The Autumn Murders by Robert Gott

Author:Robert Gott
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC050000, FIC014000
Publisher: Scribe Publications Pty Ltd
Published: 2019-06-03T16:00:00+00:00

SERGEANT BOB O’DOWD told Sergeant Joe Sable that he wished to make a statement in relation to the death of Peter Lillee, and that he wanted to make that statement to Inspector Lambert. It was Saturday afternoon, but Joe had no hesitation in telephoning the inspector at Tom Mackenzie’s house. This wasn’t something that could wait until Monday morning. O’Dowd couldn’t be given time to change his mind.

O’Dowd drove Joe to Russell Street. He didn’t say much, and Joe didn’t make small talk. What do you say to a man whose life is about to change forever? Joe had little respect for O’Dowd, but he had some empathy with how he must be feeling. Joe knew what it was like to make a statement about a fellow officer.

At Russell Street, Joe and O’Dowd waited in Inspector Lambert’s office.

‘What were you doing at Lillee’s house?’ O’Dowd asked. There wasn’t any real conviction behind the question. The silence had finally made O’Dowd uncomfortable.

‘I was doing my job.’

O’Dowd nodded, having no further interest in the matter. Sable had been assigned to the investigation, so of course he was at the Lillee house. If O’Dowd had been able to think clearly at this moment, he would have wondered at his run of bad luck, but his mind was a soup of worry and regret. And chief among his regrets was his involvement with Ron Dunnart. Perhaps, though, all this was a blessing. He’d be reprimanded for going along with Dunnart’s nasty blackmailing scheme, but as nothing had come of it, he could abase himself before Lambert and demonstrate his penitent’s credentials by stitching up Dunnart. O’Dowd knew, he just knew, that Dunnart had killed Lillee, and he knew, too, that it hadn’t been an accident. Dunnart didn’t get involved in accidents.

There was a problem. There was no firm evidence of foul play — no bruising and no wounds. Somewhere in the notes, someone had speculated that the body might have been brought to that spot in a boat, which might explain the minimal disturbance around it. ‘I don’t know’, wouldn’t be a satisfactory answer to Lambert’s inevitable question, ‘How did Dunnart kill Peter Lillee?’ O’Dowd needed Dunnart to be taken into custody, and to ensure that this happened, he was going to have to play a dangerous game and lie. Having set his foot on this path, he couldn’t now withdraw it, and O’Dowd knew that if he accused Dunnart of murder, and the accusation was so flimsy that Dunnart would remain at liberty, he, O’Dowd, would end up as dead as Peter Lillee. What he needed was a powerful and convincing lie, and it was as Inspector Lambert entered the office and took off his hat that O’Dowd thought he’d found it.

Inspector Lambert listened to O’Dowd and left the note-taking to Sergeant Sable.

‘I am prepared to make a statement, sir.’

‘Why, Bob? Why are you doing this?’

‘Because I’m not a bad man, Inspector. I’m not a good man, either, but I’m not a murderer, and I’m not going to stand by and let Ron Dunnart get away with it.

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