by Else, Chris
I turned round and crossed the road, started to walk back up the other side. The steepness of the slope told me I was not that fit. I was breathing hard by the time I got to opposite Wyett's place.
'Gidday.' A big deep voice. A bloke was standing on my side of the road beside a tree in a driveway. He was big across the shoulders and had long shaggy hair, arms folded, frowning.
'Gidday.' I stopped.
'You looking for somebody?' He seemed to get bigger as he pushed his chest out. He was wearing jeans and a grey T-shirt with sweat patches under the arms.
'Yeah,' I said. 'Wayne Wyett. I think he lives over there.' I pointed.
'Does he? Why d'you want him?'
'I've got a dog up at my place. A stray. Somebody said it belonged to him.'
'What sort of dog?'
'Black. Pig dog, I guess.'
The bloke didn't answer, just wriggled his shoulders.
'Would Wayne have a dog like that?' I asked.
'Dunno. You a friend of his?'
'No. Like I said. There's this dog . . .'
'Why don't you fuck off?'
'Hey, no need to . . .'
'Just fuck off. Go on.'
'Okay,' I said. 'Okay.'
I started to walk away. I could feel his eyes on my back. I was angry but no way I wanted to get into a fight with this guy.
As I kept going up the hill it felt like I was coming back to a healthier world. The air was lighter. My breath came easier. I was getting towards the top when I saw a white van coming towards me. It was a Mitsubishi and I had plenty of time to see the number plate. I only got a quick look at the bloke behind the wheel but it was enough to catch the gleam of light on his bald head. I stopped to put the van's number in my mobile. I wasn't sure if I made it or not. There was a final beep and the screen blacked out before I had time to turn the thing off.
Wyett's van was turning into his driveway. The bloke with the long hair was heading towards him. Halfway across the road he looked up in my direction and stopped, turned towards me, stood there with his hands on his hips. I got myself out of there.
I walked up to Basingstoke Road and then back along Church Street. The woman was in the front garden at Parline's place now. She was working on a rose bush close to the low front wall, so I got a better look at her. She was pretty, in her way, with a narrow face and high cheekbones, lipstick on her mouth. Did she put on makeup to do the garden?
'Hi,' I said.
'Did you find that dog?' She didn't sound that friendly. She was frowning at something. Staring at me from behind her sunglasses.
'No.'
'Only there's a black one down that way.' She turned and pointed in the direction I'd come from and I saw what the glasses couldn't hide. She had a black eye. Maybe I made some sort of move because she suddenly lifted her hand to the side of her face like she was trying to hide the bruise even more. 'Not sure where,' she went on. 'Ramp Street, maybe.'
'Yeah. I tried that. No luck.'
'Right.'
'Thanks anyway.'
I walked on, heading back towards the Domain, thinking about Rick Parline: the woman's eye, the house on the road to Katawai. On the other hand, his van was a Hiace and his dog was black and white. I passed the community hall. Still just the one cop car outside.
There were more people than usual out in the Domain. A cricket match. I guessed that was where Parline had gone. I crossed the road and went in through the gates. The match was down towards the northern end. Beyond the pitch was a line of trees with people sitting in the shade. I headed towards them, moving round the game. The bowler was coming into bowl. There was a whock of wood on leather and clapping from a few of the people watching. Over to my right were a man and a boy and a black-and-white dog, a border collie. The boy was throwing a stick and the dog was fetching it. The man was average height and wearing baggy shorts, a white short-sleeved shirt and a floppy hat. I started to head towards him. I wasn't sure what I was going to say but I just kind of wanted to look into his eyes and see. After a couple of minutes he saw me, saw I was coming his way and stopped to wait for me.
'Hi,' I said.
'Gidday.'
'Great weather.'
'Not bad at all.' He tilted his head and looked at the sky, like he wanted to check that the weather was still there.
'That your dog?' I asked.
'Yeah. Why?' He had pale blue eyes, half buried in wrinkles, which stared at me from under the brim of his hat.
