15.

Three and a half hours later, Oliver slipped the empty Luger into Rocky’s 44-gallon-drum mailbox on the way to Mudgee Hospital. He tried to call Penny, but the service was patchy; he could only find her message bank.

Gabe had been transferred out of intensive care, into a room on the other side of the building. Oliver realised, as he walked towards Gabe’s room, just how antisocial he’d been since moving to Mudgee. He’d lived there a decade and had no idea who anyone at the hospital was. His father – even Theo – would have made friends with people in town. Found connections and charmed people in the right places. If he’d walked in with Penny, she would have known someone. He wasn’t sure whether his reclusiveness helped or hindered him in these kinds of situations.

Gabe was in a white robe, bandage over his shoulder, arm in a sling.

‘You scared the shit out of me,’ Oliver said, pulling up a chair and sitting down.

‘God, you look awful,’ said Gabe.

‘Think one of us must have killed a Chinaman in the last life.’

‘You can’t say that anymore.’

‘Can’t say anything. What happened here?’ Oliver fiddled carefully with the bandage; he could see blood swelling through the fabric.

Gabe sighed. ‘Nothing to do with you or Theo, I’m pretty sure.’

‘Something to do with Murray?’

Gabe closed his eyes. Oliver noticed his lip quiver.

‘Long story. The drugs are making me drowsy.’

‘No hurry,’ Oliver said. After a minute, Gabe closed his eyes and appeared to be in a light sleep. Oliver heard the sound of buzzers, squeaky wheels and nurses laughing. The swish of tyres outside, the perpetual monotone of machines.

When he was alert again, Gabe said, ‘We owed money, Oli. Got in a little deep.’

Oliver straightened in his seat. ‘A little? With whom?’

‘Doesn’t matter.’ Gabe opened his eyes. He was gazing out the window, longing for something in the distance. ‘Horses. Syndicates. Partying a little too hard in the city. It’s easy to go too hard.’

‘So, they shot you because you didn’t have what you owed them?’

‘They beat me up. Hit me in the guts. Murray was worse. He walked to his ute as they were leaving and pulled his shotgun. Then, well …’

‘For fuck’s sake. So, it was definitely related to gambling?’

Gabe stared at the ceiling, refusing to make eye contact. ‘I don’t know. Perhaps. They weren’t familiar.’

‘Do you think it was the same people that came for Clare? Gabe, I need you to tell me what you remember. Were they driving an old red car?’

Gabe immediately shook his head. ‘Black four-wheel drive. Dark, expensive.’

‘This is my fault. Ever since Theo came, everything’s just …’

‘Don’t blame yourself, Oli. We both know the messes Murray’s been in before. I’m sure it’s to do with that. It makes the most sense, doesn’t it?’

Oliver tapped Gabe’s thigh. ‘You’re not allowed to die on me. At least not till I’m rotting in prison.’

‘Everson doesn’t like you much.’

‘Some days less than others. Reckons she’s got a warrant for the vineyard.’

‘There’s nothing to fear from my cottage,’ Gabe assured him. ‘She doesn’t come across as the religious type, so she shouldn’t be offended by some “curious straight friends experimenting together” kind of porn.’

‘I thought you’d be into big and black?’

‘Has to have some kernel of possibility.’

‘You’re a good-looking man,’ said Oliver. ‘Don’t sell yourself short.’

Gabe exhaled, stifling a giggle. ‘At least we can still joke about it.’

‘If we didn’t keep our humour, what else would we have left?’

Gabe was staring out of the window. ‘Some days, my friend, I’m not too sure.’ He closed his eyes and after a moment appeared to be asleep.

A nurse walked into the room and frowned. Gabe didn’t stir. She looked Oliver up and down and said sternly, ‘Make sure he drinks water.’

Before Oliver could reply, he heard Gabe’s voice: ‘Prefer a gin martini if you’ve got one. Dry, with an olive.’

***

In the car, Oliver placed his forehead on the warm steering wheel. Had he ever been this lonely before? He felt forlorn. Sad and angry and full of adrenaline, all at once. He tried Penny for the third time, but she seemed to be ignoring his calls. He hadn’t asked Gabe whether she knew about the shooting. It had to be connected to him, Orson and Clare, didn’t it? Gossip would travel through Mudgee with unpredictable urgency, granules of truth sprinkled somewhere in the mix. Did you hear that the reclusive winemaker shot his neighbour and vineyard manager? The one he’s gay with? The poor girl who owns the wine bar. How could you face it?

