Cry Blue Murder

by Kim Kane

  x

  From: Alice King Alicekingofthejungle@gmail.com

  Thursday 28 April 10:17 PM

  Hi CC

  I’m glad you wrote back. Phew! You really do cheer me up. I never talk to Tess about Johnny – she doesn’t even seem that sad either. Anyway, good to talk to you about it. Most people don’t know what to say. Even Sister Patricia and she’s the nun you’re supposed to call on when you have a problem but she creeps me out. It’s that LOOK. Whenever I see her, I run in the opposite direction. She would certainly never mention choc tops. She’d just say something dumb like, ‘Oh your poor family’, or ‘You poor thing’, and after you’ve heard that about a million times you pretty much want to hit someone. The truth is . . . POOR JOHNNY. He’s the one who’s dead. No one EVER mentions that.

  Got to go. Anika’s waiting with her dad in the car and we don’t want her to get bored and start bending herself into freaky shapes.

  PS I really do miss Gert. She’s the sweetest little hound around.

  From: Celia Beasley CeeceeB@gmail.com

  Friday 29 April 7:19 AM

  I’m glad I’m not one of those people you want to hit . . . but feel free to clobber my mother. Mum’s so desperate about money at the moment she’s put us up for a Coles home-brand ad. They want to feature us on a pasta pack. Mum had to give them a quote and she said, ‘With three growing girls, we’re a healthy active happy family and as an ex-model I know how important it is to eat well in order to look good!’ It’s enough to make you vomit. I’m trying to think of things I can do when the producers turn up to take the photos. Like shave my eyebrows.

  Hope the farm’s fun.

  Better go.

  xCCB

  From: Alice King Alicekingofthejungle@gmail.com Sunday 1 May 6:04 PM

  Hi CC

  I just got back from Anika’s. Anyway, have you done the photos yet? For the pasta packs? You’re a real showbiz family. Your mum must think she’s struck gold.

  So, yes, Anika’s farm is a real farm. I saw a tractor and I’m sure they’d have a pitchfork somewhere too. But mostly we (Leilah ended up being invited too) saw a lot of oranges and, halfway through dinner, I found out I was actually eating one of their sheep and that Anika’s family pretty much just go out to the paddock and grab one any old time they want to make a roast, just like how we grab a lemon from the backyard.

  Anyway, it really was a fun weekend, even if Leilah spent most of the time being a big girlie flirt with Anika’s brother Tom and didn’t want to do anything other than play Truth or Dare, which meant she spent the whole night running in and out of Tom’s stinky-boy bedroom while Anika and I sat in the cold hall and waited for our turn. Then we had to go to bed and Anika’s mum came in twice and told us to be quiet, which felt a little too much like Sister Catherine if you ask me. She was super annoyed the second time, on account of her needing to get up so early to milk Aileen, who happens to be their family cow, and I’m hoping like hell they don’t end up eating her too. It was all a bit awkward in the morning – not because of Leilah and Tom sitting at the breakfast table exchanging pouty-lips and soppy eyes, or because of Anika’s mum being so angry the night before, but because of how the milk she passed me for my cornflakes was AILEEN MILK and it was all warm and frothy and smelt kind of whiffy, and the thought of having it on my cornflakes really made my stomach churn. I don’t know why, I mean, I know milk comes from a cow, but I’d rather think of it as coming from a fridge. You dig? Then, Anika’s dad made some joke about Leilah and me being CITY-SLICKERS because Leilah didn’t want the Aileen milk on her cornflakes either, which was super annoying because I can’t HELP being a city-slicker any more than Anika’s dad can help being a redneck bogan farmer who insists on eating the family pets. Don’t get me wrong, though. I did like the farm – even if we did have to go to mass. I liked collecting eggs and the way horses smell.

  Baaaa for now.

  Alice xx

  PS I am so sick of listening to Leilah’s gory details about Tom. I don’t care if I’m a slow developer, I just can’t imagine boys like him, or the ones who bite Tess’s neck, ever NOT being disgusting.

  From: Celia Beasley CeeceeB@gmail.com

  Sunday 1 May 8:04 PM

  I don’t hate boys, but I don’t know any either. At the moment, focusing on my study, poetry, music and hating my mother takes up all my time.

