The capsic.u.m spray dug into my thigh as I crouched. I contemplated telling her I was a cop but figured that would only backfire. To these kids, cops were the enemy. They arrested your parents and older siblings. They crashed through your front door and took you away from your family.

'Tell you what, Rachel,' I said, hiding my daybook behind my back and putting on a smile in case she could see through the grille. 'Why don't you wake Daddy up, tell him a friend wants to talk to him. Do you think you could do that?'

Rachel's face changed to a mask of fear as an adult shadow appeared behind her. 'I'm awake,' said a nasal voice. 'What do ya's want?'

Standing up, I realised I was significantly taller than the man on the other side of the door, but I wasn't sure whether this would play in my favour or not.

'Vincent Rowe?' I asked.

'Who wants to know?'

I pressed my badge against the grille. 'I'm here with some more information on your stepson, Dallas Boyd. Can I come in?'

Rowe turned back to check the lounge, hesitation in his voice. 'I'm not really dressed properly.'

'I don't care if you've got a syringe on the coffee table, Mr Rowe. I just need to clarify who should receive your stepson's possessions.'

'Possessions?'

That was the hook. Greed. It got them every time.

'Dallas had a number of items in his apartment and we need to finalise where it will all go. It'll only take a minute. Then you can go back to bed.'

'All right.'

The door clicked open and we stepped into a dimly lit room, sunlight framing the curtains. The smell of cigarettes and stale beer hung thick in the warm apartment, turning it into a putrid incubator. Rowe was a thin man, face gaunt and unshaven. Bare-chested, tracksuit pants hanging loose off his bony hips, wiry arms covered in tattoos and pus-infected abscesses.

'Don't mind the mess,' he drawled. 'Bit of a rough time, ya know?'

I held my breath as I followed him through a lounge crowded with empty beer bottles, overflowing ashtrays, dirty dishes and piles of soiled laundry. No Amstel anywhere. My eyes were drawn to the television and the sofa, where the little girl had curled up against a pillow and teddy bear. She looked cleaner than anything else in the room.

To the left was the kitchen.

'Come in 'ere,' Rowe said, taking a cigarette from a pack on the cluttered bench. He lit the smoke using the gas stove, making no attempt to open a window.

Pappa hung back, leaning against the doorway, as I followed Rowe into the kitchen. In the sink I noticed an orange syringe cap.

'So what's the go with Dall's possessions?' Rowe asked, blowing smoke towards a ceiling stained yellow in the corners. 'Probably best it all comes here, yeah?'

Watching for needles, I pushed aside several beer bottles on the bench to make room for my daybook. I had no intention of filling in any reports. It was all for show.

'Probably,' I said. 'When did Dallas move out of home?'

's.h.i.t, years ago, mate. He was a survivor, ya know? Didn't matter what happened, he always bounced back.'

Did he bounce back from all those broken ribs? I thought. I thought. What about the shattered arm, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d? What about the shattered arm, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d?

'He was only sixteen, Mr Rowe. Most kids these days stay at home well into their twenties. Why'd he move out so young?'

Rowe took a deep drag and tapped ash in the sink. 'S'pose I best be honest, hey?'

'Appreciate that,' I said.

'Me and Dall didn't always get along so well. He's not me kid, so he was always against the discipline, me bein' the stepfather and all.'

'When was the last time you saw him, sir?'

'Christmas Day, mate. Came over to give Rachel her pressie. Didn't stay long though. What kind of possessions are we talkin' about? Last I heard he was living in some hostel in St Kilda.'

'We'll get to that. He had a mate named Sparks. Know him?'

Rowe twisted his lips, blew smoke out his nostrils. 'Nup. What kinda name is that anyway, Sparks? Did Dall have a stereo or one of them iPods? What about a plasma telly? Always wanted one of them.'

I guessed Rowe had handled a few plasma televisions in his time; just never kept any. They'd all gone up his arm.

'What d'ya reckon, Rach?' he called into the lounge. 'Maybe we could get a new telly and DVD player. That'd be all right, hey?'

The girl didn't respond and I looked back at Rowe and waited.

'What?'

'Mr Rowe, just for our records, where were you at midnight last Thursday?'

He took another long drag on his cigarette, then threw the b.u.t.t in the sink.

'There aren't any possessions, are there?' he said. 'Ya just here to size me up.'

'Just answer the question and we can move on, please.'

'Nup. This is my house, and it's me son who's dead, even if he was only me stepson. f.u.c.kin' pigs all full of s.h.i.t. Let ya in on good faith and all the while ya lookin' to work me over. When am I supposed to get me time to grief?'

'Grieve,' I spat. 'And you never treated Dallas like a son.'

