Fire Eye (13 page)

Decker’s satellite photographs show a lot of tracks through the property so they can skirt the homestead. They set up a fly camp out of sight in a depression that is part of a dry channel system. They eat a meal from cans heated up over a gas cooker, washed down with beers and roll out their swags. Decker can’t sleep, even after the day’s driving. He loves the exhilaration of being close to his prey, relishing the times when he has been close enough to watch her unseen and let his mind savour the revenge he has planned for so long, just waiting for the right opportunity.

Prison had been a bastard and the shame of what happened in there still eats away at him. There he had finally met someone tougher and meaner than him. He had been used at a whim for someone else’s pleasure. He shuts the memory from his mind and concentrates on revenge, slow and drawn out.

It is close to midnight when he finally gets up. His restless energy has to be used somehow, so he climbs into the Patrol and fires up the diesel. Its subdued rattle barely disturbs the quiet of the night. Jesse is out to it.
Kid can’t handle his bloody beer
! But Decker doesn’t mind. The kid is young and he wants to be alone. He eases the Patrol carefully in the direction of the homestead, the light of the moon letting him pick his way across the grassland studded with the scattered trees and scrub of open woodland. When he is as close as caution will allow, he parks the vehicle, takes a GPS waypoint to add to the one for the campsite and walks the remaining distance.

The night is quiet and still under the star-studded heavens. He is careful to make no sound, even feeling carefully with his boots as he has been trained to avoid the sharp sound that comes from snapping pieces of dry timber. He gets close to the homestead, real close, thrilled by the exhilaration of lurking unknown in the shadows of the night, enjoying the pleasure of anticipation. He finds a comfortable spot under a tree, flicks away the twigs and pebbles and sits down, his back leaning against the trunk of a tree to enjoy the company of his thoughts.

He listens to the sounds of the night, the occasional insect as it buzzes by on miniature wings, the occasional call from a bird, the faint rustle of the gentle breeze through the leaves over his head and other odd sounds he can’t place. He hears dogs barking and the nervous neighing of horses as they become increasingly anxious, fretting from some unseen cause. Suddenly lights go on and he sees shapes moving in the house toward a main room. They are there for a few minutes before he again sees movement framed as dark shadows against the lights.

Three people come out onto the verandah. He watches the men talk together and then separate. He watches as one stalks into the dark against a fence while the other climbs onto a water tank. He hears a gun shot and sees another shape.
That bloody woman!
She runs out to catch a horse.
Bitch and her horses!
More shots and a pig goes down in the light of a torch. A running shot.
Good fucking shot!
That fucking headmaster’s got a rifle and he can use it!
That’s something he hadn’t expected.
A fucking headmaster who can use a gun!
That changes things a bit,
he decides in the darkness as peace descends again on the homestead and finally the lights go out.

He sits for a while cursing himself for missing such an obvious complication.
Never assume anything or underestimate anyone,
he tells himself over and over again. He’s a bully at heart and by nature, but enjoys bullying on his own terms. Beneath his cruelness is a streak of yellow, a fear that someone could be better than him and not succumb to physical or emotional manipulation. The same fear he experienced in jail that gave birth to an all-consuming desire for revenge.

He stands carefully, dusts off his trousers and makes his way back to the Patrol and the camp, thinking through what this new knowledge means for his plans.

By the time Stuart and Jed stir themselves out of bed, they can smell the delicious aroma of breakfast being cooked. Eggs, bacon, mushrooms, tomatoes, the smell of bread in the toaster and the sight of a tossed salad with greens, cheese, potato, chopped nuts, crispy bacon and a dressing both of them actually like the look of. Men are men after all and salads don’t quite fit their image. It is all wolfed down with no complaints and honest compliments for Alex.

“Now that’s a breakfast to start the day!” Stuart offers generously, patting his tightly muscled stomach. They linger longer than necessary over the last of the coffee and light conversation before all chipping in for a clean up. While Alex packs her gear into the Landcruiser, Jed and Stuart move the dead pigs from the enclosure onto the back of a flat tray for disposal and do a quick patch up on the hole in the mesh.

“The boys can do the rest later today,” Stuart decides. “You guys better get moving to make the most of the day.”

Farewells are exchanged with an earnest promise to catch up again on the return trip. Alex and Jed head northwest along the dusty property track. They travel in silent companionship, contemplating the country, the recent events and the adventure ahead, each considering their own range of possibilities. Gates are few and far between as the paddocks are huge. They rarely see cattle even though the property carries thousands.

