by Perry, Kyle
‘I’ve seen her at the pub a lot of times. Even had a few drinks together, back in the day. But not since she became Jasmine’s teacher. Why?’ he said, gruff, those piercing blue eyes narrowed again.
‘Just wondering what she’s like,’ said Con. ‘Haven’t properly met her yet. The ambulance took her almost as soon as we got there. We didn’t get a chance to ask too many questions. She was a bit . . . would you say “delirious”, Gab?’
‘“Delirious” is a good descriptor,’ said Gabriella. She had closed the file on Murphy and was reading the emails being sent their way – Detective Stuart Coops, also assigned to this case, was currently interviewing the teachers, the school social worker, the parents, going through school reports and police records.
‘Yeah, well . . .’ said Murphy, sounding defensive. ‘Eliza’s good with the kids. Best Literacy teacher Jasmine’s ever had. The girls all love her. She went through the ringer last year when her niece killed herself, so this is going to really mess her up.’
‘Her niece?’ That caught Gabriella’s attention and she began typing into her computer to look up the details.
They entered the outskirts of Deloraine, the closest large-ish town – not that any towns in Tasmania were particularly large; the whole island had a lower population than the district of Geelong. Con navigated the streets, all the traffic pulling aside for his lights and siren, until they merged onto the Bass Highway. Now he could really stretch the Stinger’s legs, and they sped towards Launceston.
‘Do you mind if I ask another question?’ said Con. ‘Do you know why Sergeant Doble has a grudge against you?’
‘Yeah, I slept with his wife,’ said Murphy sarcastically.
Gabriella chuckled without looking up from her laptop. ‘Delicious. I love a little country-bogan scandal.’
‘Laugh at me again and see what happens.’
‘Threaten my partner again and I’ll bury you in the ground,’ said Con, his voice sudden ice.
‘Stop it, boys, you’re both pretty,’ said Gabriella, hitting Con on the leg.
The men had a brief staring contest, until Con had to look away to focus on the road. ‘Whatever, mate,’ muttered Murphy, leaning against the window.
Gabriella turned on the radio, so she and Con could talk without being overheard. He glanced back at Murphy and saw his eyes closed.
‘What’s wrong with you, Badenhorst?’ said Gabriella. ‘Getting a bit testy there? Those poor girls going missing a bit of an inconvenience for you?’
‘Keep your voice down, he’s still awake,’ whispered Con.
Gabriella glanced behind her. ‘No he isn’t.’
‘He’s pretending,’ said Con, watching him in the rear-view.
‘I don’t reckon he had anything to do with the girls disappearing,’ said Gabriella.
‘You’re just a sucker for a lumberjack,’ said Con. ‘Listen, I have an idea.’ He leaned across, watching the road even as he spoke low into Gabriella’s ear. Whispering, he explained that he wanted to send Murphy in to coax information out of Eliza, but he needed to find some way to get his voice recorder into the room to capture their conversation.
Gabriella shook her head. ‘Sounds unnecessarily complicated.’
‘I don’t want to take risks, but time is important here. You know what these country folk are like: probably more likely to open up to one of their own.’
‘Con, even after a year down here, I think the only thing you know about country folk is what you’ve read in books.’
They drove in silence for some time, Gabriella tapping at the computer. ‘Eliza’s niece was named Denni King. Her suicide was a messy affair . . . and it involved Madison Mason, Cierra’s sister. She’s some kind of YouTube celebrity. This is interesting.’
‘Jasmine . . .’ Murphy croaked, pulling at his seatbelt as he woke up. He cast around, eyes bloodshot and wide. When he realised Con was watching him, he looked away with a scowl. He covered his face with his forearm, resting against the car door. Though he tried to hide it, his shoulders shook in silent sobs, tears rolling down from behind his arm.
Con shifted in his seat. Still a suspect, he thought.
The Launceston General Hospital was a grey and sprawling complex, the traffic in its avenues and car parks moving slowly in the rain. They pulled into a loading zone near the emergency department.
Murphy jumped out of the car before it had stopped moving.
The three of them headed straight into emergency. Con showed his badge to the nurse at the desk, asking about Eliza.
‘Transferred to the medical ward,’ said the nurse without looking up from her computer.
