The Shadow Maker (11 page)

‘Essentially, yes. But the card isn’t enough. You’d also need all the security components and a computer configured to connect to the VPN before you could get in. Even then, you’d be treading on thin ice.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘The card’s got more than silicon in there. It’s also got a bit of nanotechnology and a micro wireless connection, so I’d guess the login is constantly changing.’ He hit the keyboard and the screens froze. ‘This Plato’s Cave is very private. No one wants you to get in.’

He handed the card back to her.

‘Any idea where it was made?’ she asked.

‘There are a few places around the world where it could’ve been produced, Melbourne being one. The software firms here are up with the best in the world.’

‘Is there anything else you can tell me?’

‘Not off the top of my head. But I’ll give you a call if something else occurs to me.’ He smiled. ‘I’ve got your mobile number.’

There was a glint in his eye as he said it.

Rita sat in the cafe at the Campus Centre drinking a strong black coffee and digesting the information Huxley had imparted. Along with his scientific analysis he’d given her a new lead to follow. It would mean knocking on the doors of the best software firms around the city; with any luck, one of them could identify the card’s provenance. Of course, there was one glaring flaw with that approach.

If Tony Kavella was indeed the customer, the firm would probably deny all knowledge of him, the card and its manufacture, so even if it had been made in Melbourne, there was a good chance it would be a fruitless quest.

She switched her thoughts to Huxley himself. He’d made a good impression on her, not just because he was attractive, but because he’d surprised her with his manner and personality. From a university professor she’d anticipated a dry, even condescending welcome.

Instead he was friendlier than she’d expected, more amenable, not pretentious at all.

Her mobile bleeped. She took it out of her shoulder bag. It was a text message from O’Keefe.

T-shirt bought in Bourke St mall. No luck with ID. Still looking
for mask.

She smiled to herself. Detective Senior Constable Kevin O’Keefe was doing what he did best, pursuing each objective with plodding tenacity.

Rita put the phone back in her bag, and tried to relax as she sipped her coffee. Around her, groups of students clustered at cafe tables. The place was full of loud conversations - the clamour of burgeoning intellects among the coffee cups and donuts. The scene almost made her feel nostalgic. A decade ago she would have been at home here in the heady mix of idealism and naivety - a convergence of sharp-witted youths, intense young women, and post-adolescent boys. Outside the cafe, students were strolling back and forth from lectures, or heading for the restaurant or the bookshop, bags slung casually over their shoulders. Then a blind girl with a guide dog walked past. It snapped her back into action, like a visual reminder of the urgency of the manhunt.

Rita picked up her bag and walked through the heat and swirling dust towards the car park. Overhead the leaves of the gum trees lashed themselves in the gusts of a northerly and a flock of galahs swerved in pink arcs as they looked for a stable perch. As she rounded a brown rotunda of lecture theatres her mobile started ringing. It was O’Keefe again.

‘I’ve just got into the office, and a hospital’s got back to us,’ he told her. ‘There’s a patient with the type of injuries we’re looking for.’

‘Go on,’ said Rita.

‘She’s a thirty-year-old woman with concussion and wrist injuries.’

‘Is she a hooker?’

‘No, the complete opposite - a company executive who says she was knocked off her bike. It might be nothing.’

‘A company executive riding a bike,’ retorted Rita. ‘That’s dubious for a start. Give me the name and hospital.’

‘Kelly Grattan, and she’s at Epworth in a private room,’ replied O’Keefe. ‘By the way, if she’s the victim of a hit-and-run, she didn’t report it. In fact, there’s no report of an accident.’

‘Okay, anything else I need to know?’

‘The DNA result’s come through from the lab,’ he answered,

‘and like we thought, the offender’s not in the database. Strickland’s pissed about it. His best hope for a breakthrough just went down the pan. It also means Kavella’s in the clear.’

‘Not necessarily,’ she corrected him. ‘I never had him down for carrying out the attack himself. Kavella doesn’t leave messy crime scenes with a trail of evidence, he’s too clever for that. He’s a puppet master, a manipulator. Besides, his prints are on file and there was no match.’

‘But you still think he’s involved?’

‘Officially, no. We’ve been told he’s out of bounds so we follow up every other lead.’ She paused as she reached her car. ‘That means my next stop is another hospital visit.’

Rita drew the ward nurse aside to ask her about Kelly Grattan.

‘When was she admitted?’

