Second Sight

by Aoife Clifford

  Alan shakes his head. ‘I took care of Tyrell for you. Not Mick’s daughter.’

  Janey tucks the pistol into the back of her waistband, her face like granite. ‘Give me your shotgun, then.’

  ‘No,’ I croak. ‘Please, Alan, you can’t. For Dad’s sake.’

  At long last he raises his eyes and looks at my face and then he blinks, breaks the connection and passes the shotgun to Janey.

  ‘No!’ I scream, but she wastes no time in grabbing it. ‘Weak prick,’ she mutters, raising the gun. Whimpering, I put out my hands and shut my eyes.

  There’s an ear-splitting bang, and then another.

  I slowly open one eye to see Alan Sharp lying on the floor. Panic floods my system and I scramble to him. There’s a hole in his chest, blood gushing out. Instinctively, I put my hands over it to stem the flow. His eyes roll back in his head and his breath is a wet whistling red and then stops.

  ‘You’ve killed him!’ I yell at Janey.

  ‘And now it’s your turn, you smart-arsed nosy lawyer. You betrayed this town and everyone in it.’

  Janey moves beside me, diminished somehow, much paler but maybe that’s because all I can see is blood. The smell of death switches all my senses to fight mode. My odds have just improved dramatically. She’s smaller and older. I need to get the shotgun off her first.

  ‘How did Paul fit into this?’

  A knife blade of a smile flickers across her face. ‘Paul loved to worm people’s secrets out of them. Jim was putty in his hands, bragging to him about how much money we all made with the birds all those years ago. Paul said why not start it up again, use the new money to get the town back on track, after a healthy cut for him. It wasn’t a bad idea. You lawyers don’t come cheap. Still, there’d be enough to get a settlement for everyone and finance the campaign to run for mayor. Set everything up nicely for the town and me. And then that pathetic excuse Tyrell had to go and wreck everything.’

  Her face contorts in a moment of fury, a split-second loss of focus and I spring, grabbing her hands, trying to wrench the gun away. I kick at her legs, she overbalances and we fall backwards, the shotgun between us.

  Bang.

  There’s a horse kick to the chest but I don’t let go. Janey’s grip lessens and I yank the gun away from her and throw it across the floor. Pushing down on her with all my weight, I look for something to hit her with, to knock her out like they did to me. Every contact leaves a trace, so I grab a fistful of her hair and pull hard. If police forensics ever analyse this place, I want to give them something to find. She screams with fury and pushes me away with one hand, twisting the other behind her back.

  She comes up with her pistol just as the generator gives up again, plunging the shed into darkness.

  Throwing myself to one side, I actually see the flash from the muzzle, feel the shot rushing past my head. In an instant I’m running, seeing nothing, hands outstretched. I’m trying to find the door but I smack straight into metal. It’s the shelving. I’ve come the wrong way. I swallow my cry of pain and grasp the shelf tightly, using it as a guide, trying to make as little noise as possible.

  I trip, then fall and kick something over. There’s the smash of glass.

  Another shot in my direction.

  Cowering, I start to crawl. Something sharp cuts my leg.

  ‘I’m going to find the torch,’ calls Janey, ‘and then I’m going to kill you.’

  I stand up and run away from the direction of her voice, going deeper into the shed. First hide, then think. Everywhere is dark but I can’t count on it staying like that.

  Standing still, I hear her moving. I could creep up behind and throttle her or find something to smack her skull in but I can’t do it. I just want to find somewhere safe to hide.

  She swears as there’s a loud clang. It sounds like the jerry can. Janey laughs. ‘Now that’s an idea,’ she calls, and I hear liquid pouring out, and then more.

  ‘You know, for years I fantasised about burning The Castle down for the insurance. That bushfire was the answer to my prayers. Finally, I could get rid of it. And that’s what I’ll do here. Burn it all down and you with it.’

  I hear the match lighting.

