We head west on the road but in less than a kilometre Tony wrenches the steering wheel and turns abruptly onto a dirt fire trail.
‘Short cut,’ he tells me. ‘Can go straight through to Old Castle Road.’
The track narrows until it is only as wide as the ute, dusty dry with the edges eroding away. It’s bumpy and I grab the handle above the door to brace myself. Tony slows down, glancing periodically back at the dog in the rear vision mirror.
‘This has gotten a lot worse than the last time I used it,’ Tony says. ‘Council will have to fix it up before the next fire season.’
He concentrates on driving and I try to work out who wants to run me out of town and why. I still don’t have a single name by the time we hit the tar of Old Castle Road and the landscape changes from bush to farmland.
The road is empty of traffic but full of potholes. When we finally pass another car, the occupant nods a greeting to Tony and in return he lifts his fingers off his steering wheel just like my Dad used to do.
Around us, the black destruction from the fire has been replaced by a vast ocean of yellow grass. Late autumn rains should turn it green again. Everywhere I look, there are the missing landmarks of my childhood. Cypresses and hedges, planted as windbreaks by long-dead farmers, are gone. Animals and buildings are few. It is a beautiful but eerie landscape.
We pull up in front of The Castle’s locked gate.
‘Won’t be a minute,’ says Tony.
He gets out to unlock it and the kelpie immediately jumps down to join him. From this distance The Castle looks as permanent as a mountain or a boulder, and all of a sudden I don’t want to go any nearer and see the damage so instead I watch the dog, waiting obediently near Tony. Its whole body, from ears to tail, almost quivers with excitement. With a gesture from Tony, it takes off like a rocket.
‘Rabbits,’ explains Tony, getting back in. ‘Rowdy goes crazy for them. He misses the farm.’
‘What farm?’ I ask.
Tony clears his throat before answering. ‘He belonged to the Newburys. They sold up after Alice was killed and couldn’t take Rowdy with them. It was the very least I could do but when I went to pick him up, Mrs Newbury couldn’t even look me in the face.’
Jaw clenched, he starts the ute down the gravel.
‘Surely they didn’t think her death was your fault?’ I ask.
He shrugs. ‘When something that terrible happens, people need someone to blame. They need to believe that it happened for a reason. Being under police investigation didn’t help.’
‘That’s awful.’
The look of bleakness on his face suggests that the description is barely adequate, but then he shakes it away. ‘There’s something I need to ask you,’ he says, keeping his eyes fixed on the road ahead. ‘Mum told me that you’re working for Colcart.’
The Castle comes closer and closer.
I hesitate, trying to pick my words carefully. ‘I’m on leave at the moment but yes I work for them.’
‘Is that why you came back to Kinsale?’
‘At the start. That isn’t why I’m here now.’
We turn from the track onto the circular drive that takes us right to the stairs leading up to the enormous front doors. From this angle The Castle looks worn down. A layer of grime has been added to the facade and there is no formal garden now to soften the stone.
‘Our lawyers say that Colcart might try and blame me for the fires, try to resurrect the investigation. Is that what you’ll do?’ asks Tony.
I think of ways to justify my job and the tactics that even a few weeks ago I might have been prepared to use but all of my excuses have disappeared. The obligations that I have to my client suddenly don’t seem important. Maybe it is time to stop thinking like a lawyer.
‘No,’ I tell him. ‘Not if I am running the case because our expert report says that the fire was started by the electricity wires.’
Tony looks at me, his grey eyes pewter. ‘Should you have told me that?’
‘Probably not,’ I say, ‘but it’s true.’
We get out. It is so quiet that the sound of the doors closing echoes back at us. Without waiting for me, Tony walks off along a path running along the side of the house. As I follow him, I can see darker patches on the external walls, windows that have been broken. Shreds of tape, which once blocked people from entering, flap in the breeze. The smell of smoke seems to get stronger, or is that just my imagination playing with me?
