Maggie sat unmoving, staring straight ahead while Zoe quietly wept. I stood stock still as the past came roaring back bringing all the baggage with it. I didn't know this husband but Maggie's reaction to his death was exactly the same. She was frozen. I was too but this time I knew better than to stay that way. I had to help her not wait for her to help me as I had back then.
I sat next to her and took her hand. She still didn't move. I looked up at Kayla.
`What happened?'
`An accident.'
`Car?'
`No, plane.'
`Plane?'
Maggie stirred. `He crashed the plane. On take-off. He would never have done that.'
I must have looked confused. Kayla explained in a monotone as if she was reading the police report. `The aircraft crashed less than a minute after take-off from Canberra airport. There were no survivors. The cause of the accident is unknown. Investigators are at the scene.'
`I don't understand how it could have happened,' said Maggie, shaking her head. `The aeroplane was fully serviced just last week. Ken is always so careful. And Canberra airport is so well run. I don't think there's ever been a crash there, not in living memory.' She turned to me. `I was supposed to be flying today,' said Maggie. Her face was stone white and rigid. She'd aged ten years in the last half hour. `Ken only did the trip because I wanted to stay and see you.'
`Mum always does the routine drops. Dad only does the distance runs,' said Kayla. `Today was a routine drop.'
I had no idea what a routine drop was or what a distance run was for that matter. I didn't know that my sister and her husband were licensed pilots either. I didn't even know what my brother-in-law did for a living.
I took Kayla aside. `What does your…Ken do? I mean what's his job that he uses an aeroplane?'
`He's an accountant.' Her voice broke and tears began to fall. `He has clients all over the state and he loves flying. They both do. So he bought a plane. It's just a little one. A Cessna 182. They take us out in it a lot. They're both very careful so I can't understand this either. Mum usually does this trip. It's just up to Canberra and back in a few hours. It's a regular one taking reports and stuff to sign to Dad's politician clients. I think it's just an excuse to go flying really. They could probably do it all online if they wanted to. And now it's killed him.' She burst into tears.
The hair on the back of my neck was standing on end and a chill had crept over me. Politicians were among the suspects in the corruption case that got Evan Treloar killed. Apart from suspicions about Curtis Tennent, they'd never been identified. Senior police were also rumoured to have been involved. All of them had good reason to stay unidentified.
Some had believed Maggie Treloar knew more than she was saying which was why she was hidden away as quickly as she was. She told me then that she knew nothing and I believed her. But I’d always wondered if perhaps she didn't know that she knew. Even if it was where Evan might have hidden the missing evidence.
After Evan was killed his office and his house had been thoroughly gone through by the police. Anything that survived that search wouldn't have filled a teaspoon. Then after Maggie and the children had left I went through the place and found nothing. To top it off someone later set fire to the house and razed it to the ground. Nothing survived.
The chilling cold sweat that was engulfing me was because last night Ken O'Hara, accountant to politicians in high places, found out that he had a brother-in-law who was a well-known, giant slaying investigative journalist. Had he mentioned that to the wrong person?
I never knew any of the details of the case that wrecked my family. My brother in law's family owned a medium-sized, wide ranging media business. It had begun with newspapers in the late 1800s and by the time Evan was born had expanded into television production and advertising. By then the newspaper arm was fading and only a few regional newspapers still existed. It was also being squeezed by the giants, the Packers and the Murdochs. With television and social media taking their toll as well the company was looking for different pathways.
Evan was an accountant and according to him his older brother Robert was the adventurous one, so he left the running of the business to him. It wasn't until later that Evan found out his brother was flirting with the gambling and casino industry. The deeper Evan dug into the business accounts the more he suspected some kind of criminal activity.
He confronted Robert but Robert told him to back off. In an attempt to save the family company Evan realised that he would have to betray his brother. But his first responsibility was to his own wife and children. He warned Robert who told him that there were much larger forces at work that he couldn't control.
The scandal erupted when Evan told the police that he had evidence involving fraud, corruption and money laundering that reached into high places. The case evolved into a cause célèbre. Some known criminals but no politicians were named, but the day Evan's evidence was to be tabled in court, he was murdered.