  ‘I like the irony of Eliza Carmody being caught up in a fire in the bush,’ she says, and with that she ignites the petrol. There’s a whoosh as a line of flames instantly leaps up. Janey is a black form behind it. The fire dies down for a moment and I stand there, thinking I should run towards it and try and stamp it out but Janey could be waiting there with a gun. In that moment of hesitation the fire has already found the hay bales. There’s probably a myriad of flammable substances in here. For all I know this place could become a fireball in an instant.

  The flickering flames are enough to work out where I am. I move towards the back, trying to find an exit. Running frantically, my hands outstretched, my fingers catch on a handle. I grab at it desperately but it’s locked. Slamming my hands on it, I feel around for a bolt but I find nothing. I’m locked in and now the only way to escape would be by running through the flames but they’re already too intense.

  I pull my jumper over my nose and mouth. The fire blazes so hot that it evaporates my tears. All is smoky now, an acrid haze. The world blurs black with edges of red and gold. Staggering back to the furthest corner next to the back door, I curl up on the floor trying to breathe the air from outside.

  I know what’s coming next.

  Already metal is beginning to warm and parts of the shed are starting to glow. The roar of the fire drowns out everything else because it is alive now, more alive than I am, growing in strength as I pitifully shrink. It won’t be too much longer now; breathing has become almost impossible. I pray the smoke gets me before the fire does, that I’ll be unconscious as all around me blisters and burns.

  Falling.

  Exploding.

  The world is red.

  My eyes start to shut.

  Through closing eyelids I glimpse a dark shape coming towards me.

  It must be my father.

  He holds out his hand.

  We’re here at the end together.

  33

  Voices rush towards me as I struggle to prise my eyes open. Faces close to mine start talking. Words like ‘sedation’ and ‘ventilator’ float in the air. I try to turn my head but it’s impossible. There are flashing lights, people asking if I can hear them, excruciating pain cutting through before I fall back into darkness again.

  The next time I wake there are two policemen beside my bed. I only know one of them. Gavin bends over me.

  ‘You’re at Southern Cross Hospital.’

  I try to nod but my head won’t move.

  ‘I need to ask you some questions,’ says the policeman who is not Gavin. He is older, with a serious expression. His questions are answered in a voice I don’t recognise, but the burning in my throat tells me it is mine. I watch Gavin’s face when I talk about Janey and Grace. He stands up abruptly and disappears from my field of vision and doesn’t come back until the other cop thanks me and leaves.

  ‘A stranger,’ I whisper to Gavin.

  ‘There’s been enough family involvement in this mess already,’ he says.

  ‘How long?’ My breath is heavy with smoke.

  ‘You’ve been out for three days,’ he says. ‘They had to intubate you. Janey’s under arrest for Jim’s murder. With your evidence we can charge her with Alan’s as well.’

  ‘And Grace?’ I say.

  He nods and then, ‘Eliza.’ He moves to hold my hand but hesitates because it is covered in bandages. ‘Mick died.’

  It takes a long time for my mouth to work. ‘Alone?’ I rasp.

  Gavin shakes his head. ‘Tess and I were both there.’

  The tears come, but they are all Gavin’s. I’ve dried up inside. Ash runs through my veins. All is grey.

  ‘I’m not involved in the investigation,’ says Gavin, ‘but I’ll look in every mine shaft in the state to find Grace if I have to.
’

  My eyes close all by themselves.

  • • •

  Tony Bayless stands by the window, lost in his own thoughts. I watch him for a while. He has bandages on his right hand but otherwise looks unchanged, until he turns around and I see his face.

  ‘Awake at last.’ He sits down next to the bed. Gavin told me he had been admitted to the hospital with burns and smoke inhalation but only had to stay a couple of days.

  ‘I’ve visited a few times,’ he says, ‘but you’ve always been asleep. How are you?’

  The natural response is to say fine but I am far from it. Peel back my skin and it feels like all you would see is black.

  ‘I’m alive,’ I say. ‘Thanks to you.’

  His mouth twists. ‘I brought you something.’ He lifts it up to show me. It’s a copy of the picture Aaron Hedland has kept in his wallet for twenty years. The three of us on the beach. The one Janey Bayless took of us the same night she killed Grace.

  ‘Did you put that in the Hedland’s letterbox?’ I ask.

  He nods. ‘I felt guilty.’

