Wings and husks and curled-up little spider corpses were the only signs that the swarm of insects had been, and gone. The rain had stopped. Fog lowered like a stage curtain, resting heavy on the ground and screening out the hut, the trees, the mountaintop, the sky, the sun, the world beyond the mountain.

Sarah and Heath were confined to the shed and the camping ground. Tansy, tethered to the tap beside the water tank, was an ethereal shape in the mist. She was grazing on the long grass around the tank. The thick air concentrated each sound, every tear of grass and each chew of Tansy’s were audible, as were Heath’s limping, squelching steps.

He was carrying loads of wood up from the pile beside the hut and stacking it to dry in the shed. He disappeared into the mist, reappeared, no complaints about his knee slowing him down or hurting him. Sarah could see that he’d carted plenty of firewood in his day. He dumped it, tossed it, lifted it with sure hands.

The potbelly was blazing hot. Sarah had woken and stepped down from the van to find Heath stoking the fire. With the same proficiency he was showing now, he’d opened the vent door, emptied the ash, arranged some kindling over the few remaining coals, and had the heater ablaze in no time.

Sarah stirred a saucepan of pumpkin soup. This morning they’d have a bowl each, and a Salada cracker in lieu of bread. Responsibility for rationing their supplies had fallen to her, probably because she’d discovered the van. Her movements gave away that the soup was ready. Heath stopped what he was doing and came across.

He’d put on a dry shirt, teamed with the shorts he’d slept in. He was wearing his boots. The pairs of socks were in rows drying by the fire. A five o’clock shadow was appearing on his top lip and jaw. When slim people dropped even one kilo it showed, and he looked leaner than he had the night before. Perhaps she looked thinner too. Sarah felt hollow.

Heath sat down at the table. Tendrils of mist wound into the shed. The bulk of the fog billowed along the shed opening, bulging inwards.

‘It’s got that all-day feel about it,’ Sarah said. ‘There won’t be any helicopters if it stays like this.’

‘Have you been down to the hut?’

‘I went in there yesterday. Why?’

‘There’s a heap of timber and scaffolding that hasn’t been used. I was thinking,’ he sniffed and jerked his shoulder, ‘I can rig up a rough yard for Tansy if you like?’

Sarah sat down in front of her soup. The table was square, the size of a café table. Rust dotted the foldout metal legs. She’d moved the Christmas hamper goods and put them with the other food inside the van. She’d cleaned away the workmen’s rubbish, wiped away the dust.

‘Oh,’ was all she said in response to his offer.

‘We could use the scaffolding as a fence. I don’t think it would be that hard to do.’ Wet fibres of bark clung to his shirt. He sniffed again – the cold air was making his nose run. He ate a spoonful of soup. ‘With the planks of timber, I can make a fence inside the shed, and cordon off that end bay, then she’ll have a stable and a yard.’ He put down his spoon, and pointed to where he meant, moving his hand to indicate a square out front of the last bay of the shed. ‘She won’t have to be tethered all the time.’

‘How long do you think we’re going to be here?’

‘I don’t know.’ He went back to his soup.

Sarah crumbled her dry biscuit into her bowl. Heath must have liked her method; he copied.

‘If they do come and can’t rescue Tansy, have you thought about what you’re going to do? We’ve probably got to build a yard. No matter what happens.’

‘I was imagining I would stay with her, until the creek recedes enough for her to be led across.’

‘That could be ages.’ He stirred in his biscuits. ‘If she’s got a yard and access to cover, they can chopper in bales of hay and drop people in to feed and check on her, until the river is down. It’s either that or they’re going to airlift her out.’

‘I don’t want her airlifted. And I won’t leave her confined in a yard, not without me here with her. Isn’t your knee hurting you?’ Sarah began her soup.

‘It’s not super sore, but it’s not strong either. I don’t know; it’s annoying, that’s all.’

‘You’re probably damaging it more by using it.’

‘Do you think a yard is a good idea? So she’s more comfortable while we’re here. Should we try it?’

Sarah nodded. ‘Thanks for thinking of her.’

‘It’s my way of winning her over.’ His head was low over his bowl, his spoon skimming the cooler surface soup. ‘She keeps giving me the evil eye.’

‘If you’re not a horsey person, she knows it, and won’t give you the time of day.’

‘Who says I’m not a horsey person?’ He arched an eyebrow.

‘What breed is she then?’

Heath rubbed his lips and squinted in her direction, although in the fog there was very little to see. ‘Quarter horse?’

‘Anglo. She’s an endurance horse.’

‘Endurance? Like trail riding?’

