Blood Tears (31 page)

“
Just
lying in bed, thinking of you, honey-boy. I miss you a
lot.”

“
I
miss you, too. I wish I was there with you.”

“
So
do I. Maybe soon?”

“
I’m
due quite a bit of time off from tomorrow.”

“
You
deserve it. You’ve been working so hard lately.”

“
So
have you, babe.” He paused. “Heard you had a run in with the kids
today.”

“
Yep.”

“
Could you just go easy on everyone at the moment? With the
funeral coming up, everyone’s a bit on edge,” he said, a
discernable level of pleading entering his voice. “We all just need
a bit of space from you and Maguire.”

“
Jakey, they shoplifted. Not to mention that they were wagging
school, and drinking and smoking pot, out in the open in public. We
can’t ignore it when people make a complaint to us.”

“
Just
back off a bit until the funeral’s over. That’s all I’m
asking.”

I refused to agree to
do that, so swiftly changed the subject. “When is the funeral going
to be?”

“
Soon. Not everything’s been finalised yet.”

“
Who’s paying for it, Jakey? I’m pretty sure Denny wouldn’t
have left much money behind because he didn’t have a job. Plus he’s
got kids.”

“
He
left virtually nothing behind,” he confirmed, but I didn’t fail to
notice that he evaded my question.

“
So,
who’s paying for the funeral?” I persisted.

He was silent for so
long, I thought he wouldn’t answer, though I knew what his answer
would be from that silence. “I am.”

I stayed silent too. It
wasn’t my place to criticise him for paying for his own brother’s
funeral. But once again, I thought with anger about how much his
layabout family depended on him financially, even though he didn’t
earn all that much. Nothing would make me happier than for him to
make a break from his family, as much for his psychological welfare
as his financial future.

“
Let’s not fight about it. Please,” he implored.

“
We’re not fighting about it, Jakey. It’s your money.” And
when I thought about it, I knew I wouldn’t care for him to start
telling me how I should spend my money. Not one little
bit.

“
I’m
sorry, babe, but I have to go. We’re so short-staffed here at the
moment. This is the first break I’ve had all night. I haven’t even
managed to have dinner yet. Bloody government cutbacks. I’m really
looking forward to tomorrow.”

“
Will
I see you tomorrow night?”

“
Try
to hold me back,” he said.

“
I
love you, Jakey.”

“
I
love you too, babe.”

And with those
comforting words ringing in my ears, I fell asleep.

Once again, I
dreamed.

I am headed for a
solemn occasion set in an old church. It’s surrounded by a
graveyard full of cracked, leaning headstones, some inscribed with
faint and illegible writing. A badly neglected tall wrought iron
and sandstone fence encompasses the compound, parts of it collapsed
on itself.

The day is grey;
heavy, low clouds threatening to release their loads of water at
any moment. It is completely still in the graveyard, and as I open
the rusting gate, it screeches with eerie loudness in the silence.
I am dressed sombrely in a dark charcoal skirt suit with low black
heels that clack on the cobblestone path, as I make my way to the
door of the church.

I push open the heavy
oak door, liberally studded with iron bolts, needing a bit of
effort to do so. Inside the church, mournful organ music fills the
hall. A group of people sit on one side of the aisle, one lonely
figure on the other. It is dark inside the church, making it
difficult to determine who they are, or where it would be most
appropriate for me to sit.

I walk down the aisle,
and it is only as I reach the last row of the crowded side of the
church that I realise everyone on that side is a Bycraft.

“
Oh,
no,” I say to myself. I’m doing what the Super told me not to do
and I’m attending Denny’s funeral. She will be so angry with
me.

His coffin sits on a
bier at the front of the church. A couple stand next to it, but I
can’t tell who they are in the dimness. As I walk past the
Bycrafts, they all turn to smile at me, big, evil grins across
their beautiful faces. I even detect some snickering amongst
them.

That’s not appropriate
for a funeral, I think to myself, scandalised. It should be a
serious occasion, not a celebration.

Something compels me
to the front of the church, so that I can say goodbye to Denny. At
the first row, I realise the lone person sitting on the opposite
side to the Bycrafts is the Sarge, dressed in a black suit, white
shirt and black tie.

“
You
shouldn’t have come, Tessie,” he says to me, shaking his head in
disappointment.

“
I
know,” I whisper to him in return.

“
The
Super tried to warn you.”

“
I
wouldn’t listen to her.”

“
You
wouldn’t listen to any of us,” he says sadly.

I continue to where
the coffin sits, realising that the couple standing next to it are
Dave and his mother.

“
But,
why are you here?” I ask them, confused.

Mrs Gatton dabs her
eyes with a lacy female hankie monogrammed with the letters AF.

“
That’s Nana Fuller’s handkerchief,” I say, increasingly
puzzled. “I recognise it.”

“
She
wanted me to be here for you today, Officer Tess. She couldn’t make
it.”

“
I
don’t understand.”

“
You
can pay your compliments to the dearly departed now,” Dave advises.
“It’s for the best.” He smiles kindly at me. “Everything is
peaceful now.”

I look into the coffin
and gasp, staggering back in shock, my hand clutched to my
mouth.

Lying there on the
soft silk, dressed in my best clothes, my eyes closed, face pale
and still, is me.

Chapter
21

On my morning jog, my
mind alternated between wondering what it meant to dream of your
own funeral, and thinking about where in town it could have been
that Annabel had fruitlessly waited for Jamie to return. Deciding
that I’d look up the meaning of dreams when I got to work this
morning, I turned my mind exclusively to the possible whereabouts
of Annabel’s hideaway.

