by Chris Hammer
But she looks unconvinced. ‘You wouldn’t understand. It sits inside you, eats away at you, stresses you, keeps you awake at night. You can never rest. It wears you out. Leaves you vulnerable.’ She stares straight ahead, eyes dry. ‘I don’t think the drugs will work. Not on me.’
There is a chill sitting on the crown of Martin’s head; the follicles on the back of his neck are rising. He’s heard this language before, this type of confessional. Not in Australia, but in war zones, in refugee camps, in the aftermath of ethnic cleansing. She’s not talking about cancer; she’s talking about guilt. ‘Jay Jay, what have you done?’
‘I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you everything. Put it in your paper if you like, once I’m gone.’
‘You’re not going to die.’
‘All the better then. Deal?’
Martin nods. He doesn’t know what he’s agreeing to, but he wants to hear and she needs to tell him. If she’s played some part in the Hummingbird deaths, then he needs to know it. ‘Deal,’ he says.
‘Amory Ashton,’ she says.
‘Ashton? What about him?’
‘I killed him. I didn’t mean to, but I did.’
Martin is still, the air electric. ‘What happened?’
‘I had a fight with him, ugly man.’
A memory flashes into Martin’s mind: Jay Jay riding the guru in her office, the scar like a red scythe around her buttock, the report in the Longton Observer. ‘Sharks,’ he says.
She nods. ‘Sharks. I was attacked. Attacked on my own break. By his fucking sharks.’
‘His sharks?’
‘Might as well have been. Bull sharks. They’d come into the swamp, attracted by the factory, by the effluent.’
‘So you killed him?’
‘Not intentionally. I went over there after I got out of hospital. I was so angry. I wasn’t the first, did you know that?’
Martin nods. ‘The owner at the caravan park.’
‘Good. You know. Put that in your paper.’
‘I will.’
‘It was a beautiful day, close to sunset. Calm, no wind, no chop to spoil the swell. I wanted to get back in, I felt ready. The wound had healed. But I couldn’t. I was too scared. Scared of my own break. That’s what he’d done to me. I was already thinking of what I might do with the place, thinking of some sort of low-key campground for surfers, a retreat, some yoga and some meditation, but I could hardly have people there if it was shark-infested. So I went to his factory to confront him. The place was empty, the last shift had clocked off, but his car was there, he was there. He was down on the jetty, fishing.’
‘What happened?’
‘We argued. It was ugly. He was ugly. His words were ugly. He tried to grab me. He had these horrible fat fingers, like sausages, clawing at me. I kicked him as hard as I could, tried to get away. I pushed him, pushed him in. Off the jetty, into the swamp.’
‘What? He drowned?’
‘Sharks got him.’
Martin doesn’t know what to say. An image comes to him, thrashing arms, the water turning red. ‘Sounds like self-defence. Why didn’t you report it?’
‘I should have, I realise that now. But I didn’t have any real reason to be there. I thought the police would say it was premeditated, that I went there intending to kill him.’
‘So what did you do?’
‘I took his fishing gear, put it all in his car and drove it up to Treachery Bay. I torched it then walked back along the beach, in the dark—in the shallows, so there were no footprints. It took two hours.’
Martin doesn’t know how to respond. A part of him is excited; it’s another riveting revelation to be included in his next book. A separate chapter. But that’s the problem: it is separate, unconnected to the deaths at Hummingbird and the murder of Jasper Speight. Unless …
‘Am I the only person you’ve told about this?’
‘Yes. Pretty much.’
‘Did you tell Jasper Speight?’
‘Jasper? No. Why would I tell him?’
‘Who then?’
Jay Jay looks down, ripples of grief washing over her face. ‘Dev. I told Dev.’
Martin sees it now; the relationship between the swami and Jay Jay wasn’t casual, it wasn’t hedonistic, it wasn’t between a guru and his disciple. ‘You were close,’ he says, stating it as a fact. ‘Partners.’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘Partners. Lovers.’ She reaches out, takes Martin’s hand. ‘I miss him. Already, I miss him. And now to face this, the cancer, alone. I wish he were here.’
‘You told him about killing Ashton. Did he ever mention his past? What happened in Crete?’
