Killarney, p.10
Killarney, page 10
On her way through town Dana made an impulsive stop at the Killarney Hotel where ten gleaming motorbikes were parked out the front. After wondering whether any of them were responsible for Johnny Buckley’s hit-and-run, Dana went inside, passing a trio of men drinking schooners at high stools on the verandah. At the bar, a woman with bright red hair looked up from pouring a beer and gave her a wide, friendly smile.
Dana flashed her work ID. ‘I’m Dana Gibson from the Department of Families. I was hoping to have a chat with Brian – sorry, I don’t know his last name. Do you know where I might find him?’
The woman’s head tilted to the side. ‘My son, Brian?’
‘Is he friends with Jayden Maloney?’
‘He is and, to be honest, I’m glad someone’s getting their act together and doing something to find him. I’m Cynthia. Brian’s in the dining room. Just head out the back and I’ll be with you in a tick.’
Dana walked through the pub and into an extension that served as a dining area. The air was stale in the windowless room. The walls were covered with maps of the local area, a photograph of two craggy bushmen, some mounted saws and bottles, and a spindly plant attempting to climb some lattice. She found herself with a sudden urge to return to the breezy benches on the front verandah.
A boy with neatly combed hair was sitting in the far corner, his head bent over a book and a packet of Smiths crisps in his lap. Cynthia appeared behind Dana and ushered her over to where the boy was sitting.
Cynthia reached into her son’s packet of chips and he slapped it away. ‘Mum!’ he said.
She gave Dana a withering look. ‘Honestly, you carry them in your womb for months on end, go through a twenty-hour labour and this is your reward.’ She blinked as if she’d suddenly remembered her manners. ‘Can I get you anything? A coffee? Glass of chardonnay?’
‘I’m fine, honestly. I was hoping to find out more about Jayden Maloney. Whether you had any idea where he might be?’
‘We haven’t, have we, Brian.’
Brian shook his head, gazing at them with doleful eyes as he sipped his pink lemonade.
‘The last time we saw him was two weeks ago – he came in on the weekend and you boys spent the afternoon playing pool – but since then, nothing. For a while there, I was going to take him in, but I’m a single mum and I can barely manage this one on my own. Then he went and stayed out in that caravan at Trevor and Connie’s house ’ She leant across to Dana. ‘I have to tell you, I’m really worried. I’ve got this bad feeling. I’ve been thinking I should put some posters of him around town and leave my name as a contact.’
‘That’s an excellent idea,’ said Dana.
‘The police are saying they’re doing everything they can, but there’s no urgency. I keep wondering, would this be happening if he was a middle-class kid who wasn’t in foster care?’
Dana could see that Cynthia wasn’t a woman to be underestimated. Brian finished his packet of chips and licked the salt from his fingers.
‘Did Jayden ever do or say anything to suggest that something was wrong? That he might have been worried?’ she asked him.
‘He’s one of the bravest and kindest guys I know,’ Brian said with a lisp. ‘There was this one time where this idiot, Rodney, kept picking on me – stealing my tuckshop money and calling me names. Anyway, after he’d stolen my sausage roll and strawberry milk, he was sitting in the grandstand and Jayden walked over to him and they talked for ages.’ Brian grinned. ‘I don’t know what Jayden said to him, but from that day Rodney never bothered me again.’ Brian scrunched the empty crisp packet into a ball. ‘I hope he shows up soon.’
As Dana drove towards the McClusky residence she detoured past the scene of the hit-and-run. Johnny Buckley only lived a block or two from the pub – she wondered if it really was an accident that had led to his death? As she turned the corner she passed the quaint green house opposite Amber Lanaski’s place. The old man was in his usual position on the front stairs, a heavily pregnant red terrier sprawled at his feet. She skidded over to the kerb and opened the car door just as he was launching into a rendition of ‘Auld Lang Syne’.
