Only Killers and Thieves(82)

“The law was with us. John said—”

“He’s a fucking snake, Billy. You’re going in with a fucking snake. The only reason he helped us was to get at the Kurrong; bastard’s kept Daddy under his heel for years, then as soon as he’s dead makes out like the two were best bloody mates.”

“How did he? What did John ever do to us?”

“Damming that creek for one thing, and who knows what else besides.”

“Well, might be he feels bad, or his wife might have put him up to it—I don’t care, Tommy! The bloke wants to help us so why wouldn’t we? Where else are we going to go? Me and you on the wallaby? You’d rather that than here?”

“Aye,” Tommy said. “Or on my own. Either way.”

Billy considered him carefully. “We’re all the other’s got left.”

“If you say so.”

“They fucking killed them! What else was I supposed to do!”

Tommy stepped a pace closer. “Joseph wasn’t there.”

Billy’s face twisted in disgust. “So you’re taking their side?”

“You see nothing, feel nothing . . . he’s broke you and you don’t even know it.”

Billy rolled his tongue inside his lips. A hard and steady stare. He walked past Tommy, deliberately nudged his shoulder, then marched out of the room. Tommy heard him walking across the atrium to Sullivan’s parlor. He looked at himself in the windows again. A stranger watched him back: a strange boy in a strange room wearing strange clothes.

“Tom-my!”

Sullivan’s voice. Two distinct syllables. A rising, full-blooded scream.

“Tom-my!”

He swallowed. Fidgeting his jacket hem, blinking at the floor.

“Tom-my!”

His name tolled around the atrium and through the entire house. A savagery in how he said it, a threat. Tommy started moving and the boy in the window seemed to hesitate before following, until Tommy was in the atrium and alone. In the far corner the parlor door was open, light flickering inside. They weren’t talking. Listening to his footsteps on the atrium floorboards.

Tommy presented himself in the doorway. Billy twisted in the wingback to watch him; Sullivan spread his arms over the desk.

“There he is. Thought you’d nodded off again, son. Come in now, take a seat.”

Tommy inched forward. The sconces were lit and the room was full of shadows and there was a strong smell of liquor in the air. On the desk before him Sullivan had a decanter and a whiskey glass and he rotated the glass back and forth, watching Tommy all the while. The three of them were alone. Locke and Noone were gone. Tommy lowered himself into the other wingback and Billy straightened on his. All Tommy could see of his brother were his forearms and legs.

“There now,” Sullivan said, smiling. “I know you’re a little reluctant but it’s important you hear this. Drink before we start? No? Well, probably for the best—we’ve all had plenty tonight.” He smiled, raised his glass, took a sip, and smacked his lips. “Anyway, I thought it best we got this done straight off. I don’t like drawing things out, figured you two would want to know where you stand.”

“Stand with what?” Tommy said, and Sullivan raised a pudgy hand.

“Boys, listen. I understand it’s been a bad time, and you’re not in the best of ways, but there’s more bad news coming, I’m afraid. Your father, he didn’t own Glendale. I don’t know what he told you, but it’s not a real selection in the legal sense of the word. He wasn’t the one that cleared it, or settled it, or built the house and sheds. He took on the run from someone else. Leased, not bought. And unfortunately, now that he’s gone, that lease becomes forfeit since you boys are still minors and too young to hold land. Are you following what I’m saying so far?”

He took a drink and looked at them, then nodded and went on.

“Good, because here’s the thing: Ned had run up a fair debt over the years, and that debt still needs to be paid. The only ones left to pay it are you.”

There was a silence. Hesitantly Billy asked, “What debt? To who?”

Sullivan spread his hands open then folded them on the desk.

“You see, the whole of this district, it’s mine. You get on a horse, and just about anywhere you can ride in the space of two days, one way or another belongs to me. Name on a title means nothing. My grandfather was the only bloke who dared come out here and stake a bloody claim. He cleared the land, beat off the natives, got this whole valley ready to graze. They hailed him as a hero, now the wig wearers are trying to carve it all up with their bloody Land Acts. So what I do is, I dummy them. You know what dummying is? The land gets bought by my agent—he’s just a name on a deed—then I put in a man of my choosing on a short lease. I set him up with all he needs, he pays me an amount in return. Not a share of profits, mind you: I get paid out first. Should be he can make a very fine life for himself, but sometimes they do fail and I have to find a new fella to take on the run . . . but the debt, the debt stays with the first bastard, minus whatever he leaves behind. You understand what I’m saying here, boys?”

He took a drink and waited. Billy said, “What’s Daddy’s debt to us, though?”

“Everything. You’ve been living in my pocket all your short lives.”