Питер Ловси - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 152, Nos. 5 & 6. Whole Nos. 926 & 927, November/December 2018

Patricia kissed Bob gently on the cheek. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be able to get away from work,” she said. “Come in, sit down.”

Ray nodded and shook Bob’s hand. The two men sat down at the dining table and made small talk — first about the weather, then about the upcoming cricket match between Australia and South Africa. Ray normally felt at ease around Bob, but tonight he was conscious that everything he said sounded stilted. Patricia fussed around them, arranging place mats and cutlery, and pouring wine into glasses, before finally sitting down herself.

“So,” she said, “you’ll have to give us an update on the murder.”

Ray made a disapproving face. “Patricia, he can’t talk about the case.”

“Well, I’m not asking him to reveal anything top secret,” Patricia said pointedly. She turned back towards Bob. “Jolene and I were just talking about the DNA screening earlier. That’s big news, isn’t it?”

“You’re telling me,” Bob said, leaning back in his chair. “Although I’m not sure if it’s worth the trouble, to tell you the truth.”

“What do you mean? I think it’s a great idea.” Patricia said. “Thank goodness Talia’s away at uni or I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night.”

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for it in theory,” Bob said. “But half the town’s in a flap about it and now some upstart lawyer’s making a fuss about... now, what did he call it? Civil liberties, that’s it.”

“Civil liberties?” Patricia said, cocking her head. “The civil thing to do when someone’s been murdered is to help the police solve the crime.”

Ray cleared his throat to speak, but immediately decided against it. He stuck a toothpick in an olive and was just about to put it in his mouth when he realised that both Patricia and Bob were staring at him expectantly.

“Oh,” he said. He looked down and noticed that his leg was jiggling again. “I was just wondering—”

Patricia and Bob exchanged a quick glance. “Well, spit it out, love,” Patricia said.

“I was just wondering,” Ray said, trying to sound casual, indifferent, “about this cold-case business in the newspaper.”

As their eyes met, Ray thought he detected a flash of suspicion on Bob’s face. Could he know? He felt the black, inky liquid bubbling up inside.

“Hmmm. Well, these detectives from Sydney aren’t exactly keeping me in the loop,” Bob said, rubbing the stubble on his chin. “But it could have something to do with that murder back in the eighties.”

“What, here in Eden?” Patricia said, startled.

“Yeah. A young Aboriginal girl. They found her body over in Ben Boyd National Park.”

“And they never caught who did it?” Patricia said.

“No. From what I’ve read, the police at the time didn’t take it too seriously. I don’t know, if she’d been a white girl, it probably would have been a different story, but you know how things were back then.” Bob sat forward in his chair. “You’ve lived here all your life, Ray. You’d remember that case, surely?”

Ray felt as if his heart had come untethered. It was beating in places it shouldn’t be and the room had become uncomfortably hot. He looked around, wondering if he should open a window. “No,” he said. There was a pounding sensation in his throat and he had trouble getting the word out. “No.” He said it louder this time and shook his head, perhaps too vigorously, he thought.

“Ah well,” Bob said, picking up his glass of wine. “Anyway, the next couple of weeks are going to be a bugger. I thought I had my work cut out for me with a murder investigation. Now I’ve got to get every single man in town to come in and give a swab. It’s going to be like herding cats, I reckon.”

“Well, Ray can come by the station tomorrow and do his. Set an example.”

“What?” Ray looked at Patricia. His heart was thrashing and flipping, and his stomach had begun to churn.

“Well, we have to go to the Safeway anyway.”

“I can’t—”

“What, is retirement keeping you too busy, mate?” Bob said, laughing. “No, seriously, I’d appreciate it. A lot of the men in these parts look up to you, so you’d be doing me a favour.”

“No, I just — Marjorie, in Queensland...” Ray trailed off.

“Maijorie? What are you talking about? You’re making no sense, love.” Patricia looked at Bob and smiled. “Don’t worry, he’ll be in tomorrow afternoon.”

Bob winked. “If you worked at the station, Patricia, there’d be men lining up around the corner to give swabs.”

Ray stood up and swayed slightly.

Patricia, who had been giggling, looked up at him. “What’s the matter, love? You look clammy.”

Ray held out an arm to indicate that he was all right. “It’s nothing,” he said, but he could hear that his voice was shaking. “I’ll be back in a minute.” He made his way to the bathroom, touching his hands to the wall as he walked.

“I hope you haven’t picked up that bug that’s going around,” Patricia called out after him.

Inside the bathroom, Ray locked the door. He leaned over the sink and gagged but only a small amount of saliva came out. He splashed his face with water and sat down on the toilet seat. He tried to calm himself, but it was impossible. His kept thinking about that night. About Jeannie. Suddenly he saw a flash of Pete, drunk and leering, opening his bedroom door.

“What have we got here? Who’s your little friend?”

“Get out.” That’s what he had said back then and he found himself saying it again now. And as he said the words out loud, other memories started to return, beating down on him like waves in a squall: Jeannie startled, sitting up in bed. Pete pushing her back down again, unzipping his jeans. Shane and Darren licking their lips, like hungry feral dogs. Ray telling Pete to get off her and Pete turning, threatening him with a fist. And Ray walking away, not wanting to hear her jarring screams.

He saw himself walking over to the phone. He was going to call the cops. But on his way, he passed an old photo of his mother. Pete, a toddler, was sitting on her knee. She was beaming down at him, her eyes sparkling. And remembering how frail and skeletal she looked in those last few days, he went outside instead. He spent the rest of the night on the porch, and as he watched the rain wash over the escarpment below, he was sure it had taken some part of him with it — the only part he liked.

When dawn broke, when Jeannie’s cries had stopped, he thought it was finally over. But then he heard Pete swear and hushed voices coming from inside. Something wasn’t right. He made his way to his room, trying to think of what he could say — what he could do — to make things up to Jeannie. He opened the door slowly, warily. The first thing that hit him was the smell of sweat. His brother was walking around the room in circles, clutching at his head. Shane and Darren sat on the floor, looking dazed. Ray shifted his gaze to the bed — Jeannie was lying naked, bruised, and still, the sheets around her stained with blood. At first he thought she was asleep, but when she wouldn’t wake, he turned to Pete.

“What have you done?” he said. “What the hell have you done?”

He could see Pete’s mouth moving, but all he heard was a buzzing noise. At some point he must have asked the others to leave the room, because soon he found himself alone, wrapping Jeannie’s body in an old red blanket — he didn’t want them touching her again. And as the sun emerged from the Pacific, he and Pete drove in silence all the way to Ben Boyd National Park and left her body in the bush, the ground still damp and muddy from the storm.

Over the years, Ray had often consoled himself with the fact that he hadn’t been the one to rape her, to kill her. “It wasn’t me,” he would think. “It wasn’t me.” But now all he could see was that he’d walked away — walked away from Jeannie while Pete pinned her down, walked away from her body in the dirt. And in that moment, he decided that he wouldn’t walk away again. He would take the test the following day. He’d have enough time to get things sorted like he’d planned. And then what? Well, he’d have to wait and see.