The Other Side of Sorrow by Peter Corris Read Free Book Online Page A

once, yes.’
    â€˜Jesus.’
    â€˜The funny thing is, it was after she did what you just did.’
    I was confused. ‘What?’
    â€˜She jumped the creek. Just for fun. She cleared it by a bit more than you though.’
    â€˜It’s not such a great jump. Twelve or thirteen feet.’
    â€˜It’s not bad in jeans and boots or dressed like you and from a soft take-off.’
    â€˜He hit her?’
    â€˜For showing off. Understandable in a way. He’s—what would you say—mildly disabled. One leg shorter than the other. He wears a built-up boot.’
    â€˜Look, Tess, this is all very important. Can we go somewhere for a talk?’
    â€˜No. There’ll be a meeting in a few minutes to plan the next phase. I have to be at it. Ramsay hopes to get his idea through while Damien’s not here. They’re sort of rivals.’
    I had questions—why did it matter whether Talbot was there or not; how had Meg French reacted to being hit, and where were she and Talbot now? I settled for the most important. ‘Do you know where Talbot and … Meg are now?’
    â€˜No, but they’ll be back. My impression is that they live in that van most of the time. But I have a feeling they also have a place somewhere. A squat or something.’
    I shook my head. I didn’t fancy relaying too much of this to Cyn. I asked her where this might be and she said she didn’t know.
    â€˜He changes the paint job on the van from time to time. Sometimes it’s plain, then it’s all sorts of colours. I think that’s illegal. I asked him about it. He calls it urban guerilla tactics.’
    Great
, I thought.
That’ll make it tougher.
‘I really need to get hold of them,’ I said. ‘It’s not about your protest in any way. I—’
    She touched me again and I had the same reaction. ‘I understand,’ she said. ‘Look, they’ll be back. Give me your phone number and I’ll do what I can to help you. That’s on one condition.’
    I was fishing for a card before she finished. ‘Good. What’s that?’
    â€˜That you tell me about this long story of yours sometime.’ She took the card. ‘Thanks. I have to go.’
    She moved back towards the tent and I walked along the bank of the creek looking for an easier place to cross. I found it less than a hundred metres away where the creek entered a concrete channel crossed by a narrow bridge. Upstream from that it disappeared into a pipe. I stood on the bridge looking back. The creek was exposed for not much more than two hundred metres. The mangroves seemed to be just clinging on against the pollution and the development. The whole thing looked like an oversight, as if such a feeble watercourse should have been covered long ago and the patch of marshland where it ended drained. I wondered what the rationale for protecting it was. It wasn’t an attractive feature, but in a way I could see why it was worth preserving whether or not animal or vegetable species were threatened. With the whole of the landscape being restructured, why not say hands off this little bit?
    My car was standing where I’d left it and there was no one around. The machines that would cover the creek and build the road had withdrawn to other parts of the site. It looked as if this represented no more than a stay in the proceedings, but you never know, we’ve still got Victoria Street and Fraser Island.
    The rain started again as I drove home and the going was slow. I debated whether to call Cyn and tell her what I’d learned but I decided against. None of it was comforting and perhaps if I found out a bit more I could put a better complexion on things. I realised I was hoping for the same thing for myself. I wasn’t too displeased with my progress so far—to identify an unknown person and establish a connection that could lead to making contact wasn’t such a bad