by Emma Viskic
‘She looks cranky,’ he said.
‘She does, doesn’t she?’ Kat agreed easily. ‘What have you done?’
He looked at the secateurs Maria was holding, and unthreaded his fingers from Kat’s.
‘You’re not moving well,’ Maria said, when he reached her. ‘Are you in pain?’
‘Oh.’ It took him a moment to recalibrate. ‘I’m just a bit, you know.’
Standing on the stepladder, her head was only a little higher than his. ‘No, Caleb, I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking.’
Kat’s head made a jerking movement. Maybe a dry cough.
‘I’m a bit stiff,’ he admitted.
‘Stiff? You’re walking as though your spine’s fused. Come inside and I’ll check you over.’
Kat returned his pleading look with a bland smile.
In the bedroom, Maria ripped the dressing from his side with more force than he thought necessary.
‘I thought I said to take it easy this week?’
‘It was just a walk.’
‘You’ve been out of bed for one day, Caleb. Doing your superhuman impersonation is going be even less helpful than usual.’ She picked up the digital thermometer. ‘Hearing aid.’
He hesitated, then removed it. He felt exposed, taking it out in front of her, but it was better than the alternative, threatened, method of taking his temperature.
‘Well that’s all right, at least.’ She checked his pulse. ‘You look tired. Are you still having trouble sleeping?’
Surely she was almost finished; she had gardening to do, a strict schedule of activities to keep.
‘I’m fine.’
‘You’re a long way from being fine, Caleb.’ She released his wrist and wrote on the clipboard she kept by the bed. ‘Have you put any more thought into getting some counselling? I can recommend some good therapists.’
‘I appreciate the thought, but I really am all right, thank you, Maria.’ The words felt stiff in his mouth, too formal. He probably sounded like the BBC news presenters his father had listened to. ‘And in other news, Caleb is intensely uncomfortable when discussing his psyche with his mother-in-law.’
‘Is this conversation making you uncomfortable?’ she asked.
‘Deeply.’
A hint of a smile. She took a breath, but released it without speaking. Maria hesitating? This was going to be bad. Cancer. End of Days. Relationship advice.
‘Sometimes the truth can hurt people,’ she said, then stopped.
Cancer.
‘Rip off the bandaid, Maria.’
‘Kathryn told me you’re looking into Gary’s death.’
‘Oh. Yeah.’
‘You’re a very determined person. I’m sure you’ll be as focused on the investigation as you are on everything else you do. More so. But you need to remember that you’re dealing with other people’s lives.’
Her urge for an impromptu consult suddenly made sense.
‘Maria, do you know something about Gary’s murder?’
‘Only what Kathryn’s told me. But one of the things about being a GP in a small town is that you know things. You know that the young couple down the road are worried they’re going to be evicted and that they’re right to be worried. You know that the woman serving you in the supermarket is going to divorce her husband and that he has no idea it’s coming. You know all that, but can never speak about it.’
Her words were as clear as always, but her meaning took a little while to sink in. ‘So what can you tell me?’
‘That the police have spoken to Honey Kovac and are happy she had nothing to do with Gary’s death.’
Honey Kovac. Married to Vince Kovac, the man McFarlane had quizzed him about.
‘Honey? You mean Vince – the guy Gary called the day he died?’
‘Vince travels a lot for work. He was out of the country when Gary called.’
‘So what’s Honey got to do with it?’
‘Nothing. That’s what I’m telling you. She’s had a hard couple of years, you should respect her privacy.’
He scrubbed his face. ‘Let me get this straight. You’re telling me that I don’t need to speak to Honey Kovac because the police have already interviewed her and established she’s not involved in Gary’s murder.’
‘Exactly. I’m glad you understand.’ She gave him a brisk smile and left.
