by Peter Corris
‘You think not?’
‘God, you’re a bastard.’
‘When I have to be. Why doesn’t your daughter come around? And you never talk about her.’
Cyn sat down in one of the leather chairs and all the energy left her in a rush. ‘We’ve fallen out, Anne and I. It’s nothing serious.’
I had my doubts about that and I wondered whether the falling out had contributed to the search for the lost child. I was out of my depth. ‘Look,’ I said. ‘The place of birth checks out. The date’s one day out, though. I suppose this Megan French could be your daughter.’
‘ Our daughter.’
I’d told Cyn about Meg French’s early academic record and about her jump across the creek. I hadn’t mentioned Talbot hitting her. ‘She’s athletic and bright…”
‘And running around with some low-life. That’s you coming out in her.’
‘Cyn.’
She covered her face with her hands. Her hair flopped forward and suddenly, thin and frail in a silk dress that was loose on her, she looked old. She lifted her face and pushed back the hair. ‘I’m sorry, Cliff. I’m sorry. It’s late in the day. Would you like a drink?’
‘I would. If you’ll have one.’
‘I hardly slept at all last night. On all these pills sometimes you do and sometimes you don’t. It feels bloody late in the day to me. I generally have a brandy at seven o’clock when I watch the news. I think I’ll have one now. You?’
‘Why not?’
She went to the kitchen for ice and soda water and poured the brandy from a decanter on a shelf. The tray also held bottles of gin and Scotch – I would’ve preferred either of them, but what the hell.
‘Cheers,’ she said. We touched glasses. ‘D’you remember when we used to like brandy, lime and soda? I wonder if people still drink that these days?’
‘Haven’t heard of it lately,’ I said. ‘It wasn’t a bad drink though.’ I sipped. ‘This is pretty smooth.’
But from the way she set it down on the arm of the chair I could tell that she wasn’t really interested in the alcohol. ‘So what’s your next move? It doesn’t sound as if you pushed very hard up there. They must know where she’d go.’
I was enjoying the drink. Brandy at 6.30, I thought. Have to watch out for that. ‘I don’t think so. The woman does possibly, but the husband’s got her hog-tied. You have to watch your step these days. Can’t throw your weight around like before. She’ll turn up again at this environmental thing.’
She gestured impatiently, almost upsetting her glass. ‘So we just wait? That doesn’t sound like the old Cliff. Goes with the suit, does it?’
I sipped the smooth brandy and didn’t say anything.
‘French,’ Cyn mused. ‘Quite a nice name for such nasty people. You said that her… uncle I suppose we have to call him, spoke well of her?’
‘Everything speaks well of her, Cyn, except her association with this Talbot. But for that, I wouldn’t be too worried.’
‘Wouldn’t you? But that’s you all over, isn’t it? Not worrying about other people. Well, he went to NIDA. What does that say about him?’
I let her waspishness pass. ‘I don’t know anything about NIDA except they train actors there. Didn’t Mel Gibson go there?’
‘Dropped out I think, like this one. That’s another thing I don’t like – this dropping out. Jesus, Cliff, how’re you going to find her? You can’t just wait for her to turn up.’
‘I’ll keep looking. That’s all I can do. I’ll talk to people at these schools they’ve gone to. Try to squeeze something out.’
Cyn took a long swallow of her drink. ‘Yes, of course. You have to find her. You have to talk to your daughter.’
And you probably need to talk to yours, I thought but didn’t say. I just nodded.
Cyn’s eyes narrowed and at first I thought she was experiencing some deep pain, but it was a gesture of concentration, penetration. ‘You know she’s yours, don’t you, Cliff?’
I took a drink. ‘I was a dropout, too,’ I said.
Cyn smiled and the fatigue and fragility momentarily fell away. ‘So you were, and you didn’t turn out so badly.’
I left, promising to keep in close touch and tell her everything I learned even though I’d already glossed over many things, particularly about Talbot, and I didn’t plan to change. She thanked me and reminded me again of my stake in the matter. For no good reason, the thought of DNA testing came into my head and I recoiled from it. She didn’t mention the cheque and neither did I.
