The Shadow House(89)

A flock, all of them going up, up, up.

Shaking my head, I took the piece of paper from Jenny’s hands. I felt numb, like all the blood in my body had just evaporated. Because Bess’s rambling story suddenly made sense.

‘This picture …’ I said, forcing my lips to move. ‘I think I’ve seen it before.’





ALEX





43


The Hassop farm was eerily quiet when Jenny and I arrived. No rumble from the nearby road, no distant whir of machinery. Even the cicadas had fallen quiet for once. I imagined them hiding under fat green leaves, like dogs under a bed.

I drove slowly through the orchard, struck once again by its beauty, the light streaming and flickering through the constantly moving leaves, the grass below so intricately dappled it resembled the glittering surface of a lake. But I also noticed things I hadn’t seen last time. Tumbledown barns just visible through the citrus trees. A large lily-laden pond with a pontoon made of planks and plastic barrels. A scarecrow in a far corner with a bucket for a head, black rags dangling from its wooden-cross body. I leaned forward in my seat, gripping the wheel, scouring the property for anything else I might’ve missed.

In the passenger seat beside me, Jenny sat stiff and pale, her eyes fixed on the higgledy-piggledy house at the end of the track. I hadn’t wanted her to come. I’d told her I was just going to run a quick Christmas errand, check on Bess, see how she was doing – but it was too late, she’d already seen my face and wouldn’t take no for an answer. ‘I’m sure Layla wouldn’t mind watching Kara for twenty minutes,’ she said firmly. And Layla, eager to make amends, hadn’t minded one bit.

When we reached the house, I parked up next to the silver ute I recognised as Dom’s, but, unlike last time, there was no sign of the man himself. There was no sign of anyone at all.

Killing the engine, I got out and studied the house, shielding my eyes from the fierce summer sun. Paint-drip shadows trickled from the windowsills and wide eaves, turning the facade into one long, mournful face. Without any discussion, Jenny and I began to walk towards the front door together, our footsteps quiet on the soft ground.

The door was unlocked, the inner panel standing ajar. ‘Hello,’ I called through the screen. ‘Dom? Anyone home?’

Just as I’d done before, I pressed the bell and listened to the chiming music echo through the building. I pressed it again. When still no one came, I pulled open the screen door, held it for Jenny, then followed her inside.

In the hallway, I stopped. There was the coat rack. The sitting room and the galley kitchen. The cracked sofas and the dark wood panelling. My eyes travelled to the staircase.

‘Jenny,’ I said, nudging her. ‘Look.’

When she saw the diagonal line of picture frames, she frowned. When she realised what they held, she took a small step forward. ‘The pictures,’ she said, her voice little more than shaped breath. ‘They’re …’

Birds. All different species. Flocks in V formation. Individuals with their wings spread wide. Necks all straining in the same direction, beaks pointing up. They’re going north, those birds. They’re going to the moon.

‘I don’t understand,’ Jenny murmured. She stepped closer, right up to the wall. ‘Gabe was so private about his drawing. He hardly ever showed anything to anyone.’

‘Weren’t they friends?’ I said. ‘Dom told me Gabriel and Bess were close.’

‘A long time ago, maybe, but …’ She shook her head. ‘I just don’t understand.’

Neither did I.

Bess’s scratchy voice came back to me in scraps. A path that leads to the sky. A hill of grassy green. A diamond moon and the bluest of blue. That, according to her, was the place where ‘it’ happened. At the time, I’d assumed she was describing the Kellerman farmhouse, but … I turned to look out the nearest window and saw green grass and a blue sky.

‘Stay here,’ I said to Jenny. ‘I’m going to look around.’


Outside, I scanned the property, trying to determine the farm’s boundaries.

A paved path around the side of the house led to a patch of dirt that housed an ancient air-con unit, a water tank and a sagging clothesline. On a patch of unmown grass, a few wooden planks had been stacked against the back wall.

Stretching away into the distance was the old citrus orchard, and I could see three weather-worn wooden huts. I jogged over to take a look, but they were just disused outhouses, probably for the farmhands back in the day.

The barns I’d glimpsed driving through the orchard were bigger than they looked but no more interesting. I had a peek inside one and found wooden beams, old trailers, concrete bricks, coils of hosepipe, a few fence posts.

No hills, though. No grassy paths, no diamond moons. And still no sign of Dom.

I’d almost walked in a complete circle before I noticed the workshop – at least, that’s what I assumed it was. Just a nondescript fibro structure with a rotting timber lean-to and a corrugated roof, half hidden behind yet more trees. But when I got up close, I glimpsed lace curtains behind the cobwebby windows.

Inside, garden tools sat on old shelves warped by damp. Junk had been stacked in piles. In the far corner, though, I found something curious. A wooden plank had been laid across two plastic barrels to look like a table. The plank held a set of teacups, a teapot, two delicate side plates and three tiny teaspoons, each with a decorative handle. Two sad-looking plastic garden chairs faced one another over a mouldy offcut of carpet.