Shadow Over Edmund Street by Suzanne Frankham (best e reader for android .txt) 📗

Clare had settled. He’d been stunned one afternoon to come home and find Clare and Mr Chan sitting at the kitchen table, which was covered in documents and old photographs.

‘Semester project,’ Clare announced. ‘New Zealand history. Mr Chan’s given me permission to write about his family.’ The two of them were beaming.

Later she’d told him more. About the ancestor born in Guangdong, who headed to the Californian gold rush as a miner and onward to the Australian goldfields as a merchant. He started using a simpler family name, Chan, before moving to New Zealand, a merchant on the goldfields there too. ‘Did you know, Dad, his ancestor was invited to come to New Zealand by the Otago Provincial Council in 1865? Imagine.’

‘Good heavens. Why?’

‘They invited miners and merchants to work on the Otago Goldfields.’ Her eyes had shone and Alex was diverted from Mr Chan’s extraordinary family history. He was dazzled by his child, enthusiastic and absorbed in her project. His fragile daughter who had been overwhelmed by her first experience of university life, excited about her work. Thank you, Mr Chan, he thought.

Gemma, on the other hand had discovered the party scene. He tried not to worry. He reminded her of his promise to their mother and did late night pick-ups. He gave her stern talks about taking rides from people who might be drunk or high on drugs. ‘You have to be brave enough to say ‘No’,’ he found himself saying. Gemma patted him on the head. ‘Honestly Dad, what do you think

I am?’

He stared at every boy who came to pick her up and had to remind himself to smile and relax when he was introduced to yet another Andy or Mick wearing torn jeans, a grubby T-shirt and driving an old battered car with not an airbag in sight. He was the same as every other parent, he could only hope.

His professional cases hadn’t been difficult to solve. There’d been a young girl found dead in the middle of a dance floor, her boyfriend hovering nearby in a drugged haze. He’d put his hand up to providing her with an ecstasy tablet, her first, and was surprised to find himself arrested. ‘Why, man?’ he kept asking. ‘Why are you doing this? What have I done? Everyone takes the stuff.’ Alex had been forced to leave the scene, the frail body on the dance floor so like Clare he had rushed outside and vomited, leaving Marion alone to restrain Jerry from beating the boyfriend to a pulp. They’d had to tell both sets of parents. More lives ruined, more hopes destroyed.

Every time Alex saw his girls, he thought how it could have been one of them. He wondered if he would survive being a father to teenagers, found himself saying one of his mother’s little prayers. A prayer of safety he didn’t believe in, but one with words of comfort.

Then there’d been two men killed in fights. The first at a party, where they’d had so many suspects it took a while to whittle it down to the one who counted. The second at a family birthday gone wrong, where two cousins had slugged it out until one lay unmoving on the floor. Everyone watching was surprised when he didn’t get up. Just a fight, they’d said. Drugs, alcohol and fights.

Alex should have been content. His girls were back with him, Clare was excited about her university work, cases were being solved. Everything was hunky-dory. Except for Edwina Bloody Biggs. That’s how they thought of her now. Jerry had given her the name and somehow it had stuck. Edwina Bloody Biggs.

They’d had uniforms trawling through statements, phone numbers, every piece of evidence that had been taken or called in. They went through it over and over again, and came up with nothing. They all agreed they’d never had a case quite like it.

Random, always hard to solve, the other detectives said. But Alex knew they were wrong. This was not random. This was a planned murder.

Once a week Alex, Jerry and Marion met and talked it through. They tried to bring something new to the table. Marion started visiting Mrs O’Brien for tea and a chat. Jerry took to having coffee with the gym ladies. ‘It’s work,’ he said, when the others laughed at him, the grin on his face huge as he kept sifting through the hospital and company records. Jerry was nothing if not tenacious. Alex walked around and around the neighbourhood, took to haunting St Jospeh’s, talking to everyone who knew Edwina, trying to unearth something, anything. It had become the proverbial thorn in his side.

* Saturday afternoon and Alex was dozing on the balcony in the winter sun, when Clare leant over and whispered in his ear. ‘Someone on the phone for you, Dad. Female.’ She handed him his mobile.

It took him a moment to wake up. ‘Hello?’

‘Alex? Detective Alex Cameron?’

He recognised the voice. ‘Rose Jones,’ he said. ‘This is an unexpected pleasure.’ Felt like an idiot, caught out, unprepared.

‘I hope you don’t mind me ringing. I feel a bit foolish. Thing is, I wonder if I’ve come up with something?’

Alex sat up. ‘Have you indeed?’

‘Well, yes. It sounds ridiculous, but …’

‘Wait’, he broke in. ‘I’ll come over. No …’ he could hear music in the background. ‘We could meet in a cafe or … hang on.’ He checked his watch. It was four-thirty. He took a deep breath and plunged on.

‘My girls are going out in a minute. Why don’t I throw something on the barbeque? We can talk over dinner.’

He heard the hesitation. The intake of breath. ‘Well, I …’ Then she laughed. ‘Food seems to be part of your interrogation technique, doesn’t it? All right, why not.’

Alex sighed, smiled. He told her the address, where to park, got off the phone and felt like an idiot. He had suggested a date. Sort of. That was a first. Since his ex-wife tore out his heart and smashed