My lawyer planned on killing me. He didn’t succeed, and I’m

here to pull him deeper into the world he stepped foot in. Only I’m also giving him an exit. He just needs to see that — and, being a lawyer, I figure he will.

‘Just the template,’ he says.

‘that’s all.’

‘It’ll take an hour.’

‘I’ve got time.’

I head upstairs to the cafeteria and order some coffee and a

couple of chicken and egg salad rolls. There are a few newspapers lying around. There is nothing in the front-page photo of Father Julian to suggest that he was living a secret life. There is a stock quote from somebody high up in the police: We are following up on leads but can’t release any further details at this time. They have a murder weapon and no suspect. There is another article

a few pages in. It details Father Julian’s history. He was assigned to the church thirty years ago. He was born in Wellington to a middle-class family, he excelled academically at school, he joined the priesthood at twenty-one. His mother died twenty-five years ago, his father is still alive. There are facts and figures that would be thrown out of whack if I were to tell them Father Julian fathered all those children.

I read through the rest of the newspaper but don’t get to the

end before Donovan Green is back. He pulls out the seat opposite me, seems about to sit down, then changes his mind. He doesn’t want to sit with a guy like me. He reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out an envelope. He sits it on the table and keeps two fingers on it.

‘We’re done now, right?’ he asks.

‘That depends.’

‘On?’

‘On whether that’s a Christmas card in there or what I asked

for.’

He slides it across. I open it up and take a look at the court order. I’ve seen them before and know it’s the real thing.

“I don’t ever want to see you again,’ he says.

‘For what it’s worth, I’m sorry’

‘Yeah. Lawyers hear it all the time, right? Everybody’s sorry

after the event.’

I don’t answer him. He stares at me for a few more seconds,

and I can tell he’s thinking about how life would be different for him right now if he’d killed me.

‘Worse,’ I say.

‘What?’

‘It’d be worse. Trust me. You did the right thing.’

He nods, seeming to understand, then turns and walks away.

I push the newspaper aside, finish my lunch and head down to

the car.

chapter forty-seven

The traffic out near the care home increases a little on weekends, but it’s not like visiting hours at the hospital. The hospital is a temporary thing. Relatives and friends don’t mind making the

visit because they only have to go a few times. Out here it’s

permanent. The visits don’t fit in as often as they ought to in the schedule of day to day life. The care home is too depressing, even with its brightly coloured artworks and flowers. There’s no covering up the pain and misery here.

I sit with my wife and hold her warm hand. She looks out at the rain but doesn’t see it. It’s hard to imagine that a person doesn’t look forward to certain types of weather. Sun, rain, storms: they don’t even register.

‘Things are getting better,’ I tell her. ‘I’ve stopped drinking, but it’s hard, I’ll admit that. It’s hard to describe. Without the drink I feel like a part of me is missing. I feel like I need to have one more just to say goodbye to it. One more won’t hurt, right?

Just to say goodbye. I think of you all the time. I wish things were different, but I want you to know that you’re helping me

get through this. You’re the reason I’m getting my life back on track.’

I tell her this, but I don’t tell her that it’s only been a day.

Maybe in a week my speech will be different. Maybe I will be

able to take that drink to say goodbye and not get pulled into the abyss. Maybe.

Back downstairs, Carol Hamilton is behind the desk.

‘It’s good that you’re starting to come back,’ she says.

“I miss her.’

“I know you do. It’s an awful situation, and it’s worse for you than it is for her. I just wish there was more I could do.’

“I know. I make the same wish every day’

She doesn’t answer, and I let the silence fall down around us

like a shroud, letting us think our own thoughts on how life could be different.

“I hate to ask,’ I say, snapping her out of it, ‘but have you got a computer I can quickly borrow? And a photocopier?’

“I … umm …’

‘It will only take me a minute or two. I promise.’

‘that’s fine, Theo. Follow me.’

She leads me into an office that has more photos of family and drawings from children on the walls than anything else. There

are so many personal items that it’s easy to see the people who work here need to stay grounded to a different kind of reality, one where the bad things that happen in life haven’t extended to their own families. I’m about to play around with the computer and

photocopier when I spot a manual typewriter. I can’t remember

the last time I saw one.

‘One of the nurses,’ Carol says, ‘is still very old school.’ She doesn’t explain any further and she doesn’t need to.

I wind the court order into the typewriter, and type in the

priest’s name and location of the bank in the provided space.

Then I sign it with some unidentifiable scribble. Carol Hamilton watches me the entire time but doesn’t ask what I’m doing. She doesn’t point out that I’ve gone over the two minutes I promised her I’d be. When I’m done, I thank her for her time, and she

does something different for once — she puts one hand on my

shoulder and, with the other, grabs my hand and tells me not

to give up hope. I’m not sure whether she means for Bridget or myself.

I already have the car started and in gear when she comes out

the doors and waves me down.

‘It doesn’t mean anything,’ she says, ‘and you need to

understand that. But it’s still something you should see.’

‘What is it?’

‘Come with me,’ she says, and I kill the engine and follow her back inside and upstairs.

My wife is still sitting by the window, staring out at the rain.

Carol stays in the doorway as I walk into the room. Bridget is in the exact same position as earlier, and at first I’m not so sure what it is that Carol wants me to see, but then I see it. Bridget is clutching a photograph of our daughter. At some point since I walked out of here she has stood up and made her way over to the bedside drawers and picked up the photo frame. I think about the photographs of the dead girls in my pocket, and it seems like an omen: that of all days for her to have somehow taken this

photograph it has to be this day. She is holding it against her, the frame pressing into her breasts, the image of Emily facing the window as though Bridget is trying to share the view. I want to read more into it, I want to believe this is more than just one of her automated responses, and I study her face for something — a tear, a flicker of emotion — but there is nothing. Still, it is the first time she has ever picked something up and brought it back to her chair. At least it’s the first time I know of— it could be she does this at night and puts the pictures back in the morning. I don’t know, but I like the idea that in the dead hours of the night she gets out of bed and reaches for Emily. It’s sad, it’s depressing, but it’s the sort of hook that I can come along and hang some hope onto.

I sit down next to her and I rest my head on her shoulder, and I hug her and tears slide from my eyes and soak into her gown, and I pray to the God I want to believe in but can’t that Bridget will tell me that things are okay, that she will stroke the back of my head and comfort me.

But she doesn’t. When I look back at her face it’s just as it was moments before. But my hope stays firmly on the hook I placed