She doesn’t speak, just shakes her head, her hands kneading the hospital blanket.
They sit in silence for a while, then: ‘Martin?’
‘Yes?’
‘Can you drive me home? They can’t do much more for me here. I need to get ready for Sydney. I need to pack my stuff.’
chapter twenty-seven
At Hummingbird Beach, the roadblock is gone from the cattle grid, the forensics team is gone from the car park, only the limp remains of police tape demonstrate they’ve been there at all. The site is almost deserted, the car park all but empty, just one old Holden and, off behind some trees, a forlorn BMW, still covered in bird shit. Garth McGrath’s. The Holden belongs to the old couple, who have stayed on to keep an eye on the place. They hear the car arrive and come to help, embracing Jay Jay and assisting her down to her home.
Martin says a quiet farewell. They’ve hardly spoken the entire way from Longton. It’s as if Jay Jay has folded in on herself, become elderly overnight. But before he leaves, he tries to ask the question that has been plaguing him for much of the drive. ‘Jay Jay, I don’t want to distress you, but I’ve been wondering about Hummingbird. The future.’
‘What happens if I die, you mean?’ she says matter-of-factly. ‘You asked me that once before. I guess I’ll have to see Nick Poulos, get a new will drawn up.’
‘A new will? You already have one?’
‘Of course. I’ve been sick before.’
‘Who was the beneficiary? The swami?’
‘That’s right.’
‘And now?’
She smiles wanly at that. ‘Now? I don’t know. We’ll see.’
Back on Dunes Road he drives towards town, past the white cross, familiarity bleeding it of potency, through the tea-tree and mangrove landscape, swamp on the right, forested cliffs to the left, lighthouse afloat in the distance. He forces himself to concentrate, on guard against fatigue and microsleeps. He gets within range and his phone rings, as if on cue. He pulls off to the side of the road.
‘Martin? It’s Bethanie. Where have you been?’
‘Hummingbird. What’s happening?’
‘They held their doorstop, the doctors and the cops.’
‘Anything interesting?’
‘Pretty routine. All the remaining victims are out of danger and making good progress. Your mate Montifore confirmed Topaz Marie Throssel as the woman they have arrested and intend to charge. He gave a blanket warning about publishing prejudicial material once charges are laid.’
‘Good. He say anything we didn’t know already?’
‘Not a lot. He only took a few questions.’
‘What did he say about Mandy? Anything?’
‘Yeah. Thunkleton asked him how she was connected. Montifore was emphatic, saying there was no connection between her and what happened at Hummingbird, that she was helping out with a separate matter. He pretty much killed her as part of the story.’
Martin feels the tension leave him. Montifore hasn’t told the media pack of the swami’s alibi or about the knife. ‘So we don’t need to include her in our coverage?’
‘It’s not as simple as that, Martin.’
The tension returns: Bethanie is a good reporter. Maybe she senses something isn’t adding up. ‘How do you mean?’
‘I told you, Baxter filed his photos of her.’
‘And?’
‘C’mon, Martin, they’re exclusives. No one else got her going in. Plus, she’s still a person of considerable public fascination after what happened in Riversend. Plus, the swami killed someone in her house. Plus, she’s stunningly good-looking, in case you didn’t notice. More like a catwalk model than a police informant. I mean, how the hell does she do that?’
Martin sighs. He knows it’s no use arguing the toss with Bethanie; it’s out of her control. If the editors in Sydney like the image, they’ll use it. ‘So what’s next?’
‘I’ve already filed the doorstop. Meanwhile, I’ve lined up a one-on-one with one of the victims. The coppers have taken the guard off the hospital. It’s an exclusive. We’re thinking she might be our breakout piece for the paper if your dead real estate agent story doesn’t come together. Baxter was thinking about taking her back out to Hummingbird, photographing her at the scene of the crime. Do you know if we can get access yet?’
‘Yeah, the cops have gone. It’s a good idea. Once you’ve done, can you give me her number, just in case I need to follow something up?’
‘What is it? What are you chasing?’
‘I’m still trying to work out what happened, who was responsible. How it’s all linked together. But it’s early days. I might have something later in the week.’
