The Things She's Seen

by Ambelin Kwaymullina

  “Disappeared?” I choked. “How many people can go missing in one small town?”

  Dad must have been wondering the same thing. “When was this?” he asked.

  “Oh, it was a long time ago. Twenty years…seven months…six days. Not that I’m counting!” She tried to laugh, but it broke in the middle. “Sarah just vanished a week before her fifteenth birthday. She got off the bus from school, same as always, but she never made it home.”

  Twenty years. Not related to this case, then. Like Allie had said, it was a long time ago.

  Twenty years, seven months, six days…Was Dad going to be like this, decades from now when he talked about me? I didn’t want him making my death some kind of depressing mathematical reference point for his life.

  “You never found out what happened to her?” Dad asked Allie.

  “No. Derek’s father was in charge of the investigation. He was convinced she’d run off.”

  “You didn’t think so?”

  “No, I didn’t, and neither did her parents. Sarah might’ve talked about going away—we both did—but she would never have left her mum and dad without saying goodbye.”

  Allie sighed. “They’re both dead now. They never did get over losing her. The rest of the family live a long way away; Sarah’s parents moved here for work. But I’d really like to be able to tell her family that I’ve found her, one day.”

  “You think she’s still out there somewhere?”

  I guessed that was Dad’s nice way of asking if Allie thought Sarah was dead.

  “It’s been a long time,” she acknowledged. “But people have been found before, even after years and years. Derek’s always telling me there’s no point in searching anymore, but…”

  She cast an anxious glance at Dad, clearly worried he was going to agree with Derek. She didn’t know my father.

  “We’re police officers,” he said, and I heard the pride in his voice. “We never stop looking for the missing.”

  Allie brightened. “I was actually wondering…um, that is, if you’re not too busy, I was thinking—”

  “I’d be happy to take a look at Sarah’s file,” Dad told her.

  She beamed at him. “Thank you!” she said. Then, “It’s in the glove compartment.”

  I laughed. “Bet she’s been carrying that file around ever since she got word there was going to be a senior detective in town, Dad.”

  He gave a small nod of agreement, reaching for the glove compartment. His eyes were crinkling around the edges the way they did when he was suppressing a smile; he liked the way Allie was fighting for her friend.

  I edged farther forward, trying to get a good look at the file as he glanced through it. After a moment, he took out a photo, holding it up as if he was studying the image, so that I could see it as well. Sarah Blue. She had long black hair, brown skin, and an expression that seemed to dare the world to get in her way. The Aboriginal girl who wanted to go to the stars.

  Dad put the photo back and closed the file. “This all there is? Seems thin, for an investigation into a missing kid.”

  “You think so too? I tried talking to Gerry Bell about it—he’s retired now, spends his time fussing over his garden with his wife—but…well, Gerry wasn’t very receptive. Derek’s always saying his dad did everything he could, and I understand that it was a long time ago and investigations are run differently now, of course. It’s just that…” She shook her head. “Gerry Bell always thought she’d be back anytime.” Her fingers tightened on the steering wheel. “Only she never did come back. Do you think any leads can be found now?”

  “It won’t be easy,” Dad warned. “But it’s not impossible. It might be best to return to the beginning: re-interview everyone the police spoke to initially, and try to identify anyone they missed. I can help you do it, if you’d like, after the investigation into the home is done.”

  A huge grin broke over Allie’s face, so bright that it made all her other smiles seem like knockoffs of the genuine article. Small towns can be like lakes. So could the people in them. There was a lot more to Allison Hartley than just the sunshine on the surface, and I was a bit embarrassed that I hadn’t seen that right away. I’d have to do better than that if I was going to be a detective like Dad when I finished…Oh.

