Crossings

by Ashley Capes

  And the vision from the white kangaroo.

  The ashes in water – the aftermath of a fire? It clearly linked to the fire she saw during the first vision. And the paintbrush...well, didn’t that mean her father? But why? And the ute was a clear warning. Something dark was attacking it, something powerful enough to rock the whole vehicle.

  Finally, there’d been a blinding-white owl. As if it was covered in mirror-pieces, like a mosaic? She sat up. Ben’s house. Ben. It all came back to Ben.

  Lisa flung the sheet aside and ran for her phone. Nearly flat. “Damn.” She plugged it in and fumbled through dishes on the bench until she found Detective McConnell’s card. She dialled and tapped a bare foot on the cool tiles.

  “Detective McConnell speaking.”

  “Detective? It’s Lisa Thomas, I need your help.”

  “Is there something you’d like to tell me?”

  “Yes. I think Ben is behind everything that’s happening. I want you to come with me when I go and confront him at his parents’ house.” No taking chances and no being fobbed off this time either. She’d kick the damn door in.

  “I wouldn’t advise that.”

  “I could use a reliable witness.”

  Silence followed. “That’s just not a good idea, I’m afraid.”

  “Fine. At least you know where I’ll be.” She hung up, changed her top then stepped into her jeans. “Come on, come on,” she said, pulling the laces on her boots tight. Straight into the Holden and out of town, along the outer roads and then she was turning up toward the mud brick property and its owl statue.

  Killing the engine, she took a deep breath then popped the boot and got out. The sun beat down on her head and shoulders and she wiped her face. Only mid-morning and it was already too damn hot. Inside the boot, she pulled up the lining and lifted the tyre iron from atop the spare but paused with one hand on the lid. The rumble of a car engine.

  Down on the road, a silver car sped toward the turn into the Drummond property. She glanced at the house. No movement in the windows, no-one came to the door. McConnell was winding up the driveway.

  The wheels soon ground to a halt before her.

  “You need to get back into your car, put that down and head home,” he said once he stepped out. As before, his composure defied the elements; no sweat, no flushed face, nothing.

  “Thanks for coming. I think Ben’s lost control.” She strode toward the front door.

  “Lisa.”

  She thumped on the door. “Ben? Ben – get out here and...” The door swung open. Dirt was strewn across the hallway. Beyond, a houseplant lay in a shattered pot on dark slate tiles.

  “Miss Thomas, you can’t –” McConnell stopped beside her.

  “If he’s in there I want to know,” Lisa said. “He’s the one who did all this.”

  His frown was fleeting. “You think Ben killed all those people?”

  “He’s involved.”

  Detective McConnell moved around Lisa and into the house. “Mr Drummond? Are you all right?”

  Lisa followed him down the hall. Family portraits hung on the wall in ornate frames. Full of smiling people. She stopped, taking one down with a wordless murmur. She and Ben at a party, both laughing, both with drinks in their hands and the rainbow wreckage of a party popper in her hair. Was it sweet or sad that they’d kept the picture?

  “Miss Thomas?”

  She returned it and joined Detective McConnell in the kitchen. On the table a place had been set for one – but the plate was covered in grass. Animal droppings littered the chair.

  Her stomach twisted. “What’s going on?”

  “I have no idea,” he said. The detective peered over the kitchen sink and his lip curled.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Blood.”

  In the sink, a shallow pool of blood. What had stopped up the drain? “Human?”

  “I don’t know.” He drew a gun from beneath his jacket. “Something is going on here, you’re right about that. Might be safest if you stay close to me now.”

  Carpeted steps led up to the second storey. Detective McConnell started up but Lisa paused by the door beneath the stairs. A heavy table and an armchair had been placed against it. Something...wrong spread from beyond the door. Where was Ben? Where were his parents? Away? On holiday as usual?

  She took the arm of the chair and hesitated.

  “Miss Thomas?”

  She flinched.