“I’ve seen plenty of kangaroos and goats, but barely any cattle and this is supposed to be a cattle station!” Alex says.

“There’s a lot of land out here for the cattle Alex. Makes you wonder how many kangaroos, goats, pigs and everything else are out here as well,” Jed replies with passion. “There are more kangaroos across this country than ever before thanks to water holes and bores put in by the farmers. Don’t get me started on that topic!” He cuts himself off before he gets wound up on an environmental topic he believes has been skewed for political purposes.

“How far are we going today,” Alex asks to change the subject. The track slowly deteriorates, winding through savannah grassland covered with open stunted trees and a variety of scrub. Twin-wheel tracks mark the way across smooth red dust and grey soil, in some places interspersed with rocky patches of iron rich, red, sharp pebbles. The occasional red, rocky hill ‘jumps up’ out of the landscape to break the even line of the horizon.

“Today we cover distance. If we’re lucky we’ll probably average twenty kilometres every hour so we will make good time to start with. Eventually the track might fade away, but we’ll keep on a GPS bearing. We should be able to make camp fairly close to the plane and spend tomorrow trying to get through to the coast.”

Alex is in a reflective mood. “A helicopter would have been a lot easier and quicker. But you’re right, if word got out there’s no guarantee what would happen to the site. It would’ve made a big hole in my budget as well! Plus we’d have missed out on this part of the adventure. It’s a queer feeling being alone out here with just us, our gear and our wits. It’s scary but also exciting. It makes me feel so small but also so connected to the country.”

“Out here that bastard Decker will need a miracle to keep track of us,” Jed prophesises.

They hit their first real obstacle for the day, an almost dry channel with the remains of wet season mud still lingering in the bottom. Jed stops the vehicle to check it out and decides the approach and departure angles are too steep for the Landcruiser. He scouts along the channel and finds a better spot to cross. Driving up to the crossing and checking it again, he decides the approach angle is still too sharp. He pulls out his knife, a Mulay survival knife issued to Portugese Special Forces, and proceeds to chop away the edge of the channel with rapid, hard, downward strokes.

“Wouldn’t a pick or shovel be easier?” Alex asks wryly.

“There’s an entrenching tool in the back but by the time we get it out I can have this done,” he replies, denying the fact she has a point. “There, done!” he exclaims. He kicks away the loose soil and gives his work a satisfied inspection. “Now we won’t get hung up as we go over.” They climb back into the Landcruiser and ease it over the edge, down into the channel in low range and back up the other side at a slight angle to lessen the departure angle.

“You make it look easy,” she says with grudging respect.

“It is if you know what you’re doing,” he replies in a tone that implies he does know what he is doing. “Most times it’s just a matter of thinking things through and using some common sense. There’ll be more yet.”

She guesses he is right on that score as they continue lurching their way across the country. As predicted, the track peters out. They may have finally left the property but there is no way to tell. The rocky areas slow progress to a crawl and they have to pick their way gingerly over rocks to avoid puncturing a sidewall.

Alex has been quiet for a while. “Decker’s son is a little shit, evil!” she announces unexpectedly, in a bitter tone. She obviously wants to share more of her past. Perhaps it is the isolation loosening the stones of her fortress.

“I had ducks and ducklings once. I intended to keep the dogs in a pen for a while until they were trained and told that little shit not to let them out. He opened the gate and they tore them to shreds. Not the dog’s fault, they were natural hunters. He did it deliberately just to see what would happen. I found him laughing, enjoying the spectacle, even stomping on one of the ducklings himself. I grabbed him and could have killed him but his father came back. Jesse told Decker and watched as he gave me a good beating in return, laughing and egging him on. Bastards, both!”

Jed is horrified but doesn’t say anything. He can’t imagine the spectacle.

She continues, as if wanting to spit out something held inside for a long time. “All this happened over a period of only a few months, once I decided to get him out of my life. I was breaking away and knew he was going to kill me. His own mother even warned me. The police couldn’t do anything as he hadn’t yet committed a crime that could be proven.”

They come to another channel crossing, this one wider, muddier and trickier. Jed repeats the crossing procedure, finding a way across further along. This time when he takes the lip off both sides of the bank, he uses the entrenching tool.

Alex notices the change from the knife. While she doesn’t say anything, she notes that he seems prepared to listen to a suggestion.
A good point
, she allows.

Once they get moving again, she continues to relive the past. “It got to the stage where he was even more psycho. I went out one night and when I came back he abused me, threw me down on the ground, pulled off my shoe and smashed my big toe with a hammer. I wanted to scream with the pain but didn’t give him the satisfaction, so he smashed the rest as well. To make sure I stayed at home and didn’t go out without him, he said.”

