‘He’s not, uh, here,’ I murmur after a moment.
‘What do you mean?’ Ryan says sharply.
He pulls the faded nightdress roughly out of his father’s hands and throws it onto Lauren’s bed, then gives him a hard shake. The two men, of a height, eye to unseeing eye.
Lauren’s wardrobe door is open, its little automatic light on. I walk carefully around Ryan’s father and pick up the nightie, throw it back inside untidily, close the door.
‘He’s …’ What is the word I’m searching for? ‘Sleep … walking.’ Ryan lets go of his father’s shoulders as if electrified.
‘I thought he’d got … over that,’ he says after a long pause. ‘He hasn’t done it for over a year. He did it a lot when Lauren was first … taken.’ There’s that pause again, like he’s measuring his words carefully. ‘Mum and I didn’t really bring it up with him, and it stopped, after a while. And when he woke, he never remembered a thing.’
‘And that’s what will happen tonight,’ I say quietly, taking the sleeping man carefully by the sleeve and turning him slowly around to face the hallway. He goes quiet and still, his eyes blank, dark pools.
Ryan hurries down the hall to his parents’ room and I hear a flurry of quiet words. Mrs Daley emerges, more skeletal than usual in her white, waffle-weave dressing gown, her paper-white face free of its usual careful make-up, her dark hair slightly matted from restless sleep. She takes one of her husband’s large hands in hers, and Ryan supports him on the other side as they walk him slowly back to his bedroom and sit him down on the edge of the marital bed.
Ryan’s mother doesn’t look at me all the while, and I withdraw back into Lauren’s bedroom to reduce the woman’s obvious distress. I see her gently close the master bedroom door until only a narrow sliver of off-white carpet is visible. The sound of voices never rises above a murmur.
Ryan joins me a moment later, turns Lauren’s white desk chair around and straddles it, facing me.
‘He didn’t do it,’ he says simply, his eyes holding mine. ‘You have to believe me. And neither did I — even Brenda will vouch for that, because we were together for most of the night. Still, half the town thinks it’s an inside job and the other half is willing to believe it. It’s two years tomorrow, did you know? It’s burned into my brain, how long she’s been gone.’ I am silent. I hadn’t let Stewart Daley touch me for long enough the day I got here to make a judgment about his guilt or innocence. Hadn’t let the maelstrom in his head fully play out before I cut the connection with him. Maybe he did it, maybe he didn’t. I am sure about one thing, however. Ryan is innocent.
Two years tomorrow. Two years of hopeless leads, and suspicion upon this house. Where would you even begin to unearth a buried mystery of two years?
‘Who saw her last?’ I say suddenly. ‘Was anyone with her on the day she was taken?’ Ryan frowns. ‘She’d spent the day with her boyfriend, Richard Coates. But she was home alone that night because they’d argued about going to the twenty-first birthday party of some stoner friend of his. Lauren detested the guy. Richard and Lauren had zero in common, but they were absolutely crazy about each other. Though they had some spectacular fights. I could always tell after they’d had a bust-up, even though Lauren wouldn’t say much about it. Mum and Dad were away for the night — at the theatre. Mum always said we might have moved away from the city but it didn’t mean we had to “live like savages” and give up on “the finer things”, though Dad didn’t see it that way. There hasn’t been a play written that he can’t sleep through from the moment the curtain goes up.’ His mouth quirks up at the corners before his expression grows sombre again. He meets my speculative gaze steadily. ‘My mother swears Dad was right beside her the whole night. And that’s what they told the police. She still blames herself, you know. Hasn’t been to the theatre, to anything, since. It’s like she cauterised that whole side of her brain,’ he adds, looking down.
‘The fun side. The ability to be happy. When we lost Lauren, we lost my mother, too.’ He’s silent so long I wonder if he is … crying?
‘So, this Richard guy,’ I say. ‘He got an alibi, too?’ Ryan finally comes back from wherever he’s been inside his head.
‘At least thirty-five half-drunk twenty-somethings insisted in writing that Richard was party hearty from seven thirty that night through till dawn. And Maury Charlton told the police he saw Lauren moving freely around her bedroom at 9.15 pm. Alone.’
