by Cathryn Hein
Then the screams and bellows as the hillside gave way in an avalanche of rock and dirt and mud, carrying Digby and the cherished new world he’d found, so filled with love, with it.
A man appeared at the edge of the park with a small dog on a leash. Digby turned immediately away and kept moving, hands thrust into his pockets. The urge to run from the risk of contact was huge, yet Digby also knew he couldn’t keep this self-imposed isolation up forever. But there was no one he could trust. Not his mother, or grandmother, and absolutely not his sister Em.
A few late lunchtime walkers were out. It was past one-thirty and most workers had returned to their desks. Levenham wasn’t large—around 15,000 people—but it acted as a service city for the region’s agricultural, forestry and fisheries industries. Tourism was on the rise too, now that local vineyards were winning accolades and investing in cellar-door facilities. There was a time when Digby was proud to say he’d played a small part in that success, but no more.
A bench sat empty in the shadows of one of the oaks. He settled down with his perpetually cold hands still plunged into his pockets to stare at nothing. Perhaps his lack of interest in anything local was a sign it was time to move on. The Wallaces had been the weave in Levenham’s fabric for generations, the region’s abundance fuelling a growth in wealth that his ancestors had used to help build a town they could be proud of. Their foundation stones, embedded like rocky fingerprints, were everywhere, from churches to fountains and civic buildings. His sister ran a business here. His mother and grandmother still played their part on committees and volunteer groups. In time, as heir to the family fortune, it was expected that he would too.
Digby let out a shuddery breath. A year had passed since Felicity’s death and yet nothing had changed within him. He still hurt, still missed her. Still tripped over every tiny reminder of their time together like a blind man in the dark. Maybe it was time to leave, escape the pressure. Find somewhere far away, with a landscape flat to the horizon in every direction. A place without any reminders of Rocking Horse Hill.
He blinked against the heat building in his eyes, blindsided by the thought. He couldn’t leave. She was here, the last traces of her. All he had.
‘Digby?’
He glanced up then rapidly looked aside, using his upper arm to rub his eyes.
Jas must have known what she’d seen but was kind enough not to say anything. Instead she sat down beside him, opened a plastic lunch box and began rummaging inside.
‘If it’s any consolation, I’m having a pretty ordinary day too.’
It wasn’t, but it was good of her to say. Digby forced what he hoped resembled a smile and resumed staring over the lawn.
‘I have a ham and cheese sandwich I can share, if you’re interested.’ She dug a little more and pulled out a muesli bar, angling it towards him. ‘Or there’s this.’
‘Thanks, but I’m not hungry.’
She sighed. ‘I wish I wasn’t, but if I don’t eat I’ll never make it through the rest of the afternoon.’
Jas took a bite of the sandwich and chewed for a while. Digby hoped she wouldn’t bring up Em. He wasn’t in the right frame of mind to talk about his sister. And he sure as hell didn’t want to talk about her wedding, no matter how much Digby owed her fiancé Josh. It was bad enough that Digby was best man. Only loyalty and gratitude to Josh for saving his life at the quarry had made Digby agree to it, and not a day went by when he didn’t wish he’d said no. Hearing them say their vows in the same church where he and Flick had planned to marry, watching their happiness, would take strength Digby wasn’t sure he possessed.
‘Can I ask you something?’
Digby eyed her, then looked away, shrugging.
‘If I wanted to put a lock on my gate, what would be the best way to do it?’
Digby swung back. ‘Why would you want to lock your gate?’
This time it was Jasmine’s turn to avoid his gaze and shrug. ‘Just a question.’
He kept up his study. Jasmine was his sister’s best friend. She’d been a fixture at Camrick and the Wallace property at Rocking Horse Hill since he was a boy, invited to all but the most intimate of family events. He knew her. Jasmine was fun, warm and welcoming. Locking her gate? That didn’t fit.
