The Bluffs : A Novel (2020)

by Perry, Kyle

  ‘My name is Bree Wilkins . . . and this is my spoken word.’

  A steady drum beat played in the background. The video cut to another angle: Bree’s face blurred, then sharpened back into focus. The production was artsy and sleek. A guitar riff began, and so did Bree’s performance:

  ‘Some days it’s like I’ll feel only one of three things:

  hollow or lifeless or like I’m covered in stings

  from the clothes I have to wear,

  the smile on my face that won’t compare

  with the smile on the screen

  from an Instagram Queen.

  I can’t pretend I don’t feel bad about my waist,

  but maybe there’s more than how much food is on my plate

  to make me feel like I’m not beneath the Queen Bee,

  maybe I can be Queen Bree without needing to kill me —’

  Gabriella glanced at Con, eyebrows raised. He kept watching the screen.

  ‘If people get near me, they’ll be infected too:

  then they’ll hate me as much as I do —’

  Abruptly, the video ended in a black screen.

  Madison shook her head. ‘Since Denni, she’s been struggling with suicidal thoughts, too,’ she said. ‘But that’s all that I’ve done so far. There’s so much footage, but we never finished it. Bree freaked out after we filmed it and made me swear never to share it.’

  ‘Freaked out?’ said Gabriella.

  ‘Got angry. Got upset. Told me she thought the whole project was a waste of time and she’d sue me if the footage ever came out. Or hit me. Or kill me. I forget the details.’

  ‘So you’re going to share it now?’ said Con, a little more accusatory than he intended.

  ‘Do you know how many people my video has brought to the search?’ said Madison, suddenly defensive again, voice rising. ‘You didn’t even know Bree had PTS! Don’t you even profile the missing? I can’t sit here and do nothing. You don’t know what those girls mean to me! My twin sister. My best friends!’

  ‘I thought you didn’t get on with Bree,’ said Con.

  Gabriella kicked him again and this time he gave her a look. Madison was putting on a good act, but he was starting to feel an act was all it was. What the hell does she know that she’s not telling us?

  Madison gave him a withering look. She turned back to the screen. ‘I need to finish this video. You can find your own way out.’

  Being dismissed by a 16-year-old was not an experience Con enjoyed, but Gabriella grabbed his arm and he let her drag him outside. His mind was turning, carefully putting observations and facts into boxes, listing options and priorities and questions he needed answered.

  They were in the car before Gabriella spoke, ignoring a foreign journalist nearby, in make-up and high heels standing in front of a camera, the Masons’ house in the background. ‘Madison was all by herself on that same trail, but she wasn’t taken. I mean, she’s the one with the massive profile – did someone take Cierra by mistake?’

  ‘Madison is hiding something,’ said Con.

  ‘Oh? Maybe you should go back in and you can do some more of your delicate questioning?’

  ‘Surely she would tell us anything she thought would help find the girls.’

  ‘Back to my question then, Badenhorst – could someone have taken Cierra by mistake?’

  ‘Cierra was wearing a bright blue wig, which makes it hard to confuse the pair,’ said Con. ‘But could Bree have had something to do with it? Madison said she got angry —’

  ‘Eliza is right: I bet it’s a boy,’ Gabriella interrupted.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The reason for the fight. It must be about a boy.’

  ‘How could you possibly know —’

  ‘If you get to have your special detective intuition, so do I,’ Gabriella said.

  ‘I agree that there’s more here. Call Coops and ask him to send us everything he’s got from talking with the teachers and friends.’

  ‘Coops is a good detective but we should be out there, interviewing everyone —’

  ‘We can’t be everywhere.’

  ‘— finding out who is dating who, who cheated on who. All teenage girls care about are boys, or girls if they prefer, and the only way we’re going to —’

  ‘Getting bogged down sorting through the quagmire of teenage relationships is a slow way to start a case,’ he said.

  ‘You don’t think it’s important?’ she demanded.

  ‘Yes, it is. But it will take a long time, and it’s just one item on the list of inferences we’re dealing with – it’s a big list. Was there foul play or are they just lost? What about Eliza’s head wound? What about the “bear” in the trees? If it’s foul play, any one of the girls could be the target – and the others could be in on it, or taken out as witnesses. Then there’s the historic disappearances – we don’t really know if Ted Barclay was guilty of those or not. One of the fathers is a drug dealer. A YouTube celebrity is friends with all the missing girls.’

