No Safe Place

by Jenny Spence

  Carol’s whispering now. “Elly, what’s this about? Did you see who it was?”

  “No, it just came out of nowhere.”

  “Is there anything . . .” She’s searching for words. “I mean – you’re not in any trouble, are you?”

  “Me?”

  “Or . . . or Miranda?”

  My brain feels like cotton wool, and I can’t grasp the idea she’s put in there.

  “But . . . it was just random,” I say. “Wasn’t it?”

  Once I’m cleaned up the nurses announce that they’re going to keep me overnight. I assure Carol I’ll be okay and she should head home to the kids. She asks if I’m sure then gives me a hug and tells me she’ll be back in the morning.

  I’m drifting, half-asleep, but there’s a man in the cubicle, and the nurses are trying to order him out.

  “Just a few questions,” he’s insisting. “This is a homicide investigation. It’s very important that I speak to her tonight.”

  Eventually he wears down their resistance and the nurses dissipate.

  I peer at him groggily as he introduces himself as Detective Senior Sergeant Something from the Homicide Squad.

  “Now then, Mrs . . . Ms . . .” he says, flicking through the notebook in his hand.

  “Elly,” I say.

  “How many shots did you hear, Elly?”

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake! Your colleagues have already asked me that a thousand times.”

  “I’m sorry. I need to get the full story from you myself. I know it’s tedious.”

  “Okay then, I didn’t hear any shots. Is that all?”

  “Are you sure? I don’t want to offend you, but not everyone recognises gunshots when they hear them.”

  “Tell me, Senior Detective . . .”

  He says a name, but in my woozy state I forget it straight away.

  “ . . . did anyone else hear any shots?”

  He gives a wry little shrug then says, “Okay, can you tell me what you did hear?”

  “Sure.” I know my speech is a bit slurred, but I can still rely on my memory. “The swish of Jason’s bike tyres. The sound of a car behind me. Mabel calling out to me. Her going ‘Oof’. Running footsteps and screaming – that was Jason coming over. A car driving off.”

  “Can you describe the car?”

  “No, it was behind me the whole time. I didn’t turn around, and Mabel had fallen on top of me by the time it went past.” I’m starting to sound a bit hysterical, but Senior Sergeant Something marches right on.

  “What about the driver?”

  “How could I have seen the driver if I didn’t see the car?” I ask with exaggerated patience.

  “Hmmm,” he murmurs, looking a bit dejected.

  “It was the person in the car,” I say, wanting to help him.

  “What was?”

  “The shooter. You know, what do you call it? The perp.”

  “The ‘perp’? Which cop shows have you been watching?”

  I blush a bit. It did feel a bit silly coming out of my mouth.

  “Anyway, how do you know?”

  “Well, the car was behind me, and it could have passed me but it didn’t. Then it was exactly level with me when . . . when it happened. So the person in the car would have seen what happened, and if it wasn’t them they would have stopped to help wouldn’t they, not accelerated away?”

  “Some people don’t want to get involved,” he says. “Still, I’m pretty sure you’re right, if only because the car would have stopped anyone else from getting a shot at you at just that moment.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  “Hmmm?”

  “Why on earth would someone do this?” I say, starting to shake again. “This is one of those random drive-by shootings, right?”

  “We will investigate that line of enquiry,” he says carefully.

  “And what other lines of enquiry will you investigate?”

  “Well,” he says, “naturally some of my colleagues are investigating Mabel.”

  “Mabel?” I say, incredulous.

  “We do like to find out more about the victim,” he explains.

  He meets my gaze for a moment and I notice he has nice eyes, for a policeman – a sort of deep blue-green.

  “But maybe you prefer to use Ockham’s Razor,” I say, the fact I’m not automatically adapting my language to the listener showing how tired I am. Usually I take a professional pride in doing that.

  “Precisely.” He gives a little smile. “So let’s cut to the chase.”

  I’m too foggy to be surprised that he knows what I’m talking about, but I’m grateful that I don’t have to spell things out. Soon I really won’t be able to keep my eyes open.

