Seven months earlier
UNMAPPED
March 11th, later
Dust hangs in the air around the police car as it stops near the den.
The man who gets out first isn’t in uniform, neither is the woman who gets out after him, but that doesn’t reassure me. The car doors slam, one, two.
I lean against the house, in the veranda shadows, as they peer around. They haven’t seen me yet. The woman spends a moment looking up at the Separates, her hand raised to her forehead. Then they both look across at my car. The man takes out a notebook and writes. I think of the gun deep in the pool: I could’ve had a shootout, me and the den teaming up against the authorities. The man kicks at the camp bed, still tipped over where we left it. He makes another note. I wonder if he’s seen your crumpled suit in the dirt near the bed, the iron warming to smooth it. There’s never enough time to prepare, is there?
The wood creaks when I move, and they turn and stare in my direction.
‘Ah, hello, miss…’ the man says, taking a couple of paces towards me.
I don’t know what to say, which name to use. I don’t know what to do.
I want to get in my car and screech out of here, leave them in the dust. I want you to stay hidden. You used to say that if you know how to hide here, no one will find you: I want to believe that now. I must make it look like you were never here. I am a diversion, buying you time to disappear properly, helping us both. The man and the woman come closer.
‘Miss…?’ the man tries again.
I still don’t know which of my names to give them, if I should give them a name at all. They’re near the veranda now and I haven’t said a word. It must look weird: me here, not speaking. I stand up straighter.
‘Ms Stone,’ I say eventually, moving out from the shadows and stepping off the veranda towards them. ‘Can I help you?’
My tone is all lady-of-the-manor, as if this is my house and they are trespassing. They stare at me as if I’ve slapped them. The man takes out his notebook again and consults it.
‘Miss Stone,’ he says, notMs.‘Miss Stone. We are searching for a missing person.’
Right. Of course. This is the scenario I thought about over and over when I was sixteen and we were here together. The police, cottoning on, finding me eventually. I imagined it all so vividly—stepping forward, presenting myself. Being returned to my parents, away from you, telling my story to the world. Back then, I wanted you to go to prison. At least, a part of me did. Now, I don’t want that at all. I’ve come to realise that prison is not a place for either of us. You and I need space, this land and its endless horizons.
The man is still watching me. I imagine his next words:We have reason to believe this missing person is you, Gemma Toombs, and we’re here to take you back…
But he doesn’t say those words. The man introduces himself as Detective Inspector Braithewaite, and his partner as Detective Sergeant Manikham, and he says, ‘We are looking for a missing man, Mr Tyler MacFarlane.’
He waits, watching me, but I don’t give him anything. He glances at his partner, who nods.
‘Mr MacFarlane has been missing since Friday, February fifteenth,’ he continues, ‘when we believe he disappeared from near his home in Perth. We have reason to believe you may know a man by that name, Miss Stone? Is that correct?’