Clem packed up the shanty the next day. Sarge could sense something was going on. He lumbered around next to Pocket all morning, never leaving his side, and after the car was packed and Pocket was sitting waiting on the back seat, he started whimpering.
‘You’ll be okay, mate. Noel’s back tomorrow morning and Ralph’ll be around tonight to feed you.’ She gave him a hug and stroked his silky golden fur, then led him into the backyard and closed the gate. As she rolled down the driveway, the howling began—head high in the air, mouth pursed, folds of skin hanging loose and forsaken from his neck, and a sound of loss and longing pitching high into the wind and the sky and out to sea.
Sitting in the living room at Seascape Avenue—the solid dining table between them, the vinyl recliners at the far end of the room and Selma hovering—she told Ralph everything. There had been no time when she’d made the desperate rescue call the previous day.
‘What, so you thought I’d killed the turtle whisperer?’ he said, offended.
‘Well, the way you carry on, dear, it’s hardly surprising,’ said Selma, laying a plate of Anzacs in front of them.
Ralph sniggered. ‘There’s plenty of people would’ve done it, and not just over the port. She was a flaming vegan, for Christ’s sake! I’ve known butchers who’d have done it as soon as blink.’
‘Oh Ralph, please!’ exclaimed Selma. She went down the hall and came back a few moments later with a letter in her hand.
‘Here, Miss Jones, you’re a lawyer. Can you help us with this?’
Clem took the letter. It was on Salamander Bridge letterhead, the plaintiff law firm handling the class action against the banks on behalf of the Piama residents who’d fallen prey to dodgy financial advice.
‘It’s an offer,’ said Clem, scanning it.
‘I know it’s a bloody offer. We’re not stupid,’ said Ralph. ‘Selma, why’d you bring it out? I said we’d handle it.’
‘Let her look at it. I want to know what she thinks,’ said Selma. ‘I think we should accept it, Miss Jones, Ralph thinks we should keep fighting.’
Clem read it all. The banks were offering a sizeable sum—compensation for the catastrophic losses suffered as a result of their failure to properly assess the customers lining up to buy their margin loan products. She put the letter down on the table and leaned back in her chair. ‘Well, looks like the firm has spent a lot of time putting the package together and of course they’re recommending acceptance, which means they think it’s a better bet than litigating further. But then, they’ll be taking their share so they’re not entirely disinterested in the outcome. I don’t know the case, of course, but from a personal perspective, I guess it might depend on how it stacks up for you? I mean for your future.’
‘Well, Ralph thinks the mortgage will be pretty much cleared. There’d be a tiny bit left but we’d manage.’
‘So you could keep the house?’
‘Yeah, but I don’t get my Robert-Considine-sold-us-a-line fishing boat,’ said Ralph, scowling.
‘Don’t listen to him, dear, he’s just a grumpy old man.’
Clem smiled and glanced out across the backyard to the straits, flickering in the sunshine. This was good, this was great. ‘You must’ve kissed one of those ugly catfishes, hey Ralph? Looks like one of those scum-sucking bottom-dwellers turned into a lovely big mackerel.’