by Graham Guy
McLoughlin started to follow Katie inside and stopped. He looked around himself and cast his arm in an outward gesture. “All this, Katie? This is all you two?”
“It’s been a lot of work,” she answered.
“It’s absolutely stunning.” Then, “The girl on the horse… your daughter?”
“She was Lorry’s little girl. You remember the young woman who worked for me at the club? She was shot by that animal, Slick, or Scarfe, or whatever his name was. Gabe and I decided to adopt her. Actually, there’s someone else here you may remember too. Kazumi, our chef. One second.” Katie hurried inside the front door. “Kazumi… Kazumi,” she called.
Moments later the woman from Hong Kong appeared at Katie’s side.
“Of course,” McLoughlin answered.
“Do you remember Sergeant McLoughlin, Kazumi?”
The woman’s face lit up.
“Yes, yes,” she gushed. “Sergeant Ken, yes?”
“Close enough,” McLoughlin chortled.
“Our Sergeant Ken will be having tea with us tonight Kazumi. Will that be all right?”
Kazumi looked at Katie with the eyes of a child hero-worshipping its idol. “Oh yes, Miss Katie, yes, yes. You Sergeant Ken. You like something special, yes?”
McLoughlin glanced at Katie.
“Don’t look at me,” she laughed.
McLoughlin felt a little embarrassed. He turned his hands out. “Hell, I’m just happy with a cup of tea and a biscuit,” he replied.
Kazumi smiled. “Then you get very special cup of tea and biscuit, yes? Sergeant Ken, Miss Katie. He very special man. He save us all, yes?”
“Now hang on a minute… !” McLoughlin interrupted.
“That’s the truth,” Katie said. “Without you, none of us would be here.”
McLoughlin was most grateful for the sound of an approaching motor vehicle. He turned to see a tractor making good speed towards the homestead. As it approached, Emma was only metres away on her horse when suddenly McLoughlin heard a booming voice over the top of the engine.
“McLoughlin… Jesus Christ! Is that really you? Bloody McLoughlin!”
Gabe bounced off the tractor and raced over to McLoughlin, grabbing him in a massive bear-hug. The vigour of the greeting took McLoughlin completely by surprise. Letting him go, he thrust out his hand. “Oh mate, Jesus, what a bloody thrill it is to see you.”
“G’day Gabe,” McLoughlin answered. “Been a while hasn’t it? Who’s this bloke?” he asked, referring to the dog standing by Gabe’s side.
“Maaate. Me pride and joy. Say g’day to Ken, old son,” he said, stroking his head. “This is Joker. Bit long in the tooth now, but he’s still a good dog. Hey, but what about you? It’s been seven years, mate… and we’ve got you to thank for every single one of them, haven’t we boy?” he said, still stroking Joker’s head.
“No, Gabe come on…”
“No, you come on! If you hadn’t fired that shot… !”
“Yes, but it was you who got the both of you out of there,” McLoughlin protested.
“Mate, he was about to blow me brains out. Then he’d have got Katie as well. As it was, he bloody near did anyway.” He looked squarely into McLoughlin’s eyes. “Not a day goes by, I kid you not, without you crossing my mind.”
McLoughlin shook his head in disbelief.
“Might have been another day at the office for someone like you, but not for us.” Gabe felt into his pocket and threw an object at McLoughlin. “Remember this?”
McLoughlin caught the object and looked at it. It was the shell of the round he had fired which had taken out the shoulder and gun arm of Slick Bennedict. It was the .416 Remington Magnum. The elephant gun.
“Well I’ll be buggered!”
“Carry it in me pocket every day,” Gabe told him. “Don’t I, Katie?”
She nodded in agreement. “That he does, Ken, that he does.”
“Anyway, enough of that. How the hell are you?” Gabe went on.
“Oh, you know. The good guys we let go. The bad guys? Some we catch. Some we don’t. But what about you two? Hell, I don’t believe all this. Take me through the last seven years.”
“You staying for tea?”
“Kazumi’s already seen to that,” Katie smiled.
“Fantastic. Come in mate, come in and have a… what do you want?… a beer? a coke?… cup of tea, coffee?”
“I’m easy.”