‘Not trail riding, faster. Competition. Trail riding on steroids. Distance. Speed. Nonstop.’

‘It’s a sport?’

‘Definitely. You can compete all over the world.’

Heath swayed his head and looked impressed. ‘Sorta like the Dakar for horses?’

‘You could say that. And she’s the best in the country. A couple more years and she will be, anyway. The Arabs, they passed her over. They made a mistake.’

‘Now I really do want to be friends with her. You ride her in competitions?’

‘Yep.’

‘You must be a good rider.’

‘I am.’

‘Mmm.’ Heath’s eyes shone, a darker shade of green this morning, depth and intensity restored. Short black lashes fringing them.

Sarah wondered if knowing his surname would make any difference. She’d taken a man’s surname and still been left in the dark. She didn’t need to know his background, his family, his friends, his likes and dislikes – you can know all those things and still not know a man. Love had tricked Sarah into thinking a person could be trusted and understood. It seemed such a naïve thing in retrospect. Why had she so blindly believed that her husband had rolled over and exposed his soft underbelly and bared his soul? He hadn’t. If anything, all those women, the one night stands, the regulars, the hookers who had only known his first name, they’d seen deeper into him than Sarah had, they’d experienced his weaknesses and his darkness and those two things were more revealing than a person’s strength and goodness. Or so she thought. Granted she was bitter.

Sarah stared through Heath while this turned in her mind, and saw now that he’d not looked away. While she’d been caught up in her thoughts he’d been studying her face, looking into her eyes while they were unseeing and open, peering right inside her.

Heat crept up Sarah’s neck and warmed her cheeks. She looked down.

‘And here I was thinking you might steal my horse to ride off and check your poppy field. But instead you sit down and tell me you want to build a yard so she’s comfortable. I can’t work you out.’

‘Poppies don’t grow well in this climate.’

‘Of course.’

‘Found out the hard way. Took a real hammering there.’

‘Worth a try I guess.’

She heard him chuckle. Sarah ate her soup.

‘Will we have a coffee after this?’ he said.

‘There’s only a bit left in the jar, and a few tea bags.’

‘I suppose we better be careful with what we’ve got.’

‘To be on the safe side, I reckon.’

It sounded like he resumed eating; Sarah didn’t look up to find out.

The workmen had taken most of their tools with them. Sarah and Heath searched in and around the hut, the van and the shed. Heath used the crowbar to prise some panels from the door of the colonial-style toilet block. After glancing around the toilet’s timber walls and at the concrete floor, peering into the quaint corrugated iron showers, seeing the new fittings designed to look old, the exposed pipes and freestanding basins, they still found nothing. Sarah and Heath remained without the most basic of tools. A hammer would have been useful. A wrench. Wire. A box of nails. A wheelbarrow would have been a godsend. Saws, pliers, all those things they had to make do without. What they did have, and appreciated all the more because of the lack of other tools, were the crowbar and the shovels.

In Hangman’s Hut, Heath separated the scaffolding into different piles, in order of size, and set aside those poles with couplings or with joiners already attached. Sarah moved the planks of timber. To save on floor space she leaned the beams and boards up against the stone walls. It was uncomfortable work. Fog clung to them like cold sweat. It made everything wet. They talked now and then, sometimes it was Sarah who broke the silence, other times it was Heath, incidental conversation, practical exchanges –

‘Do you think we’ll need these smaller pieces of timber?’

‘Probably not, but stack them anyway.’

Finished sorting the materials, and while in front of the shed marking out with stones where they’d dig the post holes, Heath said –

‘Righty-o, favourite album.’

‘Nina Simone. Live at Carnegie Hall.’

‘Jeez,’ he laughed.

‘You know the recording?’

‘Kinda. Not what I was expecting.’

‘What are you saying – that I look like —?’

‘A country music girl.’

She gagged.

‘Hey, I’m into country.’

‘Sorry.’

Sarah reappraised him. Perhaps that was what the shine was, the almost evangelistic zeal for life some country people had. Glass half-full folk. She supposed with a hat on and long pants he might start to look a bit rural. It was hard to judge when they were both dressed like a couple of Deliverance rejects. They were in their matching baggy shorts, bare legs and boots. They’d rugged up as best they could, pulled on socks, Sarah had her raincoat over her shirt and Heath had on a second shirt.

‘What sort of car do you drive?’

All she had wanted to know was whether or not his car completed the country boy picture: a ute with the R. M. Williams horns sticker in the back window. But the question caused him to turn his back to her in the fog.

‘Nothing fancy.’

