I shrugged, took a swig on the Stella. 'I can usually spot the obvious.'

'Okay. It's like this. I was one of the team investigating the murder of Peter Bellamy. It was one of the biggest hands-on jobs I'd had since getting out of uniform. I shouldn't have been anywhere near it.'

'Why?'

'I'd had an affair with Catherine. This was before I met Hilde.'

'Catherine?'

'Catherine Beddoes, Heysen's wife. It went on for a little while after she married Heysen. I didn't know that. She didn't tell me she was married. Then she did and I ended it.'

'Jesus, Frank.'

'I know, I know. I should've declared a conflict of interest and butted out.'

'Why didn't you?'

Frank drained his stubbie and looked almost angry and upset enough to throw it into the pool. We were sitting in the back yard of his Paddington terrace. He'd bought it when you could buy houses in Paddo without needing a six figure income. He still had some mortgage, he'd told me, but with lots of equity at current prices. He'd been able to renovate and put the pool in with part of his super.

'I was ambitious, wanted to make a step up. I didn't know that there'd be a clearing out of the corrupt bastards above me and that my promotion would be… accelerated anyway. The Heysen case was high profile and tricky. We got a break and cracked it. Kudos all around.'

'But?'

'I had some doubts. You mostly do except when it's open and shut. Which it usually is, you know-domestic, financial, sexual…'

I nodded.

'Bellamy and Heysen seemed to get on well. They'd graduated from Sydney uni at much the same time, done locums, knocked around, borrowed the dough to set up the practice and were doing okay. They bulk-billed, put in the hours, worked their arses off. Made house calls, would you believe?'