The Boots

Tuesday April 26, 2022
10am

El

Before picking up her phone to arrange another portrait session with Lillie, El, paused. She reflected on the previous day.

After the discovery, Dan had instructed her to make her way back to the car park.

‘I’ve called Renard and asked them to wait for you,’ he said.

‘What about you? We all came together, so, how will you get home?’ El asked.

‘Don’t worry about me. We’ll be here for hours yet—maybe all night,’ Dan replied. ‘I’ll get one of the team to give me a lift.’

El nodded and then trekked down the hill, then the steep steps of the gully. From the first lookout, the vehicles in the car park appeared so small, like toys. People like ants crawled around them.

I wonder how many of those “ants” know of the body? she thought. I hope no journalists got wind of the situation and are lurking down there with their lumpy film equipment and hundreds of onlookers.
One thing she had learnt from her years on the force was that news like this, the finding of human remains, seemed to bring journalists out from behind their computers. As if they could sniff out a breaking story. Or was there a leak? Someone on the force mentioning it on Titter or Myface?

‘Wouldn’t put it past Dee,’ El said.

She had caught Dee out, mobile in the palm of her hand, scrolling. Then there were the Dee-spamming episodes. El had made the mistake of joining Myface, for a start, and then in a moment of insanity, accepting Dee as a friend. In a blink of a screenshot, inane and blatantly silly posts flooded her email and Myface page. Dee, of course. “Find out what sort of lover you are—do this survey”, “Upload your selfie and find out what you’d look like when 80”, “Stop pigs being persecuted—copy and paste this article and send to 10 friends” … And the list, the scrolling was endless. All Dee. Only Dee.

‘Doesn’t Dee have a life?’ El said shaking her head at the bottom of the steps.

El passed the kiosk, still shaking her head while mulling over her mistake with Myface. She’d ceased using social media. She had a life, even while on leave. When some suspect character stole her profile and pretended to be her, El erased all her social media platforms.

‘Hey! El!’ Renard called.

El spotted the father and daughter pair on the alfresco deck of the kiosk.

Renard waved his hand which clutched a mint-with-choc-chips-flavoured gelato. ‘Up here, El. Come join us and have an ice cream.’

El trotted up the steps to the kiosk and after purchasing a latte-flavoured gelato, joined Renard and Zoe.
By this time Renard and Zoe had devoured their treat and sat with El at the metal dining suite, watching her lick her ice cream.

‘Well,’ Renard said, ‘that was a turn up for the books. Fancy finding a body…’

‘Shh!’ El said, ‘you don’t know who’s listening.’ She observed Zoe play with a watch, and then slip it into her pocket. Just the way she held the watch caused El to assume that the watch didn’t belong to her. Besides the watch looked old and rusty.

She was about to ask Zoe about her “find” when a van with a television logo crawled along the road below.

Instead, El nudged Renard. ‘We better get going before they start snooping around.’

El, Renard and Zoe made a quiet and unobserved exit from Waterfall Gully before the journalists became aware of their presence and connection to the “Breaking News”.

Next morning, as the news chimed triumphant, “Human remains have been found…” El dialled Lillie’s number. While waiting for Lillie to answer, El registered that the exact location of the human remains was still a mystery to the public.

---

Tuesday April 26, 2022
10am

Dan

In the informal interview room, Dan gestured to a comfortable chair to the side of the low coffee table. Fifi perched herself on the edge of the seat offered and kneaded a ball of tissues in her palm. Every so often, she dabbed her eyes with the tissues.

‘Now, Fifi,’ Dan placed on the table a plastic bag that held the mud-caked leather boots, ‘do these look familiar?’

Fifi nodded. ‘My father had a pair like those. He wore them when he went camping…and hiking.’
Dan looked at his voice recorder and said, ‘Fifi Edwards confirms that the boots possibly belong to her father, Percy Edwards.’

‘Why did it take you people so long to find the body?’ Fifi glared at Dan. ‘We told you guys forty years ago that he was down there. And you did nothing.’

‘Forty-two,’ Dan said with a brief cough. ‘I’m sorry for the pain and hardship you and your family have been through, not knowing what happened to your father. I can’t make judgements, but as you can imagine, it was a different time and policing…’

‘But we told you!’ Fifi thumped the table. ‘How hard would it have been for a detective back then to just listen and take us seriously?’