  ‘Did you know?’

  ‘I thought she ran away,’ he says. ‘I’ve been trying to convince myself I’d have done something if I’d known what had happened.’

  He wants me to say of course he would have but I can’t. It’s hard to do the right thing when your parent has killed someone.

  ‘I should have asked more questions,’ he says. ‘If not about Grace, about all the other stuff. Seen what was right in front of me. But I ignored it. I’m not brave like you.’

  ‘You ran into a burning building and pulled me out,’ I say, but already my eyelids are flickering.

  ‘You’re tired,’ he says. ‘I just wanted to say goodbye.’

  ‘Back to Kinsale?’

  Tony shakes his head. ‘Not after this. Maybe never again.’

  He bends over and kisses me on the cheek and then walks out of the room.

  • • •

  Slowly, I begin to put myself together. As my medication levels drop, the world comes back into increasing focus. The swelling starts to disappear. Some of the dressings come off, but not all of them. The red rawness underneath will harden into scars that I will have for life.

  My lungs and arterial blood gases are checked. The medics worry about infection or pneumonia and talk of electrolytes and sugar levels. A psych team comes in and does an assessment. It’s bad but under the circumstances ‘perfectly normal’, according to the kind doctor.

  Every medical person who comes into my room tells me I’m lucky, all except one. Tristan pops by every day on Amy’s orders. I’ve come to appreciate his complete lack of bedside manner and how he never gives me an ounce of sympathy.

  I slip into the routine of the hospital. The awful meals that arrive at regular intervals, the changing of the ward staff, the organised chaos of day shift, the fleeting ghosts of night shift, the little acts of kindness and dedication from the nurses. In this ordered world I spend time thinking, methodically making connections where there hadn’t been any, trying to put all the pieces together and work out what will happen next.

  People visit. My personal assistant from work comes in with flowers and information. I surprise her by dictating a letter with strict instructions about who to deliver it to. When Amy visits she brings her baby and the green hat to cheer me up and it works. Tess was right when she said it was hard to predict what would help.

  Two weeks later I’m sitting on my bed with my bag packed beside me. Tristan pokes his head around the door.

  ‘Haven’t you gone yet?’ he says.

  ‘Waiting to be discharged.’

  ‘Amy’s been trying to call you. Ring her back so she stops texting me. I’ve got a job to do, you know.’

  ‘Will do,’ I say.

  ‘Hopefully we’ll never need to see each other again,’ he says. ‘But if you have to come back, try and make it a bit more run of the mill, like a burst appendix or your tonsils.’

  After he leaves, I unzip my handbag with stiff bandaged hands and slowly unlock my phone. There’s the one-word message from Melanie that I’ve been waiting for and a million from Amy, peppered with exclamation marks. Various media reports are attached and I scroll through them, enjoying the headlines, but my phone rings before I can read them all.

  ‘How did you do it?’ asks Amy.

  ‘What do you mean?’ I say. ‘I’ve been stuck in hospital.’

  ‘You don’t fool me,’ she says. ‘Your confidential expert report is all over the news.’

  For the first time in ages, I feel like smiling.

  ‘Actually, Melanie did mention something about how poor overworked Andrew rushed when sending out the latest round of court documents to all the parties and accidentally attached the old expert report instead of his rubbish new one.’

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘The firm realised their mistake, of course, claimed privilege and got them returned, but perhaps one of the other parties made a copy and then picked the perfect moment to leak it.’

  ‘To Stella Gibson? That’s quite a coincidence,’ says Amy.

  ‘Kinsale’s answer to Lois Lane? She’s the natural pick.’

  I hear Amy laughing on the other end of the phone. ‘Andrew will regret messing you around.’

  ‘He’s leaving the firm.’ I’ve been bursting to tell someone.

  ‘What? That’s not in the articles.’

  ‘He put in his resignation this morning.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’ve got no idea.’

  ‘Yeah, right. What do you think will happen to the case now?’

  ‘Colcart will have to settle. They’ve got no choice now everyone’s seen that report.’

  Amy is speechless. I can almost hear her grinning through the phone. Eventually she says, ‘So when are you leaving?’

