He leaves, heading back out the door he arrived through. Elaine watches him the whole way. His car disappears at speed, and I understand that the hand on Elaine’s back was a gesture of power more than intimacy. I slump against the hedge, and watch her. She paces, distressed, picks up something and throws it at the wall, and then sits with her head in her hands, and sobs. Why don’t I go to her? Is it because it would be too creepy for her to know I was out here spying? Or is it because I don’t understand what I have just witnessed?
I crawl on hands and knees until I reach the sheds, and then I run, stumbling and tripping just to burn the adrenaline that is bursting in my body. The spotlight is now in the far distance, several paddocks away, so at least I am safe from that. My steps in the soft soil keep time with the battering of thoughts in my head. Is Elaine being forced to do something she doesn’t want to do and is too afraid to tell me about? That would put her in the clear. Sort of. If everything is linked, then Ben is a definite bad guy, more involved than I realised. I walk and then ride, and reach home.
I wander around my house, hoping a way forward will blossom in my head. I see Ben hitting Elaine again, and the fury with which she held that knife. Maybe they are in an abusive relationship that is also a crime partnership. That feels possible for Ben, but not Elaine. Then I watch TV for a while, not seeing it, which is good because I hate TV. It is full of stories of relationships, and failure, and loss, which make me hurt. Eventually, I sleep, not having come up with any answers.
In the morning, I drive around the farm, sticking to my pointless routine. The landscape is still green, abundant, and awesome. The weather is so mild and faultless that even I feel the beauty of it. Is there a perfect temperature for a human being? One that lifts your spirit, no matter how low? That’s how it feels, and I am desperate for the goodness of it. I know that Keats and his mates thought of autumn as decline, but round here it can match spring for splendour, and the threat of winter is no more fatal than the threat of summer.
I get out and walk the paddock for a while, and actually pay attention — like I used to. The summer grasses are holding their green, because there still hasn’t been a frost, while the winter grasses are shooting up, sticking their optimistic heads in the air. The landscape is rich and diverse, probably because I haven’t pushed it in the last few years. All good signs. I should have oats in. I should have steers grazing. I should have wheat in, and up. I should … I am clear-headed enough to know that this is bullshit. The paddocks are not prepared —they’re thick with weeds, which means that moisture hasn’t been retained and that anything planted will struggle. So the seedbed is full of weed seeds waiting for their chance. And weeds take their chance better than anything. My farm is a mess. But for a moment I am not thinking about Elaine and Ben, or James. It’s a good feeling.
And then I remember I have to tidy up James’s area, and weed the garden bed. So I drive home, and walk past the disorder of my garden to the fastidiously looked-after plot. There really isn’t anything for me to do. A weed never gets a chance in this garden bed, and the lawn is clipped, even, and clearly marked out. In two months he would have been eighteen. That one sentence has enough pain in it to last me for a thousand sleeps.
At lunchtime, I ring Elaine, and ask her if she’s all right.
‘I’m fine. That’s the question I should be asking you. Is your head okay?’
‘Back to normal.’
‘I should put you on to the company that hires my security guard.’
‘Is he around all the time?’
‘Twenty-four/seven, except when I give him the night off, which I don’t do much, because it makes me feel insecure.’
‘Yeah, I bet it would. By the way, I saw Ben’s ute driving in to your place.’ When the words come out, I realise how odd they sound — how odd I sound.
‘I did warn you about spying on me, didn’t I?’ The tone is jokey.
‘I just saw the ute go in. That’s not spying. That’s just driving past.’
‘Okay.’
‘He’s a nasty bit of work, though.’
‘You think?’
‘I know.’
‘I think he’s kinda sweet.’
Here’s an answer that bowls me over. Even if I hadn’t seen him hit her, I would struggle to believe she could think Ben was ‘sweet’. Now I know for sure she’s being dishonest with me. There is something significant she’s hiding. Even so, I can’t stop the word ‘Sweet?’ slipping out on its own as a question. She laughs that laugh. I can picture it tinkling up out of her throat.
‘I’m kidding. He’s definitely not sweet. But he’s not that bad when you get to know him. He’s helped us out a lot.’
My tongue does not have the dexterity to allow me to say, Is being hit by him part of getting to know him? I just give a ‘Hmm.’
Her rejoinder is something like, ‘He is, I promise. You should make an effort with him. He’s actually very interesting. Knows lots of things. Is in contact with all sorts of people.’
‘I don’t think I’ll be making any effort with Ben Ruder.’
‘He was a good support to Tito through all our troubles.’
I don’t say I can’t imagine it.
‘Used to get the cow bones for Tito’s pottery. Tito always appreciated that.’
I tell her I’m just glad she’s okay, which seems out of context given that we haven’t discussed what I saw, and then I hang up.
13
In the evening, I shower for a long time, because it seems like it’s something I should do. I repeat to myself that Ben was supportive of Tito. What the hell does that mean? Then I think about Tito and what might have been driving him.
