At the Lake

by Jill Harris

  Simon could remember Squint Lewis chasing him along the track, but after that it was a blank. The next thing he remembered was waking up one night in hospital with his parents sitting on either side of his bed asleep in their chairs. He was pretty over whelmed to see his father, but with an arm and a leg in plaster, he couldn’t do anything except croak ‘Dad!’

  The gap in his memory bothered him a lot. Night after night he dreamt that as he ran away from Squint, his left leg was gripped by something — a dog, a shark, a crocodile — and it hurt. He knew the dream was important, but he couldn’t work out why.

  ‘Let it go, Si,’ said his dad. ‘We’ll probably never know how you came to fall into the creek. The doctor says you might get your memory back, but you’re equally likely never to remember what happened. You might have slipped off the tree when you were climbing across the creek, or Lewis could have pushed you in. Or you might have wrenched yourself out of his grasp and over-balanced.’

  The others had told him what happened after the chase: how Mrs Lewis and Jem had got the baby to safety, how Squint Lewis had been picked up on his way to the airport trying to escape to Australia, and how he, Simon, had nearly lost his life. But there were still heaps of loose ends.

  What had happened to Mrs Lewis — was she in prison, too? Where were Rosie and Tommy? Did Rosie blame herself for Simon’s accident? Accident? He stuck on the word for a moment — it didn’t seem to fit.

  Then he wondered: if he had told Barney about Squint in the beginning, might they have discovered the baby sooner? Was the baby all right?

  His dad sat down by his bed. ‘Let’s get things straight,’ he said. He explained that Mrs Lewis had been forced to help with the kidnapping, but that didn’t make her a kidnapper. Simon’s evidence about hearing her being hit by Squint Lewis would be important. She, herself, would be the main witness in Squint’s trial, and afterwards she and Rosie and Tommy would be helped to start a new life where Squint would never find them after he got out of prison.

  Suddenly a thought struck Simon: ‘What if Squint comes looking for me when he gets out of prison? He knows it was me who discovered the kidnapping. He’ll blame me for being in prison, and he’ll want to get his own back.’

  ‘The police think that’s very unlikely. They think he’ll put all his energy into trying to find Mrs Lewis and Rosie and Tommy,’ his father reassured him.

  But Simon wasn’t so sure. He thought Squint would look for him, too. He felt as though he’d never get Squint out of his life.

  ‘Should I have told Barney about Squint at the beginning?’ he asked. ‘Would they have found Sophie sooner if I had?’

  ‘Jem told me how Squint was terrorizing you,’ his father said. ‘It took a lot of guts to try to deal with it on your own — I’d have been scared witless myself by a fellow like that. Barney understands why you didn’t tell him, even though he does feel awful that he wasn’t able to help you.

  ‘As for discovering the kidnapping sooner, I’m not sure that the police would necessarily have searched the yard just because the caretaker was heavying a kid.’

  ‘I could have told you, Dad,’ said Simon, ‘but you weren’t here.’

  Simon’s father didn’t answer immediately. Finally, he said: ‘I suppose it was unrealistic of me to think you would accept why I had to go to Australia. I had to find a way of earning more money than I could at home. And I’ve nearly done that — I’ll be back for good by February.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘But it’s what we feel, not what we think, that counts, isn’t it? You were mad at me for going, Mum and I were mad at each other for the mess I got us into, and Jem had a go at me for forgetting your birthdays. It took a terrible accident for Mum and me to come to our senses and start pulling together again.’

  ‘Why did being angry with you make me be so mean to Jem?’

  The words hung there. Simon hadn’t known that was what he thought until the question popped out. He could see it was part of how he had been behaving — but was it the whole reason?

  ‘There’s a difference between being mean and what you did to Jem at the rock, Simon. I don’t understand why you did that. Maybe you don’t either. Look, son, I don’t think you’re well enough to talk about it yet. I think we should park it ’til later. I just want to say that you had to deal with some very tough situations, and there were plenty of times when you weren’t mean to Jem — like going after him when he went to the yard, and getting you both out of a sticky situation when Squint forced you off the road, and drawing Squint away at the cove. I’m proud of those things you did, and I hold them in balance with what happened at the rock.’

