The Recipient

  “Just as well you did. Everyone is talking about it. Not in so many specifics of course, but it’s big news. Even Angus has heard about it.”

  Casey’s one eye grew wide. “God, I hope he’s all right,” she said, concerned.

  Peter patted her arm gently. “He’s fine. We’ve already spoken to him. Your Mum and I.”

  Casey turned her head, glancing around her father and across at Edie who remained by the door. Her expression was tense. When her eyes met Casey’s she shifted nervously, unsure of what to do. It was Casey who finally gestured, beckoning her to come closer.

  Peter and Lionel glanced at one another as Edie approached the bed. Lionel moved to stand, but Casey stopped him with her free hand.

  Edie glanced at him earnestly and then regarded her only daughter.

  “Stay,” Casey mouthed.

  Peter gently swung his arm around Edie’s waist as Casey turned, wincing as she leaned too heavily on her injured shoulder. She looked up at Edie for a long moment.

  “There was a file,” Edie said. “Saskia’s visa case was being handled by our office. Bill Slattery confirmed it…and I’ve since turned the file over to the police.” Edie paused and reached down to touch Casey’s face gently. “You were right, Casey,” she whispered. “You were right all along. And I am so sorry.”

  Casey gazed at her mother, too moved to speak. Finally, she reached out for Edie’s hand, taking it in her own. Her grip was firm. “It’s finished, Mum,” Casey said quietly.

  Tears welled in Edie’s eyes and her lips turned upward in an emotional smile. She nodded, leaning into her husband, resting her head on his shoulder.

  “I know,” she whispered. “I know.”

  She held onto her daughter’s hand as tightly as she dared.

  ___

  The breeze was stiff as it gusted in off the bay, whipping up whitecaps that coasted in on the current and crashed against the pylons of the jetty, sending salty spray up and over the rail. Thick clouds crossed the sky. To the south, they were especially dark and foreboding, while to the west, approaching sheets of rain dropped in wide swaths to drench the earth.

  As Prishna raised the collar of her jacket, she grimaced at the approaching storm. She could only hope that this meeting would be over and done with soon. She would give it five more minutes.

  Turning towards the shore, Prishna looked up to see the headlights of a familiar black van as it pulled into the parking area above the beach.

  Finally.

  The doors opened and she watched as Casey walked cautiously down the steps, supporting her still immobilised left arm with her right. As she crossed the sand and stepped up onto the jetty, Prishna noted that she still wore a pad over her injured eye but had concealed it with a pair of large sunglasses.

  Prishna walked along the jetty as Casey approached until she stopped a dozen feet away.

  “How’re you feeling?” Prishna greeted in a neutral tone.

  “Better. Glad to be out of that bloody hospital.” She cracked the faintest of smiles and nodded at Prishna who hugged herself against the wind. “I hope you weren’t waiting too long?”

  Prishna returned Casey’s grin with her own. Her eyebrows rose accordingly. “Not too long. Though I doubt we’ll have much time before that front reaches us.”

  Casey glanced at the approaching rain. A few drops stung her cheek.

  “So, you’re the toast of the Melbourne press and the force,” Casey said. “I hear you’re in line for a commendation…and a promotion.”

  Prishna maintained her smile. “Nothing gets past you, does it,” she responded evenly. “Why am I not surprised?”

  Prishna turned her head to allow the wind to blow her hair clear from her face. “You’ve uncovered enough material to keep us in work for a very long time, Casey. They’re talking about establishing a dedicated task force. It has exposed a lot of highly placed individuals not only within the Federal Government but also overseas.” Prishna exhaled audibly. “Who would have thought it? Organ harvesting right here in Australia.” Even now, she found the very mention of that fact difficult to process. “It was a huge operation, you know. Wealthy clients desperate for healthy organs were paying up to one million dollars for Fedele’s services.”

  Casey’s jaw stiffened. Now it was her turn to shake her head.

  “Jarsayah Sonmez, Fedele’s colleague from Afghanistan, found the clients,” Prishna continued. “Fedele conspired with Arlo to identify donor candidates at Flaxley. Then, Schutz inside Immigration would fast-track their paperwork and facilitate their release. Once they were in the community, they and their records simply disappeared.”