  I’ve been thinking about you all weekend. I mentioned Hallie Knight to one of the girls at school and she said, ‘Oh yeah, that’, and turned her back on me and started talking about PopSugar Mobile. I don’t think she meant to be as rude as she was, but it made me realise you’re the only person I can talk to about Hallie’s disappearance. You’re the only person who really cares.

  Almost two weeks, Alice, and still no news.

  xCCB

  THE HERALD

  Cocoon Killer spares Hallie

  Maya Batawitz

  May 2

  Fifteen-year-old Malvern girl Hallie Knight was found early this morning in an industrial waste-disposal unit in Thomastown. She has been missing for 14 days.

  Left for dead by her abductor, unconscious and drugged, Hallie was found wrapped in a distinctive handwoven blanket.

  While forensic experts are yet to report on evidence taken from the scene, police believe there could be links to the unsolved murders of Cornelia Walker and Esther Davidson. Cornelia Walker, 14, disappeared on her way to St Ignatius School in Eltham on May 15 two years ago. Her body was found five days later in Fairfield Park. In December of the same year, 12-year-old Esther Davidson, also from St Ignatius School, disappeared in similar circumstances. Her body was found in the same location 11 days later. Both girls were swaddled in handwoven blankets, similar to that found with Hallie Knight. Autopsy reports reveal the girls died from cardiac arrest following a lethal dose of cyanide.

  Hallie Knight is recovering from her ordeal at the Royal Children’s Hospital. A spokesperson for the hospital says that she is in a critical but stable condition and doctors are confident she will make a full recovery. At this stage, Hallie is unable to assist police with their investigations.

  From: Alice King Alicekingofthejungle@gmail.com

  Monday 2 May 2:06 PM

  Surely you’ve already seen this?? Poor, lucky Hallie. She must be so freaked out. Totally creepy, but at least she’s alive and can surely give the dumb cops a few clues. Do you have any more deets? Torture not knowing, CC. Torture! Absolutely can’t wait till she gives an interview on 60 Minutes or something when she’s better. Let me know as soon as you get more info, okay?? Promise?? So glad she’s alive. Maybe there is a God after all.

  From: Celia Beasley CeeceeB@gmail.com

  Monday 2 May 6:57 PM

  Alice!

  It’s all anyone could talk about in English. Mrs Brooks had a big smile across her face and kept patting her big Victorian bun and she said that it was ‘very nice news indeed’ before she made us go back to To Kill a Mockingbird and ‘notions of justice’.

  I can’t believe it might be the same man. It makes it worse, if that’s possible. There are more police around here than usual and choppers flying overhead. They’re so noisy the backyard feels like a war zone.

  Got to go. Struggling with this assignment on Atticus.

  x CCB

  From: Alice King Alicekingofthejungle@gmail.com

  Monday 2 May 8:45 PM

  Hi CC

  Totally relieved they found Hallie, but get this – Leilah (previously known as loyal friend and roommate) up and LEFT after school today. And I mean left school for good. Apparently she’s known all year that her family had to move to Hong Kong for her dad’s work but she didn’t tell anyone – not even me. If only she’d picked Truth rather than Dare at Anika’s.

  As it turned out, Leilah got called ou
t of class halfway through science lab today and never came back, not that I thought much of it at the time. I just hung out with Anika and this other girl, Daniele. But when I got back to our dorm all of Leilah’s stuff was gone – even the photos of her family she had on her dresser. Then, douche-bag Siobhan O’Connor saw me and said, ‘Didn’t she tell you?’ and I said, ‘Didn’t she tell me what?’ and Siobhan just rolled her eyes and said, ‘Some friend’, and walked off.

  Now I’ve blown all my credit from texting and trying to call Leilah at least 25 times, but she never picked up or texted back until finally she sent one saying, ‘Sorry’. Sorry!!! Sorry??? Jesus. I can’t believe she just sloped off. I don’t get it, I really don’t. Got to go. Sorry this email is pretty much me me me, but seriously, who can you trust?