He stared after her. What the hell had that been about? He went over the conversation, but only ended up more confused. Too tired, synapses misfiring. His bones were aching, too. This was what old age must feel like. He sat down on the bed, but resisted the urge to curl up and sleep for a week. Facts first: Gary called Vince, Vince was away, Honey picked up the phone. End of story. Except it clearly wasn’t. What did he know about Honey Kovac? Not a lot: bright, sweet, mid-twenties, a kid or two. Koori, so there was a good chance Kat would know more about her. The Bay’s Koori community was linked by a complex web of connections he could barely grasp, but which Kat knew intimately. She’d taken pity on him once and drawn a diagram: an enormous swathe of paper filled with multi-coloured lines and arrows. None of the details remained, but her social ordering had stayed with him: family, friend, outsider. Which label would she assign him these days? Focus. Honey Kovac. Ask Kat about her. And if she mentioned the conversation to her mother? Awkward. If by awkward he meant terrifying.
He hauled himself to his feet. Time for a discreet chat with Honey.
Honey Kovac’s address was easy to track down, and her house even easier to find: it was diagonally opposite Maria’s clinic. Not hard to work out how Maria had known about the police visit. The house was one of the Bay’s simple bluestone cottages. The local quarry had built dozens of them for its workers in the late 1890s. Most of them still stood, but the quarry had shut twenty years ago, leaving a hundred people out of work and a raw wound in the earth where nothing would grow. The last time he’d been in town, there’d been talk of making it into a tourist attraction. It seemed like a flawed plan. A little like standing here, in full view of the street, waiting for someone to answer the door.
A tap on his shoulder.
He jumped.
Not Maria; an ancient man with a face like a bleached raisin. A lot of brown clothing, all of it three sizes too big. Name. Name. Heraldson. Hanson. Henderson. Yes, Henderson.
‘Hi, Mr Henderson.’
‘It’s young Caleb, isn’t it? I’ve been yelling away. No wonder you didn’t hear me.’ Mr Henderson laughed. Or coughed up a lung. He pressed a dubious-looking handkerchief to his mouth and hawked.
Caleb averted his eyes for a moment. ‘I was just looking for Honey Kovac. Is she around, do you know?’
‘That’s what I was yelling about. I said to myself, “My God, he must be deaf or something.”’ Another bout of chest heaving.
‘Honey?’ Caleb prompted.
Mr Henderson fished a packet of Benson and Hedges from his coat pocket and offered the packet. Caleb shook his head.
‘Wise man. Very wise.’ He paused for another hawk and spit, then lit the cigarette. ‘Just saw her. I’m out for my daily constitutional. Your mother-in-law checks to make sure I’m doing it, you know. Terrifying woman.’
Caleb glanced towards the clinic. ‘Where did you see Honey?’
‘In the playground. She was …’
‘Thanks, Mr Henderson.’ He fled.
He found Honey in the little park at the end of the street. She had a pram parked by her side and was pushing a young boy on the swings. Her short hair was scraped into a ponytail and she was wearing a long mauve skirt and blue woollen jumper. A bit of a change from the skin-tight jeans and midriff tops she used to wear. The hard couple of years Maria had mentioned were written in the lines around her mouth and eyes, and she was too thin to be the mother of what looked like a nine-month-old baby. She still had the same shy smile, though.
‘Honey?’ he said as he approached her.
‘That’s right.’ A faint frown. Worried she was being rude in
not recognising him.
‘I’m Caleb. I think my brother Anton was a couple of years ahead of you at high school.’
The frown smoothed as she darted a quick look at his ear. ‘Right. I thought you looked familiar. Hi.’
‘Is it OK if I ask you a few questions?’
‘Questions? Like a survey?’
‘No. It’s about the phone call Gary made to you before he died. I know the police have already asked you about it, but would you mind going over it with me?’
The swing she was pushing slowed in its arc. ‘Why? It was just a wrong number.’
‘A wrong number?’
She glanced towards the pram and draped a blanket across the opening. ‘Don’t wake up yet, sweetie. Yeah, Gary rang by accident. He misdialled the number.’
‘Who was he after?’
‘His mum.’
‘Oh. Did you talk at all?’
She started rocking the pram. ‘Not really, just “Hi, how’s the family”, that sort of thing. I didn’t know him that well, just from work parties and things.’
‘Work parties?’
