e found the main road quite easily and followed it all that night. Now that no cars travelled the highway, it was as safe as anywhere, the roadblocks having long been abandoned. Occasionally he startled wallabies or roos that had been attracted by the warmth of the tarred surface, but he was never tempted to Call them. At other times, when the night was especially silent, he listened for the awesome response he had detected earlier. Although he didn’t hear it again, he continued to sense that something was out there, a great distance off, some savage intelligence luring him on.

At the first sign of grey light he left the road. He was tired by then, but also very hungry, and he decided to push on for a while, taking advantage of whatever cover he could find. Further to the south there was a narrow belt of trees, and he reached this just as day was breaking.

Tired though he was, he realised that somehow he had to find food. The question was how to go about it. He was still puzzling over this problem when he came to an untidy heap of grey boulders that interrupted the belt of trees – exactly the kind of place where snakes and lizards were likely to take refuge. With the sun already risen, all he had to do was wait for its warmth to tempt them out.

Armed with a stick, he crouched at the edge of the clearing and watched. Minutes later, a fat-bodied shingleback lumbered out onto a slab of sunlit rock. Leaping to his feet, Ben scrambled after it. But there was no need for haste: still cold and sluggish, it could do no more than raise its head and display, its mouth gaping wide, hissing at him; and quickly he swung the stick, hitting it several times, until it lay limp and still.

In spite of his experience with Greg, the act of killing sickened him. Reluctantly he picked up the scaly body. It was half a metre long and thicker than his own arm, but he had no knife to cut it up with, nor any means of cooking it. What was he supposed to do, he wondered, tear it open with his teeth? Devour the raw flesh? He knew that when he was hungry enough he would do precisely that. But he hadn’t reached that point yet.

There were some smaller stones at the base of the rock-pile and he smashed these together. With the more jagged splinters he managed to hack open the shingleback’s soft belly-skin. Once he had cleaned the carcass, he wrapped it in leaves and rolled it tightly in his coat, to protect it from flies.

‘For later,’ he told himself vaguely. And with that grisly thought he lay down in the nearest shade and slept.

A little past the middle of the afternoon he awoke to the smell of burning. Grey smoke was drifting through the trees and he suspected at first that he was in the path of a bush fire. But the bush was still damp from the recent rain; and there was no floating ash or soot in the air about him. Puzzled, he tucked the rolled-up coat under his arm and made his way to the edge of the trees. Peering through the long grass, he saw it: a house on the far side of the paddock, smoke curling up from what remained of its walls and roof. The fire must have been started hours earlier, because now there was no one in sight, and the house and most of its outbuildings were all but gutted.

For nearly an hour Ben stayed where he was, watching. He would have preferred to wait until darkness, but he needed the fire and he was worried that it might go out. At last, reasonably satisfied, he ran, bent over, through the long grass, stopping periodically to check his surroundings.

He reached the dirt road bordering the house and again took cover, making a final check. The scene before him was not unfamiliar: the tall protective fence smashed down; the vegetable garden trampled; the buildings looted and burned. Two bodies, of a man and a woman, were lying stretched out beneath a pepper tree that had once shaded the verandah. Even from where he crouched, Ben could tell they were beyond his help.

Cautiously he stood up and approached the smoking ruins. But while he was still crossing the trampled garden, something stirred beside the dead body of the woman. It was a small cattle-dog: its fur had been singed almost to the colour of ashes, but it was still defiant, its lips drawn back in a warning snarl.

Ben held out a hand enticingly. ‘Come on, boy,’ he crooned, ‘it’s all over now.’

The dog eyed him suspiciously and growled another warning.

‘I’m not going to hurt you,’ Ben murmured.

He took a step forward, and the animal started to bark. ‘Hush!’ Ben said urgently. ‘Be quiet!’

His voice only excited the animal further and it danced towards him, barking more shrilly. Ben glanced nervously around, aware that if anybody were still in the vicinity this kind of noise would soon attract them. Which meant that he had to act fast.

Clutching the carcass of the shingleback to his chest, he eyed the smouldering remains of the house longingly. Once again something Greg had said came back to him: ‘A couple of days with an empty belly and you’ll change your tune.’ A couple of days! That was all it had taken! Even less, because there had been the episode with the horse. No, he thought defensively, that was different . . .and so is this. But even as he gave in to his hunger and silently Called to the dog, he secretly admitted that this too was just another betrayal of his earlier promise.

The dog had stopped barking and was watching him uncertainly. It was too late for Ben to retreat and he repeated the Call. The small animal immediately abandoned all show of resistance: with its tail wagging, its belly brushing the ground, it crept towards him, whimpering softly. Ben fondled its head, not daring to look into its eyes for fear of what he would find there, and hurried towards the ruins of the house.

