Killer Twist (Ghostwriter Mystery 1) Read online

Chapter 21: An Old Friend

  Max Farrell brushed his fringe back off his face and sat down on the bed beside Roxy. ‘Jesus, Parker, you’d think I was the bloody murderer the way you’re behaving.’

  ‘Well they could have locked you up for break and entry. What were you doing in Sally Duffy’s house anyway?’

  ‘I waited for ages outside your room and then the woman on reception, Macey I think was her name, said you might be at some girl’s place. Said she’d seen you together a coupla times, so she gave me directions.’

  ‘Jesus this really is a small town. So, fine, you go to Sally’s place, but why did you break in? What were you thinking?’

  ‘I didn’t! The door was ajar so I went in. I called her name out a coupla times and there was no one there. I was about to go back out when I noticed there was something odd about the place. It was a mess.’

  ‘So it was trashed before you got there?’

  ‘Well, yeah, I guess. God you don’t think I did it?’ He was looking at her like he thought she was insane and Roxy shook her black hair quickly.

  ‘No, of course not. Go on.’

  ‘Well I noticed lots of shit everywhere and I figured either this Sally woman is one hell of a slob or someone had been there before me.’

  ‘Then you heard Sally come up the path?’

  ‘Well I heard several footsteps coming up the street, but I was already outside by then, so I hid in the bushes and then when I couldn’t hear anymore I took off.’

  ‘Hang on, let me get this straight. About what time did you turn up?’

  ‘About half an hour ago.’

  ‘So how long were you in the house?’

  ‘About a minute. I saw that it had been vandalized and figured I should get the hell out of there.’

  ‘That’s when you heard us come up?’

  ‘I guess so, yeah. I waited a minute or so in the bush and then came straight back here. To find you. What’s going on, Parker? Is everything okay?’

  Roxy stood up and began pacing the floor. ‘Actually, no, everything’s a bloody mess. Someone killed the old guy, Frank, before I got to talk to him.’

  ‘Jesus! No wonder everyone was acting funny when I asked about him earlier today.’

  ‘Now it seems the murderer might still be around.’

  ‘You think he’s the one who trashed Sally’s place?’

  ‘I have no doubt of it. He’d obviously just left before you got there. You may even have scared him off but it makes me fear that Sally is next on the hit list. I’ve got to act fast.’

  Max grabbed Roxy’s hand and forced her to stop pacing, forced her to look at him. He tried to give her his all-consuming smile, but this time it didn’t quite reach his eyes. ‘You don’t have to do anything, Roxy. You’re a writer not a cop. Leave the dangerous stuff to them and come back to Sydney with me first thing in the morning.’

  Roxy wrestled her arm from her friend’s grip. ‘Don’t patronize me, Max, that’s what my mum’s for.’

  ‘I’m not—’

  ‘I’m so close now, Max,’ she said, her tone gentler. ‘I know I can solve this thing. But I have to stay around at least another day. There are two people I need to see.’

  Max sighed and reached into his carry bag. ‘I come bearing gifts,’ he said, producing a bottle of her favorite plonk. As he unscrewed the bottle, she fetched two water glasses and then they moved out to the verandah to enjoy their drinks. They stayed well back from the edge, far enough to be out of sight of inquisitive cops but close enough to soak up the view. From there, you could see the town, now just a few glistening lights left in the cold country sky. They sat drinking their wine side-by-side staring down at the street below without talking for several minutes. Roxy knew Max should be hiding but she didn’t have the energy to drag him back inside.

  ‘Why did you come?’ she said eventually.

  ‘To see if you’re okay. There was something a little crazy about that old country guy at the funeral.’

  ‘Frank. His name was Frank O’Brien.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I kept thinking, what if he’s the murderer? What if I never see you again?’

  ‘So you came to rescue me?’ Her voice was like a thin, taut wire, ready to snap at any moment.

  ‘Of course not!’ he snapped instead, angrier at himself than her. He should have known better than to try to help Roxy Parker. If there was one thing she would never admit to it was needing to be rescued. ‘I’m your mate, Rox, I’m allowed to worry about you. Besides, I wanted to apologize. For what I said.’ She remained silent beside him and he turned to watch her silhouette against the night sky. ‘I’m a bloody idiot, I know that now. I ... I shouldn’t have said what I said. It wasn’t fair on you.’ He paused, but again she remained still. ‘So I’m hoping I haven’t botched our friendship completely ... but I want to stay friends. I don’t want to scare you off.’

