Dark Country (Dungirri)

by Parry, Bronwyn

  Gil’s eyes had drifted closed again. She touched the only part of him she dared to, brushing a finger against his lips. ‘Hang in there, Gil. Paramedics will be here any minute. We had them waiting not far away.’

  ‘Good,’ he murmured. He didn’t open his eyes, but his mouth made that small curve again. ‘Metal pipe. Ribs are broken, this time.’

  The dry reference to their conversation after the pub fight, an age ago now, almost made her howl.

  His forehead creased, as he suddenly remembered something, and he forced open his eyes, searched her face. ‘Megan? Is she …?’

  ‘She’s doing okay, Gil. Deb and Liam will be fine, too.’

  He moved his head in a nod, closed his eyes again.

  A hand dropped onto her shoulder, and Gary the senior paramedic crouched beside her.

  ‘What have we got here, Kris?’

  She had to blink tears from her eyes again, made herself concentrate on a sitrep. ‘Repeatedly bashed with a metal pipe. Multiple fractures – left arm, ribs, I don’t know what else. Pulse is weak, skin cold. Probably internal bleeding. He’s been conscious, and coherent, until just now. The guy beneath him is a gun shot wound, deceased.’

  ‘Thanks, Kris. We’ll take it from here.’ Gary already had his box open, was pulling out equipment, and another paramedic joined him.

  Kris struggled to her feet, moved out of their way. The room seemed full of people, with the second police team and paramedics adding to the number. Sergio Russo and Sean Barrett were cuffed, under Craig’s and Adam’s guard. Another man lay on the floor, dead. And Joe Petric half-sat, leaning against the wall, breathing heavily, but swearing very capably at a paramedic. A bullet-proof vest might stop the bullets penetrating, but it didn’t stop the impact hurting.

  With all the urgent tasks being dealt with, she couldn’t, for a long moment, think what to do.

  Caitlin and Steve saw her standing there, but it was Steve who reached her first.

  ‘How’s Gillespie?’

  ‘Alive,’ she said. ‘But critical.’

  She bit her lip, hard. She was a police sergeant. She wasn’t supposed to cry on duty, in a room full of people.

  Caitlin stopped in front of her, hands on hips. ‘Are you injured?’ she asked briskly.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Good. Then perhaps you can tell us why you shot Detective Petric?’

  Kris straightened her shoulders and met the agent’s hard stare evenly. ‘Because he was about to shoot me.’

  The rescue helicopter made the flight out from Tamworth again, and carried Gil away.

  The remainder of the evening blurred into a series of interviews, statements and reports at the Birraga station. The search of the property revealed drugs and weapons – cocaine in boxes stacked in the container, semi-automatic rifles in the house. On top of that, two deaths in a police operation, injuries, an officer shooting another – it all had to be investigated, documented and analysed.

  Kris expected to be suspended. However, as the hours passed and the interviews and investigation progressed, the evidence against Petric began to mount. The Feds already had information pointing to a leak. Craig expressed concerns about some of Joe’s behaviour, inconsistencies and procedural violations that had raised questions in his mind.

  Kris had just emerged from an interview with Internal Affairs officers around ten that evening, when Steve met her in the corridor and took her into his office. ‘Joe’s just confessed,’ he said. ‘They found a text message on Sergio Russo’s phone, warning of the raid – from Joe’s phone. We’re lucky that there’s not much phone signal in a metal box underground.’

  She didn’t feel any pleasure at the revelation, only relief, and nausea that a once-respected officer could have betrayed them all.

  She’d been in meetings and interviews almost constantly for hours, with no news of Gil.

  ‘Has there been any word from the hospital? Is Gil in Tamworth or Sydney?’

  ‘They took him to Sydney. I know he survived the flight. But Kris, you need to know – the Feds, they’re putting him into witness protection. As of tonight. They’ve got Sergio and Petric, but they’ve still got one hell of a mop-up operation to run. Gil’s a valuable witness, they can’t risk Russo’s associates getting to him.’

