the glass from his hair and ran forwards. The other police vehicles had overshot and were now revving back, their engines screaming.

The Lancer had gone almost right through the shelter and its front was sticking out the far side. The car's roof had been half ripped off, and when Troy got around the front he saw that both Scott and Burns were still in their seats. There was a lot of blood on their faces but they were conscious, although Scott didn't look too good. Burns was jabbing a gun at her anyway, prodding her chest. She was very pale, her head tilted back, and the way the crumpled front of the car had gathered around the lower part of her body, it was clear she wouldn't be getting out in a hurry. Burns was ranting at her in a low voice, as though there was an argument he had to put to her as a matter of urgency.

The other cars stopped, and officers rushed up to the accident scene, guns drawn despite the strong smell of petrol. Troy got them together and saw that their weapons were reholstered. He could already hear the approaching fire engines and ambulances. Telling the others to keep back, he walked up to the wreck.

‘It isn't going to happen, Carl,' he called.

Burns stopped talking and looked around. There was blood all over his face, and his left shoulder was at a strange angle. Scott's eyes didn't follow his movement, and Troy suspected she had gone into shock.

‘You bastard,' Burns said. ‘I thought I'd seen you off.' Said without rancour, like they were old friends.

‘Time to put the gun down,' Troy said.

He wished they'd turn off the sirens. They were getting closer now, and Burns seemed agitated. The two helicopters didn't help either, although at least they were keeping their distance.

‘My left arm's broken,' said Burns. He looked at Scott for a moment. ‘People like her, they think they rule the world. Snap their fingers and you come. Have you seen their house?'

‘Big place, with a wine cellar.'

‘Julie was sucked in by all that, it was embarrassing. I should shoot this bitch.' Waving the gun in front of Leila's nose.

‘You'll ignite the petrol. Terrible way to die, Carl.'

‘So? What, you think I should just put the gun down, we can talk this over?'

The sirens had been turned off, thank God.

‘Let's do that. Talk to me.'

Burns shifted and now the gun was aimed at Troy's chest. The petrol smell seemed stronger than ever, but that might have been his imagination.

‘I think my leg's broken too. Something's not right down there. How long do you reckon I'd get?'

Troy did his best. ‘Depends if you and Pearson argued. Maybe ten years, less with parole. You could do that.'

‘Pearson?'

‘We broke your alibi.'

‘I didn't do Pearson. What else is there?'

If you say so, Carl.

‘Nothing,' Troy lied, ‘The priest recovered.'

Burns swung his arm around so that the gun touched Scott's neck. ‘Tell me the truth about what you know or I'll do her. Now.'

There'd been a leak to the media, Troy knew, about the search at Ashfield. Burns might have heard something on the car radio. Or he might not have. A decision had to be made, without all the facts.

‘Okay. We found your box.'

Things stopped, probably only for a micro-second although it seemed longer. Then Burns nodded and there was silence for a while. Troy wanted something to happen, but he knew this was a weakness. Still, the petrol smell was definitely stronger.

Burns said softly, ‘The first was just a favour in the nursing home, he asked me to do it. The next one too—you'd be surprised how many people ask. Then it was people who'd annoyed us—'

‘What about Julie?'

Burns nodded, looked sad. ‘Good old Jules.'

‘We need to get you into an ambulance, Carl. Leila too.'

Burns looked at Scott, who was completely still, staring at the sky.

‘Bitch,' he said.

‘Carl—'

Burns put the pistol into his mouth and blew the back of his head off.

Troy took a step forwards, then stopped. He waited for the world to explode in a fireball. Everything seemed to have slowed down again, and after a bit he knew that if he was still waiting, it wasn't going to happen. And then it began to snow, great looping strands of white foam from the firies who'd raced up behind him. The ambos came after them, once the whole scene was covered in snow, and began to work on Leila Scott.

People were staring at Troy, one tried to speak to him but he couldn't hear. Eventually McIver was there and said something, held his arm.

‘You okay?' was what he was saying.

‘Yeah.'

A woman in a bright yellow coat had flicked some foam off Carl's head, and it was red. There were so many emergency workers around the crash now it was almost a crowd.

We're very good at cleaning up afterwards, Troy thought dimly. Once it's too late.

‘Attractive, isn't it?' McIver said. ‘All the colours and lights.'

‘What?'

‘Like a picture. And only we know what it means.'

It came to Troy that McIver might be slightly mad, but he didn't want to think about that now. He said, ‘China's leaving. Got a job in security.'

‘Homicide as a stepping stone to better things,' McIver said, staring at the wreck.

Troy said, ‘What could be better than this?' He could see Peters out of the corner of his eye, other detectives too. ‘I don't think we should talk to Emery, if that's okay by you.'

‘Okay,' said McIver. Sometime later he nodded, said, ‘Really,' and looked around. ‘We've done enough for now.'