‘Three nights ago,’ answered the nurse. ‘Just before nine.’

‘What are her injuries?’

‘A hairline fracture of the skull, concussion and a head wound that needed three stitches. She’s also got two sprained wrists, with lacerations and contusions to both hands.’

Rita jotted down the details, along with Kelly’s address in Toorak.

‘What treatment has she had?’

‘On admission, an X-ray and a CT scan, but there was no sign of bleeding or swelling of the brain. She was injected with a local anaesthetic before doctors sutured the wound on the back of her head. She’s on supportive treatment for the fracture, simple analgesics.

We’ve been keeping her in for observation, but she’s ready to be discharged.’

‘And she claims she was knocked off her bike?’ said Rita, tapping her notebook with her pen.

‘Yes. But she’s hazy about the circumstances because of the concussion.’

‘She didn’t give any indication that she was attacked?’

‘None at all. Is that what this is about, a road rage attack?’

‘Possibly,’ said Rita evasively. ‘Possibly not. One other thing, was she brought here by ambulance?’

‘No, she came by taxi.’

She thanked the nurse who pointed out a private room at the end of the ward. Rita walked over, opened the door and went in.

A young woman, propped up on pillows, turned from a TV and regarded her with a cool stare.

‘Who are you?’ she asked.

Rita took in the split lip, the black eye and the graze marks on the woman’s chin. Both wrists were strapped, several fingers were bandaged and there was wadding on her skull, but the injuries didn’t detract from her self-assurance. She had the air of a woman who was strong-willed and professional, well-groomed with neatly trimmed auburn hair, her face handsome even without any make-up. She wasn’t someone who would accept being beaten and mauled. A Gucci handbag stood on the bedside table. Lavish bouquets of flowers adorned the room.

‘I’m Detective Sergeant Marita Van Hassel.’

A fleeting shadow moved over the woman’s face, replaced by something more composed. ‘What do you want?’

‘I’m told you’re the victim of a hit-and-run,’ said Rita, opening her notebook. ‘I’m here to investigate.’

‘I see.’

‘If I could just check a few personal details first,’ Rita went on.

‘Your name’s Kelly Grattan, you’re thirty, have an apartment in Toorak, and you’re a company executive, is that correct?’

‘Yes.’

‘Which company and what executive position do you hold?’

‘I’m the business administrator at Xanthus.’ Kelly pressed the TV

mute button with some difficulty. ‘That’s a software company in South Melbourne.’

Rita wrote it down, underlined the word
software
, and said, ‘I haven’t heard of it.’

‘Well, you will.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘Because it’s about to hit the computer games market big-time,’

answered Kelly. ‘And because it’s owned by Martin Barbie.’

‘Martin Barbie?’ repeated Rita. ‘The TV star?’

‘Yes, there’s only one,’ said Kelly dryly, ‘though it’s hard to believe as he pops up everywhere.’

As Rita wrote down the name it seemed to be an exotic addition to her notes. Martin Barbie’s face was familiar to television viewers as the host of a reality TV show, and it was common knowledge he’d capitalised on his ratings to float publicity campaigns, sporting events and advertising. He belonged to a special breed - the celebrity entrepreneur. He was a man with an image and the brain to market it. But owning a software firm? He’d kept that quiet.

‘I thought he was just a self-promoter,’ said Rita. ‘I didn’t know he was into computer games.’

‘You’d be surprised,’ replied Kelly. ‘He’s funnelled his earnings into production companies, diversifying into games software and online services. Believe me, the Barbie media net is expanding. He’s unstoppable and incorrigible.’ She waved a hand at her bouquets.

‘Who do you think sent all the flowers?’

‘Very considerate,’ said Rita. ‘But I need to hear about the hit-and-run incident that put you here.’

‘There’s not much I can tell you,’ said Kelly. ‘I only assume I was knocked off my bike, I don’t actually remember. One moment I was riding along Toorak Road, the next I was sitting on the footpath with people helping me up and my bike buckled in the gutter. They hailed a taxi and I came straight here.’

‘Did you get any of those people’s names?’ asked Rita.

‘Sorry.’

‘What about the taxi? Do you remember which firm?’

‘I wasn’t in any state to notice much.’

‘What did you do about your bike?’

‘It was wrecked. I just left it there.’

‘Where on Toorak Road was this?’ persisted Rita.

