Gateshead when he'd been there for a training course with Newcastle Police. The magnificent and moving 'Angel of the North' looked out over the confluence of the A1 and A167 roads, the landscape grim, industrial. The sculpture, its sail-like iron wings embracing and defying the wind, had shocked Keane by its scale, its span wider than the Statue of Liberty is high. He'd found that out because he'd parked and gawped up at it, temporarily reduced to childhood again by the sheer confidence and beauty of the thing, the first and only time an artwork had literally stopped him in his tracks. Like the figures on Crosby Beach, the Angel was constructed of the stuff of northern England – iron and steel – yet it appeared light, and was possessed of so muchlatent energy that Keane wouldn't have been surprised to see it take flight across the north-eastern landscape – steam-driven and belching smoke, naturally.
But until today, standing outside the container that Keane is sure was the killing place, he hadn't 'got' the Liverpool artworks in the way he had the Angel. Gradually, though, the power of the work begins to emerge. And, in a way that he doesn't want to examine too closely, an echo of what Ferguson said in the mortuary, something about the murder being 'artistic', reverberates with him.
'Ready?' says Harris. She touches him on the arm and he realises he's been standing motionless.
He nods and Harris puts a gloved hand to the container door.
7
Koop's first call is the distribution shed at the plantation, a ten-minute drive from his place. He backs the ute to the open doors of the building and gets out. He pauses for a few seconds and looks at the neat rows of net-draped coffee trees rolling down the side of the hill into the valley before going inside.
Koop passes a minute talking about nothing in particular with Annie, the spike-haired company office manager, and a couple of the boys on the packing tables, before he loads up the tray and leaves on his rounds.
Zoe was right calling him a delivery boy; that's exactly what he is, and exactly how he likes it. After a lifetime working at the sharp end of things, Koop figures he is due a little ordinariness.
In the truck he punches in The Abyssinians and the reggae loops out, sounding as fresh-minted as the day it was recorded. If this is what ordinary feels like, he can take a bucketload. He turns up the volume and snakes down the hill towards Byron and the first delivery of the day.
Strictly speaking he doesn't need the work. He holds a fifteen per cent investment in North Coast Coffee, andcould easily bring in another driver on the wages they pay locally. But after spending the first six months of his new Australian life lazing around watching his gut grow, he knew he had to find an outlet for his energies other than swimming and drinking coffee, or his brain would have started dribbling out of his ears.
The deliveries keep him in close touch with the business. Working the deliveries is the ideal way to protect his investment. As a copper, Koop had known the value of attention to detail and he is no different when it comes to delivering coffee.
A café owner who had found the last batch a little bitter is given a new order free of charge, no questions. Another who confides in Koop that several other coffee companies are prowling his café is offered a discount on subsequent orders, with the discount increasing in direct ratio to the size of the order.
A café whose barista has gone absent without leave (a common problem on the cruisy North Coast) gets a couple of names from Koop of people who might be able to help them out.
Each wrinkle, each detail, is dutifully recorded on the voice recorder app on Koop's phone. At the end of each day he sits in the cab and listens, wincing at the sound of his nasal Liverpool accent, and noting down anything usable in a black notebook before gladly wiping the soundbites.
By lunchtime he has all but completed the run and stops
But until today, standing outside the container that Keane is sure was the killing place, he hadn't 'got' the Liverpool artworks in the way he had the Angel. Gradually, though, the power of the work begins to emerge. And, in a way that he doesn't want to examine too closely, an echo of what Ferguson said in the mortuary, something about the murder being 'artistic', reverberates with him.
'Ready?' says Harris. She touches him on the arm and he realises he's been standing motionless.
He nods and Harris puts a gloved hand to the container door.
7
Koop's first call is the distribution shed at the plantation, a ten-minute drive from his place. He backs the ute to the open doors of the building and gets out. He pauses for a few seconds and looks at the neat rows of net-draped coffee trees rolling down the side of the hill into the valley before going inside.
Koop passes a minute talking about nothing in particular with Annie, the spike-haired company office manager, and a couple of the boys on the packing tables, before he loads up the tray and leaves on his rounds.
Zoe was right calling him a delivery boy; that's exactly what he is, and exactly how he likes it. After a lifetime working at the sharp end of things, Koop figures he is due a little ordinariness.
In the truck he punches in The Abyssinians and the reggae loops out, sounding as fresh-minted as the day it was recorded. If this is what ordinary feels like, he can take a bucketload. He turns up the volume and snakes down the hill towards Byron and the first delivery of the day.
Strictly speaking he doesn't need the work. He holds a fifteen per cent investment in North Coast Coffee, andcould easily bring in another driver on the wages they pay locally. But after spending the first six months of his new Australian life lazing around watching his gut grow, he knew he had to find an outlet for his energies other than swimming and drinking coffee, or his brain would have started dribbling out of his ears.
The deliveries keep him in close touch with the business. Working the deliveries is the ideal way to protect his investment. As a copper, Koop had known the value of attention to detail and he is no different when it comes to delivering coffee.
A café owner who had found the last batch a little bitter is given a new order free of charge, no questions. Another who confides in Koop that several other coffee companies are prowling his café is offered a discount on subsequent orders, with the discount increasing in direct ratio to the size of the order.
A café whose barista has gone absent without leave (a common problem on the cruisy North Coast) gets a couple of names from Koop of people who might be able to help them out.
Each wrinkle, each detail, is dutifully recorded on the voice recorder app on Koop's phone. At the end of each day he sits in the cab and listens, wincing at the sound of his nasal Liverpool accent, and noting down anything usable in a black notebook before gladly wiping the soundbites.
By lunchtime he has all but completed the run and stops
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