Peter Corris - Comeback

I was moving slowly past Lot 10 when I heard the roar of a powerful engine. A big, dirty 4WD with a massive bull bar came hurtling at me from a track on the right. I accelerated and swerved but it hit the rear passenger door and spun me around. The seatbelt saved me, but I was jerked this way and that before the car came to a halt.

The 4WD was stopped where it had hit me. The driver’s door opened and a tallish, slim young man got out. Jason Clement limped badly and his body was oddly twisted. He stood staring at me before he approached cautiously. A pistol hung from a lanyard around his neck. I tried to release the seatbelt to reach the gun in the glove compartment but it had jammed and I was strapped in tight. He saw that and didn’t touch the pistol. He tried to open my door but it wouldn’t give.

He made a winding motion and I lowered the window. It only came down halfway.

His voice was pleasant. ‘You all right, Mr Hardy?’

I nodded.

He smiled. An actor’s smile-full of warmth and work with the eyes. ‘Good. I’ve got nothing against you.’

A strong whiff of alcohol came from him.

‘I’m glad of that,’ I said. ‘How about helping me release this seatbelt.’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. It’s over now.’

‘What is?’

He sighed and I could smell the rum. ‘Everything.’

He was looking straight at me but I wasn’t sure he was seeing me. I’d seen that fixed look before on the faces of people who didn’t care what happened to them.

‘It doesn’t have to be like that.’

‘Yes it does. Do you go to the movies, Mr Hardy?’

Keep him talking , I thought. ‘Yes.’

‘I feel. . I feel as if I’ve been in a movie for a long time. Ever since Bobby. .’

‘It’s not a movie. It’s real. You need help, Jason.’

He was leaning against the car because he was drunk and because his body had betrayed him. ‘It’s not real,’ he said. ‘Nothing is real.’

He turned, stumbled. Almost fell and laughed as he regained his balance. He walked back to the 4WD. He turned and said something I couldn’t hear. I’m no lip reader but I think he said two words-‘the end’.

He climbed in awkwardly, one hand lifting his right leg, and made a series of movements to allow him to work the controls. He started the motor and drove off in the direction of his farm.

I was aching down my right side and my left arm and shoulder were numb. It took twenty minutes to restore the feeling, then it hurt and it was a centimetre by centimetre process to dig into my jeans pocket for my Swiss army knife. I sawed through the seatbelt and scrambled painfully across to the passenger door and out of the car. When I decided I could walk I got the gun from the glove box and limped in the direction Jason had taken.

Lot 12 provided an open view down a straight dirt and gravel road to a small farmhouse and a large shed. I headed for a point where a clump of trees fringed the property and I could see across flat, open ground to the buildings. The sky had cleared and the light was holding. There were three vehicles parked nearby-one white car, one red and the dusty 4WD.

There was a cool breeze. I struggled into my jacket and checked the pistol. There was no cover of any kind between the fence and buildings. With difficulty I parted the strands of barbed wire and stepped through. I felt very exposed as I walked across the rough ground, stopping from time to time to check for movement ahead. Nothing. A hundred metres from the house a drainage ditch I couldn’t see from the road ran across the paddock. A little beyond that was a long, flat strip of land about twenty metres wide and running for at least a hundred metres to the south. Wheel marks showed on the closely mown grass. A runway of some kind.

I moved on until I reached the cars. The VW was old and rusty. I glanced inside and saw the same kind of chaos as in Chloe Monkhurst’s bedroom. The white Commodore was dusty but well maintained. The driver’s position was fitted with a hand throttle and a device to help with using the pedals. Same with the 4WD. There was a red paint smudge on the passenger-side bumper bar of the Commodore.

I moved cautiously towards the house. It was an old-style farmhouse, double-fronted with a tin roof and a bullnose verandah supported by sturdy posts. The roof was steeply pitched with two windows. There was no garden or ornamentation of any kind, but the porch and the surrounding area were tidy and swept clean. The front door was standing open but I worked my way around, crouching low as I passed the side windows with the pistol in my hand. No sounds from inside except something being rattled by the breeze.

The shed was several metres off to the right with a stand of paperbark trees affording it some shade. It faced the long runway. It had a skylight but no windows. Its double doors were open and a ride-on lawnmower stood just outside them. I approached it carefully. There was just enough light from the skylight to see a workbench, various bits of equipment and fuel drums inside, all in neat order. Nothing else.

I put the gun in my pocket and approached the back of the house. There was a lean-to with an ancient washing machine and a double cement tub. What used to be called a washhouse. Split wood was stacked in a box beside the back door. I went into the house; everything was clean and tidy and the door moved smoothly on oiled hinges. The kitchen was old style, with a linoleum floor, wood-burning stove, chip hot-water heater, a kerosene refrigerator and an enamel sink. An empty glass sat in the sink. I sniffed it. Rum.

I moved through the house, inspecting the two bedrooms and the sitting room. The bedrooms held double beds and old wardrobes and chests of drawers. The only signs of modernity were in the sitting room, where there was a home entertainment unit with a massive screen and shelves full of DVDs. Two large bookshelves were crammed with books, mostly to do with stage and screen. There were a few on gymnastics and diving. An old-fashioned drinks tray stood on a sideboard. It contained half-full bottles of dry sherry, brandy and whisky; the bottle of Bundaberg rum was empty.

The old house creaked around me and the rattling I’d heard from outside was louder and coming from upstairs, joined now with another noise. I paused and waited until I’d distinguished the two sounds: a blind flapping and human sobbing. With my stiff right leg protesting, I struggled up the narrow staircase and into the small room on the right of the landing.

Chloe Monkhurst sat on an upturned tea chest by the window. She was racked by sobs as she stared out the window.

‘Chloe,’ I said.

She turned towards me and a pistol in her shaking hand came up pointed straight at my chest.

I stopped in the doorway and leaned against the jamb.

‘Put it down, Chloe.’

‘I’ll shoot you.’

‘No you won’t. The gun’s too heavy. You can hardly hold it.’

She tried to hold the pistol steady with her other hand but her eyes were blurred by tears and she fumbled. I got to her in two strides and wrenched the gun away, exerting the minimum amount of force. It was a Glock automatic, fully loaded and quite weighty. I put it on the floor out of her reach and stood beside her. She’d stopped crying but her shoulders had slumped forward making her look small and vulnerable.

‘Where’s Jason, Chloe?’ I said.

She didn’t answer for what seemed like minutes but was probably only seconds. There was something so tragic in her manner that time seemed distorted. The window was open and the light was fading fast.

‘You’ll never catch him.’

‘Why not? I’ve got this far.’

‘Yes. I shouldn’t have told him about you.’