10
I spent the next morning working hard and not getting far. I spoke on the phone to a NIDA lecturer who remembered Talbot.
‘He thought of himself as a method actor,’ he said. ‘And he thought that just meant being his normal, charming, conceited self. He was wrong and he didn’t like it when he found out.’
Through a contact in the Corrective Services Department I tried to get information on Talbot’s prison record and failed. I went to the TAFE college in North Sydney where both Talbot and Megan had studied and drew a blank with Talbot. No-one remembered him. But Dr Sylvia Davis, who taught something called environmental philosophy, remembered Megan.
‘Very bright,’ she said. ‘Her first semester results were HD.’
‘Sorry, that means?’
‘High Distinction. First class honours in the old style.’
The college, with its multiple acronyms, codes and facilities like condom-vending machines in the toilets, had made me feel very old style. I asked what had happened to Megan subsequently.
Dr Davis didn’t even have to consult a file. ‘She dropped out. Didn’t submit an exercise, didn’t turn up for her seminar presentation. That’s the worst sign.’
‘Did you try to find out why?’
She sighed and looked around her tiny office, cluttered with books, folders and video cassettes. ‘Mr Hardy, have you any idea of what my work load here is like? You were lucky, you caught me with fifteen minutes to spare. Look, I wrote a note to the address we had on file. It came back stamped “not-known-at-this-address”. That’s all I could do. I’m sorry. I hope you can find her. She had great potential.’
No comfort, that. I went to my car and sat thinking, working out the best way to tackle Talbot’s mother. The mobile rang.
‘Mr Hardy? This is Tess Hewitt. I’ve been trying to get you for an hour or more. Why don’t you answer your mobile?’
‘I don’t carry the phone with me. Can’t stand it. Have they shown up? Are they there now?’
‘Been and gone,’ she said. ‘I think you should get over here. A man’s been killed.’
‘Killed? What man? Who by?’
‘They say Damien Talbot did it. He and Meg were here, now they’ve gone.’
‘Jesus. Right, I’m on my way.’
‘No, on second thoughts, don’t come here. There’s police all over the place and I’m going to be flat out keeping Ramsay calm. I just snuck off to let you know.’
‘Did she go with Talbot willingly?’
‘Look, I can’t talk now. We’ll have to meet later.’
There was sense in what she was saying and I fought down my impatience. ‘Okay. Where and when?’
‘Come to my place this afternoon. Say about three. The police should be finished with us by then.’
She gave me an address in Concord and rang off. I dropped the phone on the passenger seat and stared through the windscreen. The rain of the past few days had cleared and the day was fine and still. The water and wind had removed the pollution and I could see the whole length of the tree-lined street. I could see the arch of the bridge above the building line. Things were changing here too. They were knocking things down and throwing things up in search of the dollar but at least it wasn’t the Olympic tourist dollar. Just for once, the north side of the city had more appeal for me than the south.
On the drive south I caught a news broadcast that gave the usual sparse details on the events at Tadpole Creek. No names were men
tioned and the writer of the bulletin obviously had almost no knowledge about the picket line. A man had been killed and police were investigating and that was about it.
I was worried, but I tried to adopt a professional attitude. I had a good source and would learn more in time. I drove to the public library in Glebe and used the Internet to dig up whatever I could on the work at Homebush. The information was vast and I printed out only the odd page. According to the official version, every effort had been made to clean up what had been dirty, restore what had been damaged and preserve everything of value. The sanctimonious tone of the material made me suspicious and I knew something the compilers didn’t – that a straggly waterway named Tadpole Creek had escaped their notice.
Just to be thorough, I searched for Tadpole Creek. Slim pickings – an account of a picnic there in the 1930s attended by some minor member of the Royal family; a stormwater and drainage proposal not proceeded with after the war; an offer by a consortium to build a tennis facility involving piping of the creek, rejected by the council in the mid-eighties and a Native Title claim lodged in 1996 but withdrawn a year later due to the discovery of an unspecified mistake in old maps of the area.