What also didn’t fit was the fatigue showing on her pretty face. Her normally healthy pink skin was pale, making the bruised circles under her eyes appear even darker, and her shoulders had a defeated sag. Jasmine had always been proudly large-chested and never shied from showing her assets off, plus years of riding show horses had given her a straight-backed posture. Today her body was so hunched it was as if she were in hiding, or protecting herself.
Digby felt a stir of worry. ‘What’s up, Jas?’
‘Nothing. Nothing at all.’ But she refused to look at him.
He observed her for a few moments longer and let it go. What did he care about her secrets? He had enough of his own to worry about. He leaned forward as though to press himself to his feet, and felt a hand on his arm.
‘Stay? A bit longer?’ She waved her half-eaten sandwich. ‘At least until I’ve finished this?’
Digby frowned at the need in her tone and nodded, but there was tension now. The tension of his unspoken questions and the puzzle of what she was hiding.
‘What sort of latch is it?’ he asked after a while.
‘Hook and eye. I was thinking just a padlock over the hook would do.’
‘Probably. You could also fit a bike chain, running from the gate around the strainer post.’
She chewed on that. ‘That might be easiest. One of those ones with a combination lock so I don’t have to worry about a key.’
‘Won’t stop anyone climbing the fence though.’
‘No,’ she said softly, staring at the lunchbox rested on her lap, ‘it won’t. But it might be enough.’
‘Enough for what?’ When she didn’t answer he prodded again. ‘Jas?’
She glanced at her watch. ‘Oh, look at the time.’ She took a last bite of her sandwich, dumped the rest into the box and closed the lid. She stood, the smile fixed on him clearly faked. ‘Thanks for your company.’
Digby felt a weird urge to laugh. His company? He’d barely strung two sentences together.
He rose to stand with her. ‘You sure you’re all right?’
‘Yeah, I’m fine.’ Her wide blue gaze fell on his. Blue eyes. A knot formed in his chest as he remembered Felicity’s face. ‘The more important question is, are you?’
‘I’ll be all right.’
She pressed her palm against his upper arm. ‘I hope so.’
With a last smile she left him, hurrying across the lawn towards the main street and the building society where she worked, leaving Digby frowning in her wake.
CHAPTER
3
Digby flicked off the car radio. The last thing he wanted tonight was an announcer’s cheer. What he did want Digby had no idea, but it wasn’t that upbeat inflection or yet another bloody love song. He hated love. He hated everything.
Levenham’s fringes gave way to highway. The speed limit increased to 110 kilometres an hour. He eased his foot down. The lights of his Mercedes scorched the darkness with blazing tunnels of white. He liked the car’s power, the panther speed of its response. Perhaps if he’d bought a Merc instead of that useless Jeep he’d have made it to Rocking Horse Hill in time to prevent Felicity’s panicked flight to the quarry. Seconds had mattered that night. And he’d been late.
He sped westward, aware he’d have to turn south soon to avoid any glimpse of the district’s other ancient volcanic cone. There were so many of the things, scattered like acne across the plains of western Victoria and into this lower corner of South Australia. Since the accident Digby couldn’t stand the sight of them. Once harmless hills were now symbols of the earth’s treachery and triggers of pain. He knew his feelings were irrational. The hills weren’t alive. They possessed no conscience. They just were. Still he charged them with bla
me.
The night was clear and a three-quarter moon cast the rural terrain in an eerie, spectral glow. The kilometres ate away, gobbled by his leaden foot and the car’s supremacy over the land. To the left on a rise, a crop of silvery wind turbines stood in formation like alien creatures about to attack. Digby slowed as his turnoff appeared.
The road was narrow and isolated, but fully sealed and in reasonable condition. Familiar with the route and confident it was unlikely to be patrolled, Digby lowered every window then pressed his foot down dangerously hard. His grip tightened as the car surged. Fence lines and the occasional shed flew past. Wind blasted across him, buffeting the car’s interior. The land blurred as he lost himself in the sensation of speed and noise and his imaginary race towards her.
It wasn’t enough. It was never enough to drown the echoes in his head.