Con nudged Murphy forward. ‘Well, here’s where we leave you. You’d better get your wrists sorted.’
‘Like hell,’ said Murphy. ‘I’m coming with you.’ He set off in search of the medical ward, and Con and Gabriella jogged to catch up with him. When they found it, the nurse at the desk pointed the way to Eliza’s room.
‘Ah, damn,’ said Con, pausing. ‘We need to call the commander first.’
‘What?’ said Murphy.
‘It’s fine . . . you go ahead,’ said Gabriella. ‘We’ll be right in behind you.’
‘Gabby, I dunno if we should let him in without us —’
‘It’s fine, he deserves to see her,’ she said. ‘Go, Mr Murphy. We’ll follow once we’ve made all the right calls.’
Murphy glanced between them, then loped off into the ward.
‘Good job,’ said Con quietly.
‘Call me Gabby one more time and I’ll blind you,’ she muttered, flicking her hair back.
Con flashed his badge again and asked someone on the staff to bring them Eliza’s current medical file. Then he and Gabriella stepped into an empty room that smelled of antiseptic and urine, and sat on a crisp-linen bed. Con pulled out his phone and AirPods, passing one to Gabriella. He pulled open the app that was synced to his live voice recorder.
‘Slipped it in his pocket when I nudged him at the intake desk.’
‘You sly fox. Ignoring the fact this is illegal, of course.’
She went silent as a burly male nurse entered, holding the requested folder with all of Eliza’s details, including photos of her injuries. Gabriella winked at the nurse, who winked back.
‘Plus, given he’s Jasmine’s dad, if she takes the chance to apologise to him and ease some of that guilt she’s carrying, we should be able to get to the point much quicker when we go in.’
‘Your compassion is overwhelming,’ said Gabriella, her finger to her ear.
CHAPTER 7
MURPHY
Murphy stepped into Eliza’s room.
Eliza was upright in bed, propped up by pillows. Her head was wrapped in bandages, her honey hair falling around her face. She wore a thick white bathrobe, the blankets pulled up to her waist, and she was speaking with a plump, grey-haired nurse who sat beside her.
‘Who’re you?’ demanded the nurse, standing up. ‘If you’re another journalist, I swear to the Lord Jesus that I’ll —’
‘Murphy!’ said Eliza, leaning forward. ‘Have they found them?’ Her voice was hoarse. ‘Tell me they’ve found them.’
Murphy shook his head.
Eliza swayed, putting one hand to her head. ‘No . . . Murphy. It’s . . . it’s all my fault.’
‘You know this man?’ said the nurse. ‘Is he family?’
‘He’s the father of one of the girls.’
The nurse’s face softened. ‘Oh, you poor thing,’ she said to him, changing her attitude instantly. ‘If there’s anything I can . . .’ She saw the blood on his bandaged wrists.
‘It’s fine,’ said Murphy.
Undeterred, the nurse quickly snapped on some gloves, lifted his hands and began unravelling the bandages.
‘Who wrapped this, a child? This is woeful . . .’ She hissed at the cuff wounds once they were exposed, still oozing blood.
‘Are you okay, Murphy?’ said Eliza. ‘You must want to
kill me . . .’
‘What happened up there? They’re not telling me anything.’ He ignored the nurse as she rummaged in a trolley, returning to spray sharp-smelling antiseptic onto his wounds.
‘It . . . it’s hazy, Murphy. I think I took a blow to the head. But . . . I was with the four of them. Cierra, Georgia, Bree, Jasmine. We were trailing behind the main group.’
‘Why weren’t you with everyone else?’
‘I held them back. I did. This morning . . . there was a fight. I thought it would be better to keep them separate.’
‘A fight?’
‘Between Madison and Jasmine.’
Murphy’s stomach lurched, even as he recognised it was an irrational thing to be concerned about, considering she was missing. ‘Was Jaz alright?’
‘Madison ended up with a black eye, and Jasmine had a cut lip. Tom and Jack had already left with all the other girls. I still had Madison and Jasmine, as well as Georgia, Cierra, and Bree Wilkins. Do you remember Bree?’
‘She was friends with your Denni.’
