The Dead I Know Read online

  THE DEAD

  I KNOW

  ALSO BY SCOT GARDNER

  The Detachable Boy

  Bookmark Days

  Happy as Larry

  SCOT GARDNER

  THE DEAD

  I KNOW

  RAZORBILL

  an imprint of Penguin Canada

  Published by the Penguin Group

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  Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Canada Inc.)

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  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Originally published by Allen & Unwin in Australia in 2011.

  Published in this edition, 2012.

  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 (WEB)

  Copyright © Scot Gardner, 2011

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  Publisher’s note: This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Manufactured in Canada.

  LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

  Gardner, Scot

  The dead I know / Scot Gardner.

  ISBN 978-0-14-318212-2

  I. Title.

  PZ7.G177De 2012 j823’.92 C2012-900383-2

  Text design by Bruno Herfst

  Visit the Penguin Canada website at www.penguin.ca

  Special and corporate bulk purchase rates available; please see www.penguin.ca/corporatesales or call 1-800-810-3104, ext. 2477.

  For Robyn

  1

  THE OFFICE OF JKB Funerals was a majestic orange-brick addition to a modest orange-brick house. It had the boxy gabled ends of an old chapel with tall narrow eyes of stained glass to suit. There were concrete urns either side of the entry door, spilling with white flowers. I checked my front for breakfast crumbs and then rapped on the door.

  It opened with the smoothness of automation but there was a man at the handle, a round man with half a smile on his easy, ruddy face. He looked me up and down, then shielded his eyes as if my head was at the top of a distant mountain.

  ‘You must be Aaron,’ he said. ‘Please, come in.’

  I wiped my feet more than necessary, and stepped past the man into the cool silence of the building. The door hushed shut and he held out his hand.

  ‘John Barton.’

  We shook. It was a strange sensation. I’d never shaken hands with anybody.

  ‘Please, come through. Have a seat.’

  The chairs were deep lugubrious leather – more comfortable than anything I’d ever sat in.

  ‘Thank you for coming in, Aaron. Your school counsellor speaks very highly of you. I’m proposing a three-month trial period at the end of which we’ll sit here again and assess how we’ve gone. The work you’ll be doing will be varied. There’ll be be some fetching, heavy lifting and cleaning. Is your back okay? Need a good back in this line of work.’

  I nodded.

  ‘Good. Now . . . appearance. Do you have a black suit?’

  I shook my head.

  He snatched a pen from a plastic holder and made notes on a pad. ‘No matter, I’ll have Mrs Barton measure you up and we’ll get something tailored.’

  ‘I have a black tracksuit,’ I said.

  John Barton looked up, startled. ‘Tracksuit? No, I mean dress suit. What size shirt are you?’

  I shrugged. ‘XL?’

  He wrote some more. ‘You have an accent, Aaron. Where are you from? America?’

  I shrugged again. ‘I grew up here.’

  ‘Is that so? What are your parents’ names? I may know them.’

  ‘I doubt it,’ I said.

  The words hung in the air like a balled fist.

  John Barton dug no deeper.

  ‘Right,’ he said. ‘First things first. How would you feel about getting a haircut?’

  One more shrug. ‘Fine.’

  ‘The first one is my treat.’

  John Barton gave me a fleeting tour – office, chapel and viewing room with visitors’ toilets between, display room, storeroom full of plastic-wrapped coffins standing on their ends, coolroom door – on our way to the garage at the rear of the establishment. There was a quietness and studied neatness to the whole place. The service areas smelled of flowery air freshener with a metallic underscore of disinfectant. The garage, on the other hand, smelled of cool oiled dust. There were three vehicles parked inside – a fine silver Mercedes sedan, a white van that looked like an ambulance without the tattoos, and the hearse. The hearse’s chrome-and-black lustre rendered it catlike and serious in the glow from the skylight. There was a discreet crest painted on the driver’s door, containing three curlicued letters: JKB. The customised numberplates echoed the starkness of the hearse’s exterior – THEEND. If I’d been alone, I might have smiled at that.

  ‘We’ll take the Merc. Do you have a licence?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘We’ll have to do something about that.’

  It was a smooth ride, scented with leather and more air-freshener flowers. John Barton drove with an easy poise, as if he operated at a more precise speed than the rest of the world. He double-parked on Chatswood, in front of the barber’s red-and-white spiral pole.

  ‘The proprietor is Tony Henderson. Tell him I’ll be paying. I’ll be back in twenty minutes.’

  I nodded once and slipped out of the car. The door shut with a quiet huff of air and I felt . . . something. Hard to say what it was – some grey wake of a distant emotion, perhaps.

  It was early in a barber’s day but the floor already boasted small piles of grey and brown hair. Tony Henderson nodded a greeting.

  ‘John Barton will pay,’ I said.

  He ushered me to a chair.

  ‘How would you like it?’

  ‘Funeral director.’

  He chuckled. ‘Enough said.’

  He touched my head and I flinched.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said, and then looked at his hand. ‘Okay?’

  I nodded and clenched my jaw. I hadn’t planned to flinch.

