Chris took a couple of sips of coffee, still hot, before he plucked up enough courage.
“Patrick,” he said in a loud stage whisper across to his table.
No reaction.
He tried again.
This time he got something. Patrick waved one hand to the side as if waving away an annoyance. Chris grunted to himself. There was nothing for it. He stood and walked over to his table, standing right in front of him across the other side of the table.
“Patrick, I have to talk to you,” he said.
Again, the gesture with the hand.
“Patrick?”
Patrick lifted his face briefly. His dark cloudy eyes focused on Chris’s face for an instant, narrowing; then, he looked away.
Chris sighed, pulled out a chair and sat. The noise of the chair moving across the polished floor seemed unnaturally loud. “Listen,” he said. “This might sound crazy—but you know something, don’t you?”
The waitress was standing behind the counter watching them. He’d kept his voice deliberately low. He didn’t know what he was dealing with, or if there was any threat in even talking about it. Patrick’s reaction at their last meeting had told him that there was need for caution. Patrick leaned down to one side and shuffled around inside one of the shopping bags. He came up empty, then reached for his cup and lifted it, completely ignoring Chris. His gaze was fixed towards the entrance to the shopping center.
Chris leaned forward. “Listen. You spoke to me before. You said something about Sta…about my wife. I need to know what you meant, what you were talking about.”
Slowly, slowly, Patrick’s head swung about to face him. Again, he narrowed his eyes. There was understanding in those dark shadowed depths. The lank hair falling on either side only increased the impression of darkness. He flexed and unflexed his brown, soiled fingers. This close, Chris could smell the man, old, unwashed human wafting mustily across the table to him. Patrick worked his mouth as if readying himself to say something, but reached for his coffee cup instead.
Chris watched as he took another noisy slurp and placed his cup back down, rattling against the brightly painted yellow and white saucer.
“Can’t smoke here,” Patrick said, flexing his fingers again. He frowned, making the deep line across his eyes even deeper. “Can’t smoke. Could before. Could do lots of things before.”
He stared at him. What did that have to do with anything?
“It is Patrick, isn’t it?” Chris said, growing uncertain now.
“Patrick,” he said. “Patrick. Was Patrick once. Is Patrick. Not Patrick.” A quick flickering glance and he looked away again. It was as if he were afraid to meet Chris’s eyes.
“I’m Chris.”
Patrick gave a little nod.
“Look, Patrick, you said something to me the other day at the bus shelter. Do you remember? You said something about my wife, about someone taking her away. Do you remember that?”
Patrick waved his hand several times in succession fluttering his fingers in the air. Chris suddenly remembered. This was the very table where the old man had sat with the two women. He glanced up over towards the counter. The waitress was still watching. He grimaced.
“Dammit, Patrick, I need you to tell me,” he hissed.
Patrick’s gaze shot to Chris’s face at his outburst, but again he looked away. Chris put his hand flat on the table and leaned further in towards him.
“I need you to tell me what it is. What do you want? Money? Is that it? I have money.”
Patrick wiped his hand on his greasy blue sweater.
“Don’t need money. Got money.”
Chris hadn’t thought about it before, but it was strange that someone like Patrick would come and sit in this little café and sip at designer coffee from designer cups.
“Well what do you want?”
Patrick shook his head.
“What is it about my wife?”
“Pretty girl,” Patrick said thoughtfully.
“What did you see?”
Patrick nodded to himself. “See. Always see. Took her, didn’t they? Took her to the place.”
“What place? Who? What are you saying?”
“The men. Came and took her. Just like Patrick. She’s okay now. Worked for her. Not for Patrick.”
Chris frowned, not really understanding what Patrick was getting at.
“You too.” He pointed at Chris, then wiped his hand on his front again. He ran his tongue across stained teeth, his attention slipping away again.
“Go to church,” he muttered.
Chris sat back. “I’m sorry, Patrick. I don’t understand what you’re saying. No, I don’t go to church. I’m not religious. Is that what this is about?”
Patrick shook his head and grimaced. He pushed back his chair and stood, staring across at the shops on the other side, through the passing people, seeing only something he could see.
As he leaned down to retrieve his shopping bags, Chris grabbed at his coat.
“You have to tell me.”
Though soiled, the coat was surprisingly soft beneath his grasp. Patrick shook off his hand.
“Go now.”
Chris made another grab for him, gripping a good handful this time. Patrick pulled against him, struggling to get away, but still not saying anything, just making small wordless grunting sounds in his throat.
The waitress was over in an instant. “Is he bothering you?” she asked Chris.
Chris let go of the handful of Patrick’s sleeve and Patrick staggered away, bearing his twin plastic shopping bags with him. Chris hadn’t even thought to try to see what was inside them to try to get some more clues about the man.
“No, no, it’s fine,” he said to her, watching Patrick disappear towards the exit.
