The prisoners of war fill the void with whatever they can. Food, alcohol, amphetamines, every kind of addiction lingers in the crests of shell shock. Is it even possible to escape from the war? Dick Payne had tried to deny its existence, but it only corroded his psyche. He drowned in his own blood, but she suspected he’d been drowning in depression for years. She reflects on their final conversation, before inebriation emptied her brain of memory. Even as he was threatening her, Miranda felt some pity. Beneath the bravado and delusions was a black man filled with self-loathing. He may have gone to Harvard, but he spent his life delivering lines from others’ scripts.
She hears a siren, but it’s a fire engine, not a paramedic. Perhaps they will come later? She’s read that glassing has become something of an epidemic. Or maybe it’s just a media beat-up. She wonders what kind of beat-up the media will create over the Corrowa’s march. Would they have even bothered turning up, if murder hadn’t reared its head?
Death reveals so little.
What lies behind the masks of the living?
She may have never really known who Dick Payne was. But she knew even less about Bruce Brosnan and Harrison McPherson. Like most lawyers who have been around the Federal Court, she’d heard of Brosnan’s boasts of fighting in the trenches of the fledgling Aboriginal Legal Service. But it was obvious that the fire in Bruce Brosnan’s belly had died long ago. McPherson, the Golden Tongue, seemed to thrive on professional jousts and destroying witnesses. But his personal life had been a mystery. Does it even matter?
Surely no one deserves to be murdered?
Rumour has scorched the Murri community like a bushfire. Yesterday morning, Boundary Street hummed with voices. Miranda imagined the aunties, sipping hot tea, speaking in hushed tones about a serial killer, who recently escaped from the ‘psych ward’ to discover his black roots. While watching the television news in his boardinghouse room, the killer became fixated with the story of the Corrowa. In his tormented mind, he determined that he would seek revenge. But by afternoon, the serial killer had transformed into a renegade cop, out to settle personal scores with a legal profession that cared little for those at the coalface. Today, he’s probably a member of the Russian mafia.
Miranda sighs and looks up at the canopy of the tree. The shade reminds her of the old grey man in Meston Park, whose trunk now hides her shame. That morning, she found an empty can of mixed spirits that had been forced into its cavern. When Miranda had removed it, she noticed that the cavern was at least a foot deep. She threw the knife into it and scampered away, as quickly as her exhausted body allowed. She knows the police will be swarming all over Meston Park today. Will they find it?
‘I’ve brought someone who wants to see you.’ Ethel’s voice is both chirpy and authoritative. She’s wearing the Body Shop rose perfume that Miranda gave her.
The tiny silhouette behind Ethel’s legs giggles.
‘Linda!’
Miranda loves this little girl, whose parents both work as field officers for the Aboriginal Legal Service. Miranda usually dotes on her, but lately she’s felt awkward. The sight of the beautiful child only makes her own disappointments more poignant.
‘How come you’ve gone all coy, Miss Muffett?’
Ethel’s gentle chastising has no real sting, but it’s enough to bring Linda out of her shell. The little girl is wearing a white T-shirt and pink shorts, her curly brown hair divided into two braids.
‘Can I leave this one with you? Her mum and dad are driving me to the hall. We’ve got to deliver some bread for the sandwiches. We’ll only be fifteen minutes.’
‘Actually, I was thinking of going across the road for a coffee.’
‘Well you can’t. The march is starting now. You’ll have to take Linda. She wants to march, don’t you?’
A grin from below reveals two missing top teeth.
‘You’ve got your mobile, Miri, haven’t you?’
Miranda smiles in defeat. When Ethel’s in her element, it’s impossible for anyone to refuse her.
As Ethel disappears into George Street, the crowd assembles into a makeshift line. Some children in the front carry a huge Aboriginal flag. Charlie is talking to them, no doubt telling them how proud they make him. A tear rolls down Miranda’s cheek. She feels a gentle tug on her left hand and peers into the little face.
