children,
who were younger. It was unhealthy, she said. Wrestling games, fondling and
touching. She called them strange and repressed.
They all absorbed that. Pam began to
sift through the printouts of the Roe Report. Look at all these user-names:
how are we going to track them all? Do we have to track them all, boss?
If necessary.
I thought CIU would be more
glamorous, somehow.
What do you call this? said
Challis expansively.
I call it pressure from above, Pam
said. Sir.
Challis gave a mock glower. One
good thing about pressure: I asked Hindmarsh to pressure the lab for a quick
DNA result on that mucus on Lachlan Roes sleeve.
* * * *
15
I
treasure this, Ellen Destry said later, in the gentle twilight.
Theyd driven home from the pub and
now they were on foot, halfway up the hill behind the house.
Walking with me?
Walking. She snuggled against
Challis briefly. And walking with you.
If she didnt walk every day she
felt sluggish, muscle-locked, unfit. She quite liked these evening walks, loved
walking with Hal, but unspoken was the fact that she missed her dawn walks on
Penzance Beach. Now her dawns were spent having sex or making love or whatever
you wanted to call it. Which was fineenjoy it while it lasts.
She pumped her arms and lengthened
her stride. This wasnt the beach, it wasnt dawn, but had its compensations.
It was a pretty corner of the world, a patchwork of vines, orchards and grazing
paddocks stitched together with gravel roads lined with fences and trees. The
birds were busy feeding their young. The air smelt fresh: one of the farmers
had been slashing the spring grasses.
Then she recoiled. Whats that
awful smell?
Sharp, basic, sinus-burning. She
tracked it to a tangle of bracken between the side of the road and a cattle
ramp. Shells? she asked, peering into the gloom, one hand over her nose and
mouth.
Abalone, said Challis, joining
her.
The pile was half a metre high, grey
and ghostly in the half-light, each ribbed and unlovely shell the size of a
saucer. Some guy dumps them along here every year, Challis said. One day Ill
nab him.
A poacher?
Probably.
Huh, Ellen said, storing away
another piece of useless information. This doesnt happen in Penzance Beach.
He squeezed her and laughed. Its
pretty wild out here on the frontier.
They looked up. A helicopter was
slicing across a corner of the darkening sky. It was some distance away but the
sound was unmistakeably that of a police Dauphin, more turbo whine than
eggbeater chop. They glanced at each other. There were a couple of notorious
black spots on the Peninsula, blind intersections where motorists had lost
their lives. The locals liked to speculate what the cut-off point was before
VicRoads improved safety by installing a roundabout or chopping down a few
trees: ten lives? Twenty?
Hal?
Yes, oh gorgeous one.
She took his hand in hers. What are
you going to do about your plane?
He was restoring a vintage
aeroplane. Correction: he had been, but now it sat gathering dust in a
hangar on a little local airfield. Ellen was oddly bothered by that. She had no
interest in the plane but the idea of Challis with an interest apart from
police workapart from her, for that matterwas important. She thought
back to life with her husband. Alan had several obsessionsthe fact that shed
been promoted to sergeant, the electricity bill, their daughters boyfriends
but hed had no interests. Had that been her fault? Was it her fault
that Hal Challis no longer fiddled with his old wreck of an aeroplane?
I honestly dont know, he said.
She squeezed then released his hand.
I wish I had more time, he said.
Do I take up your spare time?
I like spending it with you.
She bit her lip. Hal, I cant be
everything to you, or for you.
Of course not. I know that.
And you cant be everything to me.
Is this going somewhere?
They walked in the deepening
shadows, down the final slope toward his house. Their house. Ellens head was
whirling
who were younger. It was unhealthy, she said. Wrestling games, fondling and
touching. She called them strange and repressed.
They all absorbed that. Pam began to
sift through the printouts of the Roe Report. Look at all these user-names:
how are we going to track them all? Do we have to track them all, boss?
If necessary.
I thought CIU would be more
glamorous, somehow.
What do you call this? said
Challis expansively.
I call it pressure from above, Pam
said. Sir.
Challis gave a mock glower. One
good thing about pressure: I asked Hindmarsh to pressure the lab for a quick
DNA result on that mucus on Lachlan Roes sleeve.
* * * *
15
I
treasure this, Ellen Destry said later, in the gentle twilight.
Theyd driven home from the pub and
now they were on foot, halfway up the hill behind the house.
Walking with me?
Walking. She snuggled against
Challis briefly. And walking with you.
If she didnt walk every day she
felt sluggish, muscle-locked, unfit. She quite liked these evening walks, loved
walking with Hal, but unspoken was the fact that she missed her dawn walks on
Penzance Beach. Now her dawns were spent having sex or making love or whatever
you wanted to call it. Which was fineenjoy it while it lasts.
She pumped her arms and lengthened
her stride. This wasnt the beach, it wasnt dawn, but had its compensations.
It was a pretty corner of the world, a patchwork of vines, orchards and grazing
paddocks stitched together with gravel roads lined with fences and trees. The
birds were busy feeding their young. The air smelt fresh: one of the farmers
had been slashing the spring grasses.
Then she recoiled. Whats that
awful smell?
Sharp, basic, sinus-burning. She
tracked it to a tangle of bracken between the side of the road and a cattle
ramp. Shells? she asked, peering into the gloom, one hand over her nose and
mouth.
Abalone, said Challis, joining
her.
The pile was half a metre high, grey
and ghostly in the half-light, each ribbed and unlovely shell the size of a
saucer. Some guy dumps them along here every year, Challis said. One day Ill
nab him.
A poacher?
Probably.
Huh, Ellen said, storing away
another piece of useless information. This doesnt happen in Penzance Beach.
He squeezed her and laughed. Its
pretty wild out here on the frontier.
They looked up. A helicopter was
slicing across a corner of the darkening sky. It was some distance away but the
sound was unmistakeably that of a police Dauphin, more turbo whine than
eggbeater chop. They glanced at each other. There were a couple of notorious
black spots on the Peninsula, blind intersections where motorists had lost
their lives. The locals liked to speculate what the cut-off point was before
VicRoads improved safety by installing a roundabout or chopping down a few
trees: ten lives? Twenty?
Hal?
Yes, oh gorgeous one.
She took his hand in hers. What are
you going to do about your plane?
He was restoring a vintage
aeroplane. Correction: he had been, but now it sat gathering dust in a
hangar on a little local airfield. Ellen was oddly bothered by that. She had no
interest in the plane but the idea of Challis with an interest apart from
police workapart from her, for that matterwas important. She thought
back to life with her husband. Alan had several obsessionsthe fact that shed
been promoted to sergeant, the electricity bill, their daughters boyfriends
but hed had no interests. Had that been her fault? Was it her fault
that Hal Challis no longer fiddled with his old wreck of an aeroplane?
I honestly dont know, he said.
She squeezed then released his hand.
I wish I had more time, he said.
Do I take up your spare time?
I like spending it with you.
She bit her lip. Hal, I cant be
everything to you, or for you.
Of course not. I know that.
And you cant be everything to me.
Is this going somewhere?
They walked in the deepening
shadows, down the final slope toward his house. Their house. Ellens head was
whirling
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