‘Yeah, Sharon and I used to work together before they moved to Melbourne.’
‘Did he …’
‘Look, I have to feed the baby. Once he starts crying like that there’s no stopping him.’
‘Just a couple more questions.’
‘If they’re quick.’ She unclipped her eldest son from the swing. ‘Let’s go home for dinner, hey?’
‘Did Gary ask to speak to Vince?’
‘No. I told you, he was just trying to get onto his mum. OK, seriously, I can’t bear it when he cries like that. Sorry, I’ve got to go.’ She swung the pram around.
‘One last question – is Vince friends with Anton?’
She shook her head. ‘Anton? What’s he got to do with it?’
‘Just wondering.’
‘I don’t think Vince … I mean, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t think he’d approve of your brother. Sorry, I’ve gotta go.’ She grabbed her oldest son’s hand and strode away.
Caleb watched her go. She was walking so quickly the boy had to run to keep up. Just a frazzled mum going home to feed a screaming baby. A baby that had been soundly asleep when she’d pulled the blanket over the pram.
15.
He wrenched himself from sleep, heart pounding, the darkness pressing down – 2.43 a.m. Long, long hours to go before dawn. Images lurked behind his eyelids, ready to pounce: blood-splashed tiles, Gary’s blank eyes, Frankie’s dirt-covered face. He pulled on his jeans and went to the kitchen. He needed a run. Maybe he could try a short one tomorrow, just a light jog. It was that, or start smacking his head against something solid. He lit the gas under the kettle and scrounged for a teabag. Slumming it. Kat would tell him that only loose-leaf tea held calming properties, but he was probably beyond its powers at the moment. His brain kept looping back to Gary’s last hours. Panicking, packing his bags, and he stopped to make two phone calls: one to the Kovacs, one to Anton. The Kovacs might have been a mistake, but calling Anton didn’t make sense. Not entirely true – there was one scenario in which it made perfect sense. And he was going to have to face up to that sooner or later. Later.
The overhead light flicked off and on. Kat was in the doorway, hair cascading to her shoulders in wild curls. She was wearing a long T-shirt decorated with a cartoon of an incredibly ugly cow, and, by the looks of it, nothing else. He remembered to breathe. She went to the stove and turned off the steaming kettle. It had probably been whistling madly for a while; an out-of-range pitch, even when he had his aids in.
‘Shit, sorry.’
‘We’ve really got to get you sleeping better,’ she said.
With her tousled hair and long, bare legs she looked as though she’d stepped from the pages of a travel brochure. Somewhere warm and volcanic, with the promise of sultry afternoons and exotic fruit. The air felt a little tropical now; thick and perfumed. Probably humidity from the over-boiled kettle. She yawned and her breasts swelled against the T-shirt. Focus on the blue cow. No, bad idea. He lifted his gaze to her face.
‘Sorry. Have I been disturbing you?’
She gave him a heavy-lidded look that raked the coals in his blood. ‘Yes, you have.’
Was that what he thought it was? No, just hormones running his brain.
‘Tea?’ she asked.
‘I’ll get it.’
They moved at the same time and he brushed against her sleep-warm skin. He breathed in her familiar, heady scent; it travelled through him, nestling low and tight in his groin. She paused. A heartbeat, two, three, then she reached up for the mugs. His heart stopped. Definitely not wearing anything under the T-shirt. Look away. Look at the floor, or the wall. Don’t look at her lean, brown legs. Don’t remember how they felt wrapped around him. Or the smoothness of her skin, the soft weight of her breasts.
She turned and caught the direction of his gaze. She was going to rip off his head. Or some other part of his anatomy.
She passed him his tea. ‘Exercise usually helps you sleep.’
Good, a safe subject. Boring. Impersonal. ‘I might try for a run tomorrow.’
Her lips formed a soft pucker as she blew across the surface of her tea. His jeans got a little tighter.
‘I meant tonight,’ she said.
A night-time walk to the beach with Kat. The moonlight skimming her body …
‘I’ll just …’ He put the mug down. ‘I think I’ll go back to bed.’