There’s a long silence on the other end of the phone before Bethanie speaks again. ‘I don’t follow. What do you mean, who was responsible? Topaz Throssel has confessed. You caught her, for goodness’ sake. It was our exclusive, our scoop, all over the website, all over social media. You’re not saying you got it wrong, are you?’ Martin can hear the trepidation in her voice; after what happened at Riversend, he can’t blame her.
‘No. She’s guilty all right. I meant the other murder, Jasper Speight.’
There’s another pause. ‘I thought the swami killed him, trying to cover his past. That’s what you told me. That’s what we told Terri.’
‘Yes, but the police think there may be more to it than that.’
‘So that’s why they’ve pulled in Mandalay Blonde?’
Martin doesn’t know what to say. He realises he’s sweating despite the Subaru’s air-conditioning. ‘I guess so.’
‘Jesus, Martin. Terri has Baxter’s photo burning a hole in the comps desk, she’s riding me to file something to go with it, and now the police are interrogating Mandy Blonde about a murder? And you don’t tell me?’ Martin can feel the heat of her anger coming through the ether. ‘You can’t expect me to sit on that.’
Martin breathes deep. ‘We don’t need to file it for today. We’ve got the whole Hummingbird aftermath to deal with. You have your interview with one of the victims.’
‘No, Martin. No. We have the photo, we have her being questioned in the Longton police station in relation to a murder connected to the swami and possibly seven deaths at Hummingbird Beach. If we sit on it, someone else could get it. What do I tell Terri then? That I knew and didn’t say anything?’
‘Okay, okay. You’re right. Of course you need to file it. But I can’t be involved; the conflict of interest is obvious. And if my name is on the by-line, Mandy will never talk to me again.’
‘That’s fine by me.’
‘But do me one favour?’
‘What’s that?’
‘Don’t beat it up. I’m positive Mandy is innocent. The police could clear her at any moment. Don’t make the same mistake I did down in Riversend and go off half-cocked.’
Another pause. When she speaks, some of the heat has left Bethanie’s voice. ‘I guess that makes sense. But you realise it’s Terri’s call.’
‘Sure. Just don’t over-egg the pudding.’
‘Shit, Martin.’ He can hear a hint of regret. ‘I’m sorry.’ And she ends the call.
For a long time, Martin just sits there, parked off the side of Dunes Road. He’s done what he can to protect Mandy, but he knows it’s not enough. The media pack is in town, hungry for stories. And if the supply from the police dries up, they’ll splinter, start chasing their own angles. And a photo of Mandalay Blonde on the Herald website will be irresistible, no matter how much Bethanie plays it down. And once someone has revved it up, the rest will follow, each trying to outdo the other, replaying all the images from out west, the images Mandy has travelled to Port Silver to escape. He needs to act; he needs to help. And the best thing he can do now, the thing that would help her the most, is to find a new story, a bigger story, to drive the news cycle forward, to drive it in another direction, so Mandy is forgotten.
First question: if it wasn’t the swami who opened up Jasper Speight with a filleting knife, who the hell was it?
His phone rings. It’s Terri Preswell.
‘Terri.’
‘Martin. Bethanie has taken me through the situation with your girlfriend. I’m going to hold off publishing the photo. For now.’
‘That’s fantastic. Thank you so much.’
But she cuts him off. ‘Don’t thank me, Martin. If we don’t get anything better, the photo will be the front page tomorrow morning.’ And she hangs up.
Shit. It’s already gone one. He has five hours until the front page is locked down. And if the Herald puts Mandy on the front, the rest of the media will swarm. And before long, one of the reporters is sure to uncover the swami’s alibi and learn about the knife. Five hours. He has five hours to save Mandy’s reputation; five hours to save their relationship; five hours to save face with Terri Preswell, Bethanie Glass and the Sydney Morning Herald. Five hours to find who really killed Jasper Speight. Five hours … at most.
But he has no idea what to do.
