Murder Song Read Free

he had no taste at all. Mardi Jack’s green sequinned blouse was low-cut, her cleavage made ugly by the congealed blood from her wound; her black trousers were too tight, too suggestive, Malone thought. The dead woman had not come to the flat expecting to spend the night or the weekend alone.
    â€œThere’s a black fox coat, dyed, I think, in the main bedroom,” said Clements.
    â€œHow do you know so much about dyed fox coats?”
    â€œI bought one once that fell off the back of a truck. For my mum.”
    Malone looked down again at Mardi Jack, then drew the sheet back over her. “How long’s she been dead?”
    Clements glanced at the government medical officer, who had come in from the kitchen, where he had just made himself a cup of coffee. “How long, doc?”
    â€œThirty-six hours, maybe a bit more. Saturday night, I’d say.” The GMO was a man who looked ready to burst from years of good living; belly, cheeks, chins all protruded and his breath wheezed out of a fat throat. Malone often wondered why Doc Gilbey had chosen an area where most of the corpses he examined were at ankle-height. One day the GMO, bending down, was going to collapse and die on top of one of the bodies. “Just the one bullet in her, right into her heart, I’d say. A lucky shot. It’s still in the body.”
    â€œLet me know when you’ve sent it on to Ballistics.”
    Gilbey slurped his coffee. “They’ll have it today.”
    The small apartment was becoming crowded; two men from the funeral contractors had arrived to join the Crime Scene men, the girl photographer and the two uniformed officers. Malone pulled back one of the glass doors and stepped out on to the balcony, jerking his head for Clements to follow him.
    â€œWhat have you got so far?”
    â€œBugger-all.” Clements bit his bottom lip, an old habit. He was a big, plain-looking man, a couple of inches taller than Malone and almost twenty kilos heavier. He was a bachelor, afraid of commitment to a woman but envying Malone his comfortable family life. He was mildly bigoted and racist, but kindly; he could complain sourly about too many Asians being allowed into the country, then tenderly, if awkwardly, console a Vietnamese woman who had lost her son in a gang battle. At that he was no more complex than Malone and sixteen million other Australians, including the Asian-born.
    â€œWho found her?”
    â€œThe cleaning lady.” Clements belonged to that class which thought that to call a woman a “woman” was demeaning to her; it was another manifestation that contradicted the native myth that Australians did not believe in class distinction. “I’ve interviewed her and let her go home. She’s a Greek, a bit excitable about dead bodies.”
    â€œSo am I. I don’t like them. You talk to anyone else?”
    â€œI’ve got a coupla the uniformed guys going through the building. So far they haven’t brought anyone up here.”
    â€œThe flat belong to her?” Malone nodded in at the corpse, now being covered in a green plastic shroud.
    â€œNo, it’s a company flat. There’s some notepaper and envelopes in a desk inside. Kensay Proprietary Limited. Their offices are in Cossack House in Bridge Street. She had a key, though.”
    Malone, raincoat collar turned up against the wind coming across the western reaches of the harbour, looked out at the buildings surrounding them; then he looked at the bullet hole in the glass door. “A high-powered rifle?”
    â€œI’d bet on it. I don’t think anyone would have been standing here and shot her through the glass. There’s a lot of dust and dirt here on the balcony—looks like the cleaning lady doesn’t come out here in winter. There’ s no sign of any footmarks.”
    Malone looked down at the marks his own and Clements’ shoes had made. Then he looked out again at the