Babylon South. Jon Cleary
themselves on chairs facing them. It could have been a seance, though a medium or even a spirit would not have been admitted to this house without the best of credentials.
Edwin and Ruth looked more brother and sister than husband and wife; Ruth seemed more out of the same mould than did Emma. Both were grey-haired, had thin patrician features, looked at the world with the same superior eye. They brushed each other’s hair every night and, when the occasion demanded, did the same with each other’s ego. Yet Emma, self-contained, feline, was not out of place with them.
‘Mr Springfellow,’ said Malone, plunging straight in, ‘would your brother have been the sort of man likely to have committed suicide?’
There were gasps from both women, as if Malone had accused Sir Walter of bestiality. Edwin’s expression did not change.
‘No,’ he said in a clipped voice that sounded more English than Australian. ‘He certainly would not have done anything like that.’
‘What was his attitude towards guns?’
‘They were for sport, not suicide.’ Edwin’s tone was polite but cold. ‘If that’s what you are getting at.’
He’s too well prepared, Malone thought. He could be a lawyer instead of a stockbroker. ‘Everyone seems to think we’re getting at something. Your sister-in-law had the same idea. Don’t you want to know how your brother died?’
‘Of course we do!’ Emma leaned forward; Malone waited for her to spring out of her chair. ‘But we’re not going to have his name besmirched!’
Besmirched: he had heard that word only from learned judges in libel cases. But perhaps it was part of the vocabulary one would hear in a museum like this. ‘We don’t want it – besmirched, either. But let’s face it – this case is one of Australia’s biggest mysteries. I worked on it originally for a few days – it was front-page stuff in every newspaper in the country when he disappeared.’
‘1 remember it.’ Emma looked as if she might spit. ‘Reporters! Trying to turn our life into a goldfish bowl!’
‘It’s started again,’ said Ruth Springfellow. ‘We have an ex-directory number, but somehow or other they’ve discovered it and are ringing all the time, day and night. Whatever happened to respect for privacy?’
‘We’re living in the past, sweetheart,’ said her husband and, without irony, looked around the museum.
Malone tried another tack, walking on hollow eggs. ‘This is a delicate question—’ Both women looked at him with apprehensive anticipation; but Edwin looked offended in advance. ‘What were relations like between your brother and his wife?’
Edwin and Ruth were shocked; but Emma leaned forward again. ‘There were arguments. I always said they were an ill-matched pair.’
‘Emma!’ Edwin raised an open hand as if he intended to clamp it over his sister’s mouth.
‘It’s true. We all want to know what happened to Walter—’ She faltered for a moment and her face softened; she looked a different woman, one capable of love. Then she hardened again. ‘What’s wrong with the truth?’
‘Nothing,’ said Malone, getting in first. ‘It’s the only way we’ll solve anything.’
‘By dragging up the past?’ said Edwin.
Malone gave him a steady look. ‘Yes, Mr Springfellow. That’s the only way we’re going to do it.’
‘Why not just let Walter rest in peace?’ said Ruth. ‘It’s what he would have wanted himself.’
‘No,’ said Emma. ‘He wouldn’t have wanted it that way at all. You know as well as I do, he wasn’t a man to let things rest, not even as a boy. He was like me, we always were. Let’s have the truth. It’s what he would have said.’
‘Can any of you remember anything of the day he disappeared?’
‘Nothing,’ said Edwin at once and Ruth, after a glance at him, shook her head.
‘I can,’ said Emma, looking at neither of them. ‘I was living here then with Edwin and Ruth—’
‘Where do you live now?’ said Clements. Malone always left it to him to take notes.
‘At the Vanderbilt in Macquarie Street. I’ve lived there for twenty years.’ She said it bitterly, as if south of the harbour were another country where she was a remittance woman not wanted at home.
Malone said, ‘What do you remember of that day?’
‘How can one remember exactly what happened all that time ago?’ said Edwin.
Emma ignored him. ‘Walter was very upset. I saw him for a moment before he left for the airport that morning—’
‘What did he say?’
‘It wasn’t what he said – I just knew. Walter and I were so close – we didn’t need to say things to each other. He just kissed me on the cheek and told me not to worry. Then he told me not to go near his wife.’ the last word had a dagger through it.
‘And did you? Go near his wife?’
‘Not till the news came through that he was missing. The ASIO men came to see us, and some policemen—’
‘I was one of them,’ said Malone.
‘Really?’ She looked at him with sudden sharp interest. ‘And you never found anything?’
‘Nothing. We’re having to start all over again.’
Edwin stood up. He had a certain dignity that was natural to him; old families sometimes bequeath other things besides money and a name. ‘I think that’s enough for today, Inspector. We are still upset by yesterday’s discovery. I should have been at my office if it weren’t for this …’
‘We haven’t finished—’
‘Yes, we have, Emma. The inspector will understand. Perhaps we’ll be in better shape to talk to you, Inspector, after the funeral. For the moment we’d rather be left alone.’
Emma glared at him, then abruptly stood up and without a word stalked out of the room. Ruth, as dignified as her husband, said, ‘Please forgive her, Inspector. She and Walter were very close. Even after all these years she has never really reconciled herself to his disappearance. She has always believed he was still alive. And now …’
Edwin took her hand and once again they were as still as statues. You will get no more out of us today, their stillness said. Malone, who knew when to wait for another day, said goodbye. Edwin, moving stiffly, showed the two detectives to the front door. When he closed the door behind them, Malone waited for the sound of bolts being shot; but there was none. The door, however, was as stout as a castle gate. Neither it nor the family behind it would be easy to break down.
Going down the driveway Clements said, ‘Emma was in love with her brother.’
Malone looked sideways at him: Clements was not usually given to such wild guessing. ‘You reckon? I didn’t think they went in for that sort of thing in Mosman.’
‘I don’t mean incest. But I saw it once before, when you were overseas on that High Commissioner case. Only it was the other way around, the brother was in love with the sister. He killed her because she married someone else.’
Malone stopped at the front gates. ‘Are you saying Emma could have killed Walter?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Clements, chewing his lip. ‘I’ll give you half a dozen who could have killed him. Including ASIO.’
‘Keep your mouth shut on that one or you’re headed for Tibooburra.’ That was a one-pub town in the far north-west of the State, the NSW Police Force’s farthest outpost. ‘Just think it, don’t say it.’
Clements grinned. ‘Let’s