It was late, Louise would be worried. He’d rung no one. He felt he’d never switch on the phone again. They would retreat somewhere, the four of them, cocoon themselves in a safe haven. Run away, start anew. Tasmania, perhaps. Yes, Tasmania, Louise loved it there; the great forests, the wild rivers, the cleanest air on earth, the cleanest water. That was what they needed-to be washed clean of the grime of falsity and fakery.
It was finished now. There was only the old lawyer’s funeral to come. The rest of it was buried already. He could leave any time he liked. He owed no one anything. He’d tried; it was more than most people bothered with. It was good enough.
But then there was Louise. Would she let go now? She’d have to see there was no chance without the old lawyer, have to realise their hopes lay in the sawdust on that concrete floor. She didn’t have to know about his own failure. She could keep believing he was a hero defeated by circumstance. The truth wasn’t always a necessity.
The house was ablaze with light when he drove up Alice Street. She was standing in the doorway, waiting, and ran to meet him on the path. She enveloped him and almost carried him into the house, and he was sobbing again before they reached the door.
‘How did you know?’
‘She rang. His wife. She said you needed looking after. What a remarkable woman.’
Sarah and Shane were waiting inside and the four of them held one another, wrapped together in a knot of limbs, not speaking. Finally, exhausted, they all found bed, if not sleep. He wanted to talk now, to tell her everything, even the failure, even the frailty, even his guilt. He’d killed an old man with his arrogance. He’d been warned, asked to stop, begged for compassion. But no, he’d known what was right, what was wrong, what was black and what was white. Well what did he know now? The sour taste of bile in the mouth, the rank odour of defeat and death.
She was patient with him, but pragmatic. Overdramatisation was dismissed, though gently. She would have nothing of the guilt, nothing of the failure, but when he said he wanted to walk away, she didn’t oppose it.
‘We’ll see. You’ve all your other friends helping you. The Pope or whatever his name is, and the others in the group. Talk to them. Seek their advice. That document is still in the safe, don’t forget that. Yes, it’s a tragedy this man has died. I think you loved him in some way. But be sorry for him, and his wife, not for yourself. And maybe we can make his death worth something. And if it doesn’t all resolve itself, a stone cottage by a river in Tasmania with lupins in the paddocks and salmon in the oven sounds fine to me.’
When sleep came, it was the deep, still sleep of spent emotion from which waking is the only dream.
He was being shaken, he could feel it, but he was still in the half-dream. And then the voice, the soft voice of his daughter who had never woken before him in sixteen years. ‘Dad. Dad! There are men downstairs. They want you. You have to come.’
He almost fell from the bed, but gestured for her to be silent as he saw the deep breathing of his wife under a sheet pulled half over her face. He was in the foyer before he knew it, with a robe pulled across a pair of striped boxer shorts and his feet bare on the stone floor. There were three of them, already in the house, waiting, in business suits. He looked at his watch. It was six a.m.
‘Mr Beaumont, we represent the Australian Securities and Investments Commission. We hold a duly executed warrant to search these premises. We also wish to ask you questions pertaining to a current investigation. We will now commence the search.’
He didn’t protest; what was there to protest about? He turned to Sarah and said, ‘Go back to bed, darling. It’s all right. It’s just a business thing, just routine. Don’t worry.’
But she came to him, clung to him. ‘What’s happening, Dad? Why is all this happening? I want everything to be like it used to be.’
‘I know, darling. It will be. I just have to help these people and then we can go back to our old life. I promise.’
Still she held him and he could feel the shaking.
‘They’re not after me. I haven’t done anything wrong. I’m trying to help them. You don’t have to worry.’ Finally she released him and he pushed her gently away down the corridor, though he could see her glancing back doubtfully as she turned the corner to her bedroom.
He sat in the breakfast room with coffee. He’d offered the remaining ASIC man a cup, but the offer had been politely refused. The man just sat there, not speaking-waiting, he supposed, to ensure no calls were made. That had been the instruction. He didn’t need an instruction. He couldn’t think of anyone to call.