I spun him the yarn about our sheep. What I really wanted to say was, how come your missus has got a black eye? I knew the answer to that though. Parline had the look of a hard man with a bad temper. I wondered how his kid got on.
'My dog's under control,' he said.
'Cool.' We looked at each other. 'Ken McUrran,' I said, holding out my hand. I don't know why I did that. There was no way I was going to be mates with this bloke.
He shook it but he didn't say anything.
'I run the local service station.'
'Yeah. I know.'
'I guess you've got a vehicle.'
'Yes.' He was frowning the way the woman had frowned.
Suspicious, maybe.
'Well, you know.' I shrugged. I really didn't have a clue what I was talking about. 'We're always open for business.'
'Right.' He looked away from me, somewhere over to my left, and his expression suddenly changed. 'Fuck!' he said.
Under the trees I could see a bloke, dark against the light behind him. He was just standing there with both hands raised to his face. Binoculars?
'Who's that?' I asked.
'Fucking Cleat,' he said. 'Little shit's following me around. I swear to God he is. Gives me the creeps.'
'Gives everybody the creeps,' I said.
'He's like a rat,' Parline said. 'You try to catch him and he's off. Soon as you stop he comes creeping back.'
Billy hadn't moved. I guess he had his binoculars trained on us. Parline made a noise like the growl of a big dog and suddenly started to run, straight at Billy. He was quick but Billy had a good long start. He turned and he was away. No sign of the sideways shuffle this time. He was off to the Domain fence and over it into the paddock on the other side. Parline stopped after twenty metres. He stood with his hands on his hips, just like the long-haired bloke in Ramp Street had done. Then he turned round, looked at me for a second, and headed off towards the boy and the dog. That pretty much left me standing there like an idiot. I started walking towards the people watching the cricket.
They were in twos or groups, adults with a few kids as well. Some were sitting on folding chairs, others on rugs spread on the ground. I knew a fair few of them, Brenda Paddigon and Susie Smeele for two. They were sitting together on a tartan rug with a chilly-bin and a picnic basket between them, along with an ice-cooler with a bottle of wine sticking out of it. They had glasses in their hands.
As I got closer Brenda saw me. 'Hello,' she said. She was wearing a big straw hat, which tilted back as she looked up, a nice smile.
'I thought you folk would be working.' I squatted down next to them.
'No,' Susie answered. 'We have help in.' She was small and serious-looking, with wavy dark hair and dark eyes. She gave me a grin that seemed almost sad.
'They can do without us once in a while,' Brenda said.
'Julian's playing.' Susie waved her hand at the pitch. 'He's scored . . . how many did I say?'
'Twenty, was it?' Brenda said.
'Something like that. And that's Laurie batting with him.'
'Father and son,' Brenda said. Then she turned to me. 'Wine?'
'Sure.' I sat down, stretched my legs out. She poured another glass and handed it to me.
'Cheers.' We clinked glasses.
'So what brings you here?' Brenda asked.
'I'm at a loose end, I guess.'
'Is . . . er . . . Gith with you?'
'No. She's out at my parents' place.'
'It'll give you some time to yourself,'
Susie said.
'Yes. Only trouble is, I don't know what to do with it.'
Another whack of the cricket bat. Susie put her glass down and clapped.
'Bravo,' she shouted.
Away over towards the Domain gates were two figures and a dog. I pointed to them.
'That bloke over there. He was near here before.'
'Yes,' Susie said.
'It's Rick Parline, isn't it?' I felt Brenda start listening. Susie gave the answer I wanted.
'Yes,' she said.
'You know him?' I asked.
'Sure. He buys things from us.'
'A collector?'
'In his way.'
'What does he collect?'
'Porcelain.' Susie looked at me, frowned. It was as if she wasn't sure she should be telling me. 'Why?'