  Simon slid down in the bed and turned his head away. He fought back the tears. That stuff was still all there — it hadn’t magically gone away because of what had happened since. His anger at his father and Jem suddenly clogged up his throat like slimy, black gunk. Barney would never forgive him, Jem would always hate him, and what on earth was his mother feeling about what he’d done to Jem?

  Maybe they all wished he had died in the creek.

  The tears were spurting out now. His father passed him a handkerchief.

  After a while, Simon blew his nose. ‘You’re not really proud of me,’ he whispered, ‘you think I’m a kind of monster.’ He paused. ‘And maybe I am.’

  ‘Whoa! Whoa!’ His father gripped his hand. ‘Nobody thinks that!’

  Simon squeezed his eyes shut. Just blackness. Not a pinprick of light. No way out.

  But a large, firm hand held on to him.

  His father spoke. ‘Things have been badly out of kilter this summer. None of this would have happened if I’d been around.’

  Simon opened his eyes and looked down at his father’s hand. ‘I was so angry with you, Dad,’ he whispered, ‘even though I did understand why you went to Australia.’

  They were silent for a few moments.

  ‘Why do I hate Jem?’ Simon asked. ‘He’s an OK kid. Everyone likes him better than me, especially Barney. Everyone else finds him easy to be with. It’s just me: I want him to be scared of me; I want to see him cry.’

  Simon listened to himself and felt sick. Is this how Squint Lewis felt? Why he was a criminal? Did it mean he, Simon, would turn out to be a criminal, too?

  ‘I’ve seen you and Jem getting along really well together,’ his father said. ‘I just don’t believe that’s what you feel about him all the time. Sure, you’ve always had your scraps. Most brothers do. But this really mean stuff hasn’t been going on for that long — about a year. It’d take someone a lot smarter than me to understand why it started, but I know you pretty well and you’re not that mean. It’ll pass, Si; you’ll grow beyond it. Funny things happen when your body’s changing as fast as yours is now.’

  I want to believe you, thought Simon. It’s true: Jem and me — we used to get along OK. He remembered the time he’d hit the cricket ball through the neighbour’s window, and Jem had climbed the magnolia tree, reached in through the broken glass and plucked the ball off the bed under the window. They had vowed never to own up, and Jem had been utterly staunch. When Simon had finally accepted the blame and had to cough up ten dollars, Jem had emptied his money box and chipped in three dollars. Simon’s mouth turned up slightly at the corners.

  ‘That looks a bit more cheerful,’ said his dad. He stood up. ‘I’ve got to go back tomorrow,’ he said, ‘but I’ll be in to see you before I leave.’ He kissed Simon on the forehead. ‘I love you, Si. I don’t want to leave; I want to stay here and look after you all, but it’s only for another six weeks. Mum’s coming in after lunch.’ He grinned. ‘By the way, I brought your Christmas presents with me.’

  Simon lay back. He was supposed to be spending time sitting in the chair beside his bed, but he felt too tired. His thoughts turned to Rosie. ‘Where is Rosie?’ he’d asked his father.

  ‘They’re all in a safe house until the trial.’

  ‘Will I see her again?’

  ‘I don’t think so, and it�
��s safer that way.’

  Simon felt hollow. He badly wanted to tell Rosie she had been right about something bad happening at the yard. He wanted to explain that he would have gone there anyway, because he needed to stand up to Squint, and that he didn’t blame her for what had happened.

  He thought back over the few times they had met. He would never forget how she had comforted Tommy that morning at the swing, and how he had glimpsed a different way of getting on with Jem. Simon knew that Rosie was important to him. They had been honest with each other. They had helped one another.

  ‘Would I be able to write to her?’ he’d asked.

  ‘I should think so,’ said his dad. ‘We could ask the police.’

  ‘What about the baby?’

  ‘She was in pretty good shape. Mrs Lewis had done her best to cuddle and reassure her, but she’d had an awful lot of medicine to keep her quiet, and she’d been left on her own quite often so nobody knows how much she might have cried. That’s why they kept the radio on, I suppose: to mask the crying, but also to keep Sophie company.’