  I wasn’t going to be a detective like Dad when I finished school. I wasn’t going to be anything. It was so stupid, but sometimes I forgot I was dead—probably because I didn’t really feel dead. Except that before the accident I’d been a person of the now, always who I was and never who I’d been. But how could I be that butterfly girl when I was only who I’d been, stopped forever at fifteen and a half? Unless I moved on to what was next, I sup—

  Where had that thought come from? Catching was getting into my head! I scrabbled for other thoughts, comforting thoughts, and found one fast: okay, joining the police force was out, but I could still learn things; still grow and change. I could still be a butterfly like Mum.

  I clung to that idea and made it bigger. Maybe Mum would come from wherever she was to find me, and maybe Dad would be able to see her like he could see me; then we’d be a family together! Something didn’t feel right about that, but I ignored the feeling. I’d find Mum and fix Dad, and everything would be okay.

  The car rounded a corner onto the base of a steep rise. Allie pointed to the crest of the hill. “See the house at the top? The big one? That’s the Sholt place. Alex built it himself—well, had it built, after his mum died and his dad moved in with him.”

  The house that Sholt built was a two-story redbrick property that dwarfed the weatherboard homes on either side of it and was surrounded by hedges clipped into the shapes of swans. Derek Bell had described it as “a bit hard to find.” He’d lied. The only instructions anyone would need to locate this house were “Look for the ugly brick mansion with the pretentious hedges”—which meant Bell hadn’t sent Allie with us as a guide. He’d wanted someone to keep an eye on Dad, and he’d be expecting Allie to report back to him.

  Dad had figured it out too: as the car rolled to a halt, he said to Allie, “I’d like to interview Sholt alone. I think he’ll be more inclined to take this seriously if he’s questioned by someone he doesn’t know.”

  Allie didn’t object. In fact, she seemed relieved. Guess she’s in an awkward spot, stuck between her boss and Dad. Now she could truthfully say she’d been left behind and wouldn’t have to tell Bell anything.

  I followed Dad as he strode up to the front door and lifted the heavy brass knocker to rap against the paneled wood. No one came. He’d just raised his hand to knock again when the door swung back.

  The thin, white-haired old man at the door clearly wasn’t in the best of health—his pale skin was sallow and his hands were trembling. But there was absolutely nothing wrong with his ability to glare.

  Dad held up his identification, ignoring the angry scowl being directed at him. “I need to speak to Alexander Sholt.”

  “He’s not here. Left for the city early this morning.”

  “Are you his father?”

  The old man gave a short nod. “I’m Charles Sholt. What’s it to you?”

  Dad’s gaze flicked to me, then the house. I understood. He wanted me to check if Alexander was hiding inside.

  I darted past old man Sholt and began to search, sprinting through rooms filled with fancy furniture and faded photographs of yet more pale Sholt relatives. There was no sign of Alexander on the ground floor, so I headed up a curving staircase.

  It was all bedrooms on this level, decorated in assorted shades of cream and beige that seemed to merge together as I tore on through: boring bedroom…another cream bedroom…another— Wait.

  The curtains in this room were fluttering, stirred by the wind. But the window was closed. Strange. I went over to investigate.

  There was no glass in the window. T
he wooden frame was intact, but the glass was gone. I examined the floor beneath it and found some shards.

  Someone broke in? Except there was no balcony, and we were a long way off the ground. A person would have to be exceptionally determined to get up here. Maybe it’d been broken by something thrown from the ground. A rock?

  I was about to turn away when I noticed a few strands of hair caught in the window frame. Black hair.

  An image flashed through my mind of the photo Dad had shown me back at the home. Director Cavanagh had black hair. Had he come here, after the fire? It seemed like a place he might run to, if Alexander had been the one paying him off. Cavanagh would’ve wanted to tell him about the fire, and that the drugs operation was at risk of being uncovered. And maybe ask for some help to get out of town. Except Cavanagh might not have succeeded in getting away, yet. He could still be somewhere in this house.

  I spun away from the window and went charging through the rest of the bedrooms. Nothing. Then I went back downstairs and out into the rear garden, in case someone was hiding in the manicured shrubbery. Nothing there either.

