by Ashley Capes
“No, it doesn’t.” Was she the talk of the whole town?
“Well don’t worry, it’ll get sorted.”
“Yeah?”
“Yep. Karma and that.”
She had to smile. “Hope it gets its butt into gear then.”
Trees rose up around the road as they headed out of town, bypassing Swallow’s Road and closing in on homes with a bit of land. Not quite on tank water, but far enough out that it would have been peaceful year round.
The Drummond property was a big mud brick place set off the road and obscured by scattered gums. A winding driveway led to a miniature roundabout that hugged the big owl sculpture in the centre of a rose patch. The sun flashed off mirrors spread across the mosaic bird as she and Dave approached the front door. Currawongs chatted in the trees above.
She pressed the bell and stood back.
“What if he’s not here?” Dave asked, stretching his arms behind his head.
“I rang his phone before picking you up and there was no answer. Maybe his mum will know.”
“Press it again,” Dave said.
“Give them a minute.”
“Nah, let ‘em know we’re in a hurry.” He leant in and jabbed the bell.
The door opened.
Ben stood in the arch, a deep frown on his face. Unshaven, his hair was a mess and he wore ripped jeans, a black Bonds shirt but no shoes. The jeans had a red stain at the cuff, as if he’d cut his leg. “What do you want?” He folded his arms over his chest. His nails were coated in dirt.
“To speak to you. It’s important,” she said.
“Oh? Now it’s important. That’s hilarious.” He glanced at Dave, who was grinning at the taller man. “And what the hell are you smiling at, Clarke?”
“Just thinking about that time I beat you up in high school,” Dave said.
Ben spat into a nearby pot plant. “Want to try again?”
“Any time you’re up for a challenge, mate – but it’s not like picking on women, just so you know. Maybe you better hit the weights first? I can come back.”
Ben snarled, his face flushed.
“Stop it,” Lisa shouted. It was nice to have Dave along but damn he was relentless with his shit-stirring. Not that Ben didn’t deserve it.
Dave raised his hands and Ben exhaled through his nose. “Fine. What do you want?”
“I want to warn you. This stuff that’s happening, it’s getting worse. You know what happened to Steve and James?”
His eyes narrowed. “I heard.”
“Who’s to say you’re not next?” she asked. “Maybe you should take a holiday or something.”
“Worried that Detective McConnell will pin it on you if something happens to me?”
“Just be careful.” No way was she going to let him draw her out on that one.
“Maybe I should get a new rifle for protection?” A faint smile crossed his lips.
“What?”
Dave put a hand on her shoulder. “Let’s go. He’s had his warning.”
Lisa stared at Ben. Had there been emphasis on the word ‘rifle’ or did she imagine it?
“Goodbye, Lisa.” Ben closed the door, giving it a shove when it popped back open. The click of a lock followed.
Lisa let Dave pull her to the Holden but once inside, she didn’t start the car right away. She fiddled with the keys, staring up at the house. Why did he have to keep stirring her up? Such a prick. And did he even care that two of his friends had died?
“Let’s go,” Dave said. “My customers will wither and die without me.”
She shook her head as she fired the engine and pulled around the owl sculpture. “He didn’t seem worried, did he?”
“Arrogant prick, that’s why.”
“Maybe.” Could it be that simple?
“Should’ve let me flatten him for ya. After all the shit he put you through.”
“Let’s just go.”
At the bottom of the drive she paused. McConnell lurked within his silver sedan, but made no move to follow when she turned back toward town. She thanked Dave and dropped him off before heading to her first job – only Mrs Ascot tittered on her way out of the front door, making an excuse about things being ‘a bit tight this week’ and rushing down the driveway, nearly jerking her son’s arm out of its socket as she did.
Lisa frowned after the car. “Nice to have the benefit of the doubt.”
