by Tim Slee
‘Oh dammit! I’ll help you,’ she says. ‘But there is no way I’m looking inside that coffin.’
‘You help me get the lid off,’ I tell her, ‘I’ll do the looking, fraidy cat.’
I climb up the back of the milk cart and she follows me up. I look around but no one is paying any attention to us and there’s no light shining right on us, there’s just the lamp on top of the coffin which we shut off without anyone noticing. I’m so right, this is the perfect time for what we need to do.
‘You get the clips on the left,’ I tell her. ‘I’ll do the ones on the right and the one with the lock.’
The clips are like brass screws with monkey ears. First you loosen the screws and then you can flip them up out of the eye of the lock. There’s four on my side and three on Jenny’s side plus the one that’s a locked lock. I do mine faster and crawl over to her side and she’s doing the last one before the lock.
‘OK, do you have your phone?’
‘No, I left it with yours, charging in the Albertis’ camper, remember?’
‘Bum bum bum. We need a light,’ I say. I look at the battery-powered lamp, which I’m afraid someone will notice if we start swinging it around. ‘A smaller one.’
‘Can’t you see enough to put the key in?’
‘No, to look inside the coffin! It’s dark here, it’s going to be even darker inside, right?’
‘Shall I get my phone?’
‘No, it’ll take too long. Someone could come. We’ll have to use the big lamp – I won’t turn it on until it’s inside the coffin.’ I reach for my pocket and pull out the key again. ‘Here goes.’ The key goes into the little lock and I give it a half-turn and lift the last clasp off. ‘You go to that end. We have to lift off the lid but like, just enough to slide it, enough so we can see in, not so much that it falls completely off in case we can’t get it back on again.’
‘OK.’
‘You know what I mean? Just slide it . . .’
‘I get you already!’
‘OK, go then.’
I go down to the bottom end of the coffin with the lamp and she goes to the top. I grab the clasp at the end and test it to see how heavy the lid is. I’m thinking of those vampire films where the coffin lid weighs like a ton and creaks when the vampire opens it. If this lid creaks, I’m going to scream. But it won’t creak because it isn’t on hinges, right?
Then I think about the smell. I don’t want to, but I can’t help it. Dead bodies smell, right? This coffin has been out in the sunshine for days now. I’m thinking of dead roos by the side of the road. How they smell after a couple of days. I can’t get it out of my head.
‘I don’t want to!’ Jenny whines.
‘Shut up and lift,’ I tell her. ‘Now!’
The lid isn’t heavy at all. It’s like lifting one of those table tennis tops they have at school that even Jenny and me can carry without needing help. I lift it using the clasp to get a hand under and then slide it about halfway off to the left, while Jenny slides her end about halfway off to the right, so it’s sitting diagonally across the coffin.
I can see there’s blue shiny cloth lining the inside of the coffin. That was Dad’s favorite colour, blue. I wonder if that’s on purpose.
I realise I’m holding my breath. Jenny is looking away so it has to be me who looks inside. Suddenly I can’t. But I can’t hold my breath forever. I let it out and have to drag in a huge lungful of air.
It smells OK.
I mean, it doesn’t smell like roadkill. It doesn’t smell like anything really, except maybe . . .
‘Corn,’ Jenny says. ‘Smells like cattle feed.’ And she looks in the coffin.
So I have to look. I push the lid a bit further over so I can see most of my end of the coffin. It’s dark in there all right but I put the lamp inside under the lid of the coffin and turn it on.
In the bottom of the coffin where the feet should be, I can see a big brown bag of feed, with another further along.
‘Maybe he’s under the bags?’ I whisper to Jenny. ‘Maybe they put them in there to hold it down, the body.’
‘Look how low down they are,’ Jenny says. ‘There’s nothing under them. That’s all there is, is a couple of feed sacks!’
‘Maybe further up,’ I tell her. I try putting my head in so I can see the middle of the coffin where the lid still covers it and there’s a small box shape but nothing else. There’s no way a body could be squeezed in here even if you folded it at the knees. Maybe he was burned so bad, they put his body in feed sacks?
I reach out to give one of the sacks a push.
‘Oh my god. Oh my god,’ Jenny says, really loud.
‘Keep it down,’ I hiss at her. ‘Someone will hear!’