  I noticed his aftershave and the dark hair on his knuckles. I avoided the mirror by staring at my cloaked knees as great long hanks of hair skidded over the smock and onto the floor. I tried to remember my last haircut and could only think of a time in fifth grade when I had been forced to remove a gob of gum with scissors. It was Westy – one of the drunks now living in caravan 57 – who put it there and he’d squealed with laughter when it stuck.

  Tony Henderson shifted my head this way and that. He lifted my chin but stood between t
he mirror and me as he did so.

  ‘A shave?’ he asked.

  A nod.

  Foam and a balding brush. Keen steel in a deft hand. I could see my shape in the mirror, but I didn’t let my eyes focus.

  Tony Henderson stood back and admired his handiwork. ‘I think you’ll pass.’

  As if on cue, the plastic straps on the doorway clattered and John Barton entered.

  ‘Morning, Tony. I sent my new lad in earlier. Did you see . . .’

  Tony Henderson spun my chair, unclipped my smock and dusted my neck and face with a soft brush. I waded through the clippings on the floor. I avoided the mirror and, in doing so, looked straight at my new employer.

  He was smiling and shaking his head. ‘Are you sure it’s the same fellow?’

  Tony Henderson was pleased. ‘Who’d have thought, hey? Tall, dark and handsome.’

  ‘With the emphasis on dark,’ John Barton added, not unkindly.

  ‘True,’ Tony Henderson said. ‘That’s a bonus in your industry, isn’t it?’

  ‘Indeed.’

  John Barton drew his wallet from his pocket and laid a fresh fifty on the counter. He patted it and turned to leave. ‘Keep the change.’

  ‘Very kind of you, John. Thank you.’

  ‘No, thank you, maestro. Thank you.’

  2

  JOHN BARTON HAD bought two white dress shirts and he handed me the bag as the garage door whined shut behind us.

  ‘Come,’ he said, and I followed him through a side door into a small grassy garden between the office and the residence. A clothes line full of white shirts and incongruously bright silk underwear creaked idly in one corner. John Barton caught me staring.

  ‘Yes, they’re my shorts. The suits are always black but I’m happy underneath.’

  Too much information, I thought. I mean, underpants pride?

  A dishevelled ginger cat mewed a mournful greeting as we passed. John Barton mumbled a reply and bent to rough its head.

  ‘Morning Moggy,’ he said. ‘This is Aaron. Aaron, this is Moggy.’

  ‘I . . . um . . . good morning, Moggy,’ I said. I gave the cat a quick pat on the back.

  John Barton smiled. ‘She’s an oldie but a goodie. Just recently she’s decided that the whole house is her toilet. Pays to wear slippers in the morning.’

  The house was full of television – all blue, blinking fury and noise. John Barton found the remote and poked it until the adverts became conversational.

  ‘Dearest?’ he called.

  ‘In here,’ came the reply.

  ‘We have a visitor.’

  The woman who walked into the room wore a peach apron over a floral nightmare of a dress. Her hair was grey and limp like Mam’s. She grinned to reveal crooked teeth and shook my hand with enthusiasm, her fingers cool and soft.

  ‘Goodness, you’re a tall one!’

  ‘Aaron Rowe, Delia Barton. Mrs Barton to you.’

  ‘Oh, please call me Delia,’Mrs Barton said.

  ‘Respect where respect is due, dear.’

  ‘Don’t be so stuffy! Cup of tea?’

  ‘Yes please,’John Barton answered. ‘Any messages?’

  Mrs Barton swished off to the kitchen. ‘Mrs Gray is ready to be collected.’

  John Barton sighed. ‘At rest at last.’

  A stillness settled over the room. Were they speaking about a death? Was Mrs Gray being collected from the mall with her shopping, or prised from a car wreck on the highway?

  ‘Could you measure Aaron, my dear?’ John Barton called. ‘He needs a suit.’

  ‘Of course!’ his wife replied.

  John Barton inspected a scrap of paper beside the phone. ‘Best put one of those shirts on,’ he said. ‘There’s a bathroom just along the hall.’

  I closed the door behind me quietly. A hairy brush rested in the sink. There was no room for it on the bench with all the beauty products and pill bottles. A wet mat was bunched on the floor beside a pile of discarded teddy-bear pyjamas and underwear. The air was all talcum, wet towels and fake flowers.

  And there, in the mirror, was a stranger I had once known. His face was longer and leaner than I remembered, his skin smooth and clean. His black hair fell kindly to the brow over the eyes it used to conceal. He had ears – two of – and a new jawline.

  ‘Sorry about the mess in there,’ Mrs Barton called.

  Her voice shattered my reverie and I hurriedly tore open a shirt packet.

  ‘We have a small piglet who lives with us. We call her Skye.’

  The stiff, clean cotton felt rich on my skin. It was a good fit and I tangled with the buttons until there was no doubt about who was wearing whom. I undid my heavy belt and tucked the tails away inside my black jeans. I’d never worn white. I screwed the packet into a ball but it wouldn’t fit in the bin overflowing with tissues and empty toilet rolls. I carried it back into the lounge.

  Mrs Barton whisked it from my fingers and looked me over.