  “Sorry,” I manage. “Can’t help you with that either. I’m just a younger Mabel. No jealous lovers, no shady dealings, no money, no drugs. Can’t think of anything else.”

  “That’s the basics,” he says. “Not in line for an inheritance, something like that?”

  “I wish.”

  “Is there anything at your work? Anything sensitive? Political?”

  “Hardly. You wouldn’t believe how boring my work is. I do have access to government documents, but they’re mostly about policies and procedures – like how often they stock the stationery cupboard.”

  “No lovers, you say. Is there an ex?”

  “My ex-husband died years ago.” I say, then interrupt him as he

  starts to make sympathetic noises. “No, no, I would’ve murdered him if I’d had the chance, but probably not vice versa. Well, not unless there was money in it.”

  My mind drifts back to Max, the bastard. It would have been nice if he’d left me a nice little inheritance instead of a pile of debts. And they weren’t the sort of debts you could ignore.

  The policeman is looking at his notebook again.

  “So there are . . . what . . . just two of you in the house? You and your daughter?”

  “It couldn’t have anything to do with her,” I say quickly.

  “Does your daughter look anything like you?”

  “No.”

  “In bad light? It says here you were wearing a raincoat, with the hood up?”

  I have to admit that Miranda and I are similar enough in build. But I know my daughter. She might have some questionable friends, but there’s no way she’s involved in anything like this.

  “Look, Miranda’s just headed down to Augusta Creek for a couple of weeks for a student-teacher prac,” I say. “Can you just leave her out of it for the moment?”

  “All right,” he concedes. “But we may need to question her when she gets back. That’s about it, really. I don’t suppose you’ve had anyone like . . . a stalker? Funny phone calls? Someone who’s been getting too close for comfort?”

  Carlos immediately pops into my mind. Carlos inside my personal space, Carlos making it his business to know everything about me. But I don’t want to talk to this cop about Carlos. The thought of any kind of police invading Carlos’s sanctuary and trying to talk to him in the language of the real world is just impossible. It would be the worst kind of betrayal. Besides, Carlos is not that kind of stalker; the idea is ridiculous.

  “No . . . no, of course not,” I say, shaking my head, my expression neutral. In my befuddled state I don’t trust my ability to explain Carlos to Detective Senior Sergeant Something.

  “Well,” he sighs. “Usual routine . . . I’ll leave you my card . . . here, see? Please call me if you think of anything. You’ll be asked to give a statement in the morning anyway.” He consults his notebook. “Once you’re discharged you’ll be staying with . . . Ms Brennan?”

  “Who? Oh, Carol. Did she organise that? I suppose so,” I say, feeling relieved because the thought of going home doesn’t appeal. “So you think I shouldn’t . . . Is my house a crime scene?” The words sound silly when I use them in real life.

  “That’s right, Elly.” He’s quite solemn. “Chequered tape and all.”

  He’s not ma
king fun of me, is he? No, this is his job.

  “There’ll be a team from forensics there tomorrow, and they’ll need your permission to go into the house,” he says, his face serious. “But Constable d’Alessandro will be back in the morning to arrange all that, and to take your statement. I’m going to let you get some sleep now.”

  I want to ask him more questions, but my addled brain won’t co-operate, and then he’s gone. Whatever the nurses gave me does the trick, and I slide into oblivion. It’s only towards morning that spectres come swooping into my dreams and force me to turn my head and look through the rents they have ripped in the sky, to face the horrors that lie on the other side.

  6

  I’m woken by the whirring sound of my phone vibrating on the bedside cupboard. It’s Miranda.

  “Mum? Oh my God, are you okay? You didn’t answer at the house.”

  “I’m fine, love . . .”

  “Where are you? My friends on Facebook are saying there was a shooting in our street. It’s on the news, but they’re only saying Brunswick. They’re saying two women were killed!”

  “Is that what they’re . . . ?”

  “Were you there, Mum? Do you know who it was?”