  Witness protection. She sat down heavily on the edge of the desk, gripped its edges. It would be a private hospital somewhere, a false name, and 24-hour security. As soon as he was well enough to be moved, they’d probably take him interstate to an anonymous house or apartment.

  But she wouldn’t know where. For his safety, she wouldn’t be able to see him, talk to him, have any contact whatsoever. It might be for months. It might be for years. And if the investigation against the Russos left loose ends, it might be forever.

  She knew the process, knew it was the logical, most responsible course of action to keep Gil safe.

  She just never knew how much it would hurt.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Two months later.

  Gil flexed his hand, the warmth of the sunshine on it easing the stiffness and aches.

  ‘Are you sure about this, Gil?’ Caitlin Jamieson demanded. His minders had called her in for a last-ditch effort to dissuade him.

  ‘You’ve said yourself that you’ve got plenty of hard evidence against Sergio. I’m a minor witness, with only old, insubstantial evidence against Tony, and therefore of no real use to your case. You know that as well as I do.’

  She gave a soft groan, but didn’t argue the point.

  He closed his fingers around the coffee mug, lifted it without needing his other hand. Progress. Definitely progress.

  ‘You do understand that once you leave here, your protection arrangements cease?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What will you do?’

  He kept forgetting that his left shoulder no longer shrugged. ‘You know how it is. Places to go, people to see.’

  People to see.

  Two months almost starved of news, and he’d learned something about himself: some people mattered to him. In those first few weeks, once he was conscious, he’d harangued the Feds enough that they’d passed on a few snippets. Jeanie’s valve replacement surgery had gone smoothly. Liam would make a full recovery. Megan, too. Internal Affairs had declared Kris’s shooting of Petric to be self-defence, clearing her of any wrongdoing. But simple facts weren’t sufficient.

  He put the mug down, and rose to his feet. His bag was already by the door. With his good hand he lifted it, his weaker one strong enough now to grasp the door handle.

  ‘Good luck, Gillespie,’ Caitlin called, as he walked out of the apartment, into freedom.

  He took the bus to Birraga, paying for two seats to give sufficient room for his healing body. Nevertheless, the long journey tired him; by the time the bus stopped in the centre of town, late in the afternoon, stiffness had set in, and his whole arm ached, each part with its own particular set of pains and discomfort.

  The walk the few blocks from the bus stop to the police station helped ease some of the stiffness, but the aches remained. Healing, as far as he was concerned, took far too damn long.

  He stopped on the corner near the police station, dropped his bag to the ground, and let his old-man body rest a moment or two. He’d had the whole long bus ride to think about this meeting, but now the moment had come, uncertainty made him pause.

  Much could change in two months. He hadn’t contacted her since he got out, hadn’t told her he was coming back. Hadn’t told anyone, yet. Just a phone call to the Birraga station this morning to find out her roster, and whether she’d be here or in Dungirri.

  He’d see her, and that was the extent of his plans. His future was wide open for him to choose – he had the resources for any business, any city or country he wanted, and no financial need to hurry to decide. His own money was enough. Sometime soon, he’d have to deal with Vince’s legacy, come to grips with it, make arrangements; but that could wait a little longer.
>
  ‘She’s out at the moment, mate,’ the constable at the front desk said. ‘Should be back in half an hour or so. About six. Can I give her a message?’

  He scrawled a note for her and left it with the constable.

  At a café in the main street, he ordered coffee, and sat at the table outside, under the shade of the awning, idly watching the activity around.

  Most of Birraga’s shops and businesses closed at five or five-thirty, and the winding down of the day was evident in the cheerful conversations and exchanges along the street as shopkeepers started closing up, people passed on their way home, or popped into a shop to buy some last-minute things before closing time. People knew each other here. They called each other by name, stopped for short chats, or simply waved at each other in passing.

  Mark Strelitz made slow progress down the other side of the road. In neat moleskins and shirt, he fitted in, part of the country community, respect evident in the way people greeted him, stopped for brief conversations, some casual, some clearly more related to business, community or political issues. His easy warmth and courtesy showed, even when an old man stopped him, directly across the road from where Gil sat, and engaged him in some topic about which the old man obviously held passionate views.

