by Garry Disher
She softened a little against him, but her voice was toneless: ‘What?’
‘I didn’t hurt her. Never laid a finger on her in all our years together.’
She said, a few seconds later, ‘I know.’
‘Let alone killed her.’
He needn’t have said that. She tensed under his arm: ‘I know.’
He moved his arm away, throwing Charlie a rueful look, and it seemed to release a switch in Charlie. He stared at his father as if at a stranger. The Hawaiian shirt—he’d had it for years—was both familiar and unfamiliar. It belonged to the old Rhys but hung now from the thin shoulders of an old man. The V at his throat revealed sparse grey hairs and a pale, scrawny neck. This wasn’t Rhys Deravin the beach-lover, the out-thinker. That man had vanished in the past few weeks—or years—and Charlie had been too self-involved to notice.
Not looking at Fay, he said, ‘Dad, there is one thing they might ask you. Your car was seen near Mum’s place the day she went missing.’
Rhys widened his eyes. ‘Let me unpick that,’ he said, some of the old craftiness emerging again. ‘Liam saw me, right? He challenged me; did you know that? He’s probably already told the police. Anyway, I’ve made no secret of the fact I was there.’
‘Yes you have. I didn’t know till the other day.’
‘He told me,’ Fay murmured.
Charlie hated this. He said, ‘So, what were you doing there?’
‘I went to drop off sheets and towels.’
Fay touched the back of his wrist. ‘You said table linen.’
He gestured impatiently. ‘Whatever. Fabrics. Material. Stuff that was hers that I didn’t want or need that she probably did want or need. I didn’t want to run into her. I didn’t want an argument.’
‘Tablecloths versus sheets and towels,’ Charlie said. ‘You need to get it right. The prosecution could take a mistake like that and run with it. You need to get it right on the day.’
‘On the day…In court, is that what you’re saying?’
‘Dad, I’m serious.’
Rhys lost interest, in that instantaneous way of his. He pushed away from the table, saying, ‘Not to worry.’
He swayed and closed his eyes, and Fay was swiftly at his side. ‘You need to go back to bed.’
Rhys seemed surprised that he was at home; that his son was there. Bafflement in his eyes as he blinked, pushing against the tide of it. He dropped back into his seat. ‘Just need a moment.’
Charlie watched him. His old man seemed to shrink further. Then he opened clear eyes and smiled tiredly at Charlie. ‘Sorry, son. It comes and goes.’
‘Another thing we need to talk about: Shane Lambert.’
‘Who?’
‘You know perfectly well who. Mum’s lodger.’
Rhys Deravin twitched his mouth left and right, frowning in concentration, and an intuitive conviction lodged in Charlie: He’s going to lie.
‘I have a vague memory. We’re talking a long while ago.’
‘He went to the house to advise on security.’
‘Did he?’
‘He disappeared for years and now he’s back. The police have reinterviewed him.’
And learnt nothing, according to Bekker, but Charlie wanted to gauge his father’s reaction.
‘Well, I don’t know what he has to do with anything,’ Rhys said, standing again, slowly this time, no rush of blood, eyes clear. ‘Thanks for collecting us and bringing us home, son. See you on Monday.’
44
MONDAY, THE FOYER of the Balinoe Hall. Charlie was ferrying stackable chairs to the main function room when Susan Mead arrived. Deeply touched, he gave her a quick hug. ‘Thank you, sarge, means a lot.’
She shrugged, embarrassed. ‘Sorry I’m early, I misjudged the time.’
Just then Liam came through from the storeroom, carrying a stack of chairs, trailed by Emma. Charlie felt tentative and disadvantaged suddenly, stumbling through the introductions. He wanted them all to like each other and felt that this was the beginning of the day’s many fraught moments.
But Emma, with her effortless grace, shook his old boss’s hand. ‘It’s good to meet you at last.’
Charlie saw relief flow. ‘Good to meet you. Your dad used to brag about you all the time.’
Liam was more circumspect. Shook hands briskly and at an elegant remove, then turned to Charlie. ‘People will be arriving soon.’
Good old Liam. Summoning some careworn strength, Charlie said, ‘Be right with you.’
Liam nodded, reclaimed his stack of chairs and toted them through to the main hall. Casting Charlie and Mead a crooked grin, Emma followed.