'Oh,' I said, 'just curious about him. I heard a story.' Why did I say that? I had to go on now. 'And I just walked past his house in Church Street. There was a woman doing the garden. His wife, I guess. She had a black eye.'
Susie didn't answer for a second and then she said, 'Well, yes, I did hear that about him.'
'What?' Brenda said. 'That he hits her?'
'Just a rumour.'
'She had dark glasses on,' I said, 'but you could still see.'
'Oh God,' Brenda said. 'Another bloody victim.' I wasn't sure what she meant.
Susie said nothing. She was looking down at her wine glass but I guess not really seeing it.
Brenda turned to her. 'Well, it's not acceptable, is it?'
'No. Of course not. Absolutely not.' A little flash of anger?
'All a bit too rural, if you ask me.'
That was a word that Joanne used when she wanted to run down the locals.
'It's just as bad in town,' Susie said. 'Maybe worse.'
'That's no excuse.'
Susie didn't answer. I looked from one to the other but I couldn't figure out what was going on. Suddenly I seemed to be in the middle of an argument that had already covered a whole heap of ground. Brenda looked at me, gave me a little smile like she could see what I was feeling.
'Well,' I said, 'I guess we've got our fair share. Billy Cleat was over there before.' I turned and pointed. 'With a pair of binoculars.'
'Spying?' Brenda asked.
'I don't suppose he was watching the cricket.'
'Urgh!' Susie shuddered.
We all turned and looked. Nobody there. Unless Billy had hidden himself better.
'He's gone now,' I said, feeling the way I'd done at the pub. I hadn't really told the truth about Billy. Why had I even brought him up?
***
WE STARTED TO relax after that. It was real nice sitting there with the two of them and pretending to watch the game. We talked a bit, but not about anything important, and I was glad of the company. We had another glass of wine (I have to say it tasted better each time I tried it) and I could feel my brain starting to float.
After a while Laurie Smeele joined us, and then a bit later, Julian. Laurie was fifteen but already about the same size as his father, tall and well built. He was a boarder at Wanganui Collegiate but came home most weekends. Susie fussed over him and he pushed her off in an awkward sort of way. He seemed to be good at cricket but pretty useless at talking, at least with us. Still, he was easier in company than I was at his age. Fifteen was just about the low point of my time at school. Boy, did I feel useless then.
I lay down on my back with my hands behind my head and looked up at the sunlight that twinkled through the branches of the trees. I wasn't thinking about Gith but I felt the emptiness that meant she wasn't there. Could it be that the reason I had got so keen on her after the accident was that she was fifteen and helpless? Nobody looked after me at fifteen. Except for Ma, and she never fussed over me the way Susie was fussing over Laurie.
'Hello there.' It was my sister-in-law Leece with two of her kids, Tommy and Rachel. I sat up.
'Hi,' I said. I went to introduce Leece to the others but it seemed she knew them already.
'Lovely day,' she said, looking at the sky.
'It is,' Julian nodded.
'Would you like a wine?' Brenda asked.
'No thanks,' Leece told her. 'We have to be getting back.' She turned to me. 'They tell me Anna's up at Ma and Dad's place.'
'Yes.'
'Big deal, eh?'
'Yes. First time on her own.'
'I suggested that she spend the night with us but Ma won't hear of it.'
'It depends where the puppies are,' I said.
Leece laughed. 'Oh, we've got the puppies.' She called the kids, who were chasing each other round a tree.
'Bye, Uncle Ken,' Tommy said.
Rachel waved to me.
I watched them as they walked away.
When the cricket ended, Brenda and Susie packed up the glasses and what was left of the picnic and we started back to where the cars were parked. Brenda and I finished up side by side, a little behind the others.
'Nice way to spend an afternoon,' I said.
'Yes. Kind of English, don't you think? Village green and all that stuff.'
'Yes,' I said. 'Guess that's right.' There were scenes like that in TV shows, only in some of those programmes the peace just hides the nasties going on underneath. A murder in every cottage.
'What are you doing this evening?' Brenda asked.