  Again Simon’s thoughts went back to the old house and the room with the cot. His stomach clenched up. His thoughts jumped around: the newspapers, the bottle of medicine, the cupboard, the door clicking shut when Mrs Lewis fell against it.

  ‘Here’s your lunch,’ said a cheery voice. ‘And I’ve cut up the pie for you.’

  Later that afternoon, after his mother had gone, Jem came to see him. He seemed to be his old friendly self. Although he had been in several times, they hadn’t talked about the kidnapping. Simon suspected Jem had been told not to, so he got right into it.

  ‘How did you get the outboard motor to start that afternoon?’ he asked his younger brother.

  ‘You sure you want to talk about it?’

  ‘Yep.’

  So Jem filled him in on how they’d finally got the boat going after Squint ran back up the beach after Simon. ‘I think we’d flooded it with petrol,’ he said. ‘We were trying so hard to get away.’

  He jumped to another subject: ‘Hey! You know the first time I went to the cove and hid in the willows when Squint turned up?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Simon.

  ‘And remember I told you about the cricket bag that the other person in the boat carried up the track?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Well, that’s when they brought the baby to the yard — she was in that cricket bag! I saw a bit of the kidnapping!’

  ‘I suppose they thought it was less risky bringing her by boat than by car,’ said Simon. ‘They certainly wouldn’t have expected anyone to see them.’

  ‘Hey, imagine if Squint’d caught me! What would he have done to me?’ exclaimed Jem. ‘Dad says I’ll have to give evidence at Squint’s trial!’

  Again, that bothersome feeling that the cog wheels in his head weren’t meshing properly. Simon tried desperately to pin it down. What was his brain trying to tell him? something to do with his accident? But was it an accident?

  ‘Barney said you were the one who found me,’ he said.

  ‘Yeah — on the other bank; we could just see your foot. You were that cold, man! Mum kept breathing into your back to warm you up. We both sat as close to you as we could — even though you’d thrown up and it was disgusting! The police took ages to arrive. We heard the launch a long time before it actually got there. Then they had to put you on the stretcher — boy, you groaned like anything! They put a silver sheet over you. Barney had to take Mum back to the boat ’cause she was so upset. The doctor got grumpy and said, “Take that woman away!” He wouldn’t let her go on the police launch with you.’

  Once he had started, Jem couldn’t stop. The words tumbled out. His hands jerked around, and his face was tense with the effort of getting it right.

  ‘Barney tried to make Mum wait at home for a phone call from the hospital, but after she’d warmed up with a shower and had a cuppa she drove into town to be with you. We rang the Masons to tell them we’d found you, even though it was three in the morning. Then we went to bed — and Mum woke us up when she rang about six to tell us you’d pulled through, but you had a broken right arm and leg, heaps of bruises and a big cut on your head.’

  Jem took a deep breath. His face softened.

  ‘Dad came. It kind of — it made me feel … dunno. Kind of not so bad. He had a big, flash rental car — cool — and went straight to the hospital. We turned up after lunch — we didn’t have breakfast ’til eleven! You looked awful!’ Jem grinned. ‘You still do, especially your head!’

  Jem said he had had to move into the sun porch so Mum and Dad could have the spare room, but tomorrow he would move back in with Mum after Dad left so Simon could have the sun porch when he came home from hospital. Barney was planning a welcome-home dinner, but he wouldn’t tell anyone what was on the menu in case Mum tried to take over his kitchen. He hadn’t managed so far to find out what had happened to Ace, but Mum said he couldn’t come to live with them anyway: one dog was quite enough trouble, thank you. He hadn’t seen Rosie and Tommy again; Mrs Mason said they had gone somewhere safe.

  Simon lay back listening to Jem chattering on. It was comforting and peaceful. Best of all, Jem was friendly and cheerful like he had been before, before … the rock thing. Simon was only just awake when Jem said goodbye.

