The Final Alibi

by Simon King

  “My father was a carpenter.” I suddenly laughed at a memory of my own surfacing, “he would always say ‘if it was good enough for Jesus, then it’s good enough for me’, every time we discussed my job prospects.” She smiled at that, then slowly uncovered the keys. Her fingers began to dance lightly across the white teeth, a soft tinkle dancing around the room. I didn’t place the melody, but it sounded familiar.

  “And your mum?”

  “She lives in Carlton. She’s always been a mad knitter,” I said smiling to myself, “so much so, that she could fully support herself with the money she makes from selling her wares at the Queen Vic market. Not that she needs to though. It’s just one of those hobbies that’s turned into much more.” Her nod told me she knew exactly what I meant. The sounds coming from the old Beale sounded incredible. “You play really well.”

  “Thank you. It’s been a while since I’ve played anything. I really want to teach Jude as well. Carlton, wow. That was my first station after the academy.”

  “Can I ask you a question?” I said, cautiously. She stopped playing for a moment, looking at me. Then she smiled, restarting the melody, and as she slowly began to tinkle the keys, I finally placed the melody. It was “In the Mood” by Glen Miller.

  “Sure, of course.”

  “Is Judith actually your sister?” Her smile vanished, and she stopped playing so suddenly that for a moment I honestly thought she was going to throw me out, the lines on her face becoming pronounced in an instant. I put my hands up in a surrender. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have pried.”

  “No, honestly, it’s OK,” she said, although her frown told me otherwise. “It was just unexpected, that’s all. It’s something that… well, I haven’t really discussed with anyone in so long.” She paused, looking at the piano keys with a look of puzzlement on her face. I waited, unsure of what she was thinking. Then she turned to me, seriousness replacing puzzlement. “Jim, can I trust you?”

  10.

  “Of course. It’s not like I run the local newspaper,” I replied, trying to sound humorous. She didn’t smile at that. Steph looked down at her fingers for a long time, and for a moment, I thought she wasn’t going to answer. And then without any warning, she began to cry, big tears streaming down and splashing onto the piano keys. She tried to muffle her sobs, but they came thick and fast, almost like an overwhelming asthma attack. I felt a little panicked, unsure of what I had opened within her.

  “Steph, I’m so sorry, I didn’t-”

  “No, please, it’s OK,” she said through one hand, wiping away the tears from her cheeks. I went and sat next to her on the piano stool, putting one arm around her shoulders. She leant in and put her head on my shoulder, still sobbing lightly.

  She suddenly forced herself to stop crying, stood and asked me to follow her back to the living room. As we sat back down on the sofa, the fire made her cheeks sparkle, the tears looking like glitter on her face. We sat facing the flames. Steph took a sip from her glass, took another, then held the glass in her lap protectively. It was a good five minutes before she began to talk again, her eyes never leaving the fireplace.

  “His name was Toby Warner. We had gone to school in Ballarat together although he was in a higher class than me. He was a couple of years older than I was. Well, four actually. I loved him, Jim,” she said, looking at me. “Anyway, his father refused to allow us to see each other. They were Jewish and Toby’s father was very strict, demanding his son marry a sweet Jewish girl. It didn’t stop us. I don’t think anything could stop us.” She paused again, staring into the flames, the occasional crackle breaking the room’s silence. “We began to see each other more and more and of course his father opposed us more and more. Then, as if to bless our relationship, I fell pregnant with Jude.” I could see the tears well up in her eyes again, wanted to go and comfort her, then thought better of it. “If only his father had accepted us,” she croaked, her sobbing threatening to start again. She took another sip and regained control.