  “Animals,” Casey hissed, her voice shaking with anger. “They better crucify Fedele for this.”

  Prishna studied Casey knowingly.

  “I imagine that there’s going to be opportunities for you to contribute further. I know Whittaker is already talking you up.”

  Casey’s glared at Prishna incredulously. “Oh no. I am staying right out of this one,” she retorted, her expression hardening. “I am well and truly fed up with the whole thing.”

  Prishna nodded. “I can understand that. You do realise that you will probably be called to give evidence. Thanks to both yourself and your friend up there,” Prishna gestured with a nod towards the car park where she could see Scott standing beside the van, his hands shoved in his pockets. “Simeera Fedele is likely to make a full recovery. He will stand trial.”

  Casey stiffened at the mention of his name and looked away from Prishna, out across the water. “We’ll see, I guess.”

  Prishna noted the effect the mention of his name had on Casey and she nodded in understanding. “We’ll see,” she echoed. She reached into her jacket then, and took out a folder. She held it out to Casey.

  Casey blinked and took it hesitantly.

  “Saskia’s case file,” Prishna said. “Amended.”

  Casey regarded the folder in her hand nervously.

  “Francis Arlo facilitated Saskia Andrutsiv’s release from the Detention Centre. He identified her as a candidate and then initiated a relationship with her in order to manipulate her, as he had done with the others. However, unlike them, Saskia wasn’t swayed by his charms. She became suspicious of Arlo and we believe that she discovered what his real motives were. She must have uncovered quite a bit. She began to fear for her safety. She ended the relationship with Arlo, but he wouldn’t accept it. Fearing that she would reveal all, he confronted her at the Pleasant Festival and tried to convince her with more money, more inducements.”

  “And she went with him anyway,” Casey said bitterly.

  “Probably because she wanted to stop him once and for all,” Prishna answered earnestly, turning towards Casey. “Forensics have examined the car. Despite the time that has passed, they’ve determined that there probably was a struggle that night. Saskia attacked Arlo. She gave as good as she got. We’ve since found out that Arlo was significantly injured the night of her death. No one ever put it together. Until now.”

  “What a waste.”

  Prishna tilted her head. “Not entirely.”

  Casey frowned as Prishna rested her hand on Casey’s.

  “Nothing you can do can bring Saskia back and you can’t punish yourself because of it. The fact that you received her heart was just the way the cards fell. There was no conspiracy there. You were next on the recipient list and Saskia was the next donor.”

  Casey looked down at her feet. Prishna detected great sadness in her.

  “Saskia has given you a gift, a precious gift. It’s your obligation to her now to honour it and her memory by living your life to the fullest. That’s the only thing you owe her.”

  The wind dropped a little as both women allowed a quiet to descend between them.

  “So. I guess, all that leaves then is our agreement.”

  Prishna looked back at Casey. “Octagon?” she ventured.

  Casey nodded with resignation.

  Reac
hing into her windbreaker, she took out a small rectangular object and turned it over in her fingers. Prishna noted that it seemed to be fashioned entirely from gold.

  It was a USB key.

  Flicking it up, Casey pinched it between her thumb and forefinger. She held it out towards Prishna who regarded it, then took it, laying it in the centre of her palm.

  Printed onto its surface was a small octagon.

  “It’s all there,” Casey said sourly. “Everything.”

  Prishna kept staring at the key in her palm.

  She took it in her other hand and held it up. Then, placing one hand on the jetty rail, she leaned back and flung the USB key as hard as she could into the air.

  Together, they watched it drop towards the ocean until it was swallowed up by the waves.

  Casey blinked at the water. “You do know that was pure gold, don’t you,” she remarked.

  Prishna brushed her hands with an expression of mock satisfaction and turned, walking past Casey.

  “That’s a shame,” she quipped as she left the jetty. “Come on. We’re going to get rained on.”

  CHAPTER 37.