  Then he fell asleep and dreamt about Rosie. She was on the swing, sailing out over the lake and back. Her long red hair streamed out behind her in the wind, and she wore a beautiful turquoise dress which billowed around her. She was laughing and laughing. It was the first time Simon had seen her laugh.

  26

  ‘Oh-oh, Ah wanna cross the bridge to someplace else’

  When he had no visitors, Simon spent a lot of the time lying and thinking. He didn’t want to read because the print swam on the page, and it was too noisy to read anyway — the man in the bed by the window played his radio a lot. Patients were supposed to use headphones, but as soon as he and Simon were alone in the ward, he would take the headphones out. ‘Darn things,’ he’d grumble. ‘Too hard to use; they hurt my ears.’

  Simon noticed they were still playing that dumb song at least twice a day. Amazing to think that the man who was singing it had turned out to be baby Sophie’s father, and that that was really why the radio kept playing it, not just because it was top of the charts. How had Sophie’s father and mother felt about that? Maybe they were too upset to listen to the radio anyway.

  Actually, he didn’t have that much time to himself. With his right arm and leg in plaster, simple things like going to the toilet, washing himself and cleaning his teeth took ages, and he couldn’t just hop in and out of bed — it took some navigating. Then there was eating meals with only one hand, and the wrong one at that. One way and another, he was only too pleased to lie on his bed and do nothing between visitors.

  Try as he might, he couldn’t remember his accident. Accident? Why did the word always echo back as a question whenever he used it? Was it possible Squint had caught up with him and pushed him into the creek? That his head knew perfectly well it hadn’t been an accident, even if his memory didn’t? Wouldn’t that put Squint in even worse trouble with the police? Mind you, it might mean that Squint would feel he had got his own back on Simon and wouldn’t hunt him down when he got out of prison.

  What he could remember all too clearly was being trapped in the wardrobe, and how he had felt when he heard Jem’s voice and Jem let him out. Jem did some pretty mighty things to rescue Sophie, he thought. Jem had been right about making friends with Ace: it had helped when they were escaping from the yard. And he had behaved like a much older kid the way he had helped Mrs Lewis run to the cove, launch the dinghy and take it out of Squint’s reach. He had stayed cool and staunch when the outboard motor wouldn’t start, and it had been smart to pull in at the Masons’ jetty.

  This was the same Jem he wanted to hurt!

  And this was the other matter he had to sort out, because he knew it wouldn’t go away: how
he had treated Jem, and what Barney thought of him now.

  ‘Look, son, I don’t think you’re well enough yet to talk about it. I think we should park it ’til later,’ his dad had said. And was Dad right that he would grow past the meanness? Was it really that straightforward? Even when he knew it was wrong, he couldn’t seem to stop himself doing mean things to Jem. It was like an itch you just couldn’t stop scratching, even though you knew it would make matters worse. While you were scratching, it felt terrific, but afterwards you paid for it. Simon had also found that the mean things needed to get meaner to satisfy him until, finally, it wasn’t just mean: now it was much worse.

  And that was the point. It was what had happened not what might happen that he had to deal with. His thoughts returned over and over to the sly, powerful satisfaction he had felt as he had lazily kicked away from Jem in the water that afternoon. Even now he couldn’t help thinking what a clever way it had been to teach Jem a lesson.

  He drew in his breath sharply. Did he still — deep down — want to teach Jem a lesson, despite his shame about what he had done? Simon felt dismayed. Maybe he didn’t really want to get on better with Jem after all.

  Unbidden, the words of the song came back to him:

  What’s the ma-a-atter with ma-a-ay?

  Ah can’t stop doin’ it

  no matter what you say,

  even when you walk away.

  Oh-oh, Ah’m hurtin’ bad

  oh-oh, Ah wanna

  turn back the clock

  oh-oh, Ah wanna

  cross the bridge

  to someplace else …

  Ye-es, thought Simon, surprised that the words weren’t as stupid as he had thought. That is exactly what it was like. In his head he could hear the saxophone sliding off the high note with a squeak, like a voice cracking, when it got to hurtin’ bad. He began to get an inkling of why the song was top of the charts. Maybe there were a lot of people who did things they wished they didn’t, but couldn’t stop themselves.