‘He likes to micromanage,’ Charlie said.
‘Well, someone like that can be useful. I’ll leave you to it,’ Mead said, looking around for somewhere to park herself.
‘How are you at food preparation?’
She looked at him, eyes alert as a cat’s. ‘I’ve been known to chop a carrot.’
So Charlie took her through to an annexe, where Ryan and Jess were flicking around a long table, setting out jugs of water, paper plates, napkins and sandwiches under cling wrap. But then a little of his confidence left him, the day drew clumsily around him again, and he leaned to murmur in her ear: ‘The ex-wife. My brother’s partner.’
‘I’ll cope.’
He made the introductions. Ryan reacted with a warm fuss; Jess, as Charlie expected, was cooler, preoccupied.
Charlie had pressed for a small service, Liam a large, triumphal send-off—an up-yours to Dad, Charlie thought sourly. And so his morning continued to fracture. Cameras and microphones gathered outside the hall, dozens of random mourners inside, bright and avid. Charlie had the sense of them looking at the Deravin boys, in front-row seats on either side of the centre aisle and spinning a hundred stories out of nothing. What are they feeling? Where’s their father? Why aren’t they sitting together?
Wait till Dad gets here, he thought, casting his eyes around. All the aspects of grieving: delicate, hesitant, tiresome, dishonest, self-denying. Then his expression tightened: why the fuck were Bekker and McGuire here? Hoping Rhys might break down and confess in front of everyone? And, Jesus Christ, the podcast twins. Charlie wanted to throw the lot of them out, these cynics and frauds.
There was further warping of the air around him. Noel Saltash and Mark Valente slipped in but did not sit together. Then a couple of cop widows arrived, and Charlie wondered how many of the original crowd were left. The women caught his eye; nodded. They didn’t come down to offer their condolences but sat unmoving, helping to fill the hall with a hard old history.
Susan Mead, a few rows behind him, gave him a little smile. The minutes dragged and then a queer kind of half-silence fell. A hiss. A mutter. Charlie knew, but craned his neck to see: Rhys and Fay had walked in. He’d wanted them in the front row, but Liam had scotched that idea. So had Rhys: ‘Quiet seat up the back, son.’
Charlie stood. Heads swung and eyes lit up. Facing them down, he stepped past Emma’s knees and into the aisle. She followed him and that was the cure he needed. One after the other, they strode to the rear of the hall, where Rhys and Fay waited with constricted smiles.
They hugged and kissed, Emma whispering, ‘Grandpa’ and ‘Fay’. Rhys was pale, damp, beaten down, his right hand tucked into Fay’s elbow. She seemed to stand tall and strong, not defiant but not consenting to be the embarrassed wife of a killer, either.
Chairs had been reserved for them. Watching Fay guide Rhys, watching Rhys grip her elbow until the last moment, as if afraid of falling, Charlie thought: What if he dies before I can clear him?
Liam spoke first. ‘Let this be a celebration of Rose Deravin’s life, not a reminder of the way she died.’ But he did remind them of her death. He embraced his grudges, his voice carrying to the ceiling, the back wall. Charlie had elected not to speak: even if he didn’t muff it, anything he said would remind the world that this was brother pitched against brother. Then Emma read u
nguardedly from Emily Dickinson, a concentration of light on the little stage at the front of the room, and Charlie felt the old crack in his heart again: the hard fact that his daughter had only the faintest of memories of her grandmother.
Mrs Ehrlich saved them. Gathered them in and steered them away from the shoals.
‘I want to mark a day forty years ago, when I was in my sitting room, vacuuming—I could tell you stories about Rose Deravin with a vacuum cleaner in her hand—and saw a Holden station wagon pull in next door, flat to the springs with boxes and cases, luggage skew-whiff on the roof rack. Do any of you remember that car? It was always breaking down, Rhys or Rose knocking on my door, asking my late husband for a jump start.
‘Funny how the past repeats itself. When I was widowed, rogues and scallywags would come knocking on my door, selling things too good to be true or offering to mow my lawn or repair my gutters, and Rhys would give them what for. Then only a few weeks ago his son Charlie’—the smile she gave him lit up the room, full of substance and warmth—‘sent another ratbag on his way with a swift kick up the bum.’ She paused. ‘Literally.’