‘I’ve got a choir rehearsal at 8 am tomorrow,’ I say carefully. ‘But I could always extend my double spares in the morning kind of indefinitely …’
‘You’re on,’ Ryan says, a shark-like grin on his face, his understanding pitch perfect.
I should be in study hall, considering the population profile and proclivities of the citizens of Upper Angola or somewhere, but instead we’re driving down the deserted coast road away from Paradise towards Port Marie. Along the way, we pass an abandoned military base, its mile upon mile of rusting steel fence culminating in a set of chained gates at least twenty feet high, peppered with the usual threatening messages about private property being exactly that.
A little farther along the stretch of swampy marshland that links the two coastal towns, there is a discreetly signed turn-off for an oil refinery. In the distance, I see a vast chimney, a plume of red fire issuing from its blunt concrete snout, hundreds of metres in the air. There’s a heat shimmer in the atmosphere above the salt plains that run right up to the distant refinery gates.
Apart from the flames, I see no signs of life.
‘Nice place you’ve got here,’ I say.
‘It’s like the name implies.’ Ryan grins without humour. ‘Paradise on earth.’ As we drive, he gives me a little background on the Paradise, Port Marie and Little Falls triumvirate. ‘Paradise was a hard living fishing port until that whole industry fell apart early last century and people like my folks began moving in and gentrifying — you get the “ocean views” and “lifestyle” without the price tag, and it’s only an hour and a half from the city. The old- school locals hate it. Hate us, I suppose. Port Marie’s always been like Paradise’s more genteel big sister — with better real estate and water views, less heavy pollution. Except for where we’re headed, that is. Little Falls is exactly as the name implies: it’s inland and features a small set of waterfalls that no one ever visits.’ It’s an overcast day and everything is grey on grey.
Before we reach the obligatory Welcome to Port Marie signage, we turn off onto an unsealed road plagued by deep ruts and potholes filled with gravel and muddy water.
‘It’s like something out of Deliverance, huh?’ Ryan mutters tightly.
I have no idea what he means, so I say nothing, just grip the handhold on the front passenger door a little harder so I don’t look like I’m trying to throw myself at him.
A little later, we crunch to a stop outside an unfenced, double-storey, fibro beach shack that never started off pretty and has been allowed to enter serious eyesore territory. Part of it was half-heartedly painted peach many, many moons ago and the rest is well, fibro grey, with a flat tin roof and cheerless lace curtains at each of the windows. The front yard is scattered with the carcasses and insides of slowly rusting machines, an overturned tin boat and three uncoupled outboard motors.
‘Richard’s into extreme biking,’ Ryan explains, popping the driver’s door then getting mine. ‘Lives with his old man; mother ran out on them years ago, so housekeeping isn’t a major priority.’ The contrast with Lauren’s domestic circumstances is breathtaking. ‘Nothing white-on-white about this place,’ I say.
‘You’re beginning to get the picture,’ he replies, a little ruefully. ‘Come on. There aren’t any dogs. Well, not that you can see anyway.’ With that cryptic remark, we head up the gravel-strewn drive together.
‘He left school last year, midway through,’ Ryan murmurs as he presses the doorbell. ‘Now he just races motocross bikes, does the occasional exhibition or freestyle gig.’ I raise my eyebrows and he explains patiently, ‘You know, arena racing, aerial stunt work — real daredevil, shit-your-pants stuff. After Lauren vanished, he had even less reason to do anything else except occasionally go on the circuit. He’s quite in demand, apparently.’ Ryan gives the doorbell another shove. ‘He’s a freak. I don’t know how he can live like this.’
‘He might say the same about you,’ I mutter.
The door swings open and a sweaty, whiskery old guy, with more beard than I have ever seen in my life, peers out. He’s wearing an open shirt, heavily stained under the armpits, and beat-up short shorts of an indeterminate colour that show off way too much bare, hairy leg for my liking. His distended, hairy, peek-a-boo midriff is unavoidably thrust into the space between us.
He snarls, ‘Don’t want any. Gonna set the dogs on you if you don’t piss off and quick.’ Ryan gives me a look