Jed is stunned, but keeps silent. Now he can understand the damage to her right foot. He concentrates on easing the Landcruiser through the scrub while Alex unloads. “That cop I mentioned, I was a bit harsh on him. He was the only one who believed me but had his own problems and overstepped the mark. He wanted what I couldn’t give. At least he tried to get some surveillance going. Decker came to my place one night and threatened to kill my horses if I went to the police. I got out of the house and he took shots at me but I hid in the bush. He was only a few steps away from me one time when he was searching but I lay quiet until he left. Once the anger left him, it wasn’t quite so bad. I lasted the night in the bush, but I decided to kill him and contacted Chelavenki.”

Here it comes,
Jed thinks.
The connection!

“He got me a .308, Remington, semi-automatic, with a big scope,” Alex spits out. “I heard him drive in one night and was going to shoot him as he came in the door and then put two in the ceiling just like David, the cop, told me to do. But I heard two doors slam and knew he had brought someone with him so I ran.”

They keep crawling slowly across the landscape. Its challenges have slowed them to an average of less than ten kilometres in the hour. They are travelling through red, rocky jump-up country and scattered woodland spread across savannah grassland with a hint of the dull-green swamp to come on the horizon as they crest the slight ridges. It is a landscape that opens the soul and Alex has succumbed to its subtle influence.

Jed keeps his comments to a minimum but can’t help himself. “The Remington, did it have a detachable magazine, a short barrel and a safety button near the trigger?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“A Remington Woodsmaster carbine, probably with a four-power scope,” he replies, imagining her standing with that ready to kill Decker. “A nice rifle, used to have one,” he finishes in a non-judgemental tone. So that’s what Chelavenki supplied her with! He certainly had the contacts to do that anywhere in the world.

“It gave me comfort at night at least. I would have used it too. In the end I tried the courts but he just ignored the restraining order. He would break in any time he liked and take what he wanted. He was after the tapes when he made threats over the phone. He can be clever, but he should have thought that making threats to an answering machine would leave a record. I used to replace the tape with an empty one just in case.”

Jed is building up a picture involving a clash between two strong personalities, one a sociopath and the other… He can’t put a label on it.
What is the term for someone with high intelligence and extreme intuitiveness? Eccentric?
As she slips back into reflective silence, he dredges deep into his memory. He recalls that eccentricity is the outward expression of unique  creativity. It stems from a mind so original it doesn’t conform to societal norms. Many of history’s most brilliant minds displayed unusual behaviors and habits. Eccentrics are non-conforming and idealistic with intense curiosity. They are highly intelligent and know from an early age they are different from others. They can be opinionated and outspoken, with strong moral obligations and a mischievous sense of humor. He looks across at Alex and decides the description fits pretty well.

“Finally I went to court again. Accused him of assaulting me, but in fact I scratched and bashed myself up against a stone wall after dousing my body with kerosene. I paid someone to testify he wasn’t where he said he was and he went to jail. The judge, would you believe, said I was the only credible witness in the court when I was lying and he was telling the truth! Every time I told the truth I couldn’t get justice. When I lied I got what I needed!”

Jed can imagine her inner turmoil. Alex would always have been a law-abiding member of the community, for whom honesty and protection by law is a normal expectation of living. It would have clashed with the strong moral sense of the eccentric, but survival is a stronger driving force. He also starts to understand what is driving Decker. It has to be a long pent-up desire for vengeance. A sociopath will never accept responsibility for his own behaviour. His hate and desire for revenge will be directed at the most convenient target to blame.

Alex ceases talking and Jed has the sense not to break the silence. They pick their way across country and on one of the slight rises he stops to admire the view, three hundred and sixty degrees of wilderness with no sign of civilisation.

“It’s wonderful being here,” says Alex. “Deciding to find Karl’s plane has dragged me out of a secure but entrenched lifestyle.”

“Agree with that,” he responds. He wants to say, ‘Agree with that, baby,’ but his last slip has warned him off that. He scans the horizon all the way round. Behind them he sees dust rising into the air; it could only come from a vehicle. “Take a look at that,” pointing in the direction of the dust on the horizon.

Alex searches for what he is pointing at and studies the dust cloud. “Someone else is out here,” she notes with disappointment. “Just when I hoped we were alone.”

“Could be station hands or tourists,” Jed responds thoughtfully. “Let’s get moving and make use of the remaining time.” They climb back into the Landcruiser and keep heading into the wilderness. They both wonder who is out there behind them.