by Nixon, Carl
January of '81 rolled over into February. By the time school went back, during the second week of the month, it had not rained beyond a light drizzle. The days were not as hot as in the two preceding months but, even so, the classrooms' top windows regularly had to be cranked open to let in a breeze. The smell of the rotting sea-lettuce was still strong although the bloom seemed to have passed its peak by then. Teachers took to bringing cans of air-freshener to class and spraying it in clouds over our heads. It worked for a while, but then the smell of the sea lettuce always crept back in.
We slumped at our desks in our grey shirts, unable to focus. The papers reported, in fewer and fewer column inches, that the police were following 'several lines of enquiry' into the identity of the Christmas Killer. We sensed the reporters' growing apathy. The number of detectives on the case had been scaled back. It was obvious they had made no real progress. Our own interviews and endless talk had circled around and around the same spots, leading us nowhere. The lack of forward movement made us torpid.
Looking out from our classrooms we could see a few scattered pine trees growing over in the dunes. The prevailing easterly gave the pines the low, sweptback look of the African trees we had seen on Our World. If we squinted, it was easy to imagine giraffes rocking slowly backwards and forwards against the blue horizon. Or the flick of a leopard's tail up in the lower branches.
For the first time we were beginning to think that Lucy's murder would never be solved, that our summer had been wasted. There was nothing new to be seen at the dairy and our supplies of money were exhausted. With our return to school Lucy's murder seemed to belong to a different era. Our teachers tried to instil in us a belief in the importance of the sixth form year but, as the tiny droplets of artificial lavender and rose rained down upon us, we were unable to muster any enthusiasm.
The only thing we were excited about in those days was the upcoming tour. It was almost certain now that the South Africans were coming. The Boks! For the first time in sixteen years the All Blacks' biggest rivals would play in New Zealand and we were over the moon.
For half the year, rugby was what our families talked about over dinner, what we watched together on the television, the spice in our lives. When the All Blacks toured we woke in the middle of the night to see the games. Still in our pyjamas, wrapped in blankets on the couch, with our fathers and brothers pushing in next to us, our voices lifting together, we urged Our Boys on from the dark side of the world.
Although the Boks weren't going to arrive in the country until July, the papers and the radio were full of talk about the tour. Most of it was political stuff and held no interest for us, although our fathers would watch the television coverage and mutter about 'stirrers' and 'commies'. All we knew was that the Springboks were the only team in the world that had beaten the All Blacks more than they had lost. There had been thirty-four test matches between the two countries and we had won only thirteen of them. The Boks had won the last two series — in 1970 and '76 — three games to one. And now they were coming back. Now was our chance to even things up.
Although the weather was still hot we sought comfort in discussions of our winter religion. We talked about the selections at length. Who was going to make the All Blacks this season? Who was going to be in the Boks' touring squad? We speculated about the test venues. There would definitely be a test match at Lancaster Park, and we were confident that most of us would get to go. Over dinner our fathers told us stories about the big New Zealand versus South Africa clashes of the past. We hung on every word as they discussed heroes of the 1956 tour. Not many of us were used to our fathers talking for so long or with such animation.
All of us played rugby, with varying degrees of skill and success. Jim Turner was the best, by virtue of his size more than anything. At sixteen he was already six foot one and weighed eighty-five kilos. Jim had been selected to play at lock for provincial rep teams every year without fail since the age of ten. He was the only person ever to play for the school first XV while still in the fourth form.
Matt Templeton's father was head of the history department at our school and he also coached the first XV. He had played rugby at provincial level, where he had earned a reputation as an enforcer. He was a big man made bigger by his ginger beard and a huntaway voice. During the winter months, on Tuesdays and Thursdays after school, Mr Templeton could often be heard at full volume, yelling at his players as they trained: shuttles and sit-ups, passing and kicking, the intricacies of the rolling maul and the dragged-down scrum. Jim Turner's name often featured in these motivational lectures. Mr Templeton had been overheard on the sideline telling Mr Turner that his son lacked 'the killer instinct' that would elevate him to the elite levels of the game. He said someone needed to light a fire under Jim's arse.
It was Alan Penny, though, who knew the most rugby lore. He fed us the statistics about the Springboks: he could recite the scores from test matches going back twenty years. The names of the great players rolled off his tongue and he could recall even the most obscure rules. This was ironic, because in the course of an actual game Al was next to useless. He played for the school's Under Sixteen B team, but even then was often relegated to reserve. When he did get on the field he ran along the left wing, at the peripheries of the game, without purpose or intent. He was often at odds with the angle of the ball, or sometimes even the entire direction of play. Al gave the impression that he was someone out for a jog who had unexpectedly found himself in the middle of a rugby match. When the ball was inadvertently passed to him, Al's fingers were made of butter. Nevertheless, as our clippings about Lucy began to yellow and curl, Al gathered together all the information he could about the impending Springbok tour.