The rest of the day’s work passed without any more last-minute cancellations. Before heading back to Dad’s, where she’d finally relieve Rhonda, she checked on her place. The afternoon sun streaked across the front garden, colouring the leaves into orange flames.
No-one seemed to have been inside and there were no animal corpses in the backyard. She watered the plants – even the agapanthus appeared unhappy – then wheeled the bins down to the driveway and wrangled them onto the nature-strip and stood back.
Would Ben survive whatever was happening? Would he come after her again? So much for getting answers; so much for taking matters into her own hands. She was still in limbo, with McConnell on her case, Ben menacing, the mystery of the white roo unsolved and Dad in trouble.
What now? Mum would have rolled up her sleeves.
“Me too, then.”
She’d make sure Dad was okay and she’d keep going. What else was there to do?
Chapter 19.
Two blocks from Ronald Street, Lisa slammed on her brakes.
A car beeped its horn behind her but she ignored it.
The white kangaroo stood on its hind legs in the middle of a zebra crossing, staring right at her. An ear twitched as it watched.
Two kids rushed up to the crossing and paused, glancing at her car before charging directly through the kangaroo. She blinked. Once they’d crossed, they continued up the street without a backwards glance. The kangaroo began to dissolve – reappearing at the end of the block beside a pair of elms.
Another blast from a horn.
In her mirror, a woman was waving her arms from inside her Jeep. Lisa motioned for the driver to go around. She ignored the shout as the woman roared by.
A spirit? The roo had been flesh and fur on her last visit, what had changed? Lisa closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them, the roo was still there. She eased her foot onto the accelerator and the car crept forward. At the end of the block, near the park, the roo dissolved again only to reappear further along, this time beside a squat red post box sheltering beneath a row of spiky bottlebrush. Her pulse quickened; it wanted her to follow. She trailed it to the edge of town before pulling off the road – Dad. She grabbed her mobile and rang Rhonda.
“Hi Rhonda, it’s Lisa. How is he?”
“A bit agitated because he can’t remember his TAB account number but other than that he’s fine.”
“Good. I know it.” She gave the number while keeping an eye on the roo where it waited on the road. A removalist truck passed through the pale animal. “I’m sorry to ask at such late notice, but I’m in a bind and I can’t get home yet. Any chance you could stay longer?”
“I can but I’ll have to charge you a fair bit for the honour.”
Damn. But she couldn’t lose the kangaroo; not now. And ringing someone else might take time and Rhonda was already there. “I understand. And thank you; I might be a few hours.”
“No problem.”
“Thanks.” She hung up and resumed her hopscotch-like chase. The further out of town Lisa drove, the longer the gaps between appearances. Swallow’s Road twisted and she lost sight of the roo, but around the next bend and there she was, sometimes turning to hop into nothingness and sometimes just standing motionless before dissolving into the wall of bark and leaves.
When the roo appeared at Anne’s Lane, the turn for Pumps’ farm, Lisa slowed. Where was the white kang
aroo going? There was nothing at his house, surely. She bumped up the gravel road and crunched to a stop before the farmhouse.
The roo stood by the still-unfinished fence.
Lisa grabbed her phone then opened the glove box, scrambling around for the Maglite – if she was going to end up in the bush alone in the dark, it’d be nice to have the kind of torch that was heavy enough to double as a weapon. Just in case.
“Where are we going?” she asked the kangaroo as she approached.
It faded away.
Not much of an answer. She slipped around the fencepost and climbed through the undergrowth, coming across the same trail she’d found when Pumps first called. She followed it deeper. All around, stripes of dying light coloured the bush – bark blushed a pinkish orange while the ground lay heavy with new shadow.
But the kangaroo appeared in the distance, towering over a fallen log. She slipped between two messmate onto another path, trailing the kangaroo into the darker parts of the bush. Light faded but she didn’t need the torch yet; climbing over the log, whose colour had been leeched to grey, a clearing stretched before her.
Grass and weeds spread across the open space, lit by the last of the sun.
