Chapter 17
Meg walked into the bar at the Red Lion and glanced around for someone who might be Chris, but the place was deserted except for the regulars sitting on the same barstools as yesterday. She had no idea who she was looking for. His Facebook profile was full of photos of his wife and daughters.
She ordered a Coke and found herself drawn back to the photo wall she’d looked at the day before.
Her eyes travelled over the images, snapshots of moments captured long ago, like time capsules.
Ghosts, frozen in black-and-white markings on photographic paper.
How strange to think these people were once as vivid and real as she was.
She looked back at the photo. So that was the famous Ashworth Park Hotel and Spa.
She’d seen it online when she was looking for somewhere to stay.
It was way beyond her budget, but she’d clicked on the link and allowed herself to briefly imagine a parallel universe where she would enjoy a massage and order room service, which she would eat while nestled in downy pillows.
She’d even put in the dates, to satisfy her curiosity, baulking at the outrageous cost of a four-night stay.
Twenty-four hundred dollars! How could anyone justify—
‘Catching up on your local history, are you?’
She turned to see the owner of the Apple Tree Café giving her a wry smile.
Meg shrugged. ‘Something like that.’
The woman gestured to a high table nearby. ‘Shall we sit?’
Meg shook her head. ‘Oh, I’m … um …’ she stammered. ‘Sorry, I’m meeting someone here.’ Was she meant to know this woman? She’d had a funny feeling yesterday that she knew her somehow.
The woman laughed and extended a hand. ‘You’re meeting me, Chrissy Baxter.’
Meg had the strange sensation of recalibrating. Chris was the
woman in the photos.
Meg felt her face flush. ‘Sorry, I was expecting a man.’
Chrissy laughed again. ‘It’s not the first time that’s happened. Maybe I should change my Facebook name to Chrissy.’ She had one of those faces that transformed when she smiled. Her eyes crinkled at the corners and came alive with a mischievous sparkle.
‘Can I get you a drink?’ Meg asked, gesturing to her Coke.
‘No, thanks.’ Chrissy looked around, selecting a table. One of the regulars raised his beer to greet her from a distance. Chrissy nodded in response and moved to a high table in the corner, as far from the bar as possible. She looked at her watch. ‘I’ve only got half an hour.’
‘How did you know who I was?’ Meg asked.
‘Sue told me there was someone staying here who was interested in Hartwell Gaol. I put two and two together. What’s your interest in the development? She said you’re doing research?’
Meg nodded. ‘I’m studying redevelopments of historic sites,’ she said, sticking with her story. ‘What made you start the Save Hartwell group?’
Chrissy took a deep breath, then sighed and stayed silent for a long time. ‘Actually, I think I am going to need a drink for this,’ she said eventually. ‘You want another one?’
‘I’m good, thanks,’ Meg said. ‘I’ll get it, though. It’s the least I can do.’
‘No need, it’ll be on the house.’ Chrissy tipped her head towards the bar. ‘I know the barmaid.’
‘Seems like you know everyone around here.’
‘Small town.’
Meg watched from a distance as she chatted to the barmaid.
‘You asked why I started the Facebook group,’ Chrissy said when she returned.
Meg nodded as Chrissy took a sip of her drink. Bourbon and Coke, Meg guessed.
‘I’ve watched that family rule this town my whole life,’ Chrissy said.
‘The decision to sell off the jail to them was the final straw for me. The local historical society wanted to make it a museum, keep it in public hands. Next thing, the state government’s sold it off to the Ashworths, and then, what do you know?
Somehow they have approval to build apartments above it. ’
Meg’s heartbeat picked up. Her suspicions about the apartments were correct. ‘How did that happen, though? Wouldn’t they need the local council to approve any development?’
Chrissy scoffed. ‘The Ashworths have been careful to look after Lindsay councillors over the years, if you get my drift.’
‘Look after? How?’
Chrissy shrugged. ‘A school reference here, a donation to a kid’s soccer club there … Look, everything I know is based on rumours, but where there’s smoke …’ She twirled the ice cubes with her straw. ‘If you’ve got enough money, you can do whatever the hell you like and get away with it.’
‘So that’s why you started the group?’
Chrissy met her gaze. ‘I decided enough was enough, not that it’s made any difference.’
‘I was in the café yesterday when Isobel Ashworth came in.’
Chrissy nodded but said nothing, so Meg went on.
‘It’s pretty brave, going up against a family like that.’
‘Maybe I’ve just reached the stage where I don’t give a crap.’ She laughed and the lightness returned to her tired eyes.
The strange feeling came over Meg again, a little like déjà vu. The sense that she knew this stranger, somehow. She took a sip of her Coke, which was mostly melted ice now, waiting for the unsettling sensation to dissipate.
