Nest (6 page)

Where once she had thought the whip crack and the answering call the extent of their repertoire, she now appreciated the full range of their chat and fuss. They were highly strung birds, with their flat-crested heads and so much furtive, darting movement from one bit of cover to the next. It was a shame they couldn’t relax a bit, feel safe; she was no predator.

At first it had been distracting to hear so many birds while drawing another, like trying to recall the tune of a song when something else was playing. Now, though, they all chattered away as one community, from the same songbook. From her
forest. One would come to the centre of her attention for a while and the others flit back into the background.

The robin was always there, as if at the edge of her internal clearing, peering down from the side of a tree, defying gravity, in her consciousness just as they were in the real world, popping up wherever she looked. They were rarely still, however, which was why they were so damn hard to draw.

Sometimes pencil on paper was a magical thing – and birds flew out. Other times they were just marks, her hand an inadequate tool. Today was a good morning, she could tell by the sound of the lead across the page. Everything had aligned at last. A robin’s eye looked back at her. Dark and inquisitive.

‘T
hanks for coming in, Ms Vogel.’

‘It’s Anderson.’ She swallowed a mouthful of water, which was, thankfully, refrigerated. The station house was not. It was only manned once a week, and most of that time they were out in the car, so she supposed proper air-conditioning was not considered a worthwhile investment. Or perhaps times had changed less than she liked to think in the state, and police still felt the need to make people sweat.

He frowned. ‘You’re unmarried. Is that correct?’

‘Yes.’ A crime of sorts, no doubt. A woman who could not hold a man.

‘But you’ve changed your name.’

‘I draw birds.
Vögel
means bird, in German,’ she said. ‘It seemed a bit much, you know?’ Someone at art school had been generous enough to say something before the exhibition had opened. She’d had to run around to change it in time for the program printing and had chosen Anderson without much thought.

‘Right,’ he said. ‘As you’ve probably heard, we’re investigating the disappearance of Caitlin Jones.’

‘Yes.’

‘We’re pursuing any possible connections to the disappearance of Michael Wade,’ he said. ‘It’s all a long time ago now, but we wanted to ask you a few questions.’

It had happened before either of the policemen were born, which was going to make things tedious. Surely they could have wheeled out an old-timer who had some memory of the case and the times. Or at least a local cop. These two were from down on the coast, and one of them not long out of police college.

‘Yes.’

‘Michael was in your class at school?’

‘Yes. Grade seven.’

‘And it was June fourteen he went missing.’

‘He went missing June twelve. June fourteen was when he was officially declared missing.’

‘Right.’

She finished the water in her glass and waited while the younger fellow refilled it from the misted jug on the table between them.

‘Thank you.’

‘And your father went missing on that same day?’

Jen looked out the window. Shook her head. ‘The fourteenth, yes.’ At the time, Aunt Sophie had tried to reassure her, insisting there was no connection. But people thought it and said it, and that was more than enough for most of the kids at school. Most of the town. Half a lifetime later and here she was again, in the same damn place. What had made her think she could ever feel at home here?

‘Where did he go, do you think?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I was twelve.’

‘What about your mother?’

‘I don’t think she knew anything.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘There were a lot of bills. Loose ends,’ she said. ‘If she could have referred people to him, I think she would have.’ In truth, her mother had been too heartbroken to do much about the bills, but she would have gone after him if there had been any sort of hope.

Jen kept her hands in her lap, channelling a stillness she didn’t feel. There was blood around the cuticle of her right index finger. She placed her left hand over the right; it was never good to have blood on your hands in a police station. It was her own, but they didn’t need to see it.

He cleared his throat. ‘And he never tried to contact you.’

‘No.’ Outside, lorikeets fussed in the palms, dropping sticky seeds onto the roof of the police vehicle in the driveway with a satisfying thunk.

The officer took a long time to write three words:
no contact since.
‘Have you tried to find him at all, over the years?’

‘The electoral roll, phone directory, Google, you name it.’

‘No luck?’