'f.u.c.k off, copper. I know me rights. Ya wanna stay here then let me see ya warrant.'

'I don't need one. We were invited in, weren't we, George?'

I turned to Pappa, whose face had paled.

'Leave me out of this, boss,' he said, raising his hands submissively to Rowe. 'I just walked him up, that's all.'

'Yeah, we'll see about that,' Rowe snarled. 'Slimy fat f.u.c.k, sell me out to the jacks. Fix you.'

He launched across the room but I pushed him back against the sink and held him there, then brought my hands up to his throat, pushing his face against a cupboard.

'I know about you, Vincent,' I said, the muscles under my shirt flexing tight as I whispered in his ear. 'I know you beat the s.h.i.t out of Dallas every chance you got. I know about all the broken bones you covered up, and I know he was working with Child Protection to have Rachel taken out of here. Dallas didn't leave out of choice. He left for a better life. That's what he wanted for Rachel.'

'Better life?' Rowe grunted. 'Look what happened to him.'

I pressed my fingers into his neck, releasing pressure only when he moaned.

'This place is no better. Look around you. The joint's a pigsty, syringes and s.h.i.t in the sink. Tell me something, how many times has Rachel watched you shoot up?'

'p.i.s.s off.'

'How do you discipline her her? Do you put smack in her Coco Pops to make her go to sleep? I bet you sneak into her bedroom late at night too.'

He snorted and thrashed under my grip, saliva spilling from his mouth as he fought to wriggle free. 'You're a low dog,' he snarled. 'She's me little angel and I'd never f.u.c.kin' touch her.'

'Sure.'

He hawked a mouthful and spat at me, but I dodged it and hit him hard across the face. I wanted to lay into him about the chlamydia and the s.e.xual abuse, but I couldn't risk it for Rachel's sake.

'You're finished, copper,' Rowe drawled. 'Be on the phone to the ESD the minute ya gone.'

I registered the threat and it occurred to me that I'd lost the plot. If this went through to the Ethical Standards Department there would be no escaping. Having the security guard to witness it all only made it worse. Not only that, I could already see Rowe was not capable of planning and executing a murder as slick as Dallas Boyd's. Even if he was, Boyd would never have trusted him, so there was no way he could've spiked his drink. I released my grip as a woman in a soiled nightgown appeared at the kitchen door.

'What the f.u.c.k's goin' on?' she said.

I recognised the familiar-shaped jawline, thin brown hair and slanted eyes. Dallas Boyd's mother. Once upon a time she might have been attractive. Now her hair was dishevelled, her wrists covered in track marks. A heavily rounded stomach was visible beneath the nightgown. She was pregnant.

'Oh, this just gets better,' I spat, pushing Rowe to the floor. 'You've got another one on the way. I'm going to finish what Dall started. DHS will be paying you both a visit soon. Might wanna clean up this s.h.i.thole, cover up those track marks.'

I glanced at the girl on the sofa; her eyes were wide and unreadable. She clutched the teddy tight to her chest, trying to protect it. Or was it to protect her?

'Let's go, boss,' Pappa said. 'This isn't right.'

I looked back at the girl just before the door slammed behind us, echoing in the hall like a prison gate.

In the lift, I felt empty of emotion, as if it had all been used up. Ignoring the 'No Smacking' sign, I lit a cigarette though I really needed a drink. For a moment I thought about spending the day at one of my locals, but decided it was still too early. Instead I drove back down Punt Road and over the river, finding a park near the Fawkner Gardens where I waited for my anger to subside.

11.

THE EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT at the Alfred Hospital, where Ella worked, was located at the western end of a huge complex in Prahran. I decided to cut through Fawkner Gardens to get there. In the cooler seasons the gardens were a pristine spread of lush lawns and sports fields, tennis courts and picnic benches, all canopied by rows of elm and maple trees. After three months of water restrictions that prohibited watering lawns, the park had become a barren wasteland. No joggers or cyclists. No picnics and no tennis. at the Alfred Hospital, where Ella worked, was located at the western end of a huge complex in Prahran. I decided to cut through Fawkner Gardens to get there. In the cooler seasons the gardens were a pristine spread of lush lawns and sports fields, tennis courts and picnic benches, all canopied by rows of elm and maple trees. After three months of water restrictions that prohibited watering lawns, the park had become a barren wasteland. No joggers or cyclists. No picnics and no tennis.

Dry leaves tumbled across my path as another northerly gusted through the city, bringing with it more dust and smoke from the bushfires in the north-east. Emerging from the park, I crossed Commercial Road just as a chopper landed on the helipad overpa.s.s. Within minutes a medical crew lifted a stretcher out of the cabin and wheeled the patient towards the trauma unit. The sight aroused memories of my own stay here more than a year ago, when the shooting had almost cost me my life. Fortunately I had no memory of either the frantic attempts to resuscitate me or the early treatment of my injuries. All I recalled was being holed up in a bed on the fourth floor.