She looked up. ‘Do you know of someone called Tina, by any chance?’
‘Tina?’ Chrissy repeated, a crease appearing between her brows. She picked up a cardboard coaster and folded it in half then shook her head, slowly. ‘No, I don’t think so.’
‘What about when you were growing up? She might have moved away.’
‘Tenile? There’s a woman called Tenile who works in the office at Hartwell Primary.’
‘No.’ Meg shook her head, studying Chrissy’s face as she played with the coaster, tearing it into smaller pieces. ‘It’s definitely a Tina I’m looking for.’
Chrissy shrugged and looked at her watch. ‘I’ve got to go.’ She drained her drink and reached for her bag.
‘Can you stay five more minutes? I just had a few more—’
‘No, sorry.’ She was looking at her phone now, as though something urgent had come up. ‘Good luck with your research.’
‘Thanks,’ Meg said, but Chrissy was already walking away.
Meg watched her disappear out the swinging doors, her mind racing. There’d been a shift in Chrissy when she asked about Tina. One minute she was relaxed, laughing, the next she was twitchy and distracted. Then she suddenly needed to leave.
‘What was that all about?’
‘Pardon?’ Meg looked up to see the barmaid. Light reflected off the fine gold ring through the septum of her tiny, perfect nose. She was beautiful in the same way a blue-ringed octopus was beautiful.
‘Looked serious,’ she said, scooping the fragments of the torn coaster into the empty beer glass.
‘Oh, it was just—’ Meg stopped, prickling with irritation. Why was she explaining herself to the barmaid? ‘It’s actually none of your business,’ she said, then instantly regretted it. Small towns and all that.
The barmaid raised her eyebrows and wiped the table, then gave her a long look. ‘Well, it sort of is my business,’ she said. ‘She’s my mum and she seemed a bit shaken when she left.’
‘Chrissy’s your mum?’ Meg thought of the gangly pre-teen girls in Chrissy’s profile photo. Was this barmaid really one of them?
The barmaid narrowed her sky-blue eyes and tilted her head to one side, chewing gum. ‘She didn’t mention that?’
Meg shook her head.
‘Well, she is. I’m Georgie.’
Meg gave her an apologetic smile. ‘I’m Meg. Sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude.’
‘It’s cool,’ Georgie said with the couldn’t-give-a-damn nonchalance of a teenager. She turned to go.
‘Hey, Georgie?’
She turned back, waited for Meg to go on.
‘Do you happen to know those two guys who got arrested protesting at Hartwell Gaol?’
‘Oh God—’ Georgie rolled her eyes, ‘—not you, too.’
Meg frowned.
‘I’m sick of hearing about that stupid jail. I mean, who gives a crap?’ Georgie pulled a couple of fresh coasters out of her apron pocket and placed them on the next table. ‘My mum’s obsessed. It’s not healthy.’
‘Fair enough. I wonder, though, do you think it’s the jail that your mum’s fighting?’ Meg hesitated, second-guessing Georgie’s reaction. ‘Or the Ashworths?’
Georgie smirked. ‘I reckon you’re onto something there. I do know one of those guys actually, the ones who got arrested at the jail.’
‘You do? Would you introduce me? I’d love to ask him a few questions.’
Georgie pulled a pen out of her apron and wrote a name on the back of a coaster. ‘You’ll find him on Instagram. I can’t guarantee he’ll be willing to talk, but send him a DM and say you met me.’
Her eyes flicked over to a lanky guy standing at the bar, wearing an AC/DC T-shirt.
‘I got a customer,’ she said.
Meg watched Georgie greet him and pull a beer, a silent pantomime which she knew well from her own bar days. Georgie twirled a lock of her hair as they spoke. He tossed his change into her tip jar.
Meg looked at the name on the coaster. Dan James.
At least she had a lead. He’d been arrested in the early stages of the redevelopment, but the charges had been dropped abruptly, according to what she’d read online.
She was intrigued to know why. She pulled out her phone and searched the name but there were dozens, so she searched for Georgie instead.
Georgie’s profile was public, thankfully.
Meg barely looked at it, instead tapping on the list of people Georgie was following and typing in the name she’d given her.
Bingo. Dan James had a goatee and a topknot.
In his profile picture, he was holding a complicated yoga pose in front of an orange sunset.
His bio read, Be the change. She typed a quick message, then flicked back to Georgie’s grid.
Meg glanced up to check Georgie wasn’t nearby—she was behind the bar, chatting to the regulars—then looked back at her phone. The profile was mostly bikini shots, coquettish poses with intense eye contact. There was no one else pictured. No friends, no family.