‘Yes,’ said Eliza. ‘Friends with my Denni. And now I’ve lost four more girls . . .’ Her voice wavered.
‘Don’t say that. It wasn’t your fault,’ said Murphy. ‘Not Denni, not these girls. But what were they fighting about?’
‘I don’t know, Murphy! I think it was about a boy. The five of them were lagging behind everyone else at the campsite. I thought they were just being lazy, and I knew better than to let Tom or Jack try to hurry them up. You know what those girls are like.
‘But before I knew it they were pushing and shoving and shouting. Madison punched Jasmine and Jasmine hit her back, then it was just chaos. I broke it up, with the help of the other girls. Madison was still fuming, and I was sure they would start up again, so I sent her on ahead to catch up with Tom and Jack.’ Eliza spoke quickly. ‘I know that was a mistake, but they hadn’t gone that far ahead . . . I thought it was best . . .’
‘But Jasmine was okay?’ said Murphy. The nurse had finished treating his wrists and led him to the chair beside Eliza’s bed.
‘She seemed fine. You know that she’s strong, Murphy. I tried to find out what had happened, but the girls were all tight-lipped. I made the rest walk with me . . . slowly, so we wouldn’t catch up with Madison. Cierra was crying and Georgia looked like she was going to vomit. Bree was blaming Jasmine, but Jasmine was fine, just kept chewing on her drink bottle.’ She paused. Her lip trembled for a moment, but she brought it back under control, seeming irritated at her weakness. ‘If I hadn’t made them walk so slow —’
‘Then what?’ Murphy hated himself for rushing her, but he was desperate.
‘We walked together, I don’t know, maybe thirty minutes? I was at the front and Georgia was talking to me, but the other three kept dragging their feet – Bree especially – and everyone was getting spread out and . . .’ Eliza made a conscious effort to slow down. ‘It took me too long to realise we had become separated from Jasmine, Cierra and Bree. I told Georgia we needed to go back and find them, but she sat down on the ground and said she was too tired, she was going to wait for me. And . . . and . . . I went back, and . . .’ She took another breath. ‘This is where my memory goes . . . funny. It’s almost like it’s a dream. Does that make sense, Murphy?’
Murphy put a hand on her wrist. Eliza was shaking like a leaf, and her skin was hot to the touch.
‘Murphy,’ she said, ‘things went strange.’
‘What do you mean?’ Murphy moved closer, now sitting on the bed beside her. He ignored the nurse, who was still hovering, keenly listening in.
‘It’s crazy to say it now, but it was like walking into a bubble . . . All the noise stopped. The birds, the wind. I couldn’t hear anything except my own footsteps, and they were so loud . . .’ She took a shaky breath. ‘I got scared. I’ve never felt so scared in my life. It wasn’t even normal, I was running – it was like I was running for my life.’ She grunted, tears now running down her cheeks. ‘It sounds so stupid!’
‘Eliza, what happened?’
‘I don’t know! I don’t know! I kept walking, shouting, until – something hit me on the head? I remember waking up in bare feet – one of the other girls, Carmen, she was the one who found me. I told her to run back to safety, but she came back with Jack. They found me under a flower bush further down the track, I was curled up and vomiting. I don’t remember how I got there, but I remember them finding me. The doctors say I was vomiting because I was concussed. They brought me back to the bus, and that’s when they called . . . everyone. It feels like . . . I can’t explain it, but things just went so weird up there . . .’
Murphy felt a pain in his hands. He looked down to see his knuckles were white from clenching so tight. ‘Who hit you? Did you see them?’ he asked.
‘No,’ said Eliza, her voice full of pain. ‘I didn’t see a thing.’
CHAPTER 8
CON
In the room next door, scratching his stubble and listening to every word, Con glanced at Gabriella.
‘The sounds on the mountain went quiet . . .?’ he said.
Gabriella looked excited. ‘You go in,’ she said. ‘I want to google something real quick.’
‘Google what?’
‘Just go, Con.’
He stood up, leaving his phone and the earphones with her.
When he walked into Eliza’s room, all eyes turned to him. ‘G’day, everyone,’ he said pleasantly. He flashed his badge, then nodded to Eliza. ‘Sorry I’m late. Had to sort a few things out. My name is Detective Con Badenhorst, but you can call me Con. Murphy, can you give us the room please?’ He smiled at the nurse. ‘I’m sure the hospital can find you something to eat.’