  “Oh love, I’m so sorry. It was Mabel, poor old Mabel.”

  “Oh Mum! Mabel!” she sobs. “Why would anyone . . . Oh, poor Mabel. What happened? Who was the other person? Did you see anything?”

  “Listen love, don’t say anything for a minute, okay? I was there, the other person’s me, but I’m okay . . . No, don’t say anything. It just grazed my arm. I’m at the hospital, but I’m . . . Miranda! Shoosh! I’m fine. Carol’s coming to pick me up any minute now.”

  “Oh Mum, God Mum, oh God,” she’s saying. “I’m coming home!”

  “No, Miranda, no! You stay right there, I need you to stay there.”

  I talk to her for a while till finally she’s calm.

  “Listen, love,” I venture. “They’re asking me all sorts of questions, just . . . just in case it wasn’t random. It’s just routine, they have to consider every possibility. They’re even checking out Mabel, to see what enemies she had.”

  This elicits a giggle.

  “So . . . umm . . . the detective investigating asked me to think of every possible reason anyone might, you know, have it in for me. Couldn’t come up with much. But they might ask you too.”

  “Me?”

  “It’s just . . . I had my hood up, you see. And I was just about to go into our house. Whoever it was could’ve thought I was you. Just conceivably.”

  There’s a silence.

  “Miranda?”

  “That’s really creepy, Mum.”

  “This isn’t my idea. The police have to consider every possibility, no matter how unlikely.”

  “Mum, I know you don’t like some of my friends.” I wince. “But if I was getting into something really heavy, I think now would be the time to tell you, right?”

  “Right.”

  “God, Mum, I don’t know anyone like that. I might have scored an E now and then at a party, but who hasn’t?”

  I relax a bit. If there was something specific on her mind she’d be swearing her innocence a lot more vehemently than that.

  “All the same, love, don’t go telling everyone on Facebook where you are, okay?”

  “Come on, Mum, I’m very private.”

  “I don’t think your generation knows what privacy is,” I say.

  Not long after I hang up the younger policewoman from the previous night arrives and there’s endless paperwork to sign. She’s on her best behaviour, though she insists on addressing me in police-speak. They must do a special course in it at the police academy. She’s a bit put out that I refuse to sign the brief statement until I’ve corrected all the spelling and grammatical mistakes, but she’s very polite about it.

  Before I have to tackle the hospital breakfast, which looks like the indefinable stuff you get on an international flight, Carol reappears with a few clothes she had the foresight to snatch from my house last night, including an old coat of mine Miranda left lying on the kitchen table, along with a lovely lightweight merino scarf I tried to persuade her to take. In no time we’re back at Carol’s place in Blyth Street.

  Carol’s kitchen has always been a place of calm and sanctuary, anchored by the presence of Carol sitting at the head of the table, directing operations as her family orbit around her. As we attack coffee and croissants a variety of breakfasts to suit different diets are made and consumed, lunches are prepared and scooped up, daily schedules are reported, compared and recorded on electronic devices, and one by one her kids kiss her, then me, and cast themselves off into the world for the day.

  Only then does her husband Rick appear, ambling down the stairs with a battered briefcase in his hand. As I go over my story again he makes soothing noises but I don’t think he really takes it in. Present-day events are a lot less real to him than the distant past, and I can see his mind is on something else, possibly his ten o’clock archaeology lecture. After grazing briefly on breakfast leftovers he bestows the ritual kiss on both of us, then wanders off to catch the tram to the university.

  Carol hangs around, glancing at her watch occasionally.

  “Have you thought any more about what happened?” she asks.

  “I’ve thought of nothing else,” I reply, “and this cop came asking questions after you’d gone. But really, what could I possibly have done to provoke this? Or Mabel?”

  Carol shrugs.

  “How’s the arm?” she asks.

  “Hurts like hell.”

  “The hospital gave us heaps of painkillers.” She holds up a box. “You can take two every four hours.”

