‘What was he hiding from?’
‘The dad?’
Moy shook his head. ‘Either way, it’s not gonna help us find him, is it?’
They got out and looked around the old train, the playground, the wisteria arbour and the Rotary lunch shed. ‘Patrick, it’s Bart.’
Nothing.
They got back in and drove. ‘This is fucking pointless,’ Moy said.
‘What else y’gonna do?’
There was something, or someone, missing, he guessed. The person who’d killed Alex Naismith. Who’d argued with him, knocked him on the head and driven him to the coast. Who’d dragged him from his car or ute and rolled him over rocks into the ocean.
His phone rang.
‘Dad? You still awake?’
He could hear George dropping the phone, fumbling his sheets and picking it up. Followed by rustling paper and a glass being knocked. ‘Someone here reckons a boy went missing?’
‘Yes.’
There was an uneasy silence.
‘Well? Who was it?’
‘Patrick.’
There was another pause, and George saying, ‘Fuck.’
Moy told him. From their time at the lucky dip, the three-wheeled car, the scones and water-colours. ‘I just left him for a moment…there were people everywhere.’
‘And no one saw anything?’
‘No.’
There was another long pause, but Moy could see his father shaking his head, whispering curses. ‘They said a nine-year-old boy but I didn’t think…’
‘Don’t worry, we’ll find him.’
‘He’s been taken, hasn’t he?’
‘Maybe.’
‘It’s the same fella, isn’t it?’
‘Dad—’
‘Right, I’m dressed. Come and get me now.’
Moy took a deep breath. ‘What good’ll that do?’
‘I’ll help you look.’
‘We’ve got patrols, CFS, the SES are looking on the outskirts of town.’
‘I had no idea there was any sort of threat,’ George said.
‘There are other options. He might’ve found his dad or his brother.’
‘And just gone off without telling you?’
‘Perhaps. Or they made him.’
‘Or someone else made him,’ George said. ‘Listen, I’m not gonna lose Paddy, right?’
‘There’s no point picking you up, he might come to you.’
Silence.
‘You’ve gotta find him, Bart.’
‘I know, Dad.’
‘You have to.’
Moy could hear his father’s breathing. ‘I will.’ He looked at the empty street and wondered if Guilderton would ever yield any of its secrets.
‘I will,’ he said, and hung up.
Laing was looking through the pile of notes clipped into Moy’s folder. ‘Your old man still tellin’ you what to do?’
‘Yes.’
‘Same as mine. Never any fuckin’ help, but lots of advice.’
‘They’ve grown close,’ he said. He saw Patrick’s face, confused, staring up at him. ‘He’s a good kid.’
‘I know. Funny, always thinkin’.’
Moy could see Patrick’s red cheeks, tanned by the wheatbelt sun. His neck, with one big freckle beside his carotid artery.
‘We’ll find him,’ Laing said.
‘Dad takes him bowling.’ He trailed off again. His head was full of faces, landscapes, snatches of news reports; headlines, photographs torn from newspapers. Long minutes filled with every comment, smile and lifted eyebrow he’d noticed since that morning in the alleyway. The key was there, he realised. But it was small, and it wouldn’t look familiar.
And then he was back at Mango Meats, talking to Justin Davids and the apprentice, Ray Foster. He was listening to the young man’s words: worked around the place…
‘Shit,’ he said.
‘What is it?’
Moy made a U-turn and returned to the station. He went to his office, looked up the butcher’s phone number. ‘Justin? Have you got Ray Foster’s number?’
‘Yeah…somewhere in the mess.’
The phone dropped and Davids’ wife asked if there was something wrong.
‘It’s that copper,’ Davids replied. ‘Something’s up.’
A few moments later the butcher was back on the phone. ‘Here it is.’ The numbers careful on his lips, as though he sensed the importance of each digit. Moy wrote clearly, crossing a seven and looping a two.
He called the number. ‘Ray? Sorry to disturb you; we’ve got an emergency.’ He didn’t stop to explain. ‘Listen, when we were talking about Naismith, you said he’d worked around the place.’
‘Yes.’