I push a corner, gently, and then with a bit more force and it dents and I can feel the grain moving around inside. I prod a bit more.
‘It’s just feed grain. Why?’ It comes out of me like a wail. ‘Why trick us?’
‘I don’t know, Jack,’ Jen says. ‘I don’t know.’
I don’t know what else to do, so I yell up the moon and I hear Pop’s voice from out of his car window, ‘Goddamit, I’m trying to sleep here!’
A torchlight shines in our eyes and there’s another voice, ‘What in hell are you two doing up there?!’
Mum. We’re busted.
‘You were trying to do what?!’ Mum asks. She’s sat us down on the prickly grass behind the milk cart.
‘Jack didn’t believe Dad was inside,’ Jenny says. ‘He wanted to see for himself.’
Mum sighs, ‘Oh, Jack.’
I’m about ready to explode at her. But Mum’s got the torch on us and Jenny’s looking at me like don’t make this worse, and I decide it’s better if I just shut up.
Mum sits down in front of us, turns out the torch. It’s just the light from the other campers now and it flickers on her face. ‘Look, I know this is tough on you. Losing the house, losing your father, leaving Yardley, all in the space of a few days? But we have to do this while your dad’s death is still in the papers, while people are paying attention. You get that, right?’
‘But it’s empty!’ I accuse her, not able to keep it in a second longer. ‘He’s not in there!’
‘He’s in there,’ Mum says, looking up at the coffin. ‘Just not like you might have expected.’
Jenny and I look at each other, confused.
Mum leans forward, reaches out, takes Jenny’s left hand and my right hand, and holds them, ‘There’s laws about burying bodies,’ she explains. ‘You only get a couple of days. And the whole point of this is to take it slow.’ She holds our hands tight. ‘So we had your dad cremated, and we put his ashes in a box inside the coffin, with some feed bags for the weight.’
‘Who’s we?’ Jenny asks. ‘Does everyone except us know?’
‘No, just me, the funeral home and Karsi,’ she says. ‘It was his idea. To get around the law. The others don’t need to be bothered with it, it’s just a detail.’ She shakes our hands once or twice, looking into our faces, ‘So yes, he’s really dead. And he’s really in there. OK?’
‘Yeah,’ Jenny says.
I don’t say anything, and Mum shakes my hand one more time, ‘OK, mister?’
‘Yeah, OK,’ I tell her. But what I’m thinking is, no. Not OK. She’s letting everyone think it’s his body in there, but it’s just his ashes? Well, if she’s been lying about that, what else is she lying about? And how far is it from ‘your dad’s body isn’t in there, it’s just his ashes’ to ‘actually, the real truth is, you were right Jack, he isn’t dead at all.’
Mum groans as she gets up, ‘Right, enough nonsense. Checks and bed, you two.’ She looks over at the coffin, ‘I have to get that lid back on before anyone notices.’ She lifts Jenny up and holds a hand out to me, but I get myself up. I give her the key and trail off behind Jenny, towards the toilets.
Jenny can believe he’s dead, if that’s what she wants. I want proof.
‘Wakey wake
y, sleepyheads,’ Mum’s voice says next morning. ‘Porridge when you’re ready.’
‘Cold or hot?’ I ask. Then I remember I’m mad at her for hiding stuff from us and she smiles at me but I don’t smile back.
‘Hot from Maynards’ camp stove,’ she says. She’s squatting down under the milk cart. ‘With raisins. We’re leaving in thirty minutes.’
Jenny is lying in the bottom of her swag, just her hair sticking out. The magpies are singing like crazy this morning. Like it’s a farewell song, just for us here at the racetrack.
‘Magpies are singing us goodbye,’ Jenny says, crawling out of her swag.
‘Good morning, miss. They are, aren’t they? Put your shoes on.’
‘Will there be a march, like in Colac?’ Jenny asks.
‘No chance of that. Police want us straight out of here. They’re sending us on back roads out of Geelong.’
‘Did anything happen last night?’
‘Nothing much,’ Mum says.
‘You mean apart from your mum getting the whole of the Victoria Police against us?’ comes a voice from up front of the milk cart, which must be Mr Garrett. I can hear Danny Boy shuffling around and snorting, so Mr Garrett must be about to harness him. He gets all impatient before he gets the harness on.
