Lost Girls (37 page)

Anne wished
there was a way to wind back the clock and make it otherwise, if
only Elin had lived, his first fairy queen, if only Belle lived,
she seemed the nearest in this story to a simple love, if only
Josie, but for jealousy perhaps she would have had Mark’s measure,
if only Amanda had not tried to wrest control from his soul. The
final two deaths were much darker but it did not appear that Mark
formed a premeditated plan to harm them, more it was that they were
broken inside too and had failed to understand he was even more
broken than them and how dangerous that made him.

Cathy was the
strangest; in a way she was the most broken of all. But yet, for
the first time, there appeared to be a person with a power to heal
and be healed, perhaps it was her need that had brought goodness
from him. But, before that had run any natural course, she too was
gone. But the Mark that came after her seemed a less damaged
person, the poem of the new queen seemed to be something he had
taken to heart, seeking a new beginning.

Then along came
Susan; the way Mark described her she had become the new queen,
first seen as a Greek goddess. And she had the look, that ineffable
look shared with Belle and Cathy, the dark hair and searching eyes
but something more, a mix of mischief and joie de vie, perhaps love
of life was the best way to say it. It seemed to reach into Mark’s
soul and connect with him, was it a look glimpsed as a child of a
long lost mother.

Anne had seen a
photo of Mark’s mother, taken on her wedding day, but this was a
posed photo without life. While her hair and face were similar she
could not judge if she too had that look, but perhaps.

So when Susan
had come along she too had a look, common to Belle and Cathy which
caught his attention and made him seek her out. It seemed he was
seeking to start afresh and not damage this one. He begged her not
to seek his past. But yet it could not be, she needed to know the
man and the truth was uncovered. Then, under pressure, he reverted
to type; professing love but tying her up like a dangerous animal,
unable to reconcile his two parts.

Then that final
place of clarity where he realised he could not kill what he loved
this time, but yet he could not stay and destroy it, that to impart
the knowledge to Susan of who he was would inevitably sow the seeds
of future destruction, that the knowledge would tear her apart.

And so he had
chosen. Anne had no doubt that, if Susan had not acted first, he
would have swam to join the crocodiles, the outcome would have been
the same but without Susan having his blood on her hands.

But then, as
Anne thought further, even that alternate place seemed no solution;
for Susan to watch her doomed lover being torn apart would likely
have damaged her equally to her own act. So Susan had become
trapped too by circumstances, she had seen no way out either. At
last Anne felt she was in a place where she could understand that
final hopeless desperation that had consumed her friend’s soul,
emptiness feeding on yet more emptiness.

So here she was
now at the end of her own search, seeking a solution but there was
none. Sometimes life just dealt shit cards giving no way out. And
this story had a whole royal flush of them.

By the end of
the year Anne was totally numb from living this human storm, day
after day, week after week. It was a relief to be alone with just
David and his family, to be in a place where no one talked further
about this last year. As she sat in the sun watching David’s own
family at work and at play she could feel normalcy gradually return
to her life.

Anne returned
from a New Year’s holiday at David’s family home to Darwin in late
January for a formal inquest into the disappearance and possible
death of five girls, Elin, Isabelle, Amanda, Cathy and Susan.

While Susan’s
disappearance had no connection to the others in Mark being the
person likely to be responsible, yet she was still an inextricable
part of the whole.

After some
preliminary argument and counterargument the coroner agreed that
Susan also be a subject of consideration of this inquest, if only
to more clearly establish her role in the other disappearances and
lay to rest some of the malicious rumours circulating that she was
part of some grand plot, rather than just another victim, even if
after the event.

Neither her
parents or Anne had any objection to Susan being a person under
consideration, their only interest was to find anything further
that may lead to her or allow understanding of what had happened to
her.

The judge also
named an unknown further person of interest who may also have
become deceased while in the company of Vincent Mark Bassingham.
This person was of unknown identity and, for the purpose of the
proceedings was only known as J, as this was the only clear
evidence of identity within the diary. No one had come forward to
give a possible identity of this unknown person so, in evidence, J
she remained. Still in the media and conversation she soon became
known as Josie. It gave her a human face, perhaps it was her real
first name.

The judge ruled
that J was not a formal subject of the inquiry but merely a person
about whom the court was seeking to establish facts which may lead
to an identity and subsequent investigation.

On a steamy wet
season day in Darwin the inquest got underway, the lawyers, police
and witnesses moving quickly from their air conditioned cars to
courtroom coolness, and the media scrum sweating in the sun hoping
for sensational shots of the main characters coming and going.

The coroner
called all to order. There were two main lines of evidence for the
inquiry. The first was the police investigation led by Alan and the
second was the evidence of the diary, which was provided jointly by
Anne, Alan and a psychologist who sought to establish the mental
state and accuracy of the diary on the basis of its internal
consistency and other known history of Mr Bassingham.

The police
evidence was led off with Alan taking the stand, supported by many
others, working through what the police had discovered. Alan
described how the investigation initially discovered the metal box
with the passports and then how the police had then established the
identity of the four girls whose passports were found. He showed,
in photographs, the former hiding place of the metal box in the
vehicle of Vincent Bassingham, also known by his various aliases,
then described the evidence leading to a connection between him and
these missing persons.

Various police
officers then gave evidence as to how they had investigated the
identity of each of the four girls and how, at the time when the
passports were found, all the girls were considered missing persons
but without any specific evidence as to their fate. The police
described how they contacted the parents and others who knew each
girl and obtained statements about their knowledge of the
circumstances preceding each disappearance.

