Bernie Lippard described seeing Caleb leaving the ignition site. To him, Caleb’s guilt was historical fact. Next was Darren. In disclosure documents Darren said he’d seen Caleb at a drinks machine at the front of Doonan’s Hardware, purchasing two bottles of water. Dad had taken Caleb to Doonan’s many times for weedkiller or grout cleaner that Gran wanted. For a few months, Caleb had worked at the paint counter. His first job. Darren sacked him for dyeing his hair black. ‘You scare away customers,’ Darren said then.

Outraged that night at home, Caleb had turned to Dad. He remembered the conversation vividly. ‘You can have black hair and sell paint,’ he’d told Dad.

‘It’s not just the hair though, is it?’ Dad wasn’t a human rights lawyer, not even if the human involved was his son. He said people who grew the economy by employing people should be allowed to hire, and therefore sack, anyone they liked. That was commercial law, apparently.

With Darren sworn in, Charles Scott paused the CCTV on a close-up of Caleb’s face in its former full goth glory. Black hair, melting eyeliner blackening his eyes, punctured lower lip. Riding his bike into town after the fire had begun. Charles Scott alleged he was returning from having lit it. A future jury would take note of every detail of his ghostly look and judge him, even though his piercings had healed into the faintest of scars. To Mum, Caleb’s goth guise had been experimenting, going through a phase, trying to shock his father. To Mum, Caleb looked different now because he had grown up. But the contrast between the two Calebs would mean something different to strangers. To future jurors. They would suspect his current puffy, passive incarnation was an attempt to deny his skinny, angry past. At the very least, in his changing appearance he looked unbalanced.

Douglas had said he wanted to prove Darren was prejudiced. ‘Do you know how many people used your drink machine that day?’

‘Probably lots. It was hot.’

‘Could you identify any of the others?’

‘Well, no. There was a lot going on.’ Darren’s sarcasm drew a titter from the audience. ‘A bushfire was about to burn my store.’

‘Can you explain why you noticed Caleb?’

Darren shook his shoulders and tried to pretend his statements weren’t based on pre-existing hatred. Douglas returned to his seat with a look that said, We’re getting somewhere.

Joe Green testified to seeing Caleb standing beside his bike on Anzac Avenue, near Setback Mountain, with a flat tyre. Caleb remembered that moment. The smell of smoke and burning tar, the road so hot his tyres had melted. He remembered trying to speak to Joe, yelling against the roar of the wind, resisting his urge to get into the car.