He isn’t the only one snorting. ‘And what do you think I should have said, John Garrett?’ Mum demands. ‘Stood idly by and said nothing, as they pick us off one by one? You want to join Don in a prison cell? I am bloody sick and tired of bullies and when I see them, I’m going to call them out!’
‘Well you did that,’ Mr Garrett says. ‘It’s a wonder Tom lived as long as he did around you, if he had a weak ticker.’
‘Oh shut up, you,’ Mum says, but she’s only fake annoyed at him, I can hear that.
He comes around to the front of the milk cart and lifts a newspaper off the seat and hands it me. It’s the Herald Sun. On the front page is a picture of Deb standing on her toes pouring milk for one of the police in riot gear. She looks so small, and he looks so scary in all of his black kevlar, but he’s smiling.
Mr Garrett taps the page. ‘Just made the front page of the Melbourne paper. Nothing much at all.’
I get my shoes on and start shovelling down the porridge Mum has brought. Then I need to go to the toilet but can’t decide whether to run for the toilet or finish the porridge and I know Mum will go off if I try to do both and the way I feel, if she starts having a go at me, it’ll get out of control, I know it. So I sit with my legs crossed in front of Danny and eat my porridge and try not to think about the toilet.
‘How’s Danny Boy?’ I ask Mr Garrett.
Danny Boy hears me and lowers his head and starts snuffling at my bowl.
‘He’s all right, aren’t you, mate?’ Mr Garrett says, patting his neck as he slides the harness over. ‘Watch he doesn’t slurp your . . . too late.’
You forget how long a horse’s tongue is sometimes. He’s lucky it wasn’t hot.
‘Give me that, you,’ Mum says. She must be a mind-reader because she says, ‘No, there isn’t any more. Go do your teeth.’
‘Yuk. I thought horses only like raw oats,’ I say to Mr Garrett while I try to find my toothbrush and see if Jenny is finishing her porridge or not, but she is.
‘Horses like what horses like,’ he says. ‘I had one used to like meat pies. I called him Hannibal.’
‘I know him,’ Jenny says. ‘The Roman with the elephants.’
‘Yeah, different Hannibal,’ Mr Garrett says.
‘How’s this for a treat, kids?’ Mum asks. I was thinking she’d be mad the police were making us go the back way out of Geelong, along the Portarlington Road by the swampy ground. There’s just us and the cars in front and behind and there’s no one waving signs or giving salutes or anything. But you can see the ocean, and the sun is shining, is what she’s trying to say.
‘I think you hit a chord,’ Mr Garrett says to Mum. He’s got an earphone in one ear and it’s plugged into a small radio. ‘The Ned Kelly thing is all over the radio.’
‘You think?’ she says, smiling. ‘Dad taught me that quote.’
‘I thought your dad was a city fella?’
‘He was also a troublemaker,’ she says. ‘He memorised that quote so he could say it to a policeman one day as a clever insult and he’d be able to get away with it because he could say he was quoting Ned Kelly.’
‘Did he ever use it? Like, in a real argument with a copper?’
‘Yeah.’
‘And?’
‘He got an eighty-dollar fine.’
They keep blabbing on and I tune out because Mum has just reminded me Coach Don has been arrested, Mum will probably be next, Dad is either dead, or not, and my sister is a useless co-investigator. I have to keep reminding myself I might have Dorotea’s analgesia but I’m pretty much the only sane person on this damn milk cart.
But then a car comes up alongside us and he’s tooting on his horn and the passenger is waving like crazy, but not angry, more like frantic. He pulls in front of the horse and cart with his emergency blinker lights on and two people jump out. One is the Melbourne lawyer and the other is the reporter, Geraldine. And the back door opens and Coach Don gets out too, with a big grin on his face like the Cats just won the premiership.
Mr Garrett has to pull Danny Boy up into a crash stop and there’s dust and stones flying and the cars behind have to jam on their brakes but no one is angry. Mum hops down and hoofs over to Coach Don and gives him a big hug and a kiss on the cheek and Mr Garrett gives him a little wave. The Highway Patrol car and other cars up front keep going; they haven’t realised yet we’ve stopped. Jenny looks at me like, what’s next? I just shrug.
