Dead in the Water

by Tania Chandler

  That’s never going to work.

  Steve repeated his instructions slowly, emphasising that she mention the police were coming, and asked if she was clear on the plan.

  ‘Yes.’ She looked up at the stars.

  ‘You’ll be right, I promise. He won’t try anything if he knows we’re on our way. I’ll be waiting in Paynesville for you.’

  She hung up, went inside, and held out her arms for Ella.

  Ella shook her head. ‘I’m playing with Harry.’

  ‘Come over here, please.’

  ‘Found Phoebe?’ Harry said.

  Brigitte swallowed; her mouth was dry. ‘Police are looking for her. That was Steve Williams.’ Her words seemed to be coming too slowly, from far away, echoing in her head. ‘Steve’s called Jeremy to start up the ferry so they can come across and search the island, too. The police.’

  She tried to read Harry’s face, couldn’t.

  ‘Steve woke Jeremy up when he called,’ she added, hoping Harry was still drunk enough not to notice the cracks in her voice. Or was he pretending? Did he know where Phoebe was? Had he done something to her? ‘Could you do me a favour?’

  He nodded.

  She cleared her throat and held her voice together. ‘I’m worried that Jeremy might go back to sleep. Could you please walk over to his house and check on him?’

  ‘Why didn’t Steve call the Water Police?’

  ‘I don’t know, Harry.’

  Did his eyes darken? ‘Or the coppers could just borrow a boat to get across.’

  ‘I don’t think Steve knows how to drive a boat.’

  ‘Want me to take my boat across to get him?’ He slid his hands deep into his coat pockets.

  Was the knife in there? You need an Uncle Henry fillet knife, mate. She took a step backwards, pushing Ella behind her. ‘No, you’ve been drinking. Can’t drive either.’

  ‘Bit of a walk to Jeremy’s.’

  She wrung her hands; she knew this wouldn’t work. Had to change tactics. Primeval lore — it’s all she could think of. She struggled to remember how she’d tricked punters back at the Gold Bar into paying her before she’d removed her clothes. Not with Gorgon hair, no make-up, and a Hello Kitty onesie. She pivoted the toes of her left foot and slowly circled the ankle; Harry looked at it. When he ran his eyes back up her body, she teased a finger along her collar and blinked a slow blink.

  Now that she had Harry’s complete attention, she said, in a fairy floss voice, ‘I’m really worried about Phoebe, the ferry will be quickest.’ She moistened her top lip with her tongue. ‘Can you please just check on Jeremy for me?’

  ‘All right.’

  Ella asked if she could go with Harry.

  ‘No. Go put on a jacket and some shoes.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Your feet must be cold.’

  When Harry left, Brigitte watched him through the bathroom window. How the fuck had he fallen for that? It must be a trick; he was playing games with them. As soon as his hi-vis beanie melted into darkness at the top of the driveway, she rushed to the bedroom. She twisted the safe’s combination lock. Stop shaking! The safe didn’t open. Fuck! Had Aidan told her the wrong numbers? She tried again. The lock opened. She lifted out the pistol case, laid it on the bed, and lifted the lid.

  She stared into the empty foam interior. Harry didn’t need a knife, because she’d told him where the fucking gun was. ‘Fuck. Fuck.’ But how could he have worked out the code? She rubbed her face. ‘Fuck!’

  Ella was standing in the doorway, watching.

  ‘Sorry, sweetie.’ Brigitte swallowed — there was no saliva — and in a scratchy That’s amazing what you did at kinder today voice said, ‘Let’s go see Jeremy now. We’re going to run as fast as we can so we don’t miss the ferry.’ She pulled her coat from the wardrobe and slipped it on over her onesie, shoving her phone into a pocket.

  ‘Harry coming, too?’

  ‘No, sweetie.’

  ‘What about Phoebe?’

  ‘Phoebe’s OK. The police are going to find her.’

  ‘Where’s Daddy?’

  ‘He’ll be OK, too. Let’s hurry.’

  Brigitte slid her bare feet into the pair of old boots she’d left on the porch and piggy-backed Ella, leaving the house open and the lights on.

  Brigitte’s back ached under Ella’s weight, and without socks the boots gave her instant blisters. At the top of the driveway, she turned left and headed towards Fifth Parade.