Oliver hated gossip. And his vivid imagination even more.

He remembered his trip to Martinborough with Penny a year ago. How far in the past it seemed. Sitting beside the fire, drinking pinot noir and picking at pâté. They were with Rocky and Penny’s brother, Clint, both of whom had gone to bed earlier.

‘Let’s brave the cold for a cigarette?’ said Penny, standing up and snatching the packet from the table. It was bleak outside, but after living in Mudgee they’d grown accustomed to the cold. Oliver had loved New Zealand. He’d enjoyed the trip and the company.

He placed the cigarette to his lips, ready to light, but Penny plucked it away and kissed him. They finished the rest of the bottle before they were on the boards inside, her breath warm over his neck. It sent a shiver along his side. He could still remember the way the dim light reflected onto her body, how it looked and felt as she moved up and down. The little noises she made, trying to keep quiet, as she came. Her palm pushed to Oliver’s mouth to mute the groan that vibrated along his chest. The warmth of the fire as they lay together, naked.

Bringing himself back to reality, Oliver started the car and drove to Four Dogs Missing. He was surprised to find the gate still closed.

PRIVATE.

There was no police tape at Gabe’s cottage. He drove down and parked in the driveway and opened the door to his house.

It smelled stale, like something had turned in the kitchen. A couple of indoor plants drooped with neglect. He checked his phone, but Penny still hadn’t called. There wasn’t much battery left. He scrolled through his contacts until he came across Gabe’s sister.

Vicky worked in a bank in Sydney. Oliver wasn’t sure she was close with Gabe, but he thought she should know her brother was in hospital. Both of their parents had passed away, and as far as Oliver knew, it was just the two of them left. There wasn’t much service on his mobile, so he dialled the number on the landline.

‘Vicky speaking.’

‘Hey, it’s Oliver.’

There was a pause. ‘Oliver. Right. From the winery?’

‘Yeah. Look, I’m just calling about Gabe. He’s doing all right, but he’s been shot.’

‘Shot?’ She sounded neither shocked nor surprised, merely curious. ‘What on earth happened?’

Oliver twirled the phone cord and stood looking out onto the balcony, watching the sun bathe the cabernet vines that ran from the front to the back of the property. It felt like only a few weeks ago they were green and bushy; now they were maple brown and almost leafless. Everything felt oddly quiet as he struggled for words.

‘I’m not exactly sure. A bullet grazed his shoulder at his cottage last night. He’s in hospital but he’s doing okay.’

‘He’s conscious, then?’

‘Yes.’

‘Smells like trouble to me,’ Vicky said. It sounded like she was on a train; Oliver heard the whoosh of movement, voices in the distance, the signal cutting in and out. ‘Just be careful, Oliver. He’s got himself in deep.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘With money. That’s what it’s about, surely? It has to be. Horseracing. He’d hate to know you’ve called me, because there’s the chance I’d tell you he owes me more than thirty grand.’

‘Really?’ Oliver said, surprised. At that moment, he was glad he hadn’t taken the paintings to Gabe. ‘I’m sorry, I had no idea.’

‘Just be careful,’ she said again. ‘I doubt I’ll ever see the money again. Gabe is a good salesman, but I knew one day he’d get himself in too deep.’

‘Anyway,’ Oliver said. ‘I just thought you should know.’ Before she could hang up, he said, ‘Sorry, Vicky, just one question. Do you think Gabe could hurt anyone?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘As in shoot someone. Murder them.’

She was silent for so long, Oliver wondered whether the service had dropped out. ‘I would have said no for a long time, but when someone’s desperate to save themselves, they’ll do all kinds of things.’

‘Even murder?’

‘Well,’ she said. ‘Gabe is myopic when he needs to be. I don’t think he would …’ Vicky paused. ‘No, he wouldn’t. But, it’s true that desperation does funny things to people.’

‘Yes,’ said Oliver, taking a breath. ‘I guess it does.’

***

In the kitchen, Oliver poured himself water from the tap. As he took a sip, the house phone started to ring. He stared for a good few seconds before walking over and grabbing the receiver. The sound of someone breathing.

‘Who is this?’

There was a click. A metronome. One hundred beats per minute.