She looked from Chris, then out after Patrick’s retreating back, then back again. “You’re sure,” she said dubiously. “Did he do something? He comes here a lot, drinks his coffee. He seems pretty harmless, so we let him be. He’s never made any trouble.”
“No, no. Nothing,” Chris said. “I’m sorry. Everything’s fine.”
She retreated to the counter, still watching him. With a wordless mutter to himself, Chris stood and returned to his own table to retake his seat. He lifted his coffee cup thoughtfully and sipped at the lukewarm brew. He’d achieved virtually nothing. He had a couple of scraps of information. According to Patrick, someone had taken Stase away, just like he’d been taken away at some point. The whole business about church was confusing though. Maybe he was just mad after all. Some reference to repentance and salvation. He remembered the old guy in the city, dressed in a double-breasted suit and carrying a bible, who used to harangue passers-by with shouted religious monologues. He’d been a banker or something, and had just simply lost it as he got older. No, but that didn’t make any sense at all. Patrick didn’t seem like a ranting religious lunatic, not at all, so what did he mean about church?
Well, apparently Chris had wasted roughly three days and was none the wiser for his efforts. All he had were a few more intriguing clues—intriguing and frustrating at the same time.
The thing that worried Chris most was what Patrick had said about something happening to him, to Chris personally. At least that’s what he thought he had said. If something had been done to him, surely he’d have some memory of what took place? He wasn’t the crazy one. It wasn’t good enough. He had to find some other means of working out what had been going on.
As he walked out of the shopping center and headed for home, he passed Patrick huddled in a corner in the entranceway, cigarette clutched between dirty fingers, staring out into the middle distance and muttering to himself in incomprehensible phrases. Chris almost hesitated, but then thought better of it. There was not even a flicker from Patrick as he passed. It was as if Chris didn’t even exist, as if their recent conversation had never even taken place.
Chapter Eleven
Skeletons
Before they moved, Stase�
��s plans had blossomed like a garden of expectations in her head, culled from magazines, newspapers, the television and anywhere she could find her inspiration. You know what they say—if you’re going to steal, steal from the best. For some reason, right around that time, house programs, renovation, buying, decorating were all the rage on TV and they seemed to multiply with every passing day. There were celebrity gardeners and celebrity decorators and celebrity home make-over experts. Then came the shows wandering through the houses of the well-off, peering into grand rooms with grand furniture and fittings. It was almost as if the whole of the media industry was suddenly targeted to fulfill Anastasia’s personal desires. Maybe it was just that Chris had started to notice it.
After that first flurry of moving, when they were finally starting to get settled in the new house, those plans grew and started taking over everything Stase did. Chris lost count of the number of times he walked into the bare-boarded lounge, sighed and turned around to leave and find something else to do. There was no talking to her when her shows were on. Well there was, but it was all “what do you think of that” and “isn’t that wonderful,” barely pausing to hear whether he had an opinion or not and then substituting it with her own.
They had a local builder whom they’d used on their old place to do small things, and as they hadn’t moved far away, Stase invited him around to discuss plans, or her conception of plans. Michael, short and wiry, with a tightly bunched head of curly hair, slightly thinning at the crown and temples, was always eager to explore the Anastasia’s ideas. Chris had always assumed it gave him a creative outlet on top of his kitchens and garden sheds that were the stock of his normal trade. Michael also apparently fancied himself as a creative genius and charged them an arm and a leg for the privilege of being able to play. Money was no object as far as Anastasia’s plans were concerned. Once, Chris came back to find them standing in the back garden of their old place talking about pergolas and decking and garden landscaping. He could hardly believe it; it was such a small house.
He talked to her later about it and she told him earnestly about how much value those renovations would add to the place, regardless of the thousands they would cost. Chris put his foot down. Six weeks later, he was away on business. He returned to find a transformation—pergola, decking, paving stones, the lot. Anastasia had gone ahead and arranged for the work to be done while he was gone. There wasn’t much he could do apart from be furious. Stuck in the impotence of a fait-accompli. He got over it, like he got over many things. She was right, of course; it added thousands to the value of the house when they ended up selling it, but that wasn’t the point. It was yet another grudging concession he made to her perfect dream. Another thing to be shoved away, buried deep in the minefield that becomes the history of any relationship.
Michael came over and they huddled together on the couch, poring over sketches and clippings, page after page strewn across the coffee table. Chris sat back in the armchair, sipping at his coffee, watching. After about an hour, Michael sat back and nodded approvingly.
“You’ve got some great ideas here,” he said.
Anastasia put her hand on his forearm. “Do you really think so?”
“Yes, of course. You’ve got a great eye, Stase. Of course you’re going to need planning permission.”
She sat back then. “What do you mean?”
“Well, for extensions this size, you’ll definitely need approval.”
She started shuffling through the papers in front of her. “But that’s not going to be a problem, right?”
Michael took a moment before answering. “Well, some of the things you’re planning are pretty ambitious. There are all sorts of considerations. You have to make sure of maintaining the local character. And then you have to worry about the neighbors, make sure there aren’t any objections. Of course I can help you.”