  “Toby was so happy when I told him. He had, I don’t know, this look of pride in his eyes. He told me we would marry as soon as possible and began to make all these plans.” She paused again and I could see the words stuck in her throat, the raw emotion making it harder for her to talk. Taking another sip then drawing a long, drawn-out breath, she finally continued. “He was going to enlist. He told me that once he was in the army, he would send for me and we could live near the base. We could be a family. His father wasn’t happy, of course. He ended up cutting Toby out of the family entirely. Kicked him out of the house before he had a chance to get any of the plans started. We ended up living with my mum for a brief time while his enlistment went through. All up, it took about 3 months for his acceptance to come through.” She turned to look at me. “You should have seen his face when he read his letter of confirmation, Jim. His face, it,” she hesitated, searching for the right word, one large tear, looking like a Christmas bauble in the fire light, slowly creeping down the side of her face. “it looked like he had just won a brand-new home for us. I guess, in a roundabout way, he had. He picked me up in his arms and twirled me around, that big smile never leaving his face.”

  Steph stood, picked up a log and tossed it into the fire. There was a sparkle of tiny embers that flew slightly out and up, the fireplace giving a couple of snaps and pops, then she settled back into her chair.

  “Did you end up marrying?” I asked, but she slowly shook her head, her eyes staring back into the flames again as they took hold of the new log and slowly licked the sides, gradually enveloping it.

  “Toby left on the bus for Melbourne the following week.” Her voice was now almost a whisper as she fought to contain her emotion within. Judging by the tears, it was a fight she was about to lose. “The doctors told me that he died almost instantly. The bus ran off the road on a bend near Mount Macedon. The driver survived and said there had been a sudden downpour, then a car had passed them a little too close and he had tried to steer the bus away but lost control. It slid sideways, rolled and then slammed into a tree.” The sobs began now, her words becoming almost inaudible. She fought them away desperately, wanting to share her sadness with me. “Toby was flung half out of one of the windows and was trapped between the bus and the tree. I never got to say-” But that was as far as she got, her sobs now putting a halt to any further words she wanted to share. I did the only thing I could think of and removed a handkerchief from my pocket, handing it to her. She accepted it and wiped at her eyes.

  “I’m sorry for your loss. I, too, lost someone close to me when I was about your age.” Steph looked at me, tears still flowing, but they had slowed. “Yes, it’s true. But definitely a story for another day.” I took a sip of my beer and waited for her to regain her composure, which she did relatively quickly, considering her grief. She took a sip of wine then lit a cigarette, blowing the tendrils of blue smoke toward the fireplace. We sat in silence for almost ten minutes before she began to speak again.

  “It was just so dam cruel; you know? There I was, 16; pregnant; in school; living with my mum and the father of my unborn child dead. My mum and I spent many nights talking and crying and deciding what to do. In the end, we decided to have the baby and then move to the city. Somewhere where nobody knew us and there wouldn’t be too many questions asked. For me, I wanted a job where I didn’t have to be constantly explaining the situation. It was my mum that convinced me to just call Jude my sister for the time being. There was really no reason to explain anything to anyone, and once we arrived in Cider Hill years later, people didn’t really know us. My mum never had a huge number of friends around these parts. She stayed home more than anything and when she did venture out, it was Ballarat that she would visit more often than not.” I understood the politics with unwed mothers of newborn infants. I also know that it would have been an uphill struggle to keep the baby in the first place with most being forced to put the baby up for adoption, not that I wanted to open that can of worms.

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bsp; “And now you have a job where you get to ask the questions.” She laughed at that; a sound that made me smile.

  “Yes. I guess that was one of the reasons I wanted to become a police constable. I wanted to ask the questions, not answer them.” She turned to me again, holding her cigarette in one hand. “Thank you for listening, Jim. I’m sorry I put that on you, but I haven’t really ever had the chance to tell anybody before.” I held my hand up, stopping her.

  “Don’t mention it. And I promise you that I will never share it with anybody.” She stood, walked over to me and kissed my cheek. I stood before her and held her close, hugging her tightly. She returned my hug for a moment then pulled away.

  “Ok,” she said, tossing her cigarette butt into the fire, “time to do some work.”

  11.