As she picked her way along the cracked red path bordered by clumps of rosemary he stopped singing. ‘No offence, but usually a woman like yourself would take one look at a big, bearded man like me and cross the road.’
‘None taken. I’m Dana, by the way.’
‘I’m Arthur. Arthur Compton.’ Close up his hair and beard were snowy white, his pale blue eyes the colour of water. ‘What brings you to my humble abode?’
‘I work at the Department of Families in Toowoomba. I’m looking for Jayden Maloney. He’s sixteen and has light brown hair and blue eyes. Apparently, he’s often seen with a Michael Jordan backpack. I was just wondering if you’ve seen him come past at all?’
‘Ah, yes, he’s a good boy. Never too busy to stop and say hello.’ Arthur’s winged eyebrows came together in a way that reminded her of her grandfather.
‘I don’t suppose you remember when you last saw him?’
‘Oh, it would have been over a week ago.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘That’s about when he disappeared. Any chance you could be more specific?’
‘Oh, well, let’s see. It was the same day as my Meals on Wheels comes. I was looking forward to the chicken pie they’ve been doing lately. So, it would have been a Wednesday.’
‘Did Jayden say anything to you?’
‘That was it actually, he hardly said anything at all, which was unusual. He’s usually quite talkative. But that day he told me he was going to do the right thing. He told me there was no time to chat as he was in a hurry. He seemed very determined.’
‘Did he tell you where he was going?’ She tried to keep her voice steady as adrenaline raced through her veins.
‘He didn’t stop, just called out as he passed. I was singing “Greensleeves”. There’s not many teenagers like him these days. I do hope you find him.’
Dana leant against the railing feeling deflated and hoping that the visit to the McCluskys’ house was going to prove more fruitful than her efforts so far. She was about to head back to Susan’s car when she thought of something else.
‘Arthur, I don’t suppose you were sitting out here on the night of the hit-and-run, were you?’
He visibly shrank into himself as he stared up at her. His voice was low. ‘I’ve been waiting for someone to ask me about that.’
‘What did you see?’
‘I saw Johnny Buckley go past. I knew he’d been at the pub – that’s his Friday night routine. He stopped to sing a line of the Men at Work song. That was the joke between us, you see. He was always a bit of a rascal, so I used to sing, Johnny be good, be good. And then he’d join in with the chorus.’ He tugged at his white beard and stared into the distance. ‘After he left I heard an almighty noise. A bike came tearing along the street. Johnny was further up the road when the bike hit him.’ Arthur put his hand to his cheek. ‘George and Frank ran out to help.’
Arthur’s eyes had started watering, but she couldn’t help herself. ‘Then what happened?’
‘The rider got up and started to limp away. He had a motorbike helmet on so I couldn’t tell who it was. He pulled out his mobile phone and it looked like he was going to call someone. Maybe the police.’ Arthur paused. ‘I remember thinking it was strange that he would try to call someone when he still had his helmet on.’
‘Maybe he had concussion and wasn’t thinking straight?’ she suggested.
‘You could be right. Such a tragedy. I was praying that Johnny would pull through.’
‘You didn’t contact the police?’ asked Dana.
Arthur’s eyes filled with guilt and the dog rose from the ground and licked his hand. ‘I would have, but I knew George and Frank would have spoken to them.’
She heard the trauma in Arthur’s voice and felt sorry for him. ‘Thanks, Arthur.’
As she walked back to the car she could hear the sound of his rich baritone in her ears.
O’ Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling,
from glen to glen, and down the mountainside.
The summer’s gone, and all the roses falling,
’tis you, ’tis you must go and I must bide.
The McCluskys’ house was opposite the church on the hill, making Dana wonder whether its proximity was part of the reason Jayden had been so attracted to the services. The sound of organ music floated from the building as she squeezed past vehicles parked on both sides of the street. As she exited her car, churchgoers were filing down the front stairs and mingling on the lawn at the end of a wedding.