'Don't know.'
'Would you like to come over for dinner?'
I was going to say no — I should have — but my brain got it wrong somehow. 'Thanks,' I said. 'That'd be nice.'
'About seven. At the café.'
***
BACK HOME I turned on my mobile but there was nothing left in the battery. I plugged it into the charger and got the two numbers out of it. Then I checked them in the LTSA database. Like I thought, the Hiace was registered to Richard Avery Parline, 29 Church Street, Te Kohuna, and the Mitsubishi Delica to Wayne Wyett, 16 Ramp Street.
It was four o'clock by then. I went out and did some gardening for an hour: picked the tomatoes that were ripe and got a couple of lettuces. There were a few small caterpillars on the cabbages so I puffed some derris dust over them. Then I did some general hoeing and weeding. Afterwards I took a shower, dressed myself up in what was sharp gear for me: dark wool trousers and a navy blue shirt. I thought of putting on a tie but figured that would be going too far.
At quarter to six I strolled down to the service station and relieved Pita. He had had a good day. There was a couple of hundred cash in the till and over a thousand had gone through on eftpos and credit cards. I gave him an extra twenty and he was as pleased as.
'Going somewhere?' he asked, waving a finger at my gear.
'Got a date,' I said. It felt a weird thing to say but I guess it had to be true. What the hell was I doing going on a date?
'Have fun. Don't do anything I wouldn't do.' He laughed. 'That'd leave you pretty free, eh.'
I put the money in the floor safe and locked the cupboard. On the table was a pad of paper with the top pages folded back. For some reason I started looking at it, flicking the pages. On the second page was Gith's drawing, the earlier one of the face. And then I saw it — the thing I'd been too dumb to see before. This picture was different from the one she'd done later, on the day of the show. That one had no hair. This one had a row of little standy-up spikes. Between picking up Anneke Hesse and grabbing Gith at the show, the bloke had shaved his head. And that put me in mind straight away of Wayne Wyett.
I set the alarm and locked up. Then I strolled back to the house and stood in the quiet there. I felt excited or scared, it was hard to tell which. I started to walk about from one room to another. The kitchen, the back verandah, the living room, down the hallway to the bathroom and the two bedrooms. I stood in the doorway of Gith's room. It was neat as, the narrow bed made, with a red cushion on the pillow, a photograph of her with her parents in a frame on the little dresser, a poster of Danica Patrick on the wall. I felt weird looking at it. It se
emed like a room in a picture book. I thought of the tragedy and pain that was Gith's life and that had become mine. Suddenly I felt real lonely. It was almost like she was dead too, I missed her so much.
I turned away, walked back through the house and out onto the verandah, sat there for a while watching the beginnings of the sunset, the lightening of the sky along the curve of Bobrown Hill and the ridge beyond it, the change from blue to green to yellow and orange. Too much to think about. Had Wyett taken Anneke to the place in Ramp Street? Nobody down there would ask questions. But wouldn't she have worked out what was happening and made a fuss? He couldn't have driven from our place to his without her knowing that she was in trouble. She wanted to go north, not south. And the same was true of the house on Katawai Road.
Around seven I left. There were still three kids outside the takeaway.
'Don't you have homes to go to?' I asked them.
'Yo, Fat Man,' one of them said. It was a girl, maybe twelve years old. Long straggly dark hair and big brown eyes.
'You should be home,' I said. 'It's not safe out here. Especially this time of night.'
She laughed. White teeth.
I turned away. Not much I could do except yell at them, and I figured they would just laugh if I did that. They laughed anyway. I thought of calling Hemi but my mobile was back home, still on the charger.
I walked the length of Main Street to the Arms and went into the bottlestore. The chiller was full of beer mostly, but there was one section with bottles of wine. I looked through the glass at the labels. Lofty Gunning came out from the back.
'You right, mate?' he asked.
'Wine,' I said. 'It's a bit beyond me.'
'Is it white you're after?'
'Guess so.'