Falk forced himself not to shake his head. Jesus. That bloody note.
The cops spent two hours picking apart Ellie Deacon’s bedroom. Thick fingers awkwardly probed through underwear drawers and jewelry cases. The note was almost missed. Almost. It was written on a single page torn from an ordinary exercise book. It had been folded once and slipped into the pocket of a pair of jeans. On the page, written in pen in Ellie’s distinctive handwriting, was the date she had disappeared. Underneath that was a single name: Falk.
“Explain that. If you can,” Deacon said. The bar was silent.
Falk said nothing. He couldn’t. And Deacon knew he couldn’t.
The barman banged a glass down on the counter. “Enough.” He looked hard at Falk, considering. Raco, holding his police badge visibly in his palm, raised his eyebrows and gave a tiny shake of his head. The barman’s eyes instead settled on Dow.
“You and your uncle, leave. Don’t come back for two days, thanks. Everyone else, buy a drink or get out.”
The rumors started small and by the end of the day were big. Falk—sixteen and scared—holed up in his bedroom with a thousand thoughts clamoring. He jumped as a tap sounded against the window frame. Luke’s face appeared, ghostly white in the evening gloom.
“You’re in the shit, mate,” he whispered. “I heard my mum and dad say. People are talking. What were you really doing on Friday after school?”
“I told you. Fishing. Upriver, though. Miles away, I swear.” Falk crouched by the window. His legs felt like they wouldn’t hold him up.
“Anyone else asked you yet? Cops or anyone?”
“No. They’re going to, though. They think I was meeting her or something.”
“But you weren’t.”
“No! Course not. But what if they don’t believe me?”
“You didn’t meet anyone at all? No one saw you?”
“I was on my bloody own, wasn’t I?”
“Right, listen—Aaron, mate, are you listening? Right, anyone asks, you say we were shooting rabbits together. On the back fields.”
“Nowhere near the river.”
“No. The fields off Cooran Road. Nowhere near the river. All evening. OK? We were mucking around. Like usual. We only hit one or two. Two. Say two.”
“Yes, OK. Two.”
“Don’t forget. We were together.”
“Yes. I mean no. I won’t forget. Jesus, Ellie. I can’t—”
“Say it.”
“What?”
“Say it now. What you were doing. Practice.”
“Luke and I were shooting rabbits together.”
“Again.”
“I was with Luke Hadler. Shooting rabbits. Out on the Cooran Road fields.”
“Say it until it sounds normal. And don’t get it wrong.”
“No.”
“You got all that, yeah?”
“Yes. Luke, mate. Thanks. Thank you.”
8
When Aaron Falk was eleven, he’d seen Mal Deacon turn his own flock into a staggering, bleeding mess using shearing clippers and a brutal hand. Aaron had felt an ache swell in his chest as he, Luke, and Ellie had watched one sheep after another brawled to the ground of the Deacons’ shed with a sharp twist and sliced too close to the skin.
Aaron was a farm kid, they all were, but this was something else. A pitiful cry from the smallest ewe made him open his mouth and draw breath, but he was cut short as Ellie pulled him away by his sleeve. She looked up at him and gave a single shake of her head.
She’d been a slight, intense child at that age, prone to long bouts of silence. Aaron, who leaned toward the quiet side himself, found that suited him fine. They usually let Luke do the talking.
Ellie had barely raised her head when the noises from the barn had floated over to where the three of them had been sitting on the sagging porch. Aaron had been curious, but it had been Luke who insisted they abandon their homework to investigate. Now, with the wails of the ewes in their ears and Ellie’s face fixed into an expression he hadn’t seen before, Aaron knew he wasn’t the only one wishing they hadn’t.
They turned to leave, and Aaron jumped as he saw Ellie’s mother watching silently from the barn’s doorway. She was jammed up against the frame, wearing an ill-fitting brown jumper with a single greasy stain on it. She took a sip of amber liquid from a glass without taking her eyes off the shearing. Her facial features were shared by her daughter. They had the same deep-set eyes, sallow skin, and wide mouth. But to Aaron, Ellie’s mother looked a hundred years old. It was years before he realized she would not even have been forty on that day.
As he watched, Ellie’s mother closed her eyes and tilted her head back sharply. She took a deep breath, her features creasing. When she opened her eyes again, they fixed on her husband, staring at him with a look so pure and undiluted Aaron was terrified Deacon would turn and see it for himself. Regret.
The weather that year had made the work harder for everyone, and a month later Deacon’s nephew Grant had moved into their farmhouse to lend a hand. Ellie’s mother left two days after that. Perhaps it had been the final straw. One man to resent was plenty enough for anyone.
Throwing two suitcases and a clinking bag of bottles into an old car, she had tried halfheartedly to stem her daughter’s tears with weightless vows that she would be back soon. Falk wasn’t sure how many years it had been until Ellie had stopped believing it. He wondered if part of her might have believed it until the day she died.
Falk now stood on the porch of the Fleece with Raco while the sergeant lit a cigarette. He offered the packet, and Falk shook his head. He’d spent enough time down memory lane for one night.
“Smart choice,” Raco said. “I’m trying to quit. For the baby.”
“Right. Good on you.”
Raco smoked slowly, blowing the vapor into the hot night sky. The pub noise had ratcheted up a notch. Deacon and Dow had taken their time leaving, and the hint of aggression still hung in the air.
“You should’ve told me earlier.” Raco took a drag. Suppressed a cough.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“You have anything to do with it? That girl’s death?”
“No. But I wasn’t with Luke when it happened. Not like we said.”
Raco paused.
“So you lied about your alibi. Where was Luke?”
“I don’t know.”
“You never asked?”
“Of course I did, but he—” Falk paused, remembering. “He always insisted on sticking to our story. Always. Even when it was only the two of us. He said it was safer to be consistent. I didn’t push it. I was grateful to him, you know? I thought it was for my benefit.”
“Who else knew it was a lie?”
“A few people suspected. Mal Deacon, obviously. Some others. But no one knew for certain. At least that’s what I always thought. But now I’m not sure. It turns out Gerry Hadler knew all along. Maybe he’s not the only one.”
“Do you think Luke killed Ellie?”
“I don’t know.” He stared out at the empty street. “I want to know.”
“You think all this is connected?”
“I really hope not.”