  ‘Gavin should be here any moment,’ I tell her.

  ‘Take it easy,’ she says.

  ‘Give Sophie a kiss from me,’ I reply, and hang up.

  I scroll back and read Melanie’s text. DONE. The letter had been high-stakes poker. Lying here, I thought about how Andrew had made Rob Eslake’s death threat public. As far as I could work out, only three people had known about it, Rob, myself and the person who wrote it. My letter to Andrew had been succinct. Either he resign or I would disclose to the partnership that I believed he was the author. Melanie’s text told me the outcome.

  A young doctor comes by and ticks all the boxes, which means I can go.

  ‘Is someone picking you up?’ she asks.

  ‘He must be waiting outside,’ I say.

  ‘I’ll organise a wheelchair.’

  I am wheeled through the hospital with my bag on my lap and the hat on my head so I don’t accidentally squash it. The Mustang is in the two-minute parking bay but, instead of Gavin, Tess gets out.

  ‘You?’ I say.

  ‘Gavin got caught up with work.’

  Tess has been a regular presence by my hospital bed, but this is the first time we’ve been alone together. She takes my bags, giving the hat a sideways glance, but says nothing. I sit down slowly. The dressing on my back pulls at my skin and I carefully straighten myself in the seat.

  ‘So you drive the Mustang now?’ I say.

  She nods. ‘Didn’t want the battery to get flat on you. Where do you want to go?’ she asks.

  I don’t want to go back to my apartment. It was never really home, just some kind of placeholder that became permanent without me even realising.

  ‘Kinsale.’

  Tess looks surprised but then nods.

  She takes it easy but even so the drive is difficult. We stop regularly to give me a break, so I can gingerly move around and take my painkillers. I try to drowse. On the outskirts of Kinsale, Tess’s phone rings and I manage to answer it for her. Gavin says to pull over because he needs to tell us something. His voice crackles in and out but the message is clear. They’ve found bones on the property n
ext to Alan Sharp’s.

  An entirely different pain starts to radiate out from my chest.

  Grief.

  ‘Dr Adler will be on site in the morning,’ he says. ‘We’ll know for sure tomorrow.’

  It’s got priority now.

  ‘Have you told Grace’s family?’ I try to say, but I can’t because it’s too hard to breathe. Somehow Gavin guesses and answers yes.

  We sit there for a long time. I think Tess is waiting for me to say something but I can’t. This isn’t Grace, it’s just her bones. No-one can bring Grace back. Amy was right. The truth of what happened has freed my sister but all it has done to Grace’s family is replace a benign lie with a horrible truth. Is that better?

  We drive on in silence because we’re still not used to talking to each other, or perhaps there are some subjects so big that words are not enough.

  Tess pulls up in front of the house.

  ‘Here we are,’ she says.

  I unclip my seatbelt.

  ‘I never got a chance to say . . .’ Tess begins, ‘and you nearly died . . . you don’t know what it’s like not having that as a burden anymore.’ She starts to cry.

  ‘It’s OK,’ I say.

  ‘But you’re not.’

  ‘I will be again. Both of us are going to be OK.’

  I wish I could say more to her, tell her I can see a glimmer of things being better between us, that one day our relationship will be fixed, but I’m too tired right now.

  It’s like I’ve got to the finish line and there is nothing left.

  34

  We had Dad’s funeral. The town turned out for it like they always do. Gavin spoke on behalf of the family. Tess and I sat next to each other in the front row. Scores of police lined the streets as the hearse went past. The female detective from the Luke Tyrell case tried to shake my bandaged hand and spoke comforting words to Tess. The wake was at the footy club because The Royal has been closed. Rumours are it will be sold but no-one knows for sure. Dave came along to the drinks. He brought his daughter and made her apologise. I told her not to worry, in my new husky voice. Being a teenager in Kinsale isn’t easy. Aaron Hedland sat at the back of the church during the service. That was kind of him, I thought. Aaron didn’t try to talk to me or come along afterwards. His mother is unwell again. The funeral for Grace was family only, which upset Amy, but I don’t blame them.