The Princess and the Cop Read online

  ISBN: 978-1-4835564-1-3

  This book is fiction

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  1.

  The Princess woke in the early hours of the morning and waited till she was sure that all was quiet in the cavernous building, not even a mouse, and then moved quietly out of bed. She was already dressed in jeans and a work shirt. She put on her boots, reached under her bed and pulled out a mid-size backpack. It was stuffed full.

  Quietly, she opened the door of her room and crept through the building, watching for early staff, using a side door to exit because the huge front door creaked.

  She crept steadily down the driveway and out onto the road that she knew would take her down to Brisbane City and from there she’d find her way out to the bush.

  The early morning traffic was sparse. She wasn’t sure whether she wanted a taxi or not. A taxi could give her away later when the inevitable search began and she could be found pretty quickly. She didn’t want to be found pretty quickly. Her brother David and all the rest of the Court would start to panic and start search parties. She knew what she was doing. She needed time---and space---not those commanding officials slinking around, crowding her, managing her.

  It had been all she could do to get them to agree to her leaving her little home country in Europe to live in Australia at the Brisbane Ladies’ Academy. They couldn’t see past Swiss and French academies but she’d cajoled and sweet-talked and persuaded because Australia was the place where she wanted to be.

  And she’d made it.

  Now for the real Australia---the bush.

  A taxi pulled up.

  ‘You shouldn’t be walking alone down this road at this time of night, love,’ the cabbie said. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘To the transport centre to catch a bus. I haff money.’

  ‘Hop in!’

  She kept her face in darkness as best she could, even when paying him, but paying him was a problem. She had no experience of Australian money so, in desperation, held her wallet out to him, saying, ‘Please take what I owe you? I haff to trust you.’

  He had a daughter the same age, so took only what she owed, foregoing his tip.

  He watched her wander into the busy transport centre and left his cab to catch up to her.

  ‘Do you know where you’re going, love? You seem lost.’

  ‘I want to go where there are horses, lots of horses. I don’t know much about Queensland. Could you suggest a place, please, sir?’ She had a slight foreign accent. She was a pretty girl, but plump. She seemed to want to conceal her teeth while talking.

  The cabbie thought for a while. Years ago he’d left Charleville, out west, to come to the city.

  ‘Come with me, love. I’ll help you buy a ticket to Charleville. It’s a pretty big small western town if you know what I mean and as good a place as any to start.’

  He was a nice man and he waited with her to ensure that she got on the correct coach. He waved her goodbye as the coach pulled out and the Princess happily waved back. More and more she loved Australia.

  She read the ticket as the coach moved out. Why did Australia have towns with French names? She’d have to find out.

  The cabbie had told her that it would be some hours and that the driver would ensure that she got off at Charleville. He tipped the coach driver five dollars to ensure that that happened. Before leaving her he’d advised her to look hard at the money she had in her wallet, and there seemed to be a lot, and to get used to the Australian currency.

  ‘Otherwise people will rob you, princess. They’re not all like me.’

  Her head jerked up at his use of ‘princess’ but she relaxed when she realised it was just one of the strange ways of Australians. She had a lot to learn about this wonderful country and its people and now she was among them.

  She looked out the window in fascination as the coach moved through the city and then out into the country and then there were horses to be seen. She was tired but there was too much to be seen for her to sleep. And she had to practise that word. They said ‘have’ and she knew she’d mispronounced it. So, quietly in the seat that she had to herself, she kept saying ‘have’ over and over again until she felt she had it right. And then there was the currency, which she studied hard. German had been her native language and currency, but no longer.

  Then she was at Charleville and the driver turned to her, but she was ahead of him and was off the coach before he could call to her.

  The coach moved off and she was on the footpath outside a big hotel. It was late morning.

  Now she should sleep and then perhaps ask people at the hotel where to get a job working with Australian horses. That shouldn’t be hard. This country was full of horses.

  She moved into the hotel and found the office and waited. She didn’t know that nobody went to the office in a Queensland country pub. One went into the bar to do business, such as renting a room and the Princess waited quite a while before the publican, Mrs. Martin, working in the bar, spotted her.

  ‘I wish to hire a room for a time, until I can get a good job working with horses,’ she told Mrs. Martin in her slightly accented, careful English.

  Again the Princess was lucky. Mrs. Martin had daughters, now in the city, but she could see that this girl needed help and, perhaps, protection. She was a stranger in a strange land.

  She took her to a room, watched as she locked the door, backpack safely inside, then downstairs to the dining room and fed her, and then back to her room, showing her the bathroom on the way, leaving her to wash and sleep.

  The bed was soft, and the Princess sank into it with a happy sigh.

  ****

  Two days later, Jim and Linda Ellis booked into the pub and told Mrs. Martin that they were starting a jillaroo school on their cattle property and if she heard of anyone who might be interested, would she put them in touch? He had posters. She told them of her foreign guest.