  Alice xx

  STATEMENT

  Name:Hallie Gabrielle KNIGHT

  STATES:

  My full name is Hallie Gabrielle KNIGHT and I am 15 years old. I am making this statement on this the 9th day of May at Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne with my mother present and her name is Sylvia Jean KNIGHT.

  On Monday 18th April I left the house at approximately 5.25am on my way to rowing training. On Mondays I get a lift with Mrs Sarah BROOKS, who is the mother of my friend and rowing teammate Amanda-Jane BROOKS. They usually pick me up from the corner of Pine Avenue and Malvern Road at 5.30am. It was still dark when a smallish station wagon, maybe a Subaru Forester or something like that, pulled over. It was not the usual car driven by Mrs BROOKS, which is a silver BMW four-wheel drive. I think the car was silver, but it was hard to tell for sure because it wasn’t light yet, which also made it difficult to see who was driving. But I did notice the back seat was empty, as well as the front passenger seat and I wondered why Amanda-Jane wasn’t in the car. I heard the driver say, ‘Morning, Hallie,’ and he had this kind of polite-sounding voice – not posh, just a bit English or something, just a little bit. I presumed it was Amanda-Jane’s father.

  It all happened really quickly. I was thinking things were weird, but not really doing anything about it, and then he leant over and opened the passenger door from the inside and pushed it open. He said something like, ‘Did you get Amanda-Jane’s text? She’s got gastro’, something like that. Then he said, ‘Quick, jump in. We don’t want to be late for Bridget.’ So I just hopped in. Bridget WANG is another girl from rowing and usually waits on the Orrong Road corner. I got in the car and the seatbelt alarm started up. I noticed his hands more than his face because he was wearing driving gloves – the old-fashioned kind with a button. I remember thinking his hands were quite small for a man. The seatbelt alarm got louder. I reached over to my left to find the seatbelt and, as I did, I felt a sharp jab on the right side of my neck. That’s all I remember.

  I hereby acknowledge that this statement is true and correct and I make it in the belief that a person making a false statement in the circumstances is liable to the penalties of perjury.

  Sylvia Jean KNIGHT as guardian for Hallie Gabrielle KNIGHT

  Acknowledgement made and signature witnessed by me at 5.56pm on 9th May at Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne.

  M BELL

  Detective Senior Constable 29861

  From: Alice King Alicekingofthejungle@gmail.com

  Wednesday 4 May 9:17 PM

  Hi CC

  Any goss on Hallie? My dad said the cocoon guy is smart and completely meticulous. This Hallie thing has really pulled Dad out of his obsession with work. He’s a curator. At the museum. Or did I already tell you that? He’s even got a creepy museum-ish room set up at home where anyone else would have a ping-pong table, and he’s got thousands of beetles pinned behind glass, and all kinds of jars filled with pink specimens preserved in goo. It’s kind of morbid if you ask me. Why can’t he be normal like a businessman or something? Mum’s an urban planner but she’s taking a break from work at the moment because of Johnny.

  I’ve got to go ’cause Sister Catherine is glooming around and about to turn off the modem. Things are getting worse around here. She’s put blocks on practically everything other than Google Scholar and Catholics on the Net. It’s like the nuns from Ladywell are still waiting to see if computers actually catch on!

  BTW how come you moved schools?

  Bye xx

  From: Celia Beasley CeeceeB@gmail.com

  Friday 6 May 6:57 PM

  Hi Alice

  Where does your dad even find beetles?! Does he take a bug catcher on family holidays? We haven’t been on a holiday for ages. Our family’s ‘pulling in the boot straps’ because Dad’s spending a lot of time polishing his gun collection rather than fixing the business, and that makes Mum spend a lot more time shopping (even though she says it’s just research for catalogues).

  We moved schools because I won a scholarship. Dad wanted me to take it up because Ashbourne offers the International Baccalaureate, which makes it much easier to get into top universities. Dad went to Oxford and any university that’s not at least 700 years old with former students who are prime ministers or poet laureates doesn’t count as ‘an institution of sufficient merit’ (see what I have to put up with?).

  Jaime and Cleo came across for the arts program, although I think Dad’s now wishing he’d just left us all at Evelyn College. It might have been tired – and the uniform might have been beige – but the fees were a lot less and that counts when you’ve got three kids and your business is going down the gurgler.