  ‘We’re going the wrong way, Mummy.’

  Harry could be waiting somewhere, expecting them to take the usual route via the cul-de-sac, and past the park.

  She stopped to catch her breath at the first jetty, and saw the ferry’s red and white lights shimmering on the water. Thank God.

  As she adjusted her grip on Ella, she looked up. They were too late. Harry was sitting in the island-side control compartment, above the sign that said: Users must follow the directions of the ferry operator at all times. You couldn’t miss his hi-vis beanie.

  47

  ‘Change of plan, sweetie,’ Brigitte said as she turned back and headed to the little tin boat upended at the water’s edge, near where the forensic scientists had found Maree Carver’s bloodstains and the tree had glowed with luminol. She glanced over her shoulder at Harry. It was hard to tell, but he appeared to be looking in the direction of the park.

  ‘We’re going to take a boat.’ Brigitte lowered Ella to the ground next to the old tinny.

  ‘But you’re scared of the water, Mummy.’

  She hesitated, looked at the first jetty, but the feeling of near-drowning was now like a long-ago dream she could barely remember. ‘Not anymore.’ She threw off her coat, and slid her hands under a side of the tinny, hoping to God — or anything else that could help them — that the oars were inside.

  Her back spasmed, seized. White-hot pain. No, no, no, not now. Why hadn’t she had it seen to? She dropped to her knees. Objects receded to dizzy outlines. Sepia. Black.

  She tasted dirt, and heard Ella crying.

  Hands against knees, she pushed herself up. There was a crunch in her spine. She took a few steps around in a circle. It was OK. The pain was bearable.

  Her back held up as she flipped the tinny over. Millipedes, worms, and God knows what else wriggled to deeper hiding places. She dragged and pushed the boat — no motor, but oars attached to the insides — to the water, kicked off her boots, and helped Ella scramble in. She ran back for her phone in the coat, and then waded a metre or so out before climbing-falling into the wobbly boat. Her phone went overboard; she reached for it, too late, and swore as it drowned in the strait.

  ‘Don’t worry. Just remember: red, right, return, Mummy,’ Ella said, as if they were going on a picnic. ‘So we can find our way back.’

  ‘OK, sweetie. Red, right, return.’ Wasn’t that the wrong way around? She saw water bubbling through a little hole in the port, no, starboard — whatever side. Any fucking port in a fucking storm. She gnawed her lip and started rowing, in a fashion.

  ‘Brigitte! Up here!’

  She missed the water with her oar stroke as she turned her face to the ferry. Jeremy?

  ‘It’s all right. I’ve knocked Harry out.’

  She squinted and could just make out the silhouettes of Harry slumped at the controls and Jeremy climbing down the stairs.

  Brigitte and Ella hadn’t gotten very far; she stabbed the oar into the strait’s floor and pushed the tinny back to shore.

  ‘First-class passengers this way,’ Jeremy winked as they stepped aboard.

  ‘Did you get the gun off Harry?’

  Jeremy nodded and smiled. ‘All taken care of.’

  Brigitte wanted to kiss him. She held onto the thighs of her Hello Kitty onesie, heavy with water, and rushed into the passenger sa
loon, closing the door against the icy wind. She and Ella slumped on the seat, cuddling, teeth chattering.

  It was almost over. All Jeremy had to do now was get them to the other side — five minutes max.

  Phoebe would get such a shock when police knocked on the door of whichever friend’s house she’d gone to. Brigitte wouldn’t be too angry. She was going to try harder with her, be a better mother. And a better partner for Aidan. She’d help him to get better. She’d see a doctor, too: for her back again, and maybe other … issues. If she could face the water, surely she could brave a doctor visit. No more lies — to Aidan or to herself.

  All the times Harry had sat drinking with her at the kitchen table, all the times he’d watched the kids. Waiting? How could she have been such a poor judge of character? She shuddered, not yet able to reconcile what Harry had done to Maree Carver, to Zippy, and almost … Don’t think about that now. Save it for the doctor.

  She walked over to see if she could lock the door from the inside — no. Please hurry up, Jeremy. She returned to the seat and pulled Ella onto her lap, kissing the top of her head. The ramp folded up, and the ferry started cranking across the strait. A crescent moon illuminated the vehicles and dark figures — police, she hoped, waiting for Harry — moving about near the Paynesville ferry shelter. Steve must be over there somewhere.