  ‘Ah,’ John Barton said. ‘Now we’re getting somewhere.’

  He tapped his chin with an index finger, then departed.

  Mrs Barton held up a tape. ‘Measurements,’ she smiled, and stretched her arms wide like a scarecrow.

  I imitated her and she fluttered over me, mumbling and penning numbers on a pad she pulled from her apron pocket.

  When John Barton returned, he carried a sash of deep green silk. He draped it over my outstretched arm. A necktie.

  ‘Right,’ Mrs Barton said. ‘That’s you done.’

  ‘Thank you, my dear,’ John Barton said. ‘Could you arrange for Tommy So to make one jacket and two pairs of pants?’

  I felt the heavy silk of the tie between my fingers. It was suddenly all too much: the haircut, the shirts and suit. I had no idea how to knot a tie.

  ‘Here,’ Mrs Barton said, and snatched the tie. ‘Do up your top button.’

  ‘You’ve done enough,’ I said, and she stopped.

  The television fell quiet and it amplified the hole in the air I’d made. They stared.

  ‘Nonsense,’ John Barton grumbled. ‘We’ve only just begun.’

  I looked at my shirt.

  ‘If you were starting work at McDonald’s you’d need a silly uniform and one of those delightful hairnets. Think of the tie as our hairnet and let Mrs Barton put it on for you. She’s the best in the business.’

  He smoothed his own tie and Mrs Barton.tittered. ‘Bend down,’ she said.

  I lowered myself to one knee and she tied the flat silken band around my neck. I felt like a character in a fairytale.

  ‘There you are,’ she said, and patted my shoulder.

  I stood and stroked the tie. Embroidered in thread of the same green were three florid letters: JKB.

  ‘Now, to work,’ John Barton said.

  The cup of tea would have to wait, it seemed.

  3

  THE VAN WAS A Mercedes as well, though it felt nothing like the ride in the sedan. John Barton drove at a measured pace.

  ‘We’ll be collecting the body of the late Mrs Carmel Gray from Claremont. You know the place?’

  He didn’t wait for an answer.

  ‘All I need you to do is be silent and do as you’re told. Do you understand?’

  I gave a military nod, and he smiled dryly.

  The breeze through the window whipped against my neck. In a curious way, I felt unburdened by the lack of hair. Something stirred in the pit of my belly and I wondered if the late Mrs Carmel Gray would like my shirt and my JKB tie and my new haircut. I wondered if I would be in the same room as the body. I wondered if I would smell the dead. Touch the dead.

  Be silent. Do as I am told.

  Claremont had a tradesmen’s entrance and John Barton had a key to the gate. He rattled the lock and tweaked the catch as if he’d done it a hundred times before. Thinking about it, I could see that carrying the dead through the automatic doors at the front would hardly be a good advertisement for an old people’s home. The van beeped l
ike a delivery truck as he reversed to the ramp.

  A lady in uniform propped the doors open and offered us a tired grin.

  ‘Morning John,’ she said.

  ‘The lovely Nina,’ John Barton replied.

  ‘You’ve got a new lad?’ Nina said, looking me over.

  John Barton huffed. ‘Very perceptive of you, Nina. This is Aaron Rowe. Nina Cartwright.’

  She nodded approvingly. ‘Looks a whole lot better than the last one.’

  ‘Wouldn’t have thought so this morning. Took a bit of cut and polish.’

  I stood by, listening to sparrows fighting in the hedge along the fence, as John Barton unloaded a trolley from the back of the van. Its legs unfolded automatically, dropping wheels smoothly onto the concrete path.

  ‘What happened to Taylor?’ Nina Cartwright asked.

  John Barton cleared his throat, suddenly awkward. ‘He moved interstate.’

  ‘Bound to happen, I suppose. Someone took out a contract on him then?’

  He barked a laugh. ‘Nothing would surprise me.’

  He motioned for me to hold the trolley and together we wheeled it through the doors and into the dim corridor. The smell was strangely familiar, peat bog and human. My ears strained to hold the frenetic chitter of the sparrows – there was something unsettling about the quiet inside the building. There was no industry or hubbub, just numb silence. Nina whisked past, her stockings rubbing softly.

  ‘Room 37,’ she whispered.

  A screen had been erected around Mrs Carmel Gray’s cot. John Barton wheeled the trolley right into the room and asked me to shut the door.

  I inhaled through my mouth and I could taste the air. Talcum. Morning breath.

  John Barton held one end of the screen and, with a nod, instructed me to take the other. He counted, we lifted, and there was the late Mrs Carmel Gray – arms holding the bedcovers to her sides, fingers cupped and mouth frozen mid-yawn.

  I sighed through my nose. This was death? This was what the world feared?

  I chuckled. It passed my lips as a hiccup.

  John Barton shot me a questioning glance.‘Are you okay?’

  I nodded and left my head bowed.

  I hadn‘t laughed at Mrs Carmel Gray. I hadn’t laughed at her unseemly gape or her part-lidded stare. It was the irony that caught me off guard; almost every person alive feared Death, a commanding cloaked fi gure wielding a sickle, yet here death was a casual, sleepy release.