Fran doesn’t move for a long moment, then nods her affirmation, her voice a whisper. ‘Yes. It was me. I said I’d wait for him at the lagoon. I was hoping he’d come. He never said he would, but I hoped he might.’
‘So did you go to Blackfellas? Jamie said he saw you at home.’
‘Both. I went home. Then I went out to Blackfellas. In case he came. And just to be there.’
‘And when you went home, you saw Craig, didn’t you?’
Fran looks up with eyes of pain. But she must see the resolve in Martin’s eyes, and drops her head again. ‘It doesn’t matter now, does it? Craig is dead. Byron is dead. Jamie is as good as dead. None of it matters.’
‘So tell me what happened, Fran. What did you tell Craig?’
‘I told him that Byron was leaving. There was no need to confront him, no need for guns, no need for violence. He was leaving. But Craig went anyway.’
‘But not with his gun. The men were unarmed.’
‘Jamie was at home. He’d calmed Craig down somehow.’
‘I know. Jamie has told me about it. He told Craig that Byron had never abused him, that Herb Walker was wrong, that he and Allen would never have allowed it.’
‘Is that how it happened? I see.’
‘Jamie said that before Craig left for the church, he said something to you. It made you cry.’
Fran again appears to be on the brink of tears. ‘Craig wanted revenge.’
‘Revenge?’
‘He hated Byron. He knew Byron had slept with me, made me happy. You have no idea how much that angered Craig, how much it ate away at him, me being happy. He wanted revenge.’
‘And Byron had beaten him up, humiliated him.’
‘You know about that?’
‘I do. And I know why. Byron was warning him off, telling Craig to stop hitting you. You and Jamie.’
Fran lets out a sob; Martin is surprised by its unexpected power. It comes from somewhere deep inside, racking her chest before escaping, the release of something long suppressed. She keeps her eyes down but her body is betraying her.
‘Fran? What did Craig say he was going to do?’
She looks up. ‘He said he was going to fuck with his mind.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘He went there to gloat, to inflict pain. He knew Byron was a decent man, a caring man. He told me what he was going to say, because he wanted to hurt me just as he intended to hurt Byron.’ Another sob escapes, shaking her body.
‘What was he going to say?’
‘That once Byron was gone, I was his again, his property, his plaything. He would do whatever he liked with me, treat me however he liked. Like a dog. And not just me. Mandy too. We would both be his. And any other woman Byron had been with. That’s why I went out to Blackfellas. After Craig told me that, if Byron didn’t come for me, I was going to kill myself.’
‘Jesus, Fran.’
‘But I didn’t. I couldn’t leave Jamie to face him alone. He was a monster.’ Another sob, a deep wave, wells up and escapes, her body trembling as it passes. ‘I’m glad he’s dead, Martin. I’m so glad Byron shot him. I celebrate it every day. I come here and give thanks. I’m sorry about the others, Alf and Thom and the others, I truly am, but not about him.’
Martin hesitates, uncertain whether to push on, to further distress this fragile woman. But he feels he has no option; the need to find the truth remains, insistent and unwavering, however uncomfortable he now feels about it.
‘Fran, the police have a recording of Byron talking on the phone from St James to Avery Foster. After you’d visited Byron, shortly before he started shooting. You understand?’
Martin can see in her eyes that she does. He sees confirmation and he sees torment and he sees trepidation. ‘Byron told Foster that Craig was an animal—but not just him, his hunting buddies as well. Is that what you told Byron, when you were pleading with him to meet you at Blackfellas, to save yourself from Craig? You were so desperate to get away from your husband, for Byron to save you, that you also accused his friends of violent abuse with no evidence to support it?’
Fran Landers says nothing; she doesn’t have to. Her eyes make her confession for her. And then the sobbing takes her over; she loses the last vestiges of self-control, no longer able to meet Martin’s gaze, the church no longer a sanctuary.
Martin doesn’t know whether to condemn her or comfort her. So he does both: condemning her with his mind as he comforts her with his words. This woman who had suffered so much for so long, trapped in a loveless marriage with a vicious husband. And yet had that desperate lie, accusing not just Craig but also his friends, been the sliver on the scales of Byron Swift’s unbalanced mind that had tipped him into murder? How can Martin forgive her? How can he not?
Later, out on the fateful steps, Martin stands in the blazing sun, stands where the priest was standing when he had opened fire. He looks out to where Swift’s congregation had milled beneath him, looks over to where Fran Landers’ red station wagon is parked in the shade of the trees, where Gerry Torlini and Allen Newkirk had sat in the fruit-grower’s truck, where Torlini had died and the boy had cowered. He looks across to the levee bank where Luke McIntyre had witnessed the massacre. And, at last, Martin believes he knows why Swift did it. Standing on the church steps, he tries to put himself in the priest’s shoes, to see the world as he did in those last moments of his life.
Swift arrived at church planning to conduct one last service before leaving the district, taking his guns with him. Walker, misled by Jamie Landers and Allen Newkirk, had unjustly accused him of child abuse and locked him in a cell. The allegations were false, but that didn’t mean they would go away; the Bellington sergeant would most likely investigate his past, possibly discover his true identity. The policeman might also discover the drugs growing in the Scrublands, Avery Foster’s involvement, Robbie’s concealment. And there were signs an awful crime had been perpetrated in the Scrublands. He needed to be gone.
So before arriving at the church, Swift had visited Mandy to say goodbye. She’d told him she was pregnant with their child, asked to go with him. But he’d refused. Because he wasn’t really Byron Swift, he was Julian Flynt, a war criminal and a fugitive. He would be doing her no favours taking her with him. He’d told her about the drugs, about Robbie Haus-Jones, but he’d never revealed the truth about himself. Martin can understand why: growing marijuana is one thing, killing women and children in cold blood is another.
Swift had left Mandy and gone to the church. Fran Landers arrived in a panic, warning him that her husband and his friends were coming to kill him. He laughed at the thought of Landers, a demonstrable coward, posing any threat to him. Swift had beaten him up before, he could beat him up again; if Landers brought a gun, he would fetch one of his own from the vestry. He told her not to worry, that he was leaving town anyway, leaving that very day.
That was the first she knew of his imminent departure, so she pleaded her own case. Swift would be abandoning her and her son Jamie to the violence of her husband; he should take them with him. And when that failed to move him, she not just accused Craig, but also implicated his friends. Yet Swift remained unmoved, unable to help, unwilling to meet her at Blackfellas Lagoon.