A Certain Malice by Felicity Young

think it looks grand now, you should have seen it twenty-five years ago. The girls were able to keep horses then. Let me see, over there I think.” Cam pointed to a group of dilapidated sheds in the distance.“It doesn’t look like they’re doing those up, though they seem to be doing a pretty good job elsewhere.” He swivelled around in a full circle, whistling air through his teeth as he looked. “These renovations must have cost a bomb.”
    He switched his gaze back to the school buildings and the mess the builders had left behind. Though this phase of the renovations was complete, someone still had a lot of clearing up to do before the start of the school term. The scaffolding had been dismantled and stacked in a pile. Paint splatters and dollops of concrete patterned the ground and the air hung with the fresh smell of cement.
    Three large skips filled with building debris stood near the back wall of the classroom block. He ambled towards them, handing his sunglasses to Leanne. With the help of an overturned bucket he heaved himself up into the closest skip.
    “What are you looking for, Sarge?” Leanne shaded her eyes and watched as he carefully balanced around the edge of the skip. “Be careful, there might be glass,” she added.
    “There is. Lots of it.”
    There were also rolls of old carpet, bricks, lumps of plaster, empty paint buckets and the rotting remains of someone’s lunch. He stepped across to the next skip and crunched across the dry junk until his foot slammed through some plywood, sinking shin deep into refuse. He latched on to a piece of old skirting board sticking up from the pile; it was all that stopped him from falling face down into the muck.
    He heard laughter from below.
    “I’ll remember you when it’s time to check the septics, Leanne,” he called down. He stooped to sift through some of the surface rubbish, finding pretty much what he’d expect: breathing masks, sheets of old wallpaper, plastic containers.
    “What are you looking for exactly?” Leanne said, batting at the flies circling her head.
    “I’ll know when I find it. You can learn a lot about people from what they throw out.”
    He stepped on to the third bin and made a similar inspection. A used coffee filter had stuck on to his leg. He pulled it off, looked at it for a moment then threw it back on to the pile.
    “Well?” she said as Cam jumped down from the skip.
    “Well what?”
    “Well, did you learn anything?”
    Cam wrinkled his nose and looked down at his soiled uniform. “I think I learned that it’s not a good idea to go fossicking through someone’s garbage just before an interview.” He dusted plaster powder from his pants. “Come on. Let’s go see Mr and Mrs Smithson.”
    Cam addressed the seated couple in Anne Smithson’s office. “The body belonged to a man named Herbert Bell. I believe he was once employed as a groundsman at the school.”
    Anne Smithson’s eyes widened, and an ivory hand moved to her mouth as if she were trying to wipe away a crumb without being noticed. Mr Smithson shifted in his chair and cleared his throat.
    “That’s terrible. We must send our condolences to his family,” he said. “How…” His voice came out as a squeak, forcing him to clear his throat again.“How do you think it happened?”
    “Until I can prove otherwise, I’m regarding his death as suspicious.”
    Mrs Smithson took a breath. “Constable Petrowski said it was an accident.”
    “Such deaths are always considered suspicious until proved otherwise.” Cam gave the couple a few seconds to absorb the news and leaned over to Leanne to see her notebook. “Bell worked for you for about six months – is that correct, Mrs Smithson?”
    She nodded. “Part time, only a few hours a week.”
    “I understand you have no official wages record.”
    Mrs Smithson opened her mouth to speak, but her husband interjected.
    “I take care of the monies,” he said.
    Cam switched his gaze to him. “You paid