“I know.”

“The only thing you ought to be doing right now is taking care of what family you have left.”

“That is what I’m doing.”

“Uh-huh. And how exactly are you doing that?”

“Can you take care of Sam or not?”

“Of course we can, Eddie, you know that. I’m just worried you’re thinking of doing something stupid.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Something. Stupid.”

“I’m only helping the police with a few things.”

“You’ve got a daughter who needs you. I’m not telling you to let go of what happened, but you have to let the police do their job. A man needs to know what his priorities are.”

“I know. You’re right. It’s only for tonight,” I say, “I promise.”

“Okay, Edward. And don’t worry, I won’t hold you to your promise,” he says, and finishes off his beer.

chapter twenty-four

I sit in my living room with the curtains closed and the stereo off and the TV off and the phones off. I’m sick of the world. Sick of my phone—sick of messages left by reporters and the psychiatrist I used to see years ago and by people wanting to check up on me. I stare at the TV as if it were on. In the beginning I can see my reflection, but the later the day becomes the harder it gets to see. I have nothing to do but wait for it to become dark. I stare at the Christmas tree and once again I think about taking it down, but once again I decide to leave it up for Sam. The sun comes in through one of the living room windows, it climbs up the walls as it sinks toward the horizon, reflecting off the shiny balls and bells on the tree. It moves over a photo of Sam, over a wedding photo of me and Jodie, it reflects across the room, orange light, weakening, and then it’s gone.

I keep waiting.

Darkness settles in. An hour goes by. I switch on the TV and there’s a New Zealand–made show about psychics on. They’re trying to solve the crimes the police haven’t been able to. A short time ago this kind of thing disgusted me. People were making money off the misery of victims—from the psychics themselves to anybody who had anything to do with the shooting of the show. Women were raped and murdered only to have their story re-enacted and retold by psychics trying to make a quick buck, and the TV-viewing public loved it—or at least enough of them did to keep making the show. But now I think of it differently. If the police can’t do their job, maybe the psychics can. Before I can change channels, the front of the bank appears, then two side-by-side photos, one of my wife, one of the bank manager. Jonas Jones, the main psychic on the show, sits down at an office table that may or may not be inside the bank, closes his eyes, and, surrounded by burning candles, tells the public that the stolen money is still in Christchurch, hidden, somewhere near water, which is a great feat considering Christchurch is on the edge of an ocean. No wonder psychics aren’t winning the lottery every week.

Midnight comes and goes.

I get changed at one o’clock. The shirt has dried out from last night and is stiff and scratches at me and smells the same as it did this morning. I drive through the early-Thursday-morning streets, most of them deserted until I get toward town, where there are sparks of life from the drunk and disorderly. In suburbia Christmas lights flash at me from windows and roofs and trees, the dark air illuminated by the reds and yellows as well as the pale light from the moon. If Jodie were alive it would all look fantastic. Instead it’s gaudy and cheap, the decorations coming from sweatshop factories in third-world countries. It makes the people in these houses seem desperate to cling to happiness.

If map reading was one of Darwin’s tests for survival of the fittest, I’d have been screwed long ago. It takes me a while, but I manage to find the address. Draw a straight line on a map and plot the neighborhoods on it, and they go steadily downhill, nice homes near town, okay homes further away, homes that can only be improved with the introduction of a Molotov cocktail further out again. This is where the map takes me, into a neighborhood you’d normally see on the news where the insurgents are fighting off an invading army. I keep a steady pace, not wanting to risk slowing down. I pass beaten-up cars, old washing machines parked on the sidewalk, random pieces of timber, split-open rubbish bags with waste spilling out. The street I want isn’t any better. Every yard is covered in brown grass and dog crap. Half of the streetlights don’t work. Only a few of the homes have fences, and those that do have about a quarter of a fence at most, every third or fourth paling stolen or used as firewood. A few years ago a neighborhood like this wouldn’t have existed. There were bad areas but not to this extent. Study the line I plotted on the map, and you’d see this neighborhood is spreading, it’s like a virus, touching other suburbs, infecting them, finally consuming them before moving further on. Gerald Painter’s wife is right to move her family away. They live maybe five kilometers from here in a nice street with nice cars and nice trees, but it’s only a matter of time before the virus parks up outside their house and moves in.

I drive past the house I want, my heart racing, my palms sweaty, but all I’ve come to do is see the house, maybe catch a glimpse of Shane Kingsly, then drive home and . . .

Well, drive home and do something. I don’t know what. Maybe phone the police. Maybe go to bed. Maybe write his name down next to Dean Wellington and the life insurance guy.

Then why is Sam’s bag still in the backseat?

“I forgot to take it out,” I say. The killing kit is still stuffed inside.

Then why’d you get changed?

“How about shutting up?”

I park a few houses down under a busted light, this time on the opposite side of the road, this time with the house ahead of me so I can keep watch. That’s the plan. Sit for a while. Watch for a while. Then leave.

Yeah right.

Immediately I realize the problem. This isn’t the kind of place I can sit for a while. I stand out here. Soon one of the neighbors will come to mug me, or kill me. I’ve seen all that I can safely see, and now it’s time to leave.

Like hell it is. Let me help you.

“No.”

Fine. Have it your way. Let the men who did this to Jodie go free. Go back to your life and move on. It’s not long until you hear that from everybody you know. Move on.

“What do you need me to do?” I ask.

We climb out of the car. I turn a three-sixty looking for somebody, anybody, but there is nobody. I grab Sam’s bag and carry it tightly.

We move onto the edge of the property. The dry grass crunches underfoot. I hunker down and pull on the hat and the gardening gloves and take a knife out, then move closer to the house. There are no lights on inside. None of the houses in the street have any Christmas lights. Santa doesn’t even know this place exists. Kingsly’s house is government subsidized, maybe sixty years old, made from wood siding that hasn’t seen fresh paint in all that time. The guttering is covered in dark mould and sags in places where it’s all cracked and busted. There are clumps of grass growing out of it. There is a run-down car parked up the driveway, another one on the lawn, and if you combined all the bits that worked you’d have a car that probably wouldn’t get you anywhere. I slowly approach the house and try to peer in through the windows. I can’t see a damn thing.

I head easily around the side of the house, walking slowly, careful in case there are dogs here, but so far nothing has barked at me. I thought a neighborhood like this would have a thousand dogs. Maybe the virus got them.

I look through the back windows and get the same result. The back door is locked. I don’t know how to get inside. I guess knocking on the door is the way to go.