“Bugger it, we’ll have a beer. Don’t normally drink in the middle of the day, but I reckon now you’re here, might call it a day. Emma, put the tractor in the shed for dad will you please, then come back here and sit with us.” He turned back to McLoughlin. “Jesus, it’s good to see you. You ever get married? I seem to recall you were single back then.”
“Gabe!” Katie scolded.
“Well a man’s gotta know these things.”
McLoughlin shook his head. “Not for me I guess, Gabe. And you two?”
“Coming up six and a half years next month and just look at her, Ken. Jesus, I get all choked up just watching her…”
“Oh Gabe, stop it,” Katie blushed.
Gabe held out one big arm and Katie went to him. As she sat on his lap, a tear rolled down his cheek. “Mate, what this woman has done for me and other folks round here, you couldn’t put a value on. She built this place. Took in Emma and Kazumi. Mrs Cropp. You met her yet?” his voice lifting.
McLoughlin shook his head.
“Oh Christ, you gotta meet Aunty Betsy…”
“I’ll go and get her,” Katie said, already halfway to the door.
“She’s still absolutely stunning, Gabe,” McLoughlin said of Katie as she left the room.
“Mate, I get a lump in me throat just looking at her.”
“You’re a very lucky man.”
Gabe turned as he heard a door open. “Hello, baby girl,” he said softly, “Look who’s come to see us.”
McLoughlin looked curiously at the little girl in the doorway wiping sleep from her eyes.
Gabe noticed McLoughlin’s inquiring look. “You don’t know about her?”
He shook his head.
“Come here, baby… this is Natasha Jane… you tell the man you’ll be five next month, won’t you sweetheart?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a prettier child,” McLoughlin said, as he watched the little girl climb onto her father’s lap.
“Yeah, well she’s our pride and joy. I never thought I would ever have a child. Katie said, ‘Let’s go for it’, so we did. Hell of an imposition to put on a man wasn’t it?” he announced, gleaming with pride.
Both men looked towards the kitchen door as they heard the sound of approaching voices. Gabe stood Natasha up and rose to his feet. “Aunty Betsy, have we got someone special for you to meet!”
McLoughlin lifted himself out of his chair and watched a very aged woman enter the kitchen. She’d have to be pushing ninety, he thought.
Katie, with her arm through the old lady’s to lend her support, took over.
“Aunty Betsy, this is Mr McLoughlin, the policeman who saved our lives at the club that time… Ken, this is Mrs Cropp.”
He stepped forward and held out his hand.
Mrs Cropp never took her eyes off him. She grasped his hand firmly and put the other up to his face. “Thank you,” she said gently. “Thank you for saving the two most precious things I have in my life.”
“I’m just ever so pleased it’s all worked out for them,” he answered.
“Have you got the man a drink, Gabe?” Mrs Cropp added firmly.
“Oh shit!” he exclaimed. “Bloody forgot all about it,” he answered, hurrying off to the refrigerator.
“You’ll have noticed that my boy hasn’t cleaned his language up, Mr McLoughlin…”
“Ken, ma’am.”
“Oh, all right, Ken it is.”
Gabe put some cans of beer on the table and sat down. When he looked up, Mrs Cropp was glaring at him. “What the hell h
ave I done now?” he squawked.
“Nothing for the girls?” she asked.
“Oh Jesus! Grab the cordial for Aunty and your mother, will you Emma!”
“I don’t want cordial… and neither does your wife! Emma! The sherry darling, It’s on the sideboard in the lounge.”
Katie poured the drinks and a great deal of small talk followed. Finally Katie, seeing McLoughlin might be a little confused with the chopping and changing of subjects, looked at Gabe. “Darling, I think we should go back to the last time we saw Ken and give him the sequence of events.”
“Yeah, fair enough,” Gabe chuckled. “OK. After Oakdale, it took a while for Katie to get better. While she was recuperating, I asked her to marry me and, god bless her little cotton socks, she said yes. The wedding was in Naracoorte six months later. For a wedding present, Aunty Betsy gave us her farm. Aunty Betsy in effect brought me up. My mother died when I was young. A bit later, the old man. So it was pretty much Aunty Betsy I turned to. I never went off the place for years. Then, of course, Katie went arse-up near where you turned in. I pulled her out of the wreck. She survived OK… and all that came about after she tragically lost the man in her life in a plane smash. His name was Paul Redman. He owned the Oakdale Country Club in Mildura. He left it to her in his will. Then came that stalking crap with that mongrel and Lorry Downs. After the showdown, Katie and I decided to adopt Emma plus still keep a home for Kazumi. Then, out of the blue, Natasha came along, and here we are.
