Prodigal

by T M Heron

  28

  Warren laughs. “Then she says, ‘I’m not just gluten intolerant, I’m coeliac.’”

  We’re driving out towards Silverstream. Wet and slippery, the Hutt valley road snakes its way alongside the river. We’re on our way to scope out Savannah’s stepfather’s racing stud. I decided after visiting her last night that, given I am taking back control Monday morning, I want Savannah’s stepfather sorted by Sunday night. Nothing’s going to rain on my parade Monday morning.

  “Coeliac!” says Warren again. He wears trendy sunglasses and a trilby hat and has never looked gayer.

  I’m certain Chang’s family are triad-affiliated and Warren himself is a creative genius. I’m therefore wracking my brains as to why he’s such boring conversationalist. I’m also slightly disconcerted because Chang had initially picked Karl for this mission. But Karl was “busy”. Then Chang let himself get talked into letting Warren do it.

  “We should never have put croutons with the bouillabaisse,” says Warren.

  I cringe and wonder exactly how strong a message Warren’s going to be capable of delivering. Perhaps he’s going to spray paint “Don’t beat your daughter” in rainbow colors on the side of the barn.

  “I’ve studied the layout of the property,” I say.

  “Yeah, nice. Can we be seen from the road?”

  He sounds like he’s humoring me. A pulse starts up along my right temple.

  I don’t often experience this but when I do sometimes it’s followed by a tic under my eye. I really don’t need that right now. So I force myself to focus on the larger plan, which is the conversation I’m going to have with Anthony Hartman Monday morning. It’s imperative Savannah is in good shape right now to support me through that. So I’m just going to have to have faith in Chang’s judgement and his gay nephew.

  “The main entrance has a view of the road,” I say. “But that part’s in a valley. Behind the valley is a hill. The rest of the farm is behind the hill. If we access the property from the hill side, we can look down on everything without being seen.”

  We cruise past the front of the stud without slowing. At the road entrance are enormous pillared statues in the shape of horses rearing and the gate is a wrought-iron affair. There is freshly painted white post-and-rail fencing as far as the eye can see. I notice a security camera mounted on the gate, but I’m not concerned as we’re in one of Chang’s cars and I’m not paying $2000 to have to worry about that shit.

  “It doesn’t look like anyone’s there,” I say, craning my neck to take a final look backwards.

  “There’s a race meet today,” says Warren. “That’s why the trucks are gone.”

  For a moment I’m embarrassed at having let that small but crucial piece of information fall through the cracks of my preparation. “I still think we should go across the back of the farm,” I mumble.

  Warren nods and keeps driving and I realize it’s what he intended to do all along.

  The road gets narrow and winding now, overhung with ferns and vines and native shrubbery. People who live out here love it, I suppose, but I’ve always found it oppressive. In fact, in the fading light of the late-afternoon winter sun it’s positively creepy. God, I hate the Hutt.

  By the time we emerge at the top of the hill I’m carsick. Warren parks close in behind a group of scraggy pines and retrieves a leather satchel from the boot. Then we walk the last part of our journey to the gate.

  It’s quite beautiful now we’re at the top — or maybe it’s just a relief to be off that narrow, winding road and standing on a plateau with the sun visible again and about twenty horses grazing peacefully. The most absurd thought passes through my mind, almost like a hallucination, that this is the sort of place Ava would like to be brought for a champagne picnic. Then I know I must be stressed out of my tree.

  Warren is patting a horse. “I like the kind of brown ones,” he calls.

  “Quiet,” I say, hurrying over. “It’s not ‘kind of brown’, it’s called bay.”

  The horse gazes at me with calm, intelligent eyes. I like animals more than people any day.

  “We can make all the noise we want. There’s no one around for miles,” says Warren.

  Suddenly the horse he is stroking gives an enormous shudder and its legs buckle.

  “God, what’s wrong with it? Do something.” A wave of nausea flushes through me. I’m terrible around animals in distress.

  “It’s suffering cardiac arrest,” says Warren.

