She decided to take the initiative. ‘I guess you’ll want to get back to your boat?’
‘Seen enough of The White Witch to last me a lifetime.’
‘Well, I’ve got to get the children to bed.’
‘Not already Mum, it’s only eight-thirty,’ Nicole protested.
‘You need an early night.’ There was an uncharacteristic sternness in Jane’s voice. Nicole knew better than to argue further.
‘Jeeze, you’re pretty when you’re angry,’ slurred Tom. ‘Just carry on and put them to bed, don’t mind me.’
Jane stood up, went to the kitchen and grabbed another bottle of wine from the rack. ‘Here, take this with you,’ she said firmly, thrusting it towards him. ‘This is our family time now, we have a routine.’
He opened his mouth as if to argue the point, and didn’t take the bottle. ‘You’re welcome to join us for breakfast,’ Jane said. When he still didn’t move she walked to the patio door and opened it for him. He glanced at the children, then rose reluctantly from the sofa, walked to the door and snatched the bottle from her.
‘Good night,’ she said as he walked down the gangway towards his yacht. ‘We’ll call you for breakfast in the morning.’
He didn’t reply and Jane found herself shaking.
‘Why are you closing the curtains, Mummy?’ Zach asked.
‘To keep the warmth in,’ she lied. They had never once closed the curtains since they’d moved into the canal house. There’d been no need for privacy. Now there was, and Jane imagined Tom’s eyes following her as she moved around the house.
Despite having got rid of Tom, she was in no hurry to put the children to bed. She read to them, and only when they were falling asleep on the sofa did she take them to their room and tuck them into bed. As usual Snowy settled down in his basket at the foot of Nicole’s bed, and Misty on Zach’s bed.
Jane found the key to the patio door and locked it. She cursed the fact that the forced lock on the back door had never been mended. Then she went up to her bedroom, which looked out over the canal. Below she could see the dim cabin lights of The White Witch. Again she drew the curtains.
As Jane prepared for bed, Misty wandered in and jumped up on the bed beside her. Normally she would have shooed him away, but tonight she was pleased to have his company. It was two in the morning before she finally closed her book and turned out the light. Misty snuggled up and she could hear him purring contentedly beside her.
She woke in the dark, frightened. What was that noise? She opened her eyes. Moonlight was shining through the feature porthole window high in the wall above her bed and she could just make out Tom’s naked figure hovering over her. Her heartbeat, already racing, went into overdrive. She felt his hand clamp down over her mouth and the edge of a knife pressing against her throat. Despite the knife she kicked her legs and tried to force his body off her. She opened her mouth to yell but he spoke first out of the darkness: ‘Make one sound and I’ll kill you. I mean it, and I won’t stop with you. I’ll do the kids in as well.’
The threat against her children worked. She looked at him, wide-eyed with terror, as he eased the pressure of his hand on her mouth.
‘My brother and father will be back any time,’ she blurted.
‘You’re a liar. Your daughter’s birthday’s not for another two weeks. She told me when she was showing me her rabbits.’
Her mind was racing as fast as her heart. ‘There are barricades everywhere. They said if it was too difficult to get through to Wellington they’d come back earlier.’
‘If they were coming back tonight, they’d already be here — they won’t travel in the dark,’ he sneered as he wrenched the bedclothes off her.
Misty meowed in complaint at being disturbed. Tom grabbed him brutally.
‘Shit,’ he swore, as the cat dug its teeth and claws into his bare forearm and drew blood. He hurled Misty across the bedroom; the cat slammed into the wall before picking himself up and limping away.
‘Please, leave me alone,’ whimpered Jane. But Tom wasn’t listening. He’d lost control. Savagely, he ripped off her nightdress. She felt him force her legs apart and, despite his threats, she cried out as he penetrated her. He sank down on her, clasping his hand over her mouth and stifling her cries. The smell of alcohol and body odour overwhelmed her. He jabbed the knife hard against her throat. She was dimly aware of blood trickling down her neck.
‘I mean it,’ he rasped. ‘If you call out again, I’ll kill you, and then I’ll kill your kids. Do you understand?’
