22
The following day we flew back to Sydney. After a night of deep sleep I’d woken with a general sense of suspended reality, as if I hadn’t quite surfaced from an intense dream. This feeling continued as the little plane rose up into the bright air above the island and banked to the south-west, giving me one last panoramic view. I could make out the white threads of surf along the line of the reef, the shadow of a cloud passing over one of the Admiralty Islands, a tiny boat lying off Neds Beach. And then, as we climbed higher, I caught sight of Balls Pyramid away to the south, stark and solitary. Had we really stood on top of that, Anna and I, just a couple of days before?
I glanced at her sitting beside me, reading an article in the in-flight magazine about adventure holidays in Tibet, and I smiled to myself, feeling a glow of affection for her. I imagined her going back to the Walter Murchison Memorial Nursing Home, readjusting to the grubby realities of ordinary life, and I suddenly realised how much I would miss her constant presence when we got back. She closed the magazine with a sigh, and dug a book out of her pack-a murder mystery, naturally.
The surge of people at Sydney airport roused me from my dreamy state like a slap in the face. We fought our way through the crowds to the entrance to the rail station and caught a train into Central. Anna had a twenty-minute wait for a connection to Blacktown, and I bought us coffees and sat with her, reluctant to leave. I guessed that she was feeling something similar. She’d said hardly a word that morning and now she stared at her hands, still raw and swollen from the climbing, and shook her head.
‘It’s hard to believe,’ she murmured.
‘Yes, like a dream.’
She looked at me with a frown. ‘We haven’t talked about what we’re going to do now, Josh.’
A strident voice chanted something incomprehensible over the loudspeakers and the people at the next table jumped to their feet and hurried away.
‘No, we haven’t, have we?’ I think we had both been doing our best to avoid it. Perhaps we hoped that a return to the reality of our home turf would put what we’d learned into some kind of perspective, so that we could separate fact from fantasy.
‘Damien is going to have to be confronted,’ I said.
‘I suppose so.’ Anna sounded as tired as I felt. ‘Do you think he’ll deny everything?’
‘Luce’s climbing gear is still out there on Balls Pyramid. The police would find it if they tried to check our story.’
Her frown became deeper, wrinkling those black eyebrows together. ‘It would destroy his career if we made public what Bob told us, wouldn’t it?’
‘Very likely he’d go to jail. Marcus too. Maybe Bob. It’d be a big scandal.’
We sat in silence, then I said, ‘I can talk to him on my own if you like. He might say more if there aren’t any other witnesses around.’
She looked at me, uncertain, a bit worried. ‘You wouldn’t …?’
‘What?’ I laughed. ‘Stick matches up his nails? Don’t worry, I’d just talk to him.’
‘Right. You’d be careful, wouldn’t you?’
‘Course.’ I looked up at the clock. ‘Your train’ll be in soon.’
She finished her coffee and got to her feet, made to pick up her pack, then changed her mind and suddenly flung her arms around me. ‘Thanks for everything, Josh,’ she whispered.
‘Hey, we made a great team, didn’t we?’
She nodded and broke away. I watched her hoist her pack onto her shoulder and wave goodbye. She mouthed some final message, but it was drowned out by another announcement on the loudspeaker.
Mary broke off her baking to give me a big hug, too, Socrates circling us excitedly, tail thrashing. I was surprised by how good it felt to be back, to take in the familiar kitchen smells again, and some other deeper, more elusive scent, of old timber perhaps or ancient polish, that seemed to impregnate the whole house.
‘And did you find what you were looking for, dear?’
I gave her the sanitised version I’d prepared, how we’d visited the place where Luce had had her accident, and spoken to the islanders involved, and how kind and helpful everyone had been.
‘That’s good,’ she said, pushing her hair back from her forehead and leaving a smudge of flour. I sensed her relief. ‘Now you’ve laid the past to rest, you can move on. I’m sure that’s what Lucy would want.’ I realised she must have been worrying about this.
‘You’re right. I’ve been thinking I should start looking at the job pages. I’ve been sponging off you for long enough.’
‘Don’t be silly. I’d be lost without my live-in handyman. The bulb blew in that high ceiling on the stair the other night, and I haven’t been able to change it. But you’re right-you should be thinking about your career. And Anna …’ she added cautiously, ‘she’s happy after your trip?’
‘Yes,’ I said casually. ‘As happy as she’ll ever be. I think she just needs excuses to get away from that nursing home,’ and I launched into a lurid description of the place.
Mary laughed. ‘Well, we’ll all end up there, or somewhere like it, in the long run.’
I unpacked my bag, and found that the sole of my right climbing shoe had split. I threw the pair away, deciding that my climbing days were over, then put a load in the washing machine, and phoned Damien.
‘Ah, Josh, you’re back?’ He sounded wary. ‘How did it go?’
‘Good. I need to talk to you, Damien.’
‘Of course.’ He didn’t sound surprised. I wondered if Bob Kelso had already phoned him. ‘Lauren’s going out tonight with her sisters. Why don’t you come round? We can talk in peace.’
I spent the afternoon catching up on my chores, replacing the light bulb, finishing off the bit of paving I’d been repairing on the terrace, pruning some dead branches in the lilly pilly. And I did check the employment pages in the Herald. I looked at the banking and financial sections, and also contemplated a couple of academic positions, but I didn’t get as far as applying. I thought I’d hold off contacting Damien’s friend.
I got to his front door soon after eight. He buzzed me in and met me on the landing of the twenty-eighth floor as before, and took me into his flat.
‘Drink? Scotch?’
‘Thanks.’ I watched him as he fixed them, thinking how amazingly well he’d done in such a short time. Surely he couldn’t have been in practice much more than a year? Two at the most. Already I thought he was beginning to cultivate those little quirks that some lawyers like to affect-a flamboyant curl to the hair, a mild extravagance of dress-to make them distinctive, even a little eccentric. He had great survival qualities, I thought; ambitious, focused, intelligent and charming.
‘Here.’ He handed me the tumbler and sat down opposite me. ‘Cheers.’
‘Cheers.’
‘So … your trip.’
‘Has Bob Kelso spoken to you?’
‘Indeed. He told me about your little adventure. Pretty impressive, actually. He said you got to the top of Balls Pyramid. Amazing. You must be in better shape than I thought. Anna too.’ He grinned. ‘Bob phoned me as soon as he’d put you on the plane back. The poor bloke was worried. It wasn’t his fault. He just got caught up in something he wished he hadn’t.’
I didn’t say anything, watching his face, his body language.
‘He said you found a note.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Can I see it?’
‘I haven’t got it here.’
‘Well, what did it say?’
‘I’d rather hear your side of the story, Damien.’
He looked rather pained. ‘You don’t have to be like that, Josh. From what Bob said you’d pretty much worked it out anyway.’
‘Go on.’
‘About the eggs, right? It was true. Marcus had been collecting eggs for sale to dealers for some time apparently.’ He saw the look on my face. ‘I know! It sounds incredible, Marcus of all people. The thing was that, brilliant scientist as he no doubt was, he was pretty hopeless at getting research money. He was arrogant, he thought the review process demeaning, and he’d managed to offend or personally insult just about every one of his peers at one time or another. As a result he wasn’t very successful with his grant applications. So he decided to supplement his research money by selling eggs. The way he put it to us, his birds were helping him save their necks by making a small contribution. He insisted the numbers were small, and made no difference to the breeding populations.’