Fall Girl (19 page)

‘Yes, Dr Canfield ma'am. Not one more word of goats or wells or even cheetahs will pass my lips.' He mimes zipping his mouth closed.

‘Good. Now Glenda. Stop looking at Timothy like that. For God's sake woman, I'm not even cold in the grave. There's a whole Oktoberfest of German backpackers just down the track for your recreational pleasure.'

‘I feel so ashamed,' she says. ‘It's this hairstyle. It's cutting off the blood flow to my brain.'

‘And you, Daniel Metcalf.'

He stands in front of me. His lips are pressed together but his eyes are laughing. ‘Yes Dr Canfield. Ma'am,' he says.

‘You, you,' I begin, but the puff has gone from my anger and there is nothing more I can say. Also the wine seems to have unhooked my arms at the shoulder joints. Just then Timothy struggles to his feet and gives me a clumsy embrace.

‘There there Ella,' he says. ‘Please, don't look so glum. Really. Don't give it another thought. Unfair of me to put you in this position. It's really not as bad as all that. I'm feeling better already. I'm very fond of you, of course, but I'll recover. Never mind. Chin up. You know what they say: better late is the better part of valour.' He presses one arm around my shoulders, and winks at Greta.

The night continues on for about another bottle and a half. Greta grows increasingly giggly. Timothy explains how his father has never understood him, pledges his undying friendship for me, his genuine fondness and manlove for Daniel and Julius and drapes his jacket over Greta's shoulders when he notices she is shivering. Daniel offers to share his tent with Timothy tonight, unless Greta would rather sleep outside under the stars on account of her claustrophobia, an offer she declines as her therapy is progressing well. Daniel seems exceptionally jocular, even joining Timothy in a painful rendition of ‘Summer Nights' with Daniel in falsetto as Olivia Newton-John and Timothy as John Travolta.

Only I am quiet. Sitting still, by the lamp, I hope my face is in shadow and that they cannot see me. I wonder if my father or Ruby was ever in this situation when they were younger, when they were pulling grand stings, living the high life by their wits. I bet they never sat around in the bush hours from civilisation surrounded by drunken lunatics singing songs from the great musicals of the seventies, a decade apparently not distinguished only by the glory of its porn industry.

When we were children we would sit home and wait for Dad and Ruby to return and we would hear only the peaks of their success, not the depths of their struggle. This job is curdling before my eyes. I doubt I will ever see this money and what is worse I cannot seem to stop looking at Daniel. His smallest movement, each tiny gesture. Yet he seems so far away and so does the money. They both seem further with every chorus.

Here is something serious: Ruby, who says I have no memory of my mother, is wrong. I do have one memory. I have never told this to anyone, especially not to anyone who might be able to disprove it, like my father or Sam. I am in a dark quiet room. I am sitting on a soft surface and I fight to balance and not to topple. My hands are gripping thin bars of wood through which my arms will fit but not my head or my body. I shake them but I cannot make them budge. I reach one hand down and pick up something big and soft—a teddy bear? There is a crack of light and I see her face appear. This part shames me: I do not remember her face. Of all the thousands of faces I have seen and memorised over the years, hers is perhaps the only one I cannot recall. Hers, and sometimes my own.

Although I cannot remember her face, I know the sight of her fills me with joy and comfort and peace. I drop the bear and let go of the bar and stretch my arms out—this will make her come closer, I know. All that matters now is being picked up, held by her. But she does not come closer and she does not pick me up. After a time I drop my arms. I grizzle a little from frustration, which seems always to have been part of my character. At this the light disappears and so does the face. That is all I remember.

And here is something flippant: I feel a desperate desire to sneak out of the tent while everyone is asleep. I wouldn't even undo the zip. I would take a pen knife and make a jagged cut in the back of the tent, the side facing the bush. I would hold the knife in both hands and start high and pull it down with my whole weight. In the dead of night I would move silently down the path, past the sleeping Germans, wade the creek and climb the path again by the light of the moon or my torch. Or perhaps I would not climb—I might swim around the headland until I found a spot to land and then I would drag myself ashore. This country of mine has always been a place where people have dragged themselves ashore and begun new lives. I would carry nothing. My new life would not be so exhausting and frustrating as this one.