  “I hate that stuff,” I say grumpily. “It makes me feel woozy. I’ll have some when I want to sleep.”

  “Well, a nap’s not such a bad idea,” she says firmly. “You need recovery time, you know. Trauma’s pretty tiring.”

  “Okay, Doc,” I say, grinning at her. She’s actually a psychologist, but her medical knowledge seems endless.

  “Just have a nice, relaxing day,” she says. “We’ve got some good DVDs. I’m sure you’ll be able to work the thing.”

  “I’ll be fine,” I say. “Go and look after the real crazies. I’ll see you tonight.”

  Finally I’m alone, stretched out on the couch in Carol’s comfortable, chaotic living room. They even have central heating. There’s a whole shelf of DVDs, but it’s a bit of a dilemma today. I usually like to lose myself in a gripping, edge-of-the-seat thriller, but right now that idea has lost its appeal. She’s got “Inception”, which is certainly worth one more viewing, and some good TV series, including every episode of “The Wire”, but I’m too jumpy to embark on something like that.

  I notice my computer in the corner – Carol must have grabbed it when she got some clothes from my house – so I check out the news online. All the reports say is that one woman was killed and one seriously injured, with no hint about our identities. Curious. Is this the hand of Senior Sergeant Something, making sure the shooter doesn’t know whether or not he’s succeeded?

  I send off a quick email to Derek to tell him I won’t be in. All I say by way of explanation is: “My neighbour was shot last night – check out the news – and I got caught up in it. Will tell you everything tomorrow.”

  Now’s the time Carol would tell me to relax and put the whole thing out of my head. I don’t want to think about it. I shouldn’t think about it. Carol even had the foresight to bring the book I’m reading from my bedside so I can lose myself in that. By a stroke of luck I didn’t read Wolf Hall when everyone else did – probably because I’m so obsessed with the seventeenth century I didn’t want to read about Henry the Eighth and his lot in the sixteenth – so now that I need a major diversion, it’s there.

  But I hear again the roar of a car accelerating, and I feel the cold metal of the gun as if it were in my own hand. He – and I’m assuming it’s a he – aimed at o
ne of us, and suddenly there were two. There was a confusion of bodies going down, arms and legs flying. He’s bound to read the news and find out we were both hit. Will he care?

  I don’t want to think about it, but of course I do.

  There are three possibilities, or maybe four. I try to rank them in my head.

  One: It was random. He had the car, he had the gun, he just wanted to shoot someone. He cruised along the street, following a shadowy figure in a hooded jacket, playing with the gun, maybe practising his aim. The figure turned in at a gate – it was now or never.

  Two: He was after Mabel. Maybe he was on the way to her house and she darted out, making it easy. But why would anyone want to target poor old helpless Mabel? Maybe she had money stashed away somewhere and one of those nephews of hers couldn’t wait to inherit. No, number two goes to the bottom of the list.

  Three: He was after me. He saw me walking down the street, but I had my hood up, so he wasn’t sure it was me. He didn’t know me well, but he knew where I lived, so he waited to see where I was going. But why me? That’s the part that doesn’t make sense.

  Four: He thought I was Miranda. Whatever she might say, I don’t know what dark corners Miranda has explored.

  After thinking about that possibility for a while I firmly push Miranda to the bottom of the list, even below Mabel, and go back to number three. The car creeping down the street. Me, oblivious and hidden by the hood of my raincoat before I betrayed myself by stopping at my gate.

  But why?

  When Max died, it turned out he owed money to some pretty dodgy people. I was looking over my shoulder for a while. As far as I know I paid everyone off. Even if I hadn’t, it was nearly fifteen years ago. Even criminals must have a statute of limitations, and in any case, I wouldn’t be much use to them dead. As I discovered, with those people it’s just business.

  It’s got to have been random, I think with relief. It’s obviously number one. None of us are the sort of people things like this happen to, so it was random. Who knows what goes on inside the head of someone like that? But he’s gone now, and it’s over. I can relax, rest, watch DVDs, like Carol said.