Miranda bends down and kisses her forehead. ‘Come on, Miss Muffett, let’s go.’
The demonstrators cross where Elizabeth Street meets William. To their left, the Performing Arts Centre celebrates twenty-five years. In the distance they can see the head of Kurilpa Bridge, pointing into the sky like the masts of the tall ships. They walk in silence, through cameras and bitumen. The sun hits them like a nail gun, but still they walk across the bridge. Journalists follow, shoving microphones into black faces.
The face of the river is chocolate, its ripples milk. Bridges like metal harnesses are choking Meanjin, Miranda thinks. The mangroves are cowering in shame, their branches bending into the water. Low tide cruelly reveals the newcomers’ contempt: bottles, shopping trolleys and even household furniture wallow in the sediment.
They reach South Bank, the mutant child of World Expo ’88. A multitude of identities pushed into the one brain that acknowledges only its shallow, recent past. A huge white ferris wheel stands alone, without the kin of an amusement park. The Nepalese pagoda remains among the artificial rainforest and synthetic beach. All on a riverbank where the homeless once slept.
Cranes hover above, guarding the steel skeletons of their new offspring. Every so often, the crowd pauses, allowing the stragglers to catch up. They jeer and laugh outside the South Bank Police Station. Its huge windows conceal the identities of those inside, together with their thoughts.
Wet cotton clings to Jason’s chest like skin. The day is a furnace. The crowd is only a few hundred, a good number are elderly and young children. On a portable stage in the centre of the amphitheatre, a young man is throwing the lyrics of a rap song to the appreciative audience. White tents housing food stalls form a circle like a caravan of wagons.
As he walks down the hill into Meston Park, discomfort wells. There are scores of police on the fringes of the crowd. So many here hate the badge, but save their venom for the black men in blue.
Colleagues usually assume he’ll go easy on blacks. At times however, Jason goes harder. When he was stationed at Palm Island, he lost it with a twelve-year-old. The kid had been throwing rocks the size of a baseball glove into the police compound. One night a projectile grazed Jason’s face. He bound the boy’s wrists with thick rope and held it through the window of his car. As he revved the engine, Jason grinned into a face smeared with tears and snot. After that night, Jason felt the weight of hate upon him.
He did nothing when Higgins beat Tipat to a pulp. He told himself it was because of the crime, but Jason had also wanted to prove his loyalty was not with a black child-killer. Jason’s fidelity to the job is unquestionable. His skin only a vague tie to a family he’s never known. Doesn’t want to know.
Mum and Dad had tried to romanticise his black skin. When he was five, they took him to see Stormboy, ranted for ages about David Gulpilil’s presence on the screen. In the lead-up to NAIDOC each year, they’d meet with the principal of Jason’s school to discuss how the event would be celebrated. But they never really understood the terror and confusion that slowly cooked his emotions. Emotions that are now lifeless roots in the soil.
In his heart, Jason knew they were determined to give him the best they could. But life was never that precise. Their first inkling of the tumultuous path ahead occurred when he was six years old. While playing in the front yard the little boy noticed children descending upon the house next door that was adorned with balloons and streamers. Jason was the only child in their street who had not been invited to the birthday party. He felt a lump in his throat as he refle
cted on the memory of Dad’s face. Complete powerlessness.
Jason’s athletic prowess saw him play for the high school rugby league team. An aptitude for sport was ordinarily a ticket to teenage popularity, but Jason was acutely aware that he was different. One day, he overheard a group of girls behind him in Year Ten English. He immediately recognised Joanne Sutherland’s voice. She was the most popular student in the school, with long legs and elegant blond curls. Like the other boys, Jason fancied her, but he felt protective of her. After all, they had been to kindergarten together and then primary school. Sitting behind her, he faintly heard Joanne whispering to her pack of understudies.
‘Jason Matthews is so hot, but my dad would kill me if he ever caught me going out with a boong.’