‘It’s a four-wheel-drive though?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Whereabouts on the plateau is it?’

‘I’d actually crossed over the plateau.’ He still had his back to her. ‘And got a bit lost on the tracks the other side of it.’

‘If it’s on a track it’s going to be harder to see from the air, right?’

‘Like you said, they’re going to fly over the camping site and see us up here anyway. Finding my car isn’t going to make much difference, I don’t reckon.’

The mist was so dense that when Sarah was on one end of a bundled length of scaffolding poles and Heath was on the other end she lost sight of him. It was as though a ghost were holding up the other end of the load. They carried the poles and the timber boards out the back door of the hut, up the incline, past Tansy’s new tethering point – a star picket sunk deep into the earth – and to the shed. Sarah could feel Heath during these trips, hear his footsteps, his breathing, when he spoke his voice came clear out of the mist, but he was invisible. They talked about the weather, the storm, recalling the cloud colour and way the thunder hadn’t stopped rumbling, and the strength of the rain, the volume. Their conversation flowed easily. Sarah told him about the bridge. He came close and listened. She could see him now and saw that he reacted to her tale in the way she’d expected him to react the night before: lips parted, eyes tightened with disbelief – she wasn’t exaggerating, was she?

‘The tree hit only metres behind you?’

‘Yep.’

‘And it was how big?’

‘As big as any I’ve seen in the ranges. Like the ones in Lauriston Park.’

‘Christ.’ His head tipped to one side and his hand rested gentle on his hip. ‘Did you . . . what did you do after that?’

She explained how Tansy had run. For some reason she didn’t mention the stag. It wasn’t that she deliberately kept the animal out of the story, it was only towards the end that she thought to include him, and then it seemed strange – oh yeah, and there was this huge stag deer. Was the animal her secret? Did she want that special moment to remain between the stag and her alone? No one could understand what had passed between them.

Heath talked freely about his walk up to the hut. It sounded to her as though he’d known precisely where he’d been at the time of the flood and exactly how to get to where he was going.

‘I walked up an old trappers track. There were creeks forming as I climbed, out of nowhere rivers were appearing. I hardly got across some sections. And since then we’ve had more rain. I wouldn’t be surprised if we’re not only cut off from the bottom, from Lauriston, but if we’re cut off now from Spinners Creek as well. That’s what I reckon. We can check the road, but I know the way I came would be impossible to get down now. I don’t think we can even get back to the plateau and that area.’

‘There were washouts in the road. I thought, though, on foot there’d be a way through the bush.’

‘I’m telling you – there are whole new ravines that weren’t there a couple of days ago. The mountaintop is carved up. I’ve been trying not to frighten you, but, as far as I can see, the only way we’re getting down is to be helicoptered out. That’s why we’ve gotta build the yard. We shouldn’t panic – like you said, we’ve got food, we’ve got shelter, they will come, but it’s going to be a while before anyone can walk in and out.’

Sarah set about digging the post holes they had marked. Heath, unable to dig due to his weak knee, left her side and set to work building the dividing wall inside the shed. They were isolated in their jobs, cut off visually from one another because of the fog, aurally in touch, but that was all.

After a while Sarah noticed that the noises of Heath working had stopped. She paused and listened. She heard movement down at the other end of the shed, not where he was meant to be.

She called into the fog, in jest to hide her suspicion – ‘That you, Sid?’

‘Aye indeed,’ Heath answered from somewhere near the van.

‘I didn’t know Sid was a pirate as well as a bushranger?’

‘Yeah, dunno why I was channelling Jack Sparrow then.’

‘I hope you’re not down there pinching food?’

Sarah emptied the shovel of sloppy earth and squinted into the mist. Not a breath of wind to shift the fog, which was becoming increasingly suffocating as the morning stretched on. Tansy snorted. Unconvincing chirps and twitters came from the bush, tentative birdsong, none of the bigger birds – the kookaburras, the currawongs, the magpies and the ravens – had yet returned.

Sarah heard the caravan suspension creak. She felt her pockets. The magazine of bullets was safe with her, but her phone was in the van. She’d put it on the bench last night when she gave him her shorts to wear, and she’d left it there this morning. Sarah went to move but stopped herself. It would be clear she was checking up on him if she went to the van. She waited for him to answer her.

He didn’t.

‘You are stealing food, aren’t you . . .’ Her expression nowhere near as light-hearted as her tone.

‘Changing socks.’

