The Lost Man(39)

‘And what did you tell him?’ Ilse was watching Harry closely.

‘What you’d expect. That things were going well here, but Cam had been worried about something.’

‘Did he ask what?’

‘Of course.’

‘And?’

Harry’s face barely moved but he kept his eyes on Ilse. ‘And none of us were much help. So I reckon he’ll be wanting to ask you.’

Ilse shot a look at her daughters, who were watching now. ‘Maybe we should talk about this later.’

For a few minutes the only sound was cutlery against plates and the ticking of the kitchen clock. Nathan cleared his throat and turned to Harry.

‘I thought I’d go to Lehmann’s Hill tomorrow. Try to fix that mast.’

‘That’d be good. Bub can give you a hand.’ He looked at Bub, who nodded.

‘It’s fine,’ Nathan said. ‘Xander’ll come.’

Harry shook his head. ‘It’s a long way and the radio’s down. Take Bub too.’

Nathan opened his mouth to reply when Liz appeared at the door, her face strangely fixed. ‘Glenn needs to talk to you,’ she said to Ilse, who stood up and left the kitchen.

‘What’s wrong?’ Harry said.

‘Nothing. Everything’s fine.’ Liz flashed a rigid smile at the girls. ‘But a quick word outside, Harry, if you don’t mind.’

Nathan saw his confusion mirrored in Bub and Xander’s faces. They heard the slam of the screen door as Harry followed Liz out, and a moment later the hum of low voices on the verandah. The backpackers looked at each other, their meals forgotten on their plates.

A minute passed, then another. No-one came back. Slowly, they all picked up their forks and continued eating. After what felt like a long time, Nathan heard fast footsteps in the hall and the screech of the screen door again. Another murmured voice on the verandah, inaudible but with a new sense of urgency in its tone. Ilse, he thought. He waited, but still no-one returned to the kitchen. Finally, he pushed back his chair, six pairs of eyes on him.

‘Back in a minute.’

The conversation stopped dead as he stepped outside. Harry cut himself off mid-word and Liz looked up. She had both arms wrapped tightly around herself. Ilse, who appeared to have been looking from one to the other, now fixed her eyes firmly on Nathan. He wasn’t sure what she was trying to tell him, if anything. The yellow porch light cast a sickly glow over them all.

‘What’s going on?’

No-one answered him straight away.

‘Anyone?’ he tried again. ‘What did Glenn say?’

Harry shot a look at Liz. ‘He was going through the police records this afternoon for his report and he found a reference to Cameron.’

Nathan frowned. ‘Did Cam do something?’

‘No,’ Liz snapped, and Ilse’s jaw tightened.

‘Apparently about two months ago someone rang the cop shop asking about Cameron,’ Harry said, and looked at Liz. ‘You tell him. It was you Glenn spoke to.’

Liz shook her head, a tight jerk of the neck, and glanced at Ilse, who waved her hand impatiently. ‘Christ, you just tell him, Harry.’

Harry sighed. ‘Someone called the police station, but it wasn’t Glenn who took the call. It was when he was on medical leave for that week or so, you remember?’

‘Vaguely,’ Nathan said. ‘Matt covered.’ The usual stand-in sergeant from St Helens. He was an okay bloke.

‘Right. Well, Glenn noticed a minor entry on the log and asked Matt about it. Matt reckons he got a call at the station from a woman saying she used to know Cameron and asking if he still worked on this property.’

Ilse was now looking out into the night with a thousand-yard stare.

‘So Matt says yes,’ Harry went on. ‘Offers to pass on her details, but she says something like: “No, it’s fine. As long as Cameron’s still there, I’ll get in touch myself.”’

Nathan felt a seed of disquiet unfurl and grow. ‘Okay.’

‘Matt doesn’t think too much of it, but he mentions this woman to Cameron when he sees him in town a few days later. Thinking it’s an old girlfriend or whatever.’

Ilse folded her arms firmly across her chest.

‘But apparently, Cam wasn’t too happy to hear this,’ Harry said. ‘Told Matt he wasn’t interested in hearing from her. Not to pass on his number or email. Get rid of her if she calls again. So Matt thinks fair enough. Old girlfriend.’ Harry glanced at Ilse. ‘New girlfriend maybe. None of his business. And that’s that. Quick note in the log, nothing more to see.’

The creases in Harry’s face deepened.

‘Until all this, obviously,’ he said. ‘Glenn saw the log this arvo, got the story from Matt, and thought he’d better call us and see if this woman’s name rang any bells.’

‘Well, don’t bloody keep me in suspense, mate,’ Nathan said. Liz was examining the floorboards and Ilse was still staring out into the night.

‘It was Jenna Moore.’

Nathan breathed out. ‘Shit.’ He hadn’t heard the name in more than twenty years and he had to dig deep to fully unearth the memory. Dusty and buried, it rose up through the years and clicked into place, and by then it wasn’t a bell ringing in Nathan’s head, it was an alarm.