Mark met her gaze but remained silent.
Fraser stood and broke the moment. ‘I’ll keep you informed of the investigation’s progress, Ms Barrett, when I have the facts. Will you stay in Birraga tonight? Or would you like me to arrange a lift for you to Dungirri?’
Interview over. Smoothly, politely done, but she wouldn’t get anything more from Steve Fraser tonight. If she’d been somebody other than Jennifer Barrett, journalist, maybe she would have. But in this circumstance her reputation worked against her, not for her. Fraser and Mark were toeing the professional, legal line, and neither of them would be easy to budge.
She would respect that if it didn’t frustrate her so much.
But if Jim’s death was connected even slightly to the long-ago accident she would keep pushing until she uncovered the full story. Just not right now. Not when she was so exhausted from the mix of jetlag, smoke inhalation, adrenaline letdown, shock and grief that she could scarcely think straight She dragged a strand of hair away from her eyes, the movement giving a sharp, painful reminder of the damaged skin on her hand. Tomorrow. Tomorrow she would ask questions. In the meantime, she needed to arrange somewhere to stay for the night.
‘I can drive you to Dungirri, if that’s where you want to go,’ Mark offered quietly. ‘I brought your things from your car.’
Forty minutes in a car with Mark? Nothing about today had been easy, but she would rather drive with him than the detective or some night-duty constable allocated the task – and maybe she would be able to get a better sense of the man he’d become.
He watched her, waiting for her response, and she wondered if he thought she would reject his offer out of hand.
She nodded. ‘Thank you. I planned on staying at the pub, assuming it’s bearable. But I haven’t booked.’ She couldn’t stay with Paul and Chloe, not unannounced, not tonight when Paul needed his wife and family and privacy to grieve.
‘They’ll have a room for you,’ Mark said. ‘It’s nothing flash, but it’s clean and well kept.’ He made an attempt to smile, a ghostly shadow of his old grin that twisted in her heart. ‘In other circumstances, I’d offer you a guest room at Marrayin, but I’m sure you’ve breathed enough smoke for tonight.’
‘Yes. Thank you.’ They were dancing around each other, being polite, and as he escorted her to his LandCruiser, controlled and distant and so unlike the easygoing friend of her youth, the unexpected sorrow of that loss hit her almost as hard as her uncle’s death.
The headlights illuminated the black ribbon of road ahead, a tunnel in the dark night. Beside him Jenn sat silently in the passenger seat, staring out the window away from him.
He didn’t intrude on her grief with any attempt at small talk. Nothing he could say could ease such sorrow – hers or his. He steered his own thoughts away from the quagmire of feeling on to the solid ground of planning and practical needs. There would be plenty to deal with: the workers’ compensation inspector, house-insurance assessor, arson investigators and safety inspectors as well as the police questions about both the fire and his confession. The days ahead would not be easy. And the media would have hold of the story by morning, relishing another dramatic turn to the news of his resignation.
The road began a zigzag around some old property boundaries and the headlights shone on a large old gum tree, dead branches stark against the black sky.
‘It was there, wasn’t it?’ Jenn broke the silence as he shifted down a gear to negotiate the next curve.
‘So I was told.’ On his release from hospital he’d stopped there, seen the rut dug into the dirt by the wheels, the scar on the tree, the broken stump of the low branch that had speared through the windscreen.
‘What I don’t understand,’ she said, turning to face him, ‘is why Gillespie is making these accusations now about you being the driver, after eighteen years? And why you believe him?’
Mark kept his eyes on the road. ‘He didn’t make any accusations. I had to drag it from him. When he came back to town a few months ago it was the first time I’d seen him since the accident. He never said a word about it. But the information that came out then about the Flanagans and their mafia connections, about the corruption and coercion that’s infested this district for years, got me thinking about the inconsistencies. It haunted me, Jenn, and I don’t know if it’s the shadow of a memory or just my subconscious at work, but I kept dreaming about swerving to avoid a kangaroo. When Gillespie walked out of witness protection a week ago and came back here, I confronted him about it.’
