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alternative energy as well as the water crisis in Australia and elsewhere. The only personal touches were a set of trophies sitting on top of the bookcase.
    Josephine Dart had sat in the room’s easy chair while I made my inspection. ‘Terry was very proud of those,’ she said. ‘He said they stood for aching muscles and gallons of sweat.’
    Dart had evidently won a couple of long-distance road races and placed in a few more. ‘He must’ve been good.’
    â€˜Good. Yes, when he was younger, but not at the top level. It didn’t bother him. He was a lovely, calm, kind, considerate man from the day I met him until the morning he rode off. It’s so bloody unfair.’
    Something about the room bothered me. I opened the drawers in the desk—printer paper, cheque books, invoices, a postcode book, staples, printer cartridges, expended and new.
    â€˜What?’ Mrs Dart said.
    â€˜Something’s missing.’
    She looked carefully. ‘Everything’s as he left it.’
    It came to me in a flash. ‘Where’s his briefcase?’
    She got up quickly. ‘He kept it tucked down between the desk and the filing cabinet.’
    The space, wide enough to hold a sizeable briefcase, was empty.
    â€˜Mrs Dart, have many people been in the flat since your husband died?’
    She nodded. ‘We had a wake … a party. My brother organised it. Terry was an only child. Terry would have liked it—they played some of his favourite music—“Bolero” and “The Ritual Fire Dance” and things from
Carmen
. There were quite a few people—neighbours and from the CSIRO and the cycling club. I didn’t know them all.’
    â€˜Did anyone comment on McKinley not being there?’
    â€˜Of course,’ she said sadly. ‘It was a talking point.’
    I asked her if she’d come with me when I inspected Henry McKinley’s house but she refused.
    â€˜I went there quite often. Sometimes with Terry, sometimes without,’ she said. ‘We had some wonderful times together. I don’t think I could bear to see it all empty and … dead.’
    She produced five keys on a ring. I asked whether she wanted some kind of authorisation from McKinley’s daughter or the private detective she’d hired.
    â€˜I thought you were the private detective.’
    That was ticklish, but something I had to get used to. ‘I’m more or less retired. I’m just doing this as a favour to Ms McKinley. She was a nurse in the hospital in California when I had a heart attack.’
    â€˜My goodness! You look fit now.’
    â€˜Yes, I’m fine.’
    She gave me the keys. ‘I trust you, Mr Hardy.’
    You don’t get a lot of that in this business and her remark buoyed me up even though I was sure there were things she wasn’t telling me and that what I was learning added up to bad news for Margaret McKinley.
    * * *
    Henry McKinley’s townhouse was part of a small set of newish places, modelled on the good old Victorian terrace. The architect had done his job well and the houses blended in nicely with the old and new stuff around them. The street was a bit back from New South Head Road and elevated, so that the houses had a view of the water with the trees of the Royal Sydney golf course off to the south. The security wasn’t state of the art but it was adequate. A high, solid wooden gate at street level opened easily with one of the keys on the bunch and there was a security grille over the front door and bars on the windows on the lower level. A balcony ran along the width of the house and I could see greenery hanging down over the rail. The space in front was taken up with the traditional white pebbles and a few largish plants, looking bedraggled, in pots.
    Another key opened the grille door and yet another the front door. I waited before going in. I hadn’t been tentative about my approach, but I was