The second attack happened in broad daylight and on a weekday — to be accurate, at three forty-five on Monday the twenty-seventh of February. Tracy Templeton, Matt's youngest sister and the last of our history teacher's seven children, was walking home from school with her best friend Jenny Jones. They were both eleven and had just moved up to form one at South Brighton Primary, which went up to form two. (Ninety percent of the kids went from there to New Brighton High in form three. Really it was only the Catholics who got shipped off to town for their high-school years.) In '81 during the first day of school Tracy and Jenny had found themselves sitting next to each other at the back of Mrs Shepherd's class. JJ and TT was what they started calling each other.
In those days there were no rows of chauffeuring mothers waiting outside the school gates come three o'clock; instead the streets around every school in the city were awash with kids heading home. They took up the whole footpath with their jostling, uniformed mêlée. Later, in the side streets, they broke off into trios or pairs. Sometimes the groups thinned out so much that they turned into a single kid walking home alone. Nobody thought anything of it.
The Bridge Street Reserve is an open area as big as a rugby field, with a kids' playground set back from the road: a slide and a seesaw and a five-seat metal horse that rocks backwards and forwards. There's also the community centre and the bowling club but they're on the far side. There are bushes and a stand of cabbage trees that drop long leaves the council workers have to pick up before they can mow. On the estuary side is a stand of pine trees that, if you walk through it, leads down to the water, or the mud if the tide is out.
Tracy Templeton told the police she and JJ weren't in the reserve, just walking along the road beside it, when she heard a noise and looked up to see a man with a dirty hat jump out at them. Before Tracy knew what was happening he had hold of her friend. Whether the guy was targeting Jenny Jones or he simply grabbed the nearer girl is impossible to say. Certainly Jenny was the smaller and by disposition shyer. To a predator lying in wait, Jenny Jones would have looked the easier of the two to bring down.
Tracy reported that the man at first grabbed Jenny by the arm but quickly changed his grip so that Jenny's back was against his chest and his left arm was across her throat. He wrapped his free arm around
Jenny's waist and started to drag her backwards through the gap in the bushes. He must have been strong because he managed to lift her right off the ground, although he was later described as 'skinny, like a big boy'. Tracy said her friend was kicking like a non-swimmer who had got out of her depth.
The guy could have been any age from sixteen to seventy, Tracy admitted. She told the police that his hat had a wide brim and was pulled down low over his face. She got the impression that his hands and wrists were tanned, 'like a surfer or a Maori or something like that', which really didn't tell the police (or us) anything useful. He seemed to be talking into Jenny's ear. Although she wasn't sure, Tracy thought he might have been wearing a raincoat.
But you have to hand it to her. Most girls (or even boys) Tracy's age would have turned and run, hell for leather. Later they might have justified it as an attempt to get help, when actually the first impulse is always one of survival, to get yourself out of there. But being the youngest of seven kids makes you resilient, and Tracy Templeton wasn't intimidated by size. As Matt told us later his little sister had come out of their mother's womb ready to battle for a fair share of anything that was going.
As the guy dragged Jenny, one hand now burrowed under her skirt, Tracy followed them through the bushes. She didn't try to kick him or bite him or anything like that; she simply started screaming. Apparently it was a technique she had used before in her domestic battles. In our interview two weeks later we asked for a demonstration and she was happy to oblige. We were impressed by both Jenny's volume and pitch.
There are houses on both sides of the reserve and cars were passing on the road. The guy obviously thought Tracy's screaming would bring trouble for him, and sooner rather than later. In one movement he released his hold, turned and ran off towards the pine trees and the estuary. Jenny sat down hard on the ground and Tracy kept screaming until he was out of sight, just to be sure.
It took a little under half an hour for a police dog to be brought to the reserve. There was a small crowd there by that time and a number of rumours swirled around about what had actually happened. Grant Webb, on his way home from basketball practice, reported seeing the police dog sniffing around the base of the slide where the attacker may have waited for a while, smoking cigarettes and going over his plan. According to the official police report, the dog lost the scent at the edge of the water. The tide was high and the guy had been bright enough to wade in and use the estuary to cover his tracks. He may even have swum across to the other side.
On Rocking Horse Road people were already twitchy after Lucy's murder. One attack could be put down to bad luck, a lightning bolt out of a clear sky, the brakes that fail on the car you're driving home from the showroom. But two . . . Everyone assumed that the guy who attacked Jenny was the same person who had murdered Lucy Asher. After that, Jenny and Lucy were regularly spoken of in the same sentence. How often did we hear our mothers say that it was only luck that stopped little Jenny ending up like poor Lucy Asher?
The certainty arose that a predator was, if not actually among us, then waiting close by. People eyed the long yellow grass of the dunes as though something crouched there. The darkness of the public toilets became a cave.
Some of us had sisters, and in later years we all dated girls from down the Spit. Without exception they could all recall the new rules and the lectures from parents after that attack on Jenny Jones. It was now dogma that they never talked to strangers. 'No, not even "hello."
'Keep your eyes down.'
'Keep walking.'
'Never ever get into a car!'
Such instructions were issued in every home, to girls as young as three.
