Outside the Crays’ house in Paddington he tried to settle his hands so they didn’t shake. He wouldn’t stay, not unless she wanted him to. He was sure she wouldn’t. But she might. She might want to talk about what he knew about Cray, what he had been like in those last weeks. He had prepared a speech in case she wanted to know how he’d died. He wouldn’t lie, but he wouldn’t tell everything, he wouldn’t tell how Cray had known he was going to die, had seen it coming over the tops of the trees, had died with no one touching him, just one man with a smashed knee watching it happen from across a clearing. In any case she might just ask him to go away.
The house was pale pink with a large blooming jacaranda outside and he felt happy that he’d brought the right cake. There was a French-style balcony halfway up and on it a wooden rocking chair, still and solid. He watched it. He wondered if Lena still sat in it, if she spent the long summer evenings rocking their baby against her chest, if she listened to the flying foxes in the jacaranda tree and wondered about Cray and wondered what next?
He shrugged his shoulders, trying to loosen his shirt collar as he stood at the front door. He knocked and somewhere inside he heard a baby crying. He exhaled long and hard, breathed in through his nose, knocked again, hoped he didn’t sound too impatient. Footsteps inside. He swallowed all he could, hoping an empty mouth would help him speak. The door opened a crack and a woman, older than he’d expected, looked out, her hair in curlers and a cigarette in her mouth.
‘Mrs Cray?’
‘No. What do you want?’
‘Is Mrs Cray in?’
‘Who are you?
‘I’m a friend of her husband’s.’
The woman looked him up and down, not in a friendly way, but not either in an unfriendly way, just in a way that suggested she was very tired and wished he hadn’t come. The baby cried again. ‘Look. I’m sorry,’ she said, the howls inside distracting her. ‘Lena isn’t here. I’m her sister. Lena died.’
‘What?’
‘She put her head in the oven after Paul. I’m sorry to be the bearer — I really am, but she left a baby behind and it’s crying, so if you don’t mind?’
‘Of course not.’
He stepped back and the woman nodded and closed the door. Leon heard her footsteps getting fainter inside. He hadn’t known Cray’s first name was Paul.
25
As he neared the end of his track, Frank saw that something was wrong. The stove was tipped over on to its side, its legs in the air like an upturned beetle. An empty car was parked outside the shack and the front door was wide open. As he pulled up he saw the vegetable patch had been dug out, splints snapped in half, Sal’s careful chicken wire flattened.
He got out of the truck and spat on the ground. What the fuck now? What else, possibly?
He left the door to his truck open and moved quietly up the steps. Kirk, alone, warbled in a nearby tree.
‘Thanks a bunch, mate,’ he muttered.
Inside was as much of a mess as his few possessions would allow. His bed was turned on its side, the fridge door hung open, the sugar figurines were upended, arms and legs turned to dust on the floor.
His ears strained and his fists clenched at his sides. He looked around for something hefty to grab hold of, but there was nothing — the machete was missing from its stump.
A bird flew behind him and he whipped round, ready to swing.
‘I need you to come with me, mate.’
All the blood in his body dropped to his feet and he breathed out long and slow. It was Linus.
‘Jesus. What is it?’ He wanted to be able to sleep lying down for a long time.
‘I need you to come with me.’
‘Where to?’
‘Police, mate.’
‘Why? What’s happened?’
‘I’ll explain on the way, mate.’
‘Tell me now.’
‘Haydon’s kid is missing.’
Frank opened his mouth but didn’t speak. Something heavy held him on the spot, like he’d been eating sand.
‘We’ll take my car, eh?’ said Linus, bouncing down the stairs and dumping himself in the driver’s seat.
Frank joined him, but in slow motion like his bones were soft and not his own. ‘How long has she been gone?’
‘As long as you bin away.’
‘What?’
Linus kept quiet. Frank searched for something else to ask. ‘Did she run away?’
Linus looked at him, then back at the road. ‘No one’s sure of anything yet. All that’s news is that we’ve been trying to get hold of you for as long as she’s been away.’
‘What do you mean by that?’
Linus held his look in the rear-view mirror. ‘I don’t think you did it, mate. That’s why I’ve come down here. Soon as we get youse to the cops, soon as they can get some sort of alibi.’
‘Did what? You think I’ve got her?’ He blinked hard, tried to think. ‘This is stupid,’ he said softly.
‘Didn’t I just say I don’t think you did it?’ They passed by the roundabout and the boy he’d seen on that first day with the book was there at the side of the road with his back to them. ‘You’ve got to admit, though, it is a coincidence — Ian’s girl and then Sal. And you haven’t been here long.’
‘Do Bob and Vick think it was me?’
Linus looked back at the road. ‘Bob and Vick don’t know which way is up. They both want to beat the living shit out of everyone.’
Frank thought he might be sick.
Linus wobbled the car a little, anticipating a jump from a wallaby at the side of the road. ‘Where’s your machete, Frank?’
‘What?’ He looked at Linus, but Linus kept his eyes on the road. ‘I don’t know! Jesus, what are you about? Machete? Fuck.’ He ground his hands into his eyes to try to make his brain work.
‘Where’ve you bin, then?’
‘I went to see my old man.’
‘I thought you said he was dead.’
‘No. That was a lie. I just haven’t seen him in a long time.’
‘Okay then.’
They drove the rest of the way in silence. He kept his eyes wide open, as if by really looking he might be able to work out what the hell was going on. Linus glanced at him from time to time, then looked away.
The police officer asked all his questions as if Frank were a naughty kid. He was a man who thought highly of his own eyebrows, he seemed to think they had a touch of the dry wit about them. He repeated everything that Frank said, which made it sound less and less plausible.
Frank wanted to smack him in the mouth. ‘I went to see my father.’
‘Yes, you went to see your father. His phone number?’
‘I don’t know it.’
‘You don’t know it?’
‘No.’
‘You don’t know your own father’s telephone number?’
‘No.’
‘No.’
‘I have his address.’
‘You have his address, but not his telephone number?’
‘Yes.’
‘Yes.’
The officer looked at the piece of bar mat June had written the address on and raised his eyebrows even further up his head. ‘Roedale? That’s a long way to get in three days.’
‘Yes.’
‘So. If I speak to your old man. In Roedale. He. Will tell me. That you were with him. Over the last three days?’
‘No, look, he won’t because I didn’t see him.’