He slowed, panting, tears pricking his eyes, and remembering his promise to Josh he braked to a stop. For a long while he sat in the car in the centre of the road and breathed until his urge to howl at the earth and the moon like a rabid animal abated. Finally he wound up all the windows and continued his drive to nowhere.
Tonight had been yet another disaster. Tuesday evening family dinners at Camrick were a longstanding tradition that had gradually slid away after Felicity’s arrival. Now his mother was desperate to revive them. Em and Josh were to be married. Children would come along. They had to return to being the family they had once been, and that included Digby. The pressure on him to comply had been enormous, and getting worse.
Very different to the early days when everyone tip-toed warily around him, took care in what they said, respected the force of his grief. Even Granny B had remained deferential, and she had no love for Felicity. That front remained united even as the months passed, shadowed by the looming inquest, an event they all feared. But the inquest was long over, Felicity’s life and death had been analysed, commented upon and concluded, until she’d become another file in the state’s archives, gathering dust.
Closure. That’s what they apparently had now. Stupid, ignorant platitude. Others might have closure, all Digby had was death. But no one saw it like that. Instead people began to regard him with confusion, pity, even a touch of scorn. She’d been gone a year. Why couldn’t he move on like a normal person?
Granny B had been the first to lose patience. Not that she’d snapped or been short, but her usual hauteur had gradually leaked back into her manner. Even disguised, he could read her old-school disapproval: Digby was a Wallace and should show more backbone. His mother had gently suggested more counselling. Her partner Samuel attempted a paternalistic, ‘You can talk to me, son’ approach. His mates had been sympathetic before tiring of his apathy and misery. Digby responded by clamming up and isolating himself even further. Now he was being dragged forcibly out.
And what a mess it had created.
Adrienne should have known what it would do to him. She should have served dinner in the kitchen. He could have coped with that. Maybe. Instead they’d all sat in the grand formal dining room, with his family staring nervously at one another around the table while Digby sweated and glanced at the door, his mind overwhelmed with memories.
Images, sounds, feelings. The past resurrected in all its beauty and horror, and so much of it centred in that room. The tick of the cherry-wood mantel clock as he’d waited, excited beyond belief for Felicity’s first arrival. Standing at the dining-room door with his arm around her, presenting his shy new fiancée to his family with a chest so ballooned with pride and love he wanted to burst.
Her past had never mattered to him. Felicity was Digby’s future and that was all that he cared about. Others cared though, his grandmother in particular. From first meeting she turned suspicious, believing Felicity a gold-digger like Digby’s old girlfriend Cait, and when Granny B learned of Flick’s attempted manslaughter conviction there was no hiding her disapproval and family tensions ran high.
Digby had protected Flick as best he could. They didn’t understand what she’d been through, how much compassion she deserved. Her life had had been hell, controlled by her drug-dealing, violent family then an even more violent partner. The stabbing had been self-defence, even if the courts didn’t see it that cleanly, and she’d served her sentence.
Buoyed by his love, Flick had tried to fit in but her attempts were given sinister intent by his family. The rift grew until one fateful night in the dining room Granny B accused Felicity of being a cuckoo in the nest, trying to steal not only favour but Rocking Horse Hill from Em. Felicity took revenge by locking Granny B out on her balcony on a freezing night, with no one to hear her calls for help.
Digby had truly believed Felicity’s lies, that it wasn’t her, but it was. He hadn’t wanted to believe it even when Em, who’d been on her side, voiced doubts. He’d had to ask Felicity though—where she’d been, why she hadn’t heard Granny B’s cries for help—and they’d argued over it. The bewilderment and pain she’d shown at his questioning would live with him forever.
It was Em who had unravelled the truth, when Felicity failed to keep her lies consistent. Furious and vengeful, Em promised Felicity that not only would she be exposed, but she would lose Digby’s precious, protective love, and it was that which caused Flick’s fragile mind to finally crack. Lost and terrified of returning to jail, she’d driven to Rocking Horse Hill to plead her case again with Em and somehow during the confrontation his sister was hurt. Panicked further by Josh and Digby’s arrival, Felicity sprinted to the property’s abandoned quarry, unaware that heavy rain had destabilised the area. The ground fell away and despite all efforts to save her, Felicity was crushed when the entire wall collapsed.
