‘The survivor.’
‘He wasn’t asked.’
‘People at Bega.’
‘Ah, there you have it. An obscure report in a local newspaper about a sick passenger being transferred to a whaling vessel at the mouth of the bay.’
‘You’re drawing a very long bow.’
‘I’d agree with you but for one thing.’
‘That is?’
‘At one point along the line in this tale a person who was in a position to know what happened wrote it all down. No, I shouldn’t say that—is alleged to have written most of it down.’
When someone backtracks and dilutes a story in that way it can be because they know they’re on shaky ground and don’t want to have to provide much more substance, or because they’re being honest and trying to tell it like it is. With Wakefield, it was hard to judge.
‘You’ve made a lot of assumptions and the documentation’s pretty flimsy,’ I said. ‘I don’t trust newspapers to do much beyond getting the date right.’
‘I agree with you, but in this period such things are all we have. A good deal of accepted history is built on nothing much stronger.’
He was getting close to his chosen field of revisionary history and I didn’t want to get into that. I was sure he could out-fence me there with examples and evidence.
‘What exactly do you have in mind for me to do?’
‘Just this—talk to John Twizell in Bathurst gaol. Ask him certain questions and report back on what he says.’
Put like that, what could I do? We signed the contract and Wakefield wrote me a cheque for a retainer that would keep the wolves from my door for the better part of a month. Generally speaking, these days I prefer a direct deposit into my working account, but with the chequebook and a silver pen in his hand I didn’t feel like objecting. He signed with a flourish and handed the cheque to me. In the old days you could arrange to have cheques cleared instantly by paying a fee. Not any more.
‘A question. If you’re planning to write a book about this, wouldn’t it be better for you to interview Twizell yourself? I mean, wouldn’t it add flavour? You’d be the investigator as well as the researcher. Save you money, too.’
He shook his head. ‘Look at me, the modern, corporate, funded academic. I’d be out of my depth with someone like Twizell and likely to antagonise him. I’m assuming you know people in the ... custodial industry—prison and parole officers, lawyers and the like?’
Custodial industry, I thought. Well, I guess that’s what it is, more or less.
I nodded, folded the cheque and slipped it into my wallet. ‘What’s he in for?’
Putting the chequebook and pen away he looked slightly uncomfortable. ‘Oh, didn’t I say? He’s serving a sentence for assault with a deadly weapon.’
~ * ~
4
I couldn’t remember reading or hearing about Twizell, but a few years back I’d spent ten months in the US and in my delicensed period I didn’t pay too much attention to what was happening on the dark side. With the Sydney Morning Herald online at the State Library it wasn’t hard to catch up.
Four years earlier, when I was helping a friend prepare for championship fights in America, Twizell had been convicted of assaulting his lover, Kristine Tanner, in Newcastle. Drugs were involved and there was a fair degree of provocation. He was sentenced to seven years with five to serve before becoming eligible for parole. It was a sordid, run-of-the-mill case that hadn’t attracted much media attention. The Herald’s reports were spare and there were few photographs. Twizell, thirty-nine, was a stocky individual with a shaved head and a belligerent stare; Kristine Tanner, thirty at the time of the attack, had been hospitalised for several months and had undergone extensive reconstructive surgery.
I printed out a couple of the reports and underlined some names. Twizell had been represented by Courtenay Braithwaite, who I didn’t know but I was sure my solicitor, Viv Garner, would. One of the police officers giving testimony was Detective Inspector Kevin Rush, who I had met under not very friendly circumstances some time in the past. I also underlined the name Tanner without quite knowing why. I was punching in Viv’s number when it came to me— Tanner was the name of the woman who’d registered the child Wakefield believed to be William Dalgarno Twizell’s son. Well, it was a common enough name. I had a feeling there was something more to the name than that but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
Viv knew Braithwaite.
‘Is he any good?’ I asked.