  “How do you know? Christ. We need to call a vet.” Panic erupts inside me.

  “I know because I just caused it,” says Warren, looking taken aback. “We’d better get a move on. There’s ten more to do here and then those ones over there.”

  The ground beside us trembles as the horse topples.

  “This can’t be happening,” I say.

  “How exactly did you think we were going to convey a message?” Warren is already moving towards the next horse, a leggy youngster, with bright eyes and a furry winter coat. “You wanted to give him something to think about, didn’t you?”

  “Not the young ones,” I say, my voice almost pleading.

  “Of course the young ones. They’re his future.” Warren places his hand on the animal’s neck. Its dark little muzzle snuffles into his hand. “They all need to go.”

  In my peripheral vision the first horse he touched contorts then goes slack.

  “Go back to the car if you want,” Warren says, still playing with the youngster.

  But I’m already walking. What he is doing repulses me. I want no part in it. I would never have allowed it to happen and this will haunt me forever. I sit in the car and try to keep from hyperventilating. I want to be sick. Strange sensations are engulfing me, and I realize I want to cry. I don’t think I’ve ever cried before, but my eyes are watering.

  When Warren returns leaving two paddocks of dead horses in his wake, I can’t bring myself to look at him. All that beauty. All that breeding.

  “I left a note on the gate,” says Warren as he drives. “It says, ‘Domestic abuse is unacceptable’.” He switches on the heater. “That way he can tie it back to what he’s doing to his stepdaughter without being too source-specific. Who knows, he may be doing it to the mother as well.”

  “That was sick, Warren,” I tell him.

  “You’re lucky Karl wasn’t here. He would have done it the old-fashioned way,” says Warren. And he laughs. This time his laugh sounds less gay and more sinister.

  29

  It’s Sunday morning and I haven’t slept. I spent the night in the guest room. I worry lately whether if Ava started another argument, I’m worried that . . . I would like to think I have the self-control necessary not to wrap my hands around that long, pale neck. With the emphasis strictly on “would like”.

  The other night I was able to have sex with Ava for the first time in a long time solely because my hands were around her neck. I probably could have reached full resolution if they’d been tighter. That’s how wound up I am.

  Of course, flashing through my mind were images of Savannah and Ingrid Claire. Anyhow, the way my life is going, unless I take due precautions I’m just as likely to wake up one morning and find I’ve killed Ava.

  I can’t get the horses out of my mind. I didn’t see the end result with all of them lying still and dead on that grassy, sunny plateau. But my imagination has filled in the blanks. For the last eight hours I’ve had visions of horses shuddering and buckling and twitching and lying dead. In the worst vision, all of them were still except a steel grey that kept twitching its back leg.

  I’m a wreck. It’s horrific. I tell myself they died quickly. I tell myself Savannah is more important than any horse. But is she?

  And although I didn’t sleep, I had waking nightmares. What happened with those poor, innocent horses brought back memories of my childhood labradoodle, Scamper. I’d forgotten about Scamper until now.

  When Helena was injured her immune system was
initially compromised. She couldn’t just be a tetraplegic. No, my sister had to go and have everything else go wrong as well. She turned high-maintenance and self-centered and neurotic. Interesting how it took a life-threatening accident to bring out the real person.

  Scamper was middle-aged at the time. He was actually my dog. But in true canine fashion he was never discerning with his affections. When I wasn’t around he would weasel his way into the newly converted medical wing of our house in search of Helena. The nurses would find him sitting on her bed. It was hardly his fault. But my father decided that Scamper had to go.

  No one told me what was going to happen with Scamper. Our family universe rotated on a steadfast and committed axis around my voiceless, broken sister. And one black day I walked into my father’s workshop to find him and Mr. Keaton, our neighbor, crouched over the work bench. Scamper was on the bench and Mr. Keaton, who was a vet, was injecting him with a clear greenish fluid.

  Right there and then my fear of needles was born. Not of being stuck, but of sticking. Of holding the barrel of the syringe and depressing the needle. I’m sure it has got worse as I got older. Scamper, looking back, was the one thing I loved during my childhood.