  But when Mark glanced across and noticed Gil, his face changed, his initial shock shifting to a worried distraction as he hastily finished his conversation, shook hands, and hurried across the street. Gil rose as he approached.

  ‘Gil! I didn’t know you were back.’

  Mark’s handshake was firm, polite as ever, but his eyes seemed … older, Gil thought. Troubled, under the social polish.

  ‘I just arrived.’

  ‘It’s good to see you. Everyone was worried, for a while there. You’re well?’

  Small talk had never been Gil’s strong point. ‘Much better.’

  ‘Great to hear.’ Mark stopped, shifted uneasily, and the easy confidence evaporated. ‘Gil, would you have a few minutes? There’s a matter I’ve been wanting to discuss with you.’

  Alarm bells rang in his head. He felt tempted to make some excuse, but if the ‘matter’ concerned Mark and Kris, he didn’t want to hear about it. Yet the man did seem worried. Perhaps there’d been ongoing issues from all the arrests and charges.

  ‘Yeah, I guess so. I’ve got nowhere to be until six.’

  ‘Thanks. My office is just round the corner – shall we go there?’

  Mark’s staff had gone home, the electorate office deserted but for the two of them. Gil accepted a cool drink, and followed Mark into his private office, taking a seat at a low table opposite him.

  Mark looked down at his hands, at the glass in them, and took a long breath before he began. ‘Gil, I need to ask you about the accident, with Paula. I’ve never regained my memory of it, the medicos think I probably never will. It’s just a black hole in my head. But the thing is … ever since the other month, when you were here and I had that concussion, I’ve had dreams, quite often. Always the same – a bloody kangaroo glaring at me in the headlights, a horrendous crunch as we hit the tree.’ He paused, his shoulders hunched, and took a swig of his juice, as though it were a strong spirit and he needed to fortify himself.

  Then he looked Gil straight in the eye. ‘The scene I see – it’s always from the driver’s seat. I was driving that night, wasn’t I?’

  Gil stood abruptly, walked to the window and gazed out at the sky, no clue how to handle this. He’d buried it, long ago. Accepted the way the cards had fallen, and moved on.

  ‘It’s just a dream,’ he insisted.

  ‘I have to know for sure, Gil. I don’t know if what I’m dreaming is a fragment of memory or just my imagination. I don’t remember anything between my birthday the week before, and waking up in the hospital. But seeing you again, the concussion – one of them’s triggered something in my head. The dream keeps coming again and again and again, and I need to know whether it’s real or not.’

  ‘Leave it, Mark,’ Gil growled.

  He heard Mark rise from his seat, come a few steps closer. ‘Can you swear to me that you were driving, Gil? Can you do that?’

  Gil turned to face him, searching for words to dissuade him from this path. ‘It’s ancient history, now. Just let it be.’ He knew as soon as he’d said the words that they weren’t the right ones.

  Mark closed his eyes and leaned his head against the window frame, a single quietly spoken curse escaping his lips. When he finally opened his eyes again, Gil expected to see anger or fear but there was only calmness, acceptance, and Mark simply said, ‘Why?’

  Gil recognised the question but didn’t answer, the silence stretching between them. Confirming Mark’s suspicions wouldn’t help anyone, and after all this time the truth might be more damaging than the fiction.

  ‘Damn it, Gil, why?’ Mark demanded. ‘Why did you tell them it was you?’

  He let out the breath he was holding, slowly, carefully. ‘I didn’t. The old sarge – Bill Franklin – was the first one there, and by then I’d got you out of the car and was doing what I could for Paula. I couldn’t get to her through her door so I was kneeling in the driver’s seat, and Franklin just assumed at first I’d been driving. Then Paula died at the scene, and they didn’t know if you’d make it, and everyone was angry, and although Franklin knew by then it was you, not me – well, I guess he figured it was better to blame the feral kid than the town favourite.’

  ‘But why didn’t you say something?’

  As if it would have been that easy. The differences between his own experiences of the world and Mark’s made a chasm.