The roo stood in the centre in a patch of bracken, scratching at the ground.
Lisa moved closer, feet crunching twigs. The kangaroo disappeared before she reached the point where the ground should have been torn – but the earth was undisturbed. The kangaroo was a white sliver between distant trees.
“Where are we going?”
Lisa walked on, torch in hand. At one point she paused to wipe her brow and temples. The evening was barely cooler than midday and the longer she walked the further behind the farm fell. Could she find her way back? She had the Maglite at least.
By the time she neared the roo for what had to have been the tenth time, it was dark enough that she had to choose her steps carefully. The kangaroo had become a grey smudge. It had stood on the edge of another path – only when she reached the spot where it disappeared did she find a broader way, not a narrow animal trail. The dirt was looser, almost a silken grey in places. Few weeds grew across it and she nodded to herself when a smooth bump appeared in the road – a ramp or a ‘jump’ as she used to call it as a kid.
Not that she was a great rider or anything, but it was clearly man-made.
A dirt bike trail; the Dump Track it used to be called, named for its proximity to an old illegal rubbish tip.
The kangaroo hopped along, pausing frequently to check Lisa was following. She clicked the torch on and continued. The beam cut through the shadows and when it passed over the kangaroo dark holes appeared – revealing the bush beyond.
It kept hopping and still Lisa found herself unable to close the distance but she never lost the roo either. The Dump Track wound through the bush, sometimes veering off into secondary paths – one of which the white kangaroo chose.
When she reached the fork the kangaroo was gone.
Lisa let her torch range ahead. The trail curved around a dense stand of trees, eventually rejoining the original road. Lisa paused, running the torch across the huddled trunks, peering between them. No sign of the roo.
“Where are you?” she called.
Was she supposed to go on? She took a few steps forward then stopped. The whole time the kangaroo – or its spirit – led her, it made sure she didn’t fall behind. What had changed?
Maybe the side path was the way.
She moved along her back trail, torch beam crawling over tree trunks and dirt. Only her own footprints until...another branch to the path – driving into the trees and half-concealed by a build-up of dirt, weeds and saplings.
There was the smell of dead animal to the air.
A chill crossed her shoulders, like icy fingers against her skin. Something was wrong. Had Ben been here? She wheeled on the bush. Was he here now? No. Only shadow between the leaves. Shit. Maybe she’d made a mistake, coming alone. Chasing a spectre.
Lisa turned back to the path, squinting past the beam of light.
Something red lay beyond the screen of branches. She moved closer and pushed through. A small path led to a red door set into the earth, which looked to have half-buried a shelter. Trees and brush grew thick on the sides and over the top of the door. Weeds hung like an errant fringe.
Her grip on the torch tightened as she reached out to run her fingers across the bolts in the steel door – even they were covered beneath the heavy red paint. Bright, like a fire truck. Faint words crossed the surface but none were legible. Was it a fire shelter? A bomb shelter from the war? Unless...no, Dad had told her about an old depot for storing dynamite, once used for road construction. Is this what the kangaroo wanted her to find? What waited inside?
There was no handle on the door, only a pair of holes, one set above the other and she had no key.
Lisa stepped closer, running the torch along the edges. It was ajar. She cinched the Mag beneath her arm and dragged the door open with a grunt. Darkness and the scent of animal. And death. She moved deeper into the shelter, feet shifting over the sandy floor, torchlight forging ahead. A large shape rested at the limit of the light, where the shelter opened. Lisa’s steps faltered when she neared.
White fur.
Sand flew as she ran forward, collapsing by the head; the kangaroo lay on the floor, its neck twisted. “No.” The roo’s dark eyes were open. A trail of blood had trickled from beneath the body, eaten up by the sand. There was no breath in her chest. The stillness of the shelter was heavy; Lisa’s shoulders slumped.
