To the Sea Read online

  Zoe was such a beautiful girl, the real beauty of the family. Just like their mother. Her deep blue eyes and long brown lashes, the slightly crooked upturned nose with its pale freckles, her clear golden skin and blonde hair which was always loose and messy. Zoe had Eva’s wide mouth, too, with the pink lips that lipstick manufacturers would capture a market with if only they could make it with the same natural glow. And such a smile.

  Sadie realised sadly that she had not seen much of her baby sister in recent years. She and Zoe had never been close. How could they with twenty-seven years between them? It was a whole lifetime. Sadie wanted to be the big sister Zoe needed, but what closeness Sadie had tried to make between them when Zoe was little had faded away over the years and she had somehow missed Zoe growing into the beautiful young woman in the photos. Sadie could feel her eyes filling with tears again and she desperately wanted to talk to Zoe now and try and get it right between them.

  Sadie remembered what it was like to be seventeen. She had left home for Melbourne, studying ideas she barely grasped, working, and falling into the raw delight of love and a life with Tim. Zoe was old enough to have all those things happen to her. Maybe some of them already had. Sadie had no idea. But if they hadn’t, Zoe must come back to experience them. They were the most important things in life. Zoe’s life could not be over.

  But now Sadie was sitting in the bedroom waiting for the moment the police found her sister’s body and asked her to identify it. She knew it would be her. Her mother would be silent in the background, overwhelmed or untouched by everything, and her father would say he was going to do it but would hesitate just long enough for Sadie to take her cue and do what needed to be done. Zoe’s life had been so short and Sadie could only remember small fragments of it. Nowhere near seventeen years’ worth.

  She sat in the dimming room watching the scene below. It was getting late and the sun was on its ritual descent into the sea. Sadie had heard her father go downstairs a little while ago but she couldn’t face him or the others just yet. It was quiet in the bedroom and looking around at Zoe’s young girl things, the search for her body seemed premature, silly. Surely a person couldn’t just slip away like this. Surely life was more tenacious.

  Sadie heard voices on the landing outside Zoe’s room. Roger was out there talking to someone.

  ‘Wouldn’t your time be better spent with the divers?’ She used to think that flat drawl of his sounded like John Malkovich but Roger could never master the sexually charged undertone needed to really pull it off. These days he just sounded pretentious and bored. The upside, Sadie thought, was that it wasn’t only her who bored him.

  She heard the female detective answer him. ‘We have a report of a missing girl. We will be conducting the search as widely as we need to.’

  ‘Well you’re not going to search my room or those of my children.’ His voice still held that threatening growl that knotted Sadie’s stomach. Belligerent, her friend Kay called it. Arsehole, Cecile called it.

  ‘Excuse me, who are you?’ asked the detective.

  ‘As I have not been arrested, I will not answer your questions and I forbid you to speak to my children either. If you wish to speak to them, make an appointment at a time convenient for our lawyer.’

  Sadie almost laughed. Did they even have a lawyer? She didn’t, but she guessed Roger would. She stood up at the window and hugged her chest. She wanted to tell him to stop being a fool but she remained where she was and kept her eyes on the divers who had just resurfaced.

  ‘Will do, sir,’ said the detective patiently. ‘But the owner of the property and father of the missing girl, Mr John Kennett, has given us permission to do a thorough search of the house and adjoining property. He has offered his full assistance and that of his family.’

  ‘John doesn’t speak for me.’

  ‘Perhaps Mr Kennett doesn’t consider you part of his family,’ said the detective. Sadie smiled tiredly at her defiance.

  ‘You can search in Zoe’s room and John’s but stay out of mine.’

  ‘As you are not the owner of this property, sir, none of the rooms are yours. I’d advise you to stop hindering our lawful search.’ Sadie wondered if the detective really was up to arguing with a wound-up Roger. It was beyond Sadie.

  ‘Or what?’ goaded Roger. ‘Will you arrest me?’

  ‘Yes, I will,’ said the detective calmly.

  ‘I think my children and I will return to town right now.’

  Not me then, thought Sadie.