  Roxy was overwhelmed by a sudden, groggy sense of exhaustion and despair. Every limb felt weighed down and she could barely keep her eyes focused on the lights beyond. It had been a frantic two days. A frantic fortnight, in fact. She didn’t have any energy left over for this man standing so forlornly beside her, waiting for her soothing words of comfort. But she wasn’t up to another argument either, so she just pulled him close and hugged him to her chest. ‘It’s all going to be okay,’ she told him softly, not believing it for a moment.

  Chief Butler was in a very bad mood. After returning from town the night before, he had not enjoyed his dried out pie and his wife’s probing questions, and had spent a restless night wondering about Sally’s intruder. She had stayed over in his spare bedroom, despite her insistence to the contrary, and was sitting looking bored in his office now, nibbling on a muffin. She had managed to change her clothes, though, and was wearing blue jeans and a black jumper, her ginger hair scooped back behind oversized, dark sunglasses, and now looked a lot more like the young woman she was than the matronly shopkeeper of before.

  Beside her, Roxy sat stony-faced and quiet. She too was wearing blue jeans, this time teamed with her red cardigan again. She had wanted to wash it first, to scrub the memory of dead Frank off its delicate sleeves, but she hadn’t the time and her wardrobe was fast wearing thin.

  ‘That’s all either of you can tell me,’ he was saying. ‘Tall and skinny. That’s all you saw.’

  Roxy nodded cautiously. She had already deduced that the person Sally saw cowering behind her door at 6:00 p.m. was not her friend Max, but the burglar, and most likely Frank’s murderer. By the time Max got to Sally’s house, a good hour later, the intruder had cleared out, leaving a mess behind. In any case, Sally had described the first intruder as tall and skinny and Roxy saw no reason to mention Max at all. It would only confuse matters and probably land them both in deeper waters than they could handle. Chief Butler had been happy enough to accept her presence at one crime scene, but now Max? It was too coincidental. Bustling him back on the plane that morning was a welcome relief. In more ways than one.

  ‘No hair color?’ Butler continued. ‘No nationality? No sex?’

  ‘Oh it was definitely a man,’ Sally said and then looked across at Roxy for confirmation.

  ‘But we can’t be sure,’ Roxy said. ‘It was too dark.’

  The police chief grunted. ‘Okay, Sally you can go. I want to speak to Miss Parker here for a few minutes more.’

  Sally shot an apologetic glance across at the other woman and then, slipping her shades firmly over her eyes, exited the office. Chief Butler turned to Roxy and she prepared herself for an angry outburst. But his tone was soft and conspiratorial when he said, ‘We’re very worried about Sally. We’ve checked out her digs and have reason to believe that the person who went through her stuff last night was the same person who killed Frankie O’Brien.’

  Roxy nodded. It was just as she suspected.

  ‘Now, we’ve arranged for her to go and visit a relative in Sydney for a while until we sort this mess out. In the meantime, I’ve passe
d the hospital’s forged adoption files regarding Beatrice Musgrave on to the police in Mosman.’

  Roxy couldn’t help raising her eyebrows and Butler smirked back. ‘Yes, yes, you were right. The guys in Sydney have suspected foul play from the start, but it’s all being kept under tight wraps. The official word is, she killed herself. Period. That’s off the record and I don’t want a word of this going anywhere.’

  ‘I knew it!’ Roxy said. ‘I knew I wasn’t crazy. But why all the secrecy?’

  ‘Something about not wanting to alert the murderer to their suspicions. I guess complacency can make you slip up. But it’s all top secret and I don’t want to hear one word about your blasted journalistic ethics and the public’s right to blah, blah, blah.’

  ‘It won’t go past this room, I promise you,’ she said. ‘Who do they suspect?’

  ‘I gather one of the family members, they said something about a big family secret about to be aired, but of course you know all about that.’

  Roxy smiled back without saying a word. Deep down she felt vindicated. This was not a wild goose chase after all. And finally someone agreed with her.

  ‘In any case,’ he continued, ‘the Mosman detective in charge of the case, Detective Superintendent Maltin, wants to see you the second you return to Sydney. I think you’ve got a hell of a lot of explaining to do young lady.’

  And I’ll have a hell of a lot more by the time I get back there, she thought to herself smugly as she exited the office. Before heading to the police station that morning, Roxy had looked up the names of the two midwives she had taken from the hospital files, believing in her heart that one of them could provide the missing link, the identity of Beatrice Musgrave’s illegitimate daughter. The first name, Agnetha Frickensburg was nowhere to be found but Zoe Callahan was still residing in Macksland and was more than happy to see her. As Roxy made her way back to town, she felt closer than ever to finally solving this baffling mystery.