Laughter. Something eased in the hall.
‘And there was Rose, dear Rose,’ Mrs Ehrlich said. ‘Thirty years separated us, but we became firm friends. We did the things that neighbours do—had each other over for a cuppa, exchanged recipes and gardening tips—and she was a rock when Tom died. But what I remember most is her self-deprecatory, teasing manner. She didn’t take the world seriously and yet she took it very seriously. She didn’t doubt herself and yet never big-noted herself. Whenever the world around her became too altered, she brought it back on track. But the world was altered when she disappeared—and it continues to alter as awful truths are revealed. It’s our job to mend it for her.’
Charlie blinked. Felt a nudge: Emma was offering him a tissue.
Noon now, Liam announcing that mourners were invited to join the family in the supper room—which was the last thing Charlie wanted. He didn’t stir as the hall emptied.
Sue Mead came in on his flank, placed her hand on his shoulder, squeezed. ‘Sorry, Charlie, I have to go.’
He placed his hand briefly on hers. ‘But the stale sandwiches. The bricklayers’ tea.’
‘I know, a real wrench, but I have a stack of interviews to collate.’
A pat and she was gone. Still Charlie sat. He felt numb; wished Anna was with him.
Then Fay was there, her face strained and depleted. ‘Charlie, your dad’s not well. I’m taking him home.’
He stood. ‘Does he need a doctor?’
‘He’s just tired.’
‘Stay at my place tonight.’
She shook her head. ‘His own bed,’ she said. Then, gesturing at the main door, she added: ‘Plus we wouldn’t want the hyenas to follow us to your front lawn.’
Charlie nodded. The appetites and assimilations of the media. ‘I’ll help you get him into the car.’
Out into a surge of young cameramen and sound techs wearing boardshorts and T-shirts, middle-aged print reporters with beer bellies and notebooks, young TV talent in summer dresses—all with the light of pursuit in their eyes…
‘Did you kill your wife, Mr Deravin?’
‘Why did Billy Saul have to die?’
‘What did you think when the bodies were found?’
Charlie bulldozed his father through the mob, Fay in his wake, and realised a moment later that Mark Valente was helping, looking vivid and energised. An old headbanging cop, Charlie thought, the kind you didn’t find anymore.
They reached Rhys and Fay’s Peugeot but found themselves trapped, Charlie pinned against his father, his father against the passenger door. Then a microphone was thrust at Rhys and the cute little face behind it was speaking: ‘Some might consider it bad form that you dared to attend your late wife’s memorial service, Mr Deravin.’
Charlie struggled to elbow her away, struggled with the door. Where was Valente? Where was Fay, for that matter? He looked across the roof of the car. She was still several metres away, running a smaller gauntlet. A reporter, a photographer—and the podcast twins. As he watched, she said something to them. Deamer nodded; Nadal helped her reach the car.
He returned his attention to the reporter. ‘Please move so I can open the door.’
‘Who are you?’ she asked. ‘One of the sons?’
Her eyes gleamed as she thrust the microphone at him. Then he saw her gape, a wild light of agony in her eyes as she doubled over. And Valente was there beside her, his elbows flying, a dropped shoulder tackling. ‘Clear a way for the lady,’ he shouted, ‘she’s about to be sick.’
The throng fell back. The pressure eased and Charlie opened the passenger door and bundled his father into the car. ‘See you soon.’
By now Fay was opening her door. He called over the roof, ‘See you soon.’
She nodded climbed in, buckled up. Started the car, eased it out onto Frankston–Flinders Road in a series of little spurts.
Then Valente joined him, brushing his palms together. ‘Most fun I’ve had in years.’
‘You punched her in the stomach,’ Charlie said.
Valente shrugged. Cast a look at the reporter, who was still doubled over, hanging onto a friend. ‘And his name was death, and hell followed after him.’
‘Yeah, I think we could do with a bit less of that,’ Charlie said.
He counted: twenty-eight mourners had stayed for sandwiches, cupcakes and tea, and, as he flicked among them dutifully, still dazed, his brother stood back looking awkward. Shyness? Disapproval? You didn’t always know with Liam.