“You bastard, Ben.” Somehow, it was Ben. He was the man with the rifle, he was the one who’d shot the giant white kangaroo. She couldn’t prove it but that didn’t matter. His grin, when he mentioned ‘rifle’ at the house. It was him. Had to be.
Her fist ached where she gripped the torch. How dare he? He’d murdered the most beautiful animal she’d ever seen. A gentle creature – maybe even ancient, sacred. And now she was gone, smothered in the dark, her life wasted by that fucking bastard!
Lisa drew in a shuddering breath.
“Damn you.” Anger wasn’t enough; it didn’t help anyone. Wouldn’t change what had happened. And yet, the smouldering rage burned tears away. She drew out her pouch of salt and sprinkled it over the body, then added some more – everything she had, shaking the little bag over the fur.
“Watch over her.”
But who would watch over the white roo? Maybe the white kangaroo was the one Lisa had been praying to in the past, the one who’d watched over all the other animals. A moment of quiet would be fitting. Of darkness too. She flicked the torch off, leaving only her breathing.
A pale glow.
Was the torch broken? No – the glow came from the roo’s head. Lisa leant down. Light flickered in one of the roo’s eyes, resolving into the image of a brilliant owl, blinding white. The eye blinked. Now running water rushing over sand and smooth rocks, its clarity gradually being overtaken with blackened leaves and ash. Another blink. When the dark eye reopened, the Wildlife ute sat in a clearing. A dark shape slammed into it, appearing from nowhere. The ute tipped but didn’t fall, wheels stirring dust when it thumped down again. Two figures sat inside, waving their arms.
One more blink and now the eye revealed a paintbrush.
And then only a soft dark.
Chapter 20.
On the way back her phone beeped. A voice message – shit, was it Dad? Reception was patchy. She crashed through the last of the bracken, boots scraping across the gravel driveway, torch beam wild, and leapt into the Holden.
Rhonda. Dad was in hospital again.
Lisa jammed the key into the ignition and stomped on the pedal, tearing down Pumps’ drive, scorching the night as she flew along the black highway.
By the time she reached Yarsdale Hospital visiting hours were far beyond o
ver. But at the dim-lit nurses station one of the women let her look in on him, once again propped up on white pillows, his face calm as he slept to the blip of the heart monitor. It seemed strong enough.
On the way to the hospital, ghostly trees and reflectors flashing by on the roadside, she’d played Rhonda’s message half a dozen times. He’d collapsed in the bedroom. Rhonda had heard, and when she couldn’t wake him, had the ambulance on the way in seconds. That was all Rhonda knew. “You’re welcome to call me if you need to, dear,” her message said. Lisa had wanted to thank her, but there was time for that later. And better to let Rhonda rest; she’d given up a lot already.
Lisa turned back to the nurse who stood beside her in the darkened hospital. “But you don’t know what’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry, Miss Thomas. It could be a lot of things – even a reaction to the medication we’re giving him. We’re waiting on test results. There’s nothing you can do tonight.”
“Okay.” She stared at a novelty pen on the desk. It had a stupid, gleeful face. “I guess I’ll go home.”
“We’ll call you in the morning.” The short woman paused, then reached out to pat Lisa’s hand. “You look pretty stuffed. Did you want to take a powernap before you leave?”
“Maybe some coffee?”
“I got lots of that.”
Much later it seemed, she was climbing into her own bed after having locked up and checked the house twice, forcing herself to be sure about the doors and windows. And now there was only the pillow and the cool sheets, the ‘underneath everything else’ hum of the air-conditioner.
*
Lisa rolled onto her back and stretched like a starfish.
The sun was out there somewhere, but it didn’t matter yet. Just for a moment, she could lie still and not have to get up to help anyone.
Dad.
She groaned. “Oh God.” What kind of daughter was she? To enjoy the thought that – even if only for a little while – he was under someone else’s care. And maybe it was the best place for him, but just as likely; maybe not. She’d sure as shit never decide lying in bed.