  ‘You are very welcome to do so, sir. As are your children.’

  ‘So, I’m not a suspect or under arrest yet then?’

  ‘As far as we’re aware, no crime has been committed. Unless you have something different to tell us?’ She paused but Roger made no reply. ‘We’ll be in touch if we need to speak to you,’ said the detective.

  ‘I didn’t give you my details.’ Roger’s voice was still controlled but Sadie could hear the fury building. ‘How do you have that information?’

  Roger was obsessed with his privacy. They had always had an unlisted phone number and the children had been punished when they were younger if they gave the number to people Roger had not approved. He had ‘private number’ on his mobile and had at least three email accounts that Sadie knew of, and probably more she didn’t. He lived like a spy. Or a liar.

  ‘Your son gave me the information, sir,’ said a young male voice. ‘He was very helpful.’

  ‘He had no right to do that,’ said Roger.

  Sadie heard him walk downstairs.

  ‘What a prick,’ said the young man’s voice.

  ‘Every family has at least one, Jack,’ said the detective. ‘Let’s hope this family only has him.’

  They opened the door but stopped when they saw Sadie there.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said the young officer to Sadie. ‘We didn’t know anyone was in here.’

  He looked uncomfortable that he had been overheard and Sadie wanted to tell him that he hadn’t said anything that shocked or hurt her. She had suspected that Roger was a prick for a while now, but she had only recently admitted it to herself and she was still a long way away from acknowledging it to anyone else.

  ‘So this is Zoe’s room?’ asked the detective.

  ‘Yes. I was just sitting up here thinking about her and trying to figure out what’s happened. Am I in your way?’

  ‘No, not at all. Your father told us that Zoe has a mobile phone and laptop in here and we want to see if we can find anything on those that might give us some clues. We also want to look through her room.’

  Sadie stepped out of the way so the young officer could sit at Zoe’s desk. He opened her laptop and turned it on. Sadie noticed that he had gloves on.

  ‘If it’s password-protected, there’s nothing I can do,’ he said. ‘We’ll have to take it back to town and get forensics on to it. Unless you know her password?’ He looked up hopefully at Sadie. She shook her head.

  The laptop went to the login screen, which was the view outside the window, probably taken by Zoe sitting at her desk on a dark, stormy day. The sea was up, white horses galloping fast and high across a grey chop. There was a garish streak of lightning in the deep purple sky above snow-covered Mount Wellington.

  The officer tapped at the keyboard and said, ‘We’re in luck, boss. No password.’

  He continued tapping.

  ‘She’s on Facebook. With any luck, she’ll still be logged in and we’ll be able to view her page and links.’

  Sadie looked out the window away from what was going on in Zoe’s room. Two of her little nieces were running around on the lawn trying to get Ben to join in a complicated game with a ball and two towels. Their squeals and laughter were the only sounds breaking the quietness of the day.

  ‘No luck,’ said the young officer, cutting through the girls’ laughter. ‘She’s not logged in. Don’t suppose you’re a friend of hers on Facebook?’ he asked, looking back up at Sadie.

  ‘I�
�m not,’ said Sadie. Sadie knew nothing about social media. ‘My kids, Matt or Jess, might be.’

  ‘I’ll follow up with them later. I’ll check her emails now.’

  The detective was walking slowly around the room looking at everything. She had gloves on too. She opened Zoe’s wardrobe door and riffled slowly through the hanging clothes. She stopped to read some of the postcards stuck on the inside of the mirrored wardrobe door. She ran her gloved hand slowly down the neck of Zoe’s violin lying in its open case on the felt-covered table in the corner. She looked at the music on the stand next to the violin. Sadie knew it was Bach’s haunting ‘Concerto for Violin and Oboe in C Minor’. Sadie had heard Zoe playing it yesterday afternoon. Sadie had come up to her room after another one-sided, muted argument with Roger and she lay on her bed in the warm afternoon sun listening to the sublime music. Rosetta felt empty without Zoe’s music drifting through its rooms.