It was like going back in time. Everyone in their best clothes – men in suits and women wearing floral dresses as they clutched their handbags. There were so many people Dana wondered whether the entire town was in attendance. With a pang, she realised that she missed the sense of community the church had provided. Perhaps that’s what she should be doing on the weekends instead of working straight through. But the truth was, ever since Oscar’s death she’d lost faith. The idea of God who’d allowed her only son to die filled her with ambivalence.
She met Connie McClusky in the front yard of a high-set brick home and followed the rhythmic swishing of her ponytail as she strode down the side of the house, through a side gate and under an arch of climbing white roses. A caravan was parked at the end of their generous backyard. Inside was a small bed and table with a cushioned sofa, which ran around the edges of the van. The velour curtains and brown carpet gave it a slightly dated feel.
‘It’s not much,’ Connie said, as they stared at the Ace Ventura and Friends posters that Jayden had used as decoration. ‘But it seemed to make him happy.’ She sat down at the table, then gestured for Dana to do the same. ‘I hate to admit this,’ Connie said, fingering the small gold cross around her neck, ‘but when Trevor told me that he’d offered to let Jayden stay here I didn’t want a bar of it. I mean, Phoenix was only eighteen months old and Griffith was three. I already had enough on my plate.’
‘That’s understandable.’ Dana smiled, hoping Connie would take her into her confidence.
‘But it was actually the opposite. He was so helpful. He’d look after the kids if I needed to duck out, make sandwiches for them, and he was so good with his hands. He fixed all sorts of things that were broken around here – cupboard doors, leaking taps. I don’t know how I ever managed without him.’
‘What did he get up to in his spare time?’
‘Regular teenage stuff, I guess. He was into basketball and went to youth group and church. He also had a small group of friends he hung out with. They liked to spend their time at the swimming hole near Browns Falls.’
‘Was there anything that happened in the lead-up to his disappearance? Anything he was sad or worried about?’
‘Well, he used to confide in me sometimes, about how depressed he was that his parents aren’t in his life and all the problems he’d had with his aunt.’ She hesitated.
‘Yes?’ prompted Dana.
‘I’m not sure.’
‘Even the smallest of things can be important sometimes.’
‘I wasn’t going to tell you this, but on the morning of his disappearance I had a bit of a go at him.’ She put a thumbnail to her mouth. ‘I was tired and sleeping badly. I was trying to find the camera so I could take some photos at Griff’s birthday party and I usually keep it up in the cupboard, but I just couldn’t find it anywhere. I’m embarrassed to admit this, but I accused Jayden of stealing it, which is especially shameful after I found it in the glove box of the car a few hours later. Turns out my husband had borrowed it for a buck’s party and didn’t think to put it back. Anyway, when I found it I just felt like the worst person in the world. You don’t think that’s why he left, do you? Why we haven’t heard from him?’
‘I very much doubt it,’ said Dana. Though it would not have helped. ‘Do you mind if I have a look around?’
‘Go for it. I’m just glad that someone is taking this seriously.’
On the bedside cabinet was a can of Lynx deodorant and a tube of Clearasil. In the first drawer she found his Game Boy. The second contained a black velcro wallet with Jayden’s bank card, bus pass and a condom. Was he sexually active? Or was it just something he carried with him to make him seem more mature than he really was?
In the clear insert at the front of the wallet was a Polaroid of a young woman. She was sitting on a swing with her hair in pigtails and wearing a pinafore. There was a similarity to Jayden around the eyes and in her upturned nose which made Dana certain it was his mother. She felt a wave of sadness that he’d lost his mum at such a young age and felt as though she was trespassing on his private pain. A yellow Sony Walkman was on his bed. He clearly hadn’t been planning to go for long and now it had been over a week.
