Pay Dirt (15 page)

* * * *

TWENTY-EIGHT

The
blood had begun to coagulate and flies were gathering but the body was still warm.
The fat driver looked less fat now that hed been shot and dumped in a roadside
ditch. Wyatt wondered why Venables had taken this route, why he had stopped,
why he had left the van.

He examined the tracks. Apart from
Venabless heel scrapes in the powdery dirt, there were two sets of tyre
tracks the Steelgard van and a narrower set belonging to a car. Both had
stopped here, something had happened, and both had gone on again.

Maybe they wouldnt be far ahead.
Wyatt started the utility again and put his foot down, the elderly suspension
complaining, the sump smacking against the hard-baked ruts in the road.

He got to the end and stopped. The
main road to Belcowie was empty. There was only a shot-up road sign warning of
the T-intersection and indicating that Belcowie was four kilometres to the
north, Goyder seventy to the south. He got out to see if he could read the
tracks. There werent any. Gravel had been spread around the junction, too
coarse to register tyre tracks. But something had been dragged across it
recently. Wyatt followed the scrape mark into the thick grass leading to a
strainer post in the fence on the left-hand corner paddock. Someone had dumped
a road-closed sign there. It was cruder than the ones Leah and Snyder had made.

He returned to the utility. The
intersection was on a slight rise. He could see Belcowie clearly, the wheat
silos glowing white, sunlight flashing on windscreens and rooftops.

He turned his head the other way.
South, he thought. Thats where theyll be.

He was about to head after them when
something about the scope and intensity of the flashing windscreens made him
pause and get out the field-glasses. At one point between the intersection and
Belcowie the road curved broadly to skirt a large limestone reef. Within a few
seconds he saw what the fuss was about. Four of the Brava Landcruisers were
pushing fast out of the town. He guessed there would be more like it setting
out from the other end of the town. Jorge was sending out search parties. His
men were volatile and wanted their wages.

Wyatt spun the utility around,
cursing himself. He should have thought of that, should have realised Steelgard
wouldnt be alone in wondering where the money had got to.

He threw the Holden into the bends
and over the bone-jarring ruts and holes of the track. He had to get out and
onto a main road before they squeezed him from both ends. If they saw him theyd
know the utility wasnt one of theirs. If they found Venabless body, theyd
assume hed done it. Theyd call each other on their CB radios and box him in.
Theyd call the cops. If they caught him they wouldnt find any money but theyd
find Snyder under the sleeping bags and plenty of evidence of a planned job.
Theyd find enough to put him away for life.

For a few seconds, when the track
was flat and smooth, Wyatt risked giving his attention to Snyders fancy radio.
It was turned low, still tuned to the monotonous Steelgard dispatcher. He
switched to the CB band and tuned it to the channel used by Brava.

Excited voices erupted in Spanish
and English. They knew each other, so no one was bothering with formalities.

Jorge said no heroics, wait for the
police.

Fuck that. By the time the cops get
here the bastardsll be long gone.

Maybe is no been robbed. Maybe is
lost, is no more gasoline in the tank. Maybe the radio he is broken.

So how come theres no sign of the
van? How come he changed his route?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Then a voice said, The chopper will
find them.

Wyatt went cold, remembering the
gasfields helicopter. Several times a month it flew geologists and engineers
down to confer with Jorge. If this was one of those times, it was probably
already in the air, starting a sweep of the area.

Plus theres an air ambulance
coming down from Port Augusta, the voice continued.

No worries, then, said another
voice. Well find the bastards in no time.

Half a dozen other voices agreed.

Wyatt pushed even harder along the
track, feeling the old chassis bottom out on the outcrops of stone. If they
spotted him from the air, he was finished. Theyd guide the land party in until
all his exits were closed. His only chance was to get to the farm, get the
Holden into one of the sheds, then escape on foot across country.

Meanwhile Leah deserved a better
chance. He called her. There was no answer. Perhaps she couldnt hear him. Shed
be kilometres away by now, probably well out of radio range. He called again,
waited, and called a third time.

He didnt try again. He felt the
strain of listening, the strain of driving one-handed along the tortuous track.

For just a few moments then he had a
clear view of the Vimy Ridge road. A lone Brava Landcruiser had braked beyond
the turn-off and was backing up to it.

There was only one way out of this.
Wyatt pulled up next to Venabless body and turned off the engine. Ejecting the
cartridges from Snyders pistol and using the butt as a hammer, he destroyed
the big radio. Then he opened both doors wide and shot the front tyres with his
own gun. He threw Snyders gun into the grass. He was still wearing latex
gloves so he wasnt worried about prints.

Part of the fence line along this
section of the track was a stone wall built by shepherds in the nineteenth
century. Flat stones the size of frying pans had been stacked chest-high for
several hundred metres. Here and there parts of the wall had collapsed. Wyatt
vaulted through a gap and got ready to wait, disturbing a tiny brown lizard.
The lizard flicked away in the space of an eye blink.

It wasnt much of a trap but it had
the element of confusiona stationary vehicle, both its doors open; a dead man
in the grass; the fake Brava paint job; the empty road under the spooked sky.

They werent taking any chances. He
watched as the Landcruiser approached slowly and stopped fifty metres short of
the Holden utility. There were two men aboard. They didnt get out but waited
there, the engine running. One of them was calling on the CB radio. Wyatt
recognised him. It was Carlos.

Half a minute later, Carlos got out
and cautiously walked towards the body and the stranded utility. He was.
carrying a heavy tyre iron. There were guns in the Brava camp, but they were
kept under lock and key in Jorges safe.