  “Lisa. Can you join me up here.” It wasn’t a question, and his tone suggested more unpleasantness.

  Up the stairs and onto the landing where McConnell stood before Ben’s old room. Further down the hall waited a closed door with a tassel hanging from the handle – his parents’ room. A hall table had been dragged across the doorway and a heavy statue from the yard outside rested before it, a great concrete Buddha, his smiling face oddly complacent in the quiet – a quiet which grew more unnatural the longer she stood in the Drummond home.

  “What is it?”

  He stepped aside. “Animals have been here.”

  Ben’s room was a converted exercise space, but the treadmill had been knocked into a window; shattered glass piled on the dark carpet below like sharp ice. A blowfly buzzed in through the gap, a dull sound adding to chaos. It flew to a fluoro pink mat on the floor, coming to rest on a clot of blood and hair.

  Dark hair, not white.

  More blood spots and smears were visible in the room – along with scars in the carpet, as if torn by claws. A smear of blood crossed the mud brick walls, spanning a vintage Coke poster down to the skirting board.

  Yet it didn’t seem like enough blood to prove a death. “How much blood would indicate a murder?”

  He ran thumb and forefinger over his moustache. “More than this. But it appears to be another attack.” He glanced at her a moment. Was he thinking about Steve and the fountain? Or Fathead in his van?

  She returned the look. “Think I’d do this then call you over to ‘discover’ it with me?”

  “You said you wanted a reliable witness.”

  “Then I’m a master criminal doing hard drugs to stay awake – because I spent most of last night with Dad in the hospital.” Not a complete lie.

  His expression softened but he shook his head. “Look, you have to know that –” He stopped, turning to the window. “I smell smoke.”

  “Fire?”

  He glanced over his shoulder before turning back to the window. “You haven’t heard? The forecast is bad. Not Black Saturday bad – but we need to check.” He started down the stairs and Lisa hurried after, rushing from the house. In the driveway, she spun a circle. Smoke pumped into the sky like an ugly grey worm, looming over the hills in the distance. “How close is it?”

  “Come on.” He strode to his car and switched ABC radio on. The announcer was finishing a list of places at risk. “...and finally, people in areas surrounding Yarsdale are advised to monitor news outlets for incidents involving the fire in the Alpine National Park.” Detective McConnell turned it down but didn’t switch it off. He reached for his police radio and called the station.

  “Lidelson Station.”

  “Karen, it’s Andrew McConnell. What’s the latest?”

  “Nothing new. CFA’s still doing last minute back-burning.” Her voice crackled over the speakers. “We could use a hand down here, actually.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “The Browns and the Healy boys are getting into it. Gerry’s trying to calm them down but it’s going to turn bad. I can tell.”

  “I’ll be there soon.” McConnell’s expression was clouded with worry as he stared across the hills to the plume of smoke.

  Billy Brown was an idiot – and so were Clint’s sons, it seemed. But then, she could hardly blame them. Any of them.

  “Do you
have family around here?” she asked.

  “No – but you know how these fires can change direction. If it’s in the park now, it could easily run down toward Mansfield. My mother is in a home there.”

  “Oh.”

  “You should go home and keep the radio on. And no more stunts like this,” he said, removing his jacket and tossing it on the passenger seat, his shoulder holster dark against his shirt.

  “So you do think I had something to do with all that inside?”

  “No idea what to think anymore.” He rolled back his sleeves, part of an apparent concession to the heat, then hopped into the car and backed onto the grass, turning toward town. Lisa glanced to the smoke. He was right – distant yes, but fire moved when the wind got behind it.

  She tilted her head as something moved at the treeline, just beyond the yard. A dark figure stepped out then ducked back in. As if hiding. She took a step closer, shielding her eyes with a hand. No movement now. Was it Ben? Was he hiding out there in the trees?

  The tyre iron had grown slick. She wiped her hands on her jeans then squeezed the steel tight. It had to be him. He’d heard the car when she arrived and ran out back.