‘No.’

‘When was that?’

‘Started in the nineties,’ she said. ‘On and off till a few years ago.’ More recently, she had been checking each state’s death records, though without much enthusiasm.

He glanced at the other officer, still taking notes. ‘Any reason why you stopped?’

‘I figured that if he was alive, he didn’t want to be found,’ she said.

The officer chewed his pencil. From its mangled shape, the habit was not a new one. He picked a flake of paint from his lip.

‘The police looked for him at the time,’ she said. ‘They didn’t find him either.’

‘Are you aware of any other names he might go by?’

‘No.’

‘Everyone called him Peter?’

‘Yes.’ They knew the answers to the questions; where was this going?

‘But that was his middle name?’

‘His first name was Mallory. He was teased as a child – people said it was a girl’s name.’ Perhaps if he had kept it, he might have had the courage to climb a few more mountains.

‘And his mother’s maiden name?’

‘Dent.’ She had searched using that name, too.

‘And you’ve never received any gifts or money over the years?’

‘No.’

‘Not even a birthday present? When you were a child, perhaps?’

‘Nothing.’

‘How did your mother support the two of you?’

‘A second mortgage on the house. Benefits. And my aunt helped out with my expenses.’

‘No one else?’

‘Not to my knowledge,’ she said. Not until her mother had hooked up with the Brethren.

He tapped his pencil on his notebook. ‘Do you think your father is still alive?’

‘He’d be in his seventies,’ she said. ‘And it was a hard life – all the physical work, I mean.’

‘Is that a no?’

She shrugged.

‘So you last saw your father on the morning he left?’

Jen spilled a little water on her pants, leaving a dark spot. ‘I said goodbye before I went to school.’

‘Nothing out of the ordinary?’

‘No.’ His hands had been shaking and, looking back, his hug might have been a little longer than usual, but that could just be her turning a childhood memory into a sentimental film.

‘And when you got home from school, how would you describe your mother’s behaviour?’

‘From what I remember,’ Jen said, ‘she was a mess.’

‘Go on.’

‘She was distressed, upset. Not coping. Her husband had left her, the phone had been cut off, and there were bills to pay.’

‘She was clear that your father had left?’

‘Yes.’

‘Was there a note? Something for you?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Had they had a fight? How had things been between them?’

‘I was not aware of anything out of the ordinary.’ She swung her feet as if she were still twelve. Through the smeary window, Jen watched cloud sneaking in from the west; a thunderstorm tonight perhaps. It was a mild form of torture, shut in a small hot room in the middle of the afternoon, having all her deficiencies pointed out by a couple of men young enough to be her sons – and given enough water to push a middle-aged woman’s bladder to its limits. It was worse than sitting in the shrink’s office. Though he at least had air-con.

The water cooler gurgled as the sergeant refilled the jug. ‘Do you need a break?’ he asked. ‘I know this isn’t easy. We’re just trying to get a sense of what happened back then.’

She crossed her legs. ‘I’m fine,’ she said.

‘Were you aware your parents used drugs?’

Jen sat up straighter in her chair. There was an agenda here, despite what they said, and she needed to pay more attention. ‘Not as a child. I learned later that they smoked marijuana recreationally,’ she said. ‘Like most of their generation around here.’

The corner of his mouth twitched. ‘How did you become aware of that?’

‘My Aunt Sophie,’ she said.

‘You went to live with her after your mother was … hospitalised …’ He looked down at his notes.

‘At the end of grade nine.’

‘And you completed school down there?’

‘Yes.’

‘And your mother died three and a half years ago?’

‘Yes.’

‘There was a funeral?’

‘Yes.’

‘Was that here in town?’

She had to work harder now; too long in a hot, stuffy room answering questions designed to irritate. ‘No,’ she said. ‘A service near the nursing home, in Canberra.’

‘Anyone from your father’s family there?’

Jen blinked. ‘No.’

‘We’re nearly there,’ he said. ‘Would you like me to open a window?’

‘That’d be good.’