  “He was a risk to your sister,” said my father, the fucking beloved philanthropist.

  I have never forgiven Helena for that.

  Now I lie in the guest bed of my own damn house and wish I’d been the one to kill my father. If only I’d had the idea earlier. The poisoned cigar. He could have gone of a heart attack, just like the horses. Oh no, the horses.

  Today I have less energy than a corpse. Than Jo — who would have to be the most indolent corpse to ever grace a mortuary. This thought and my own quick wit momentarily cheer me.

  I swear I can’t remember the last time I woke up fresh, free from the burgeoning weight of my latest swill of problems and responsibilities. This is what marriage must feel like. No wonder so many of my colleagues are so grey. So repressed.

  ◆◆◆

  It’s naughty but last night I swung by Savannah’s on the way home. I ended up spending half the night in their pool house.

  When I arrived it looked as if all the lights were dimmer than normal. I wondered if the household was in mourning. They’d have to know about the horses by now.

  Then Savannah showed up in her room looking upset. I wasn’t about to let her know that indirectly I was behind it. After all, ultimately it was for her. And given the resulting trauma I experienced I don’t think I’d take too kindly to her ingratitude. Better not to give her the opportunity to be ungrateful.

  She went to bed early with lights out immediately. I waited patiently, a new experience for me. Hours later she turned on the light and appeared at the window. Faded blue T-shirt, grey toweling shorts, a little torso showing. Lean thighs, almost gangly. And the smile.

  I knew you’d come around.

  ◆◆◆

  This morning I’m chemically altered yet again — coke and speed. I’ve slightly overdone it and that’s being kind. Not the best start to any Monday morning but these days I can barely drag myself out of bed. And with my false burst of energy last night, and then Savannah — there are no reserves left in my system. So I need more false energy.

  In particular, I need this energy for my talk with Anthony. After my visit to Savannah every extra hour that heralds my lack of partnership curdles in the back of my throat. As I walk down to Anthony’s office, I see Pacitto leaving. He raises an eyebrow. I ignore him but inside the sour curdles. He wants me for this. He wants me so badly.

  I’m totally fired up on a combination of agitation and feeling wronged by the time I open Anthony’s door. It’s not an ideal mindset.

  He’s standing behind his desk. He smiles widely when he sees me. I go to return the smile. Then something takes over, maybe the excess coke, maybe the excess speed, and I start to see myself having this conversation rather than experiencing it. “You know, this looks just like a knock-off I saw in a cheap Asian shop in town,” I say rudely, pointing to the rug on his desk. My eyes feel way too open. I probably look like someone with Graves’ disease.

  “It is a knock off,” says Anthony, without missing a beat. “Gabriella gave it to me for our first anniversary. She was at med school at the time.”

  He treats me to another smile. “Have a seat,” he says.

  “I don’t have time,” I reply. Then in the peripheral vision of my super-open eyes I see Finch. Here in Anthony’s office. Finch, my biggest impediment to becoming a partner full-stop. Finch, who at some level, for reasons unbeknown, to me views me as if I were a type of vermin.

  I sit down. “This is good,” I say, “this is good.”

  Finch says, “That detective was here—”

  “That’s fascinating, Henry, and as it happens also relevant,” I cut straight over him. I tend to do this when I’m on speed. “Relevant,” I continue, “in that he has absolutely no relevance to anything. Not any longer. Not anymore.”

  I look straight at Anthony, eyes popping right out of my skull. “You know what I’m saying. My partnership. You need to make it happen.” I beat out a little tattoo with my fingers on his desk. I don’t know why I do this. It just happens. At the time it seems cool.

  Anthony purses his lips. “Your partnership has happened for all intents and purposes. It’s just the timing of the announcement.”

  I shoot him down just as I did Finch two seconds earlier. “I won’t have the timing of my partnership announcement dictated by a cop.” My heart is going crazy. How ironic would it be to drop dead of a drug-induced heart attack at this moment? Finch would like that. Fucker. “I’m not giving you the satisfaction,” I mumble to him out the side of my mouth.