He’s sitting there, trying to think, when a motorbike turns sharply in front of him, heading up the dirt track towards Hartigan’s, the rider in black. A motorbike. Again. He remembers Ridge Road: had Jasper Speight discovered something up there that had put his life at risk? Certainly someone didn’t want people accessing the residual road: there was the old gate on the boundary of Bede and Alexander’s place secured by a shiny new lock, but with tyre tracks beyond it. At this end, a tree felled, the entry to the track disguised. And down at the caravan park, someone had thrown a filleting knife into the Argyle. What had the park owner said? Trail bikes, riding along the river at all times of day. It’s enough. He starts the car and follows. When he gets up towards the gate, there’s no sign of the bike or its rider, just the distant squeal of a two-stroke engine and an oily smell hanging in the air. Martin leaves his car, finds the concealed entrance to Ridge Road, and pushes through the bushes, already running.
At first he’s almost sprinting, carried by adrenaline and dread, but he soon slows to a jog as his lack of fitness and lack of sleep impose themselves. The path is narrow, carving through the undergrowth, following what’s left of Ridge Road. Around him the bush is silent, the rainforest expectant; the air is thick, the heat heavy. The track leads up, slanting more and more northwards the closer it gets to the high ground of the cliffs. He stops to catch his breath and thinks he can hear the surf, a distant white noise. He berates himself for rushing off in pursuit of the trail bike. What is he looking for? He runs again, as if trying to outdistance his doubts.
The land starts to slope down and no more than fifteen minutes after leaving the car he reaches a fallen bridge, collapsed into a gully. It must be the one Bede Cromwell mentioned. To one side of the moss-covered timbers, the path leads down into the gully and up the other side. He can see the tyre marks left by the motorbike, where the rider has manoeuvred down into the creek bed and up the other side. The rider must have skill. And guts. Martin scrambles down, pauses at the bottom, close by the pools of water, breathing hard by the trickling stream. He bends, cups some water, drinks. It’s cool, clean on his palate. He looks at the flow, trickling out of one pool and into another. It’s not flowing inland and down into Mackenzie’s Swamp, as he might have expected. Instead, it’s flowing the other way, towards the cliffs and the sea. He scrambles up from the
gully and recommences jogging.
Only another hundred metres or so further, the track bursts out of the forest into a clearing, a wide circle of dirt. Martin stops, panting. Beyond the clearing he can see where the track continues, no longer a single lane, but twin furrows. He looks at the ground. There are other tyre tracks here, the parallel lines left by a car. The circle of dirt is not just a clearing but a turning circle. This is as far as a car can come after passing through the gate at the far end of the Hartigan block. But there is no car, and there is no motorbike. Christ. The rider must have continued on. Maybe he has a key to the gate. Martin looks at his watch. Four and a half hours to save Mandy from a newspaper lynching and he’s stuck in the middle of a rainforest, out of breath, out of ideas, and running out of time. He looks to the heavens, as if seeking divine intervention, and that’s when he sees it: the gap in the canopy. To the west side of the track, the trees are thick and obstructing the sun, the undergrowth dense and impenetrable. But to the east, the seaward side, while the undergrowth looks just as solid, there is a gap in the trees, the sky is clear and blue.
Martin investigates the roadside foliage. Now he knows what he’s looking for, the path isn’t difficult to locate, partially obscured by the shrubbery. He pushes through, and just ten metres in from the road it opens up into a wider track, clearly defined and easy to follow, even as the land begins to fall away. Another ten metres and, pushing through more shrubbery, there’s concrete. Concrete, here. A concrete path, just wide enough for a vehicle, cracked and covered by dirt at its edges, with weeds and grass pushing through the lichen-lined cracks. It looks old, decades old, the pebbled surface rough where the cement has eroded over the years. The material reminds him of the gun emplacements from the Second World War still dotted along the coast and preserved as historic monuments. Could this be that old?
The path doesn’t run straight down the slope but veers away to the right, at a diagonal, to minimise run-off and to render the gradient less steep, like an off-camber cricket pitch. Thirty metres further and it stops in a wall of vegetation. Martin looks up, finds again the telltale gap in the canopy slanting back down the slope the other way. He checks the wall of plants: sure enough, someone has pushed through the bushes. Martin follows, gaining access to another concrete slab, running across the hill at a complementary angle, the fall of the earth growing steeper. And on the concrete, the dirt tyre marks of the motorbike. He’s heading in the right direction.