Almost immediately, Joanne’s fulsome lips shrivelled and her eyes grew cruel. Now he can only imagine her as an adult, standing at a clothesline with a cigarette between her lips. Yelling at a horde of children in a yard littered with broken toys, like discarded landmines.
From there on homework became a rarity. He began to truant, but soon tired of hiding in the bush behind their home. Miraculously, Jason finished school but with lacklustre grades. At seventeen years of age he didn’t know what he wanted to do, in a world that had never really welcomed him. So he pursued one of the few careers open to him and, surprisingly, found his calling.
The aroma of the sausage sizzle is intoxicating. Sausages cooked on the barbecue always taste better, not that Jason eats a great deal of red meat these days. It’s mostly fish and tofu for him. In the south-western corner of Meston Park he sees a bald black man sitting in a transparent box. He’s wearing headphones and his fingers are working the sound equipment.
‘Welcome to Black and Strong on 4MM. My name is Huey B and I’m your host. Today we’re at beautiful Meston Park, in the heart of Corrowa country. The reason we are here – native title. As you all know, the Federal Court dismissed the Corrowa People’s claim over Meston Park because, apparently, they weren’t traditional enough. Hmm, it seems to me that the wrong question was being asked. When are they going to prove to us that we no longer have our sovereignty?’
A few in the crowd stop to listen, but most continue their business of greeting, laughing and earnest discussion. Plastic tables and chairs have been scattered in front of the stage. Ethel Cobb is at one of the few tables that has shade. Her face breaks into a grin when she sees him.
‘Detective Matthews.’
Jason turns around.
Charlie Eversely is wearing the uniform that Jason has seen him in, many times on television – black land rights T-shirt, black shorts and thongs. He’s shorter than Jason had imagined and older. Charlie’s accompanied by a group of young men whose grey T-shirts identify them as security.
‘Mr Eversely. How did you know my name?’
‘I’ve seen you around.’ Charlie’s handshake is firm, genuine. ‘It’s good to see you here, son.’
‘Thank you, Mr Eversely.’
‘We’ll see more of you, no doubt.’
Charlie continues on his way, leaving Jason to ponder the hidden meaning in their exchange.
‘What are you doing here?’
‘Oh, hi Miranda.’
She’s casually dressed in a pair of black stretch jeans and a white T-shirt. A young child sits on her hip.
‘You’ve got your hands full.’
‘This is Linda. Linda, this is Uncle Jason.’
‘She doesn’t have to call me uncle.’ ‘Actually, she does. It’s not right for Murri kids to be calling adults by their first names.’
Linda cries out to a nearby group of children and Miranda releases her to the ground. ‘Actually, I’m glad you’re here.’
‘Really?’
‘You know, it occurred to me yesterday that I didn’t even ask where your people are from. That was rude of me, but in the circumstances . . .’
‘Brisbane. We come from Brisbane.’
‘Really, who are your parents?’
‘Tom and Deborah Matthews.’
He laughs at the confusion on Miranda’s face. ‘They’re my adoptive parents.’ He pauses, uncertain of how much he should share. ‘I don’t know anything about my birth parents.’
‘I’m sorry.’
Miranda seems awkward and he’s relieved that she’s finally showing some vulnerability. In the corner of his eye, he sees Ethel approaching, her tiny little arms in a runner’s position. Jason feigns surprise.
‘Boy, you disappoint me.’
He’s been called ‘boy’ only a few times in his adult life. A couple of the old timers practically spat it at him. But Ethel’s voice is coated with affection.
‘Why’s that, Miss Cobb?’
‘I thought you’d see me before I crept up on you. You are a detective after all.’
‘Who’s saying I didn’t?’ Jason winks bashfully. ‘This is a good turn-out,’ he says, gesturing to the crowd.
Miranda looks around the park. ‘Yeah, thanks to your friends the crowd has grown by at least a hundred.’
‘We’re glad to be of service.’ He smiles into deep blue eyes that offer no reprieve.
Ethel pulls gently on his left shoulder. ‘Boy, you and I need to talk.’
