‘You’re friends, aren’t you? You and Mandy?’
‘Yes. She was really nice after Craig died. Helped me a lot. And I look after Liam for her sometimes.’
‘You’re right, she is nice. But you were telling me about Harley Snouch. Why was he ostracised?’
‘Well, it was before my time, before Craig and I came back here. The story is that Harley was the most eligible bachelor in town, only child of the Snouches of Springfields. He’d been away to boarding school, then university somewhere. He came home over the summer break and met Katie Blonde, who was the daughter of a local truck driver. Smart, though, and very good-looking; Mandy is her spitting image apparently. Katie had been to university too, at Bathurst or Wagga or somewhere, which was fairly unusual in those days, a girl from a working-class family. Harley and Katie were an item, engaged to be married. Then they were gone, back to university. No one knew anything had gone wrong until a year later. She came back again, with a degree and a baby. But there was no Harley Snouch.
‘It was only later that people learnt she’d accused him of rape, that he’d gone to prison. Everyone was horrified, of course. His mother, poor woman, died of shame. The old man became a recluse, sold off parts of the property. Gave a lot to the government for a national park that never happened, gave land to war veterans and ne’er-do-wells and to poor old Codger Harris. Thank God he’s dead—Eric, I mean. Imagine the shame of these latest murders. Anyway, by the time Craig and Jamie and I got here, it was all a bit like a town legend. And then Harley Snouch turns up out of the blue, released from prison. And then Mandy came back to look after Katie and he’s wanting to know her. Ugly man.’
Martin’s mind is alive with possibilities. ‘So when did the old man die?’
‘Not sure. Maybe five years ago.’
‘So Harley Snouch only turned up well after his father had died?’
‘Oh yes. Like I said, the old man had banished him. Never wanted to see him again.’
‘But left him the farm, nevertheless?’
‘I wouldn’t know about that. I guess so. He lives there.’
‘Yes—up until Wednesday, anyway.’
Martin considers what Fran has told him. Such a strange story. Two young people: bright, good-looking, engaged to be married. Then they disappear, ostensibly back to their respective universities. A year later the woman returns with their baby, while he’s been sentenced to prison for raping her.
‘Is there anything else?’ Fran asks. ‘I need to be closing up, preparing for tomorrow.’
‘What’s tomorrow?’
‘The funeral. For Allen Newkirk.’
‘The boy in the ute?’
‘Yes.’
Martin pays for his mineral water and hefts it from the counter, then pauses to ask one more question. ‘Fran, when you were praying in St James the other day, giving thanks for Jamie being spared, did you say a prayer for Craig as well?’
She takes offence at that. ‘Yes, of course I did. He was my husband.’
‘Thanks, Fran. Thanks for helping.’ And carrying his water, he leaves.
Parking at the Black Dog, he discovers he’s no longer the only guest. There are three cars parked outside rooms in the motel’s solitary wing. Two are police cars; the other looks like a rental. Lounging against the front of the rental in the shade of the carport is a thin man smoking a cigarette. He’s wearing the remains of a suit: the coat has gone, the white shirt is smeared with charcoal, the tie is at half-mast. His city shoes are caked with mud.
‘Tough day,’ says Martin, getting out of his car.
The man looks unflinchingly into Martin’s eyes. ‘Who are you?’
‘Martin Scarsden. Sydney Morning Herald.’ Martin offers his hand, but the man merely looks at it, declining to shake it.
‘Didn’t take you long to get here,’ he says, a disparaging tone to his voice.
‘I’ve been here for a few days.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘Writing a piece on the anniversary of the shooting by the priest. Do you think there’s a connection between the two?’
‘The two what?’
‘The two shootings. The priest at the church and the bodies in the dam.’
‘What makes you think they were shot?’
‘Weren’t they?’
‘You tell me.’
Martin realises his run of luck with the police has come to an end; this is a fully-fledged homicide officer, not an academy graduate like Robbie or a small-town powerbroker like Herb Walker. The detective is not about to volunteer anything. The best Martin can hope for is confirmation or denial. ‘We’re running a story in tomorrow’s paper saying there were two bodies found in the dam by an insurance inspector. We’re saying you think they were German backpackers, abducted a year ago from Swan Hill. That you’ve arrested Harley Snouch.’
The cop considers him, as if deciding whether or not to engage. He takes a final drag on his cigarette, drops the butt to the ground, grinds it under his shoe. ‘I look forward to reading it. Nice to meet you, Mr Scarsden.’ And he walks past Martin into room number nine.
THE OASIS IS OPEN, BUT MANDY IS CLOSED. SHE SELLS MARTIN A COFFEE, but makes it clear she doesn’t want to talk, muttering something about feeding Liam. Martin barely notices; he’s on a high. He takes his coffee and proceeds to the general store. Fran isn’t there, but the Saturday papers are. He buys them and takes them outside to relish—not the Sydney papers, but their Melbourne cousins. No matter, the front pages are just as good. BUSHLAND MURDERS screams the rival tabloid, the Herald Sun, but its copy is a mishmash of information cribbed from the Sydney Morning Herald’s website and the television news. He smirks as he reads a verbatim quote, lifted from the interview he gave Channel Ten, attributed to ‘an informed source’. The SMH’s Melbourne cousin, The Age, does it better: EVIL STALKS TOWN OF DEATH and the subheading Massacre Priest Linked to Backpackers’ Murder. The splash has a red EXCLUSIVE banner above their by-lines: By Martin Scarsden in Riversend and Bethanie Glass, Senior Police Reporter. There’s an aerial shot of the property, police cars and figures in white overalls by the farm dam, courtesy of Nine News. And his second piece, under the headline MASSACRE PRIEST’S NEW HORROR, has his dinkus photo, the red EXCLUSIVE stamp and is branded as A Herald Investigation. Martin smiles with satisfaction: the holy trinity.
He scans through the stories quickly, picking out where Bethanie or the subeditors have inserted facts or cleaned up his copy. He discards the front section, moving through to News Review. The graphic artists and layout subs have done his copy proud, dressing his tale of a dying town with suitably bleak images; if they’d taken a week they couldn’t have done a better job. And there’s more to come: he’s already written half of the follow-up, THE PRIEST WITH NO PAST, having woken early in his motel room, unable to sleep. It will make the perfect follow-up for the Sunday papers, the Sun-Herald and The Sunday Age. Max Fuller was right; coming to Riversend was exactly what he needed.