From Mrs Ehrlich to Alby the aircon mechanic to Noel Saltash to a long-lost aunt, to Alan Wagoner and Pat the dog-woman. Hands pressed his warmly, his cheek was kissed, arms were flung around his shoulders. Meanwhile Valente was also working the room. He knew everyone. He was affectionate with Emma, Jess, Ryan. Ignored Saltash. Was reserved with Mrs Ehrlich—as if they knew too much about each other.
No sign of Bekker, but McGuire sidled in.
‘You still here?’
‘Manners, Mr Deravin.’
‘Where’s your boss?’
‘Fetching the car.’
‘I thought that would be your job.’
McGuire smiled. Stood close alongside Charlie and, with him, surveyed the room.
‘This is private,’ Charlie said. ‘Fuck off, okay?’
‘One of the reporters made a good point,’ McGuire said. ‘It was bad form for your father to turn up here.’
‘Fuck off, I said.’
‘I mean,’ McGuire said, ‘the sheer nerve of it.’
Charlie walked away from her, and she called, ‘One o’clock tomorrow.’
He walked back. ‘What?’
‘It’s been arranged with your dad and his lawyer. One tomorrow.’
Charlie walked off again and found a quiet corner from which to watch the crowd dwindle. Saw all the little dramas play out. Valente turning a cold shoulder when the podcast twins wandered in, for example. His normal swagger and bluster curiously dialled down.
45
CHARLIE DIDN’T SO much wake as realise that he’d been awake for some time. And as he lay there, washed in the light of a full moon, the memorial service that had hijacked his dreams last night—hectic, confused—began to fade, replaced by memories of the actual service. The actual service was hardly an improvement, though. Two awful hours of his life, over which hovered the media scrum, Mark Valente’s hungry gaze, the hissing whispers of strangers. He shifted under the bedsheet. For twenty years he’d dared not grieve for his mother. He’d not known what to grieve for, apart from her absence. Now all he wanted was simple mourning, and the bastards weren’t letting him have it.
He checked the bedside clock: 4 a.m. He’d gone through this enough times to know that sleep wouldn’t come now. And he felt rested anyway, after a fashion; to lie there gazing at moon shadows would achieve nothing.
He slipped out of bed, pulled o
n shorts and a T-shirt, and padded through to the kitchen. Tea and toast. The armchair beside the sitting-room floor lamp. Em’s bird book in his lap.
Instead of reading he found himself scrolling through the news feed on his phone. He was doing that too often, not good for him, not wise, but still he continued to do it—several times a day, headlong down rabbit holes of stupidity. How the world economies were controlled by Jewish bankers, the British royals were lizard people and China had unleashed the virus upon the world. And, closer to home, how your average fuckwit can fuck up—like last night, a junkie, impatient to make a buy, had interrupted undercover Drug Squad officers who were grilling her dealer.
But mainly he chased down virus stories, a deepening obsession ever since Rhys’s hospitalisation. The first deaths in Europe; growing anxiety in Italy; fifteen cases in Australia. The susceptibility of cruise-ship passengers and crew—days spent mingling at close quarters, onboard and on mini-bus daytrips. The bushfires, the virus: as one source of dread eased, another stepped in neatly to replace it.
At 6.30 he walked down to the beach carrying his long-board, his right arm tense and ropy. Reached the sand and turned left, around to where low waves rolled slowly in. Half-a-dozen heads were in the water, including a couple of heroes on wide-nosed, chunky-tailed shortboards. He paddled out to wait. Bobbed there a while, idly waiting, positioning himself, keeping ready, casting one eye back over his shoulder for breaks that never came. How often had he done this, starting when he was a kid, out on the water with Rhys and Mark? Lifted, lowered; the rolling sea beneath him false, late and benign. He nodded to the other surfers. He knew most of them. ‘Dickhead,’ they all said when a newcomer came through on a swell that almost but not quite paid off, shouting that Charlie was a useless old man who should fuck off out of the way.
He was wading onto Balinoe Beach when he saw Mark Valente in bathers, a towel over one shoulder, talking to Noel Saltash in his shire ranger’s beach buggy. The odd couple, he thought. They turned to face him as he drew near, and he had that old sense of them: a predatory undercurrent in Valente and Saltash faintly aggrieved and put upon.