Tony stops at the back of the house. The more modern addition added a century after the original has been reduced to a skeletal black lace, with the sky poking through the skeleton that’s been left. A creeping carpet of green has begun to rim the edges, beginning the long process of reclaiming the building. It’s terrible.
‘This is the worst part,’ he says. ‘The outbuildings were destroyed as well but we knocked those down. No one was sure what to do with The Castle and then Mum went and sold it anyway.’
‘I only came out here for that function. It was so beautiful. I thought you were so lucky to own it.’
‘That was a good night,’ Tony answers. ‘I remember how you stood up to my father when he refused to pay you.’
‘I was a terrible waitress.’
‘Took guts. I never heard anyone talk to Dad like that before. Not even Mum and she’s the bravest person I know.’
‘You’ve got through the last two years. That’s pretty brave.’
He tries to laugh, but there’s a mirthless quality to it. ‘If I was brave, I’d tell people what really happened that day.’
The words swirl in the air like dust.
‘You told me about that expert report, I guess I should give you something in return.’
I hold my breath and for a long time he doesn’t speak but then, ‘Everyone knew that day was going to be bad and it was important to be organised so I was out here all that morning. You know, hoses ready, cleaning out gutters on the outbuildings, trimming the surrounds, lashing things down. I was about to head back into town and was down near the front gate.’ He points back the way we came. ‘There was this noise loud enough to be heard over the wind and that was already howling. It was like whip crack but louder and then a buzzing, enormous and metallic somehow.’
His hand pinches and then flicks back of its own accord as he tries to give a shape to the sound.
‘I ran towards it. The wire was arcing along the fence line and the fire had already started in the dry grass. I should have stomped it out with my boots but I couldn’t move. Just stood there watching it. Every fire truck in the district was on standby, but this was minor, I could deal with it. It wasn’t like I felt panic, more like I was numb. And as I’m there doing nothing, the fire is getting bigger and bigger and I keep standing there until I’m practically getting roasted from the heat. I couldn’t quite believe it was happening.’
He rubs a thumb along his face and covers his chin with his hand.
‘It grew into a wall of smoke. Only when I was struggling to breathe did I run back to shelter in the house. Didn’t even drive, left the car there, panicking I guess. Even when I got back inside I didn’t phone it in, the thought didn’t even cross my mind. All I wanted to do was hide. It was left to fire watchers who eventually saw the smoke. I thought I was going to die that day but other people did instead. The whole town almost went up and it was because I did nothing.’
I turn away from Tony and try to assess what he is telling me. Fifty metres away there is fresh police tape near a mound of dirt, marking out the recent dig, but my mind doesn’t stretch to thoughts of the bones and Grace’s necklace. Instead, I can’t stop myself from trying to dice his story into nice legal paragraphs that could sink a class action.
‘Why are you telling me this?’ I ask, looking back at him again.
Tony’s shoulders slump, like he’s weighed down by his confession.
‘There’s no-one else I can tell. Mum wouldn’t understand because she’s not scared of anything. If I tol
d the police, maybe they would charge me with endangering people’s lives because people might not have died if they had more warning, like Alice Newbury. She got caught in her car only a couple of kilometres from here. A few minutes earlier she might have made it to town. I think about that most days.’
There are tears in his words.
‘Are the Newburys right to blame me? Am I guilty?’
‘I’m not a judge,’ I say.
‘But you’re a lawyer,’ he answers. ‘What would Colcart say if they knew?’
I could use what he told me. In the right hands, this sort of testimony would be ammunition. It might not win the day but it would certainly muddy the waters.
‘What happened that day was terrible,’ I say. ‘But if you were my client, I’d tell you that you are not legally responsible. You don’t control the weather. You didn’t cause the wires to break. You could have been electrocuted if you went near the live wire on the ground. You were a witness to something terrible but that doesn’t make you responsible for it. There was no legal obligation for you to do anything.’
‘What about morally?’ he asks.
That’s a harder question but Tony has suffered enough already.
