Scrublands(71)

‘After that? No. I never had another relationship that lasted more than three months. I could never properly trust anyone again. You have no idea how much she hurt me, how much she undermined my faith in people. No, I never married, never had kids.’

‘So why come back here?’

‘Because I couldn’t get her out of my mind.’

Snouch sips some more wine. Staring off into the darkness, as if he might still catch a glimpse of her there, his bewitching young fiancée. Martin says nothing, and Snouch eventually speaks again.

‘It happens as you get older: the past bears down on you more and more until sometimes you spend more time living there than in the present. And in the night, she’d be in my dreams. Not all the time, but often enough. Every now and then, there she’d be, freed by my subconscious: the Katie I first knew, perfect and golden and glorious, and she’d take my heart once again, so that when I woke I’d know that I was still in love with her. They were the worst days. I’d go out and get ferociously wasted, drive the dreams from every waking thought. Like those poor old soldiers who used to come here to the wine saloon. The walking wounded. But it never worked. So in the end I came back here.

‘She wouldn’t see me, of course. It ran too deep, it was too entrenched, the petrified loathing. But I found this place, my hideaway. The role of the derro suited me—not that it was such an act; I was halfway there already. It gave people an excuse to ignore me, to leave me alone. I could sit here and occasionally I’d see her coming and going. She was older, of course, but not so old. And there is something about old friends, old loves, those who you were young with: when you see them after many years, they don’t appear as they are now, but as they were. You can see past the pudginess and wrinkles, past cloudy eyes and sagging jawlines. You can see them as they were when they were young and vital. I would see Katie like that, as she was before it all came apart. She’d walk out the door of her store and in my mind she was twenty again. And then one day—one day I saw the girl, I saw Mandalay, back from uni. Not a girl, though: a woman. She looked just like her mother once had. It took my breath away. I sat here and cried.

‘In the end, I did get to talk to her, to Katie. She was in the hospital down in Bellington. Mandalay was there, wouldn’t let me in the room, thought I’d upset her mother, but the priest was there, he knew. Later on, he got me in to see her. Katie said to me: “We shan’t talk about it, Harley. No talk. Just hold my hand.” And so I did. We sat and held hands and looked into each other’s eyes. She looked terrible, wasted, but her eyes were just the same. Glowing. And she looked at me fondly, Martin. Fondly. Without recriminations. And a week later she died. I couldn’t go to the funeral, but it didn’t matter. We’d made our peace. But she never recanted her allegation, not as far as I know, and I am still persona non grata, the town monster.’

He pauses, reflects, drinks some more wine. ‘And now I think I really will have to leave. The house is gone, and even when the police clear me, people here will still believe I put those poor young girls in the dam. Pity. Springfields was starting to feel like the home it never was when I was a child. And I like it here in the saloon. I sit here in the dark and I wonder how it might have been different.’

Martin is starting to feel sorry for the old man, but not sorry enough to forget the threat Snouch has made. So when he speaks, he tries to remove any suggestion of sympathy from his voice. ‘Why do you want to reconcile with Mandy if she’s not your daughter?’

‘Because I’m an old man and I have my regrets. The doctors don’t like what I’ve done to my liver. I’m not going to live forever. I sit in here and wonder how it could have been different, if I’d not insisted, if I’d married Katherine and kept her secret. Mandy would have grown up as my daughter, Katie and I could have had our own children, it could have been so very different. Mandy’s the last vestige of that left, the only part I might salvage.’

‘Harley, I don’t see what I can do. She loved her mother. She’s not going to take your word or my word or anyone else’s word against that.’

‘I want you to persuade her to take a DNA test.’

‘What?’

‘To prove I’m not her father. Tell her if she agrees, regardless of the result, I’ll leave Riversend.’

There is silence. Snouch’s proposition hangs in the air.

‘Have you told anyone else all of this, Harley?’

‘No, mate. Not since I came back. Just you. You and Byron Swift.’

‘Byron Swift?’

‘He was a priest, Martin.’

They sit in silence. Martin finishes his wine, gets to his feet. ‘Okay, Harley. I’ll see what I can do.’

Martin is almost to the door when the old man, the now not-so-very-old man, speaks. ‘Martin, tread carefully. I know she’s beautiful, I know she’s intelligent. But she’s also her mother’s daughter. Don’t push too hard, too soon. Don’t rush it. I’ve been waiting thirty years; I can wait a bit longer if I have to.’





MARTIN SITS ON THE BENCH OUTSIDE THE GENERAL STORE AND STARES AT The Age. Page five. His article is on page five. Even the Herald Sun’s story is on the front page, and they’ve got no story at all, just a jumble of stale facts and fresh conjecture, unsourced speculation dressed up as the truth that the Germans had been raped and tortured before being shot. He rereads his copy, looking for some weakness to explain its banishment to the inside pages, but finds none. The front page is a grab bag of second-rate stories. The main story is about Melbourne real estate, the photo story about a TV celebrity leaving his wife and family to join a religious cult. Martin recalls the conversation with Max Fuller, the editor assuring him of his trust and confidence. But Max is the editor of the Sydney Morning Herald; his counterpart at The Age is not constrained by personal loyalty. A pit has opened in Martin’s guts. Something is not right.