‘OK,’ Watkins said. ‘We’ll have to catch this guy. Kensington, you obviously know your way around there, and you, Holy, I don’t suppose you would object to seeing a bit more of Australia. I’ll get McCormack to give Nimbin a bell so they know you’re coming.’
7
Lithgow
THEY MINGLED WITH tourists and took the single-track railway to Darling Harbour, got off at Harbourside and found an outside table with a view of the quays.
A pair of long legs stalked past on stilettos. Andrew rolled his eyes and whistled in a very un-PC way. A couple of heads in the restaurant turned and sent them an irritated glare. Harry shook his head.
‘How’s your friend Otto?’
‘Well, he’s devastated. He’s been abandoned for a woman. If their lovers are bi they always end up with a woman, he says. But he’ll survive this time as well.’
To his surprise, Harry felt some raindrops, and sure enough: heavy cloud cover had drifted in from the north-west almost without his noticing.
‘How did you recognise this Nimbin place with no more than a photo of a house front?’
‘Nimbin? Did I forget to tell you that I’m an old hippy?’ Andrew grinned. ‘It’s claimed that anyone who can remember the Aquarius Festival wasn’t there. Well, I remember the houses in the main street at least. It looked like an outlaw town in a middling Western, painted in psychedelic yellow and purple. Well, to tell the truth, I thought the yellow and purple had been the result of taking certain substances. Until I saw the photo in Inger’s room.’
On their return from lunch Watkins called another meeting in the Ops Room. Yong Sue had unearthed some interesting cases on his computer.
‘I’ve been through all the unsolved murder cases in New South Wales over the last ten years and I’ve found four cases that have similarities with this one. The bodies are found in out-of-the-way places, two in landfill sites, one on a road by the edge of a forest and one floating in the Darling River. The women have probably been killed and sexually abused elsewhere and then dumped. And crucially – all of them have been strangled and show bruising to the neck from fingers.’ Yong Sue beamed.
Watkins cleared his throat. ‘Let’s hold onto our hats here. After all, strangulation’s not such an unusual type of killing after rape. What’s the geographical distribution, Yong Sue? The Darling’s in the bloody outback, more than a thousand kilometres from Sydney.’
‘No luck, sir. I couldn’t find any geographical pattern.’ Yong Sue looked genuinely sorry.
‘Well, four strangled women scattered across the whole state over a period of ten years is not a lot to—’
‘One more thing, sir. All the women were blonde. I mean, not blonde hair, but fair hair, almost white.’
Lebie released a silent whistle. The table went quiet.
Watkins was still looking sceptical. ‘Can you do your sums on this, Yong? Have a squiz at statistical significance and all that, find out if the odds are within reasonable limits before we cry wolf. For safety’s sake perhaps you should check all of Australia first. And include the unsolved rapes. We might dig up something there.’
‘That’ll take a bit of time. But I’ll try, sir.’ Yong smiled again.
‘OK. Kensington and Holy, why aren’t you on your way to Nimbin?’
‘We’re going early tomorrow morning, sir,’ Andrew said. ‘There’s a recent rape case in Lithgow I’d like to investigate first. I have a feeling there may be a connection. We were just heading there now.’
Watkins frowned. ‘Lithgow? We’re trying to work as a team here, Kensington. That means we discuss and coordinate and we don’t wander off on our own. To my knowledge, we’ve never spoken about any rape cases in Lithgow.’
‘Just a hunch, sir.’
Watkins sighed. ‘Well, McCormack seems to believe you have a kind of sixth sense.’
‘We Blackfellas have closer contact with the spiritual world than you whities, you know, sir.’
‘In my department we don’t base our police work on that sort of thing, Kensington.’
‘A joke, sir. I’ve got a bit more than that on this matter.’
Watkins shook his head. ‘Just be on the plane early tomorrow morning, OK?’
They took the freeway from Sydney. Lithgow is an industrial town of ten to twelve thousand inhabitants, but it seemed more like a medium-sized village to Harry. Outside the police station there was a flashing blue light nailed on top of a post.
The chief there received them warmly. He was an overweight, jovial type with a stack of double chins and went by the name of Larsen. Distant relatives in Norway.