‘Yes,’ she heard herself whimpering through the fingers of his clasped hand. Jane closed her eyes and sobbed as she endured the rhythmic pounding of his body between her legs.
At last it was over, and she was left sobbing, her body convulsing. Without a word, he dressed and left the room. For a long time she lay crying, her nerves flayed, her stomach heaving. She was also listening to the sounds outside. She could hear him moving around the buildings and was terrified he might come back.
After half an hour, she ripped the sheets from the bed, put on her dressing gown, crept down the stairs and stuffed the bedclothes and her nightdress into the fire. Then she took a meat cleaver from the block on the kitchen bench and ran back up the stairs and into the children’s bedroom.
She closed the door behind her, braced a chair against it and slumped onto it. She looked at the children; they were both fast asleep, like her so-called guard dog Snowy. Only Misty seemed to be awake and to care. He crept off Zach’s bed, wandered across the room and jumped up onto her lap before settling down, purring, as if trying to give her comfort.
An hour later she heard the distinctive sound of a yacht’s diesel engine turning over and firing. She waited a few moments then, still clutching the cleaver, she crept back into her own bedroom and peered through a crack in the curtains. To her immense relief, she saw the moonlit figure of Tom letting go The White Witch’s lines. He backed the yacht out of the marina berth and motored down the canal. She didn’t leave the window until the yacht had disappeared from sight. Then she rushed through to the shower, threw off her dressing gown and scrubbed herself over and over. She hardly noticed when the hot water ran out.
Early the next morning, Jane walked alone to the warehouse. She’d left the children eating their breakfast; she needed to get away from them for a few minutes. The strain of acting normally for their sake was too great to sustain.
She saw the doors on the first level had been left open where Tom had helped himself to items from their stores. The armoury on the top floor was still locked. She turned the key, took a pistol and ammunition and locked the door behind her. She wouldn’t be taking any more chances.
When Jane returned to the house she realised that a silver-framed portrait of herself, one her mother had given her for her birthday, was missing from the lounge. Tom must have taken it as a trophy. This was another violation, a final insult that she scarcely had the strength to bear.
17
It wasn’t until the fourth night of their expedition that Mark and Steven reached the seaside settlement of Paraparaumu, north of Wellington. Their progress had been delayed by a series of slips, fallen trees and other barricades.
‘We should make Wellington tomorrow,’ Mark said as he wriggled down into his sleeping bag. ‘I’m keen to get the journey done and get back home to Jane.’
However, the next day’s journey was longer and more difficult than they’d expected. The Paekakariki road had suffered a major slip and they couldn’t get past. They turned back and headed down the road from Waikanae to Upper Hutt, but again their way was blocked by a major slip.
‘Nothing else for it,’ Mark said. ‘We’ll have to leave the car and trailer here.’
They loaded rucksacks with sufficient food to last three days, lifted the bicycles from the trailer, shouldered their rifles and picked their way across the rock slip. They reached the large settlement of Upper Hutt late in the afternoon. The desolation, the burnt-out
buildings, the skeletons and the graves reminded them of the suburbs of Auckland.
At dusk they reached the home of Mark’s niece Sarah in Stokes Valley. There was no sign of the family.
‘One good thing,’ Steven said as they wandered around the garden, ‘there’s only one grave — Sarah’s husband’s.’
Not far away, Sarah’s sister Katie’s house had been gutted by fire. Again, there was only one grave — it belonged to Katie’s husband.
Mark and Steven slept at Sarah’s house. They were up at first light next morning, preparing to head to Wainuiomata, where Mark’s brother Christopher lived. They found a car locked in a garage at the end of Sarah’s secluded cul-de-sac. The battery was dead, but the vehicle had half a tank of petrol. They struggled together to push the vehicle to the top of a moderate incline. As it rolled down the hill Steven dropped the clutch and put the car into second gear. Belching smoke, coughing and spluttering in protest, the engine came to life. The men threw their gear on the back seat, tied their bicycles onto the roof and set off to complete what they hoped would be the last few kilometres of the journey.