  “What?” says Finch.

  “What?” I say, in my best derogatory imitation.

  A ripple of calm passes over Anthony’s face. I’ve seen it before. It means he’s about to do battle. There is no man on the planet nicer and more courteous than Anthony when he’s going for the jugular.

  “Make it his jugular, not mine,” I say, jerking my head in Finch’s direction.

  “What?” says Finch again.

  “What?” I say again.

  “Perhaps Henry should leave?” says Anthony. He looks dangerously unruffled.

  “No, a party wouldn’t be a party without Santa Claus here,” I say, waving an arm in Finch’s general direction. “Besides, I don’t have much to say. Just make it happen.” Then I do the tattoo thing again with both hands.

  “It’s not that easy,” says Anthony in a reasonable voice.

  “It’s precisely that easy,” I say. “Here’s what I know. Beatson Geard and Walsh would make me a partner tomorrow if I walked in there with RIL.”

  Anthony and Finch exchange glances but I’ve got too much to say and it’s all in a hurry to come out.

  “I’ve bent over backwards for this firm. Backwards. And that was never going to be enough. Because,” and I shoot Anthony a meaningful look, “I had to bring in RIL. You guys and your big demands and your grand agendas. So I deliver RIL. On a platter. And now just because Jo, who was no good to anyone, happens to get murdered, it’s a waiting game all over again. And I’m being treated like the bad guy. Just like I was with that crazy bitch who threw paint at me. And this firm is not standing tall and having my back.

  “I didn’t lay a hand on Jo. I’d rather have syphilis.” Hands tattooing, out of control. Eyes feeling dry, sandpapery, they’re so open. There’s a glass of water on the desk and I’d like to pour it over my face. But I’ve got too much more to say. “I’m not guilty. You know it. I know it. You know I know you know it. But here we have some poxy cop sniffing around, with no evidence, absolutely none, and suddenly Bernadette is bleating on and our biggest win this year is being ignored, and my partnership’s being treated like some dirty secret, and everything is hinging on a police investigation. What kind of way is this to reward your performers? You’re meant to have my back, not be letting som
e bitch cop mop the floor with me.”

  At this point I realize from both of their faces that I am talking so quickly it may be coming out as some form of guttural drivel. “Make it happen,” I yell. “Make it happen or I walk.”

  “You can walk,” says Finch.

  “You’d welcome that,” I snap. “I’ll be out-earning you within five years.”

  I also intend to out-earn Anthony. And every goddamn one of them. There’s only room for one at the top. Really. And Anthony’s had a long enough run there already.

  I try to blink, squeeze my eyelids close to give my parched eyeballs some relief.

  It’s the law of nature, for a younger hungrier version of any species to usurp the older. And now I realize that even while I looked forward to being an equal with Anthony that would never really have been enough and eventually, sooner rather than later, I would want to be superior. But I’m not going to share this with Anthony right now. Not even in my speed-addled rage.

  “Make it happen,” I say to him again, blinking my powdery eyeballs. “We have the power. They’re nothing, they’re drones.” And I feel potent saying this. I needed this moment.

  “I understand your frustration,” says Anthony, his face a mask of tranquility.

  “I don’t need to be understood,” I say. “I need a little goddamn respect. And I want to be a named partner by the end of this week.”

  Then my eyes can’t wait any longer and I pick up the glass, hold it to my face like a large eyebath, flip my head back and rinse first one eye then the other.

  “You can’t, we don’t, I think,” is all Finch can come up with.

  “Jesus, Henry,” I say.

  “Henry, I’d appreciate a word with Jackson,” says Anthony.

  Finch stands up, gawks at the glass and crabs out of the room.

  Anthony adjusts a cufflink. Then he looks at me and in his eyes just briefly is an expression of sheer rage. “Your partnership will be announced to the firm this afternoon. It will be in the NBR and the Dom Post as soon as Bernadette can manage it. The partners will throw welcoming drinks this Thursday.”