‘What makes you think he’s not lying? He gains from this, and you lose.’
‘I believe him because it makes more sense than the official story.’ He shifted back up a gear as the road straightened again, and the words to answer her question formed into logical sense. ‘Jenn, I was barely eighteen years old and I’d had that car for less than a week. Paula was with me. What eighteen-year-old guy with a girl to impress lets someone else drive his new car? I know I tried to be a decent person, but I wasn’t a bloody saint.’
‘Do you really have no memory of it?’
Ghost Hill rose on their left and it might as well have been between them. Do you really have no memory of it? They’d asked him that repeatedly at the media conference this morning, suspicious, eager to find any hint of a lie.
He couldn’t read her expression in the darkness. ‘Are you asking as a journalist, or as an old friend?’
‘Does it matter?’ she countered. ‘Are the answers different?’
‘No, they’re not different.’ Her scepticism didn’t surprise him. They hadn’t spoken in eighteen years; he’d never had a chance to explain. She’d gone by the time he returned home from hospital, her only farewell a note in a ‘Get Well’ card. ‘I don’t remember any of it,’ he said. ‘The accident and the few days before it are gone. The doctors said that they weren’t laid down in my long-term memory, so I’ll never get them back. I don’t remember my eighteenth birthday. I don’t remember—’ He risked a quick glance away from the road to make eye contact with her and made his second confession for the day. ‘Jenn, I don’t remember getting together with Paula, although everyone tells me we did. I don’t understand how or why, because although I was always fond of Paula, what I do remember is you and me. I know we were young, but our friendship was important to me then and if I hurt you, I’m truly sorry.’
She didn’t respond. The road stretched ahead into the night, the rear-vision mirror black. No, not much point in looking back, it was past and done with and there was only the narrow path to move forward on now, wherever it took him.
But he remembered the horror of that first day when he’d woken up in the hospital and overheard someone refer to the Barrett girl who’d died … and his guilt-ridden relief when he’d discovered that it had been Paula, not Jenn, in the car with him.
He genuinely didn’t remember. Either that, or he was an excellent actor and a bastard determined to manipulate her emotions. Maybe it would be easier to believe that, to be angry, than to face the truth that she had been the one who had hurt him. The emotional tumult of that last day with him hung in her memory, even if it was wiped from his. But few people made it through teenage years without at least one episode of romantic drama and heartbreak, so what did it really matter, now?
The scattered lights of Dungirri came into view as they topped a slight rise. A sight she’d come to loathe, that last year after her Uncle Mick had slacked off at Marrayin one too many times and they’d had to move into town. At Marrayin there’d been plenty of places to escape the manager’s cottage, and Mark’s parents hadn’t minded her and Paula making use of the homestead family room and library to study. But in Dungirri there had been only the small weatherboard house in its untidy, overgrown yard and the constant sullen presence of her uncle and aunt.
If it hadn’t meant leaving Paula alone to deal with Mick and Freda, Jenn would have left Dungirri long before she did. She’d stayed only because of her cousin, their plans to lea
ve together as soon as Paula finished high school the goal that kept her going. That, and Mark’s friendship and support. They’d been close … no wonder the story about him and Paula puzzled him. At least she could set him at ease about that.
‘The thing with you and Paula … she wasn’t your girlfriend. She was keen on a guy from another town, but one of the Dungirri boys was pestering her, almost stalking her. So, the two of you decided to pretend to be together to discourage him. That’s all it was.’
He slowed as they reached the first scattered houses of the town. ‘I’m glad I didn’t hurt you. I sometimes wondered if that was why you never wrote, never phoned.’
She hesitated, seeking words to explain. ‘Your future was based here, and that was everything you wanted. My future was elsewhere, and I was passionate about what I wanted to do, what I wanted to be. I still am. We were just kids, Mark, but we both understood that.’ She forced lightness into her voice. ‘So, no hearts broken. Not even fragile teenage ones.’
Lights blazed from the pub, and a dozen or more four-wheel drives and utes were parked in front of it and in the side street. Through the open doors of the front bar she could see that most of the tables and the bar area were full.
