When Aaron Falk was eleven he’d seen Mal Deacon turn his own flock into a staggering, bleeding mess using shearing clippers and a brutal hand. Aaron had felt an ache swell in his chest as he, Luke and Ellie had watched one sheep after another brawled to the ground of the Deacons’ shed with a sharp twist and sliced too close to the skin.
Aaron was a farm kid, they all were, but this was something else. A pitiful cry from the smallest ewe made him open his mouth and draw breath, but he was cut short as Ellie pulled him away by his sleeve. She looked up at him and gave a single shake of her head.
She’d been a slight, intense child at that age, prone to long bouts of silence. Aaron, who leaned towards the quiet side himself, found that suited him fine. They usually let Luke do the talking.
Ellie had barely raised her head when the noises from the barn had floated over to where the three of them had been sitting on the sagging porch. Aaron had been curious, but it had been Luke who insisted they abandon their homework to investigate. Now, with the wails of the ewes in their ears and Ellie’s face fixed into an expression he hadn’t seen before, Aaron knew he wasn’t the only one wishing they hadn’t.
They turned to leave and Aaron jumped as he saw Ellie’s mother watching silently from the barn’s doorway. She was jammed up against the frame, wearing an ill-fitting brown jumper with a single greasy stain on it. She took a sip of amber liquid from a glass without taking her eyes off the shearing. Her facial features were shared by her daughter. They had the same deep-set eyes, sallow skin and wide mouth. But to Aaron, Ellie’s mother looked a hundred years old. It was years before he realised on that day she would not even have been forty.
As he watched, Ellie’s mother closed her eyes and tilted her head back sharply. She took a deep breath, her features creasing. When she opened her eyes again, they fixed on her husband, staring at him with a look so pure and undiluted Aaron was terrified Deacon would turn and see it for himself. Regret.
The weather that year had made the work harder for everyone, and a month later Deacon’s nephew Grant had moved into their farmhouse to lend a hand. Ellie’s mother left two days after that. Perhaps it had been the final straw. One man to resent was plenty enough for anyone.
Throwing two suitcases and a clinking bag of bottles into an old car, she had tried half-heartedly to stem her daughter’s tears with weightless vows that she would be back soon. Falk wasn’t sure how many years it had been until Ellie had stopped believing it. He wondered if part of her might have believed it until the day she died.
Falk now stood on the porch of the Fleece with Raco while the sergeant lit a cigarette. He offered the packet and Falk shook his head. He’d spent enough time down memory lane for one night.
‘Smart choice,’ Raco said. ‘I’m trying to quit. For the baby.’
‘Right. Good on you.’
Raco smoked slowly, blowing the vapour into the hot night sky. The pub noise had ratcheted up a notch. Deacon and Dow had taken their time leaving and the hint of aggression still hung in the air.
‘You should’ve told me earlier.’ Raco took a drag. Suppressed a cough.
‘I know. I’m sorry.’
‘You have anything to do with it? That girl’s death?’
‘No. But I wasn’t with Luke when it happened. Not like we said.’
Raco paused.
‘So you lied about your alibi. Where was Luke?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You never asked?’
‘Of course I did, but he –’ Falk paused, remembering. ‘He always insisted on sticking to our story. Always. Even when it was only the two of us. He said it was safer to be consistent. I didn’t push it. I was grateful to him, you know? I thought it was for my benefit.’
‘Who else knew it was a lie?’
‘A few people suspected. Mal Deacon, obviously. Some others. But no-one knew for certain. At least that’s what I always thought. But now I’m not sure. It turns out Gerry Hadler knew all along. Maybe he’s not the only one.’
‘Do you think Luke killed Ellie?’
‘I don’t know.’ He stared out at the empty street. ‘I want to know.’
‘You think all this is connected?’
‘I really hope not.’
Raco sighed. He stubbed the cigarette out carefully, then doused the butt with a splash of beer.
‘All right, mate,’ he said. ‘Your secret’s safe with me. For now. Unless it needs to come out, in which case you sing like a canary and I knew nothing about any of it, right?’
‘Yes. Thank you.’
‘Meet me at the station at nine tomorrow morning. We’ll go and have a chat to Luke’s mate, Jamie Sullivan. The last person who admits seeing him alive.’ He looked at Falk. ‘If you’re still in town.’
With a wave, he headed off into the night.
Back in his room, Falk lay on his bed and pulled out his mobile. He held it in his palm but didn’t dial. The huntsman had disappeared from above the lamp. He tried not to think about where it was now.
If you’re still in town, Raco had said. Falk was all too aware he had the choice. His car was parked right outside. He could pack his bag, pay the bearded bartender and be on the road to Melbourne inside fifteen minutes.
Raco might roll his eyes, and Gerry would try to call. But what could they do? They wouldn’t be pleased, but he could live with that. Barb, though – Falk could picture her face with unwelcome clarity – Barb would be dismayed. And he wasn’t entirely sure he could live with that. Falk shifted uncomfortably at the thought. The room felt airless in the heat.
He had never known his own mother. She had died in a haemorrhaging pool of her own blood less than an hour after he was born. His dad had tried – tried hard, even – to fill the gap. But any sense Falk had growing up of maternal tenderness, every warm cake from the oven, every over-perfumed cuddle, had come from Barb Hadler. She may have been Luke’s mother, but she had always made time for him.
He, Ellie and Luke had spent more time at the Hadlers’ house than at any of the others’. Falk’s own home was often silent and empty, his father trapped for hours by the demands of the land. Ellie would shake her head at suggestions they go to her house. Not today, she’d say. When he and Luke had insisted for variety, Falk always found himself regretting it. Ellie’s house was messy, with a whiff of empty bottles.
The Hadlers’ place was sunlit and busy, with good things coming from the kitchen and clear instructions about homework and bedtime and orders to turn off that damn TV and get some fresh air. The Hadlers’ property had always been a haven – until two weeks ago, when it had become a crime scene of the worst kind.
Falk lay unmoving on the bed. Fifteen minutes had passed. He could be on the road by now. Instead, he was still there.
He sighed and rolled over, his fingers hovering over his phone as he considered who he needed to inform. He pictured his St Kilda flat, the lights off, front door locked up tight. Big enough for two, but for the past three years home only to him. No-one was waiting there anymore. No-one fresh from the shower, with music playing and a bottle of red breathing on the kitchen counter. No-one eager to answer the phone and interested to hear why he was staying a few extra days.
Most of the time, he was fine with that. But at that moment, lying in a pub room in Kiewarra, he wished he’d built a home a little more like Barb and Gerry Hadlers’ than one just like his father’s.
He was due back at work on Monday, but they knew he’d been at a funeral. He’d avoided saying whose. He could stay, he knew. He could take a few days. For Barb. For Ellie. For Luke, even. He’d built up more overtime and goodwill on the Pemberley case than he could use. His latest investigation was a slow burn at best.
Falk mulled it over, and another fifteen minutes passed. Finally, he picked up his phone and left a message for the financial division’s long-suffering secretary, informing her he’d be taking a week’s leave for personal reasons, effective immediately.
It was hard to say which one of them was more surprised.