Andy fetches beers for himself and Teddie; he offers one to Julie, but she says no. Ryan, Nadine and Barbara are on the other side of the hall, securing places near the front among the rows of folding seats. There is no sign of Allan. Julie sees Ryan gaze around at the crowd, and instinctively she steps back behind the shelter of Andy’s shoulder. She can’t sit near the front anyway, she argues to herself; if Tony comes in late, he’ll never be able to find her all the way down there. She makes sure she sits at the end of a row, just in case. Feeling slightly guilty, she promises herself she’ll go and find Ryan after the film. It’s just that, tonight, she feels like concentrating on the movie, without worrying about how far Ryan’s hand is travelling up her thigh . . .
The film does turn out to be science fiction, as Nadine predicted, a recent movie called Soylent Green, which Julie hasn’t seen. It’s set in an overcrowded future where food is running out, and people rely on a plankton-based wafer for sustenance. Julie watches the hero running back and forth across the screen. The hum of rain on the roof, which drowned out some of the early dialogue, gradually peters out. She wonders how Tony is getting on, shut inside his plane. She hopes it’s an Islander, with more leg room than the Baron. If he’s lucky, he might have some food on board, some chocolate maybe, something more palatable than tins of fish or raw rice. At least he won’t have to turn to Soylent Green . . .
A touch on her shoulder makes her jump. Allan Crabtree is squatting beside her; in the flickering light from the projector, he motions with his head for her to follow him out of the hall. Julie stumbles after him, her heart thudding, as if her body knows more than her mind is prepared to acknowledge. She tells herself that perhaps Allan is going to suggest that she stay the night with the Crabtrees, in a proper bed in Nadine’s room, instead of the Spargos’ camping mattress.
Outside, the clouds have cleared. The moon is almost full, and the sky is blazing with stars.
‘Julie,’ says Allan. ‘I’ve got some bad news, love.’
He’s found out that Tony is not stuck on the airfield at Koinambe. His plane had definitely taken off through the Kumil Gap, heading for Hagen. He didn’t turn back, and he has not arrived, and as far as they could tell, he hasn’t touched down anywhere else on the way. His plane is missing.
‘I’m so sorry, love. But we have to assume — with weather like we had today — there’s a good chance he’s gone down.’
Teddie and Andy have come out after them. They are standing close to Julie, warm shadowy presences in the dark. Teddie lets out a hiccupping gasp. Andy’s low voice says, ‘Oh, no. No, I don’t believe it.’
Julie is numb. She can’t gasp; she can’t speak. She hears Teddie and Andy talking, their words muffled, as if her head is underwater.
Teddie says, ‘He — he might be all right, though? Even if —?’
‘The country round there is pretty rough,’ says Allan. ‘We won’t know for sure for a day or two. But I wouldn’t — well, we shouldn’t get our hopes up.’
Andy swears. ‘I don’t get it! Tony’s so careful. He never takes risks. No see; no go. He hammered that into me for months.’
Teddie covers her face with her hands. Allan lays his hand heavily on Julie’s shoulder, and his beefy fingers squeeze her collarbone so hard it seems he might snap it like a wishbone.
And Julie remembers then that they all know Tony so much better than she does. She’s only been here for a few weeks; they’ve lived with him, worked beside him, been his friend for months and years. They have more right to be upset than she does. She wraps her arms around herself and shivers. Again, as she did at Teddie and Andy’s party, she has that feeling of watching herself, of being an impostor.
‘You all right, love?’ says Allan.
Julie nods.
Allan looks at Andy. ‘Better take her home. You got anything to help her sleep?’
‘Yes,’ says Teddie. ‘I’ve got something.’
‘If not, I’ll get something from Gibbo,’ says Andy.
They bundle her into the car. The ride back into town is a nightmare jumble of sinister shadows, trees that flare suddenly in the headlights then seem to jerk away, the red eyes of the road markers glaring out of the darkness.
She hears Teddie say in a low voice, ‘He must have been rushing back for Julie. After the break-in —’
‘Shut up!’ says Andy sharply, and shoots a look at Julie in the rear-view mirror.
But their words don’t sink in, they glance off her like raindrops off glass.