  Steph led the way back out into the dining room and opened the top box from Crab Apple. She began to pull out its contents a piece at a time, depositing each on to the now almost empty table. There were folders, books, loose bits of papers and more folders. When the box was empty, she threw it into the far corner of the room, and started on the second one. Once that was also empty and discarded of, we began to separate all the items out individually. There were visitor logs, medical records, criminal records, disciplinary files, officer’s logs and daily prison logs. There were folders with specific years from the 30s all the way to the 50s.

  “There certainly is a lot of stuff there,” I said when we had it all separated. Steph picked a folder up and handed it to me.

  “Probably a good place to start?” she said, and I saw it was all the visitor logs that included Lightman’s for the past 20 years. She needed two hands to lift it due its size, at least 5 inches thick. I opened it and discovered page after page of logs, bearing the names of prisoners and visitors.

  “Do you have a pen and some scrap paper I can write on? To take notes. You know, keep track of stuff” Steph nodded, opened a drawer in a desk that sat against the far wall and took out a writing pad. She took a pen from the desktop then handed them to me. I took the folder and sat in one of the chairs, removing the paperwork and began working my way through the stack. Steph opened a folder marked “Officer’s Logs” and sat opposite to me at the table. Our investigation had officially begun.

  Chapter 4: The Trail Begins

  1.

  By the time we were too tired to continue, the sun was already breaking over the far horizon, its rays of bright sunshine creeping between the drawn curtains. I had managed to compile a significant list of people that were of interest, two in particular. One was the reporter that Lightman had already told us about. The other was a man called Clancy Higgins.

  “Clancy Higgins? Isn’t he the school janitor?” Steph had asked as I read the name to her.

  “Unless there is another Clancy Higgins around. And get this. Clancy visited Lightman once a month, every third Saturday, never missing a single time in over 17 years. And then, three years ago he stopped. Just like that.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. Why would he stop visiting? And why was he visiting him in the first place? Were they related?”

  “It doesn’t say. But if I can predict the future, and on this note I think I can with some confidence, I think we’ll probably be visiting Mr. Higgins pretty soon.” I showed her the list of dates when he had been to the prison and she read them with interest, handing it back to me once finished perusing both sides.

  “Think I’ll make a pot of strong coffee. You up for a visit to a Mr. Higgins?”

  “Definitely. What about Judith?”

  “Mrs. Wong is not only my lovely neighbour, she’s also Jude’s nanny. And my cleaner when I need one. And she wakes up every morning before the sun comes up to do her Tai Chi in her back yard.” She went to the window and pulled the curtains apart. “See?” I walked over and saw that the window overlooked her own backyard as well as a clear view over the timber fence and into the adjoining plot. There was a small Asian lady doing some poses on what looked like a tiled surface. She moved gracefully from one position to another as Steph excused herself. I kept looking out the window and saw Steph pop her head over the fence and talk to the woman. She stopped, listened, then nodded vigorously. Steph came back in and went to her room to dress while I went to the kitchen and took care of the coffee situation; hot, black, strong and lots of it.

  2.

  We were on the road ten minutes later. Mrs. Wong had agreed to sit and keep an eye on Judith, still sound asleep while going about some light cleaning duties. She seemed undeterred with the time of day, smiling throughout the requests Steph had made of her. We were headed back to the primary school, sure that Clancy Higgins would already be busy preparing for the day ahead.

  Rather than park in the school car park, Steph parked down a side street, adjacent to the school oval. She pointed Clancy out to me, a man busy scurrying from one rubbish bin to another, pushing a cart before him that resembled a small dump master. He would stop next to a rubbish bin, lift it out of a metal holder, then tip its contents into the trolley. He moved slowly and looked to be walking with a slight limp.

  “Know anything about him?” I asked Steph as we walked in through a small side gate. She shook her head.

  “Nothing except that he’s the janitor here.”

  We could hear singing as we neared him, the man not hearing our approach until we were almost upon him. When he finally did realize our presence, he almost jumped at the sight of us.

  “Clancy Higgins?” Steph asked him and he nodded hesitatingly. He answered with a slow, somewhat laboured voice, as if he found it difficult to speak.