She’d been wrong. Digby would have still loved her. He would have forgiven. But, thanks to his sister, he’d never been given the chance.
Digby had been so adrift in the past he’d barely noticed his mother placing his soup in front of him—a steaming bowl of lobster consommé with tiny crayfish meatballs that Adrienne must have spent hours making. Digby had stared at it, willing himself to find the strength to eat. He lifted his spoon and dipped it into the soup. His hands trembled as he brought the spoon to his mouth, the consommé making plopping sounds as it slipped back into the bowl. He hovered, breathing shakily, aware they were all pretending not to watch.
His mother said his name. Granny B gave up feigning disinterest and regarded him openly, top lip curled. Josh and Em exchanged a worried look. The walls began to bend and crowd in on him. Digby’s head swelled loud with recriminations. His shaking intensified. She should have been here as his wife, sharing his life and love. Not dead. Not lost to him.
The spoon fell into the bowl with a splash and a harsh clatter. He jerked upright, napkin dropping to the floor, and wiped his greasy hands on his jeans, eyes only for the door and escape. ‘I have to go.’
Samuel half rose from his seat as Digby reeled out. He glimpsed Josh signalling for Samuel to sit, then he was in the hall and all his energy was channelled into making it outside into air he could breathe.
Far enough away from Camrick’s walls for the claustrophobia to ease, Digby halted on the gravel drive and tried to swallow away his despair. Stones crunched as Josh crossed to join him. Thank God for Josh. If Samuel had tried to play father figure again Digby might have punched him.
He glanced at his friend’s face and down at his feet as shame for his weakness filled him. ‘I can’t do it, Josh. I tried but …’ He shook his head, wanting to cry.
‘I know. One day you will though.’
There didn’t seem much else to say that hadn’t been said a thousand times before, and so together they stared southward at the night, the silence accepted between them. Digby wondered if Josh was remembering too. They might not show, but Josh had scars of his own.
Josh turned to study Digby’s face. ‘You right?’
‘Yes.’ Outside in the cool air he felt better, calmer, less haunted.
Josh continued to observe him.
Finally he nodded, but his next words spoke a warning. ‘I love your sister and I love your family. Don’t do anything stupid. They’ve been through enough. We all have.’
It didn’t take a rocket scientist to know what Josh meant, but one thing Digby knew, for all his grief and loss and darkness, that wasn’t him. He met Josh’s gaze with strength. ‘I won’t.’ He breathed in. ‘I promise you.’
Josh nodded and tilted his head back to survey the starry sky, his relief palpable. Then he squeezed Digby’s shoulder. ‘Take it easy, okay?’
‘I will. I might go for a drive.’ He waved vaguely towards the stables and his apartment above the five-car garage. ‘I don’t want to …’ He sucked in a breath.
‘Yeah.’ Josh looked up at the line of windows. ‘Yeah,’ he repeated, the word loaded with understanding. Then he gave a small smile of reassurance. ‘Do what you have to do. I’ll let them know.’
Digby kept the Mercedes at a safe speed. There were not enough words in the universe to thank Josh for what he’d done for Felicity, or for him. It was Josh who, risking his own life, had dragged Digby to safety from the quarry ruins then raced back in a futile attempt to dig Felicity from the disintegrating rock face. His friendship felt like the only crutch Digby had left in this life, and he refused to let him down.
The road began to snake as it wound south-eastward. The number of buildings alongside increased as the land switched from cattle and sheep grazing to dairy farming. A few centre-pivot and lateral irrigation systems spread skinny, gleaming metal arms across the paddocks. The ground turned rockier as limestone outcrops broke the soil surface, the tips ghost-grey in the moonlight.