She placed her cup on the bench and closed the distance between them.
‘Good idea.’ And she draped her hands around his neck and kissed him.
The taste of tea and something wild and sweet. A fierce need stoked inside.
He pulled away. ‘We shouldn’t …’
‘Stop talking.’
‘I’m …’
‘Can’t usually get you to talk. Now I can’t get you to shut up.’
She kissed him again and all of his words, and most of his blood, left his brain. He pulled her to him. Soft skin, heat, salt. A distant voice told him they’d better move now, because pretty soon he wasn’t going to be able to. He grasped her to him and managed to direct them into the bedroom without once releasing her.
‘Well that shut you up.’
His body was made of a warm jelly-like substance, not a muscle or bone in it.
‘Is that a common thing for you these days? Using your sexual wiles to get your way?’
‘Mmmm. Gets me great service in shops.’
‘I can imagine.’
She smiled sleepily. ‘I’ll give you a demonstration tomorrow.’
She curled against him, resting her head on his shoulder. Within seconds, her breathing slowed and her heartbeat settled. He pressed his lips to her forehead as heat gathered in his eyes and slipped down his cheeks. Home.
16.
The next morning, they returned to Kat’s bedroom for an encore performance. Performances. A definite improvement in his stamina. He made a mental note to include sex in his cross-training.
‘Excellent,’ Kat announced. ‘Just the way to start the day.’ She was lying with her legs kicked up behind her, tracing a lazy pattern on his chest with one finger.
Excellent, yes. It was amazing the way sex with some-one you loved could put an entirely different slant on life. Joy to the world and goodwill to all men. He propped the pillow beneath his head to gaze at her. The morning sun lay gently on her face, lighting the planes of her cheekbones and threading amber through her hair.
‘God, you’re beautiful.’
She flashed him a smile. ‘Indeed I am. And what else?’
‘Modest.’
She twisted his nipple.
‘Funny,’ he said. ‘Smart, talented.’
‘And?’
Loved.
‘Insatiable.’
Her chuckle vibrated through him, had him reconsidering his energy levels.
‘Is it serious with that guy?’ The
words were out before he realised he’d signed them. No. Bad move.
‘What guy?’
‘The guy on the phone the other day. In the garden. Just a yes or no answer, no need for details.’
‘Oh, that guy. You want to know his name?’
He wanted to know where he lived. ‘Sure.’
She held a crooked finger to her palm – R. Then an O and an S. He’d been right, the bastard’s name was Ross. Then she tapped her index finger – E. Rose.
A sudden easing of pain, like a vice had been loosened.
Spoken names should be banned. Rose looked like Ross, Matt looked like Pat, Ian looked like nothing at all. Everyone should have a sign name. It was easy to remember his own CZ, or work out who Black Hair was, or find the guy called Scar Face. And then there were names so right you wanted to sign them just to feel their perfection. Names like Kat’s. Her face had lit up when he’d told her the name his Deaf friends had given her.
‘Do it again,’ she’d said. So he had. Two soft strokes to mime cat’s whiskers: the sign for panther. Every time he’d done it, her smile had grown.
She was smiling now. ‘What are you smirking about?’
‘You.’
‘Good. So, your brother …’ She pressed a finger to the furrow between his eyebrows. ‘If the wind changes, you’ll be stuck like that. Anyway, Anton – love him to death, but he’s not exactly reliable.’
‘Your point?’
‘Gary was a smart guy. Let’s imagine for a moment he was leading a mysterious double life as a crook – why would he choose to work with someone as flighty as Anton?’
He wouldn’t. Of course he wouldn’t. Anton would be the last person Gary would work with.
‘He wouldn’t,’ he said. ‘Then why call him?’
‘Crazy idea, but you could always try asking Anton.’
Put the puzzle of the Kovacs to one side and think about who Gary called that day: family, him and Frankie. He’s scared, needs to tell someone about Scott, but he’ll be on the road soon. Or dead. Frankie misses his call, Caleb can’t speak on the phone. But Anton can. He’s the perfect messenger: close enough to trust, far enough away to be safe.