‘The ABC. Trelore and Fielding.’
‘What do you think?’
‘They’re inoculating themselves.’
‘What have you got?’
Martin hesitates, looking around the empty foyer of the police station, but only for a fraction of a moment. ‘It’s connected. The story Max and Elizabeth were chasing, this whole thing with the Mess, Sweetwater and the US mafia and the murder of an undercover cop named Tarquin Molloy.’
‘Mate, that’s brilliant. Outstanding. Is that why they were killed?’ Even to Martin’s ears, Smith’s unbridled enthusiasm for death and destruction lacks empathy. Max and Elizabeth were working for him, after all.
‘Here’s what I’m thinking,’ the editor continues, fervour undiminished. ‘Something for This Month. There’s still another fortnight before deadline, so plenty of time. I’d need it confirmed well before then, of course. And there has to be another book in this. The ones on Riversend and Port Silver are still selling well. You are the king of the true crime blockbuster. We really have to put you on the writers’ festival circuit and …’ Wellington stops in mid-sentence, refocuses. ‘But that’s for the future. We need to publish whatever you’ve got up online as soon as possible. We need to get ahead of the pack on this one. Put D’Arcy Defoe back in his box.’
‘Online?’
‘Welcome to the future, pal. Give me something as soon as you can. It doesn’t have to be lengthy, it doesn’t have to be comprehensive. Just enough to stake a claim, let our readers know we’re on to it, something for our newsletter, a pointer to the mag. In fact, all the better if you segment it, run it out over several days. Keep the punters interested. I’ll make it worth your while. Keep something central back for the magazine, if you like. Then, once we’ve staked it out as our own, that will prepare the ground for the book. You good with that?’
‘I’ll see. I can’t make any promises. It does depend on what I can dig up.’
‘Are you kidding? You were there. In the middle of that goddamn gunfight. Like the O.K. Corral. Just write a first-hand account, what it was like to be there. Do that now. Nothing the Herald or anyone else has got can compete with that. And make sure you insert yourself right into the heart of it; make it clear that you weren’t there by accident.’
After the call is over, Martin sits and wonders. Wellington is right, so very obviously right. So why has he been so slow to realise it? He’s written such stories before, knows the power of them. Maybe he really is losing his chops.
Ivan Lucic emerges through a security door beside the counter, interrupting his reverie, speaking to them as a group. ‘The boss wants a word. All of you.’
Inside the station, in the same glassed-in office as the previous evening, Morris Montifore is waiting, deep in conversation with Claus Vandenbruk. The inspector looks up as they enter and signals them to sit. ‘Morning. I’ve got another meeting upstairs shortly. We’ve got Mess members outing themselves and the brass are shitting themselves. So we need to be fast. Claus and I have a few simple questions.’
That’s enough for Vandenbruk; he launches straight in on Martin with his customary sledgehammer approach. ‘Detective Inspector Montifore tells me it came as no surprise to you when Harry Sweetwater revealed himself as a member of a United States organised crime syndicate.’
‘The Chicago mob.’
‘Precisely. How did you know?’
Martin frowns, folds his arms. ‘I’m not revealing sources.’
‘Fuck that. Was it, or was it not, a member of the ACIC or the AFP?’
Martin shrugs. ‘Sorry. I can’t afford to play rule in, rule out.’
Vandenbruk seethes, Martin can see it in his eyes, but the investigator’s voice remains even. ‘I appreciate your journalistic undertakings. But this is life and death. Understand this: Tarquin Molloy was an undercover operative, a police officer, a good man with a family. He was murdered. Brutally murdered. Probably because his cover was blown. We have other undercover agents whose lives are potentially threatened. We can’t afford to risk any more killings. If one of the federal agencies is leaking, we need to know.’
‘There’s an ongoing investigation into Mollisons?’
Vandenbruk slams his open hand down onto the table in frustration. ‘Lives are at risk, that’s all you need to know.’
Martin thinks it over. ‘All right. I didn’t learn anything from the ACIC or the AFP.’
‘Good. Thank God,’ says Vandenbruk, some of the intensity leaving him. He takes a deep breath, rolling his shoulders as if to relax them. ‘What else did you learn about Sweetwater?’
Martin’s first instinct is to keep his mouth shut, but then he sees an opportunity: maybe he can glean some information in return. Vandenbruk was conducive to such arrangements the last time they dealt with each other, down in Riversend. ‘Sweetwater is registered as an AFP informant.’
A chill descends on the room. Both Vandenbruk and Montifore appear stunned, rendered motionless, as if someone has removed their batteries for a second. A journalist has somehow learnt the identity of a highly protected source.
Martin sees an opportunity to press home his advantage. ‘Was he Molloy’s informant?’
Now it’s Vandenbruk’s turn to assess his position. The longer he hesitates, the more Martin starts to believe there must have been a connection. ‘Maybe,’ says Vandenbruk finally. ‘We’re unsure of their precise relationship.’
‘So why didn’t you investigate Sweetwater back when Molloy was killed?’
‘Because we didn’t know Molloy was dead. We thought the same as everyone else: that he’d taken the money and scarpered, either with or without Sweetwater’s help.’
‘And has Sweetwater continued to cooperate, after Molloy vanished?’
But Vandenbruk is shaking his head. ‘I can’t tell you anything about his current status, other than that he is wanted for shooting dead Joshua Spitt and for questioning involving Tarquin Molloy’s murder. Being an informant gives him no protection against that. None.’
‘You think he did it?’
‘Don’t you? He had the perfect motivation and the perfect opportunity.’
‘He told Morris and me that the mob had a contract out on
