'My wife's at work.'
Jill stared hard at Gabriel, then turned back to Joss. 'You're probably aware of how urgent it is for us to investigate this case. You might have heard about the latest home invasion?'
'I don't watch the news,' said Joss.
'Well, we believe that the gang that attacked you at Andy Wu's house have now killed a man.' Jill noticed Joss rub his hand across his mouth. 'We need to get as much information as we can about these people so that we can get them off the streets.'
She watched his shoulders relax a little, and his arms, folded across his chest, dropped to his sides.
'I haven't really been back to work since it happened,' said Joss. 'But Isobel had to go. She's bringing our daughter, Charlie, home at about four.'
'Is that Charlie?' Jill pointed to a photo on the fridge. It showed a blonde toddler nursing a fluffy cat almost bigger than herself.
Joss laughed a little. 'Yep.' The love in his eyes looked like pain.
Jill became aware that Gabriel was unpacking his bag.
'The light's probably best in here,' he said, unfolding a telescoped tripod.
'For what?' Joss's arms folded again.
'From now on we'll be videotaping all of our interviews regarding the case.' Gabriel spoke to the small camera he was screwing to the top of the tripod.
Jill glowered at him. This guy could turn the charm on and then drop it in an instant. She guessed that they were about to be kicked out, but instead Joss offered them something to drink. She and Gabriel accepted an orange juice. Joss poured himself a tall glass of water from a filter jug next to the sink.
'Might as well get on with it then,' he said, walking back towards them.
Gabriel set up the recording equipment with more speed than she could have imagined. By the time Joss had taken a seat at the breakfast bar, the contents of Gabriel's modest-sized duffle bag had transformed the small dining area off the kitchen into a studio. He had angled two dining chairs to face one another, and a collapsible reflective screen was positioned behind one of the chairs. He ushered their host towards this chair, motioning Jill towards the other, and took up his place behind the camera.
Jill took her seat feeling nervous and annoyed. For heaven's sake, she thought, we're interviewing a witness, not interrogating a suspect. She opened her notebook and smiled reassuringly at Joss.
'Hang on a sec,' said Gabriel. Incredulous, she watched him drop to his knees and, using a retractable tape measure, calculate the distance between the two chairs. Walking back on his knees, he signalled with his hand for her to rise. She stood and he pushed her chair backwards a hand's breadth.
'Sorry,' he looked up at her.
'Um, yes, maybe we should just get on with it.'
'They were only ninety-two centimetres apart.'
Jill stared. It seemed he was apologising for not getting the measurements right the first time, rather than for the ridiculous fact that he was bothering with such details in the first place.
'Should've been ninety-seven,' Gabriel said to Joss, hands out, as if that explained everything.
I gotta talk to this guy, Jill thought.
'Joss,' she took over. His legs and arms were crossed now, and he leaned towards the back door as though he wanted to be anywhere but in there with them. 'We're here to get your full description of what you remember happening at Andy Wu's last Saturday night. Can you tell us everything that happened after you arrived? Please don't leave anything out, everything you've got to say is very important to us. You are our eyes and ears in there.'
Gabriel caught her eye, raised his eyebrows at her.
They listened quietly to Joss's account, occasionally interrupting to clarify a point.
While speaking, Joss stared at a point just beyond Jill's shoulder. She watched him reliving the horror of the night, saw his eyeballs tracking actively as the scene replayed before him. His face was grey and his voice hoarse when he finished. An electronic chime indicated that Gabriel had turned the camera off. Jill looked down at her watch. Three-thirty. The wife would be home soon, but this guy had had enough. His hand shook slightly as he rubbed the bristle on top of his head. When he stood, he steadied himself using the back of the chair, his eyes glazed and unfocused. She and Gabriel gave him their thanks and left, arranging to return to take his wife's statement the following day.
'I hope he's going to be okay,' said Jill, opening the back door of the car so Gabriel could dump his equipment. 'He looked pretty shaken up.'
The steering wheel felt warm when she started the ignition.
'He certainly did,' said Gabriel, absentmindedly struggling to fasten his seatbelt. The plug had caught in his khaki shirt, and she had to stifle an unexpected impulse to untangle the mess for him. She turned on the air- conditioner instead.
'So it's back to Liverpool, then,' she said, mentally calculating the time it would take to get there and back again.
'No. Let's just go to your house.'
'My house.'
'Yeah. I want to watch this tape back. We've got some problems here.'
'I live in Maroubra.'
'Have you got a good TV?'
'Well, yes. But… Oh, whatever. We can watch the tape there I suppose.'
She pulled the car out from the curb and headed into the city, finding herself smiling at the thought of the early mark. They travelled against the traffic for most of the trip, Gabriel staring out the window, from time to time jotting in his notebook. As they passed the shops in Randwick, she suddenly wondered what the hell she was doing. Scotty was the only partner she'd ever had in her house, and she trusted him. She'd known her new partner for under a week.
Last night on the phone, her mum had asked her what he was like, and she'd been unable to find the words. After a few moments, she'd laughed, and told her mum that she'd have to get back to her. She hadn't figured him out yet.
Jill drove towards the ocean ahead.
After seeing the detectives out, Joss found himself back in front of the cupboard in the kitchen. Describing the night at Andy's in such detail had unshackled the demons in his brain. Memories howled in his head now, each clamouring for processing, hurling up image after horrifying image. He gave in to the kaleidoscope, knowing from experience that he was incapable of stemming the flood once it had progressed unchecked to this point. He reached unseeingly for the bottle of bourbon. The interview had prevented him utilising his routine avoidance strategies – hard exercise; forcing himself to remember he was home, safe, in the present. He had only this recourse left. He swigged directly from the bottle and then reached for a glass.
Back on the sofa, he steeled himself for the show; he drank quickly to put as much distance between himself and the images as possible.
Kibeho, 1995. The definition of human depravity. From every angle someone died in agony, or, much worse, survived, a machete wound through the middle of their face; a limb or genitals missing; intestines exposed for the birds that dived sorties in screaming, black-eyed packs. He moved through the blood and body pieces, pulling a dead woman away from her wailing infant before the child suffocated under her weight, dragging a breathing body from a pile of corpses and handing him to the medics. A small team from Medecins Sans Frontieres and the medical section of the Australian peacekeeping force patched up those they could, medivaced a fortunate few, and provided morphine to many others, who would at least die oblivious to their own screams. For many years, he envied them that.
Another glass. The bourbon burned.
The boy and his family. The memory kicked in at the worst part, of course. The father lay dead, feeble spits of blood still exiting the mess of his throat. A girl, maybe ten, waited, mute, for the next act of horror life would bring her. Her mother, a baby on her hip, keened quietly, a steady, emotionless moan that conveyed more pain than a scream. And the new man of the house – the boy, younger than his sister – shaped up with a stick to the Tutsi