  Frustrated, I returned to Dad. He was still talking to Charles Sholt—or, more accurately, Charles Sholt was talking to him, going on about how the police should have better things to do with their time than harass successful businessmen like his son.

  “No sign of Alexander,” I said to Dad. “But there’s a broken window upstairs at the back, with strands of black hair caught in the frame. I think Director Cavanagh was here.”

  Dad interrupted the old man’s rambling. “I’m afraid I have to leave now, but I really do need to talk to your son.” He handed over one of his cards. “Please have him contact me as soon as possible.”

  Sholt dropped the card onto the floor and shuffled back, letting the door swing shut with a bang.

  I stared at Dad in confusion.

  “What do you mean you have to go? You should be searching the house. I couldn’t look in drawers or anything; there could be all sorts of incriminating evidence hidden away!”

  Dad glanced back to the car, where Allie was watching. He pulled out his phone and brought it up to his ear.

  “Black hair and a smashed window isn’t enough, Beth,” he said as we walked away from the house. “The window could have been an accident of some kind; the hair could be anyone’s—and besides, how could I have known about it?”

  Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. “But don’t you think it’s suspicious?”

  “I do, especially combined with the way Alexander Sholt seems to be dodging the police. I just can’t get a search warrant yet. But I can get people to start looking a lot more closely at the Sholt family.”

  He gave me an approving nod. “You did good, Beth.”

  I grinned at him. Today had just gone from a good day to a great day. Not only had I helped Dad, I’d done it as a ghost, doing something that I couldn’t have done when I was alive.

  Maybe I could be a detective after all! Okay, not exactly in the way I’d imagined it when I was alive, but still. Beth Teller. Ghost detective. This could be the start of a whole new future for Dad and me—and Mum too, once I found her.

  My happy thoughts were interrupted as Allie leaped out of her car and bolted over to us, her phone in her hand and red hair flapping around her face. She skidded to a halt in front of Dad. Her skin was white beneath her freckles, but she kept her voice steady and professional as she said, “They’ve found two more bodies. Both of them have been stabbed.”

  Allie sped through the town in grim silence. Streets flashed by in a blur of weatherboard houses, gum trees, and crows until we finally stopped at one that looked just like all the others—except for the two police cars. The cops had blocked off the whole road, but they were mostly gathered at one end, standing around a high wire fence that surrounded something I couldn’t see from here.

  Dad and Allie got out of the car, and I followed after them. As we neared the fence, I realized it enclosed a low pit—there was a gradual slope downward to a mass of leafy vegetation. Derek Bell came hurrying over, looking even twitchier than he had this morning.

  “Are the victims in there?” Dad asked, nodding to the fence.

  “Yeah. It’s the access point to an old stormwater drain. A passerby spotted one of the bodies.” Bell blinked in a stunned kind of way, like he couldn’t quite absorb what had happened. “The victims…It’s Tom Cavanagh and Martin Flint.”

  I gaped. “The director and the nurse are dead? Here? But then who died in the fire?”

  “You’re certain?” Dad asked.

  “I know them both. There’s no doubt.” Bell dragged a trembling hand through his hair. “Killed with single stab wounds to the chest, probably sometime during the night.”

  “Anyone hear anything? See anything?”

  “We don’t know yet. No one’s come forward, but it’ll take a while to interview all the residents.”

  Bell nodded over at where a crowd of anxious people were clustered around a police officer. They were all speaking at once, pelting questions at the cop.

  “But who died?”

  “What happened to them?”

  “Are we safe here?”

  Bell looked pleadingly at Allie. “You think you could…?”

  She nodded and strode over, holding up her hands and speaking in a low, reassuring tone. Within a few minutes, the hubbub of voices had quieted.

  “She’s good with people, huh?” Dad asked.