‘Busy night,’ she commented.
‘Yes.’ Mark swung the vehicle in to reverse park on the opposite side of the road. ‘Plenty to talk about.’
His revelations this morning, and his resignation. The fire. Jim. Plenty of reasons for a small community to gather.
‘I’ll just grab my bags and go in the side door,’ she said. ‘There’s no need for you to come in.’
‘Yes, there is.’
Mark’s response didn’t surprise her. His political reputation for staying the course and mediating and negotiating through conflict took a kind of courage that he’d always had. Always accepting responsibility and never walking away from difficult situations.
He offered to carry her duffle bag but she slung it over her shoulder, her laptop bag in her other hand. ‘Habit,’ she said so that she didn’t seem rude. ‘Some of the places I travel, I like to keep my things close.’
Entering through the side door, she caught sight of a young woman cleaning up in the back bar, the chairs already on the tables. Mark went straight to the servery window off the front bar and caught the attention of the young Asian barman. Definitely someone new to town – other than Johnno Dawson’s Filipina bride, there’d been no Asian people in Dungirri in her time.
Seeing Jenn and Mark in their grimy, ash-covered clothes, the barman raised a concerned eyebrow. ‘Mark! We heard about the fire – are you okay?’
‘I’m fine, thanks, Liam. Jenn needs a room, at least for tonight. Have you got one for her?’
‘Sure.’ Liam took a key from the drawer. ‘Room two’s upstairs on the left. It’s the nicest one. You can fix up the bill in the morning, Ms …’ He gave her the I’m-sure-I-recognise-you look she was gradually becoming more accustomed to. ‘Ms Barrett, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. Thank you.’ A shower, a bed, peace and quiet – she craved all of it.
‘I’d better go in,’ Mark said, his voice low, indicating the front bar, where the rumble of conversation was gradually slowing. ‘They’ll want to know about Jim. Do you want it known, yet?’
He was asking her permission – family permission – to tell them. Not that she had any right; that was Paul’s role, not hers. But Paul wasn’t here, and a bar full of locals who knew Jim far better than she did were waiting on news.
She nodded. ‘Let’s go tell them.’
She left her duffle bag in the hallway and walked into the main bar beside Mark. The chatter fell silent, and all eyes turned to face them.
She scanned the small crowd: maybe thirty, forty people. There were guys in RFS T-shirts – the crew who’d been first on the scene – and a couple of people in SES overalls, including the young man who’d worked with Beth on Jim. She knew the face, although in a much younger form. One of the Sauer boys; Karl, Mark had called him earlier. She’d babysat the Sauer kids a couple of times.
Other faces held that similar disconcerting familiarity of kids she’d known, now adults. And the older ones – yes, they’d aged, some more than others. George Pappas and Frank Williams now with white hair and the faces of old men.
And every face watched Mark, wary, with a hundred questions waiting to be asked. A few people nodded at Jenn, one or two with subdued smiles. She checked the room again for her Uncle Mick – no sign of him. Good. Maybe it was cowardly of her, but she was relieved Paul would be the one to tell him of his brother’s death.
Frank Williams cleared his throat. ‘Mark. I’m sorry about your place. Is there any news on Jim?’
She felt Mark’s eyes on her, his hand light against her elbow. He’d do it for her if she couldn’t. But some part of her wanted to take the responsibility, do Jim this small service and tell his friends.
Words. Just words, and there were a thousand phrases she could use.
‘We’ve just come from the hospital,’ she said, more steadily than she’d expected. ‘It won’t be announced officially until Sean and Mick are informed, but I’m sorry to tell you that Jim’s injuries were too severe. He … passed away a little while ago.’
Passed away. Stopped breathing. Died. Expired. Departed. She could think of a hundred synonyms and none of them came close to expressing the sense of desolation gradually engulfing her numbness. How could a man she hadn’t seen in so long leave such an emptiness?
Murmurs of shock, denial and dismay rippled around the room. Frank squeezed his eyes shut, a brief battle for control evident in his features, but he succeeded, stepping forward and taking her hand between his.