When this thought first occurred to me it seemed flippant. It certainly does not show a respectful attitude—to my family, to Daniel or even to the tent. But now that I have thought it out in all its detail, this also seems serious. Of course, I do not do it.

The water is still but not still enough and I cannot see my reflection. My arms move across it like ripples in sand. I'm aware I have a certain level of vanity, having been brought up by Ruby, but now that it is morning and I am swimming I realise I have forgotten to bring a mirror.

I woke early, if I slept at all. I changed into my bathers inside the tent and crept down here as the dark was just lifting. There was no sound from our camp, and no sign of life other than Timothy's feet sticking out from Daniel's tent. There was no sound from the Germans' camp as I passed either: most of them had slept in sleeping bags straight on the sand, others only on bedrolls and some against the trees where they were leaning last night. When I first waded into the sea the tree-tops seemed the same colour as the sky but now they are not. They are back-lit. The water seems over-salty; it holds me up. Here I can barely feel the throb of my stiff thighs or the crick in my neck from sleeping on the ground. The air and the water are both cold but I barely feel them. I tilt my face towards the sky. I am floating.

There is a movement on the path; someone is walking down here, bare-chested, carrying a towel. I do not have to look to know that it is Daniel. The water is covering me up to my chin. He strides in from the sand and is beside me in a few easy strokes.

‘If I knew scientists were this much fun I'd have started hanging around universities a lot sooner,' he says. He sculls his hands backwards and forwards, pushing them against the water as if they were webbed.

‘How dare you not be hung over,' I say. ‘It isn't right.'

‘You don't look too shabby yourself.'

‘One voice I can possibly manage. As soon as the birds start or the Germans wake up, I'm in trouble. I feel like there's an angry dwarf sitting on my shoulders and squeezing my ears between his knees. Are the others coming down?'

‘Not yet. Joshua will be OK. Glenda and Timmy…well, I wouldn't want to be in their heads this morning.' He raises one eyebrow, thinks for a moment. ‘Or ever, really.'

I can feel the current his hands make. Small waves jostle my shoulders.

‘I'm not sure what you had planned to do today,' he says. ‘How much work you intended?'

The water has formed small beads on his shoulders and some have nestled in the divot at the base of his throat. I think about what my father would do now. What rule could I rely upon if a person from one life intruded into another, destroying my dignity, transforming me from a seductive femme fatale to an angry flirt worth one and a third goats?

There's always the option of murdering Timothy, and possibly Sam for telling him where I was, and burying them in the apple orchard. The thought gives me some comfort.

‘I had things planned,' I say. His eyes are cool. His mouth is straight. I can read no expression here. I swallow and pray for inspiration. ‘But after our behaviour last night I'm beginning to think I'd be wasting my time.'

This is a final roll of the dice, to give him an opportunity to say
No no, not at all. I'm even more interested in your kooky project now that
I've met your deranged ex-boyfriend and my cheque book is right here down
the front of my swimmers. Do you have a pen? And don't worry about your
fears: I'm not lying. I'm rolling in money and in any case, I really fancy you.

But as soon as I speak I know I have made a mistake. There is no going back from here.

He stretches out on his back for a moment, toes towards the sky, then twists upright again in one quick movement. ‘You're right,' he says finally. ‘You'd be wasting your time.'

For the rest of the morning I carry with me a feeling of calm unlike anything I remember. We have not convinced Daniel we are professional safe hands. This has not been a cheap expedition: there is the cost of everyone's time, but that's just a start. Hundreds of dollars of camping equipment, clothing, books and the rest.

No one will hold me personally accountable. We all agreed to take the risk. Yet I feel it. I should, in fact, feel worse. But now I no longer have to worry about what Daniel is lying about. Now it is out of my hands and I am free of the worry.

