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“And by the way,” Quinn said, “you’re supposed to send Troy and Janey to live with their grandparents so you and I can go out drinking and dancing in cowboy bars and possibly develop a flourishing meth business from our doublewide without the burden of those pesky kids. I thought Australians were descended from convicts. Easygoing. Salt of the earth.”
“The convict taint,” he said. “Some embrace it. In recent times, at least. Others still run screaming. If you’d asked her, she’d have explained that Great-Great-Grandfather Whoever was a lieutenant in the Third Fleet, ‘later promoted to Commander.’ And glossed over Great-Great-Grandmother. There weren’t many other women out there at the time. She’d have been the daughter of convicts at best.”
“How about you?” she asked. “Was your great-great-grandpa a convict?”
“Dunno. Probably. My dad wasn’t much chop.”
“Oh, yeah?” She turned in her seat to look at him. “You’ve never said, and—oh, no. I’ve never asked, have I? I am such a fail on the femininity front. I’m supposed to have empathy as a judge. Idohave empathy. Where was my empathy?”
“When you’re done bashing yourself,” he said, “let me know, and I’ll tell you that it’s not my favorite subject anyway.”
“So you’re not expecting a call at Christmas? What about your mom?”
“Dead.”
“Oh.” She hesitated, then said, “We’re driving anyway. Tell me.”
“Not much to tell. I was the oldest, and the boy. Copped most of what was going to the kids, but my mum copped more of it.”
“He was abusive?”
“No. Or yes. Threw things. Smashed things. Didn’t hit her, though he shoved her a few times that I know of. Hit me, until I got old enough to hit back. Mean as a cut snake in a sack when he was on the piss, which was heaps.”
“If I translate,” she said, “that means he was a mean drunk?”
“That’s about the size of it.” He rubbed his hand over his face and yawned. “Two younger sisters, one married and in the UK, one married and in Perth. We don’t have reunions.”
“Your dad’s still alive, though?”
“Far as I know.”
“Wow. Well, at least now I know why my dad didn’t scare you off.”
He laughed. “You always surprise me. Yeah, your dad’s all right. Loves your mum. That’s a good thing to show your kids. Otherwise, he’s a bit rough, that’s all. I grew up a bit rough myself.”
“I know that,” she said. “Know how I know that?”
He was grinning despite himself. “No, how?”
“Your mother-in-law told me. Tell me the sister’s better. I’m guessing, though …” She trailed off.
“What?” he asked.
“No, don’t tell me. I think I should find out for myself. The only way I’m going to figure this thing out is if I go in there with a clear mind. Well, relatively. I may be going to take another little nap here.”
“As you’ve got the clearest mind I know,” he said, “I reckon the right person is on the case.”
50
THE CAPSULE WARDROBE
Ahalf hour later, she stood in front of a bank of buzzers, took a deep breath, let it out again, and straightened the unstructured jacket of her capsule wardrobe outfit. This jacket was gray, so was the tank beneath it, and the stretchy pants were navy. They were all a merino blend, and she’d been wearing them for about thirty-six hours, but that was the whole idea of the capsule wardrobe, that you couldn’t tell. That was probably why Christine hadn’t thrown her out from the beginning. She hadn’t looked un-classy until she’d opened her mouth.So there, Mom,she thought.Can your sweater dress do that?She sniffed under her arms to make sure her antiperspirant wasn’t letting her down, checked that both of her gold hoop earrings were fastened, just in case the sister was like the mom, put on her Judge Face, and rang the bell.
No answer, and she rang it again. This had always been a possibility, of course, since her questions would work better if she took Samantha by surprise, and before she’d had a chance to talk to her mother. If Samantha wasn’t home, she’d come back again this afternoon. And tonight. And tomorrow morning. However long it took. She was trying not to see Beckett’s face as he stood at the top of the boat ramp and looked out at the wide, deceptively sluggish river, but that image was hard to erase from her mind.
Bleak, except that wasn’t a strong enough word. Ravaged.
He didn’t deserve that. She was going to do her best to keep him from staying in that spot. She rang the bell a third time.