The sun fell into the room in patterns on the floor just the way he’d designed it to fall. He’d stood on this site, with the model in his hand and watched the light strike the roofline and lifted the roof to imagine the shafts falling through the skylights. And now here they were, here he was, here was the ASIC man.
One of the others entered the room. ‘There’s a safe in a room out here, Brian.’
The seated man turned to Jack. ‘Would you come and open the safe please, Mr Beaumont?’
He followed tamely and dialled the combination. He sat in a deep chair and tried not to see the body fall again, tried not to see the puff of sawdust as it hit the floor, tried not to hear the dull thud.
‘What is this, Mr Beaumont?’ He looked up. There was a pile of Louise’s jewellery boxes on the table and the man was holding a paper. ‘I’m sorry, what? I didn’t hear you.’
The man handed him the paper. It was the Global Re side letter, the smoking gun, which might never fire now.
‘Why is this company document in your private safe?’ Exhaustion overcame him again. Sleep had restored no energy or, if it had, it had dissipated with his daughter’s hand. ‘It’s a long story. It’s the story you’re searching for, I think, but I’d like to tell it some other time.’
‘We’d like to hear it now, Mr Beaumont. In fact, we insist.’ They both pulled chairs towards him and the spokesman placed a small tape recorder on the arm of one. How could he explain the saga? Where to start? Was there a finish? ‘It’s very complicated. We were about to turn over a whole pile of documents to you, a whole case really. This is one of them.’
‘Who is we? Mr Beaumont?’
Jack pressed one hand to the top of his head, pressed down hard as if to prevent pain from spreading, dug his fingers into the scalp. ‘Can’t we do this some other time?
I’m trying to help you people. I’m the one who started all this, started digging into all this dirt. But I need a little time to put my thoughts in order.’
The man sat impassively and removed a small notebook from his breast pocket. ‘What dirt are you referring to?’
Jack sighed. ‘Look, I don’t want to have to call lawyers and all that nonsense. I’m on your side. Just give me some time. It’s been a rough period.’
‘You referred to we in your previous comments. Who is we?’ And so it began. He tried to outline the process, his initial concerns, his meeting with Hedley Stimson, their peculiar arrangement, his search for documents. As he sketched the lines, it sounded complex, even to him. The chief executive of a major company ferrying documents to a retired lawyer buried in the suburbs. He left out the group’s involvement; that was too hard to explain.
‘And we were nearly there. We felt we’d just about pieced it all together.’
The man stared at him. ‘I see. That’s what we normally do, Mr Beaumont, piece it all together. That’s what the Australian Government has charged us with doing. It’s not normally, or ever, the role of private citizens. Whoever they may be.’ He turned a page in the notebook. ‘Please give me the phone number and address of Mr Stimson.’
Jack hunched his shoulders up into the base of his neck and arched his head back. The tension in his skull was unbearable. He wanted to be out of this room, away from these people, running with his dog, riding bikes with his kids, away.
‘He’s dead.’
The pen remained poised over the note
book. ‘I’m sorry, your meaning is unclear. Who is dead?’
‘Hedley Stimson. The lawyer. He died last night.’ Still the pen didn’t move. ‘But you’ve told us you were going to speak to him yesterday. That you were taking this document to him.’
‘That’s right. But when I got there he was dead.’ He was starting to shake now. He could feel the tremors coursing through him. The body was falling again, slowly, so slowly. Why hadn’t he stopped it, caught it before it hit the floor? He should’ve moved, should’ve held it to him, taken the weight and lowered it gently, with love. It was a shameful thing, the worst failure, to allow that fall, to hear that thud.
‘So you replaced the document in the safe?’ He was shivering uncontrollably. The sun was on him and he was as cold as he’d ever been. ‘I killed him. I killed him with all this.’