  Lisa took a few more steps toward the edge of the yard. If she ran, could she catch him? If he lurked in the trees and if it was Ben...did she want to? Hard to forget the blood in the sink. And the marks in the exercise room or the sense of wrongness from beneath the stairs.

  Despite Detective McConnell’s warning...she’d come for answers. The white roo showed her the owl for a reason. There was something to be discovered here. And there was that faint smile too, when Ben mentioned getting a new rifle. Lisa clenched her teeth. Her heart rate was up. Just go. Get on with it, Mum would have said. She set off at a run, tyre iron swinging.

  The treeline loomed before her, shadows thick between the trunks. She leapt over a sharp depression and detoured a young fruit tree before skidding to a halt at the barbed-wire fence. Was this the spot where the figure appeared? She pushed on the wire where the tension lagged and climbed through the fence, stepping into the trees.

  Shade cloaked her. The crunch of bark underfoot filled the bush. The scent of hot gum leaves; it should have been wonderful. No birds sang. No sign of a dark figure, not even a sense that anyone had set foot within the trees recently. No crushed leaves on the ground, no bent saplings. Deeper into the trees the shadows stood thicker, sound grew duller. Was there a slight hiss of breath back where the dark was so profound? The image of a kangaroo, fur matted with blood, flashed in her mind. Had he been killing more?

  Her imagination was flailing. If it was Ben in the dark...she could find out if she charged through the undergrowth.

  Yet what if he was waiting there, smiling? Waiting for her to come closer, to move further from the light and deeper into the anonymity of the trees. She’d be at his mercy and no-one would see if he hurt her. Or worse, know if he killed her. Was he that far gone?

  Damn him.

  Lisa backed into the daylight, keeping an eye on the shadows.

  She climbed through the fence again then jogged for the car, glancing over her shoulder several times. Always the trees were still, empty. He hadn’t been there. Just her imagination. No breathing, no smiling in the dark.

  If she wanted answers there was another place to check.

  The room beneath the stairs.

  With one more glance at the distant smoke, she returned to the house. Dirt scraped against slate beneath her boots. The moment she reached the door, the feeling returned in a long, sick wave. The front door was still ajar. If something lurked down there it was something unnatural.

  She went for her mobile but swore. It was at home, charging. She found the Drummond’s phone and dialled Robert; best to leave Gerry out of it. No answer. She left a message and set the tyre iron down a moment. Then she shifted the furniture from in front of the door but stopped when a shiver rippled across her entire body – like oily hands over her skin.

  The sensation lingered when she reached for the handle. Gritting her teeth, she pulled the door open. Steps led down to darkness. She flicked the light switch – nothing.

  “Fine.” Lisa dragged the table before the door, propping it open. The small amount of light it ensured was better than nothing, but she still went back to the car for her Maglite. The greasy, slick sensation swimming across her skin faded but it returned the moment she reached the stairs.

  One hand carried the torch and the other gripped the iron.

  The beam cleaved the dark as she descended, pausing at the bottom to wrinkle her nose. Something was ‘off.’ Like bad meat. She tried to slow her breathing as the torchlight passed over shelves stacked with tools and piles of boxes and plastic tubs, each marked in the handwriting of Ben’s mother – the same graceful loops that Lisa had always seen on birthday and Christmas cards.

  Jennifer, a kind woman. Nothing like her son.

  If he’d hurt her...Lisa squeezed the iron again. What was she thinking? He’d been acting strange but shit, he wouldn’t kill his own parents. Yet, the scratching in the room above, the blood in the sink – was it another roo attack? Misplaced vengeance? Hard to imagine a kangaroo managing the stairs.

  The weight of the oil against her skin increased, as if she’d entered a pool that grew deeper with each step. Something blue flashed in the torchlight beyond a stack of boxes. The corner of a tarp? She pushed through the feeling, blinking against it when she reached the boxes – only to fall against them.

  Piles of skin lay in the centre of the tarp.

