by Gilmour, SJB
Mitch and Sally were startled and came to her with hugs and kind words, but Kelly shrugged them away, sniffling. She dug in her pocket and pulled out the letter. It was simple black lettering on A4 paper. It could have come from any printer in the world.
“I hand-delivered this so you’d know I’m not afraid to come and find you. Keep your trap shut. You know what will happen if you don’t.”
‘I… I din’ know what to do with it.’ Kelly could barely talk through her own sniffles.
Mitch’s mind turned to ice. The current of his thoughts became a cold, dark purple colour, through which I could see black determination and crimson rage.
‘I think it’s time we went to the police again,’ he told the sobbing girl.
Kelly protested desperately, grabbing his arm in fear.
‘No! He… He’ll know!’
‘He?’ demanded Sally. ‘You know who it is? You know it’s a male?’
Confusion filled Kelly’s brain. She had no idea who the letter had come from. Stuttering, she shook her head, trying to explain that she had just used the male personal pronoun, but the words wouldn’t come out.
Mitch wrapped his arms around her and held her to his chest.
‘Okay,’ he said softly. ‘It’s going to be okay. We’re not going to let anyone hurt you.’
His voice was so incredibly gentle and fatherly. I felt my own emotions swirling. He was so good! The poor girl’s own father was so awful. Her mother was horrid, and now this? I think in that moment, I fell in love with Mitch all over again.
Sally also felt a whirl of emotion, though while Mitch’s rage was suppressed by his rationality and single-mindedness, hers bucked and chopped at the surface. It was no longer a mild current, but furious rapids of lava. Someone was going to pay for this.
‘Well the cops aren’t the only ones who know their way around a fucking microscope,’ she muttered. ‘I’ll be right back.’
Kelly looked at her in surprise. ‘What?’
Sally grinned tightly. ‘I’ll see if there are any fingerprints on it or the envelope.’
Kelly stopped crying and pulled away from Mitch, embarrassed.
‘You can do that?’
‘And if I do find any fingerprints, I’ll compare them to the prints in my fuse-box.’ Her blue eyes flashed. There was no sign of her trademark sweetness-and-light disposition. She stormed out of me and up the stairs to her office.
‘Have you told your parents?’ Mitch was demonstrating he too could hold a poker fake when needed. His voice, so calm and gentle, was nothing like the fury in his mind. I’m gonna find this fucker, and I’m gonna make him wish I let Salls have him.
Just the thought that he knew Sally could be bloodthirsty surprised me. Even more surprising was his own blood-lust. Something about the poor girl had stirred some very strong paternal currents in his mind.
Kelly shook her head and sniffed. They talked for perhaps another half hour until Kelly had calmed down enough to smile. When Sally returned, her determined expression wiped that smile right off the teenager’s face. Her small eyes opened wide as Sally marched out of the house and around to the fuse-box, carrying a small plastic box with some of her lab equipment in it. When she came back in, her grin had turned vicious.
‘I got a print off the glue on the envelope. I’ll check it against the ones the cops left all dusty in the box. It’s the same digit. Left thumb.’
Mitch blinked. ‘How do you know that?’
Sally rolled her eyes at him. ‘I’m not just a pretty face you know. You think tracking different spiders is easy? Those things can be carbon copies of each other. If I can tell the difference between one lycosa and the next—’
‘Lyco what?’ Kelly whispered to Mitch.
‘Type of spider,’ he whispered back.
‘—I can bloody-well tell the difference between fingerprints’
Mitch frowned. ‘Salls, I don’t mind us playing cops, but I still reckon we should get this letter to them. We don’t have guns.’
Kelly protested again, but Mitch held a hand up. ‘If they came around here instead of your place, nobody’s gonna know it’s about you. They’ll think it’s about us.’
Sally nodded, a little deflated. ‘Fine, but I’m still checking. And we don’t need guns. I’ve got tankfuls of stuff far more frightening.’
‘What?’ Kelly asked.
‘Spiders, Kelly. I’ve got dozens of wolf spiders upstairs. They’re used to being handled. I guarantee you. If I throw a spider at the sorry prick who wrote that letter, he’ll shit himself long enough for me to gut him with a spork. You two go on, get some fresh air. I’m going to scan the prints now and look at ‘em under my lens.’
Kelly helped Mitch clean up the coffee cups and then the two went outside to finish up the yard work. Sally spent about half an hour on her phone, arguing with James. She paced about the house as she did so, nervous energy pulsing through her. She came in once to check the chicken.
‘How the fuck should I know who sent it? I compared the print to the one in my fuse-box and it’s not the same. Hang on, I’ll put you on speaker.’ She put the phone down on my bench-top next to the stove.
‘Wait, can she hear you?’ James asked.
‘She’s outside.’ Sally retrieved the chickens from my oven and gave them a thorough baste with juices from the pan. ‘Look,’ she said, shoving the tray back in, ‘you’ve got a chance to do something about this right now. The kid’s terrified. Get off your lazy ass and come and talk to her. Look at the letter. She’s sure as hell not going to talk to you at her place, and she won’t come anywhere near a police station unless she’s in cuffs.’