Stase stood and started pacing. “They can’t object can they? What do we need to do?”
Michael tracked her as she walked. “Well, there’s a bunch of forms to fill in, and then there are the sketches. I’ve got a friend. He kind of doubles as an architect.”
Stase looked thoughtful. “So we need an architect?”
“Oh yes. The detailed drawings always help with planning approval. Do you want me to talk to my friend?”
Stase stopped her pacing and returned to the couch. “Chris and I need to talk about it first.”
“All right,” said Michael. “But you just let me know.”
Chris could see that Michael was convinced he was in for the job and the dollar signs were already clicking behind his eyes.
As soon as Stase had ushered Michael out the door and thanked him for coming around, she had that look on her face that told Chris she had more than plans.
“Right,” she said. “We need an architect.”
“But Michael said that—”
“No,” she said, lifting a hand. “If there’s any possibility that we can’t get approval for this, then we have to do it properly.”
Chris felt another sigh growing within him. “Okay, tell me what you mean.”
“I mean we get the best architect. We have plans drawn up, proper plans, and we do the whole approval thing properly. We can’t blow this.”
He frowned at her and shook his head. “This isn’t some grand mansion, Stase. We’re not building a palace.”
“But if we do this work, the house is just going to be worth so much more. This is a good place, but it can be better. It’s not the place I want, but if we do the work properly, we can live here for a couple of years, then trade up.” She held her hand out flat and hit the empty air several times in succession as if patting something into place.
Chris sighed. He knew it was no point trying to talk her out of it. She believed she could do it, so why not let her try. There was a level of comfort to be had from her contentment and focus. Once upon a time, Chris had been the project; now it was the house.
The next day, Stase started making calls, and for the following two weeks, they interviewed a procession of architects. One by one, she ushered them into the place and listened to them as they discussed their visions. As they trooped past down the hallway, he could see the expressions of doubt on some of their faces. Why were they being called in to a job this size? Some of these firms worked on huge public buildings and residential complexes. They narrowed it down to three possible contenders and Chris wasn’t convinced about any of them. All he really knew about them was their price tag.
“What is it about these guys?” he asked her.
“It’s simple,” she said, looking at him as if he was slightly slow. “These are reputable firms and if we’re going to do this thing, we’re going to do it the right way. You heard what Michael said about the planning authority.”
“And what’s this going to cost?”
“That’s not important. It will add so much value to the house that we’ll get it all back in the long run.”
The following day, she called Michael again. “We want you to be involved,” she told him. “Mainly for the internal decoration, but I want to hear what you think about the architects. Will you come over and look at some sketches?”
So there it was again. Another evening of drawings and plans and visions. As usual, Chris sat in the chair and watched.
Michael rubbed his jaw and looked doubtful. “You have to be careful about these people,” he told her, slightly put out that he apparently wasn’t going to get the lion’s share of the work. “Have they talked about using site managers?”
“Well, yes,” said Stase.
He sat back. “You may as well just throw your money away.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, if the architect employs a site manager, he gets in the way of the builders and you end up having more trouble than it’s worth. They’ll never agree on anything.”
Stase frowned. “I don’t get it.”
“Look,” said Michael. “The architect is there to make as
much money out of you as he can. The more he can do to up the costs of a particular job, the bigger cut he gets. They work on percentage of the total job cost, and that’s on top. It’s in their interest to make sure the job costs more.”
“But we can put a ceiling on it.”
“Sure, but there’s always unforeseen circumstances, parts of the job that have to be redone.”
She wasn’t convinced. “As you said yourself, the important thing is to get the building approval, and these people are among the best. They don’t have a reputation for nothing. We can use that reputation and then once we’ve got what we want, then we decide what we want to do.”
Michael nodded slowly. “It would be much easier to knock up some sketches and just put those in with your planning request. You’ll save yourself a lot of hassle and expense.”
Chris was all for following Michael’s advice and said so. Stase turned and gave him a look like thunder.
“No,” she said. “We’ll do this properly.”
Chris bit his lip and shut up.
It didn’t take her long to swing the conversation back to the plans themselves, and she spent the next couple of hours picking Michael’s brains. Chris listened to the ideas patiently, looked around the living room and felt the sinking feeling wash over him again. Everything was starting to get out of proportion. The feeling had been coming back more and more over the past couple of weeks. The plans were becoming grander and grander, extensions, remodeling—she even started talking about cathedral ceilings, and this was all in a fairly modest house in the suburbs. She was trying to turn it into a distorted reflection of what she eventually wanted, her ideal house. No matter what they had in front of them, all she could see was her dream future overlaying it. Chris knew that what she was talking about was grander than it should have ever been, but any objections he voiced were swept away in an obsessive rush of committed words. They were going to do this, and he knew then, that he was fighting a losing battle.
The Hollowed Page 8