All morning Timothy buzzes around me like a fly. He makes tea and delivers my breakfast. He washes the dishes afterwards. He keeps saying, over and over,
I hope I haven't messed up your research
and
there's no need to mention this to anybody else, is there?
He gives me desperate looks, and tries to pull me aside for a private chat, but I want the next time we speak to be dignified, on my side at least. I know I cannot manage this yet. I also suspect he only wants to speak with me to circumvent what is coming to him. When we get back he'll have to face not just me, but my father and Sam as well. Not that Sam is blameless, the moron.

Daniel and I pack our belongings. We will walk out first, as per the original plan. Beau and Anders are waiting on the beach in a reversal of Friday's operation, and will come to the campsite when they see us leave. Timothy will stay and carry equipment too: his penance for stuffing up this sting. He is sheepish when I tell him there will be more for him to carry than his own suitcase. He volunteers to do whatever he can to help.

Daniel and I hoist our packs and are half-way down the beach before I hear a panting behind me. I turn: it is Timothy, running on bare feet over the sand. When he reaches us he leans over, hands on his knees, unable to speak. He must have chased us all the way from the camp. Daniel raises his eyebrows at me and keeps walking. He'll wait for me a little further on, he says. I wait until Daniel is out of earshot, then I turn to Timothy.

‘Well,' I say. ‘Is there something you want?'

‘Yes. Yes there is. I know you have to do this,' he says eventually, his face red and blotchy. ‘I know it's your job, and all that. But I don't think you should. I don't think it's fair.'

I make my hands into fists and restrain myself from raining them down on his empty skull like it was a bongo. What I have to put up with is unbelievable.

‘So, Timothy. You don't like the way I make my living. Since when?'

‘Well. Since last night.'

I poke my finger at his chest and almost break the skin. ‘You, Timothy, are an utter, utter bastard. And you've got a lot of nerve. First you bust in here, uninvited, and mess everything up. And now you're lecturing me on what I should and shouldn't do. If Daniel wasn't just down the beach watching us I'd dig a hole in the sand and put you in it, face first. Your fat head would feed the crabs for days.'

‘Listen Della. This hasn't been much fun for me either, you know. I've never proposed before. To anyone. And I had to sleep in a tent. Or half in a tent. And my feet are very itchy because they were sticking out of the tent all night and they're covered in mosquito bites. I've scratched them so hard I'm bleeding. And I've already said I'm sorry about coming here, to the park. I wasn't thinking straight. I can't undo it. But that doesn't change the facts.' He tucks his shirt into his shorts and straightens his collar, and nods his head up the beach at Daniel. ‘He's a good guy, Della. He doesn't deserve this.'

‘You know better than anybody that there are two kinds of people who always deserve it: the rich and the greedy.'

‘You don't really believe that.'

‘I'll tell you a secret: that's the only thing I do believe. What's this all about, Timothy? You've never minded my job before. In fact I seem to remember that you've even helped us once or twice. And been paid for it. And last night you didn't seem to mind at all.'

‘It's different. Knowing you were a grifter, that your whole family was. That's one thing. But meeting someone who's about to get ripped off. Drinking wine with them. Singing “Summer Nights”. That's another matter entirely.'

‘Well, well Timothy. Maybe singing a duet with Daniel Metcalf has turned your pretty head. Maybe
you've
fallen in love with him. Perhaps I should leave you two alone for a bit of privacy.'

He snorts. ‘Don't be ridiculous. Even if I wasn't one hundred per cent hetero, he's not my type.'

I am about to yell at him again when I see Daniel further down the beach. He has taken his pack off and is sitting in the sand, looking out upon the water. I come closer to Timothy and lower my voice to a growl. ‘You, Timothy, are a hypocrite. What about all the people you rip off ?'

‘That shows how little you know. I don't rip anyone off. For a start, my customers receive excellent value for money. Excellent. Where else can you buy a mobile phone worth hundreds of dollars for ninety-nine ninety-five? Customer satisfaction is what separates me from my competitors.'

‘And what about the people you steal the phones from? They're not quite so fortunate, are they?'

‘But Della, I don't steal from people.' He speaks slowly, and wags his annoying head in my face. ‘I steal from
companies
, and companies, by definition, are not people. Most of the time they don't even notice that the stuff is missing. And if they weren't so stupid, if they put in some decent systems, nothing would go missing at all.'