Always move around in groups. Don't get caught out after dark. Don't go too far from an adult. Always tell someone where you're going and when you're due back and don't be late or we'll be worried sick. Avoid playing near the bushes or in the trees. Mum will be waiting for you at the school gates.
Overnight, the boundaries of childhood had shrunk.
But of course kids have questions. Why? was asked in a hundred different ways. What did the man want with Jenny Jones? What's wrong with the sweets? Are they poisoned like the apple in Snow White? What would the stranger do to me if he got me in his car?
The stories that parents told; the lies and half lies, the white lies and the grey lies and the black black truth. They told their kids everything from the generic 'hurt you', which was open to the most benign interpretation, right through to anatomically detailed descriptions of the act of rape.
For many girls these were the first conversations they'd ever had with their parents on the subject of sex. It was the birds and the bees. Except the way it was told down the Spit in late February of '81, the bird is an insatiable black crow and the bee will sting you again and again and again, and then leave you in a ditch for dead.
Through an informal network of neighbours, old team-mates and drinking buddies, the local men set up a community patrol. There were about thirty guys involved, including most of our fathers. There was a roster; four men each evening — there were enough volunteers that each name came up only once every couple of weeks. At the end of their working day, the men found themselves in groups of four, cruising the streets in a car, looking for anything suspicious. They often didn't have time to eat dinner so their wives packed food on plates covered with tinfoil. There was always a Thermos of coffee that was shared around. Normally there was beer as well. Everyone put in a small sum of money so that whoever supplied the car for the evening could have his petrol costs reimbursed. You can eat through a surprisingly large amount of petrol cruising slowly up and down the road.
We'd see them drive past as we went about our business. Their territory covered all of New Brighton, right from the bottom of the Spit all the way up past Thompson Park and into North New Brighton. Sometimes the driver would pull the car over and someone's dad would lean out the window to talk to us. The patrols were always good-natured. The guys would joke around and the smell from the plates of food would waft out through the rolled-down windows. More often than not the guy doing the talking had beer on his breath. He'd ask us if we'd seen anyone unusual hanging around. Sometimes we had — a surfer we didn't recognise, or a guy with his dog, down in the dunes. The patrol always took what we had to say seriously, which we liked. They'd thank us and ask us to keep our eyes peeled and then drive off to check out what we'd reported.
They were looking for someone lurking in the shadows of the school grounds or a furtive peeper crouching outside a girl's bedroom window. They'd often pull over to talk to a stranger or a foreigner walking down the street. A couple of the guys would get out and have a chat. Officially, the plan was to call the police from the nearest house if the patrol spotted anything unusual. That was officially. But as we sat on our bikes with our feet on the footpath, or stood skateboard in hand and watched the car as it pulled away from us, we could hear the rattle of softball bats and golf clubs coming from the boot. None of us was naïve enough to think that the men were planning on fitting in a round of golf before they went home.
Our fathers and their friends cruised the streets until midnight and then returned home to get some sleep before work the next day. As we lay in our beds we would sometimes hear our fathers coming home; the creak from the front door and then footsteps, stumbly and slightly drunk, moving around the house. Our fathers would inevitably be drawn to the kitchen where they would muck around with bread and jam and whatever else they could find. Our mothers would often still be up and we would listen through the walls to their voices muttering together.
It was good to know that our dads were out there keeping everyone safe. We would roll over in our beds and try to get back to sleep.
The main organiser of the community patrol was, surprisingly, Bill Harbidge. Perhaps the attack on Jenny Jones had shocked him out of his downward spiral. Almost overnight Bill stopped drinking during the day and even his evening consumption seemed to have tailed off. He was still officially
on sick leave but Jase would come home and find his father out in the garage pounding away on the stained punching bag that hung in the corner. Bill Harbidge had been an amateur boxer in his younger days. Jase would watch him shuffle around the bag with his guard up, jabbing away with his left and then letting loose with his right; what he called his 'cannonball'. The bag would swing a fair way when Bill Harbidge hit it with his right. The only thing that Jase reckoned let his dad down was his footwork. Bill Harbidge didn't dance like a butterfly any more. He didn't even dance like an old bear. He pretty much just stayed in the one spot jabbing away with his left and then unleashing that big right. Just a couple of minutes of jabbing and punching saw him breathing hard and his old sweatshirt from police training soaked with sweat.
When he wasn't hitting the bag or going for walks along the beach Bill Harbidge was on the phone to the local men organising who was going to provide the car that evening and who was going along for the ride. Bill drew up the roster for each week but on any given day guys were pulling out because of some emergency or other, or ringing Bill wanting to swap a shift with someone else.
Another one of our fathers who reacted strongly to the second attack was Mr Templeton, understandably, considering his youngest daughter was involved. Matt reported that after the attack his six sisters were under virtual house arrest. We'd all been taught history or social studies by Mr Templeton and knew that he was not someone you messed with. This was back in the days of corporal punishment and he was pretty handy with both ruler and strap, not hesitating to strap his pupils for talking in class or repeated lateness.