  They interviewed the Princess and signed her up for the school. Linda had her doubts but she was their first enrolment and Jim won the day. They were waiting in town for a new station cook so Linda examined the Princess’s outfit and took her to buy things such as the westerner’s raincoat—an oilskin known as the Drizabone. She needed a big hat too and sturdy riding boots.

  They ate with her every day and, at the end of three days, both Linda and Jim had a real affection for the young girl, although they knew little more about her than when they’d first met. She gave little away.

  The new cook turned up, and early the next day Jim loaded the station Land Cruiser truck ready to depart.

  A problem arose. The cook refused to travel in the back of the truck, in the open; Jim refused to allow Linda to travel there; so it was agreed that Linda should drive and Jim get in the back with Rex, the unfriendly blue-heeler cattle dog. But it started to rain, heavily, and they decided that Jim should drive on the tricky road.

  When they stopped to re-arrange places the Princess said, ‘Ple
ase? Let me ride there? I have a new raincoat which I wish to wear and I wish to know Rex. This is a new thing about Australia and this is what I came here for to see. I haff never ridden in the end of a truck before.’ She was persuasive and showing just a little glimmer of determination. Jim and Linda agreed, glaring at the cook.

  Using her backpack as a rest she leaned in close against the back of the cabin and watched the muddy road recede and the creeks begin to flow and she tried to entice the dog into shelter, but it ignored her. The rain poured down more heavily and Rex eventually crept in beside her, even seeming to snuggle in. She patted him a lot even though he smelt, like a wet cattle dog, and on the way to the property there were enough horses in sight to satisfy even her.

  Frequently they stopped while they took her into the cabin of the truck, out of the rain, and gave her hot tea and a big corned beef sandwich, all this so new to her. The cook got little.

  Then she insisted on returning to her post, with a bit of the sandwich for Rex. Jim watched in some surprise. Rex was his dog, and his only, but not now, it seemed.

  They set off again and the rain came down and she snuggled down into her new raincoat.

  She had never been happier.

  That night, at The Gums, she lay on her hard bunk, relived the wonderful day, practised the word ‘have’ and slept.

  She’d beaten them. No one knew where she was.

  When she’d had to give her name she had no false name to fall back on, which was just as well because she wasn’t a very good liar. So she told them—Tessa Pramberg from Austria. That’s what her passport read. She’d made sure of that, when preparing for this exciting adventure.

  She had another, diplomatic, passport which read---Her Royal Highness, The Princess Tessadonna von Pramberg du Mont, of the European principality of Bassenburg du Mont.

  2.

  I was sitting in Supreme Court Number 2, in Brisbane, along with the three other detectives from my squad, awaiting the jury’s verdict in the Lily Osbourne murder case.

  Lily had been a beautiful 17-year-old who’d been raped and then strangled with a ligature, and her body dumped in a park on the outskirts of Brisbane. Her next door neighbour, Henry Chang, who’d grown up with her, had been charged and was now on trial. He wasn’t back in the dock yet. I’d spent most of the past three days staring at his left ear, as he sat in the dock in front of us. He was protected by a thick plastic shield. He knew I was there. He kept looking for me from the corner of his eye. I wanted him to know I was there, but not for the reasons you think.

  I was Henry’s lone friend in these jurisprudence circles because I didn’t think he’d done it. All the evidence pointed to him—DNA and all that, on the ligature. Henry admitted to having sex with Lily but not to strangling her.

  But our crime squad wasn’t doing too well lately and my superiors pressed me to bring in a result, quickly. So Henry was being railroaded, to put it mildly, on the most circumstantial of evidence.

  I had my own ideas about the perpetrator and I hoped like hell that the jury hadn’t been fooled like everyone else except me.

  I wasn’t looking forward to the next few hours. My lack of conviction about Henry had shown in my evidence and my attitude, and the Crown Prosecutor was less than impressed with me, the main prosecution witness. In fact he was quite angry and told me he’d be reporting me to Assistant Commissioner Don Simmons for my less than strong conviction, displayed in the witness box, that Henry was guilty. It was the best I could do for the young man.

  I’d been a detective for eight years, after graduating from Uni, a spell with the Stock Squad and then had been despatched to murder investigations. My mentor was Don Simmons, then an Inspector, and the best detective in Australia. I fell into the role of investigator immediately. I could sniff things and I became the Boy Wonder, much disliked at Police Headquarters, because of my rapid success rate and equally rapid rise in the ranks.

  I ignored all the snide remarks and things left near my locker---baby dummies, and bags of nappies, for example; treated everybody the same and eventually they tired of it all.

  Soon I’d cop it from Don, mentor or not, and I knew that everything he’d say would be true. But Henry wasn’t guilty.

  The problem soon would be getting enough of a foothold to flush out the actual killer. The Osbournes, Sir Robert and Lady Laura, had proved difficult in the original investigation, apparently forgetting that their daughter was the one who’d died. They were convinced of Henry’s guilt and wouldn’t consider other possibilities. Sir Robert was a powerful industrialist and a friend of senior politicians and had complained officially to the Commissioner of Police about my behaviour. All I’d done was ask questions, which was my job.