‘That’s enough.’ It was Louise’s voice, calm, in control. ‘He’s not answering any more questions without a lawyer. We’re prepared to cooperate with you, but in a proper environment with lawyers present.’ She came down the stairs and stood behind Jack with both hands on his neck. ‘I can confirm everything he says and am happy to give evidence, but in due course. Not in an atmosphere of tension and intimidation, and I repeat, not without our lawyer.’
The ASIC man switched off the tape. ‘We have the right to ask questions wherever we wish, and in any manner we wish, Mrs Beaumont. It is Mrs Beaumont, I take it?’
She didn’t flinch. ‘It is. And we have the right to refuse. And we do so.’
‘You have no such rights, Mrs Beaumont. But your refusal is noted.’
The floor was terrazzo, the walls panelled in dark wood, the tables clothed in white linen covered by paper, the waiters in long aprons. She might have been back in Rome, where she’d lived for a year after university, scratching a living as a part-time research assistant for an American professor, except the atmosphere was Sydney cool, not Italian buzz. She’d arrived early, nervous, still shattered by the events of the previous days and the effort of holding Jack, and the children, together. The day her father had left the house forever kept flashing into her mind. Her mother had run after him into the garden, into the street, clutching at him, trying to draw him back, when only minutes before she’d seemed set on driving him away. She’d always felt her mother was wrong. She should’ve forgiven him whatever the fault. What did it matter? They could have been together with forgiveness, they could have been a family. Instead there were all those years of a mother and a daughter pretending they preferred life alone.
‘I’m sorry I’m late, Louise. I hope you haven’t been waiting long.’
He slid into the chair opposite her and she found she was unreasonably glad to see him. ‘You’re not late. I was early. Remind me, it is John I use on Thursdays, isn’t it?’
The Pope smiled. ‘Yes, it is.’ He waved a waiter to the table. ‘Will you eat, or just coffee? A glass of wine?’
‘I’d love something. I haven’t eaten today. The pattern of life is a little confused at the moment.’
She watched him order, take charge, and relaxed back into the chair. That was what she wanted-for someone to take charge. Everyone assumed that inside she was as strong as the shield she wore externally. But to have someone else command, take over, what a relief to be able to cast off the burden of care.
‘How is Jack?’ He saw the disappointment on her face. ‘More to the point, how are you? It must be very hard.’
She began to speak, but the tears came before the words. It was impossible, to be crying in a public place, with a man she barely knew, but it was impossible to stop. He slipped around into the chair alongside and took her hand, not speaking, just a strong hand holding hers. The waiter placed the food and water on the table and glanced at her as he did so, but still she cried. Finally the hand was withdrawn.
‘The pasta will be cold and the wine will be warm.’ He passed her a white handkerchief from his pocket and she took it gratefully. It smelled of sun and she could see his initials in blue in one corner.
‘It’s a beautiful handkerchief. Thank you.’ He laughed. ‘Please keep it, although you’d better unpick the initials or your husband might get jealous.’
‘I don’t think he’d have any case on that score, do you?’ He glanced at her quizzically. They ate in silence for a while. ‘We need help. It’s too much. Hedley Stimson’s death, ASIC, Jack’s suspension. You heard about that?’
‘Yes, it was on the screens this morning. Along with a beautifully crafted press release from Sir Laurence. The company makes no presumption of guilt regarding the investigation of the actions of its CEO, but believes the suspension of his duties pending the outcome of such investigation is in the interest of shareholders.’
She let her fork fall into the remains of the pasta. ‘I notice they didn’t suspend Mac Biddulph.’
‘You can’t suspend a director of a public company. The shareholders can vote him out in a general meeting, but the board has no power to oust a director.’
She folded her napkin and placed it beside the bowl. ‘Can you help us? I mean, can you help us more? I know you’ve already contributed a great deal, but now we need a new direction, a new lawyer-I don’t know. This is all beyond my experience.’ She leaned forward, trying to hold him with her eyes. ‘I feel we’ll never recover from this if we don’t fight. Jack’s reputation may never recover anyway. Mud sticks, doesn’t it, even though you wash it clean. It sticks in people’s dirty minds.’