“At first Katie wanted to rebuild the club but, as time went on, her heart went out of it so, despite great protests from me, she decided to put a lot of the insurance money into this place. The little complex on the end of the triple garage is where Aunty Betsy lives. That great big chestnut-coloured bag of bones in her stable is her pet Clydesdale. She calls him Stanley and I reckon by now he’d be pushing twenty-four or 25. Poor old bastard. I’ve got the glue makers coming out to have a look at him next week.”
“Dad, you have not!” Emma protested loudly. “Gabe!” Katie scolded.
“It’s all right dear. God will get him for that,” the old lady smiled.
With a big grin on his face, Gabe went on. “Kazumi has her own unit at the rear. Emma took a bit of shine to Andalusians, so Katie took her off to Austria last year and came home with two stallions and four mares. She seems to think she wants to make them her life, so we’ll see. She bloody better! After writing out the cheque for that little lot, we nearly all had a haemorrhage. So there you go. Katie asked me one day, in an off-handed sort of way, what sort of house I would like, so I said one of those great big rambling homesteads. Christ, I was only jokin’! That little joint next door is where I lived all my life. I was quite happy to stay there. Next thing I know, in roll the semis and up goes this place.” He raised his glass. “But without you, mate, none of this would have been possible. So from all of us… thank you. Thank you very much.”
Everyone raised their glass and more chatter took place.
Gabe then eased himself out of his chair. “Come on Ken, Katie and I will show you round the place. You want to come Aunty Betsy?”
“Oh, I think I’ve seen it all before. I might just make my exit if that’s all right with everyone…”
The three of them headed outside and watched as Emma cantered off on her stallion. “Any problems?” McLoughlin asked of the girl.
“By gee, at first,” Katie began, “we didn’t know what we were in for. She’d been brutalised beyond human comprehension…”
“Her hands wasn’t it?” McLoughlin put in.
“Yeah! That bastard Bennedict pressed them onto a hot plate,” Gabe told him, his face and neck flushing in anger at the thought.
“But we’ve been very lucky in that regard,” continued Katie. “We found a very clever plastic surgeon and over a period of years, he was able to restore them almost to what they were. She’s come through it OK. At first we were fearful she may not be able to control the reins of a horse, but she manages just fine. When we first got her home with us… goodness me, we copped the lot. She had nightmares over what that guy did to her mother. But slowly, slowly, we both gave her more love than she knew what to do with. So did Kazumi. And Aunty Betsy. By gee, that grand old lady is a rock.” She sighed. “Don’t know what this place will be like when she goes. But she really took to Emma… and Emma to her. But the big thing was in getting her to call us mum and dad.”
Gabe continued. “We went to this professional, that professional. All had their own text-book ideas until, finally, Katie said, why don’t we just ask the child? Leave it up to her to decide.”
Katie took over. “So we all sat round the kitchen table. She would have been about six then and we simply asked the question. She never hesitated. Well you could’ve knocked us over with a feather. And it’s been mum and dad ever since. Simple as that.”
“Incredible,” McLoughlin commented.
As they continued to walk, McLoughlin was revelling in the country air and the laid-back approach to things. He enjoyed seeing all the farm machinery, the sheds, the chooks, the sheep, the cattle, the cats, the dogs, the prized Andalusians.
“And this is Stanley,” Katie said, reaching through the railing of the Clydesdale’s fence to stroke his nose.
“Bit of a toss up who’ll go first,” Gabe said. “Somehow I don’t reckon one will be far behind the other.”
McLoughlin laughed lightly. “What’s that?” he asked, aiming his eyeline at the massive structure he recalled on the drive in.
“That’s the shearing shed. Put the bugger up last year. Four stand. Ever been in one?”
McLoughlin shook his head.
“Then it’s about bloody time you were given an education.”
