Pam and Ellen joined him. ‘That devious little shit,’ Pam said.
They watched Clode peruse the receipts and dump all but one into a bin. ‘Model citizen,’ muttered Ellen. ‘Back it up, Scobie, to around three-thirty, then roll it forward to five-thirty. We need to double check that neither Clode nor Duyker were there between those times.’
Scobie complied. It took a while. ‘Nope,’ he reported.
‘Okay, let’s pick both of them up. Duyker first.’
They crossed the Peninsula in a CIU Falcon, Scobie directing while Pam drove, flicking the wheel expertly, her pacing and anticipation giving them a smooth ride. Ellen closed her eyes in the back seat and let Scobie twitch and prattle on in the passenger seat.
Finally the car slowed. Ellen opened her eyes. ‘His van’s here,’ Pam said.
‘Scobie, go around the back,’ said Ellen. ‘Pam, you come with me.’
She knocked on Duyker’s door and the fact that it swung open, and the air was saturated with the odour of blood and the buzzing of springtime flies, told her that she was too late, Kellock had got here ahead of her and taken care of a loose end.
60
She went into action. ‘Scobie, head back to Waterloo, grab a couple of uniforms for backup, and arrest Clode.’
‘Will do.’
When he was gone, she made a series of calls, first arranging an all-points apprehension order on Kellock: air, sea and ferry ports, bus terminals, train stations. Then she called Challis. She didn’t need his advice; she wanted to hear his voice, that’s all. But his mobile was switched off or out of range, and had been since yesterday. Finally she called Force Command headquarters and asked for a team of armed response police. There was a pause when she said who the target was.
‘One of ours? You sure?’
‘Perfectly sure. Armed and dangerous. He’s already shot one man dead.’
Another pause. ‘Where exactly are you?’
Ellen gave directions.
‘Take a while to get there. Hour and a half, maybe.’
‘I realise that.’
‘Meanwhile don’t do anything rash.’
‘I won’t,’ Ellen said, immediately taking Pam with her to Gideon House to hunt for Kellock. They’d barely reached the outskirts of Mornington when her mobile rang and Superintendent McQuarrie was barking at her.
‘Tell me this is all a bad joke, Sergeant Destry.’
‘No, sir.’
‘Armed response officers? A warrant for his arrest? What the hell is going on?’
Ellen had to go carefully here. Everyone knew that the super used Kellock for information and influence, but did the relationship go deeper than that? She didn’t say anything about the paedophile ring, or police involvement, but merely said that Kellock was apparently unhinged and had shot dead a witness.
‘I hope you know what you’re doing.’
There had been a time when Ellen might have said ‘So do I’ to herself, but not any more. ‘I do, sir,’ she said with some force.
McQuarrie muttered and broke the call.
Gideon House came into view, set one block back from the Mornington seafront in an overgrown garden. Once a gracious residence, and later a boarding house, it now sheltered street kids and the homeless with funding from the shire and the state government. It looked run-down, and Ellen wondered if the Kellocks were siphoning the upkeep funds into their own pockets, along with abusing the kids in their care.
That’s if Kellock’s wife was involved.
Ellen knocked. A shy-looking kid answered.
‘Is Mrs Kellock in?’
‘Er, yep.’
‘Could you fetch her, please?’
A moment later, Kellock’s wife appeared from the gloomy interior. She was bulky, blowsy-looking, with short, stiff, carroty hair, an affronted jaw and a hard face. She wore dressy black pants and a silk shirt, with plenty of gold on her fingers, wrists and neck. Narrow, tanned feet in elegant sandals, with bright red nails. A woman who tans joylessly all year round, Ellen thought.
‘Mrs Kellock, I’m Sergeant Destry and this is Constable Murphy. May we speak to your husband?’
The reply was guarded. ‘He’s not here.’
‘Do you know where he is?’
‘He doesn’t tell me his every move. Why do you want to know? He’s in charge of the station. He doesn’t have to justify himself to anybody.’
It was absurd pride. Ellen said firmly, ‘We need to speak to him.’
‘Try his mobile.’
Ellen knew that would spook him-that’s if he hadn’t already flown the coop. She asked, ‘Do you and your husband live here, Mrs Kellock?’
‘We have a flat at the back.’
‘Could he be there? Maybe he slipped home while you’ve been in the main building?’
‘No.’
‘Can you think where else he might be?’
‘Why?’
Because he’s on a murderous rampage, Ellen thought. She cleared her throat, suddenly uneasy: had she sent Scobie Sutton into a trap? ‘We need his input on something,’ she said with an empty smile.
The eyes narrowed and an expression passed across them, as though Kellock’s wife knew why they were there, and that everything was about to fall apart in her life. She recovered and said tartly, ‘He could be at a conference, at divisional headquarters, at one of the other stations. Check his diary.’
‘We have, Mrs Kellock.’
Pam had been silent until now. ‘Your husband is closely involved here, Mrs Kellock? He’s close to the children who live here?’
‘What’s that got to do with anything? Who do you think you are? My husband is senior in rank to both of you and I want you to remember that.’
It was pointless grandstanding. Ellen said, ‘Do you have another house?’
‘Of course.’
‘Where is it?’
Kellock’s wife scowled, then muttered an address in Red Hill, twenty minutes south.
‘Could your husband be there?’
‘Well, why don’t you go and look,’ snapped the woman, stalking off around the side of the big house.
Ellen got out her mobile phone, walking around with it in the grounds of the building until she got a clear signal. ‘Scobie? Thank God.’
He cut in hurriedly: ‘I was just about to call you. Clode’s dead.’
She breathed in and out. ‘Any sign of Kellock?’
‘No.’
‘Same MO as Duyker?’
‘Yes. Shotgunned in the groin and bled out on the floor.’
‘You know the drill, Scobie. Secure the scene. We’re heading for Red Hilclass="underline" the Kellocks have a house there.’
She gave him the address. He grunted. ‘He’ll have done a runner.’
‘I know that, Scobie,’ Ellen said. She ended the call, jerked her head at Pam. ‘Let’s go.’
They sped down the Peninsula, taking the freeway south and exiting onto a road that climbed steeply away from the coast, past vineyards, orchards and little art-and-craft galleries. Red Hill was a ribbon of houses amid huge gums, with vines and hobby farms on the nearby slopes. It was a well-heeled town, home to wineries that offered costly wines and meals to weekend tourists from the city. Ellen navigated, directing Pam to Point Leo Road and finally a gravelled track that plunged between dense stands of gum trees. A firetrap in summer. Pam braked suddenly.
They’d come to a clearing, a house fronting a tight turning circle. There were two vehicles, a police car and a Toyota twin-cab, a dented working vehicle. The house, of sandy brick, red tiles, gleaming aluminium window and door frames and potted ferns, looked out of place amongst the native trees. Ellen leaned forward, one hand on the dash. ‘I know that Toyota. It belongs to Laurie Jarrett.’
Both women glanced at each other then. ‘I should have realised,’ Ellen said.
‘We need backup, Sarge.’
‘Yes.’
But their arrival had alerted Jarrett. He burst from the house, pushing Kellock ahead of him with the barrel of a shotgun. ‘Stay out of this,’ he yelled.