The Dark Lake

‘Well, I’m getting a bit old to manage things but I believe it is ticking along nicely.’

I look him in the eye. ‘We’ve heard that there are a few issues. You seem to have a few enemies.’

He lightly snorts air out of his nostrils. ‘No one special. I have found in business, detective, that if you don’t have someone upset with you then you’re not doing it right.’ He folds his hands together and firms his jaw.

‘So all the turmoil about Aussie jobs and the salaries of your senior executives doesn’t concern you?’

He sighs and says mildly, ‘It concerns me, yes. But it has nothing to do with Rose.’

‘How do you know?’ I press.

‘Because it’s all a political beat-up. And the reports are misleading, so we’re focusing on setting the record straight.’

‘Have you received threats?’

He shakes his head. ‘No, nothing directly. I’ve never really been threatened about the company. There was a bomb threat made here to the house once but that was years ago now.’

‘Tell me about Rosalind,’ I say, changing the subject again.

His hands flutter briefly away from his lap before settling back into place. ‘What else would you like to know?’

‘Well, how did you feel about having a daughter finally, after three sons?’

He looks surprised but says, ‘Rosalind’s birth was not a happy time, unfortunately. As you know, Olivia died very shortly after Rose was born and I’m afraid a new baby was a very hard thing to have to deal with.’

‘Understandable,’ I murmur.

‘Yes. It was very hard. It was Christmas Day, which added to the strain. This has never been a happy time of the year for our family. Rosalind was quite a good baby but the boys were young and scared without their mother and there simply weren’t enough hours in the day. I made sure I had help.’

‘From family?’

He laughs. ‘No. Not from family, though Olivia’s mother tried her best to help. Mad as a cut snake, that woman. I wouldn’t let her anywhere near the children. No, I had paid help mostly. Fortunately, I had the means.’

‘What was your wife like?’

He sips at his tea thoughtfully and then looks up at me as if he is trying to decide how much to reveal. ‘Olivia was a very complicated woman.’

‘And very beautiful,’ I say, indicating the photo of Olivia on the mantelpiece.

He nods, looking at it too. ‘Indeed she was. Incredible-looking. Like Vivien Leigh, I used to think. But she did know it. I loved her to death but she was very difficult.’ He smiles. ‘My very own Scarlett O’Hara.’

‘Difficult how?’

He sighs heavily. ‘Difficult in all the ways a woman can be difficult. She was very selfish. Very demanding. She would occasionally have episodes. Quite bad episodes. We had been having a lot of trouble before she died. Pregnancy seemed to make things worse. Hormones, I suppose. I was keen to keep that side of her away from the boys.’

I nod. ‘It’s challenging looking after children when you are dealing with all the things that adults have to work out.’

‘Yes. Being an adult is something that I don’t think you ever really get used to.’ He gives a brief ironic laugh. ‘You must have children yourself to say that.’ He releases another heavy sigh. ‘But this is not about Olivia, is it?’

‘No, it’s not. But sometimes this kind of background information is helpful. Do you think Rosalind was impacted by not having a mother?’

‘Impossible to say. She never knew another life. She was very quiet and sort of self-contained. Smart and opinionated at times but not overly affectionate. I remarried for a while and she seemed to like having Lila around, but that didn’t work out in the end.’

‘I didn’t know you had remarried,’ I say.

‘Yes, to Lila Wilcox. She’s a good woman but we were terribly unsuited.’ He clenches his fists as if trying to get his blood flowing. ‘To be honest, their closeness bothered me sometimes. I felt a bit excluded, though I recognised it was probably good for Rose to have another woman around. Seems ridiculous now. I don’t know if they were in touch. Lila lives in China.’ He looks around the room absently. ‘I should tell her what’s happened, I suppose.’

I make a note to call Lila Wilcox myself.

‘Mr Ryan, I know this is hard, but what was your relationship with Rosalind like?’

George Ryan glances outside to the shimmering pool. He looks regal sitting in profile, his shirt tailored, his hair groomed. I recall seeing a similar scene online a few days ago in a local news article that profiled his business. I keep catching the startling blue of Olivia’s frozen stare in my peripheral vision.

‘I loved Rose, but I think that, as hard as I tried, it was difficult to separate losing Olivia from gaining her. I suppose she might have sensed that sometimes.’ He finishes his tea and the cup slips as he places it on the saucer. The clatter of china needles up my spine. ‘But I always looked after her. I loved her. I’m just not sure I really knew what to do with a daughter.’

His formality feels jarring. I sense he is telling the truth but there is a coolness that has me on guard.

‘Do you think Rosalind liked living in Smithson? I mean, I assume she must have, to come back.’

‘Well, yes, I suppose she did.’ The furrow on his brow deepens as he says, ‘In many ways, Rosalind wasn’t very ambitious. But she was happy to work hard. Not like my boys, who have high expectations but want everything to fall into their laps. She always had her head in a book. She liked reading and writing and those kinds of things. She did live in the city for a few years but I don’t think she really enjoyed it. I understood that, as I am not well-suited to the city lifestyle either. And there was some trouble at the school she taught at.’

‘Trouble?’

‘Yes. Some issue with a love-struck student, which caused her a lot of grief. She didn’t want to discuss it but I got the sense she was quite angry about it. She decided to move back here to teach after that.’

‘That must have been very stressful for her,’ I say. Felix and I made some calls to her old school late yesterday and are waiting to hear back. Something definitely went down there.

‘She took it all in her stride. She wasn’t one to dwell on things, really. Despite how she looked, she was very strong.’

‘We’ve been to her house,’ I say abruptly.

George seems mildly surprised. ‘Well, yes, I suppose you have. Of course.’

‘Once we have everything we need we’ll let you know so that you can have her things. And you may wish to sell the house in time.’

He waves his hand limply in my direction. ‘None of that seems to matter right now.’

‘You bought her the place, is that right?’

Sarah Bailey's books