He felt Murphy’s jacket, reaching into the pocket with one hand as he gripped the collar with his other. ‘This is still soaked. Want me to find a heater and dry it off?’
‘Get off me!’ Murphy pushed his hands away and Con pocketed the voice recorder. The nurse took hold of Murphy, leading him out of the room.
‘Hey, we’re not done,’ protested Murphy, even as the door clicked shut behind them.
Con sat down in the chair beside Eliza’s bed.
‘Have they found them?’ she begged, her bloodshot eyes searching his. ‘Anything at all?’
‘The weather has been hampering the search. But they did find Jasmine’s drink bottle, with blood on it.’
‘She had a cut lip,’ said Eliza. ‘From the fight.’
She let her head fall back on the pillow. Con stayed silent. He pulled out his notebook and waited. She glanced at him, down at his notebook, up to his face. He kept an expression of deepest interest, but didn’t say a word.
‘You want to know what happened up there,’ she said.
Con smiled and clicked his pen.
She waited a moment, then began to recount the same tale he’d heard her tell Murphy. The fight, and sending Madison ahead. How Eliza realised the other girls were missing and went back to find them. Things going strange. The silence, the disorientation, the storm.
Con stayed silent throughout the whole thing, jotting down notes occasionally, but keeping his eyes on her. He’d been told his deep blue eyes could be unnerving – he had this trick where he didn’t blink, didn’t waver, just stared, writing notes without looking at the page.
When she’d finished, she fell silent and watched him. ‘Does that all sound mad?’ she finally said.
Con didn’t reply. He let the silence build further. People often provided more information than necessary in order to fill silence.
‘Are you okay, detective?’ She was watching him curiously.
‘Anything else?’ he said, irritated. Neither his eye trick nor the silence was working.
‘Well . . . I think . . .’ she began. ‘It just sounds so stupid, and I honestly think Georgia might’ve been making it up.’
‘What’s that?’ he said, leaning forward.
‘On the path, before the girls disappeare
d . . . Georgia told me that she thought she saw a figure watching us.’
‘She saw someone? Why haven’t you told anyone?’
‘I thought she was seeing things,’ she said. ‘Even she didn’t tell me right away because she didn’t believe it. But when we walked through one of the patches of swamp, where the trees are clearer, she said she’d seen someone at the top of one of the ridges, one that looks like a fish fin.’
‘Did she say what they looked like?’ said Con.
‘Georgia said that . . . well, like a . . . huge . . .’ Her voice trailed off in frustration.
‘Like a what?’
‘A bear-man.’ She sighed. ‘See? This is why I didn’t tell anyone. Georgia thought she saw a bear in the bush.’
‘A . . . bear.’ Con had a mad urge to laugh, which he quickly quelled. ‘But you didn’t see it?’
‘Like I said, she didn’t point it out at the time. She said she didn’t want to scare any of the other girls, or let them make fun of her.’
‘Did Georgia say anything else?’
‘Just that, whatever it was, once she had seen it, it ducked behind a tree. It didn’t want to be seen. Georgia said it looked like it was carrying something on its back.’
The door opened and an elderly doctor entered. He looked angry. ‘Sorry, detective, I’m not sure who told you you could be in here. Miss Ellis needs to rest. She’s in no state to answer questions.’
Gabriella stepped in beside the doctor. She shrugged at Con, sipping a coffee she must have weaselled out of the hospital staff. ‘I told him you needed more time, but he insisted.’
Con felt another flash of irritation, but he hid it. ‘Sorry, mate, but this is important,’ he said to the doctor. ‘Lives might be at stake.’
‘Don’t call me mate, it’s crass,’ said the doctor, but he softened. ‘How much longer?’
‘Eliza, this other figure – however weird, it might be our only lead. Is there anything else? Could you take us back to that location?’
‘Maybe? Right now, in this state, I’m not sure.’ She pointed angrily at her own head, indignant at her weakness. ‘But I’ve told you everything I remember. The girls were there, and then they weren’t.’ She put her hands over her face. ‘This has to be a nightmare. I have to help find them.’