He loved Adolf Hitler and Ptolemy Jones. Hitler was in Berlin, a long way from Victoria, and Jones was dead. He knew Jones was dead because he’d stood in the shadows and watched the coppers bring his body out of a house in Belgrave. One of those coppers had been a Jew named Joe Sable, and that meant one thing, and one thing only — Joe Sable’s days were numbered. DETECTIVE JOE SABLE knew he’d returned to work too soon. He sat, bruised and miserable, at his desk in the Homicide division of the Victoria Police in Russell Street, Melbourne. Detective Inspector Titus Lambert and Constable Helen Lord were out, but he wasn’t alone in the office. Sergeant David Reilly sat on the opposite side of the room. Reilly was a recent acquisition, and Joe had yet to make up his mind about him. He knew Helen Lord resented Reilly, but her resentment was based less on his abilities and more on the fact that he threatened her position in the squad. She was there by the grace and favour of Inspector Lambert, who’d snaffled her by arguing chronic manpower shortages to his superiors.