‘You were a bystander caught up in a terrible event. It wasn’t your fault that the powerlines hadn’t been checked in years. You’ve been unlucky, that’s all.’
There’s a sigh from him, a mixture of regret but perhaps also the beginnings of relief, that this burden doesn’t fall directly on him.
We walk the perimeter of the house, silently tracing the path of destruction, until Tony is satisfied that his job is done. Rowdy appears, panting and rabbitless, and we head back to the ute. The return trip to the motel is quiet, conversation kept to safe topics like the weather and Janey’s upcoming election as the setting sun gives the world a fiery glow.
It isn’t until Tony is standing on the steps of Cabin 2 that he brings it up again.
‘You said I was a bystander and that’s exactly how I feel,’ he says. ‘It’s not just about the fire, it’s bigger than that. I’m watching my life pass by and in my head I keep thinking grab it, do something, but instead I stand there. It’s like that night we were at the beach.’
We have circled back again to that night so right now we are both adults and sixteen at the same time.
He reaches out to take my hand in his and I know he wants to choose the other path offered to him that night. That we might kiss, skinny-dip, have sex and somehow rewrite the last twenty years.
It’s too late.
I pull my hand back gently.
‘Is it because of Donal?’ he asks. ‘I know you and him . . .’
I shake my head even though he is probably right. ‘It’s been a pretty eventful day. Thanks for everything but I’m pretty tired.’
If he’s disappointed, he hides it well.
‘Sure,’ he says. ‘Maybe dinner sometime.’
Standing at the doorway, insects buzz around the outside light as he heads off.
When I close the door, I make sure to lock it.
25
Aaron sits on a chair in the foyer looking out at the city as I wait for the receptionist to get off the phone. He is dressed in his version of formal – tracksuit pants covering up the tattoos and a collared football shirt so synthetic you could get electric shocks just looking at him. I’m wearing my best tailored blazer, nipped at the waist, with a matching pencil skirt. We could be a criminal lawyer and her client off to court.
The receptionist fiddles with my business card, murmuring something into her headset, and then looks up at me again.
‘And you say you have an appointment with Dr Adler?’
‘My assistant rang last week.’ I try to sound confident enough for both of us.
‘And this was organised through the police?’
‘It was the police who gave me Dr Adler’s name.’ It’s technically correct.
More whisperings into the phone, which I do my best to decipher. My law firm is being mentioned nervously. Law firms have that effect on people.
‘I’m afraid there’s no record of it,’ she says, part apologetically and part wanting to make it clear that this isn’t her stuff-up. ‘If you’re here about a deceased family member who is currently being examined, you can talk to one of our liaison officers.’
I don’t want to be liaised with, which implies sympathetic cups of tea and someone junior fobbing us off. Instead, my forehead crinkles as I pretend this is all very vexing.
‘My client has driven up from Kinsale this morning especially for this meeting. Could you see if Dr Adler is available now? We won’t take up much of her time.’
She makes a face but has another discreet discussion with the person on the other end. I’m certain that it is Dr Adler herself. That’s objective number one achieved, establishing that she is in the building. Finishing her conversation, the receptionist turns back to me shaking her head, more forcefully this time. She’s obviously been given an earful.
‘I’m afraid that isn’t possible. Unless we are notified directly by the police or the Heritage Department, it isn’t appropriate that Dr Adler speaks to you.’
‘The Heritage Department?’ I ask, momentarily confused. The receptionist’s mouth thins in response. Before she asks security to escort us out, I put up my hands to placate her.
‘We’ll go back to the police and get it sorted,’ I say. ‘Could you tell me the nearest place to grab coffee?’
‘So what do we do now?’ Aaron asks, after we sit down at a table in a nearby cafe. He doesn’t really look at me, preferring a space that’s about two feet to my left. It was an uncomfortable drive to the city this morning.
‘We’re just going to have to wait until she comes out.’ I pass him the photographs of her that I’ve printed from her LinkedIn profile. ‘We can take turns if you like.’