The socks had been drying by the fire, not in the van. Sarah pushed the spade into the soft ground and left it upright by the hole. She entered the shed nearest to where they were working and glanced at the internal fence he was building. He’d made four thick pillars, evenly spaced, out of firewood and had left gaps for the ends of beams and planks to be slotted in, held in place by the firewood, without the need for nails. He’d done a lot in a short space of time. Near the shed wall was an area he’d left for a gateway into the stable and yard. Sarah continued down to the potbelly stove – no sign of any of the socks being moved or swapped. She approached the van door.

Heath stepped into the doorway. In his hand was a large roll of cling film. ‘Remembered seeing it,’ he said, holding up the roll. ‘Gonna strap my knee with it.’

It was a catering-size roll, thicker and more heavy-duty than what you’d find at a supermarket.

‘That’s a good idea. I meant to tell you I’ve got some painkillers too, if your knee is giving you trouble.’

‘This’ll help I reckon. Save your tablets.’

He was blocking the van entrance.

‘I want to check my phone. To see if it’s working yet.’

He moved to the side and she stepped in past him. Her phone was where she’d left it on the bench, as dead as ever. There were a few specks of dirt and thin strands of bark on the bench. Heath’s muddy boot prints were concentrated on the floor nearby. It was to be expected, she guessed, that he would check also to see if her phone was working . . . But did the device feel lighter in her hand? Unbalanced slightly?

Heath was perched on the end of the caravan bench seat, his sore leg across the narrow walkway. He was feeling for the edge of the cling film on the roll.

‘You’ve got fingernails. Can you find the end of this for me?’

She took the roll from him.

‘No luck with your phone?’

Sarah found the edge of the film and peeled it back. ‘No.’

After he’d strapped his knee, Heath did what he said he’d do – he built a yard. It was remarkable to watch him do it. He didn’t waste time making it too big or elaborate: its purpose was to hold Tansy safely. The main effort went into making it strong. He certainly did that. He worked fast and without any more breaks.

Mushy ground posed the biggest problem. Holes Sarah had dug filled with water. Sloppy earth didn’t tamp down well around the corner posts. To compensate, Heath added a bottom rung to the fence. He laid the poles of scaffolding across the grass and fixed them to the base of the corner posts. The fence had a top rail, and now this ground-level rail to brace the structure.

As a final touch in strengthening the yard, Heath ran short poles across each far corner and attached them, using scaffolding connectors and elbows. The poles he picked for the job were smooth, without joins or protruding screws, so there was no chance of Tansy hurting herself. Once done digging holes, Sarah held things for him. She was his apprentice, standing beside him, waiting for instruction, passing things, getting things, keeping out of his way. It was hard to find fault in him while he was toiling away so resourcefully for her horse. Although the whisper in the back of her mind wondered if his kind act was one of counterbalance – look what I did for you, now all you have to do is not question me.

He got dirty, mud caked his knees, his clothes were wet. Droplets of mist beaded along strands of his hair, and his face was greasy with sweat. He jammed his fingers, bumped them, pinched the skin on his arm, nicked his elbow. The fog was maddening in that it didn’t dissipate at all, Sarah’s chest felt tight, and his did too – he sucked in a breath, shaking his head as though to clear it. ‘It’s like smog not fog.’

For all their earlier talk of saving food, they began discussing what they’d eat next.

‘Should we have our Christmas?’ Sarah put forward. ‘Because we missed out.’

‘I’m pretty bloody hungry.’

‘Me too.’

‘Did you bring all that Christmas food though? It’s yours.’

‘As if I’m not gonna share it.’

‘It’s the most perishable, I suppose.’

‘The cheese and ham we really have to eat today.’

‘Yeah, we should.’

Last joint tightened, all rails in place, their hunger won out and it was decided – they deserved something good after their hard work. It was well into the afternoon. Sarah’s stomach was rumbling. Heath held out his hand and showed her how it was shaking.

‘The workmen’s food will be our serious supplies,’ Sarah said.

Knowing they were going to eat well was enough to stave off the hunger pains for a while. They finished up and cleared away. Heath put the poles he hadn’t used against the back wall of the shed. Sarah made benches out of blocks of wood and the leftover planks to house her saddle and to keep other important items up off the floor. Heath walked out front and looked at his handiwork from different angles, critically eyeing the lines of the yard. He pushed the railing with both hands, his weight behind it. It didn’t move.

‘Heath, it’s excellent.’

‘. . . I dunno . . .’

‘Are you kidding me? Look at it.’

Half of the permanent yards Sarah had seen in her day weren’t as well built. She liked how clean and unfussy it was. The timber and firewood fence inside the shed was messy, but that at least had the benefit of making the undercover part seem rustic and homely.