For the next few minutes McLoughlin was taken through the basics in combs and cutters, catching pens, wool tables, wool packs, the wool press, grinders, the hand piece, branding stencils and holding yards.
“It’s certainly a long way from murders, kidnaps and sieges,” he commented.
“Just on that,” Gabe went on, “what brings you down this way?”
“Oh, just on my way to Robe for a bit of fishing for a few days, then I have to collect my partner in Mildura and head off to Sydney.”
“Big job?” Katie asked.
McLoughlin nodded. “Real big.”
“What… a gang, a murder… or can’t you say?” Gabe asked.
“Yes I can say… sort of. It’s really the pursuit of one man.”
“Sort of like a Bennedict?”
“Different scenario. But a bad bugger, nonetheless.”
“Why do you do it?” Katie asked him.
“Someone has to, I guess,” he told her.
“Are we to take it you’ve been summoned?” asked Gabe.
McLoughlin just smiled his reply.
“You are obviously very good at what you do, Sergeant McLoughlin,” Katie added.
“We both know the answer to that don’t we sweetheart? And I’d say on that note, that’s about all the good Sergeant has to say on the matter… am I right Sergeant?”
McLoughlin just shrugged.
“Can you come and see us again?” Katie urged.
He stopped in his stride. “You two will never know what a thrill it’s been for me to be here today. Your graciousness. Your hospitality. Hell, you don’t know me and yet you’ve taken me in as one of the family…”
“Don’t you understand, Ken,” Katie pleaded, “you saved our lives. Of course we’re going to take you in as family. You didn’t know us either when you fired that shot…”
“That was the job…”
“Bullshit!” Gabe said. “That was beyond the job. You didn’t have to call for the elephant gun! And I’ll just bet the shit hit the fan over that little lot. You probably won’t tell us. Well that’s fine. But we want you to know that as far as we’re concerned, we are forever indebted to you…”
* * *
Unbeknown to McLoughlin, Katie had Ka
zumi make up one of the guest rooms that evening.
“Sergeant Ken. He staying tonight. Yes?”
Katie told her he would be, then took a second glance at this woman from Hong Kong. She noticed a particular glint in her eye. “Oh, really, Kazumi? He’s single, too!”
“I not know what you mean,” she giggled.
“You know what I mean, all right.”
Kazumi was about to walk away when Katie called her back. “There’ll also be an extra guest at dinner tonight,” she told her.
“Yes, yes, Mrs Cropp. She come. I know. OK. OK.”
“No. Other than Mrs Cropp.”
“Oh?”
“You, Kazumi. You will join us at dinner tonight. I think I might just put you right next to Sergeant Ken… yes?”
“Oh no, Miss Katie… who get dinner then?”
“I think you’ll be able to manage,” she told her.
“You bad girl, Miss Katie.”
“Now remember. No men in your room after midnight.”
“Oh, Miss Katie!”
Katie walked away laughing to herself. She found the two men sharing another cold beer and found an excuse to call her husband aside. “I’ll tell Ken in a minute that we’d like him to stay tonigh. Is that all right?”
“Yeah, Jesus Christ, the bugger can live here for all I care.”
Gabe and Katie went back to join Ken McLoughlin.
“We’ve just taken a vote. You’re staying the night,” Gabe said.
“No, no, I can’t do that…” McLoughlin began to protest.
“Where were you going to stay?”
“Hell, I don’t know. A motel in town. I didn’t come here to impose. I just dropped in for a cup of tea…”
“Too late,” Katie said. “I’ve already told Kazumi to make up one of the guest rooms. Now please excuse me while I go and clean up a little. You coming Gabe?”
Ken McLoughlin wandered outside and over to the stables where Emma was grooming one of the Andalusians. He put a foot up on a rail. “Has he got a name?”
“This one’s Samson because he’s the stronger of the two. The other one is Prince because I reckon he looks a bit royal. And the mares are Queeny, Gypsy. She’s funny because she likes to just wander off. Mum’s favourite is that one over there,” she added, pointing to a particular Andalusian. “So we call her Katie. And the last one is Betsy, after Aunty Betsy. Aunty Betsy’s father used to have a team of Clydesdales, and two were called Queen and Gypsy. Aren’t they beautiful?”