Tess Hewitt’s house was a Californian bungalow on a large block with the backyard abutting the golf course. The driveway held a newish Holden Barina that would have had to brush branches aside to get to where it was parked. The front lawn was badly in need of mowing and the bushes and shrubs wanted a trim. I parked behind the Barina and went along a series of cement circles to the porch. The circles were overgrown and in danger of disappearing. A large thistle poked up knee-high in front of the porch steps.
‘Neglected, isn’t it?’ Tess Hewitt said.
I pulled up the thistle, knocked the soil from the roots and tossed it aside. ‘You should see my place.’
Tess stood at the top of the steps looking down at me. She wore black ski pants, medium heels and a white silk blouse with full sleeves. She held a glass of red wine in one hand and a bottle in the other.
‘You caught me red-handed.’
Despite my anxiety, I laughed and went up the steps. ‘I’m glad you’re all right. You seemed pretty upset on the phone. The news people don’t know a thing. What’s happening?’
‘Come in and I’ll tell you all about it. I know you’ve got an interest, but so have I. Ramsay. I’m resolved not to panic and I regard red wine as the best anti-panic formula in the world. Do you drink red wine?’
‘I do.’
We went in. The front rooms were dim, as they often are in such houses, but the back had been opened up to the light by some tasteful renovation – a skylight, big windows, sliding glass doors. We went through to a tiled area with cane furniture and indoor plants. A low table held a loaf of sliced rye bread, fetta cheese on a board, black olives still in their delicatessen plastic bowl, some plates. Tess Hewitt had grabbed another glass on the way through the kitchen. She poured for me and topped up her own.
‘I heard the car pull up,’ she said. She wasn’t sober exactly, but she was a long way from drunk.
‘It needs a tune. Still, that’s good hearing.’ I raised my glass to her. ‘Cheers.’
She acknowledged the gesture but didn’t respond. She might not have panicked, but she was battling against something else. The food on the table reminded me that I’d skipped lunch. It must have showed because she forced a smile and picked up a knife from the cheese board. ‘Hungry?’
The wine was smooth and good and would’ve disposed me to eat even if I hadn’t been hungry. I nodded. ‘Please. I missed lunch.’
‘I tried to eat but I couldn’t. I didn’t think private detectives concerned themselves about things like lunch. You disappoint me.’ She concentrated hard, frowning, as she sliced some cheese and put it on a plate with some bread and half a dozen olives and passed it to me with a paper napkin which I immediately dropped.
‘I’ve never been able to keep one of these things where they should be,’ I said. ‘They usually end up on the floor.’
‘Don’t worry. I’m glad to have some company and see someone acting normally. I can’t, quite. Have a bite and I’ll tell you what happened.’
She took a good slug of wine and told me that she’d stayed at the picket line overnight, dossing down in a sleeping bag in the tent. ‘I do that pretty often,’ she said. ‘Act as a sort of organiser and keeper-together of things. Ramsay can’t do it all and there’s sometimes disputes and arguments that need a subtle touch.’
I nodded. I wanted her to get to the point, but the bread and cheese and wine were hitting the spot and I was enjoying looking at her. Unprofessional, I know, but it was polite to let her tell it her way and I sensed that that in her tense, edgy state, politeness was a good strategy.
‘I woke up in the early hours. I knew the noise. It was that bloody van of Damien’s. It’s got a shot muffler. I thought, Good, I’ll try to get Meg to stick around and I’ll get through to Mr Hardy. I went back to sleep. A bit later I woke up again and there was a scream and shouts and lights and bangings and clangs. I pulled on my pants and went out. It was just dawn and bloody cold. I heard a woman scream and I saw the van roaring off. A few people were huddled together over near the creek. There’s a spot where you can cross on some rocks and a log. There was a man on the ground with his head beaten in. It was horrible. The faint light made it worse, sort of. Like in a black and white movie. The blood looked black.’
She had another drink and I finished what I was eating and left the rest on my plate. ‘I know what you mean,’ I said. ‘I’ve seen it. Who was he?’
She sucked in a deep breath. ‘One of the security people.’
‘Jesus.’