  The detective flicked through some books on the bookcase and looked under Zoe’s bed. She took some photos of things that didn’t strike Sadie as particularly photo worthy. But then, she had no idea what they were looking for.

  ‘Is Zoe’s room always this tidy?’ the detective asked turning to face Sadie.

  ‘I don’t know. I think so.’ Sadie hadn’t been in Zoe’s room for years. There had been a boy band poster above her bed the last time Sadie had been here. ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘It is unusually clean and tidy for a teenager’s room. I’m just wondering if she perhaps tidied it before she went snorkelling.’

  Sadie didn’t reply and the detective returned to searching for whatever she hoped to find. ‘No emails today,’ said the male officer. ‘Sent or received.’

  The detective picked up Zoe’s phone in its pink plastic case from her bedside table.

  ‘This too, Jack.’

  He took the phone and activated it. ‘No password or pin here either.’ He started scrolling through the phone. ‘She hasn’t made any calls or sent any texts since yesterday afternoon.’ He was speaking to the detective. They both crinkled their brows. That was obviously a problem. Another problem Sadie couldn’t fathom. She felt sudden tears welling up behind her eyes again.

  ‘Any photos?’ asked the detective.

  The young policeman swiped his fingers across the screen of Zoe’s phone, moving from one private section of Zoe’s life to another. Sadie wanted to reach out and snatch the phone from him. He shouldn’t be looking at her sister’s private conversations and photos like this. There was no need for this intrusion into Zoe’s life.

  ‘None taken today.’ He continued to flick through photos of Zoe and her friends, Zoe sailing, Ben and some of her mother which were taken down on the jetty. Sadie looked away.

  ‘I’ll download everything for your file,’ Jack said, ‘before I secure the phone for evidence.’

  The detective nodded and kept looking through Zoe’s things.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ Sadie said and went to go. At the door, she turned and said to them, ‘Please feel free to do whatever you have to do to find my sister. If you need to talk to my daughter, you have my permission. She goes to school with Zoe and she will do anything she can to assist you. Matt is nineteen and will make his own decisions, despite everything I just heard my husband say to you. Roger’s just upset and wants to protect his children.’

  ‘We understand. Thank you. Sadie, isn’t it?’ asked the detective.

  ‘Yes. I won’t be returning to town with my husband so please find me and talk to me any time.’

  She left them to their search and walked downstairs to find Matt. She hoped it wasn’t too late to warn him.

  Tony

  THE DIVERS HAD THEIR DOUBTS ABOUT THE SEARCH. THE WATER WAS clear and not more than eight metres in the deepest pockets but shallower in most of the area around Table Rock. There were no currents and it was hard to explain how a strong swimmer familiar with these waters could have got into any difficulty. And if she had got into difficulty, where was her body?

  ‘So you’re sure this is where she went in?’ asked the lead marine, Bill Watson. ‘She definitely went snorkelling around these rocks?’

  ‘That’s what all the family are saying,’ said Tony. Now that he was here on the boat and could see the protected little bay where the girl had gone snorkelling, he was puzzled too.

  ‘You want us to keep going?’ asked Bill.

  ‘Yes. Keep going until dark and I’ll go up and talk to the family again. If I get any new info, I’ll call it in.’

  Tony stood up but turned and called out to Bill just before he submerged.

  ‘Bill, what do you think?’

  ‘There’s no body here,’ the experienced marine said emphatically as he lifted his mask and looked up at Tony. ‘This water is too clear and calm. Not even any kelp. The bottom is flat and sandy. If she was here and something happened to her and she somehow drowned this close to shore and in such shallow water, she would be right here, floating on the surface. There’s no drift, no swell and the tides have turned twice since she was reported as missing. We’ll keep diving for you cause that’s what you pay us for but there’s no body here. Just so you know.’

  ‘And are we definitely looking for a body?’

  ‘After twenty plus hours? Afraid so.’

  ‘People have been found alive after longer than that. Could she be floating, treading water, swimming?’

  ‘If she’s in the water, she’s dead, though I’m damned if I know where the body has got to. If the family had called us sooner, we might have had a chance of finding her alive. But not now.’