  But Bell’s attention wasn’t on Allie. Instead, he was looking around the street. “Why dump the bodies here, of all places…?” He cast an uneasy glance back at the entrance to the drain.

  “They weren’t killed in there?” Dad asked.

  “No. There’s not enough blood. They had to have been killed somewhere else. I’m hoping someone heard a car, at least—I’m thinking the killer would’ve had to drive the bodies up to the drain, then carry them in…Anyway, come and see.”

  Dad followed Bell toward the gate in the fence, but not before shooting me a stern look that meant: you are not to view homicide victims. That was fine by me. I didn’t want to look at murdered people and talk about how they’d died, any more than I wanted to think about the details of how I’d died. I’d leave that part of detecting to Dad.

  I suddenly remembered how Catching had thought I was still here because someone had murdered me and I had “unfinished business.” Could the ghosts of Cavanagh and Flint be about, clinging to their earthly remains? Although I hadn’t stuck with my body. There’d been a period of nothingness, followed by drifting through colors—and then I’d heard Dad crying. When I reached him, I found that a couple of weeks had passed since the accident and my body was already buried.

  The director and the nurse might be different to me, though. Except some deeper part of me was certain that they weren’t around. I wasn’t sure how I knew it, but I did. For whatever reason, there wasn’t any unfinished business for them. I guessed it was up to Dad and me to figure out who had killed them, and why.

  I turned my attention back to the residents. They were mostly people Dad’s age or older. While there were no children outside, it was obvious by the toys scattered across the front gardens that families lived here. I hoped the kids weren’t too scared.

  I hoped Dad and I could solve this before anyone else got hurt.

  Dad came back through the gate and strode away from the rest of the police, pulling out his phone to make a call. I went over to him and caught the end of a low-voiced conversation: “Yeah, quick as you can…There’s definitely something off…I’ll check in again later.”

  “Something off about what?” I demanded as he hung up.

  He put his phone back to his ear so he could talk to me without getting stared at. “The case. Rachel’s sending a team from the city; they should be here early tomorrow. I nee
d some officers here who don’t report to Derek Bell.”

  “He’s scared, huh? After you left the station this morning, he was standing in the doorway, looking around like he thought someone might be after him.”

  Dad nodded, like he wasn’t surprised. “That’s how he looks now. I don’t know how deep he’s into whatever this is, but three people murdered in a town this size? Something’s going on around here, and Bell knows more than he’s saying.”

  Dad was right—the deaths couldn’t possibly be unrelated. “This has to all be connected to the home, right? Wouldn’t the kids who were in there know something?”

  “Maybe.” His mouth tightened. “But Rachel said they still aren’t saying much. They could be scared. Kids like that, caught up in the system—it wouldn’t have been hard for the men running the home to intimidate them into silence over a drugs operation. Or whatever was going on at that place.”

  “Director Cavanagh and Nurse Flint can’t push them around now. Rachel should tell the kids that!”

  “She’ll do her best to reassure them, but…” He sighed. “Those kids have probably been failed so many times, they won’t believe anyone in authority will treat them fairly. Besides, Rachel thinks there might be something else going on. She says it seems like they’re not afraid, almost like they think everything’s been taken care of. I suppose they might just want to put the home behind them. It’s gone now, after all.”

  I thought back to the not-quite-smiling faces of the kids in the photo Dad had shown me. The home was supposed to have been a place that was good for them. It might’ve been too, if Allie and the other people who’d wanted to volunteer had been allowed in. Instead, they’d been shut out, so that Sholt could sell drugs or whatever he’d been doing. And Derek Bell hadn’t done anything about it either because he was involved or because the Sholts were rich and powerful. “How those kids were treated—it’s not right!”

  I sounded like Dad. He heard it too; his mouth curved into a smile. “No, it isn’t. But the boss is onto it. She’ll find a way to get the kids to trust her, and get them all the help she can too. She’s got the city end of this. I need to work things here.”