Magpie Hall (25 page)

Rosemary

‘I’ll go and talk to him,’ said Charlie, but he lingered by the telephone table, moving his lanky frame from foot to foot.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’ll go. You just stay there and keep an eye on us.’ I discarded the comforting old rug and dragged myself off the couch. This was my battle, I realised. I wasn’t going to be rescued any more, not by Charlie, or by Sam, or Hugh. This was something I needed to confront on my own.

Josh watched me walk towards him. He rocked on his heels, greeted me with nothing more than a flick of his eyebrows, his cracked lips set in a straight line. I hadn’t been this close to him in twenty years. He still held the basic shape of his youth but his face had sucked up the years and the harsh weather and was deeply lined. His dark hair, shot with grey, was still as thick as ever. He was well
into his forties by now, and gone was the uncertainty he’d had as the orphan farmhand. This was a man in charge of a large station, and of himself.

I glanced back at the house and saw Charlie sitting on the couch, watching. He looked small suddenly, and I could see the little freckle-faced kid he’d been, waiting for his big sister. I couldn’t help thinking that he had let me go so quickly, without any questions. I wondered how much he knew or understood about what had happened to Tess all those years ago. I had never asked him.

‘Josh,’ I said, when I reached him, keeping my distance.

‘Rosemary.’

‘Did you see who killed the magpie?’

He smiled, showing straight teeth, with a veneer of nicotine. ‘I did see, yes.’

‘And do you want to tell me who it was?’

‘I think you know.’

‘Right.’ I folded my arms against the cold. The sun had sunk behind the hills. ‘So it’s been you all along? Lurking around.’

He spat on the ground suddenly. ‘You make it sound so sinister.’

I felt my temper loosen then. ‘Well, fuck, Josh. A dead bird nailed to the door? A dead possum on the doorstep? I’d say that’s pretty sinister, wouldn’t you?’

‘Yeah, I suppose so. Look, I was just trying to scare you. It was a joke, really.’

‘And what’s it all for? I mean, really?’

He wouldn’t meet my eyes. Instead, he focused on the roof of the house, the magpies watching us from the chimneys. What he said next came as a complete surprise. He said it so quietly I was unsure at first if I’d heard him correctly.

‘I loved your grandfather, you know. He was like a dad to me.’

‘You
loved
him?’

He looked at me then, and his face screwed up. ‘I was the one who was here for him. You all just left him to that nurse, Susan. I kept him company, every day.’ He jabbed himself in the chest with a thumb. ‘
Me
. Got behind in my work, too, but he was more important than any of that. You just left him here to die alone.’

I felt blood rushing to my head. ‘That’s not true. How could you say that? I was very close to him.’

‘You
were
close to him. He told me all about it. How you two used to stuff animals together. How you just stopped visiting after … after she died. You all did. It broke his heart. You know, I used to stand outside and watch you all, one big happy family. That night that I got invited in, that wasn’t the first time I’d watched you, and it sure wasn’t the last. But after she died, you all just stopped coming. And he started inviting me in, giving me warm clothes to wear, feeding me. Suddenly I wasn’t the one outside looking in, any more. You just abandoned it all. You abandoned him.’

‘Can’t you see how hard it was for us? For my parents? I didn’t have much say. But I came back to New Zealand to be near him.’

‘But not
very
near. He said that he didn’t know you any more. That he wished you were still a little girl so he could talk to you.’

I thought back to the time we spent together just before he died, how he always wanted to reminisce about my childhood, before Tess. How we talked about my taxidermy job in London, but we never talked about my life as it was right then. But what could I talk to him about? My failed love life? My tattoos? How we both blamed ourselves for Tess’s death?

‘Did he ever talk about her? About Tess?’

Josh hung his head and shook it. ‘Nah, not really. It took him a long time to tell me that he was sending her away that day. He
blamed himself, that’s why. Oh, he was cold about it at first, especially towards me, but when he realised how much I loved her —’

‘You loved her.’ I couldn’t keep the derision from my voice.