‘Where are you headed?’ Coach Don yells up to Mr Garrett. ‘Melbourne’s that way!’ he says, pointing back behind us.
‘Police want us to go via Queenscliff, keep us off the freeway,’ Mr Garrett yells back. ‘It still works. Plenty of towns to pass through.’
‘It’s not even the right side of town for the cemetery.’ Coach Don scratches his head. ‘It means we have to go right through St Kilda and Southbank to get there.’
‘Right up St Kilda Road through Fed Square actually,’ comes a voice and it’s Karsi. ‘Hey, Don.’
‘Hey yourself,’ Coach Don says and they shake hands. ‘You have anything to do with this idea?’
‘Highway Patrol wanted us on back roads north, sending us via the You Yangs, but that would take forever. I suggested the Nepean Highway instead and that kept them happy. But they’re still hoping you’ll give up before Melbourne. I guess you’re not. Giving up, that is . . .’
‘I’d guess not,’ Coach Don agrees.
Geraldine is taking photos and the Melbourne lawyer is talking to Mum and Mr Alberti has turned his car around and him and the police escort car are coming back to see what the hold-up is.
‘Where’s our next stop?’ Jenny asks. ‘Did you hear?’
Mum gave us a map a couple of days ago and I pull it out, tracing my finger around Port Phillip Bay. ‘How long’s the ferry trip?’
‘There’s a ferry?’
I show her. ‘From Queenscliff to . . . Sorrento? See?’
‘Can you take a horse on a ferry?’
‘Mum!’ Jenny calls out. ‘Can you even take horses on the ferry?’
All the grown-ups look at each other. The policeman driving the escort car pulls up alongside and leans out the window. ‘What’s the hold-up?’
‘Can you take a horse and cart on the Queenscliff ferry?’ Mum asks him.
‘I dunno,’ says the policeman, and he and the police lady in the car have a talk. ‘I can ask, but it’s your responsibility to sort it out with the ferry operator.’
‘It was your boss told us we’d have to go this way,’ Mr Garrett points out.
‘We’re the Victoria Police,’ the cop says, ‘not a bloody travel agent. Now get moving again, would you, you’re backing up traffic.’
Coach D
on and Mum and the Melbourne lawyer climb up into the cart. Mr Garrett whistles at Danny Boy and we get rolling again.
‘Call the ferry company,’ Mum says to Coach Don, ‘would you?’
‘I’ll look it up!’ Jenny says, pulling out her phone, all puffed up because it was her idea the ferry and the horse might be a problem. ‘Can I use data, Mum?’
‘I’ve been thinking about why the police were so happy we decided to come this way. I’m willing to bet,’ Alasdair says, ‘they’ve already checked and think they know what the rules are about horses on the Queenscliff ferry.’ He’s changed his clothes since he first turned up. When he first arrived he was wearing a suit and waistcoat and shiny black shoes and a white shirt and a blue tie. Now he’s wearing black jeans and a blue shirt with a white t-shirt underneath and working boots that still look new but not shiny.
‘Course they have,’ Coach Don says. ‘That’s their plan, send us all the way down the Bellarine and then we get to Queenscliff and find out we can’t get on the ferry. We’ve lost a day that way and we have to waste another day getting back to Geelong and then it’s back roads all through bloody Werribee and Sunshine to get to Melbourne – we’ll never make it in time. That’s their bloody thinking and we fell for it.’
‘We’re not out of it yet,’ Mum says. ‘Call the ferry company.’
‘I’ll make a few calls too,’ Alasdair says. ‘We have a guy who’s an expert on traffic and carriage law.’
‘Here’s the number,’ Jenny says, handing her phone to Coach Don.
‘How much does the ferry cost?’ Mr Garrett asks. ‘Isn’t it about seventy bucks? We’ll lose a few of these hangers-on if they have to cough up.’
‘And what if the ferry is already booked,’ I ask. ‘Remember that time . . .’
Everyone is firing questions at her suddenly and Mum holds up her hands. ‘Jenny has money. Don, you have to book for twenty cars,’ Mum says, tugging on Coach Don’s arm. ‘And a horse.’
‘Summary Offences Act 1966, section 8,’ the Melbourne lawyer is telling the manager in the ferry’s small ticket office. He hands his phone to the manager and shows him something his office sent through to him.