The Dry

Falk stops by Gretchen's farm and upon arrival, he hears three shots. He sprints toward the house, thinking she might be dead. He sees that she is in the field shooting rabbits, and notices that she is using Winchester ammunition. She offers him the gun, but the blood on the ground reminds him of Billy's body, and he cannot bring himself to shoot. Inside, Gretchen mentions that with Karen gone, she has taken up the job of applying for grants to get the school more funding. She wants to apply to the Crossley Education Trust again, even though Whitlam “reckons they're a waste of time” (236). Gretchen cannot remember Karen ever mentioning Falk but reminds him that they were never close friends.

When he tells her about his interaction with Deacon in the cemetery, Gretchen blames Deacon that “his daughter was unhappy enough to drown herself” (238), never doubting that Ellie committed suicide. They reflect on how miserable Ellie had seemed before she died, and the suspicion that Deacon had been abusing her. Gretchen tries to assuage Falk's guilt by reminding him that they all remained oblivious to it, in part because they both often directed their attention to Luke, which is “a lesson [they've] all had to learn the hard way” (243).

A flashback from the day Ellie died is dispersed through the chapter. Ellie was planning to do something after school, certain that “after this weekend, everything would be different” (239). She declined Luke's offer to hang out, because she “had enough men in her life who wanted more from her than they gave back” (241). Falk, on the other hand, “always made her feel safe” (242), and she almost shared her secret plan with him. Knowing he would try to dissuade her, she kept it to herself and kissed him goodbye, which Luke witnessed from the doorway of the classroom.

Falk stays up late trying to piece together everyone's connections, and calls Raco to tell him his suspicions of Deacon abusing Ellie. Raco, not convinced that Deacon is capable of murder given his current physical and mental state, thinks Falk has developed a bias toward Deacon. Early Wednesday morning, McMurdo wakes up Falk, because Falk's car is covered and filled with feces, the inside stuffed with fliers about Ellie's death. Later, at the station, Falk goes on about Deacon and Grant “leaving a trail of destruction and misery” (247), and Raco warns him that “tunnel vision is a dangerous route” (248).

Deacon arrives with his lawyer, and Deborah, the receptionist, brings Falk to the storeroom so that he can secretly listen in on the interview. Deacon reiterates that he heard the shots that killed Karen and Billy, but assumed it was farm business. For the first time he mentions that he was on the phone with the pharmacist at the time of the second shot, but as he is pressed further, he sounds increasingly less sure. Falk figures that he had not mentioned it in his first statement because of his dementia.

Deacon gets let off with a warning, and Falk secretly follows him home in a police car. Falk confronts Deacon in his driveway and reiterates that he did not kill Ellie. He accuses Deacon of knowing more about the death than he admits, and when he accuses him of abusing Ellie, Deacon attacks Falk. When their scuffle ends, Deacon insists he loved Ellie, and Falk asks: “Since when […] has that ever stopped anybody from hurting someone?” (257). After he leaves Deacon's, Falk calls Raco, who is incredibly angry. Falk promises he will take responsibility for his actions, reassuring Raco he can still work on the case. Deacon's alibi was confirmed, and Raco accuses Falk of blaming Deacon for the Hadlers' deaths as retribution for being blamed for Ellie's.

Several flashbacks from the day Ellie went missing are dispersed through this chapter. Deacon returned home from the fields, angry that Ellie was not home to prepare dinner. He went up to her room and noticed a dent in the bedpost and a stain on the carpet, which gave him “the uneasy sensation of misalignment” (254). Meanwhile, Luke struggled with feelings of jealousy that Ellie kissed Falk, and Falk went fishing after school.

Later that evening, Falk enjoys a dinner and copious wine at Gretchen's house. She excitedly shows him a photo of the two of them as young school children, claiming they must have been friends before anyone else. They start to kiss but are interrupted by a phone call from Lachie's babysitter. While Gretchen talks in the other room, Falk flips through a different photo album. He is surprised to see many photos of Gretchen and Luke in their early twenties, well past the time Gretchen said they broke up. Falk notices that the photos of Luke disappear around the age of 30, which is when he met Karen. The last photo in the album is of Luke holding a baby which Falk presumes to be Billy but sees from the hospital bracelet that it is Lachie.

With growing suspicion, Falk flips through the other photo album looking for clues. He spots one photo at a community event where Gretchen is standing next to Karen but making eye contact with Luke. When Gretchen returns to the room and realizes Falk has been looking through the photos, she becomes defensive. Falk accuses Luke of being Lachie's dad, and while she insists that he was not, she admits Luke hurt her by choosing Karen. Falk thinks about the way Gretchen effortlessly shot the rabbits the other day and presses her further. She accuses him of being jealous of Luke, telling him he has always been “obsessed” with him. Before Gretchen kicks him out, she tells him she knows his alibi for Ellie's death was a lie, because she knows where Luke was. As Falk leaves, she tells him: “Looks like we've all got our secrets, [Falk].” (269)

Falk walks home, and runs into Whitlam at the Fleece, who offers to buy him a beer. Whitlam asks McMurdo to put it on his tab, but he refuses. Whitlam is short on cash, so Falk must pay for the drinks. Whitlam confides that he is planning to move up north, to please his wife, and blaming the “lack of water,” which “makes the whole town crazy” (271). After Whitlam leaves, McMurdo shares that he will miss Falk because he is a reliable customer, unlike Whitlam, who has a gambling problem.

In bed, Falk thinks about what McMurdo said about gambling only working “if you back the right horse” (273). He pictures Kiewarra from above, “noticing, for the first time, how things looked from a very different perspective” (274). He goes outside to take a photo of the inside of his trunk. After a restless night, he wakes early on Thursday, and makes a call promptly at 9 o’clock in the morning. The chapter ends with a short flashback of Luke driving home from Jamie's house, feeling hot and eager to get home. He was almost home when he saw a person standing on the side of the road, waving.