  ‘So the case is full of mysteries! Let’s cross one off the list.’ She pulled out her phone and began scrolling. ‘I’m calling the hospital. I want to know why Eliza Ellis thinks the fight was about a boy.’

  Con opened his mouth to argue – they still didn’t have the doctor’s all-clear – but Gabriella was already speaking on the phone. He huffed, then started the BMW in what he hoped was an angry sort of manner.

  ‘Fantastic,’ said Gabriella when she hung up. ‘Eliza was released from hospital this morning. Apparently they left a message with the station, but no one told us.’

  ‘These country police stations,’ said Con, a burst of frustration rolling through him. ‘They don’t know their inbox from their elbow.’

  ‘They said she’s gone to stay with her sister. I’ve got her address.’

  ‘Well, hopefully Eliza’s mind is a lot clearer today.’

  ‘Maybe she’s remembered something else . . . paranormal.’

  ‘I bloody hope not.’

  Tom and Monica North’s house was on the outskirts of Limestone Creek, where the nature strips were lined with tall poplar trees – full of water, they were a natural firebreak that the early settlers had planted against the dreaded bushfires. The rain brought out the smell of lawns and fertiliser.

  Con rang the doorbell. A dog’s booming bark came from inside.

  ‘Down, Sarge – no, outside! Go! Outside!’ came Eliza’s voice. When she opened the door, she looked different: her hair was shorter, she wasn’t wearing glasses, and her face wasn’t cut and bruised. She was still just as pretty, with the same smattering of freckles across the nose. She kept a hold of the door handle.

  ‘Hello again, Eliza,’ said Con, a little uncertainly.

  ‘I’m Monica,’ she said coldly, her amber eyes narrowed. ‘I’m Eliza’s sister. And you are?’

  Gabriella showed Monica her badge. ‘Sorry, Monica. Eliza didn’t tell us you were twins.’

  Two sets of twins . . . thought Con. Is that just a coincidence?

  Monica relaxed. ‘Thought you were journalists. They’ve already tried to speak with her twice.’ She opened the door wide. ‘Please, come in. Eliza is in bed, or maybe she’s in the shower by now: I’ll go get her.’

  They followed Monica into the kitchen – black marble with bone-white flourishes – and sat at the counter. Monica headed down the corridor, short hair bouncing.

  ‘Two sets of identical twins in one town,’ said Con. ‘Is that unusual?’

  ‘Limestone Creek isn’t that small,’ said Gabriella. ‘It’s not necessarily abnormal.’

  A few moments later Monica returned, Eliza following behind.

  The bruising on Eliza’s face had worsened, but she wore a pink dressing gown, hoop earrings and a leopard-print scarf around her head. ‘Hi again, Detective Badenhorst.’ She held out her hand to Gabriella. ‘I’m not sure we’ve met, Detective . . .?’

  ‘This is Detective Pakinga, but just calling us Con an
d Gabriella is fine,’ said Con. ‘How are you feeling this morning?’

  ‘Physically? Much better.’ Her smile didn’t reach her eyes. ‘Apart from that . . . what am I supposed to say? That this feels like a nightmare and I’m barely holding on? That I keep reliving that morning over and over?’

  ‘Yesterday . . . you said you couldn’t quite remember . . .’

  ‘I don’t remember anything more than I’ve already told you,’ she said. ‘The last thing I remember is leaving Georgia to find the girls, everything going all weird, then waking up on the ground.’

  ‘Did you hear footsteps?’ said Gabriella suddenly.

  ‘Ah . . . so the Hungry Man is a suspect now, is that right?’ said Eliza, a little uneasily. ‘Look . . . when I woke up, I thought maybe I did. My memory is hazy, part of the concussion, the doctor said. I don’t remember half of what I said to Carmen, I don’t remember walking down the trail as far as I did before they found me, and I have a vague memory of . . . Maybe I did hear footsteps? I do keep getting that stupid rhyme in my head, so it’s hard to tell.’

  ‘What rhyme?’ said Gabriella.

  ‘You haven’t heard it yet? It’s legend up here – does the rounds every generation . . .

  ‘Up in the hills, he hides and kills.

  Down in the caves, he hides and waits.