There was only one road into the settlement of Wainuiomata, a suburb that lies in a broad valley over a range of hills to the northeast of Wellington Harbour. They began to drive up the hill road but abandoned cars and army vehicles soon blocked their way. They parked the car, untied their bicycles and began to pedal their way up the remainder of the hill.
‘Looks as if there’s been a major battle up here,’ Steven remarked as they neared the summit. ‘I wonder what they were fighting over.’
Mark took his binoculars and focused on the sprawl of housing in the valley below, hoping to find a plume of smoke in the direction of his brother’s house. There were no signs of life; disappointed, he led the way down the hill and through the valley.
The once tidy gardens of Christopher’s house were overgrown. They pushed through the undergrowth to the front door, which was unlocked. The musty damp smell inside suggested the house had not been lived in for some time.
‘Just Elizabeth’s grave,’ Steven said after searching the garden. ‘It may be my imagination, but I think the grave might have been tidied up recently. Have you found anything?’
‘There are signs your uncle made an orderly exit. His clothes are missing, and there are patches on the walls where photographs have been removed. I wonder where he’s gone.’
‘How long do you think we should spend searching for him?’
‘Today and tomorrow.’ Mark replied. ‘We’ll search the rest of Wainuiomata today, and head into Wellington tomorrow.’
They spent the remainder of the day moving through the valley. As they cycled along, Steven blew a bugle. The sound echoed off the surrounding hills. Even if they couldn’t find Christopher, there was no reason why he couldn’t find them. As dusk drew in they returned to the house, and Steven blew the bugle periodically for the next hour. ‘Doesn’t look as if he’s in the valley,’ he said as he put down the bugle and returned to stirring the soup that was warming over the open fire. ‘What are you writing?’
‘Just a note for Christopher, telling him we’re living at Gulf Harbour. I’ll leave it on the grave in a bottle. I’m sure that, if he’s still alive, he’ll come back and visit Elizabeth’s grave. I’ve told him if he can’t make it up to Auckland he should leave us details of where to find him.’
Early the next morning they retraced their route up the hill out of Wainuiomata. At the summit they stopped and scanned the suburbs of Wellington below, again searching for smoke or any other signs of life. They could find none.
Disappointed, they rode down the hill to their car, tied the bicycles back on the roof and drove around the suburb of Petone before joining the motorway into Wellington.
They spent the rest of the day driving through the deserted suburbs, forcing their way through roadblocks and periodically sounding the bugle. There were no signs of life. As dusk drew in they found a suitable house on the slopes of Mount Victoria and prepared their evening meal.
‘Well, I suppose that’s it,’ Steven said. He pulled a wry face as he spoke and Mark guessed that his son’s lips were hurting after the unaccustomed bugle playing. ‘Unless one of us stays on in Wellington and keeps searching.’
‘No, I think we should both head back to Gulf Harbour tomorrow. We’ll wait a couple of months, then come down to Wellington again.’
Steven nodded. ‘It’ll be easier now we’ve forced a way through the barricades.’
‘I’m sure Christopher’s still alive,’ Mark said, thinking aloud.
Steven heard the frustration in his father’s voice. Mark had been close to his brother, and was obviously torn between a desire to spend longer searching for him and a wish to get back to Jane and the children at Gulf Harbour.
‘It’s a nice night,’ Steven said. ‘Why don’t we walk up to the top of Mount Victoria and see what we can see?’
They made their way to the summit. It was a crisp, clear night. Moonlight had laid a silver wash over Wellington Harbour and they sat for a while, enjoying the panorama in spite of the chill seeping into their bones.
‘A light!’ Steven exclaimed, pointing towards the eastern arm of the harbour. ‘I can see a light.’
Mark raised his binoculars. ‘There’s something there, yes — a fire or a light. I think it’s in Eastbourne. It didn’t occur to me to search around there.’ Once Mark and Steven had descended the Wainuiomata hill and searched Petone, they had turned west towards Wellington city, forgetting the tiny settlements tucked in at the bottom of the cliffs on the eastern arm of the harbour.