He looked at me sharply. ‘Yeah, I did, actually.’

‘But she was just a kid. She was only sixteen. I mean, come
on
. You were an adult. You should have known better.’

He paused, glaring at me. Then he shrugged. ‘I suppose I should of, sure. But I don’t know … she just had this effect on me. I was hooked on her. Like a drug.’

‘Josh, it was twenty years ago. You’ve got a wife now. A family. Don’t they mean anything?’

‘Of course they do,’ he growled. ‘What do you take me for? Tess has nothing to do with them, don’t you see? She’s been bloody well
haunting
me that girl. I see her, all the time. Ever since Percy died and I found out about you lot wanting to get rid of the place.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Get rid of me.’

I gulped, suddenly short of air.

‘What do you mean, you
see
her?’

‘I mean I seen her walking over the hills. Watching me work. I seen her in the tower.’

‘The tower. Is that why you’ve been up there? Have you been sleeping up there or something?’

‘Sleeping? Nah. I just go up there sometimes and talk to her. I tell her about your grandad. About all the things he promised me and how your family has come along to fuck it all up.’

‘And that mattress. What, is that just some kind of nostalgia trip for you? The scene of your last …’ I trailed off. I didn’t want to say it.

‘It was the last place I saw her alive, sure. We were happy. Until you came along.’

‘And what’s this about Grandpa’s promising you things? What kind of things?’

‘That the farm would stay as it was. That I’d always have a job. That the house could be as good as mine. I guess he never thought to put all that stuff in his will.’

‘Of course he didn’t. Don’t be ridiculous. This property has been in our family for generations. Why would he leave it to you?’

Josh said nothing.

‘You’ve been in there while I’ve been staying, haven’t you? You moved the huia that day.’

‘Just looking after the place. Keeping the clock wound. That kind of thing.’

‘Trying to scare me off, you mean.’

He shrugged again. ‘Like I said, just jokes.’ His voice was anything but jovial and there was no trace of mirth on his face. He was deadly serious.

I had nothing more to say to him. The house would be renovated, the farm would be subdivided and sold, he might or might not keep his job. After news got back to the family of how he’d behaved, most likely not. There was nothing I could do about it. I turned to leave, catching Charlie’s eye where he stood in the window, watching us. He gave a flicker of a wave.

‘You didn’t deserve to be here, alone with Tess. I wanted you gone. I wanted her to myself. That’s why I tried to scare you off.’

I stopped, but I didn’t turn around.

He went on. ‘She was coming to see me that day, wasn’t she?’

Still I kept my back to him, looking towards the house, up at the tower. ‘How should I know?’

‘She was coming to see me to say goodbye, because you’d told on her and she was being sent away.’

When I faced him I was surprised to see tears in his eyes. I tried to keep my voice as calm as possible. ‘You’ve got to let it go now, Josh. I was just a kid. Just like she was.’

‘That’s bullshit!’ he exploded. ‘You knew exactly what you were doing. I
knew
it. I knew that very day that it was all your fault.’

‘Stop it,’ I said. ‘It wasn’t my fault.’ I started to cry, lying to myself, lying to Josh. ‘You should have known better! Screwing around with a girl, you were, just a girl!’ I threw myself at him, slapping him in the face. He pulled back in surprise, then punched me in the nose.

The light fractured and I fell backwards onto the cold, muddy lawn. My face throbbed with a tight, sharp pain and blood spurted out onto my lap as I sat there. Josh took another step towards me and for a moment I thought he was going to kick me, but I heard feet pounding the grass and from one side something flew towards him, knocking him down. I thought it must be Charlie, but then I felt soft hands pulling me to my feet, and my brother embraced me while Josh fought on the ground with somebody else.

Sam.

Their limbs windmilled as Sam scrambled on top of the much bigger man. Charlie tried to pull me away as they rolled together on the ground, swapping weight and power until finally they came to a stop with Josh pinning the farmhand down. Sam bucked and arched his body, trying to throw him off. It was futile.