  Just over halfway across the strait, the ferry gave a sad kind of whimper, and then stopped dead. Brigitte’s heart thundered in her chest. She stood up. Harry’s awake. Or another broken chain. Please not now.

  She left Ella on the seat and opened the door a crack to look outside.

  ‘Coast Guard to Paynesville.’ The radio from the upper deck.

  She pushed the door open a little more, wanting to call out to Jeremy, but afraid of Harry hearing.

  ‘You know that secret cupboard in your bedroom?’ Ella said. ‘Phoebe knows the numbers.’

  Brigitte turned to gape at her.

  ‘She says I can’t see inside.’

  The fluorescent tube overhead flickered.

  ‘Do you read me, Paynesville?’ Static. ‘Paynesville, do you read me? Over.’ And then the radio died.

  She heard footsteps on the stairs and froze. Just Jeremy’s Doc Martens — she saw them from the underside of the steel staircase. ‘Is everything …’

  There was a second pair of feet, in front of Jeremy’s. Small feet, in pink Converse sneakers. Brigitte’s first emotion was relief.

  She stepped out of the saloon, closing the door behind her. At the bottom of the stairs, Jeremy pulled down the rag from Phoebe’s mouth. In his other hand, he held a pistol — the one from their safe.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mummy.’ Phoebe’s speech was punctuated by ragged breaths. Snot and tears were smeared over her face, and there was a small cut on her forehead. ‘I just wanted to show the gun to Emily.’

  Jeremy told her to shut up or he’d tie her up again. He must have had her hidden in the mainland-side operator’s compartment.

  He pushed the pistol’s barrel into her temple. She flinched and hunched up her shoulders; a trickle of urine ran through her denim shorts and down her bare legs.

  Brigitte looked at the goosebumps on her daughter’s legs and gripped the rail behind, her heart shifting from her stomach to her throat. ‘Shh. It’s OK, baby.’

  Jeremy shook his head, and looked at Brigitte as though he didn’t recognise her.

  Little strangled sobs like hiccups shook Phoebe’s body. Brigitte locked eyes with her, focusing on her own breath control, hoping that would somehow help Phoebe to control hers. She was back in the NICU — having only one want: for her babies to survive. Breathe. I love you. Everything’s going to be OK. Breathe. My beautiful little baby. Breathe.

  She tried to think of something a police officer might say to negotiate out of the situation. How to keep things under control? Surely she’d absorbed something, but nothing came. She looked to Jeremy. ‘Why do you want to hurt us?’

  Jeremy stared at her — through her — with dead fish eyes. What had happened to him? Drugs? Lack of drugs? She vaguely remembered him telling her he’d had depression. Maybe it was something more, and he’d gone off his meds.

  ‘We didn’t do anything to you,’ she said.

  ‘But he did.’ When he spoke, his lips made a popping sound — his mouth was dry.

  Brigitte winced as he waved the gun in the air. ‘Who? Who hurt you?’ Steve would have called the Special Operations Group, and a hostage negotiator — she just needed to distract Jeremy until they arrived.

  ‘Serra.’

  ‘But he barely knows you.’

  He seemed to struggle to form saliva in his mouth. ‘He killed our sister.’

  Our? How many people were in his head? If he was hearing voices, God knew what he might do.

  ‘Me and Steve’s.’ He wiped his nose with the back of his gun hand.

  Serra, Steve, he was saying random names now. Brigitte kept her eyes on the gun.

  ‘Our Laurie.’

  Oh my fucking God. She remembered the initials on the scarf in Jeremy’s ute — not Lang Hardware. She remembered Steve dropping something on Harry’s boat — not his hanky.

  He nodded slowly, a faint sneer tugging a corner of his mouth. The SOG weren’t coming; nobody was coming to help.

  If she could just get close enough, she could snatch the gun from his hands, somehow. Or, he could shoot them all. Keep him talking, distract him. ‘You don’t have a dog, do you?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘You paid those boys to say they killed my dog?’

  He looked at the sky, and in a raspy voice, started singing: ‘Memories I’m stealing, but you’re innocent in your dreams.’