‘It’s definitely a light,’ Steven concluded.
Mark jumped to his feet. ‘Let’s go.’
‘I think’, Steven said as they hurried down the hill towards their temporary lodgings, ‘we should wait until morning. There are bound to be more barricades to negotiate, and we don’t know what else we might come across. Even if there’s anyone in Eastbourne, we don’t know for sure it’s Uncle Christopher. I think it will be safer to wait for daylight.’
Reluctantly, Mark agreed.
When Steven woke the next morning Mark was already cooking breakfast. He could feel his father’s excitement and he hoped Mark wasn’t going to be disappointed.
It was only just beginning to get light as they drove along the shores of Wellington Harbour. Despite their early start, it was mid-morning by the time they had negotiated a number of barricades and arrived at Lowry Bay. They were a little over a kilometre from their destination when they encountered a major landslip; there was no way around. The clear skies had disappeared as a southerly front swept through. They abandoned the car, picked up their rifles and rucksacks and set off for Eastbourne on foot.
‘Welcome to windy Wellington,’ Mark quipped as sudden wind and rain lashed their faces.
‘I think caution’s the name of the game,’ Steven said as they reached the outskirts of Eastbourne. ‘Let’s check the place out before we go in.’
They found a vantage point in a small reserve on a headland at the northern end of Eastbourne Beach and sprawled on their stomachs behind a bush, training their binoculars on the properties along the beach.
‘Dad, I see smoke! The red roof — halfway along the beach.’
Mark shifted his binoculars. He could just make out smoke near the top of the chimney before it was blown away.
‘I see it.’
He began to rise but Steven pulled him back down. ‘We still don’t know who’s in there. Let’s wait and see if we recognise anyone coming in or out.’
They took turns focusing on the front door of the bungalow.
‘We could be here all day,’ Mark said impatiently after quarter of an hour. ‘I think we should chance it and go in.’
The words were barely out of his mouth when they heard the distinctive sound of a human cough immediately behind them. They both jumped with fright but Steven, recovering fast, grabbed his rifle and spun over onto
his back, his finger on the trigger. Nothing happened, and Mark too rolled over onto his back. Staring down at them were the inquisitive faces of two young girls.
‘I’m Zoë,’ the smaller one said. She was pretty — wide eyed, with short-cropped dark hair.
‘I’m Holly,’ said the older girl quietly. Her hair was longer, but her features and the same large eyes suggested they were sisters. ‘And you’re Great-Uncle Mark,’ she continued seriously, looking intently at him. ‘Grandad’s got your photograph in the house.’
‘Why are you crying, Uncle Mark?’ Zoë asked.
‘It’s just the rain in my eyes,’ Mark said as he stood up.
18
Mark and Steven followed the children along the beach. A hundred metres from the bungalow Zoë could contain herself no longer. She ran ahead, shouting, ‘Mummy, Mummy! Great-Uncle Mark and Uncle Steven are here!’
Sarah and her sister Katie rushed out of the house. Mark’s two nieces were, as they had been all their lives, quite different. Sarah, Zoë and Holly’s mother, was short and motherly, her hair close-cropped like her daughter’s. She was wearing jeans. Katie, her younger sister, was taller and very elegant, wearing a dress and a clasp in her curly shoulder-length hair. Mark saw that despite their austere circumstances, she was wearing makeup.
‘Thank God you’ve come!’ Sarah was crying.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘It’s Dad. He’s not well.’
They followed Sarah into the house.
‘You’ve got a visitor,’ she said gently as they opened the door to the bedroom.
The sight of Christopher shocked Mark. His brother was eighteen months younger than him and had always been fit and healthy, but now he lay in bed with the sheets pulled up round his swollen neck, his thin face unshaven. He’d lost a number of his front teeth, and the gaps showed as he grinned in welcome. But in spite of his condition he had not lost his sense of humour. ‘What took you so long?’ he asked.
Blood Line: What if your family was the last left alive? (The Blood Line Trilogy Book 1) Page 10