There was enough evidence to bankrupt the Treloar brothers' own business and send Robert to prison for fraud. I was ready to lay waste in a search for revenge and justice in that order but Maggie begged me not to. She was sure I'd get myself killed and she couldn't face the loss of the child she'd raised as her own since she was fifteen.
Until now, I had stuck to that. But things were different now. Her husband had been killed and I reckoned Maggie had been the target. Somebody knew and Kayla's `bad people' were on our tails. How might they respond if they had me on their case? Exactly like this.
I looked up. Maggie stood in front of me. I struggled to my feet and reached out to hug her but she pushed me away.
`I have to pick up the boys.' Her face was white but her eyes were dry. `Wait here. I'll be back soon. You girls also stay and don't let anyone in. Not the police, not friends, no one. Do you understand me?'
`Yes, Mum,' they chorused.
`Right. Remember, anyone could be our enemy now.'
I couldn't have put it better. I walked up to her. `Maggie—'
She raised a hand. `Later.'
`No,' I said. I gave her a note I'd written and closed her fingers over it. `Don't speak to anyone or answer any questions about this or anything else. Just do it.'
Her eyes flashed up to my face. The questions and the pain in them made my bones ache but none of us could afford to let our guard drop. I nodded and gently pushed her towards the door. She didn't look back.
After she'd gone I turned to the two very frightened young girls. I wasn't about to land a guilt trip on them because sooner or later this could have happened anyway. As Kayla said, I looked like my sister and my face was all over national television in living colour. I'd always had misgivings about being the narrator for the Kashmir film but, flattered, I'd bowed to the network. So even if my nieces hadn't kidnapped me the risk of the cat jumping out of the bag was there.
I didn't take into account the well-developed teenaged consciences of the girls.
`It's all my fault,' wailed Zoe. `I got Dad killed.'
`No, it's mine. It was all my idea,' wept Kayla. `I just didn't think. And now we'll be lucky to live.'
`Oh for heaven's sake, cut the melodrama you two. This is not a competition. We got dealt a bad hand so we deal with it. You're jumping the gun anyway. Ken's accident was probably an accident. Aeroplanes crash all the time.'
`But you don't think it was. Do you?'
`I don't know. None of us do. Until there's evidence we keep our heads down, we don't attract attention and we don't blame anyone.'
`But—'
`If our cover is blown, we'll find out soon enough. And your mother's right. The danger's probably over by now. The whole thing's blown over and we can all come out into the sunshine again.'
`I think Mum's scared,' said Zoe. `I don't think she really believes any of that. Not now that Ken's been killed. It was meant to be her.'
I thought about that. It didn't ring true somehow. Apart from the girls, Maggie and Ken, no one here knew that Maggie had a brother. Much less that I was here. And only Ken had the opportunity to spread the word. Maggie hadn't told anyone. The girls hadn't either. And the old woman at the motel had never laid eyes on me.
The more I thought about it, Ken was the only person who'd had the opportunity to mention me at all.
`Zoe,' I asked, `did you see Ken before he left this morning?'
`No. He left really early.'
`Did you speak to him last night?'
She shook her head.
`That's after you told your Mum about me.'
She burst into tears again. `Yes, I'm so sorry.'
`Then no one here, apart from Ken, could have spoken to anyone about who I am or that I was here. Could they?'
Kayla stared at me her mouth dropping open.
`So,' whispered Zoe, `you're saying that, if Ken was killed, it had nothing to do with any of us. It was him talking to somebody in Canberra that the bad guys heard.'
`If bad guys are involved at all. So no, Zoe, you didn't get Ken killed and neither did you Kayla.'
`Except—'
`No, Kayla. Leave it.'
We sat back, each inside ourselves, until the sound of children yelling intruded. The door from the garage flew open and two little boys raced in dumping school bags and ran to the fridge. A subdued, but determinedly smiling Maggie followed them and busied herself feeding and watering them.
When they looked up from their food they looked from me back to Maggie as she introduced me as Harry. They accepted I was a visitor and asked no questions before running outside to play. The afternoon was punctuated by their squeals. They’d learn soon enough that their Daddy wasn’t coming home. Before the door had closed behind her brothers, Zoe reiterated my theory about Ken's accident.
`It wasn't us, Mum. It must have just been a horrible accident. Harry said so.'
Maggie looked at me, her eyes bleak. `Is that what you really think, Harry?'