  I’d been ordered to Don’s office, front and centre.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Corrigan,’ Don said in frustration, ‘haven’t you learned yet to assess the political lay of the land and adjust accordingly? Osbourne’s a friend of the Premier and a big donor to his party. Back off, mate, or we’re all in trouble!’

  ‘And should I compromise my investigation, sir, just because of who he is?’

  ‘You use the common-sense that we all know you have!’

  ‘What if he did it?’

  ‘Unthinkable, Bart. Think of all the meanings in that statement. You saw her in the morgue and you said she was a beautiful young girl and that very few people could kill her, let alone a father. You said that, Bart. Move to another track, Senior Sergeant. You’ll be in trouble if I get another complaint about you.’

  Yeah! Well! It had been a long time since Don had looked at a violated body, be it male or female, and smelt the blood. A long time since he’d looked into a perpetrator’s eyes and had known he was lying. I’d been fortunate and I knew it. I could sense the discomfort of the liar and had from the start. Others had had to pick it up from years of experience. Some never did.

  Henry had not been lying when he said that he’d had sex with Lily but then, he said, she’d gone home, next door, just beating his parents arriving home and he knew nothing after that. He’d stayed on in bed and slept. He had no witnesses to support him, Mum and Dad having gone straight to bed.

  Don was right. I’d seen Lily’s body lying there in the morgue, after being cut open. Young girls and young children stirred me deeply when I had to attend their post mortem examinations. Young babies---nope! I left the room before the tiny body was uncovered and the first incision was made, and never returned until called.

  I was frequently mocked in the bar afterwards. So what! I had a weakness.

  And now the jury returned and the court passed through all the procedures.

  Not guilty.

  There were loud grunts from my squad. Henry wisely didn’t look at us. He shook hands with his legal people and skedaddled out of that courtroom before anyone could react. I took my blokes to the nearest bar. They needed to cool down.

  3.

  My problem in this case, from the start, was that Lily had had sex, and violent sex at that. She was marked in the significant areas of her body. Then she’d been strangled.

  So, everyone concluded, she’d been raped and murdered.

  But we knew, from interviews with her friends, and a reticent Henry, that Lily, while apparently a sweet young girl, was promiscuous. She put out for Henry whenever she felt like it. Henry said he never ever made the first approach, but she used him when the mood took her.

  It had been happening ever since they’d reached puberty, and the excitement of childish games had worn thin.

  Others didn’t believe Henry when he said he was trying to be free of her, until they were both older, but I did. She was 17 and Henry 18. And that was about all he told us. His lawyer had told him not to answer questions and Henry had taken that advice pretty well literally.

  He was a Chinese Australian lad, with super wealthy parents and the lovers lived next door to each other in a posh gated estate. He was a very nice boy, in my opinion, and he wasn’t a murder
er, especially of a girl he loved. He was a patsy.

  Then some detectives, including Don, shaped Henry’s denials to mean that he’d tried to be free of her; couldn’t persuade Lily, and so choked her with a cord in anger or desperation. A reasonable theory, but not to this Senior Sergeant. I believed that Henry genuinely loved Lily, forgiving her all her faults, and that, some day he hoped to marry her, despite all her obvious imperfections. He’d said that to me, but unfortunately alone, during a casual chat while awaiting a formal, recorded interview. But then he’d clammed up; never said it again, staring warily at the others in my homicide team.

  And now Henry was free and my colleagues were not pleased.

  The morning after the verdict Don called a meeting of the homicide group and we reviewed what had happened. The others were unhappy, not contributing much, so Don assigned them to other tasks, leaving me to concentrate on the Osbourne homicide.

  We agreed that I’d study all the files for a while and then I’d report what brilliant new conclusions I’d reached.

  My take on the whole thing was that Lily’s father, Sir Robert Osbourne, was involved somehow. I’d done a criminology course at University and that had involved psychology. There were myriad cases where daughters had seduced their fathers, or where fathers had abused daughters, triggering promiscuity. It happened all over the world. It was probably happening now.

  I sat and thought about that. Targeting Sir Robert was not without its difficulties. As I’d been so often told, he was a leading industrialist and developer in Queensland, and a friend of all who counted in the State—the Premier and Government ministers, Federal ministers and even the Prime Minister. But, most importantly, as far as I was concerned, he was a mate of our Police Commissioner, David Bertram.

  Commissioner Bertram and I did not get on with each other and for the most stupid of reasons. I reckon he was jealous of me. He was not a handsome man. He had a big bullet head, which he shaved, and big rounded eyes which seemed to sink back in his skull. His expression was always aggressive. He had a big solid jaw and a big gut in the way of the old-fashioned copper. He wheezed a lot. But he’d known the right people and had been promoted. I suspected he was on the take, knew a lot of things and stayed silent about them, hence the promotion.