Martin gets to the general store, but it’s not yet open, despite it being well past nine o’clock. Martin checks the opening hours: 8 am Monday to Saturday, 9.30 am Sunday. Fair enough. He sits on a bench in the shade and waits.
Herb Walker’s motivation seems easier to divine. A year ago he was master of all he surveyed, a big fish in a small pond. But then bigger fish from bigger ponds interfered with his investigation into allegations of child abuse against Byron Swift. And after the massacre at St James, he was relegated to being an adjunct to the investigation. So he spoke to D’Arcy Defoe, making sure the child abuse allegations were ventilated in public. Good for him. He didn’t stop there, either; he started digging into Swift’s past, eventually discovering he wasn’t the real Byron Swift, only to hit a brick wall when he suggested the priest be exhumed. And now something similar is happening. Walker can hardly complain about the Sydney homicide detectives; he is, after all, a country cop. But the presence of the ASIO agent, Jack Goffing, must leave him feeling out of the loop, especially if Goffing isn’t telling Walker why he’s here, sniffing around his patch. Walker is protective of his fiefdom. It explains why he wants to talk to Martin.
Which brings Martin to Jack Goffing. What is ASIO doing here? Walker doesn’t know. According to the Bellington cop, Goffing isn’t actively investigating anything, he’s simply monitoring the police. Martin wonders how Goffing and Montifore are getting along, if they’re sitting around at night comparing notes and war-gaming strategies, or whether Montifore is as resentful as Walker. Perhaps Montifore might be willing to talk, if not about his investigation, then maybe about ASIO. Or could the cops have actually called on ASIO for assistance? That seems unlikely; there wouldn’t be much the spooks could offer a homicide investigation, at least not this one. In any case, Goffing arrived in Riversend two days ago, the same day the homicide cops choppered in. Most likely he flew in with them; Martin recalls the mud on the man’s shoes and the charcoal on his shirt when he first encountered him in the Black Dog’s car park, suggesting he’d been out at Springfields with Montifore, Lucic, Walker and the forensic investigators.
But why? The dead backpackers had been nineteen and twenty, middle-class German students travelling around Australia like so many other young foreigners. They’d come to the Murray to look for seasonal work picking fruit. There was absolutely nothing in their backgrounds, or in their deaths, to suggest any possible security threat to Australia. Besides, if Goffing had flown in with Montifore’s team, the identity of the bodies wouldn’t have been determined by then. The conclusion is inescapable: Goffing is in Riversend in case the bodies in the farm dam are linked in some way to Byron Swift’s rampage at St James. But how? How were the killings at the church and the bodies in the dam connected? Did Swift kill the backpackers and then unleash his violence at the church? And what does the St James massacre have to do with national security? A disturbing thought: is Goffing here to uncover new information about the priest and his murderous spree, or is he here to suppress it? Is that what Walker thinks?
Martin’s train of thought is interrupted by the arrival of Fran Landers. She parks her red station wagon with practised skill, reversing in quickly towards the curve before stopping just centimetres short. She gets out, scowls at Martin, then walks to the back of the car to retrieve the milk, paper and bread she has picked up in Bellington.
Martin stands up. ‘Morning, Fran. Give you a hand?’
‘No thanks, Martin. I think you’ve done enough.’
‘How’s that?’
‘I don’t just sell the papers. I read them as well.’
His feature on the mystery priest. Shit. He steps down from the gutter to stand beside her. ‘Fran, I’m sorry, but it’s what I do. It’s my job to inform people what’s happening. But if there’s anything in that article that you think is wrong, then tell me. That’s all I want to do: tell people what’s happened.’ Even to his own ears, it sounds ingratiating and insincere.
She regards him with animosity. ‘Even if it hurts and harms those who have been hurt and harmed enough already?’
‘Look, Fran, you know it’s not like that. I found evidence that Byron Swift was an imposter, some former soldier only pretending to be Swift. I asked you about it, remember? Surely you understand I couldn’t keep that quiet? It’s a big story—people have the right to know.’
‘If it’s such a big story, why did you have to put in all that stuff about him having an affair?’
‘Because it informs the readers what he was really like. Sure, I wrote that he was involved with a married woman, but I didn’t say more than that. And it was down in the body of the article; the subs wanted it at the top. I could have named you, but I didn’t.’
She looks at him with disgust. ‘Well, thanks for nothing. And you still repeated all that rubbish about him being a paedophile. What a lot of garbage.’
‘Is it? It was already all on the record. Surely you remember my paper making a big deal of it a year ago. And the police have told me that some boys—boys here in Riversend—confirmed that allegation to them.’
‘What police? That fat dopey cop who was so busy persecuting Byron that he couldn’t be bothered finding those poor girls?’
‘What?’
‘Sergeant Walker in Bellington.’
‘Yeah, I know who you’re talking about, but what do you mean about the girls? He couldn’t possibly have known about them a year ago. Their bodies have only just been found. What are you talking about?’
Fran looks at him for a moment, obviously confused. ‘Don’t you read your own stories?’
‘What?’ It’s Martin’s turn to look confused.
Fran leans into the back of the car and retrieves a newspaper, The Sunday Age, and hands it to Martin. There’s no missing the headline screaming across the front page: COPS IGNORED MURDER TIP-OFF. The story is accompanied by a colour photo of two pretty girls at a cafe table, toasting the camera with broad smiles. The two German backpackers. The by-line hits him in the guts. By Bethanie Glass, Senior Police Reporter, and Martin Scarsden in Riversend. Shit. This time, the red EXCLUSIVE stamp incites dismay, not pride.
New South Wales Police ignored information received within days of the disappearance of two German backpackers that the two young women had been murdered and their bodies dumped in a Riverina farm dam.
The anonymous tip was received by Crime Stoppers and passed on to local police in the Murray River town of Bellington, but a search of the dam was never conducted.
A source close to Crime Stoppers has confirmed the tip-off was received three days after German backpackers Heidi Schmeikle and Anna Brün were seen getting into a blue sedan in Swan Hill, and two days before Riversend priest Byron Swift went on a murderous rampage, shooting dead five locals.
Bellington police officer Sergeant Herbert Joseph Walker offered no comment when contacted by…
There’s more. Much more. But Martin can’t bring himself to read it. Herbert Joseph Walker. Shit a brick. The use of the policeman’s full name was no subeditor’s slip; Bethanie had deliberately used it knowing it is the form typically used to identify criminals appearing before a court. Walker would know that too.
Martin turns to Fran Landers, who has been watching his reaction with interest. ‘Fran, can I use your phone? It’s important.’
Fran nods, perhaps sensing his desperation, fetches her keys from the ignition and unlocks the door of the general store. Martin rushes to the counter and picks up the phone.
‘Thanks for giving us a hand,’ says Fran, carrying in the newspapers and spreading them out on the low flat areas before the magazine racks, but Martin ignores her sarcasm. He has his notebook out, dialling Walker’s office number, but is put through to an answering machine.