  ‘I was just a kid, outcast, and way out of my depth.’ With Franklin’s hand on the back of his head, slamming his face into the table. ‘It was … made clear to me that I was to carry the blame. And then the first night in the remand centre, the threat was delivered – comply, or Jeanie would suffer. I thought I had no choice. The days went by, and you never said anything to contradict the story. No-one would have believed me, without your backup, and I couldn’t risk anything happening to Jeanie.’

  And Gil had not known then, still didn’t know, whether the deception was all Franklin’s and Doc Russell’s doing, with a favour or two from Flanagan, or whether others had knowingly participated.

  Mark dropped his head in his hands, shaking it, grappling to comprehend. ‘Gil, I wish I knew what to say. “Sorry” is nowhere near enough.’

  ‘You don’t need to say sorry or any other shit. It’s done and gone years ago, and you weren’t involved. They stuffed up the rigging of evidence, and the conviction was quashed. I don’t have a record. There’s nothing to fix. There’s no bloody point in bringing it up after all this time.’

  ‘There is if it was my fault,’ Mark insisted quietly. ‘Had I been drinking, Gil? Was I drunk?’

  Gil ran a hand through his hair, searched for an answer. He still had no clue, to this day, whose blood they’d tested – except that it hadn’t been his own. Trust bloody Mark to ask the awkward questions.

  ‘You weren’t drunk,’ he said and that was honest, because he could still remember Mark’s cheerful, unslurred voice. ‘I was hitching, and you offered me a ride. I was only in the car ten minutes or so before the smash. Paula had a bottle of something, offered it around, but you didn’t have any.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean I wasn’t already over the limit.’

  ‘I saw no sign of it.’ That, too, was honest – although maybe not enough to deter Mark from pursuing it. ‘Look, Mark, the accident was just that, an accident, no-one’s fault. Not yours or mine or Paula’s or even the bloody kangaroo’s fault. So don’t go being all high-minded and doing anything stupid.’

  Mark’s half-smile didn’t wipe the grim look from his eyes, the one that had aged him ten years in the past half-hour. ‘Don’t worry, Gil – I didn’t get to where I am by doing stupid things.’

  Kris parked behind the station, went in through the back door, and headed down the corridor to her o
ffice, glad her shift was almost done.

  Jake had left a message on her chair and she flicked open the folded sheet of paper as she sat.

  Arrived on the bus. Will come back around 6pm. G.

  She grinned and might have kept staring at the paper and grinning stupidly, except she glanced at her watch. Six-ten. She refrained from dancing down the corridor to the reception area – just. But her boots were definitely lighter than they’d been for a while.

  He was there, waiting, standing reading one of the posters on the wall, his back to her. Jeans, dark blue shirt, kit bag on the floor. His left arm hung a little stiffly at his side, but even as she watched, he flexed his hand a couple of times, with what seemed like a good range of movement.

  Weeks of worrying and wondering, and frustration at simply not knowing faded into a wild jumble of relief and pleasure.

  She leaned her elbows on the counter. ‘Good to see you upright, Gillespie.’

  He turned, stayed where he was, his careful, expressionless mask only holding for a couple of seconds before the corner of his mouth quirked.

  ‘After ten hours on the bus, it feels good to be standing up, Blue.’

  God, she’d missed the dry humour, missed hearing that nickname in that laconic voice. Missed the sight of him – and more.

  ‘You planning on visiting Dungirri? There’s been a few people worrying about you. No news has been hard to deal with.’

  ‘Cuts both ways, Blue. Been wondering about a few people, myself.’

  Not much clue there on which specific people, but she could guess. That careful lack of expression had to cover emotion he wasn’t sure how to reveal.

  ‘Come on through to my office, then, and we can catch up on the news.’ She smiled on the last word, let it hang suggestively.

  With a brief flash of a grin, he nodded, reached down with his right hand to pick up the bag on his left side, and grimaced slightly with the twisting, lifting movement. The blunt reminder of the trauma he’d endured cast a shadow on her joy. He’d been through too much, might not be ready for, or even want to continue, what they’d shared months ago. Things had to be different, now.