  Casey reclined on the sofa with her feet up, balancing a tea cup in her lap as she regarded the Rothko painting.

  The pairing of colour seemed different to her now. Her antipathy towards it had dissipated. Where once she had considered it pretentious and intimidating, Casey looked at the two distinct blocks of colour with none of her former angst. The way the earth-like brown at the bottom rose upwards and gradually evolved through a subtle band of red in the middle then soft orange hues towards the top touched off a flurry of new thoughts about what the image might be and she allowed herself to ponder them.

  It could have been anything really. Its abstraction was striking, powerful even. For now, it most resembled the sky. The longer she stared at it, the more the print reminded her of morning.

  For a brief moment, images from the dream teased at the edges of her consciousness, but something told her not to resist them. She allowed them to cross her stream of thought as fleeting vignettes. She considered them without emotion.

  She saw herself standing alone on Lasterby Road. There was nothing around her except the sprawling fields, the row of pines whose branches swayed languidly in the breeze. The ribbon of bitumen stretched into the distance, towards an emerging dawn.

  Closing her eyes, she winced and lifted her hand to the resolving bruise that haloed her injured eye. She no longer wore the pad to conceal it. The sling that she was supposed to be wearing to support her injured collarbone lay at her feet. It was a bloody ridiculous thing.

  Across from her, Kirkwood tilted her head curiously observing Casey’s study of the print, as she picked at a corner of the clipboard that rested on her lap.

  “I’ve always had some sort of thing for that print,” Casey said, before Kirkwood could venture a question. “Even before, when I first started coming here.”

  Kirkwood twisted in her chair and looked at the Rothko. “Oh? I got the impression that you hated it.”

  “I did once,” Casey admitted frankly. “But, things change.”

  Kirkwood feigned an expression of mock hurt and both women laughed. “What do you see?”

  Casey raised her cup to her lips and sipped thoughtfully. “Beginnings,” she offered.

  “I suspect Rothko might have thought the same thing when he painted it. I often see that myself. Sometimes, I imagine the sun is just about to rise in the image and that it will evolve.”

  “Evolve?” Casey questioned, her eyes narrowing. “Into what?”

  Kirkwood shrugged. “Who knows. Possibility? Potential? Beginnings? There are endless motifs in his work.”

  Casey sipped from her cup again, then set it down on the table in front of her. “You feel the same about your work,” she said.

  Kirkwood raised an eyebrow, clearly impressed. “That’s insightful. Yes, I do. Everyone has potential. Even those who might seem the most lost. That has been my approach ever since I started in practice. Everyone begins somewhere.”

  “I figured that,” Casey said.

  She sat forward, swinging her legs over the edge of the leather sofa and resting her feet on top of her leather sandals on the floor. She clasped her hands together, squeezing them tightly. “So. What do we do now? Where do we begin?”

  Kirkwood looked down at the notepad. Closing the clipboard, she tossed it on the table.

  “We don’t need to begin. In fact, we don’t really need to do anything. Why don’t we just talk instead?”

  Casey studied Kirkwood. She pursed her lips.

  “Okay,” she said, knowing that Kirkwood never just talked. Not that she really minded much anymore.

  Kirkwood began. “Do you have any plans?”

  “I do,” Casey responded with a hint of enthusiasm. “I’m heading north for a little while. I’m going to take that holiday I promised myself.”

  “Good.” Kirkwood beamed. “Good for you.”

  Her eyes narrowed as a thought popped into her head. “Wait. How are you going to get there?”

  “I’m going to drive…all by myself.” Casey took a stilted breath in, as though she still couldn’t quite get her mind around the challenge she had set for herself.

  Kirkwood’s eyes widened and she nodded approvingly. “I am impressed. You’ve gotten yourself a new car already?”

  “No, not quite,” Casey paused as her lips twisted into a wry smile. “Edie…Mum is letting me take hers.”

  Casey noted Kirkwood’s raised eyebrow once again.

  “Sounds like progress. You and your mum are…”

  “Talking?” Casey finished for her. “Yeah. We’re talking. It’s good. Nice. She is trying really hard, although I think Dad might have pushed her into agreeing to surrender her car to me.” Casey’s eyes drifted away from Kirkwood. “I miss my Vee-Dub,” she said. Memories threatened.