He pinched his nose and rubbed it. ‘It’s only as good as its weakest point. The gate and the fence inside the shed aren’t right . . .’

‘At least that section is out of the weather, we can fix it up and work on it anytime. This outside part was the most important to get done, in case it rains again . . . So, are we ready for her?’

‘I think we are.’

Tansy had matured over the last twenty-four hours. Sarah could see it and feel it in her horse. Whereas the old Tansy would have spent all day pulling on the tether, pawing with disgust at the waterlogged lengths of grass, the new Tansy had grazed as best she could and now stood patiently in the fog. The mare sensed the need for a different mode. She was conserving energy. And perhaps, too, blinkered by the mist, subdued.

Heath’s scent was on Sarah and in her clothes. Tansy nudged Sarah’s shoulder and snuffed at the sleeve of her coat. ‘It’s okay,’ Sarah said softly to her mare. ‘We’ve built you a nice open stable.’ She stroked and patted the side of Tansy’s face. ‘No head tossing, okay?’

Heath was standing beside the stable entrance. He had slid the makeshift door – a single rail – open. His back was turned and his hands were busy picking dry mud off his palms.

This casual stance revealed that he’d told the truth about one thing: he’d been around horses before. Compared to the way he’d acted when first encountering Tansy, this showed some nous. He remained facing away. He kept looking down at his hands as he rubbed and brushed at the dry mud. Tansy’s ears craned forward, and Sarah could feel a change occur in her mare. The horse went from indignant to interested in a heartbeat. She stopped and held her head high to look at Heath. With his attention focused inward, it drew her to him, and the mare leaned his way. He bent forward to check the bandage on his knee, fiddled with it, and Tansy leaned in further. When he didn’t glance at her, she got impatient and whinnied.

Sarah led her towards the entranceway. ‘Come on. He’s ignoring you on purpose – it’s the oldest trick in the book.’

When he still didn’t turn, Tansy did what any well-mannered horse wouldn’t do – she reared up, landed light-footed on her front legs, and kicked out her hindquarters, not frightened, flaunting her agility.

Face turned away, Heath smiled. Sarah heard him breathe out softly, amused. ‘She’s beautiful.’

‘I was thinking she might have matured. Now I’m not so sure.’

Heath rested against the wooden railing and looked into the empty stable. He propped his elbows on the top rail as though he had all day to ponder the vacant yard. Over his shoulder he said, ‘Did you name her?’

‘She had a proper name, a long name.’ Sarah ran her hand down Tansy’s nose. ‘I renamed her. Tansy means forever.’

Tansy didn’t like that they were talking about her and yet not paying her enough attention. She barged forward, about to go up and sniff Heath, or push him brazenly, but Sarah tugged the horse’s head around and led her through the gateway and into the stable. Once in the enclosure Tansy was more concerned with the look and feel of the place she was to be confined to. Her body stiffened and she turned her head to take in her new borders. Sarah unbuckled and slid off the bridle to let Tansy explore the space on her own.

‘It’s okay, baby.’

Even if her horse wasn’t any more at home with her tether off and in a yard, Sarah felt more at ease. The mare walked into the outside area and lowered her head to smell the ground and the grass. She went to the far end of the fence and shied at her first touch and sniff of the metal railing. She whinnied, pranced around the small space.

Heath ran a slow gaze over her. ‘She’s completely black.’

‘Yeah.’

‘She’s really beautiful.’

‘Shh, she’ll hear you and get an ever bigger head.’

He watched her some more. ‘She’s got something about her, hasn’t she? Something special.’

‘Black mare lore, maybe that’s what you see.’

‘Am I not a horse aficionado if I don’t know what that means?’

‘Black mares live forever.’

‘Jeez, she’s good for her age,’ he laughed.

‘They say black mares’ spirits are earthbound. When they die it passes to the next black mare born, and so on . . .’

‘You don’t believe it?’

‘No, but then it’s just reincarnation I guess; that’s all the lore is saying really. Lots of people believe in reincarnation. Maybe it’s a curse? I don’t know if I’d want to be a black mare forever.’

‘What about black stallions?’

‘The lore says stallions are too one-track-minded to remember the past anyway. Sex obsessed. I’d believe that.’

‘How is she with other people riding her?’

‘Why?’

‘Those poppies don’t harvest themselves,’ he replied grinning.

‘Well then I better warn you,’ Sarah said without a smile, ‘she won’t let anyone but me on her back. She will throw you, and in the process injure that other leg of yours, and then you’ll be stuck on the mountain with two stuffed knees.’

‘Glad we cleared that up.’