I looked up at the enormous building and pinpointed the window that had been my only connection to the outside world for what had seemed like a lifetime, though in reality had been little more than three weeks. Walking up the path towards the main sliding doors, I pa.s.sed the smokers' huts, then entered the emergency department where I was immediately overcome by the sense of unease that gripped me any time I was in a hospital.

Even before the shooting, I'd always hated hospitals. To me they were depressing places, worse than prisons sometimes. Today was no different. People were slumped in the waiting room, some watching outdated sitcoms on a television in the corner, others asleep. The smell was not unlike the morgue, a smell I always a.s.sociated with sickness and human anguish. Then there was the sound of the machines: the PA system, the generators, the never-ending hum of the fluorescent lights. It was like being trapped in a bunker.

At the triage desk, a tradesman with his hand wrapped in a b.l.o.o.d.y towel demanded to know why it was taking so long to see a doctor.

'Sir, our team is stretched to the limit,' said a nurse I recognised, a friend of Ella's. 'Your injury isn't life threatening and we need to '

'Not life threatening?' said the tradesman, unwrapping the towel and causing a thick pool of blood to run down his elbow and spill on the desk. 'I could bleed to death out here.'

'If you keep pressure on it, like I told you to, you won't lose any more blood. Please Please be patient. We've just had three more firemen brought in from the bushfires. Their injuries are much more serious than yours.' be patient. We've just had three more firemen brought in from the bushfires. Their injuries are much more serious than yours.'

'That'd be right. Take care of your own.' The tradey leant over the counter and kicked the panelling. 'I've waited three f.u.c.kin' hours out here and all you've done is stand there yakkin' to ya b.l.o.o.d.y friends.'

'There's no need to swear or get aggro. Security!'

A hulking security guard with a face like a cane toad stalked over and the tradey got the message, grumbling to himself as he sat back down. Having been married to a nurse, I knew the tradey had just cost himself at least another hour in the waiting room. I waited while the nurse slid on gloves and wiped up the blood from the desk. After tossing the waste in a medical bin, she looked up, probably expecting another angry patient.

'Now what can I do for ... Rubens Rubens, hi!'

'Hey Jen, expecting someone else?'

'Rough one today,' she said, lowering her voice. 'The fires have thrown the whole place right off. My partner's up there with them on relief duty. I feel like I've sent him off to war.'

I nodded, sympathetic.

'I take it you're looking for El?'

'Yeah, I know it's crazy in there today, but if you could just see if she can pop her head out. I'll only take a few minutes.'

'Few minutes, huh?' She smiled wryly. 'That's all men ever need.'

I laughed as Jen swept through the doors into the emergency department. Drama in real emergency departments was never as chaotic as depicted on television. Ella often said you could be lying in a bed and a person in the next cubicle could die and you probably wouldn't even know. In her experience, there was rarely any yelling or screaming, and it wasn't often you saw patients being rushed through the room on gurneys. You sure as s.h.i.t didn't see doctors or nurses break down when a life was lost.

Ella came out carrying a clipboard, a stethoscope around her neck. Pinned to her uniform pocket was her ID, photo looking nothing like her. She walked to the side of the triage counter and I followed.

'You're a tad early,' she whispered, smiling but fl.u.s.tered. 'We're not supposed to meet until seven.'

'Yeah, I was pa.s.sing by the hospital and thought I'd see if you had time for a quick lunch.'

Truth was I simply wanted to see her and it was just lucky I had a workable excuse.

'You'll need to do better than that, mister,' she jeered, seeing through my lame effort. 'Can't do lunch today. The fires are getting worse. We just had three more CFA guys brought in.'

'I know. Jen just told me, said you're busier than a one-armed paper boy. What's going on in there?'

'I think three of the fires have merged to create one big superfire. It's rolling down from the Alpine forest and they can't stop it.' She gave a pained expression. 'All up, we've got five in there already with all sorts of trouble. Heat exhaustion, smoke inhalation, a broken leg. Even a cardiac arrest.'

's.h.i.t.'

'That's on top of our everyday regulars,' she said, nodding to the waiting room. 'Plus they're evacuating all the country hospitals in the vicinity of the fires, transferring patients to city beds, just in case. What the h.e.l.l's happening to the world anyway? There's no water, the city's surrounded by fire and everything's covered in smoke. It's like an apocalypse.'

Alarm hit me as I thought about my father, who lived in Benalla, about a hundred kilometres north-west of the danger zone. My mother's nursing home in Kyneton wasn't far off either. I needed to call the emergency hotline for information.