‘Just quit it!’ Josh yelled at him. Sam went limp. He glanced at me, eyes wide, and flicked his head in the direction he had come. I looked. His rifle lay a few metres from where the men now eyeballed each other like dog and sheep. Feeling sick and dizzy, my feet curiously light, I stepped out of Charlie’s grasp and picked up the gun. I pointed it at Josh, but I was too scared to put my finger anywhere near the trigger. I prayed that the safety catch was on.

‘Get off him,’ I said to Josh. His head turned slowly to look at me. He loosened his grip on Sam’s wrists, but he looked amused, rather than alarmed.

Charlie, on the other hand, looked terrified. ‘Put it down, Rose,’ he said. ‘What the hell are you doing?’

Freed, Sam turned on his side and scrambled to his feet. He got to me in two strides and placed both hands on the gun, keeping it pointed away from any living thing. ‘You okay?’ he asked. I nodded. Blood was running into my mouth and stars danced in my vision for a few seconds afterwards.

‘This is bullshit,’ said Josh, as he rose slowly, knees and hands crusted with mud. He hesitated, looking at me. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, then turned and strode away.

We watched his broad back disappearing towards the gravel road, where, in the last of the dim light, I could see his quad bike parked behind a tree. Hidden.

‘What were you arguing about?’ asked Sam, but Charlie pushed him aside and tilted my face with a finger on my chin.

‘No time for that,’ he said. ‘I think it’s broken. Let’s get you to the hospital.’

‘Yes, Dr Summers.’ I looked at Sam. ‘Thanks.’

He helped me to the Mercedes and sat with me while Charlie gathered together some warm clothes and a few of my things. As I caught the blood with a towel, it stained the white cotton with Rorschach patterns. It was getting harder for me to see, and when I looked in the rear-view mirror, it was obvious why. The delicate skin around my eyes was turning purple and puffing out like jellyfish. I lay back in the seat and closed my eyes. Colours swirled and pulsed in time to the waves of pain. When Charlie emerged, he shook Sam’s hand awkwardly.

‘Can you keep an eye on the place, mate?’ he asked. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

‘Are you going to call the cops?’ Sam asked.

‘I don’t know. That’s something Rose and I will have to talk about.’

I wound down my window and held out my hand. Sam took it in both of his. Mine was freezing but his were on fire, warming my blood.

‘Can you stay? In the house? It needs to be looked after.’

‘Sure I can,’ he said, and smiled. He squeezed my hand. ‘Don’t you worry about a thing.’

The Mercedes rumbled into action. Charlie pulled away slowly and I wound the window back up. It was almost dark now. The sky still held stubbornly to its indigo light, but the hills were a solid black. The stark, bare trees were silhouetted, every twig sharp, and the house loomed huge behind us. The magpies watched us go.

I think I knew that would be the last I saw of Magpie Hall in its present state. As I sat under the harsh lights of the hospital emergency room, waiting to be seen by the doctors, I mentally walked through the house and said goodbye to all its rooms. I started in the entrance hall and moved past the great dining hall, with its impossibly long table and matching straight-backed chairs, through to the living room, with its dust and soft, peeling furniture and sagging wallpaper. I moved down the hallway, stopping in the gold-walled smoking room, lined with more insects and butterflies, past the mildewy damp bathroom with its railway-like tiles and stained bath, to the kitchen, the heart of the house. The library was still and quiet as usual, the bookshelves
leaning in and enclosing the room. I lingered in the menagerie room, whispering to the animals and the cases full of grotesque specimens that I would be back for them, that they would find a new home. I said goodbye to Grandpa, who looked up from the rabbit we had been working on, and gave a waggle of his false teeth to make me laugh. Up the stairs over black carpet, so thick it had hardly worn in years, and down the passage to the red room, my grandparents’ bedroom with frilly bedspreads and faded floral curtains covering the huge arched windows, diminishing them somehow.