I cook a barbecue for myself, and make sure there are veggies on the plate. Apparently, that’s how you live longer, and that seems a weird thing for me to be thinking about. At the current level of my vegetable consumption, I should be dead tomorrow. James liked peas, but no other vegetable I could think of. This never stopped Sarah thinking up new ways to trick and blackmail him into eating them. Sometimes she succeeded, and sometimes she succeeded because he knew he had to please someone who was trying so hard.
And then I search for the name of the small village that Elaine said Tito liked to visit. I don’t know anything else about Tito, except what we talked about and what Elaine has told me. The internet has a few articles and pictures of him winning prizes and awards over the years, but nothing of any help to me. Willi comes up on the map, but not before the algorithm has tried to send me to a dozen similar-sounding places. It is about five hours’ drive west of here, and according to various websites it is a thriving metropolis. It has hotels and motels, and schools and industry. But when I refine the search on each of these categories, I discover that Willi has none of them. All I can find is that it has something called a sub post office, but the internet can’t really explain what this is. All the references are to licensed post offices and community postal agents. I guess these are modern rebadgings of the old half post office, half small businesses that used to exist around here. I remember one on the other side of Waterglen that sold booze as well.
I call the Willi number provided. I know with these sorts of establishments I have just as much chance of catching the proprietors at night as I do during work hours.
‘Hello.’ The voice is pleasant, but unconcerned.
‘Is that the Willi post office?’
‘Sure is. How can I help?’ It is not the voice of someone from the west. He has not bothered to take up the distinct way they talk out there. A newcomer, I’m guessing, but maybe new a decade or so ago.
‘I just wanted to check that you were still in business.’
‘Business? We’re still open, and we do the mail, if that’s what you’re asking.’
‘Yeah. That’s good to hear. Do you remember a bloke called Tito Slade?’
He d
oes not say anything for a long time. A dog yaps a small-dog bark in the background. No one hushes him. ‘Who am I talking to?’ The voice is now tense and on-guard.
‘Dave Martin from Stony Creek.’
‘Dave.’ His voice relaxes. ‘How are you, Dave?’
‘I’m well, thanks. You’ve heard of me, my name?’
‘Well, I would have, wouldn’t I?’
‘Why is that?’
‘If you want to find that out, you’d better come and visit.’ The line goes dead.
I ring Ian, and Mandy answers the phone. I tell her I need to go on a little trip, and this time I really will go away, and would Ian mind feeding the dogs? She is quick to agree to do anything I ask, and then wonders aloud if I would like Ian to go with me.
‘Thanks, Mandy, but I need to do this on my own.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘I promise I’ll look after myself.’
At daylight, I fuel the ute, throw some things in, and head out. I’ll be driving west for five hours: a little south-west, and bit north-west, but west over all. I put my sunglasses on, and turn the radio up. I reckon I’m driving towards answers and away from something, and that’s a feeling I’m going to hang on to for all of those five hours. I’m not going to think about what I’ll do with the answers I may or may not get. And as the country changes from undulating to fairly flat, to really bloody flat, I keep guiding my thoughts away from who would be interested in those answers, why they would be, and what they might do.
I sing along loudly to old songs, and disagree with opinionated radio announcers. It borders on fun, and is definitely a type of peace. My phone is off, and nothing can touch me in my cab. There is just me and the whirring of my tyres on the black top. I check off towns as I go — none of them the same, and none dissimilar. Some look like they’ve been boosted by mining or some other new industry, and others look like they should have ‘If we don’t do something soon’ written across their ‘Welcome to …’ signs. The trees on either side of the road change as I cruise through different districts. Eventually the trees take a back seat, and forms of shrub and low bush dominate.
When James was a small boy he was always asking me the names of things, especially plants and animals. I would explain box trees, Myall trees, red river gums, and kurrajongs, and he would say them back to me, rolling the words around in his mouth and trying them out until he got them right, or close to right. He demanded to know grass types, thistles, and birds until I was running for books to expand my own knowledge. I know so much more of my world because of him. Just one of his legacies, I guess.
Late morning, I pull over in a small river town and buy a hamburger and a drink in a cafe that feels like it refuses to notice it is the twenty-first century. There is a large coffee machine, but I’m not willing to risk it. I take my lunch down to the riverside, sit at a shaded council bench, and look at the slowly flowing water, glad that it actually exists. I’ve made such good time that some of my urgency has dropped off. After I’ve eaten I put my feet up and half doze for an hour or so. It is almost like being on holiday: no one knows me and nothing is familiar.
I go for a drive along the river, which winds away from the direction I’m supposed to be heading. By the time I’ve found my way back to the main track, I realise I’ve wasted a few hours. Well wasted, though. I’m calm and as positive as I get.
I take a turn off the highway, even though the faded signposts do not mention Willi. The country gets paler and harder, and I know the farmers here must own an awful lot of land to run enough animals to exist. I haven’t seen any animals other than kangaroos for over half an hour. There is some feed in the paddocks, but I don’t think my cows would eat it. The GPS says Willi is only twenty minutes away, but I know GPS doesn’t always have the right information in country like this. I stick to the track, and see a gravel right-hand turn that has its own sign pointing to the village I’m looking for. On the map, Willi is at the junction of three roads, but the sign makes no such suggestion. Willi is the end of the line.
