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the ransom note as genuine. The demands suggested an international connection, with a number of participants. Its talk of radioactive dust and listening devices was designed to invoke fear, and it was successful in that. The Whelan household was in a state of panic laced with grief. Everyone was terrified.
    Just before nine o’clock, Detective Sergeant Allan Duncan gathered the family together. His instructions were strict, he said, because Kerry’s life depended on it: ‘I know this is an absolutely devastating situation for you all, but we’re going to do all we can to get your wife and your mum back,’ he said. ‘But you’re not to talk to anyone outside this room about the ransom note, nor anything to do with the case. That means that you can’t even mention that your mum is missing.’ Duncan’s voice was stern: ‘ To anyone .’
    The children nodded. James started to cry.
    Duncan told Bernie they needed to interview him. Was there a quiet area somewhere? Bernie led them out to the cottage, a sort of upmarket granny flat at the back of the family home where Amanda Minton-Taylor stayed a few nights a week, often with her boyfriend, Damon. For the next four hours, two detectives dissected every detail of Bernie’s life with Kerry.
    Bernie assured them his marriage was a good one. Loving, stable and honest.
    ‘Are you having an affair, Mr Whelan?’ Duncan was blunt.
    ‘Absolutely not. I adore my wife.’
    ‘What about your nanny, Amanda Minton-Taylor?’
    ‘That’s a ridiculous suggestion. Amanda is like a daughter to Kerry and I.’
    ‘But, Mr Whelan,’ Duncan said, ‘you travel a lot. Could your wife have been having an affair then? Often us men don’t see the signs.’
    Bernie swiftly held up a hand in protest. ‘Absolutely not. Look, my wife’s not like that, but even if there is someone else, she would never have left Sarah at this time.’ Sarah had a life-threatening bowel condition and her second major operation was just weeks away.
    ‘Her children are her life, Detective,’ Bernie said, gasping a bit for breath. ‘She would never leave them.’ Also, his wife had plans: a boating trip for Mother’s Day, an overseas holiday in July.
    Duncan needed to know whether Bernie had any enemies. Had threats ever been made against him?
    ‘I’ve employed thousands of people going back twenty to thirty years sir, and you can’t help upsetting some people,’ Bernie said. ‘I’ve been threatened by unions, an opposition company, and that was scary. But, no, nothing recently.’
    The interview was incredibly draining. Bernie had not slept for almost forty-eight hours, and his head felt like it would explode from the pressure of trying to remember dates, times and events in order to answer the detectives’ questions. At midnight, Duncan put his pen down. ‘Bernie, how about we call it a night?’ Bernie’s eyes had a faraway look. They could finish off his statement later, after they had interviewed the nanny and her mother Marge.
    Sarah’s bedroom was large and had a proper work desk, suitable for transformation into a mini operations HQ ahead of the arrival of the senior detectives. She cleared away her artwork and textbooks to make way for three police computers. She watched through the door as the technical support officers took over her room. It made her feel good, as if she was really contributing something to getting her mum back.
    Chief investigator Bray knew the task ahead was formidable. The state’s police force had never encountered a kidnap and ransom demand of this magnitude before. The closest they had come was thirty-five years earlier when the eight-year-old son of a lottery winner was snatched on his way home from school. His name was Graeme Thorne, the son of a middle-class Australian family who had won a £100 000 lottery held to finance the building of the Sydney Opera House. A month after the win, on 7 July 1960, the dark-haired boy was snatched and bundled into the boot of