Anxiety washes over Miranda’s face. ‘Auntie, is this a good time? You’ve still got food to get ready.’
‘It’s done, girl. Now you leave me and the young fella alone. We got some talking to do.’
Miranda sighs in resignation and heads for the ramshackle playground.
Ethel gestures towards the table where she’s been sitting. ‘Sit down, boy. You look tired.’
From the way she speaks, Jason guesses Ethel is in her seventies. Her skin is surprisingly smooth for her age. The bob-cut parted in the middle of her crown is too severe, but he doubts there’s a soul in the park, or anywhere for that matter, who would have the gall to tell her.
‘So what do you think, Jason?’
‘I think today’s been a great success. You got lots of press and the people here seem to be having a good time.’
Jason casts the line, as he has done so many times. He will wait patiently until she’s on the hook.
‘Usually I’d ask where your people are from. But with you I don’t have to ask,’ Ethel says, grinning.
‘Why’s that, Auntie?’
‘Because I already know.’
Jason shrugs, accepts her challenge.
‘Aurukun.’
Jason is stunned. He’s discussed his birth parents with no one. Not even Higgins. ‘How did you know that?’
‘Red Feathers told me.’
‘Red what?’
‘Red Feathers. He’s your mob. At least, his father was your mob. But his mother was Corrowa.’ Ethel laughs, slaps his shoulder. ‘So I guess that means we’re related!’
From behind his smile, Jason’s brain is scrambling. Does Ethel know about the feathers at the crime scenes? Is that what she’s telling him? They haven’t told the press. They haven’t told anyone. There is no way Ethel could know. Unless she was there.
‘She doesn’t know anything.’
He looks up to see Miranda standing over him. In the corner of his eye, he sees Ethel walking towards the stage. ‘How can you be sure?’
Miranda sighs, as if the answer is self-evident. ‘In all the time I’ve known her, Auntie Ethel has never so much as taken a fist to anyone. She’s a Christian for crying out loud.’
The T-shirt is tight against her lace bra. Hour-glass figure wears those jeans like a glove. Jason notices that other men in the crowd are also looking in her direction. Miranda, however, appears oblivious.
He smiles. ‘I think you and I started off on the wrong foot.’
‘What makes you say that?’
<
br /> ‘I have no desire to cause any harm. If anything, I want to work with your community.’
Miranda looks incredulous.
He checks his watch. ‘It’s three o’clock and I’m in desperate need of a good coffee.’ He turns his head in the direction of Boundary Street. ‘Join me.’
It was less a question than a command. He should have known Miranda wouldn’t take kindly to orders.
‘No, thanks. I have to get ready for an appointment.’
As Jason watches Miranda’s svelte body disappear into the crowd, he resolves to shake every single cupboard in Ethel Cobb’s life.
If that requires spending time with Miranda, he’ll be the last to complain.
SIXTEEN
Miranda opens the door of the wardrobe, skims through her limited choices yet again. What she’s wearing simply won’t do. The tight white T-shirt makes her feel exposed. In the end, she settles on a loose blouse and black three-quarter length pants. As she walks out the door, Miranda laughs. Where she’s going, no one will be concerned about fashion.
The front of Miranda’s apartment is met by a new highrise complex. Sometimes, it feels like the highrise sits right on top of her front patio. She walks past Tegan’s place, the converted flats. The landlord is an elderly Italian woman, who still lives on the top floor.
On a Sunday afternoon, the old lady usually potters in her vegetable garden. Tegan often works in the garden too. Miranda had once heard them marvelling over the sight of a bush turkey. Miranda realises she hasn’t seen her neighbour since the exhibition. It was such an enjoyable night, until she ran into Dan and his fiancée.
Dan’s not so spontaneous that he’d propose after a brief courtship. She knows that much. When they were together he’d take an eternity to mull over most decisions, from choosing the right brand of toothpaste to changing jobs. He was seeing them both, for sure. Weighing up the pros and cons each woman had to offer. All the while, Miranda was doing her utmost to make him happy.
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