  The Hungry Man, who likes little girls,

  with their pretty faces and pretty curls.

  Don’t believe what the grown-ups say,

  the Hungry Man will find a way.

  So I won’t walk alone by the mountain trees,

  or the Hungry Man will come for me.’

  Gabriella shuddered. ‘That’s horrifying.’

  ‘Tell me about it. Denni used to write it on her walls – she was obsessed with the Hungry Man.’

  ‘I have nieces of my own . . .’ said Gabriella. ‘I’m so sorry about what happened.’

  ‘And now I’ve lost another four girls.’ Eliza covered her face with her hands. ‘Teacher of the year.’

  ‘It wasn’t your fault —’ began Gabriella.

  ‘I know, I know,’ Eliza said, although she sounded thankful. She dropped her hands, her eyes fresh with tears. ‘Everyone keeps telling me. In my head, I know that. But in my heart . . .’

  ‘Can I ask about the fight the girls had?’ said Con. ‘You definitely don’t know what caused it?’

  ‘They wouldn’t tell me.’

  ‘You have an idea, though, don’t you?’ said Gabriella.

  ‘Honestly? I think it was about boys. What else would it be?’

  Gabriella nodded, a smirk in Con’s direction. ‘I think you’re right.’

  ‘Madison always has approximately fifty thousand boys on the go,’ said Eliza. ‘Jasmine never seems interested in anyone for more than a day, but there’s been rumours she’s dating someone. It must have been serious, though, for the fight to go the way it did. Neither of them is the type to go to blows over some crush.’

  ‘Something serious,’ said Gabriella. ‘A relationship . . . I wonder if anyone else knew about Jasmine’s supposed boyfriend.’ She turned away from the conversation and began typing on her phone – Con knew she would be texting Detective Coops.

  ‘Yesterday you told me that Georgia had seen a . . . bear,’ said Con. ‘Now that you’ve had a chance to rest and recover – do you think she could’ve been making that up?’

  ‘Georgia isn’t that kind of girl . . . But when you’re up in those mountains, detective, it is easy to see things. The whole place is eerie. And, I mean, for her especially, all that blood in the soil.’

  ‘You mean from 1985?’

  ‘I mean the Black War,’ said Eliza. When Con and Gabriella looked at her blankly, she continued. ‘Aboriginal history was never a strong point of our generation’s schooling, was it? The Black War was one of the first recorded genocides in human history. The European settlers declared all-out war on Tasmania’s Aboriginal people, killing almost all of them. And it began here, at the Great Western Tiers. Kooparoona Niara, the local mob call it. Mountain of Spirits.’

  ‘Mountain of Spirits,’ said Gabriella with something akin to glee.

  ‘Okay, so the mountains can be unnerving,’ said Con, not liking the interest appearing on Gabriella’s face, her text message to Coops unsent. ‘Helped, I’m sure, by the legend of the Hungry Man.’

  ‘There are many who think the Hungry Man is not just a legend, detective.’

  ‘Do you?’ said Con.

  ‘It’s all I can think about. When you’re up there in the bush, among the trees and the cliffs, it’s hard not to believe there’s someone out there, watching you. And, well, the one thing that was never explained in 1985 was little Dorrie Dossett. She was the only witness, she’s the source of the Hungry Man stories.’

  ‘From what I understand, she had Down’s syndrome,’ said Con.

  ‘That doesn’t make you see things that aren’t there, Con,’ said Gabriella.

  ‘Dorrie said that a tall, thin, bearded bushman took her from her backyard,’ said Eliza. ‘He took her up the mountain and down into a cave. She said she saw Rose Cahil there, still alive. She said Rose was missing fingers and toes. She said the man, the Hungry Man, had eaten them. Then Dorrie escaped when he was sleeping and found her way back.’

  ‘Again, I’m sorry, but Down’s syndrome doesn’t lend itself to daring escapes from deranged serial killers,’ said Con.

  ‘But you’re not the only one who thinks that way,’ said Gabriella. ‘Maybe he was complacent around her, maybe he didn’t tie her up.’

  ‘Dorrie was never taken seriously, she was an inconvenience,’ said Eliza. ‘The police had their man – Ted Barclay – but he was in custody at the time Dorrie Dossett was taken. They weren’t happy about it, but Ted was granted bail after that, and you know what happened then.