He thought he would have to rake away the ash and search for the remains of the live coals, but quite by chance everything had been prepared for him. The roof had been the last part of the house to cave in, and the sheets of unpainted corrugated iron were burning hot, like a ready-made barbecue. All he had to do was unwrap the carcass and place it directly on the hot surface.

While he was waiting for the lizard to cook, he explored the area around the house. Almost everything of any use had been stolen or destroyed. The only objects still intact were the water tank and an old corrugated-iron shed near the back fence. The door of the shed had been torn off and the interior was strewn with debris. Left to himself, Ben would probably not have lingered in there, but the dog began scratching at the earth floor.

‘What is it, boy?’ Ben asked sharply.

The dog continued with its scratching, and Ben crouched down to inspect the floor for himself. Beneath a layer of dust was a dull glint of metal. It gave off a hollow ring when he rapped it, and with a start of recognition he guessed what he had found. Eagerly, he too began scrabbling in the dust, but before he could investigate further he caught the tantalising scent of grilled meat and ran back to the house.

For a while he was too busy satisfying his hunger to think of anything else. Not until he had picked the bones clean and had a long drink from the tank did he return to the shed.

As he suspected, he had stumbled on a hidden cellar. When he cleared away the earth and pulled the sheet of steel aside, he found a ladder leading down into darkness, a torch hanging in readiness from the top rung. With the light to guide him, he descended the ladder, leaving the dog whining nervously at the top.

He found himself in a room with rough earth walls and timber supports. It contained everything necessary for survival: stacks of dried and tinned food; cannisters of water; blankets, kerosene, tools – even two bicycles, equipped with heavy-duty tyres in case it was ever necessary to escape along the back roads. So why hadn’t the owners of the house escaped, or at least hidden in this room? Had the attack been too sudden? Or had they somehow been tricked, much as his parents had been tricked perhaps, by a friendly face they believed they could trust? Trust! The word alone was enough to make him flinch guiltily, and he climbed hastily back up the ladder.

The sun was low in the sky when he emerged from the shed and he crouched thoughtfully in the lengthening shadows. Finding the storeroom had been a marvellous piece of luck. What he had to decide was how to use that luck. Should he stay here and live off the supplies? It was the sensible thing to do. There was enough food to last him for months. And he would be reasonably safe: soon this would be just another burned-out property, of no more interest than any other.

After two days with an empty stomach, the idea of a regular food supply was particularly attractive. Yet still he hesitated. If you stay put, Greg had insisted, you’re a sitting duck – sooner or later someone’ll spot you, and then . . .zap! And even if that didn’t happen, what would he do when the food was used up? Wouldn’t it be better to take this opportunity to escape? To stick to his half-formulated plan of heading for Sydney?

He stood up, undecided. Before him, the yellow ball of the sun slipped towards the horizon. As it hung there, in the dying moments of the day, he heard again the same far-off response he had detected on the previous evening. But slightly clearer now: a passionate expression of freedom; the brief outburst of a mind that recognises neither fear nor dependence. He heard it only once, but that soundless cry, terrible and challenging, was enough to decide him.

In the waning dusk he began preparing for the journey ahead. First he hoisted one of the bicycles up through the trapdoor. It was equipped with a back carrier, and onto this he tied a rucksack which he filled with tinned food. Apart from the food he took little else – some matches, a sheath knife, a canvas water bag, and a pair of binoculars. None of the clothing fitted him and so he kept the old army greatcoat, tying it across the handlebars.

It was nearly dark by the time he had finished and he was impatient to set off. But he felt he owed the people of the house something. Taking a spade from the underground room, he dug a shallow grave and rolled the two bodies into it, covering the mound with a piece of roofing iron, to protect it from dingoes.

With that last duty completed, and with the underground room again concealed, he wheeled the bicycle over to the road. The night was cool and dark, and as he settled himself in the saddle he was filled with a strange excitement, as if he were being given a second chance, an opportunity to wipe out the mistakes of the past.

He began pedalling down the road, so engrossed by his own thoughts that he had gone some distance before he became aware of the dog loping along beside him. He stopped and looked down. ‘No, not you,’ he said regretfully. ‘Stay here, where you belong.’

It whimpered and moved closer to the bicycle. There was one sure way of sending it back, but he balked at that. And it crossed his mind that the dog could, after all, be useful: its keen senses would be an added protection on the road. ‘All right,’ he said, relenting, ‘you can stick around for a while.’

Not for some days did he come to regret that decision and to realise that he had fallen into the same old trap yet again.