  Distant echoes of smashing glass and screeching tyres.

  She stifled them before they could infiltrate further into her mind.

  Kirkwood watched her with subtle concern. “They will pass in time. Your memories.”

  Casey shrugged. “I guess.”

  Kirkwood studied her more intently, sensing a little of Casey’s obfuscation returning. “You’re still dreaming?”

  “No,” Casey responded. She relaxed her shoulders. “No, I’m not. They’ve stopped. Ever since I stopped him. Fedele.” Casey went quiet, though Kirkwood sensed she hadn’t finished.

  “But?” she prompted.

  Casey looked up. Her face tensed slightly. “There are other memories. Her memories.”

  “Her memories. You mean Saskia’s?”

  Again Casey nodded. “I am seeing things or, rather feeling things. Old memories. Things that I know aren’t mine. I assume they are hers.”

  Kirkwood considered her theory without any hint of judgement or doubt.

  “I expect they will pass, too,” she offered. “Or maybe they won’t. You’re in a unique position, having acquired what you have inside of you. It’s quite reasonable to wonder whether a part of her has remained with you. The question is whether you can come to a place where you have peace with that.”

  “I think I can.”

  “Well then. When you find that place, so will she.”

  Casey smiled sadly. Her lip began to tremble.

  Kirkwood’s eyes diverted to the clock on the wall as the hand approached the top of the hour. Casey noticed and felt a pang of disappointment.

  “Time to wrap up, huh?”

  Kirkwood tilted her head sideways back and forth, considering. “Well, actually, my three o’clock cancelled earlier, so we could stretch this conversation for a little longer. If you wanted to.”

  Casey nodded and smiled more broadly. She wiped at her eyes. “That would be good. I think I would like to stretch this out for a lot longer.”

  “How much longer?”

  Casey glanced casually around the consulting
suite. The books on the shelf behind her, Kirkwood’s cherished photos, out through the window and the garden beyond. A pair of birds were splashing in the urn again, oblivious to their human observers.

  The old angst was gone. The fear. There was nothing left to conceal, nor was there anything that Casey wanted to conceal.

  It felt good to be here. Safe.

  Turning back to Kirkwood, she relaxed back into the sofa and put her free hand behind her head.

  “Oh, I’m a basket case, Geddie Kirkwood,” Casey said with a mischievous grin. “This is gonna take ages.”

  Kirkwood laughed and poured herself a glass of water from a pitcher on the table.

  “I’m very pleased to hear that, Casey Schillinge.”

  ___

  Lionel stood in the centre of the courtyard behind the warehouse. Armed with a broom, he swept the pavement, stopping to lift a garden hose that snaked across the courtyard from a nearby tap towards a large pot containing a small orange tree.

  The courtyard had been transformed. Gone was the accumulated mess, refuse and discarded ephemera of Casey’s failed attempts at raising her own garden. In its place, courtesy of Lionel’s handiwork, was a pristine retreat, the centrepiece of which was a brand new outdoor dining setting and matching day bed. All around him was a revived garden consisting of low maintenance fruit trees, hanging baskets and colourful flowers. A vine grew from a trellis along one wall, promising a lush green backdrop in the not-too-distant future.

  As he scooped up a final pile of dirt and leaf litter, Lionel stood and admired his project. From the carport, he heard the sound of a car boot closing. He turned just in time to see Casey step into view. She wiped beads of sweat from her brow.

  “That’s it,” she said. “I’m packed and ready. All’s I’ve left to do is to…fill the tank.”

  Lionel noted her hesitation. “You know you can still probably catch that flight up with me if you want. You don’t need to drive all that way.”

  “Fly?” she croaked, lifting her finger skyward. “You’d have me—a recovering agoraphobe—fly?”

  Lionel’s cheeks reddened visibly and he flashed an awkward smile. “No, of course not. It’s just that it’s a long drive to do on your own. Even if you weren’t, you know…”