very brave. He doesn’t mind pricking his finger to get the blood.’
‘And he gives himself his injections?’
‘Oh, yes. Jamie would never allow anyone else to do that. I wanted to get him a nurse to do it. His father could certainly have afforded it, but he wouldn’t hear of it. He’s been doing it himself ever since he… ever since it… since he was a little fellow of fourteen.’
From the look of him, Jamie would have been a pretty long streak of a fellow at fourteen, but I didn’t say anything. She told me about his excellent school record, his popularity, his golf-playing.
‘Has he got a girlfriend?’ I asked.
‘Of course not. He’s far too young for that sort of thing.’
I was beginning to build up a picture. I had a couple of other cases on hand, but I agreed to visit the Truscott residence in Chatswood that afternoon to look over the scene of the disappearance. After she’d signed a contract and a cheque, and restored her gold Parker pen and hefty chequebook to her purse, Mrs Truscott began to look a little uneasy.
‘I think I know what’s happened,’ she said.
Look out, Hardy, I thought. This could be cheque-tearing-up time. ‘You’d better tell me,’ I said.
‘I think his father has arranged for someone to abduct him so that I’ll have to go to the police and report it. Then Roger will have him set free and I’ll be made to look like a neglectful parent. Oh, how I hate that man.’
I relaxed somewhat. Mrs T’s theory wasn’t worth the paper it wasn’t worth writing it on, but I pretended to give it some weight. Clearly, she wanted to talk about Roger. ‘I have to ask, Mrs Truscott-why is there so much ill- feeling between you and your husband? It sounds as if there’s more than… infidelity involved.’
Her chin was soft, a bit loose, perhaps needing a tuck soon, but she jutted it firmly across the desk at me. ‘The diabetes is on his side of the family,’ she said.
She drove a bronze Celica; I followed her in my rust-pocked Falcon. The two-storey house in Chatswood with ample grounds and well-tended gardens front and back was close to the golf course where, I was told, young Truscott was a junior member. He played off a 9 handicap and got in a round almost every day, studies permitting.
‘He got a hole-in-one,’ his mother told me as she conducted me up the stairs to the boy’s room, ‘but he had no witnesses. I believe him, his father didn’t. He’s a very honest boy. Of course I drive him to the club and check his bag to make sure he has barley sugar with him and his diabetic identity card as well as his bracelet. Just between you and me, I ring and check with the professional while he’s out playing, just to make sure that he’s all right.’
I was beginning to feel Mrs Truscott’s motherly concern wrapping itself stiflingly around me, and I was only a casual employee. I asked her if I could look at the room on my own. ‘Man stuff,’ I said, trying for a hearty tone. ‘It might help me form a clearer picture of Jim.’
‘Jamie,’ she said and retreated tearfully down the stairs.
He might have had a serious, chronic disease, but Jim Truscott (as I had begun to think of him) presented as one of the healthiest young men I had ever snooped on. He was obviously an organised and motivated student, keen on golf and other sports, and not immune to the attractions of the opposite sex. He had a couple of cunningly concealed copies of Playboy, and I found a packet of condoms with two missing. A rock radio calendar on the wall had the birthdays of his mother and father circled and annotated. I did a quick check of the upstairs bathroom where Jim’s tracksuit hung and a pair of smelly sneakers lived, and rejoined Mrs Truscott in her chintzy living room.
‘I can’t find any of these things you mentioned,’ I said. ‘The needles and the sugar-testing machine. Where does he keep them?’
‘In the upstairs bathroom. They’re gone. Whoever took him knew he had to have those things to live. It must be Roger.’
I doubted it. It looked to me as if the boy had tidied his room and taken his survival equipment with him, but not his expensive set of Ping clubs or his spiked shoes. Something was obviously more important to him than golf. I was beginning to form impressions of the lad and the crosses he had to bear-antagonistic parents, an over- protective mother, the discipline of diabetes.
‘This will sound silly,’ I said, ‘but are you sure there was no message-a note, a phone call?’
‘Of course not. What do you mean?’
‘I’m not sure. He appears to be a nice, considerate lad. I see he’s got your birthday marked on his calendar. I can’t believe he’d put you through this sort of worry. Have you checked your letterbox?’
‘My accountant handles all the bills and I don’t get many letters, not since the divorce… But I check the box daily.’
I’d noticed that the telephone was attached to an answering machine. ‘What about telephone messages?’
‘What do you mean?’
I walked over to the instrument. The light was flashing. ‘You don’t play back your calls?’
‘I don’t know anything about it. I never touch it. Jamie’s friends use it. He runs downstairs and takes the calls upstairs. It’s all beyond me.’
I felt sorry for her in her lonely, isolated existence but even more sorry for Jamie. I even felt a little sorry for Roger. I hit the button and a young voice came through
loud and clear: ‘DON’T WORRY, MUM. I’M FINE. I’M STAYING WITH A FRIEND FOR A WHILE. I NEED TO WORK A FEW THINGS OUT AND I THINK YOU DO AS WELL. I’LL BE IN TOUCH SOON. LOTS OF LOVE.’
‘Oh, thank God,’ she said, ‘but on earth what does he mean? Where is he?’
‘Who’s his best mate, Mrs Truscott?’
Joel Lawson was another tall, lean teenager. I talked to him on the putting green at the Chatswood golf club where he’d gone immediately after school. He was rolling them in and leaving them close, one after another. I interrupted him, introduced myself and showed him my ID.
‘Jesus,’ he said, ‘a private eye.’
‘Think of me as a social worker,’ I said. ‘I’m looking for James Truscott. His mother’s worried about him.’
He tapped his ball with the toe of his putter. ‘Why?’
‘She doesn’t know where he is. Do you?’
‘Didn’t Jim tell her?’
‘Son, if he’d told her she wouldn’t be paying me to find him. This is serious. Where is he?’
Tap, tap. I was about to grab the putter when he reversed it and flicked the ball up into his hand. Neat catch. ‘What’s her problem?’
‘He’s a diabetic. She worries.’
‘He can play thirty-six holes in a day. He’s fit. She’s an idiot.’
I was inclined to agree but she was writing the cheques. ‘She’s got the say, Joel. Where is he?’
‘It’s no big deal. He’s with Julie, Julie Massingham. She’s his girlfriend.’
It sounded as if he wished she was his but that wasn’t my problem. He gave me her address and phone number. ‘Tell him to come and have a game. I’ll lick the arse off him.’
I grinned. ‘What’s your handicap?’
He dropped the ball onto the green and lined up a putt. ‘Thirteen.’
‘Work on it.’
I called Julie’s number as I drove towards the address in Willoughby. A young female answered. I hung up.
The house was an old weatherboard, probably scheduled for demolition when the owner could get the right price. For now, a student share-rental joint if ever I saw one. I opened the rusty gate and walked up the overgrown path. The grass in the front yard had been half-cut fairly recently. At a guess, the Victa had run out of fuel and the mowing person had run out of money or energy or both.
My knock brought a pretty dark-haired teenager to the door. I tried as best I could to minimise the tough