She opened the caravan door and thanked Connie for her time. She retraced her steps back to the front yard and found a cameraman setting up a tripod on the perimeter of the property, his ABC News van behind him. Dana headed to her car, deep in thought. As she was starting the engine, she remembered what she’d read in Jayden’s case notes. Jayden had never missed a day of work. He had no interest in drugs and wasn’t into absconding.
She felt a terrible anxiety and a tightness in her chest. When she arrived home at 5 pm she went straight to the lounge room and turned on the TV. On ABC News a female newsreader was addressing the viewers in a serious tone.
The foster mother of Jayden Maloney, a missing teen from the small town of Killarney, has made an impassioned plea for the community to help find him. Connie McClusky last spoke to Jayden on January eight before he left for work.
The segment cut to Connie standing outside her home with her sunglasses perched on top of her head.
‘Please, Jay, come home. You’re not in trouble and the kids miss you. We all miss you. All we want is for you to come back to us safe and sound, and for this all to have been a huge misunderstanding.’
Jayden’s backpack, with a Michael Jordan logo on it, may be a key source of information to finding him. Police have identified a person of interest in Jayden’s disappearance, with a name yet to be released publicly. Authorities have ruled out a link between Jayden’s case and the hit-and-run accident in Killarney the week before.
When the news program was over it occurred to her that she hadn’t had a chance to think about Sean all day. She rummaged through her handbag for her phone, hoping for a message about their date, but her heart swooped when she was greeted by a blank screen. He’d no doubt been just as busy as she had.
She fired off a text asking him what time he wanted to meet at Queen Mary Falls the next day, and hesitated before signing off with a kiss.
When Sunday lunch came and went, and she still hadn’t heard from Sean, she started vacillating between despondency and anger. To keep herself busy she whipped up a tuna casserole but didn’t feel hungry. At 3 pm she checked her phone, certain he would’ve been in contact. Once again, the screen was blank.
She was about to force herself out of the house for a run but decided to tackle the problem head-on by speaking with him. Her call went straight to message bank.
Hello you’ve reached Sean. I’m not around right now but you know the drill …
She stabbed at the red button on her phone, his voicemail irritating her as much as the fact she hadn’t heard from him. Feeling defeated, she ran herself a bath with the Lux body wash she’d been given for Christmas. As she lay back in the water she made some stern resolutions about the next time she found herself dating someone. One, she’d figure out whether the person was worth investing in before getting emotionally involved. And two, she’d make sure they were reliable.
8
On Monday morning Lachlan arrived early in his Range Rover. He jogged down the front path in the drizzling rain, smiling as he met Dana at her front door, droplets of water dripping from his fringe.
‘Don’t you believe in umbrellas?’ she asked him, surprised to find him in a good mood after the tense argument they’d had about Blair the week before. She decided not to bring it up, for fear of upsetting the delicate equilibrium that had been restored.
‘That stuff’s for wimps.’ He handed her a large take-away coffee and a brown paper bag. ‘Bacon and egg brekky wrap with special sauce, just for you.’
She breathed in the delicious aroma. ‘You’re a lifesaver.’
He looked at her as she sipped the warm, strong coffee. ‘I don’t want to tell you that you look like shit, but … anyway. How’s things with my brother?’
‘You know how I told you that I had a date with him on Friday night? Well, he was supposed to take me to Queen Mary Falls yesterday but I haven’t heard from him.’
‘God, that’s poor form – even for him.’
‘It’s fine, I gave myself a good talking-to last night and I’m pretty much over it now.’
He chuckled. ‘I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation – you’re the best thing to happen to him in ages. Anyway, we should probably head next door and pick up Angus.’
Dana grabbed an umbrella and they made a dash for the car. Lachlan beeped his horn and after a few moments Susan’s door opened and Angus hugged his nan goodbye.
He’s forgiven her, Dana noted with relief. She wound down her window and waved at Susan as Angus jumped in the back seat.
‘Dinner, if I make it back early enough?’ she called out, wondering if Susan could hear her over the din of the rain.