He watched her carefully as she spoke and saw the turmoil beneath her struggle for composure. ‘There are enough people who know Jack’s real character to outweigh the others, if he holds on.’
‘You really believe that?’
‘Yes.’
‘So will you help us?’ He took the bowls and stacked them with the side plates and gestured for the waiter to clear the table. Her heart sank as she watched him. ‘I can’t help you any longer. I’m deeply sorry.’
Somehow this seemed the worst blow of all. He’d been her secret hope, the mysterious, powerful boundary rider who would make it all come right.
‘I’m ashamed to say this to you, but I must say it.’ He reached for her hand again, but she drew it away. He nodded resignedly. ‘It’s difficult to explain, I-’
She cut in. ‘Don’t bother. You can’t help. Let’s not confuse matters with unnecessary explanation.’ She took up her handbag from the spare chair, but this time he grasped her arm before she could withdraw.
‘Please. Don’t go. It’s not like that. I’m not a fair-weather friend.’ He held her to the chair. ‘Will you answer one question for me? If you could save a child of yours or a friend of yours, but not both, which would you choose?’
She looked into his eyes and saw the pain and knew it was real. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘And I can’t explain.’ He stood and placed money on the saucer with the bill. ‘Go to the group. Go to Jack’s friends. I’m not a member anymore, but they’ll help you.’ He held out his hand. ‘One day, I hope you’ll forgive me and want to see me again. I’ll always want to see you.’
When she stumbled out into the glaring sun, she was blinded and confused. She crossed the busy road with cars hooting at her. She wandered into Hyde Park without reason or purpose. She felt old and unattractive and lost. She was a woman in an expensive suit with eyes red from crying, stripped bare of artifice or mask. She came upon a giant chess board cut into a corner of the park, with a group of men moving the pieces about the squares. She sat on a stone parapet nearby, to watch, without seeing. An old man smiled at her, but it was a smile of pity.
She walked back to the street and past a newsstand. The poster had the letters HOA and a picture of Jack with some other word, and she hurried away from it. She tried to hail a taxi but none stopped, so she just stood there, for how long she wasn’t sure, watching the traffic roar by. And then she heard the voice and focused on the taxi with the driver calling to her through the open window.
She was going home. chapter sixteen
Mac was already seated in the wicker armchair on the verandah when the dawn chorus greeted the promise of first light. First came the raucous laughter of the blue-winged kookaburras-a satirical parody of the bigger laughing kookaburra he was used to hearing in Sydney. Then the single-note contact calls and territorial screeches of the galahs, followed by the loud yodelling of the secretive black butcherbirds. He’d never seen one of these birds despite years of trudging through creek beds with binoculars at the ready. He wondered if they sometimes impaled their prey on a thorn before devouring it, like their cousins, the grey butcherbirds. But then there were so many conflicting calls ringing out through the eucalypts and bouncing off the rocky outcrops that he couldn’t distinguish one from another.
He sat very still in the chair. He loved this time of day in this place. He loved being alone here. He smiled inwardly at the thought. Most people wouldn’t believe Mac Biddulph was a nature lover, but of all the things he stood to lose, the loss of Bellaranga would hurt the most. Fishing in the rivers for barramundi, hunting for rock art in the helicopter, riding into palm-filled valleys surrounded by red rock cliffs, the dawn chorus. And the people. There was no pretence in these people; they were straightforward, blunt, as tough as the landscape. They were his sort of people-honest and hardworking.
Well, who would ever see him as honest again? All they had to do was charge you with something and your reputation was shredded forever. Not that they’d charged him with anything yet. But they would.
What would happen to his people here? Who would look after them if he lost this place? When he lost it. It was when, not if. He had to be realistic. Even if the banks didn’t take it, even if they couldn’t navigate their way through the reefs of dummy companies and legal atolls littered in their course, he couldn’t pay the bills anymore. Simple as that. Now the cash tap was turned off it was frightening how quickly the pipes blocked up. So who would look after his people?
The Butcherbird Page 20