The magistrate had collapsed his bulk into one of the drawing room armchairs and from the way he struggled to rise when Billy entered, looked like he might have wedged himself in. “Don’t get up, Spencer,” Billy said, striding across the room, shaking his clammy hand. He was flushed in the face, his brow was beaded, and he finished every breath with a wheeze. Billy flopped onto the sofa, hooked his ankle onto his knee. “You run here or something?” he asked.
“I swear them steps are getting steeper, Billy. It’s every time I come.”
“Next time we’ll have a boy carry you. You want a drink? Something to eat?”
“Whiskey if you have it, maybe some cake?”
Hardy was waiting in the doorway. Billy nodded, and he left the room. Billy went to the sideboard and poured them each a whiskey,handed one to MacIntyre; they touched glasses and, smirking, Billy toasted the magistrate’s health.
“So,” he said, sitting down again, “what’s this about?”
MacIntyre gazed admiringly around the room: the polished furniture, exotic rug, the vases, silver, gold. “Seems you’re faringall right, anyhow.”
“We’re getting by.”
“I’ll say. It’s been a while, Billy. Not seen you in town.”
Billy shrugged. “I’ve a station to run, can’t be spending my nights drinking in the Bewley Hotel anymore.”
“Wouldn’t kill you,” MacIntyre said. There was a knock at the door and the girl came in with a tray bearing two slices ofginger cake topped with a dollop of thickened cream. She handed them out and had not left the room before MacIntyre tore intohis portion, attacking the thing like it had done him ill. Billy set his plate on the side table and waited, MacIntyre glancingup from his gorging, crumbs and cream coating his mouth. He pointed at the cake with his fork and spluttered, “You want toget stuck into this. Best damn cake I’ve had in months.”
Billy ignored him. “So you’re missing me, is that it? That’s why you came all this way?”
MacIntyre shook his head, swallowed. “It’s not me I’m telling you for. People can get an idea about a fella if he thinks he’s too good for their town. Which maybe you are these days, but it doesn’t hurt to show your face once in a while.”
“What do I care what they think of me down there?”
“You will if you ever need them. If you wanted them to side with you, let’s say. The thing about John Sullivan, Billy, heartlessbastard though he really was, is that he knew how to give people the impression he cared. Wouldn’t have pissed on them ifthey were burning, yet they treated him like a king. Donations to the church and all that horseshit, you know what I mean.It’s a question of reputation, which can be worth a lot out here. More than money sometimes.”
“All right,” Billy said vaguely. “So . . . I’ll take a trip to town.”
“Good lad, good lad. Here—you planning on eating that?”
Billy handed over his plate and MacIntyre devoured that portion of cake too. He wiped his lips with a napkin, missed the corners,cream gathering like spittle, then washed it down with the whiskey and sighed. Billy braced himself.
“So, there’s something else I need to talk to you about.”
“I figured. Trouble?”
“Might be, aye.” MacIntyre sniffed and contemplated his whiskey. “I’ve had a telegram from Brisbane. Colonial secretary’soffice, no less. Ordering me to look into what happened to your family, hold a proper inquest, and not just the murders neither—Imean what came after, with the blacks. Seems someone’s kicked the nest hard enough to get a reaction on the coast, and youknow what those bastards are like. Apparently there’s a witness reckons he saw what went on.”
“What went on with what?”
“The natives. After.”
“What fucking witness?”
“There’s no name yet, but I’ll find out soon enough. Some lawyer’s bringing him out on the train.”
Billy had flushed a deep crimson. He was sitting very still. “What the hell is this, Spencer? What’s going on?”
He raised his hands. “Just what I’m telling you. And I don’t have a choice about it, neither. An order comes from the top like that, it’ll be my neck if I don’t follow it through. Like I said, someone’s been stirring. Got their attention too.”
“But who—” Billy checked himself. “It’s not Tommy, is it? This witness?”
“What makes you ask that?”
“Because every other witness is dead.”
MacIntyre sipped his whiskey, let the silence run. Billy’s gaze slid away until it was dancing about the room, flicking madlyover the walls.
“Do we have anything to worry about?” MacIntyre asked.
Billy blinked and came to. “How d’you mean?”
“Well, if there is a witness, what might he have seen?”
“Nothing. Don’t you already know what went on?”
“I know what was in Inspector Noone’s report, and them testimonies you and your brother swore. Aside from that, I don’t reallywant to hear another word.”
Billy froze at the name. “Does he know yet? Noone?”
“I expect so. He usually does.”
“About this witness, I mean—that it wasn’t me who turned?”
“Ah, don’t worry about that, Billy. You’re both on the same side here. As am I, incidentally, or else I wouldn’t have come.Besides, Edmund Noone is a different man these days: got himself a nice little posting on the coast, heading for a careerin politics, so I hear.”
“Will he come? For the hearing?”
MacIntyre laughed. “He’ll have to! It’s him it’s all about!”
“I thought you said it was the murders and everything?”
“Let’s just take it one step at a time, shall we? That testimony you and your brother gave—you’ll stand by it, swear to itin court?”
“’Course I bloody will.”
“And what about Tommy? You heard from him at all?”
“No.”
“Well, that makes it easier. The fewer the better as far as I’m concerned. Them
