Garry Disher - Chain of Evidence

To throw off the dreaminess, he began to make notes about his brother-in-law. Gavin Hurst had suffered extreme mood swings in the months leading up to his disappearance. He’d become paranoid, argumentative, suspicious and belligerent. RSPCA regional headquarters had received dozens of complaints. Then his car had been found abandoned in dry country several kilometres east of the Bluff. Suicide, that was the general verdict, but, four months later, Meg had begun to receive unusual mail. National Geographic arrived, followed by an invoice for the subscription. She complained, and was faxed the subscription form, filled out in her name. An Internet service provider sent her a free modem, part of the two-year package deal she’d ‘signed’ for. She received catalogues, mail-order goods, book club samples, and applications for life insurance policies naming her husband as beneficiary. Challis had to ask himself: Was Meg capable of setting something like this up-maybe with the old man’s help? Or had Gavin staged his disappearance, then begun to taunt her out of malice?

He was relieved when Meg arrived, as arranged, to cook dinner. ‘You don’t have to do this, you know,’ he told her.

She was already clattering about in the kitchen. ‘I know.’

‘Eve couldn’t come?’

‘Give the girl a break. It’s Saturday night. She’s going out with some of her friends.’

Challis helped. Soon a stir-fry of onions, garlic, ginger, soy sauce and strips of chicken was hissing and crackling in a wok. ‘I didn’t know Mum had a wok.’

‘There are a lot of things you didn’t know about Mum.’

‘Ouch.’

Meg looked mortified and touched his forearm. ‘I didn’t mean to sound so harsh.’

‘Probably deserved,’ Challis said. Meg had carried the burden of the last couple of years. She’d been closer to their parents in all respects, yet the family dynamics had always demonstrated, very faintly, the sense that he was the favoured one, the first-born.

Challis glanced guiltily through the archway at his father, who was slumbering in one of the sitting room armchairs. He’d rarely given much thought to the South Australian compartment of his life: his mother, when she was alive, his father, Meg and Eve, their individual heartaches and vulnerabilities. Partly distance, and partly that he was a bad son? Certainly self-absorption wasn’t a factor, for he rarely considered his own heartaches and vulnerabilities but lived inside the crimes and criminals he dealt with. Now, here, he had things to face up to.

‘I didn’t tell you why I came through Adelaide.’

Meg was busy at the wok, but cast him an inquiring glance.

‘Do you remember Max Andrewartha?’

‘The sergeant here when you were a probationer?’

‘Yes. Well, he’s head of the missing persons unit now.’

‘Oh, Hal.’

‘I read their file on Gavin.’

Meg seemed distressed. ‘Why would you do that?’

Could he tell her that a sense of responsibility was growing inside him, threatening to swamp him?

‘Hal?’

‘Sorry, miles away.’

‘Forget about Gavin. That’s what I’m trying to do.’

‘The case is still open. Nothing can change that.’

Meg breathed out exasperatedly. ‘Did you learn anything new?’

‘No. I thought I’d ask around while I’m here.’

‘Please don’t.’

‘Low key, sis, low key.’

She gave him a shove. ‘Out of the kitchen. You’re in my way.’

Challis went through to his father, woke him gently, and read to him from Mr Midshipman Hornblower. When Meg called, ‘It’s on the table,’ he helped the old man through to the dining room. Three plates steamed on the table, one of them minuscule and plain, chicken without soy sauce, cut into tiny pieces, adorned with a spoonful of rice and what looked like overcooked carrots and peas. Dad’s dodgy digestion, Challis thought.

‘Wine, I think,’ he said, and went to his bedroom, returning with a bottle he’d packed before leaving Waterloo.

‘You read my mind, son.’

‘Dad,’ warned Meg.

The old man ignored her, waggling his glass at Challis, who poured a tiny measure.

‘Jesus Christ, son. A bit more wrist action.’

‘You shouldn’t have alcohol, Dad,’ Meg said, tucking a napkin into the old man’s collar.

‘Too late.’

Challis said ‘Cheers’ and they toasted each other and began to eat and talk, their conversation punctuated by peaceful silences. Early evening, the sun settling, darkening the room but not removing its essential warmth. Now and then the old man tore a knuckle of bread from the white slice on his side plate and masticated slowly. The wine, and the presence of his children, rallied him in contestable ways. Challis found it exhausting, and was relieved when his father fell asleep.

Meg smiled. The light was soft all around them and encouraged release and harmony. They murmured into the night, sipping the wine. Meg examined the bottle. ‘This is good. Elan. Never heard of it.’

‘A small winery just up the road from where I live,’ Challis said.

‘I guess it doesn’t really matter if Dad has a glass now and then. You know…’

‘Yep.’

Their father continued to sleep, diminished by age and illness.

‘What are Eve’s friends like?’

‘Nice.’

This led by degrees to a discussion of their own late teens: the heartaches, rituals, mating and courting indiscretions, and, above all, the waiting.

‘Weeks would go by and nobody would ask me out.’

Challis laughed. ‘Weeks would go by when I didn’t have the nerve to ask anyone out.’

Meg said slyly, ‘Except Lisa Acres. You didn’t have to wait long for her.’

Challis shifted ruefully in his chair. ‘No one did.’

He was being unfair. Lisa Acres-Acres’ because the first thing she asked you was how many acres you owned-hadn’t really been free with her affections. But she was the daughter of the local publican and had ambitions to settle down with a rich man. Challis hadn’t been rich, so she must have seen something else in him. It had been heady fun while it lasted and had broken his heart.

‘Do you ever see her?’ he asked.

‘Oh, she’s around. Still stunning to look at, in a brittle kind of way. The husband’s an alcoholic. She virtually runs the place. They’d go bankrupt if it wasn’t for her.’

She’d married a man named Rex Joyce, who came from old money in the district. Rex had been sent away to boarding school, Prince Alfred College in Adelaide, at the age of five. He’d suddenly reappeared one day, in a red Jaguar given to him by his father when he turned eighteen. Rex, that car, and the acres that came with them, had offered Lisa more than Challis ever could.

‘Any kids?’

Meg shook her head. ‘Some unkind people say she didn’t want to ruin her figure, others that she’s been too busy keeping the property intact. A lot of farms have gone under in the past few years.’

Meg toyed with her knife, turning it to catch the light. ‘Are you seeing anyone, Hal?’

Was he? At once he was visualising Ellen Destry, the way her fair hair would swing as she walked, her intensity when she was working, her sly humour, above all her beauty. She wasn’t straightforwardly beautiful. You had to know her for a while to see it. She’d once said her looks were ‘average’, ‘girl next door’, but they were more complicated and alluring than that.

He wanted her, but was he seeing her? ‘Not really.’

Meg sighed. ‘Nor am I.’ She paused. ‘The kids go out as groups of friends these days, rather than as couples, like we did. It’s healthier, I think.’

‘Do you think Eve’s, you know…’

Meg cocked her head. ‘Sexually active? I don’t know about active. We’ve talked about it. She’s not a virgin. She knows she can have a boy stay overnight if she really cares about him and he’s nice to her.’