Wyatt watched Carlos circle the
Holden, look around apprehensively, his eyes passing over Wyatts hiding place,
and crouch next to the dead driver. He seemed to recoil in shock then, stepping
back from the body and signalling urgently to the other man.

Wyatt waited until they were both
standing there in the road, looking down at the glistening skull, their guard
down. He vaulted the wall again and took them at a run. They heard him and
turned around. Slowly their hands went up.

Carlos spoke first. They will catch
you, my friend. He gestured at the sky and spun the tip of his forefinger. The
aeroplane, he comes now.

The other man had red curly hair and
a sneering mouth. Mad bastard.

Shut up. The keys, Wyatt said.

In the ignition.

Wyatt nodded and began to back away
from them.

Wheres the fucking money?

Wyatt ignored them. When he was a
few metres away from the Landcruiser he turned and sprinted the rest of the
way. A minute later he was on the Vimy Ridge road again, just another mad Latin
adding to the confusion on the ground.

* * * *

TWENTY-NINE

They
were going crazy in the Brava camp. Eight of the pale blue Landcruisers with
the bull logo passed Wyatt in the first five minutes. They were being driven
carelessly and fastbut at least they werent stopping him to ask who he was.
He drove slouched over the wheel, lifting a finger as they passeda custom
which the Brava crews had adopted from the locals. It helped that he was
wearing the sunglasses and bright orange baseball cap left by Carlos on the
drivers seat, but what helped most was the high spirits in the Brava camp.
Wyatt was driving a Brava vehicle so they assumed he was caught up in it too.

But Wyatt knew that the disguise was
only good for another few minutes and wasnt good enough to get him past a
roadblock. Hed have to go to ground at the farm.

He was thinking it through when
headlights on an oncoming car flashed at him and a blue light started to pulse
on its roof. A policeman stepped into the middle of the road with his hand
raised, waving him down. Wyatt got ready. Slowing the Landcruiser, he slipped
his .38 out of his belt and onto the seat beside him, covering it with his
hand.

He pulled up twenty metres short of
the police car and left the engine running. He was about to put his foot down
but something told him to think twice about it. The cops expression was wrong.
He wasnt wary. He wasnt expecting trouble. If anything he was angry. Wyatt
wound down his window. Gday, he said.

Dont gday me. Do you arseholes
know what youre doing?

Sorry?

One of you blokes has already
rolled over. I nearly smashed head-on with another one. Youre buggerising
around inside an official crime scene. Piss off before I lock you up.

Sorry, just trying to help.

Go and do it somewhere else. If you
see any of your mates, pass it onanyone found farting around gets the book
thrown at him.

Sure, no worries, Wyatt said. He
lifted his foot off the clutch, nodded at the cop and pulled away.

Bloody cowboys, he heard the cop
say.

Wyatt watched him in the rearview
mirror. He saw him shake his head, climb into the patrol car, and pull away
fast, spinning tyres in the roadside gravel. The blue light faded in the dust
like a special effect.

No one else bothered Wyatt after
that. He came to the tin-hut corner a few minutes later, paused for half a
minute, and bounced his way towards the farm gate. He saw dust in the distance,
from all the excitement, but no vehicles were close enough to spot him. The
helicopter was several kilometres away, sweeping back and forth across the
valley. Eventually it would pass over the farmhouse, but now it was
concentrating the search around the turn-off.

Wyatt first began to doubt Leah when
he got to the implement shed and found the Suzuki there. The door was open, the
bike on its stand in the corner. The doubts werent specifiche just wanted to
know what she was doing there.

He drove the Brava Landcruiser into
the musty interior, switched off, and got out, holding the .38 loose at his
side. He didnt go into the house immediately. He closed the massive shed door
then waited outside it for a few minutes, testing the air, giving Leah a chance
to come out of the house. The helicopter was now a few degrees left of where it
had been. It was hovering, beginning to settle on the ground. Theyd found
Venables.

Wyatt turned and crossed the yard.
He needed only a minute to see that the house was empty. He searched the sheds.
Nothing. He told himself that shed got spooked by the helicopter and made a
run for it.

But it didnt feel right. And when
he found faint tyre marks on the track behind the property, the doubts set in
and wouldnt go away.

He went to the head of the driveway
to sweep the valley with his field-glasses. The helicopter had just completed a
sweep near the tin-hut corner. Beneath it the roads were dust-clogged.

The ground party was congregating.
Theyd be at the farmhouse soon, wondering if this was where the murderers had
got to.

* * * *

THIRTY

Wyatt
wheeled the Suzuki out of the shed. He could hear the flat
whump whump
of
the helicopter now. He shook the bike fuel sloshed in the tank. He climbed on,
pushed hard on the kick-start and accelerated across the yard. A minute later he
was on the track leading back into the ranges behind the farmhouse.

He had advantages on a bike. He
hoped theyd be enough. It was faster than walking and he could go where a car
couldnt go. The cops would be blocking the roads but they couldnt throw a
cordon over paddocks and creeks. That was what Wyatt was relying on. That and
speed.

He looked back over his shoulder
briefly, almost losing the bike in an erosion channel. The helicopter was
apparently closing in on the farm. Wyatt hoped theyd concentrate on the house
and sheds and not the hills behind it just yet. He was a small shape, dressed
in dull khaki overalls, but he knew it was movement that attracts attention
from the air, not shape, size or colour.

He righted the bike, his eyes
darting from the ground surface under his wheels to the shape of the land
ahead. He didnt want to tie himself to the track if he could save time by
heading across country. Using his eyes and his mental map, he began to plot his
route out of the hills. He knew what to avoidthe dry creekbeds with their
treacherous sand; stone reefs like stakes embedded in the wind-blasted
hillsides; foxholes and rusty fencing wire in the long grass.