I reach the village around three in the afternoon. There is a main street and a strip of tar again, so you know you’re in a settlement. There are six houses to my right, and a hall, and maybe eight houses on my left. I drive down the main drag, and look. The houses are okay, their gardens better kept than mine, and there aren’t too many vehicles on blocks in the long grass. At what I think is the end of the street I turn left into a street that takes me past the backs of the houses I’ve seen, and in front of another row of maybe five more houses. These ones have large yards, and one of them has a prime mover parked out the front. I’m guessing the inhabitants are workers who service the surrounding farming district, but I can’t imagine there is much work for them. There will be people on welfare, too, as there always is in small villages. Then again, it isn’t the place I’d pick to be on welfare, so perhaps no one else has.
A loop of the village takes me back to a house with a phone box out the front. In my memory, a phone box used to be a sign of civilisation: if you were broken down, or lost, or desperate, it was the one way to call someone. No phone box, no phone call. Now it looks quaint, and old-world in the legion of a parked horse and buggy. Behind the phone box on the front of the house is a faded sign with the ‘P’ symbol of the post office on it. There is no other evidence that this is the place I’m looking for. I park next to the phone box, get out, and push my way through a small wire gate. The house looks unloved but solid, more solid than mine. A screen door that has been poorly repaired a couple of times swings loosely on its hinges. I open it, and step into the past. In front of me is a smooth timber counter with no one behind it so I can see the rows of empty pigeonholes on the back wall. There are a few parcels on the floor, and some small dusty piles of letters, and post packs that you can buy. A bell sits on the counter on top of a sticky-taped note to ring it if you need service.
To the left, I can see, side-on, an upright communications board with wires coming out of it, and a headset lying next to it. I know what it is, but it is so long since I’ve seen one that it takes me a moment to comprehend. It is an old party-line phone switchboard. We had one when we were small children. You wound the handle a few times to get the operator, and then you asked him or her to put you through to the number you wanted. It was a party line because only one caller could use it at a time, and anyone could pick up the phone and listen in to any conversation. Everyone had a Morse code identifier assigned to them, and when you heard your Morse code you knew the call was for you. Everyone else knew you were getting a phone call. There were seven or eight families to each line. We were one of the last areas to be upgraded to an automatic exchange with phones that you could dial a number with, like they did on the television.
This switchboard has not been used in a very long time, and I’m sure the lines no longer exist, but it is still strange to see it. I am floating around in the time when everything was so different, even though it doesn’t seem that long ago, when a man’s voice says, ‘Can I help you?’
He is probably in his mid-thirties, tall, slim, with long, thick hair that is only one combing short of being dreadlocks. He has a loose look about him, and his eyes are odd, not quite able to hold focus. The clothes he’s wearing are a light fabric that might even have been tie-dyed at one stage but are now just a faded blue. ‘Alternative’ comes to mind, or maybe ‘artist’. But out here?
I stick out a hand and say, ‘My name is Dave Martin. From Stony Creek. We spoke on the phone?’
‘Shit. You really did come?’ There’s something like panic in his mad eyes. ‘Shiflon Vasser.’ He shakes my hand with a firm but irregular shake. ‘Is your car out the front?’
I tell him yes.
‘Would you mind taking it round the back? There’s a little track right next to the house. If you follow it down until you pull in under a really bushy tree, it will be much harder to see you.’ He gives a sort
of whinny after he speaks, which I think is involuntary.
I want to ask why he wants me to park around the back, but he’s already been a bit secret-agenty with me on the phone, so I figure if I want information I’d better play along.
It is warm and clear outside, and I am glad of the fresh air. I do as he says. The bushy tree, which I hadn’t noticed in my lap around town, does a good job of hiding my ute. You might almost think it was pruned for the purpose. Shiflon sticks his head out of a door at the back of his house, and waves me in. Inside, the house is dark but fairly clean. There are couches and beanbags with Indian-looking sheets and rugs thrown over them. Here and there, instruments that look like guitars rest against walls and chairs. It looks like an interior (and maybe even weight-bearing) wall has been removed, because the area is one big room that opens onto a kitchen at one end and a bathroom at the other. The ceiling droops. A single, bare globe on a long lead hangs at the lowest point. He ushers me towards the kitchen, and I ask, ‘Is someone watching us?’
He peers at me as if I’m stupid or perhaps joking, and then looks concerned. A whinny escapes from somewhere between his nose and his mouth. I notice his feet are bare, and his toes are very long.
‘You are Dave Martin, who lives near Tito Slade’s place, aren’t you?’ He puts his hands on his hips, and looks like he’s ready for some sort of fight.
‘I am.’
‘And why are you here?’
‘I think Tito involved me in something, but I’m not sure what. His wife said he loved to spend time in this village.’
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