  Flecked red and pink, the folds sagged over one another. Some pieces were stretched, so thin as to appear translucent beneath the shaking beam of her torch. Other clumps were thick with hair and several pieces bore even edges, cuts, each a deep red. At the edge of the pile rested a large toenail and one patch of skin bore black marks – tattooed skin.

  The outline of the Southern Cross.

  A garbled sound was swallowed up by the dark basement and Lisa spun, raising the torch.

  Alone. No-one. Nothing.

  The sound had been a groan. “Oh God.” She’d made the sound herself.

  Lisa forced her body forward, checking the pile again, shining the beam on the tattoo. The five stars of the Southern Cross. Ben’s tattoo, Ben’s tattoo. She moved the torchlight higher – a bench with a sink stood beyond the pile. Resting atop lay a tin tray lined with surgical implements – a scalpel most prominent, its tip a deep red.

  Ordered.

  Neat, just like the pile and the tarp itself. Nothing an animal could achieve.

  Human hands had done the bloody work.

  Her breath came a little harder and the beam wavered as she shifted it along the bench. And stopped.

  A huge skull sat atop a pile of moist earth. Longer than anything human, with deep grooves for eye sockets, it almost looked to have a beak – but it was no bird.

  Kangaroo.

  The bone had yellowed to a deep brown in places and cracks covered the surface, but the teeth remained. Despite the apparent decay, the thinness of some parts, the skull was whole.

  Ancient.

  And the greasy, sickening feeling of wrongness poured from it.

  Malice washed over her as a light flashed in the eyes.

  Something crashed above. She spun. Glass shattered and a shadow passed before the door – just a silhouette – but no shape she could fathom. Leaping for the stairs, Lisa cried out when the door was slammed as if by a great force. She climbed, taking them two at a time, and crashed into the door. It didn’t budge. Where was the handle? She beat against the surface with the iron. “Let me out,” she cried.

  No answer except a shuffling from beyond and more breaking glass.

  She continued to beat on the door until her arms grew heavy – anything was better than being trapped with the skin, the skull and the weight o
f the oil. She’d dropped the torch – she’d been hammering the door in pitch black.

  Lisa slumped against the wood and cast the iron aside. It clanged down to the concrete. Fumbling for the Maglite, her fingers wrapped around the shaft. Twisting the head, she shook the light and it blinked on.

  Yet it made no difference.

  Trapped.

  Chapter 21.

  “Lisa? Hello? Lisa, are you here?”

  Robert’s voice, muffled by the door. She stood and thumped on the grain. “In here,” she called. Footsteps approached. “Beneath the stairs.”

  “I’m here,” he said, voice nearly covered by the scrape of furniture. The door swung open and she blinked against the light, stumbling free. Robert took her arm and led her to a chair across from the plate of grass. “What happened? Are you all right?”

  She nodded. “I think so. Thanks.”

  “Are you sure? You’re covered in sweat,” he said, crouching before her.

  Lisa wiped her forehead. It was almost odd that her hand wasn’t covered in thick oil – only salty sweat. She glanced at a silver clock on the wall. Lunchtime. “I was in there for a couple of hours I guess.”

  “I was in the back garden,” he said. “I didn’t get your message until just now.”

  “It’s not your fault.” She couldn’t stop the shaking in her hands.

  “Let me get you some water,” he said, moving around the bench.

  She straightened in the chair. “Not from there.”

  “Why not, it’s –” He stopped, eyes widening. “What’s going on?”

  “Not in here.” She started for the door. “We should talk outside.”

  By the Holden she took a moment to breathe in hot air, leaning against the warm driver’s door. Anything was better than the basement. Lurking over the hills, the column of smoke had spread across a third of the sky. “Something’s happened to Ben.”

  “Is he dead too?”

  “I think so...it’s like Fat – like James and Steven.”

  He looked away. “I heard about that. I’m sorry I didn’t call you. I dropped around but you were with your dad and then I had an appointment with the specialist.”