  Tony watched as Bill prepared to dive again and then he gave the nod for the skipper to take him into the jetty. As he walked back along the jetty, Tony again noticed the little sailboat moored on the other side.

  It was a long twilight this far south in summer and it would be late, well after ten o’clock, before daylight was gone and the stars were visible in a black night sky. Tony looked out across the small bay to the channel. The red light of the lighthouse on the nearest island was flashing slow and bright, mingling with the red rays of the sinking sun. His eyes scanned the view of bays, rocks and the channel with its islands leading to the massive ocean rolling gently out behind the still bays. Mount Wellington was a dark purple haze on the horizon. There were no boats out now and, except for the marines’ boats, the scene was empty of a human presence. There was just the imposing house with the bush to its back and the sea. Tony could feel its emptiness and knew that if Zoe was out there, they would never find her. One young girl could not leave her mark on this vastness.

  He caught a quick movement out of the corner of his eye on the rocks near the divers – a black flash as a seal slid into the water from the flat ledge of a rocky outcrop. He heard the splash as it broke the surface of the water with barely a ripple and then tracked it as it flashed through the water, surfacing every few moments. It became fiery red as it swam out towards the sun, which was now low on the horizon and almost blinding. How long had the seal been sitting on those rocks, Tony wondered. He smiled to himself that he may just have let his only eyewitness leave the scene.

  Tony walked up towards the house. Paul and Narelle were standing on the dunes, caught up in the view and the sunset, just as he had been.

  ‘You guys got anything useful?’ he asked them.

  ‘Not really,’ said Narelle. ‘I did a room search and then spoke to some of the teenage kids. They all say that Zoe went snorkelling last evening. She went alone and she didn’t come back.’ She looked out over the calm bay exploding in golden and crimson rays. ‘I take it the divers haven’t found anything?’

  Tony shook his head.

  ‘The rest of the family’s not much help either,’ said Paul. ‘They all say the same thing about Zoe going snorkelling.’ He was watching the boats as they moved further out into the orange water of the bay with the divers following.

  ‘Do we think there’s something strange going on here?’
asked Paul. ‘This whole family’s a bit weird.’

  ‘Go on,’ said Tony after a moment. The dunes beneath their feet were a deep pink and Tony wondered if that was how the place got its name.

  ‘They all seem so vague,’ said Paul. ‘I talked to the brother and sisters and they couldn’t tell me what Zoe did or said before she left, why she would go snorkelling at low tide, when they realised she was gone. Nothing. Now, it’s not that surprising that one or two of them might not have talked to her or seen her, but none of them have any idea. Yet, they’re all certain that she’s drowned.’

  The Sorell boys arrived at that moment and the five of them stood in a line along the top of the dune looking out at the crimson ocean.

  ‘I spoke to a couple of neighbours around in the next big bay,’ Eric said, ‘and they didn’t see anything. One man was out fishing most of the afternoon and evening about half a k off the rocks where Zoe went snorkelling and he says that he didn’t see anyone in the water. He also says he’s known Zoe Kennett all her life and would definitely have recognised her if she’d been snorkelling there. Also spoke to another fisherman from further down the road and he said he saw Zoe out on Table Rock with a young man around sixish last night. He said that Zoe waved to him and there was nothing out of the ordinary. Apparently he’s seen Zoe sitting out on those rocks hundreds of times. He didn’t see her in the water. I’ve got the names and addresses of a few other people who were out in boats in the general area and I can follow them up now or in the morning. What would you like me to do, sir?’

  ‘That’s good work, Constable,’ said Tony. ‘Tomorrow will be fine. What about you, Jack? Anything?’

  ‘No, sir.’ He was looking at his notebook as he talked. ‘Zoe was online yesterday but nothing today. She only sent one text message yesterday. Nothing else. That’s pretty light traffic for a seventeen-year-old girl, sir.’ Jack looked up at Tony.

  Tony kept a straight face but thought, if you’re more than a year or two older than seventeen I’d be surprised, so spare me the experienced old man observations.