  ‘A lot of people disregarded Dorrie’s testimony. Ted was the groundsman at the school and there were rumours that she knew him, that they were friends and she made up a story to protect him.’

  Footsteps came down the hall and then a shirtless Tom North appeared, hesitating at the sight of Con and Gabriella. ‘Ah,’ said Tom. ‘Sorry.’ He spun on his heel and headed back up the corridor.

  ‘No, please,’ said Con, rising. ‘We need to chat with you, too.’

  Tom hesitated, then returned. Con and Gabriella had spoken to him briefly in the car park by the trail, together with Jack Michaels, but he looked different now in just track pants. His jaw looked too big for his face – ‘Juice Jaw’, they called it. When he’d turned, Con had seen the acne on his back. Tom North was definitely on steroids. He filed that away in his mind.

  ‘Not sure what else I can tell you,’ said Tom.

  ‘I have some new questions. Take a seat,’ said Con. ‘Tell me about the girls – let’s start with Jasmine Murphy.’

  ‘She’s a good egg,’ said Tom. He sat down at the kitchen counter. ‘I only had her for PE. She’d get in and have a go. Little thing, had a bit of a reputation for being a bad girl. The guys just flocked to her. I’m not sure how she did it.’

  Eliza nodded. ‘Her and Georgia weren’t as stunning as the twins, but they still drew the boys. They were more down to earth. Or maybe less . . . untouchable.’

  ‘So did Jasmine have a boyfriend?’ said Con, looking between the two of them.

  Tom spoke first. ‘She told all the boys at school that she did, but she wouldn’t say who it was,’ he said. ‘It drove them wild. I’m telling you, if you think girls are gossips, just come along to the locker room before footy training.’ He chuckled. ‘Or not. It gets pretty dirty sometimes. Jasmine has this temper – the boys go wild for it. Like her dad, in that way.’

  ‘You know Jordan Murphy?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Tom. Monica appeared and pushed a shirt into Tom’s hands, which he hastily pulled on, prompting a quiet sigh of disappointment from Gabriella. ‘We were in the same year, growing up here. We didn’t mix in the same ci
rcles, though, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘Let’s pretend that I don’t,’ said Con, with a smile.

  ‘Ah. Well. Murphy . . . he didn’t show up at school much. And when he did, he spent half the day smoking by the basketball courts and the other half in the principal’s office. His dad was our dealer. Best bush bud around. Then he dropped out and followed in Daddy’s footsteps . . .’

  Eliza hit him on the side.

  ‘What?’ said Tom. ‘As if they don’t already know.’ He leaned towards Con. ‘He’s the one you should be interrogating.’

  ‘Didn’t realise this was an interrogation,’ said Con.

  ‘Just having a joke, mate,’ said Tom.

  ‘Tell us about Cierra Mason,’ said Gabriella.

  Monica had lingered in the kitchen, washing dishes, and at this question Con heard her pause, just for a second.

  ‘I don’t have too much to do with her,’ said Tom. ‘Whenever she shows up to PE, she doesn’t do much. I called home about it a few times but nothing ever happened: you’d think the sun shone out of those two girls’ backsides, the way their parents talk about them.’ He shrugged. ‘Eliza would know more.’

  ‘Cierra isn’t much into Literacy or History or Indigenous Studies or . . . anything, really,’ said Eliza, a small catch in her voice, a half-glance in Tom’s direction. ‘To be honest, she’s a pain in the classroom: whenever she finally opens up her books, which usually takes half the lesson, she just complains it’s too hard. You have to be helping her one-on-one all the time. Polar opposite of her sister.’

  ‘Was Cierra seeing anyone?’ said Gabriella.

  ‘Oh yeah. She had someone on the go all the time,’ interjected Tom. ‘Tyler Cabot? Or is it Jye Calloway now?’ Tom stood up, long legs unfolding. ‘I better dry some of these dishes for Monica. I’m afraid I don’t know much more about the other two girls, either.’

  ‘Stick around, mate, I’m not finished yet,’ said Con. ‘Up in the mountains, when you first realised the girls and Eliza were missing, did you see anything unusual?’

  ‘Nothing at all, mate. Same as I told you yesterday. Those storm clouds came in a lot quicker than we expected, but you get that in the Tiers – sometimes we’ll get thunder on a calm blue day. You just can’t pick it.’