Then she picked up the phone, turned off the speaker function and stormed out. Half an hour later, James arrived in his civilian clothes. Sally called Mitch in from the back and they both met him in me.
James ran his fingers along his brow and into his hair. He’d abandoned his cop face. None of this makes any sense. It’s all too fucking weird for me.
‘First the step, then the break-in, now you say the kid’s got hate mail?’
Sally gave him the letter wordlessly.
Oh, fuck, he thought as he read it.
He turned to Sally. ‘And you tested a print off this?’
Sally shook her head and pointed to the envelope.
‘Off the envelope.’ She showed him the enlarged pictures she’d printed out. Even I could see they weren’t the same.
James nodded. ‘The one on the envelope is male. I’ll test it, but I doubt it’ll come up.’
‘Why?’
James shrugged. ‘He’s smart enough to deliver it without being seen, so we know he’s not stupid or sloppy. Not bothering to make sure he didn’t leave any fingerprints tells me he’s confident he’s not on our books.’ He glanced out the window as Kelly wheeled the wheelbarrow laden with rakes and shovels back to the shed. ‘I better talk to her.’
Sally nodded grimly, but pointed a warning finger at him.
‘Be gentle, or,’ and she shook her head in the direction of my oven, ‘I’ll be roasting more than just chooks.’
‘Why don’t you just let me ask her the questions?’ Mitch suggested. ‘She likes us, but cops… Authority figures?’ He waved his hand back and forth.
‘Tell you what. Play down the importance of the letter. We all know what it’s about. The Owen deaths. Someone obviously thinks she’s a witness to either the crime itself or the break-in. You ask away. She’s a minor, so any witness statement she makes is going to be taken with a grain of salt anyway. But it might just lead us in a direction we’ve not thought of.’
When Kelly came in, she was very nervous. Why do these cops want to talk to me all the time? First they ask if I was in the shed, now what do they want? I don’t like the way that one looks at me…
‘This is about the letter, right?’
James nodded, smiling. ‘More just a chat than anything, Kelly. I wouldn’t worry about the letter too much. Peop
le who send that kind of thing are always cowards. Never amount to anything. Whoever sent it is probably just trying to freak you out.’
‘Can you find out who sent it?’
‘We’ll try, but like I said, it probably won’t matter. Most likely, it’s some idiot from school playing a prank on you.’ James shrugged the matter off. ‘Actually, I’m here because I’m asking for your help.’
Kelly didn’t understand. My help? What for? How can I help anyone. I’m stupid and I can’t remember stuff.
‘Huh?’
That thought right there tore at me deep inside.
‘Kells,’ Mitch took over. He slid a plate of Sally’s home-made biscuits along the counter to her. ‘You know how we got broken into the other week?’
Kelly nodded. She took a biscuit and began to nibble, looking nothing more than narrow-eyed brunette rabbit.
‘Well, these guys think there might be a connection to that and the bit of wood I found in the shed. That all goes back to when Mrs Owen died. You were what, ten years old?’
‘Ten or eleven,’ she agreed. ‘I can’t remember.’
The memory was hazy. Distant. The poor girl couldn’t even remember how old she’d been back then.
‘But you remember when Mrs Owen died?’
The girl nodded again and gazed down at my bench-top sadly.
‘Kinda. I mean she was dead for like, weeks, before anyone found her, right?’ She shuddered, remembering me as I was, living and vibrant, then suddenly imagining a bloated rotting corpse on the floor with flies and rats all over it. She put her biscuit down.
Mitch pressed on. ‘But they found Mr Owen right away didn’t they?’
Kelly nodded again. ‘Uh huh. Mrs Owen found him. I think mum went over later.’
‘Do you remember much about when it happened? Like, what you were doing?’
Kelly stiffened. ‘Hey! I didn’t have anything—’
Mitch held up both hands in a calming motion.
‘No, no. Nothing like that. It’s more like when Princess Dianna died. I remember exactly where I was when I heard the news. I was in JB HiFi, checking out some cd’s and it came on the news. Every television screen in the place got switched to the same channel.’
Now Kelly understood, but it was hard for her to dig up the memory. My own memory was much easier for me now. I sank into her mind. I’d seen her as I’d gone out to the shed for the firewood. I’d waved and she’d waved back. Lifting that memory in her mind was like trying to lift a sleeping cat. It was limp and heavy and sluggish.
Her eyes brightened and she reached for the biscuit again.
‘Oh yeah! I was riding my bike.’ She nodded out my window to the fence-line. ‘I saw Mrs Owen come out for firewood. She waved to me.’
Now James leaned forward. ‘You saw Mrs Owens go into the shed? Was she carrying anything?’
Kelly thought hard. It was a struggle for us both to keep the memory clear in her mind. After a moment, she shook her head.