‘Jenny, I’m sorry for your loss. Jim was a good man, a good friend.’
The Jenny threatened her composure. She could almost hear Jim saying it, in his voice so like her memory of her father’s. She hadn’t been Jenny since she left Dungirri. But that was half a lifetime ago, and she wasn’t going to fall to pieces in the front bar of the Dungirri pub.
Do the right things, say the right things. ‘Thank you, Frank. He valued his mates. I know you will all miss him.’
‘Has anyone told Mick yet?’ ‘Paul’s telling him now,’ she said.
‘Tough on the lad. I’ll head over there and see if he needs some support. Your Uncle Mick can be … unpredictable.’
A tactful way of saying ‘prone to drunken rages’. Yes, she knew that.
Frank clasped her hand again, eyes brimming with earnest sympathy. ‘If there’s anything we can do, Jenny, anything at all for you or Jim’s lads, you just ask.’ He turned to Mark. ‘And you too, Mark. When the police are done and you start to clean up out there, you give us a hoy. I’m sure there’ll be plenty of people who’ll be happy to come out and help.’
A significant public statement of faith and friendship, and Jenn watched the response of those gathered. Some nodded, others were less approving. It seemed to touch Mark, his voice catching as he shook the man’s hand with quiet dignity.
‘Thank you, Frank. I appreciate the offer.’
Johnno Dawson shoved away from the bar, beer schooner waving unsteadily in his hand as he lurched across the room. ‘Yeah well, that depends. What the fuck’s the story, Strelitz? Have you always been a lying prick, or is that bastard Gillespie blackmailing you?’
The tension thickened the air, and no-one moved, no-one spoke. Except Mark. He took a single step forward, his unwavering gaze on Johnno. Firm, not aggressive, his words clear and deliberate.
‘No, Johnno. Gil’s not blackmailing me.’
The screen door thwacked behind her, and a man in black leathers stepped inside, lifting a motorbike helmet off his head. Gil Gillespie. Except for the absence of insignia or tattoos, he carried the hard air of the roughest biker. Most of her contemporaries had steered clear of him as teenagers, although she’d always suspected that his bad reputation exceeded reality. But still not a man she’d ever want to h
ave as an enemy.
He threw Johnno a brief, withering look. ‘Oh, shut it, Dawson. I’m not frigging blackmailing Mark.’ He tossed a nod to the watching crowd. ‘Mark’s telling the truth. Although he’s a bloody idiot for saying anything at all. It’s in the past. I told him there’s no point bringing it all up again.’
The two men faced each other, equal in height, Gillespie slightly broader in build than Mark’s lean, muscular frame. Their similarities and contrasts struck her: same age, different backgrounds, different personalities, yet both with an unshakeable strength – acquired by one through years of adversity, the other from an inner core of integrity and emotional intelligence.
‘The point,’ Mark said, with the formidable calmness of certainty, ‘is that you went to prison for a crime you didn’t commit. That needs to be set right.’
Gillespie gave a shrug. ‘The way I see it, there was no crime, and that’s what I told Fraser today.’ No crime?
Jenn stepped in front of him as he started towards the bar. ‘My cousin died that night, Gillespie.’
Too late to rephrase her words, she remembered that this was the man Sean had almost killed. She saw recognition in his face and his dark eyes considered her coolly. Yet he spoke politely enough. ‘Sometimes accidents happen. A swerve to avoid a ’roo, a blown-out tyre – it’s happened to all of us. Believe me, Jenn Barrett, I’m more than sorry about Paula. But her death – I doubt that was a crime. It was what happened afterwards that was the crime.’
He walked around her, conversation finished, and all those who’d been watching fell back a step, clearing his path to the bar. He went behind it without hesitation, saying to the barman as he passed through to the kitchen, ‘You got those figures for me, Liam?’
She had no clue why that prompted a whole new round of whispers and hushed discussion, and she didn’t bother trying to figure it out, but at least attention drifted away from her and Mark. A headache pounded alongside a million conflicting thoughts, the room suddenly hot and stuffy, and a whiff of smoke from her own clothes made nausea rise.
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