All the parents
and many of the friends were in court to corroborate this
testimony. This testimony established last known places of
residence and intended travel plans of each girl, though it was
clear that such knowledge in each case was very limited and
fragmentary.

The coroner was
heard to remark that these girls seemed to typify many backpackers
who came to Australia with only the vaguest knowledge of where they
were going and what they would do.

The police then
established their other lines of inquiry which led to last known
locations of each girl. This evidence placed Elin’s last known
location at Birdsville in the company of Vincent Bassingham, on the
basis of evidence of the landlord of the Birdsville Hotel.
Isabelle’s last known location was at Derby, where it was confirmed
she had stayed the night, in a room in her own name but in the
company of Vincent Bassingham. It established that Amanda’s last
known location was at the Emerald Hotel, where she had shared a
room with Vincent Bassingham. For Cathy it established the last
known location as the private residence of Nikko and Athena
Christos, where she also shared a room with Vincent Bassingham.

Thus, all
parties agreed that Vincent Bassingham, in various aliases, was the
last person known to be in the company of all these girls and that
all had appeared to travel willingly with him at that point.

The evidence
then moved to Anne who described first the transcript of Susan as
captured on tape. Short excerpts of the tape were played to confirm
the veracity of some parts and a full transcript provided to the
coroner. Anne led them through a summarised version of this tape
describing its key events from Susan first meeting Mark on the
Barrier Reef to travelling with him from Alice Springs to the Top
End of the NT.

She told of the
succession of discoveries Susan made, beginning with the multiple
number plates, then the metal box with the passports and the
multiple identities of Vincent Bassingham, the various Mark Bs,
then of the text she sent and its reply. Finally she told of the
events from Mark’s discovery about the texts, Susan’s captivity and
coming to the billabong of the crocodiles, then of the final night
and the next day. As she worked her way through this story she
could see journalists running in an out of the court room,
capturing ever more details as this story was finally revealed and
rushing to tell their various media outlets.

It surprised
her that this story, which she carried in such detail inside her
head, was as largely unknown to the outside world. Of course, while
the police had released some parts, it had never been told as a
coherent whole until this day of her testimony.

Anne then
described the verbal story, as passed on to Susan by Vincent
Bassingham, that he had admitted to killing some of these girls,
particularly one who matched the description of Amanda.

Her next
evidence was to be about the information within the diary. However,
before she was called to give this, the psychologist, who had also
investigated the contents of the diary, so as to appraise the
mental state of its author, was called.

He said he had
formed the view that the diary was mostly a credible and accurate
document, which predominantly showed its author was a rational and
lucid person, though it increasingly showed evidence of psychotic
behaviours in its later parts.

He also
explained that it included parts of creative writing and poetry
which were, in some instances, apparently fictitious. He said that
in many cases it was difficult to distinguish between parts giving
true information and fictional parts. However his overall
assessment was that the diary of one Vincent Mark Bassingham should
be generally treated as providing an accurate description of the
facts it recorded.

The police were
also questioned about their investigations into the diary’s
veracity and confirmed that, in places where information allowed,
they had been able to verify many specific facts.

Anne was then
recalled to continue her telling of her discoveries of the fate of
these girls from the diary records, corroborated by other sources,
particularly the various girls’ parents.

She told the
judge that with his permission she would use the name Mark to
describe this man as that was his identity within the diary and
also the name he was known by to all the girls. She explained how
she had read the full diary document through several times and had
begun by cross referencing the parts which told of Susan with the
descriptions Susan had given of the same events. This had helped
her to familiarise herself with Mark’s writing style and also give
her a sense of the veracity of his descriptions. It also helped
differentiate between factual and creative components.

Overall she
said she had found close corroboration between what was in Susan’s
story and the diary records, though Susan’s story was more
comprehensive and complete for the parts she knew.

She then began
giving the substance of the diary records made of Elin, which
described the period after they left Birdsville and travelled into
a remote part of south western Queensland where they had spent
about a week removing opals from an abandoned mine shaft until its
collapse led to Elin’s death. She told how Mark had described this
event, his attempted rescue and then how he buried her on the side
of a nearby billabong and marked the grave site with rocks placed
to mark out a boat.

The police
corroborated the account of the diary and confirmed there were
innumerable abandoned mine shafts in this part of Queensland, which
had an estimated area of about 100,000 square kilometres. They said
to date it had proved impossible to locate the site of the mine or
the grave though searches were continuing including through
satellite images.

Anne then told
of her visit to Sweden and described how this burial site matched
the form of burial of Elin’s own mother, providing a further and
independent source of corroboration for the diary account.

From there the
coroner moved to examining the circumstances of Isabelle’s
disappearance. Anne took them through the key points of the diary
account, in this case the joint handwriting of both Isabelle and
Mark with Isabelle’s French annotations now translated and
confirmed as being in her handwriting by her parents. She then
described how Mark recorded her fall from the cliff into the water
below surrounded by large crocodiles and how he had shot her in the
head with his rifle in the final seconds to alleviate her
suffering.

There was
audible surprise from the press gallery at this revelation and
Isabelle’s parents covered their faces in pain as it was recounted.
The judge admitted these facts were deeply distressing to all
parties and called a recess. After the recess the police advised
they had searched for the location of Isabelle’s demise without
success, but as there were hundreds of kilometres of coast in this
area it was another needle in a haystack.