Andy and Teddie are kind and gentle. Teddie helps her to undress, and gives her a pill to swallow. She hugs her, and tells her not to give up hope. Andy warms some milk in a saucepan, to wash down the pill, but he accidentally lets it boil over on the stove, and the stink of burnt milk floods through the whole house.
After this night, for the rest of her life, the smell of burning milk will make Julie retch. Sometimes it will take her a moment to remember why, but it’s her body, holding grimly onto knowledge that her mind has tried to forget.
14
After that first night, Barbara takes over. She marches into Teddie and Andy’s house early the next morning and hustles Julie into the car.
‘You’d better stay with us for now,’ she says briskly. ‘There’s a spare bed in Nadine’s room; you can bunk in with her.’
Julie puts up a feeble struggle. ‘I’d like to go home.’ She means, to Tony’s place.
Barbara pats her knee. ‘Of course you do. As soon as we can manage it. We’re having a bit of trouble tracking down your mother. Perhaps she’s gone away? Have you heard from her?’
‘She’s in Sydney, staying with a friend. I’ve got the number somewhere.’
Barbara nods. ‘We’ll find her, don’t you worry.’
Christmas is only two days away. Julie leans her head against the cold glass of the window. The car smells of dog. She thinks of the gifts she’d carefully wrapped for Tony and hidden under her bed. A lump rises into her throat. She closes her eyes and swallows hard.
Barbara spends most of the day holding the phone to her ear with her shoulder while she scribbles on a notepad. There’s no answer from Caroline’s friend’s number.
‘Perhaps they’ve gone away?’ Barbara looks at Julie. ‘Did your mother mention anything like that?’
‘I haven’t spoken to her for a little while . . .’
‘Hm.’
Clearly Barbara thinks this is odd, even reprehensible, but she is kind enough not to say so. She leaves messages for Caroline everywhere. Even the police have been notified; although, as Barbara says in exasperation, they’re being no help at all.
Julie sits numbly on the couch with Ryan’s arm around her, while Nadine tries to distract her with her pets. Julie leans against the warmth of Ryan and the circle of his arms feels like safety. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t say, I’m so sorry, or poor Tony, I can’t believe it; he just holds her. Sometimes she lets Nadine nurse her hand, as if it’s one of her wounded animals, and Koki brings cups of sweet tea and rubs her back with her callused hand. Roxy the dog licks anxiously at her ankles and whines softly, as if she knows what’s wrong. Everyone is kind, but Julie knows she can’t start to cry, because once she starts, she won’t be able to stop. She leans against Ryan, and concentrates on not letting herself cry.
She wishes she was at home — home in Melbourne. She could be hanging out with Rachel, eating doughnuts at Southland, skating at Rollerama. She wishes she could lose herself watching TV. Her head feels full of cold fog.
Allan comes in and shakes his head. He murmurs gruffly to Barbara, but Julie overhears. They’ve found the plane. It’s in the Jimi Valley, not far from Koinambe. But it will take days to reach the wreckage and retrieve Tony’s body. There’s no mistake; there will be no miracle, no reprieve. But somehow she still can’t feel it.
In the afternoon, she goes to bed, takes another of Teddie’s pills, and sleeps like a felled tree. She wakes in the middle of the night and hears N
adine’s snuffly breathing in the next bed, and for a second she doesn’t know where she is.
Tony’s dead. It slices down like a guillotine blade. She turns her face into the pillow and the tears flood out of her. She sobs, choking into the pillow, so she won’t wake Nadine. She thinks about creeping across the hallway to Ryan’s room, sliding into his bed, for the comfort of his eager body, for the oblivion; she almost does it; it’s only exhaustion that pulls her under and keeps her paralysed, tangled in the blankets like an animal in the net.
On Christmas morning, she wakes up late. Nadine’s bed is empty. Julie lies unmoving beneath the blankets for as long as she can bear it; she dreads dragging her grief into the Crabtrees’ family Christmas. But at last the hollow, lonely feeling overwhelms her. She pulls on some clothes and shuffles out into the big living room where the lopsided Christmas tree fills the air with the scent of pine.