The younger officer clicked his pen. ‘This boy you tutor, Henry Green. You know his family?’

‘His mother, Kay, answered an ad I put up on the notice-board in town.’

‘In the co-op?’

‘That’s right.’

‘So you hadn’t met his parents previously.’

‘No.’

‘You don’t have any other students?’

‘I wouldn’t have minded a few more.’ By the time Kay had called, Jen had almost given up on the idea. It wasn’t as if she had thought the phone would ring nonstop – but still.

‘Okay, Ms Anderson,’ he said. ‘I think that’s it. Thank you for coming in.’

The other one cleared his throat. ‘If we do … track down your father, either way, would you like us to let you know?’

She tried to catch the feather of childish hope that had taken flight. Chances were the same as they had been this morning: slim to nothing.

‘Sure. That would be good.’

S
he had walked into the wrong part of the pub; every head was turned. It was still that sort of town. She should have gone to the coffee shop, with all the other middle-aged women, but it was a beer she wanted. She could have tried harder, though, to find the entrance to the ladies’ lounge or the beer garden or whatever they were calling the less pubby part of the establishment these days. For a moment, while she stood absorbing the collective stare, she considered backing up, going home. But she had been apologising for her own existence long enough.

She nodded, walked across the room to the bar. ‘Schooner of Gold, thanks,’ she said. She would have preferred a Tooheys New – or better still a Coopers ale – but in the local you had to make some concessions.

The barman placed her change on the towel runner, sat her dripping beer on a coaster, all without meeting her eye. She had a mind to perch on a bar stool, next to the old-timers, to discomfort them further, but in the end she would only discomfort herself.

She retreated to a table by the window, looking back out over the valley, and flipped through the local paper. The men of the town, or those free to drink midafternoon on a Tuesday, went back to whatever version of football was on the green screen that dominated the room.

She drank from the glass and breathed. Stilled her hands. Breathed again, from the stomach. Toughing it out was sometimes only a matter of moments and you were through to the other side.

That was not going to be the case for Caitlin’s parents, on the front page again. They were raising money in some sort of appeal, putting up posters all over the coast. Jen couldn’t help feeling sorry for the girl’s sister, wondering if she was getting the support she would need. The whole town’s attention was on the missing child rather than the one still at home dealing with it.

There hadn’t been nearly as much fuss for Michael. Not that she had been aware of, anyway. They were expected to get on with it and, to a large extent, they had. It had only been after some lobbying by the school captains that they had even been allowed to include Michael in their grade seven graduation, projecting slides onto the wall when he was awarded best and fairest for football and most improved scholar. His sister collected the awards on his behalf, shaking the principal’s hand.

When Jen’s class each went up on stage to collect their certificates, they had to stop, face the audience, thank their parents for supporting them, and mumble about what school they were going to and what they wanted to be when they grew up. Glen and Phil had gone last and second last so that together they could read out Michael’s plan to go on to the local state school and become a pro-footballer or a sports reporter.

The class had cheered Glen and Phil as much as Michael; they had volunteered to do what no one else could. Out of respect for their bravery, and in a somewhat misguided attempt at stoicism, the rest of them had managed, collectively, not to shed a tear. The same could not be said of the largely adult audience. The principal made a speech and presented a special award to the whole class, for citizenship, which had sent parents reaching for a tissue. Jen hadn’t looked at her own mother. She didn’t need to – she knew she would be blubbering.

That night, their class had been united – ‘together forever’ – before breaking for the holidays, scattering to six different high schools, and setting out on much more lonely paths through adolescence.

Jen sipped the beer. Ran her finger through the frost on the glass. Cars pulled in and out in front of the supermarket across the road, most shoppers leaving with a single plastic bag. She counted five young mothers pushing strollers up or down the street. Motherhood hadn’t been part of many life plans in grade seven, but by grade ten it was a reality for some. More so these days, it seemed. But then who was she to judge. Perhaps they were happy, and just as likely to sneer at a barren old spinster.