  Do you miss your friends from your old school? I miss mine, especially Avril and Mia (the twins) but not as we are now – rather as we were, if that makes sense. It’s just not the same. When they’re talking, I can’t keep up with the names of all the new teachers or the boys at Nandos and they go all quiet when I mention Ashbourne.

  Mum’s pretty happy about the move. She thinks we should be an Ashbourne family because most of the women at her gym have girls who go there. She says the name really loudly, Ashborn instead of Ashben, tossing it about as she tosses her hair.

  Okay – sorry to rant. Back to Atticus,

  CCB x

  PS Here’s this year’s school photo. Ugly, but pretty much what I look like. Could you send a pic of you? I’ll print it out and stick it on my wall. Right next to Hallie Knight.

  PPS In case you really do want to send letters, our address is 18 Belmore Road, Armadale, Victoria 3144.

  PPPS Speaking of poet laureates and new girls, here’s a poem I wrote.

  The New Girl

  She waits in newly minted socks

  Just to the side

  Always to the side

  The last desk

  The last loo

  The last to collect the coldest sausage roll.

  She’s an impostor, a Trojan horse in an Ashbourne bridle.

  Under her grey kilt she wears beige knickers

  A tiny flag of her true colours.

  From: Alice King Alicekingofthejungle@gmail.com

  Friday 6 May 8:40 PM

  Hi there – got your pic and you are so NOT uggers!! Here’s one of me in the prep hall. The other one is me at my cousin’s birthday. She got Grand Theft Auto and I played it for three hours and seriously wanted to shoot people afterwards. Lucky my dad doesn’t have a gun cabinet – even an antique one. My dad just drinks whisky while he’s fussing about with his dead things, then gets all red in the face and tells lame jokes.

  I don’t always GET poetry. Sometimes I think the poet doesn’t even want you to understand what they’re talking about. But your poem is very cool and actually tells a real story – so thanks for the words, CC.

  BTW your mum sounds hilarious! At least she’s out and about. Ever since Johnny died, mine just stays in bed. I wonder whether it might take her mind off things to have to get up and make school lunches or even go back to work. I asked he
r about the Cocoon Killer but she hardly even knew what I was talking about. She’s not worried, though, because I’m up here, but you’d think she’d be worried about Tess! Or, maybe he’s not interested in girls like her. Anyway, I told Dad to definitely put Tess’s flyscreen back and then when I spoke to Tess, I really did try and tell her to have boys over in traditional ways, like through a DOOR. But she just snapped my head off and handed me back to Mum.

  I do get how you feel about Ashbourne girls. They can be such bitches when they’re not down at Portsea or starving themselves into skinny jeans. But I’m sure you’ll find a couple of good ones, CC – that’s if you’ve got time for new friends with all the school work you do – even on Friday nights!

  From: Celia Beasley CeeceeB@gmail.com

  Saturday 7 May 12:34 PM

  Thanks for the photo. You look a bit darker than I imagined but you’re pretty and absolutely nothing like a Pritchard. I’m sure you’d get a lot more catalogue work than me.

  It’s so cool you do prep and in a prep hall. I dream about prep – all that lovely quiet to just sit and get your work done without a mum blustering into your bedroom telling you to ‘hold off on the carrot and zucchini cake’. I wish she’d stay in bed.

  It’s not that the girls are mean to me, it’s just that I haven’t found my group yet. I’m only new now – not new enough to have exotic secrets, but new enough not to have friends. The girls are nice, they’re smiley, they wander off in the general direction of house meetings or choir practice and don’t seem to mind if I tag along, but on weekends they’re all hanging out on Chapel Street having their nails done and I’m left stranded. And why would they ask me? Our parents don’t play tennis at the same club and I can’t remember their Year 4 ice-skating parties or the hike when Daisy-Davis-got-a-leech-on-her-eyeball. It’s almost as if my memories don’t count for anything because no one’s interested in them and anyway, no one’s heard of Evelyn College. They might be interested if it was Barrington, or if we had a house with a cinema and a lodge at Buller – but we don’t. We’ve got shabby swapshop uniforms and Mum’s handbag’s a fake.