  “Yes. That’s my name.” For a moment he just stood there, eyeing us off. He offered us his hand, remembered that he was wearing gloves and removed one, then re-offered us a handshake which we both returned. He also seemed to talk with a slight impairment, but the main feature that stood out was one of his eyes appearing blind. It was milky white, the eyeball looking tired and worn out, a large cataract covering almost the entire surface. If he decided to wear an eyepatch with the rest of his natural features, I figured he would have looked exactly like a pirate.

  “Clancy, I’m Constable Connor. Do you think we could talk with you for a minute?” He turned his head to her, paused and stared for a moment, then smiled.

  “Sure. I could take a break.”

  “Thank you, Clancy,” Steph replied. She looked around for a bit, then spotted a wooden table and bench near the monkey bars. Beckoning him towards it, Clancy followed her. When we were all seated, Steph on one side and Clancy and I on the other facing her, Steph began to ask him questions, although given that he appeared a bit on the slow side, she kept them short and basic.

  “How long have you been the janitor here, Clancy?” He looked up at the sky and appeared to count in his head. One of his hands lifted a little and I could see the fingers twitching slightly, each one at a time, as if he was numbering them.

  “I think about four years now,” he said after a minute.

  “Do you like it here?”

  “Yes, very much. Mr. Bester says that if I work hard, then it’s a job I can retire on.” He broke a smile at that as if he was actually picturing his retirement.

  “Can I ask you how old you are?” Steph asked. Again, his eyes went skyward, as if calculating.

  “32. No wait,” more calculating, fingers working and twitching, “no, 33. Yes, 33.” Steph smiled at him as he corrected himself and he seemed to relax, his shoulders visibly sagging a little.

  “Clancy, can I ask you about someone? A man you visited up at Crab Apple?” He considered her question for a moment, his expression vacant. Then after thinking about it for a few seconds, something seemed to switch on inside him, as if remembering something from long ago. He also appeared to cringe a little as if recalling something bad.

  “Are you going to ask me about Harry?”

  “Yes, that’s right. Harry Lightman. Do you remember visiting him up at Crab Apple?” He look
ed down at his hands, interlacing his fingers.

  “Is it OK to talk about Harry?” Steph asked and Clancy appeared to wince, although he began to nod a little. I reached out and touched his arm. He flinched, looked up at me, then forced a smile.

  “It’s OK, Clancy. Take your time,” I said to him reassuringly. After a moment his shoulders relaxed again.

  “Sure. I visited Harry. Up in jail.”

  “Yes, that’s right. Clancy, how do you know Harry?” she asked him. He looked at her for a long time before answering as if trying to remember the lines to a play. His lips would begin to move, mouthing silent words, then stop. After a minute he spoke.

  “Harry used to live behind our house. He was a nice man. Used to let me help him fix stuff.”

  “Fix stuff? Like what?” I asked.

  “Harry would always have stuff that needed fixing. He had this motorbike that he loved. He would work on it often and I would hand him the spanner he needed, or clean parts. He even took me for rides on the motorbike.” He grinned widely, revealing several gaps and a couple of leaners. “That was fun.”

  “I bet it was. And you used to visit him a lot, didn’t you?” Steph continued.

  “Yup. Harry showed me how to play Poker. That’s a card game. Harry loves playing cards. ‘Kings and Queens used to play’ he would always say.”

  “Yes, they did. Did you happen to do anything else for Harry?”

  “Anything else?” He thought for a moment. “I brought him books, too. He likes to read. And these.” He pulled out an open packet of Juicy Fruit and held it out to us, showing us the name on the side of the packet. “I love them, too. I always carry a packet. Would you like one?” He took one out and held it out to Steph. She shook her head and when he offered it to me, I accepted. He popped one into his mouth, then smiled as he saw me chew, as if victorious. “Yum, aren’t they?”.

  “What sort of books?” I asked, putting the silver foil in my pocket. He began folding his own foil, this way and that, until it resembled a tiny “W”.