  She’d heard the song, but couldn’t place it. Phoebe’s eyes followed Brigitte’s to the gun. She gave a tiny shake of her head: not yet. Jeremy was still staring heavenward, and singing. ‘In your dreams, in your dreams. Innocent in your dreams.’

  She took a step towards him. He didn’t seem to notice. She glanced at the upper deck. Please, Harry, please wake up now.

  Jeremy stopped singing. ‘It wasn’t meant to be Maree Carver,’ he said.

  Anger overrode Brigitte’s fear. ‘No shit! You really screwed that up, didn’t you?’

  That brought him back to Earth.

  ‘And the night after that stupid bogan band?’

  He glared at her.

  ‘There are no short cuts to our house.’

  ‘Fucken Serra. We wanted him,’ he spat the word with no spit, ‘to know how it feels to lose somebody you love, but you tricked us. Same hair, same coat, you fucken cunts all look the same.’

  ‘Aidan had no choice. Your sister shot him first, and killed his partner.’

  ‘Bullshit!’

  The fear returned and she stopped talking; he was waving the gun around too much, losing control. The passenger-saloon door creaked open, and she felt Ella against her backside. She pushed her back inside with a hip.

  Jeremy looked around Brigitte and grinned. ‘I almost forgot the little one there.’

  A few heavy raindrops hit the upper deck. Jeremy looked towards the sound, and she took another step. She could see Harry drooping forward. It wasn’t raindrops: it was crimson. Four darks in red. Nausea burned her throat, stung her eyes. She stumbled a step back, dizzy, dry retching.

  Jeremy laughed. ‘Good old Harry. He so wanted to get into your pants, didn’t he?’

  She gritted her teeth.

  ‘He was s’posed to find you all. Would’ve looked like he did it — like the animals back when we worked at the abattoir. Then Steve, or better still, Serra, was gunna shoot him. But he got here a bit early. The one time Harry didn’t do exactly what you told him to … Th-th-th-that’s all folks. Lucky Blondie here brought your gun for me this time. Knife’s a bit messy.’
His gaze flickered across to the mainland and back. ‘You know how this ends, don’t you?’

  She felt herself dissociating, Jeremy’s voice coming from far away.

  ‘What, you didn’t read your boyfriend’s book?’

  That jolted her back.

  He tut-tutted. ‘I read it three times. I love the twist at the end. It wasn’t Detective Moore; it was Annaleah. First the wife, then the dog, then the kids, and —’

  Jeremy’s phone rang in his pocket. Brigitte stared at him; he gazed into the middle distance for five rings, and then released Phoebe as he answered. He appeared to listen, and then replied, ‘Just fuck off.’

  A negotiator?

  Phoebe was cemented like a statue to the spot where Jeremy had been holding her. Brigitte held out her hand, but Phoebe didn’t — couldn’t — move.

  ‘Dumb fucken cunt,’ Jeremy said into the phone. ‘I’ve got a gun. Which one should I shoot with it first? Eeny, meeny, miney, moe.’ He listened again. ‘I don’t want anything. Fuck off! Just fuck off!’

  A dog barked. The lights in the dwelling above Joe’s fish shop came on.

  ‘I don’t want your fucken help!’ Jeremy yelled, and threw his phone overboard.

  Ella ran through the passenger saloon to the front of the ferry. She screamed and tried to scramble up the ramp, but slipped back down onto the floor.

  Jeremy covered his ears. Now. Now was the time to snatch the gun. But Brigitte was cement like Phoebe, couldn’t move.

  More shops lit up. For fuck’s sake, do something! Brigitte lurched for the gun. Jeremy was too strong; his fingers gouged into her flesh. He flung her aside, and she smashed like a doll against the rails. Ella screamed again. Brigitte braced herself for a bullet going awry.

  ‘Make her shut up, Brigitte, or she gets it first.’

  A police siren screamed on the mainland, and was killed quickly. Another car. A door slammed. Raised voices, an argument. A splash. Somebody in the water. Floodlight. Jeremy monstered through the passenger saloon, arms barely moving by his sides. He placed a hand on the rail, jumped over into the vehicle section, and went to the port — no, the starboard — side, training the pistol on the swimmer.