Challis - 03 - Snapshot by Garry Disher
Authors: Garry Disher
Tags: Fiction, Mystery & Detective, Police, australia, Police Procedural, Large Type Books, Melbourne Region (Vic.), Destry; Ellen (Fictitious Character), Challis; Hal (Fictitious Character)
Ads: Link
swivel necking, and hand gestures as he talked, punctuated
with occasional swigs from a bottle of mineral water.
You know the Cobb family? Scobie
said. From one of the estates?
One of the kids took a marijuana
plant to school for show-and-tell, gasped Ellen.
Correct.
What about them?
My wifes had dealings with them.
Ellen knew that Scobie would get to
the point eventually. Shed met Beth Sutton a few times, at police picnics and
Christmas parties. A plain, good, churchgoing woman who worked for Community
Health and was given to helping the unfortunates of the Peninsula. Nothing
wrong with that, except that people involved in good works often seemed to wear
an air of piety and satisfaction, which often grated on Ellen. She waited, said
Really? to prompt Scobie.
When I was in court this morning I
let slip that I was married to Beth. Now Natalies going to be suspicious of
her.
Scobie, suspicion of the police is
inbred on those housing estates.
I know, but it neednt be. Beth
keeps her work and mine completely separate.
They lapsed into silence. The road
was wide and flat now and Ellen relaxed fractionally. Her mind drifted. There
was a possibility that one of Janine McQuarries clients was the killer, but
getting access to her records was going to be a headache. At the same time, all
of the circumstances of the murder indicated a degree of planning and
professionalism, as if the killers had been hired.
The womans finances would have to
be examined minutely. Did everything come back to money? Ellen wondered,
thinking about her husbands own futile rants centred on money. They were struggling,
despite their combined salariesone of their cars was for the scrap heap, and
their daughters rent and university tuition fees were cripplingbut Alans
resentment sometimes took strange turnings. Only last night hed said, with a
sidelong glance, Dont you think its interesting that its always
plainclothed police who go up on theft or corruption charges?
Plainclothed police like her, he
meant. Your point being?
They bring decent police into
disrepute.
Guys like him, he meant. Rarely was
the Ethical Standards department of the police force obliged to investigate the
guys who worked in the Traffic and Accident Investigation squads.
Alan was full of undercurrents. It
was very possible that he was depressed. But, more than anything, Ellen was
scared that hed found her out. Now and then over the years shed pocketed
money at crime-scenes, $50 here, $500 there. Probably no more than $2000 in
all, over a ten-year period, and shed even put one haul, of $500, into a
church poor box. But the pathology was there in her and she was afraid. It had
started with chewing gum at the corner shop when she was eight years old and
although shed more or less stopped, the impulse hadnt. Maybe she needed a
psychologist. Maybe she needed to make an appointment with Dominic OBrien.
God, what would Challis think of her
if he ever found out? She felt sick at heart at the thought. Her palms were
damp. She dried them on her thighs, letting Scobie Sutton wander all over the
road and talk and talk.
* * * *
They
arrived to find that Challis had brought in two DCs from Mornington and, with
their help, set up the first-floor conference room as an incident room: extra
computers, phones, fax machines, whiteboards, photocopiers and scanners, and a
TV set. But, more than anything as far as Ellen was concerned, hed brewed
coffee and placed a box of pastries in the centre of the conference table. She
sipped and nibbled as he introduced the Mornington detectives and outlined the
case, reading from his laptop.
Finally he turned to her. Ellen?
She brushed flakes of pastry from
her lapels and summarised the results of the Bayside Counselling interviews. We
need to look at those files, Challis said. Meanwhile, I carried out a Google
search on the husband. Hes a well-known hard case in the finance world, good
at firing and downsizing, so no doubt hes got
with occasional swigs from a bottle of mineral water.
You know the Cobb family? Scobie
said. From one of the estates?
One of the kids took a marijuana
plant to school for show-and-tell, gasped Ellen.
Correct.
What about them?
My wifes had dealings with them.
Ellen knew that Scobie would get to
the point eventually. Shed met Beth Sutton a few times, at police picnics and
Christmas parties. A plain, good, churchgoing woman who worked for Community
Health and was given to helping the unfortunates of the Peninsula. Nothing
wrong with that, except that people involved in good works often seemed to wear
an air of piety and satisfaction, which often grated on Ellen. She waited, said
Really? to prompt Scobie.
When I was in court this morning I
let slip that I was married to Beth. Now Natalies going to be suspicious of
her.
Scobie, suspicion of the police is
inbred on those housing estates.
I know, but it neednt be. Beth
keeps her work and mine completely separate.
They lapsed into silence. The road
was wide and flat now and Ellen relaxed fractionally. Her mind drifted. There
was a possibility that one of Janine McQuarries clients was the killer, but
getting access to her records was going to be a headache. At the same time, all
of the circumstances of the murder indicated a degree of planning and
professionalism, as if the killers had been hired.
The womans finances would have to
be examined minutely. Did everything come back to money? Ellen wondered,
thinking about her husbands own futile rants centred on money. They were struggling,
despite their combined salariesone of their cars was for the scrap heap, and
their daughters rent and university tuition fees were cripplingbut Alans
resentment sometimes took strange turnings. Only last night hed said, with a
sidelong glance, Dont you think its interesting that its always
plainclothed police who go up on theft or corruption charges?
Plainclothed police like her, he
meant. Your point being?
They bring decent police into
disrepute.
Guys like him, he meant. Rarely was
the Ethical Standards department of the police force obliged to investigate the
guys who worked in the Traffic and Accident Investigation squads.
Alan was full of undercurrents. It
was very possible that he was depressed. But, more than anything, Ellen was
scared that hed found her out. Now and then over the years shed pocketed
money at crime-scenes, $50 here, $500 there. Probably no more than $2000 in
all, over a ten-year period, and shed even put one haul, of $500, into a
church poor box. But the pathology was there in her and she was afraid. It had
started with chewing gum at the corner shop when she was eight years old and
although shed more or less stopped, the impulse hadnt. Maybe she needed a
psychologist. Maybe she needed to make an appointment with Dominic OBrien.
God, what would Challis think of her
if he ever found out? She felt sick at heart at the thought. Her palms were
damp. She dried them on her thighs, letting Scobie Sutton wander all over the
road and talk and talk.
* * * *
They
arrived to find that Challis had brought in two DCs from Mornington and, with
their help, set up the first-floor conference room as an incident room: extra
computers, phones, fax machines, whiteboards, photocopiers and scanners, and a
TV set. But, more than anything as far as Ellen was concerned, hed brewed
coffee and placed a box of pastries in the centre of the conference table. She
sipped and nibbled as he introduced the Mornington detectives and outlined the
case, reading from his laptop.
Finally he turned to her. Ellen?
She brushed flakes of pastry from
her lapels and summarised the results of the Bayside Counselling interviews. We
need to look at those files, Challis said. Meanwhile, I carried out a Google
search on the husband. Hes a well-known hard case in the finance world, good
at firing and downsizing, so no doubt hes got
Similar Books