But it’s only Nadine who sits beneath the tree with Christmas wrappings strewn around her. The others sit motionless, looking as shell-shocked as Julie feels. The radio is on, but it’s not wafting the expected Christmas carols; a newsreader is speaking. Ryan beckons Julie over and she wedges herself into the armchair beside him.
‘The news once again: Cyclone Tracy has devastated the city of Darwin. The extent of damage is unknown at this stage, but early reports indicate —’
Julie leans forward and holds her head in her hands. It seems like some kind of grotesque joke. For a wild second, she wonders if Caroline has gone to Darwin; if her mother has been killed; if she’s an orphan now. The next instant she realises how unlikely this is. But over the next few days, photographs appear in the newspapers: flattened buildings, piles of rubble, uprooted trees, mile after mile of torn and twisted sheets of tin and fibro, scattered at random where a town had once stood. And it’s as if nature has echoed the chaos in her own heart.
On Christmas night, Caroline rings.
‘Oh, God, darling,’ she says. ‘I’m so sorry. I can’t believe it. Trust Tony to wait until you were there to fly himself into a mountain. Oh dear, poor Tony. I didn’t mean that . . . Julie? Are you there?’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you all right? You’re not on your own, are you? There’s someone looking after you? These Crabtree people?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, tell them it’s only for another couple of days. As soon as I can get your flight changed, you’ll be on your way home. Oh, dear. If only it wasn’t Christmas — it’s impossible to get anyone to answer the phone. I wonder if it might not be easier from your end? Perhaps I should talk to this — Belinda, is it?’
‘Barbara.’
‘Yes, Barbara, put her on, will you, darling? I think I’d better speak to her.’
Julie’s hand tightens around the receiver. ‘No.’
‘Sorry, darling, what was that?’
Julie says, more loudly, ‘No!’
‘What? What’s the matter?’
‘I don’t want to come back yet. I want to wait —’ She swallows. ‘They haven’t even found his body yet. I want to stay until the funeral.’
‘Oh. Well, I suppose — When do you think that’s likely to be?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Sorry, darling, I couldn’t hear you —’ ‘I don’t know!’
A pause. Julie can imagine her mother, harassed, pushing her hair back from her forehead. ‘Sweetheart, you can’t just impose on these Crabtree people indefinitely. What are we talking about? Days, weeks?’
‘I don’t know. They don’t mind me being here. Allan said I could stay as long as I liked.’
‘Yes, well, of course he said that.’ Another pause. ‘Who is organising the funeral, anyway?’
‘I don’t know; Allan, I suppose.’
‘That’s his manager, isn’t it?’
‘They were friends, Mum.’
‘Perhaps I should come up there myself,’ says Caroline. ‘Maybe that’s the best idea. We can’t leave it all to strangers.’
‘You don’t have to do that! People up here look after each other; Tony had plenty of friends. There’s no need to —’
But Caroline speaks over her. ‘That’s the pips, darling. Love you, goodbye —’
‘Bye,’ says Julie. But the line is dead.
‘Oh, hell,’ says Barbara suddenly on Boxing Day. ‘The Wewak trip. We were supposed to leave on Saturday. I’ll have to phone up and cancel the hotel.’
Julie looks up. ‘Do we have to cancel?’
‘As far as I know, it’s all paid for,’ says Allan. ‘But there shouldn’t be any problem getting a refund. Under the circumstances.’
The lump in Julie’s throat is so hard she can barely force out the words. ‘I don’t want to cancel it. Tony said it was my Christmas present.’
Barbara shoots a quick glance at Allan. ‘But, Julie, surely you don’t feel like a holiday at the beach? Just a few days after your father —?’
Julie’s throat is tight. She mutters, ‘I really want to go.’
‘Ah, to hell with it,’ growls Allan. ‘Why not? Where’s the bloody harm?’
Barbara draws him aside. She murmurs, ‘It looks heartless. Even you can see that. Anyway, she might have gone home by then. As soon as Caroline can organise her visa —’
‘Mac wanted her to see Wewak,’ says Allan loudly. ‘Why the hell shouldn’t she go? What’s the point of cancelling? It was the last bloody thing Mac did for her. Give the poor kid something to cheer her up. And the rest of us, come to that.’ He glares at his wife.