We have no record of anyone coming in and making a statement.’

‘Probably thought we were just kids and were just wasting their time.’

‘So, you and your friends came into the station and spoke to someone?’

Fifi sighed. ‘Well, actually, we got my friend Lillie to come in and make a statement. She said she did, and I believed her; she was that sort of girl. Solid. Trustworthy. I mean, now, look at her. She’s a principal of one of the most prestigious colleges in Adelaide.’

‘And your sister-in-law.’

‘Who would know better?’ Fifi continued, ‘I’ve known her since we were kids. We were neighbours. Best friends since kindy.’

‘Best friends, eh?’

‘Oh, well, these days not so much, I must admit,’ Fifi said. ‘She’s always busy with her work. No life outside of teaching, and now she’s a principal, the task is all-consuming.’

‘Hmm,’ Dan uttered, but thought, Just the sort of person not to be trustworthy. After all, if Zoe is her daughter, then Lillie would have been in the initial stages of pregnancy. Perhaps she had other things on her mind when her friends instructed her to go and report their finding. Did she get distracted and forget? Did she turn up at the police station and have to wait too long? Was she afraid her secret would become known if she reported the discovery of remains? What was her secret? Pregnancy? Or something more sinister?

Detective Hooper leaned back, laced his hands and rested them on his taut belly. ‘What can you tell me about the day your father went missing, Fifi?’

Fifi shrugged. ‘He went to work and never came home.’

‘Then, how come he was wearing hiking boots?’

‘I don’t know, I was just a kid. ‘sides, Mum ‘n I went to town that day. Had to get a new pair of school shoes. I remember ‘cos I was angry. Really peed off. My friend Lillie and her brother, Sven and my brother Jimmy, were going for a hike up in the hills and Mum said I couldn’t go. Not fair!’

‘And your dad, as far as you know, went to work.’ Dan leaned forward. ‘And what sort of work did your dad do?’

‘He was a businessman.’

‘What sort of business?’

Fifi shrugged. ‘I dunno. Cars, I think. Holdens up at Elizabeth, I think.’

‘I see…’ Dan mused. Always remember him into Fords.

‘So, on that particular day, January 1978, your dad drove off in his…’ Dan looked up from notetaking.

‘What car did your family own?’

‘Um…a station wagon…blue…’

‘What make and model?’

‘Gawd! I can’t remember. Those cars, they’re all the same. And Dad had so many of them. I mean, we’re talking fifty years ago.’

‘Forty-four, Fifi,’ Dan said, remembering that at the time, the family had a Ford Falcon, XA Fairmont station wagon. And she was correct, it was blue. He mused how the family looked a sight all piled into the wagon rolling up the church driveway to swell the numbers of the congregation on Sundays. Mr. E (Edwards) big noting himself after the service, Sunday best brown suit—look at me! I’m from Somerton. Look at me! The latest model car! Look at me! Look at what a good father I am! All these children I have! I’m a good Christian. I’m fruitful and multiplying. Look at my wife! She’s the most beautiful lady here! Dan’s dad called her a “trophy wife”.

‘Yeah, you’re right.’ Fifi lifted her bag from the floor and rose from her chair. ‘I don’t think there’s much more I can tell you, sir.’

‘Thank you, for your help, Fifi.’ Dan also stood. ‘If there are any developments, we’ll be in touch. And if you can remember anything else, let us know.’

When Fifi had gone, Dan reflected. His mum had once said when Mr. Edwards had gone, Mrs. Edwards came to life, became her own vibrant person. Before, she had no personality, she really was just a “thing”, a trophy. But once her husband had left, she was filled with verve and energy. Then there was no stopping Mrs. Edwards.

He thought about Lillie. At college, a pretty, but dull kind of girl; the sort who melted into the background. Studious, he reckoned. And now, according to Dee, all class and power, running a fancy-wancy college in the Eastern suburbs.

Dan chuckled, ‘It’s like Lillie took over where Mr. Edwards left off.’

© Tessa Trudinger 2024
*Feature Photo: Boots © L.M. Kling 2024

***

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