CHAPTER 4

They began to appear half an hour later: the cavalcade of heavies and experts, the (mostly) men in suits, boots and overalls, more moustaches per square head than a seventies skin flick. First came the Criminal Investigation Unit from Greendale, then Highway Patrol, Forensics, Homicide. Somebody even arranged a morning tea van, full of the kind of crap cops consume to shorten their lives and lengthen their belts.

I gave a statement to the Hommies, explained my observations and conclusions. The sergeant in charge, Calhoun, listened closely then nodded what may have been appreciation.

I spent a few hours on scene, part of a band of local uniforms consigned to the grunt work when the specialists took charge.

The jobs I was given got dirtier and gluggier as the morning wore on. I spent a few hours scrambling down among brambles and boggy wombat holes, foot-slogging through the sludge and the mud, trudging around the neighbourhood knocking on doors in search for witnesses. Needless to say, I didn’t find any. They were an insular lot round here. Deliverance country. My only notable moment came when I lifted a log and a massive snake leapt out, striking wildly before slithering away at pace.

Dougherty disappeared, but came back around eleven.

‘You still here?’ he exclaimed when he spotted me digging mud out of my boots.

‘Haven’t been released yet.’

‘I’m releasing you now.’

‘This is my region, boss. I like to know what’s going on.’

But he told me to go home, take a couple of days off. He was right, of course. I’d been on the go for nearly thirty hours. You lose your concentration after a while.

I grabbed some sandwiches from the van and drove back to Satellite. My heart sank a little as I rolled into town. Still no power. Everything was shrouded in semi-darkness. Semi-darkness, I was beginning to realise, was par for the course round here, even in the middle of the day. The tall trees came right up to the edge of town, seemed to almost smother it. Satellite would be a hell of a place to be if – when – a bushfire hit. I’d been in a bushfire a couple of years before and didn’t want to be in one again. It had been worse than I’d imagined.

Satellite was a small community – maybe five hundred people, as many again in the surrounding hills. It had been a mining and timber town in its heyday, but the gold had long since dried up and timber was going the same way. The community’s main sources of sustenance, as Lance succinctly put it, were drug dealing, dole bludging and the old age pension. There was a store, a school, a stockfeed, a cop shop – and a pub. A trio of desperadoes were sitting in the gutter outside the latter, beer cans in hand, faces bright with grog blossom.

I pushed on to Shady Grove Road. The rain had stopped but the bed was still soaked so I dragged my swag out from where I’d dumped it in the shed and curled up inside it.

When I woke it was dark outside. I checked my watch: six thirty in the evening. I’d slept all afternoon. I must have been more exhausted than I thought.

I wondered how the investigation was unfolding up at Wycliff Rise. The incident had left an unpleasant taste in my mouth, a stirring of anxiety in my bones. I realised what was worrying me: the level of organisation. This was no random incident. It had been carefully planned. Whoever was responsible had covered their tracks in a manner that suggested a ruthless intelligence at work. It was a miracle I’d spotted the anomalies I had, a fact that was doubtless due to the years I’d spent working with Warlpiri trackers in the Territory.

I considered phoning Dougherty, but rejected the idea, worried about the reception I’d receive.

Bugger it, I thought, it’s my turf. I’m responsible for this town and its surrounds. If there’s anything going on, I need to know about it.

I drove my HiLux back to the crime scene at Wycliff. By the time I got there, though, the place was deserted. I got out and walked around but found nothing other than a few shreds of tape and a lot of trodden, sodden earth. Everybody had packed up and pissed off. I couldn’t blame them. A clap of thunder crashed through the heavy mountain air and the rain returned with a vengeance. The sky was full of mad, mauling winds and flying ice.

I ran for the car and sat there for a moment, shivering and listening to hail bounce off the roof. I closed my eyes, breathed deeply and carried out a little self-examination. The results were not good. My fingernails were filthy and broken, my hands were numb, my stomach was growling like a camp dog. I felt shithouse, my general decrepitude magnified by hunger and fatigue. I thought about the condition and contents of my kitchen back in Satellite. A can or two of beans, a loaf of bread. Beans on toast. Hmmm, possibly cold beans on wet bread. I didn’t know if the power was on yet, and the roof was a sieve.

New plan. I started up and headed for Ryan’s Road, the quickest way to Windmark, the biggest local town. With a bit of luck, the pub kitchen would still be open. If not, I could nip up to the nearby Canticle Creek and do some freeloading off my father, who lived in a snug little house there.

The darkness flew by, its depth somehow intensified by the red glow from the tail-lights in my wake.