‘It was hard to work out what had happened because it was dark and there were people moving around. We mount a sort of watch at night, you see. The way it looks is that Damien took it on himself to scout around and found this security man on our side of the creek. There could have been a fight. I don’t know. But the man’s dead and Damien’s gone.’
She set her glass down hard on the table. ‘I know what you want to ask. What about Megan? But think about me. The police are charging Ramsay with being an accessory or something.’
I told her that the charge of being an accessory in matters like this was largely a bluff and seldom led to any serious consequences. ‘Have you got a lawyer?’
She nodded. ‘Yes. We’ve had one all along. Bill Damelian. But he’s really an environmental man. I don’t think he does any criminal stuff.’
‘Doesn’t matter. Environmental lawyers deal with bail and all that stuff regularly. And he’ll know who to talk to if it goes any further,’ I said. ‘Don’t worry.’
She picked up her glass and looked at me. ‘For some unknown bloody reason I believe you. Why would that be?’
‘Experience,’ I said. ‘I’ve been around lawyers and police and crims for more than twenty years. You get a feel for where the real danger lies. Not always right about it, but…’
‘Okay, the police took Ramsay off, but he was pretty composed and I got onto Bill. He said he’d be right on it. You’re saying he’ll get Ramsay out.’
I nodded. ‘It mightn’t go so well for the protest, though.’
She shrugged. ‘You win some, you lose some.’ She poured some more wine for us. ‘Thanks. You’re a comfort. Right. Well, Megan. She went off with Damien, I’m sorry to tell you.’
I repeated what I’d asked her on the phone. ‘Willingly?’
‘I can’t say. I would say that I think the scream I heard when I woke up was hers, and that I heard her scream again just before the van roared off.’
‘Meaning that the first scream might have been when she saw the body, so she wasn’t there when it happened, and the second one was a protest at being dragged off?’
‘I hope so. For her sake and yours.’ She looked at me keenly. ‘I don’t really know you, of course. But just at a guess I’d say you’re taking this missing persons case rather
personally. How come?’
I told her. Before she could respond the phone rang.
She took the call and from the few words I heard I guessed it was from the lawyer so I moved out to the back verandah to give her some privacy. The back garden bore the same hallmarks of neglect as the front. It was somehow sad. I’ve never lived with anyone long enough or in an appropriate place to reshape a piece of land together. Clearly, that’s what had happened here once. A fishpond showed signs of heavy work – not professionally done, but satisfactorily. The flowers in the well-mulched garden beds had been carefully tended at one time; not any more.
I wandered down the overgrown path and found a screened-in vegetable garden that told the same story – crude but solid carpentry, a considerable amount of earth moved, subtle touches.
‘What’re you doing?’
I turned to see Tess on the verandah, shielding her eyes against the late afternoon sun. Her posture was tense, almost aggressive. I walked back, careful to avoid a rake that lay on the ground, teeth up.
‘I was getting out of your way while you were on the phone. Something bad?’
She nodded. ‘They’re charging Ramsay as an accessory to unlawful death and opposing bail. I thought you said accessory charges didn’t amount to anything.’
She was upset, looking for someone to blame. Lawyers are great at deflecting blame, I seem to have a knack for attracting it. ‘It depends. What does the lawyer say?’
‘He says he’s working on it. Ramsay’ll have to stay in custody tonight at least.’
‘It won’t be so bad. He – ‘
‘Oh, he’ll love it! He’s been looking for it for ages. Martyrdom’s just his style, the idiot.’
We went back into the house and Tess made coffee. It seemed to fit the new mood. She told me that her parents had died in a plane crash when Ramsay, who was ten years younger than her, was fifteen. She’d seen him through his adolescence, delaying her marriage to do so. Ramsay had spent the next few years as a part-time student of this and that, dropout, trainee at a variety of things and dole recipient.
‘Somehow, he just couldn’t let go of me. Phillip, my husband, eventually got sick of it. I can’t blame him. Ramsay’d turn up at just the wrong times. Stay too long. Cost too much. I don’t know whether Phillip and I would’ve made a go of it anyway, but certainly not with Ramsay hanging on. He was a sort of catalyst for our breakup.’