There were plenty of
abandoned, ruined sheds in town, but they were mainly situated on
people’s properties. Because nobody had noticed anything suspicious
on their properties when we’d asked around, I wondered if was
possible that Annabel and Jamie had sheltered somewhere in a vacant
lot. The problem with that theory was that there weren’t many
unoccupied plots of land surrounding town, as most of the available
land was used for farming-related activities.

It was only in the
shower afterwards that I recalled one particular block that
remained undeveloped. The Sarge and I had discovered, in his first
week in town, that a vacant block that people had long assumed was
owned by the government, was in fact owned by the last member of
one of the town’s pioneering families.

Thinking of that, I
immediately wanted to go to the site, dripping water and all. But
then I remembered I had no wheels. It would have to wait until I
got to the station. But how was I going to get there? It was a
five-kilometre walk into town along the highway – not a hike that
anyone would look forward to with eagerness.

Just when I was lacing
up my boots, tossing up whether to ring the Sarge to ask for a
lift, or just slog it out, a car pulled into our driveway and a
horn tooted. I peered out the door to find the patrol car waiting
for me. I waved to show him I’d seen him and ducked back inside to
grab my phone and wallet. I peeked into Dad’s room, but he was
still asleep, the lines of pain on his face only slightly softened
by deep slumber. I hated to leave him alone, but apart from a small
pension he received, I was the breadwinner in the family, so had no
choice but to go to work every day. I made a note to myself to ring
Adele to see if she could spare a few minutes from her job to pop
in and check on him sometime today.

“
I
was just about to ring you for a lift,” I said, flopping into the
passenger seat.

“
See
what a top partner I am? I anticipate your every need,” he
smiled.

I rolled my eyes. “If
you say so.”

“
Did
you have a good jog this morning?”

“
Yes,
thank you. Why didn’t you join me? Did the good life make you
lazy?”

“
I
worked out on my own equipment.”

“
Sure
you did. Admit it – you slept in.”

“
Stop
looking in my window.”

“
You’re going to stack on a few kilos if you don’t start
moving your butt soon.”

“
Charming,” he said dryly, waiting while I did up my seatbelt.
“I’ll have you know that I weigh exactly the same now as when I
left here.”

“
It’s
just proportioned differently, right?” I smiled, enjoying winding
him up. “More fat, less muscle?”

“
I
can see why you’re such a hit with the men. And besides, you’re the
one who told me I looked the same when I returned.”

“
I
didn’t want to hurt your feelings. I know how sensitive you men can
be about your weight.”

“
I’d
rather have a bit more fat than to have shed a huge amount of
weight by losing all the muscles in my brain, like someone I
know.”

“
Ooh,
he stings.”

“
Like
a scorpion.”

I giggled. “More like a
slightly annoyed mosquito. And for your information, I used my
muscle-less brain this morning to perhaps locate where Annabel and
Jamie were staying.”

“
Oh,
yeah?”

“
Remember when Valmae Kilroy brought in that suitcase of money
she found in an old lean-to shed on the property next to
hers?”

“
Who
could forget that? It’s not every day you see that much
money.”

“
That
property is still vacant. They must be waiting for someone to buy
it. That shed is probably still there.”

“
You’re thinking that’s the shed Annabel was talking
about?”

“
It’s
hard to think of another vacant block as close to where Dave’s ute
was found. I think we should check it out now.”

“
Okay.”

On our drive there, I
asked, “Sarge, what do you think it means if you dream about your
own funeral?”

He shot me a look of
concern. “Is that what you dreamt last night? Are you still having
all those bad dreams?”

“
Yeah. I don’t think they’ll ever go away.”

“
I
suppose this dream is directly related to Denny’s
funeral.”

“
You
were in my dream telling me I should have listened to the Super and
not gone to the funeral.”

“
That
wasn’t a dream. That’s the reality of me telling you that every
day.”

“
Geez, I can’t even get away from your nagging at night
time.”

“
Do
you really dream about me?”

“
Sometimes. Do you ever dream about me?”

“
All
the time. But they’re called daymares, and I only get them every
time you walk into the station ready to start work.”

I thumped him, causing
him swerve the car.

“
Careful,” he admonished.

I returned to my dream.
“All the Bycrafts were there at my funeral, and they were all
smiling at me. They were glad to be there. They were glad I was
dead.”

I could tell he was
choosing his words carefully. “I don’t think it’s any kind of
premonition, if that’s what you’re worried about. Funerals are a
very final way of saying goodbye, so perhaps it symbolises your
readiness to say goodbye to something, or some part of your life.
Or maybe a phase in your life is going to end.”

“
Like
what?”

“
I
don’t know, Tess. I don’t even know if I believe in dream
interpretations.”

“
Me
neither. It probably means nothing.”

“
Probably. Now where exactly was Dave’s ute found?”

I directed him to the
location. We stepped out and locked the patrol car.

“
Annabel said they walked for a while until Jamie spotted a
shed on a property.”

We headed south for a
kilometre or so, ending up at the boundary of the Kilroys’
property.

“
Yeah, look,” said the Sarge, pointing. “You can see a shed
way down the end of that driveway.”

“
Okay. So then she said they started heading for that, before
dogs began to bark at them.”

We walked down the
driveway, and as if just on cue, the Kilroys’ two dogs began to
bark, drawing the attention of Gerry Kilroy from the back of his
house. His hands were oily, and he had a smear of grease across his
face.

“
Officer Tess. Sergeant Maguire. Can I help you?” he asked, a
little puzzled and wary. People were often disconcerted to find
police officers heading up their driveway – even the innocent ones
started feeling vaguely guilty.