‘Nup. She was just going to the shed. I remember it now.’
Then a memory I’d not seen flashed up in her mind and it chilled me to the core. It was vague at first, as if it was under frosted glass. I had to hold it tight and squeeze it to make it clearer. In the space of a few breaths, a foggy, blurred memory from her childhood was too clear for it to be misread.
‘I remember. It was getting dark, and I’m remembering mum telling me how I hafta be home by dark ‘cos it’s not safe, even out on that road that nobody uses much, but then I’m riding along and Father Brian hoons past. Nearly hits me. So then I figure mum was right and I go home. Then like, five minutes later, we hear sirens from this place and mum gets mad at me ‘cos I wanna go see what was going on, but she makes me stay home.
‘I mean, she’s such a bitch. First Father Brian comes over and she tells me to go out, then I come home, and he’s not even there and she tells me to stay home. She’s always crazy when she drinks a lot.’
James was surprised. ‘Father Brian? What was he doing at your house?’
I could imagine. Trish had ended the relationship with Father Brian. After being celibate and then suddenly having a carnal relationship with a woman, it would be hard for him to go back to being celibate again. I doubted very much if he cared one whit about her drinking. The rotten sod wanted his harlot back.
Kelly looked blank. ‘I dunno. He’s like a priest or some shit—’ She blushed. ‘I mean some stuff. ‘I think he wanted to talk to mum about her drinking. She always gets mad when someone talks to her about that.’
‘She was mad with him?’
‘I guess.’ Then Kelly shrugged. Her memory had run out, replaced by ones of sheer joy of riding her bike along the trail. Then she inhaled again and her stomach rumbled. That chicken smells good.
Well, fuck me, thought James. The priest was in the neighbourhood. That wasn’t in the file. First responders said he’d come from Gembrook when he’d heard the news. That means he’d have driven all the way from here to there and back again. That’s half an hour’s return trip at least. The timing doesn’t add up. Might just ask Mrs drunk-off-her-ass Forbes if she can remember anything from that night.
Kelly looked up at Mitch and Sally, then over to James.
‘Is that it? Can I get back to my jobs now?’ Again, her mind was simple and innocent. She had no idea of the importance of what she’d just revealed. When she’d gone, making sure to take a few more biscuits with her, there was silence within me for one of the longest minutes I’d ever experienced.
‘So now, you’ve got a priest who may or may not be a witness too,’ surmised Sally.
Might be more than just a fucking witness. James thought.
‘It’s something. I’ll ask a few more questions.’ He sniffed deeply. ‘That really does smell delicious, Sally.’ He looked at Mitch. ‘How do stay so thin?’
Mitch grinned. ‘Oh, I don’t get to eat it all. That chook’s gotta feed the white slaves we’ve got stashed in the basement too.’
James laughed and then left. By midday, urged on by hungry tummies, Sally began preparing lunch. She pulled apart a cos lettuce, sliced up some red capsicum and a cucumber and about four tomatoes for a basic salad, and then began quartering the chickens. I drifted into her mind as she inhaled the aroma. Oh my, it was lovely.
She tasted the stuffing. Bit bitter. Should’ve added sugar as well. Still, I guess it’s okay.
Okay? The woman was way too hard on herself. It was delicious. Mitch and Kelly thought so too. Kelly piled on perhaps a third of a chicken onto her plate, plus plenty of the salad and a bread roll. Mitch was more inventive. He tore open a roll and made himself a very sloppy salad and hot chicken roll, with as much of the stuffing as he could cram into it.
The meal and the constant up-beat vibe Mitch and Sally maintained, helped Kelly cheer up immensely. I love it here, she thought to herself. Always so nice and warm and happy. Wish holidays didn’t have to end, then I could spend more time here.
And so, as much as she’d been unhappy when she arrived and was a little sad to be going, the reasons were vastly different and overall, she felt much better and safer. That safety was something I was determined to maintain. Lucky, I didn’t need to reach far into either Mitch’s or Sally’s mind to find the same thought.
‘I’ll walk you home,’ Mitch offered. ‘I want to say g’day to your mum anyway.’
From the porch, Sally watched the two walk out the gate and down the road. Then she came in to me and called Detective Thomson. I don’t care if Hewitt thinks I’m going over his head. That kid could be in danger and I’m not going to let anything happen to her.
As it turned out, it was very lucky she called.
Chapter Nine
It was past midnight when I heard the sirens. Then the flashing of red and blue lights flickered through the trees, bouncing off the white trunk of the mountain ash in the front yard. The police went by first. Then, several minutes later, an ambulance hurtled past. They w
ere headed towards the Forbes house.
I was nearly beside myself when Alec finally turned up.
‘Well, I did it,’ he reported smugly. He drifted through and sat on my counter.
‘Don’t sit there, please,’ I asked him. His head was level with the bloodstain my wall. It was freaking me out.
He shrugged and floated over to a stool. He looked around, blinking; his young face unable to hide his opinion that I must be slightly mad.
