Free Crucifixion Creek by Barry Maitland

a story, Harry, and it’d be great if you could help me. If you
could find out that the son’s lawyer is Horn, say, I’d write you up as the great
detective. It would do you good.’
    No, it really wouldn’t. That’s the last thing it would do. ‘No, Kelly,’ he says.
‘You’re not going to mention my name and you’re not going to contact me again, okay?’
    As he walks back to headquarters he phones Garry Roberts the pathologist. Yes, Garry
did the post-mortems on the old couple and yes, he did specifically examine their
brains for signs of Alzheimer degeneration.
    ‘And?’
    ‘Nothing,’ says Garry.
    Harry then phones Jenny and asks if she can hack into Justin Waterford’s computer,
find out if he knows Kristich or Horn. She says she’ll try.
    When he arrives home there is a small pile of computer printouts on the kitchen
table. Since neither Jenny nor her whispering electronic friend has any use for hard
copies, he realises they are for him. First he pours two glasses of wine and asks
Jenny about her day, and turns the roasting chicken over for her.
    ‘I got into Waterford’s computer all right,’ she says. ‘There’s some copies for you
over there.’ He sways back as she points over her shoulder with the knife in her
hand, dangerously close to his face. ‘Oops,’ she says. ‘Was that near you? Sorry.’
    He picks up the papers. First some pages from websites referencing Alexander Kristich
and Bluereef Financial Services. They are all from a two-day period, four months
ago.
    ‘That’s all there was on Kristich,’ she says. ‘Waterford just looked him up that
time, then nothing.’
    ‘Right.’ There are more Google searches, this time for Nathaniel Horn, all within
the past week, and an exchange of emails with the lawyer’s office, confirming the
time of a meeting.
    ‘Not much,’ Jenny says.
    ‘It’s enough. He knows them.’ And he tells her about his meeting with Kelly Pool.
    ‘You didn’t tell her about Greg and Kristich, did you?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘That’s the most important thing, isn’t it? What did he do to Greg, and how can we
now protect Nicole?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘If I could get into his computer I might find a record of their transactions, and
then we could have them looked at by our lawyer.’
    So after dinner she sits down with her little spy and gets to work. Harry sits with
her for a while, reading, until he suddenly lurches upright and realises he’s been
asleep. She hears his grunt and tells him to go to bed, that she’ll join him soon.
But she doesn’t, and when he wakes in the morning the bed beside him is empty, and
she’s still in the front room, working.
    ‘I can’t bloody do it,’ she says wearily. ‘He’s got some new NGFW with IPS I’ve never
seen before.’
    Harry has no idea what that means. ‘You’ve been at it all night?’
    ‘Yes. I’ll get some sleep now and try again later, but I really don’t think I’m going
to get anywhere. I also tried getting in through Horn’s computer, but it’s equally
well protected.’
    Later, when he gets home, he can tell from her expression that she’s failed. ‘I’m
sorry,’ she says, despairing. ‘It’s hopeless. I can’t do it.’
    ‘What if you had his computer?’
    ‘What?’
    ‘I mean, physically here in front of you. Could you get into it then?’
    ‘I…’ She’s staring right at him. ‘I know someone who could probably help me.’
    ‘Okay. So could you bypass the security systems in the Gipps Tower—cameras, locks?’
    ‘What? I don’t know.’
    ‘Why don’t you try?’
    ‘Harry…I don’t want you to do that.’
    ‘Just try.’
    By midnight she’s worked out how to do it. She can give him the master entry code
for all the electronic locks in the tower, and can pause the cameras and freeze the
images on the monitors in the security centre for a limited period. ‘Thirty minutes,
Harry. No more than an hour.’
    ‘Right, I’ll go and get changed.’
    ‘You’re going now?’