‘No,’ he says. ‘We’ll do it together or not at all.’
Aaron stares at the entrance to the Forensic Medicine Institute, a revolving carousel of glass, as I check my phone messages, more out of habit rather than because I’m expecting anything of importance. There’s one from Melanie asking if I’ve seen the legal section in today’s paper. Twisting in my chair, I notice the newspapers all lined up in a row on the counter.
‘I’ll be back in a minute.’ Aaron nods his head but his gaze doesn’t move from the entrance.
There’s a large picture of Andrew on the second page of the Legal Affairs supplement. He’s looking impressive on a Chesterfield armchair, one hand resting on the arm of it and the other on his leg but you get the feeling that the photographer doesn’t like him. There’s a double chin and a smile of infinite smugness. It’s a half-page profile about his glowing career. The fourth paragraph in particular catches my eye, as it outlines his current clients. Colcart is top of the list.
‘We intend to vigorously defend this claim,’ says the quote. The piece itself reads like our PR wrote it, which is probably the case, since most of the journalists took a redundancy package last year. On the face of it, this propaganda is intended to wrong-foot the plaintiffs’ lawyers. But not only is it declaring war on the other side by saying that Colcart won’t settle and that they are prepared to run up the costs to win, it is also aimed at me. The sandbags I put in place are not enough. Andrew isn’t babysitting. He’s taking over.
Disheartened, I head back to where Aaron is sitting. Thankfully, he doesn’t talk to me and we sit there, drinking endless coffees and waiting. The mid-morning break passes. Occasionally an employee comes out for a sneaky smoke but it isn’t until lunchtime that a woman, dressed casually in jeans and a T-shirt with a schoolgirl ponytail, strides out, a lanyard swinging from her neck. It’s Aaron who notices her first.
‘It’s her,’ he says in a low voice.
Dr Adler is younger than I expected, more cheerful, too. There is a jauntiness to her.
‘Let me do the talking,’ I say under my breath to Aaron. He hangs back, a lit
tle reluctantly, as I walk towards her.
‘Dr Adler.’ I hold out my hand. ‘What a coincidence.’
She has the sun-weathered complexion of someone who has spent a lot of time outside. ‘Nilla, please. I’m sorry, you are?’
‘Eliza Carmody,’ I say. ‘We were just having lunch when we saw you.’ I gesture towards Aaron. ‘We thought we were meeting with you today.’
Aaron stands there silently.
‘Is this about that mix-up earlier?’ she asks.
‘We could all have a coffee now. My shout.’ I’m doing my best busy lawyer impression in a bid to railroad her. ‘Only take a few minutes. Seeing as Mr Hedland has travelled all this way.’
But Nilla is made of stronger stuff than that. Her smile becomes wary. ‘This is about the bones found in Kinsale?’
‘I understand that you wrote the report.’
There is a slight hesitation before she replies. ‘Can I ask what your interest in this matter is?’
‘There’s evidence that you may not be aware of that could assist with the identification,’ I tell her. ‘We believe those bones may belong to a relative of Mr Hedland.’
Aaron nods his head. She studies Aaron and then addresses him directly.
‘If you have any evidence, you should give it to the police. TV shows have the scientists fighting crime and solving cases, but the truth is a little more prosaic. My job is to provide independent advice in relation to questions that the police have about bones. Nothing more than that.’
She is making an apologetic face and I can see we are heading for a bureaucratic brush-off.
‘So,’ she continues, ‘it really is up to them what information from the report they want to make publicly available. I’m afraid I can’t help.’ Already she is starting to edge away from us.
‘But what if they don’t release the information?’ Instinctively I grab her arm to stop her going. ‘What if the police are covering up what happened?’
Aaron gives me a shocked look and Nilla’s face becomes closed, like she’s pulling the shutters down.
‘I can’t be of any more help,’ she says, and detaches herself from my grip.
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