The Light Between Oceans(86)

At least he’d managed to keep Spragg away from Isabel. ‘You know we can’t compel a wife to talk, so stay away from her. If you put pressure on her, she could clam up for good. Is that what you want?’ he’d asked the sergeant. ‘You leave her to me.’

Christ, all this was too much. A quiet life in a quiet town, that’s what he’d signed up for. And now he was supposed to make sense of all this. A bastard of a case, this was. A real bastard. His job was to be fair, and thorough. And to hand it over to Albany when the time came. He threw the shell into the water. Didn’t even make a splash, drowned by the roar of the waves.



Sergeant Spragg, still sweating from the long journey from Albany, flicked a piece of fluff from his sleeve. Slowly, he turned back to the papers in front of him. ‘Thomas Edward Sherbourne. Date of birth, 28 September 1893.’

Tom offered no response to the statement. The cicadas clicked shrilly from the forest, as though they were the sound of the heat itself.

‘Quite the war hero, too. Military Cross and Bar. I’ve read your citations: captured a German machine-gun nest single-handed. Carried four of your men to safety under sniper fire. And the rest.’ Spragg let a moment pass. ‘You must have killed a lot of people in your time.’

Tom remained silent.

‘I said,’ Spragg leaned towards him over the table, ‘you must have killed a lot of people in your time.’

Tom’s breathing remained steady. He looked straight ahead, his face expressionless.

Spragg thumped the table. ‘When I ask you a question you’ll bloody well answer it, understand me?’

‘When you ask me a question, I will,’ said Tom quietly.

‘Why did you kill Frank Roennfeldt? That’s a question.’

‘I didn’t kill him.’

‘Was it because he was German? Still had the accent, by all accounts.’

‘He didn’t have an accent when I came across him. He was dead.’

‘You’d killed plenty of his sort before. One more would have made no difference, would it?’

Tom let out a long breath, and folded his arms.

‘That’s a question too, Sherbourne.’

‘What’s all this about? I’ve told you I’m responsible for keeping Lucy. I’ve told you the man was dead when the boat washed up. I buried him, and that’s my responsibility too. What more do you want?’

‘ “Oh, he’s so brave, so honest, copping it sweet like that, prepared to go to gaol,”’ Spragg mimicked in a sing-song. ‘Well it doesn’t wash with me, mate, you understand? It’s a bit too much like you’re trying to get away with murder.’

Tom’s stillness riled him even more, and he went on, ‘I’ve seen your type before. And I’ve had enough of bloody war heroes. Came back here and expected to be worshipped for the rest of your lives. Looking down on anyone who didn’t have a uniform. Well the war’s long over. God knows we saw plenty of you get back and go right off the rails. The way you survived over there isn’t the way to survive in a civilized country and you won’t get away with it.’

‘This has got bugger all to do with the war.’

‘Someone’s got to take a stand for common decency, and I’m the one who’s going to do it here.’

‘And what about common sense, Sergeant? For Christ’s sake, think about it! I could have denied everything. I could have said that Frank Roennfeldt wasn’t even in the boat, and you’d have been none the wiser. I told the truth because I wanted his wife to know what had happened, and because he deserved a decent burial.’

‘Or maybe you told half the truth because you wanted to ease your conscience and get let off with a slap on the wrist.’

‘I’m asking you what makes sense.’

The sergeant eyed him coldly. ‘Seven men, it says you killed in your little machine-gun escapade. That looks to me like the work of a violent man. Of a ruthless killer. Your heroics might just be the death of you,’ he said, gathering up his notes. ‘It’s hard to be a hero when you’re swinging from a rope.’ He closed the file and called to Harry Garstone to take the prisoner back to the cells.





CHAPTER 31



SINCE THE INCIDENT at Mouchemore’s, Hannah hardly sets foot outside the house, and Grace has regressed, becoming more withdrawn, despite her mother’s best efforts.

‘I want to go home. I want my mamma,’ the girl whimpers.

‘I am your mummy, Grace, darling. I know it must be confusing for you.’ She puts a finger under the little girl’s chin. ‘I’ve loved you since the day you were born. I waited so long for you to come home. One day you’ll understand, I promise.’

‘I want my dadda!’ the child rejoins, smacking the finger away.

‘Daddy can’t be with us. But he loved you very much. So very much.’ And she pictures Frank, his baby in his arms. The child looks at Hannah with bewilderment, sometimes anger, and eventually resignation.

Walking home from a visit to her dressmaker the following week, Gwen ran over and over the situation. She worried what would become of her niece: it was a sin for a child to suffer that much, surely. She couldn’t stand idly by any longer.

As she passed the edge of the park where it fringed into bush, her eye was drawn to a woman sitting on a bench, staring into the distance. She noticed first the pretty shade of her green dress. Then she realised it was Isabel Sherbourne. She hurried past, but there was no risk of Isabel seeing her: she was in a trance. The following day, and the next, Gwen saw her in the same place, in the same dazed state.