The Silence. Susan Allott
burner. He’d be able to sleep tonight.
No such luck. The kid jumped to her feet and started shouting at the others to come and see, come and look at this. Waving the stick in the air. Steve kept driving, kept humming, and she kept waving the stick and yelling. What did she have to go and do that for?
‘There she is!’ Harry jumped clean out of his seat. ‘Over there, by the creek.’
Steve braked. Turned off the ignition. ‘Well spotted, mate.’
Harry wandered over to her, nice and easy, for all the world like he was her favourite uncle come to visit. He started talking to her, squatting down by the water. Steve knew what he’d say: ‘I’m going to take you for a ride in a police truck.’ He always said that. ‘And then you’re going to have a little holiday.’
Steve climbed out of the truck and waited. Harry held his hand out and the girl took it. She was taken with him, you could see it. Looking up at him and smiling. With any luck they could do this nice and quick without a scene.
‘There’s a baby too,’ Harry said, just loud enough to reach him. ‘A boy.’
‘Do we need to do that today?’
‘I should say we do.’ Harry looked at him like he was out of his mind. ‘Get the job done, mate. No sense dragging it out.’
Steve looked away, over at the creek where the kids had been playing. They’d all cleared off. It had gone quiet; just a dog barking, a door slamming shut. Someone must’ve raised the alarm. They’d be hiding their kids under the beds, in cupboards. The older ones would have made it into the bush by now.
‘I’d just as soon leave it.’ He kept his voice low. ‘Why don’t we leave it, Harry? It’s never easy when it’s a baby.’
‘It’s not meant to be easy.’ Harry held the car door open for the kid, still with the nice guy smile on his face. ‘You wouldn’t be here if it was easy,’ he said, shutting the door behind her.
‘Not easy for them, I mean.’ He glanced up at the house behind them, where the family lived. ‘It doesn’t seem right, does it?’
‘Jesus, Steve. What are you saying?’
Steve stared back at Harry. Another dog started barking, closer than the first. ‘Nothing,’ he said.
The kid leaned out the window. ‘Where am I going on holiday?’ She was looking wary. ‘Can I say goodbye to Grandpa?’
‘I’ll speak to him,’ Steve said. His voice sounded fake, like an actor with a bit part. ‘I’ll let him know.’
‘Get a bloody move on,’ said Harry. ‘And don’t let ’em get to you. It’s been signed off.’
The house was quiet. Tin-roof verandah and a dog sleeping in the shade. He knocked, not too loud, but footsteps came right away. He braced himself.
‘What’s wrong?’ An old fella answered the door. He was darker than the girl: black skin and white hair, like a photo negative. What Ray would call a ‘full blood’ Aboriginal. He was none too happy to see a copper on the doorstep, and he’d clocked the truck down by the creek too. ‘What’s the problem?’
A baby cried quietly in the front room, out of sight.
‘I’m here about the kids,’ Steve said. ‘You the grandpa?’
‘What d’you mean?’ He took a better look at the truck and saw the girl through the window. He reared back in shock. Tried to push past, hollering her name. Dora.
‘Listen. Don’t make this hard on yourself.’ Steve gripped him by the shoulder and shoved him back into the house, just enough force so he knew this was serious. ‘Let me in.’
It was dark inside, and a tight knot of flies was frantic over a piece of meat on a plate near the stove. Three empty beer bottles lined up next to the sink. The baby was propped up on the couch in a singlet and a nappy. He’d gone quiet, big wet eyes following Steve as he moved.
‘Where’s the mother?’
‘Out,’ the old fella said, and looked at his feet. ‘Her sisters help with the kids. There’s three sisters and five cousins. Plenty of us to care for the younguns.’
‘Look, mate. We’ve been told to take the baby. Orders from above.’
The old fella shook his head. ‘You can’t.’ He picked the boy up and held him tight, both arms across his body. ‘We’re a loving family. We look after the kids.’
A fly thumped against the small window and dropped to the floor. The room was stifling. Steve started feeling separate from his body, like he might not be in charge of himself. He didn’t know what he’d do next. He locked eyes with the baby: a steady gaze, wise and sad. Something in Steve shifted then, standing in that small room in Ivanhoe, although he barely felt it. The slight loosening of a knot.
‘I’m not going to take him,’ he said. ‘You get to keep the boy.’ The old bloke didn’t react. Steve didn’t know if he’d said what he thought he’d said. ‘I’m going to leave him here with you. I won’t take him. But his sister’s coming with me, mate. Foster family’s lined up already.’ He went into automatic. ‘She’ll be looked after. She’ll get a good education. Good start in life.’
The old man started to cry then, his face stretched long and trembling. ‘Can I see her?’
‘Best you don’t. Stay here and keep the baby quiet. Or else I’ll have to take him.’
Steve heard the old man wailing as he shut the door behind him. White, hard sunlight after the dark of the house. The dog lifted its head and got up on its haunches, barked at him until he was off the property.
He shook his head at Harry as he got into the truck.
‘No baby in there,’ he told him. His hand trembled on the ignition. He wanted to cry himself, now he was out of there, away from the old man and his despair, his grief. He had no reason to cry next to that, but still his throat ached and his eyes threatened to well up. He was a lily-livered, poisonous bastard. He couldn’t even look at the girl in the back.
‘I changed my mind,’ she said, swinging round in her seat. ‘I want Grandpa.’
‘Your grandpa says to be a good girl.’ He said it without turning. ‘He says to sit down nice and quiet and don’t muck about.’
He reversed back a few yards and a great cloud of dust rose up around them. The old bloke was out on the verandah as he pulled away, then he was chasing the truck. Steve crunched through the gears, put his foot down and drove blind through the dust till he’d gone.
Mandy had taken her eye off of Isla for one minute. Two, maximum. She’d been right there in the wet sand, a few feet away, digging with her hands. Mandy stood beside the little hole Isla had dug; the damp heaps of sand beside it. The hole was full of water. A huge great wave had come and covered the beach, wetting the tip of Mandy’s towel. Which was when she’d looked up and found Isla gone.
She searched up and down the beach; strode off in one direction shouting Isla’s name, then went back the way she came and did the same thing. She must have missed her. She kept calling. There were too many little girls in blue swimmers on this beach. All of them looked familiar from a distance and became strangers as she drew closer. Panic seized her. Her legs became heavy and slow. She stood on the shingle and faced out to the water, calling again, her voice lost to the boom and crash of the waves. The heat of the day, the laughter and movement, became nauseating; the gulls sounded shrill and full of dread. She waded into the sea and shouted, ‘Isla! Isla!’
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