Finally, glee. Hirsch appearing, barely upright, on Radish the Clydesdale with a bulky sack of wrapped presents across his lap: one for every child in the district and a handful marked B and G just in case. Now he could be heard booming, ‘Ho, ho, ho,’ and trying to read Joyce Gwynne’s handwriting. Tilting dangerously in the saddle as he dispensed his gifts, stretching muscles he didn’t know he had. Radish letting go thunderous turds and the kids cracking up.

Sight and sound, but what Katie’s video failed to record was Hirsch’s tortured tailbone and spine, the stink of sweat and horse, Santa’s whiskers feathery in his mouth.

Santa. It was ‘Father Christmas’ when Hirsch was a kid. He replayed the clip, began to smile, his muscle strains temporarily forgotten. The kids had been beside themselves with excitement. And they’d appreciated the joke, Santa on horseback. But distributing the presents had taken forever, so Katie had begun to use the pause button, filming freely again when it was time to award the prize for the best Christmas lights. Hirsch watched himself slip dangerously, grab Radish by the mane, haul himself upright, clearly trembling, before gingerly handing Nan Washburn her award, a framed certificate and a plum pudding wrapped in cellophane.

Thus ended Hirsch’s fifteen minutes of glory.

Walking would ease his stiffness.

But there on his bedroom chair was the Santa suit. He couldn’t return it unwashed—what would Martin say? Reflecting on the legions of people who went through life anticipating what Martin would say, Hirsch hand-washed and rinsed the pants, jacket, cap and beard and pegged them out on his backyard clothesline.

Then he stuffed a large garbage bag into his pocket and set out. First to the oval—football in winter, cricket in summer—circling the low rail fence twice. Tall, smooth, silvery gum trees around the edge of the park, galahs screeching among the branches, constantly rising and settling. He walked the town’s perimeter roads and occasionally up and back down one of the side streets. A distant kookaburra joined the bird chorus. Otherwise Hirsch heard only the scrape of his rubber soles and small creatures rustling, clinging to the last vestiges of night.

He passed a fence strung with Christmas lights, the colours washed out now, with the sun above the horizon. Hirsch was sick of looking at Christmas lights, sick of Christmas.

Six-thirty. The sun was above the droughty hills and slanting through the trees now, promising another cloudless, windless, stifling day. Time for his shower and shave, his second breakfast. But first he passed by the shop, quickly confirming that it had been a good idea to bring the garbage bag. Bending, pushing against his aches and pains, he scooped up plastic bottles, scraps of wrapping paper, dead sparklers, paper hats, cigarette butts. He moved further up Kitchener Street, hunting and pecking, and came upon a significant pool of blood.