Barbara tosses her head. ‘There’s no need to take that tone. I’m fed up with the way you always try to make me into the villain.’
‘Give it a bloody rest —’
Julie stands up quietly and slips from the room.
With Allan on her side, the argument is over almost before it’s begun. The following Saturday, they drive out to the airport. When Julie catches sight of Simon and Patrick Murphy in the waiting area of the HAC terminal, she has to stand behind the Crabtrees’ car for a moment and hide her face in her hands. Tony must have organised it, without telling her. She’d mentioned her brilliant idea to him in passing, but she didn’t know that he’d acted on it.
Simon crunches across the gravel of the car park to speak to her.
‘We weren’t sure if you’d still want us to come,’ he says awkwardly. ‘It’s okay, we can always go home. We won’t be offended if you’d rather just be with the Crabtrees —’
‘No, no, I’m so pleased you’re here!’
Even as the words tumble from her lips, it occurs to her for the first time how weird it will be to have Simon and Ryan on the same holiday. She’s not sure how Ryan will feel about it, either . . . But she’s sure that she doesn’t want Simon to go home.
‘Dad was really touched that you’d thought of him,’ Simon says.
‘Is Dulcie here too?’
He shakes his head. ‘No, she . . . decided not to come. But Tony did invite her. Was that because of you?’
Julie scratches at the gravel with her toe. ‘Well, you know . . . of course you were all invited.’
‘No of course about it,’ says Simon. He lays his hand on her arm, and a shiver of electricity runs through her. ‘I’m so sorry. About your father.’
‘I feel a bit guilty,’ says Julie. ‘Everyone’s being so kind to me, but I hardly knew him, really. He was Allan’s friend for years and years . . .’
‘In a way, it might make things easier for Allan, having you here,’ says Simon. ‘Looking after you gives him something to do. It’s something he can do for your father, something useful. Does that make sense?’
‘Yes.’ The more Julie thinks about it, the more sense it makes. She looks at Simon with respect.
Because there are seven of them in the party, they fly in a larger plane, an Islander, with the call sign Hotel Alpha Mike. Ryan takes the seat beside Julie. ‘Are you okay?’
It takes her a few seconds to work out why he’s as
king with such particular concern. It hasn’t actually occurred to her to be frightened of flying because of what happened to Tony. Perhaps she’s just stupid, or insensitive, but she honestly hasn’t thought about it. ‘No, I’m fine,’ she says, and she lets him hold her hand, and tries to ignore the reassuring and sympathetic looks that Nadine and Barbara send in her direction.
‘You sure?’ says Ryan. ‘You know we’ll be flying right over the place where Tony went down?’
‘Oh.’ Julie’s skin goes cold. She says, ‘Yes, of course I realised that.’
Simon sits beside Patrick, who reaches across to grip Julie’s hand in his strong, bony fingers.
‘I was sorry to hear about Tony McGinty,’ he says. ‘He was a good man.’
As they fly north, Julie isn’t thinking, This is what killed my father; she is thinking, This is what my father loved. The towering clouds, the roller-coaster of the air currents, the glory of the emerald-shrouded mountains and valleys laid out below, the drone of the engines speeding them through the sky, the smell of avgas and cloth seats. The view is better from the Islander than from the Baron, because the wings are attached above the windows. She stares down as the mountains rise and fall below, but she doesn’t see Tony’s plane.
At last the Islander begins to descend into Wewak. As Julie gazes down at the jungle, she catches sight of mysterious objects there, almost hidden by the trees. It takes her a moment to understand that she’s looking at the half-rotted bodies of crashed warplanes, lying where they were shot down thirty years ago, in World War II. She covers her mouth with her hand. Beside her, Ryan picks up her other hand and squeezes it. She’s aware of his eyes, liquid with anxious sympathy, too much sympathy, fixed on her face. She pulls her hand out of his grasp. For the first time, his silent concern feels oppressive rather than comforting. ‘I’m okay,’ she shouts, but he can’t hear her. When she looks back down at the ruined planes, she can’t see them any more. The Islander is sinking lower, and the trees rise up and conceal the wrecks from view.