He put the phone down and swiped open his laptop and the camera app, but it was taking too long to load, so he walked outside as fast as his legs would carry him. He made it to the wine shed, opened the padlock with his key and went inside. After pulling the lever, the lights kicked on, but there was no one around, so he walked into the piano room. Also empty. He looked under the tables, behind the wine barrels, in the small toilet, but the building was vacant. Then he walked over to the piano and saw his metronome sitting on the piano, moving back and forth.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Dear Angie,

I’ve been thinking a lot about my father. Thinking too often about the signs, thinking about what I could have done to prevent things. How life could have been (which is a waste of time). Although I do wonder if it’s helping me go easier on myself, in relation to leaving Oliver behind.

I think we both faded into the world in the only way we knew how.

While in theory I want to remember my father as a murdering piece of shit, there are so many good childhood memories. The problem with criminals, and I’m sure you understand this better than I do, is no one is ever mercilessly evil. As a kid, Oliver and I would hang out at our father’s pharmacy and laugh along with the staff at the jokes he used to tell. The customers, especially the old ladies, used to love him. When we were younger, I’m positive, too, that my mother still loved my father. Sometimes it’s a snap, other times it makes sense over time. I wonder whether we were too close to see all of the signs?

You asked me in Orange, though, if I remembered the first sign. A warning. There was an ominous and obvious one, clearly full of foreboding. I can see that now, with the benefit of hindsight – although you’ll have to forgive me for not being able to connect the dots the day we turned ten.

I remember brooding clouds, a full moon, even before dusk. That afternoon, the three of us loped through the long grass, flecked with mud after the biggest storm I’d ever seen. The earth squelched between our toes: it was cool, especially for the first week of summer. La Niña, our father said, stomping behind us in gumboots. ‘Do you boys know what it means in Spanish?’ he asked us. ‘The girl. A cold event. A fuck ton of rain.’ Miles decided he was taking his twin sons yabbying and hunting, something to pass the time together in our new backyard; something country people did to celebrate another lap around the sun.

We’d only been in the bush for a few months and we’d been told, ad nauseum, to prepare for the heat. Our father had packed us into the car and taken us five hundred kilometres west of Sydney, our mother anxious as we drove along the barren landscape that refused to recede into anything more than dust and sporadic gums. The destination: a town of eight hundred people so desperate for a pharmacist they agreed to pay my father twice his city wage.

Miles kept a small butane stove on the back of the ute. We’d parked beside a farm dam and he tossed a live yabby we’d caught into a stained silver pot that spat boiling water. The yabby had barely been in there twenty seconds when he pulled it out with his fingers and seared the knife down its middle. Only then did the claws stop wriggling. Sometimes, even now, the same crunch permeates my dreams – an image of my father standing over me, the crack of the knife plunging into my ribs. He squeezed lemon over the flesh and handed one half to me, the other to Oliver, telling us, ‘Better than the shit at home. Enjoy it, won’t you?’

It was one of the best things I’d ever put in my mouth. It was a tad dirty but tender, sweet, nothing at all like the overcooked pasta and stewed meat we normally ate.

Once we’d finished, I was allowed to drive us – in second gear – around the paddock. I’m not even sure who the land belonged to, or if our father had permission to be there. Oliver sat quietly in the back seat, uninterested in taking his turn. When we pulled up, the two of us sat on the tray and watched our father shoot at boars and kangaroos as the sun waned behind the flat earth. I can still hear the high whirr of the bullet leaving the chamber.

I remember one particular kangaroo leaping towards us. It turned away when it saw my father draw his shotgun and aim, and it began hopping frantically towards the trees. I was desperately hoping it would escape, that Miles’s shot would miss – but our father pulled the trigger and less than a second later the animal dropped dead.

‘Come on. Let’s have a look,’ he told us. ‘Might be able to slow-cook her. Best way to nibble our coat of arms.’ Oliver and I ambled dubiously behind our father.

‘Check this out,’ Miles said, pointing to a joey, still alive, cushioned in its mother’s pouch. It was only a few weeks old. Completely helpless. Oliver and I shared concern. Maybe we’d take it home with us? Keep it as a pet, something we could raise before releasing back into the bush. Next thing we knew, Miles pulled the joey from the pouch, held it by the tail and forcibly struck its head on a rock – once, twice, three times. Blood mottled the wet grass. He tossed the dead joey to the ground as though discarding a spent cigarette.

I stared at my twin brother: any bit of existing colour had leached from his skin. Our father laughed. ‘Oh come on, boys. How would you feel if I killed your mother and let you starve out here alone?’

The ebullient laugh still echoes from time to time. It was almost thirty years ago, but it still enters my skull some days without warning. Without reprieve. It was a sign, wasn’t it?

I know that now. And how did I ignore the others? What should I have done differently?

(trying to find) Peace,

Theo