‘I can’t even remember that,’ shrugged Kelly. ‘Somewhere between Chapel Street and Orrong Road.’

Rita put a hand on her hip, not bothering to note this down.

‘That’s quite a distance. What on earth were you doing cycling at that time of night? It must have been well after eight.’

‘Yes, silly of me, it was getting dark. I’d been browsing in the shops, didn’t notice the time. I should have driven there but thought the exercise would do me good. How wrong can you get?’

‘Not much more wrong than that,’ said Rita. ‘Why weren’t you wearing a safety helmet?’

The question seemed to take Kelly by surprise. ‘I should have been …’ She hesitated. ‘I just forgot. Big mistake.’

‘Yes,’ Rita agreed. ‘There’s something else I’ve got to ask. Were you assaulted?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Did someone try to molest you - a man, a stranger, with a mask and chains?’

Kelly burst out laughing. ‘Absolutely not!’

‘Are you sure? After all, you were concussed.’

‘I think I’d remember
that
! But if it comes back to me, I’ll let you know.’

‘You do that.’ Rita wrote in her notebook, tore out the page and placed it beside Kelly’s handbag. ‘That’s my mobile number.’

‘Thanks,’ said Kelly, smiling. ‘I’m impressed by the level of police concern.’

‘Part of the service,’ said Rita. ‘When do you get out of here?’

‘I’ve decided to discharge myself as soon as the doctor does his rounds. I’ve got urgent business to attend to.’

‘With Martin Barbie?’

‘The man himself,’ said Kelly. ‘He’s due to have a crisis on his hands.’

Rita wondered about the comment. It seemed to have a double meaning. As an afterthought she pulled out the Plato’s Cave smartcard.

‘Ever seen this before?’

There was a fleeting reaction, something like a brief flicker of recognition in Kelly’s eyes, but Rita couldn’t be sure.

‘No,’ said Kelly firmly. ‘Means nothing to me.’

Strickland’s scowl was setting in. It wasn’t directed at anyone in particular, not even Rita and O’Keefe, sitting across the desk from him. It was more an involuntary response to a growing list of frustrations.

‘So, effectively, you two haven’t come up with anything either,’

he was saying. ‘That means not a single lead has panned out. This investigation is already starting to drag.’

‘Look on the bright side,’ put in O’Keefe. ‘At least it’s not headline news anymore.’

‘Until the next victim,’ said Strickland grimly. ‘Then we’ll have every hack and his dog on our backs.’

They were sitting in the untidy surroundings of his office, where Rita had just briefed him on her trips to the university and hospital.

‘Kelly Grattan’s story bothers me,’ she said.

Strickland massaged a temple, still scowling. ‘But it rules her out as the offender’s first victim.’

‘Completely,’ agreed Rita. ‘But it doesn’t add up.’

‘You haven’t even checked it out.’

‘That’s just it, I can’t. Not one aspect of it. She’s given me an uncheckable version of what happened to her. I know she’s lying.’

‘For Christ’s sake, women lie out of habit!’ Strickland snorted.

‘That doesn’t mean she was attacked.’

‘Sexism aside,’ Rita remarked, ‘look at it another way. The injuries and timing are consistent with an assault. But if she’s got a strong reason to conceal it, she’d come up with just the sort of unverifiable crap I had to listen to. I mean, a woman executive cycling to window-shop at night in Chapel Street! Excuse me, that’s bullshit.’

‘Okay, okay, she got up your nose with a dicey account,’ Strickland conceded. ‘But it doesn’t make her a victim and, more to the point, it doesn’t give us a witness.’

‘Maybe she’s got amnesia,’ said O’Keefe. The other two looked at him to see if he was joking, but they couldn’t tell. Then he added,

‘Or maybe she’s just a businesswoman who doesn’t want sex assault on her CV.’

‘The way I see it,’ Strickland went on, ‘is we just keep grinding away. I’ll keep Bradby’s team looking for the car, Higgs and his crew working the street angle, while you two start checking software companies. And you’re gonna check out this other Plato’s Cave, right?’

‘A new boutique brothel in Collingwood,’ Rita explained. ‘I’ll drop in tomorrow.’

‘Fine. But the smartcard could turn out to be the best lead after all. If we pin down its source it might give us a direct line to the offender.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Rita. ‘And I’m going to begin with Xanthus. Even if Kelly’s injuries are just coincidence, it gives me a starting point.’