Jimmy picked up the trail quick enough that they didn't need to backtrack much. Out here, on the edge of the bush, the trees and the sand waged an endless war, one fought over inches and centuries as each side gained and lost the upper hand. It wasn't readily apparent, but even now Jimmy could see that clearcutting for grazing land had given the desert a large advantage, one that wouldn't be felt for decades.
The trees would fight, but the dirt would win in the end. He stared out at the desert, watching fine sand slither across the dunes towards the shrubs, trees and the budding grass in the so-called pastures, depositing itself as it liked. It was inevitable.
Jimmy felt a hand grab him by the bicep. He imagined ripping his knife from its sheath and burying it in the head of the hand's owner. Instead Jimmy simply looked at the hand—a black hand, no sleeve: Dave's hand—and he glanced up to give the kid a look that said ‘move it or lose it’. Dave seemed to get the message, because he let go hastily.
"You seen something out there, Jimmy?" the kid asked, his voice unashamedly scared.
"No." Jimmy replied curtly, annoyed at the question.
"Oh, okay," Dave nearly stammered. "John says he's got the trail over this way and we can continue," the kid said, gesturing in the direction any dullard could tell the mass of blackbirds went. "If you're ready, I mean."
Jimmy looked about and saw the rest of the group staring in his direction, and in his mind he killed them all in a dozen different ways. Outwardly, he nodded at Dave to tell the kid he'd be along.
John checked to see that David was alright. He'd barely resumed the trail when a terrible roar rumbled in the distance, loud enough to echo all around them. John’s eyes widened at the sound. It was like no animal he'd ever heard, and he knew some animal calls that could make your blood stop still. The sound of koalas fucking kept even Jimmy awake at night, a rhythmic gurgle from the back of the throat, like a death rattle performed in time to clapsticks.
John turned and saw the others grouped together, like a pack of roos at a riverbank, each hoping the croc would take someone other than them. It was subconscious: people clustered when afraid, even if they didn't know they were scared. Or what they were scared of. He looked at David and Jimmy and shrugged.
"Garkain?" asked David, his tone serious and fearful.
The kid was prone to flights of fancy like this: the Garkain was a Dreamtime monster, told to keep kids from playing too far out of sight.
"Ghindaring?" added Jimmy.
He was far from the type to entertain monster stories, but hearing Jimmy float the idea forced John to take in the scene. There was definitely something odd in the air. The symphony of the bush, trees, birds and critters on the ground were all a bit too quiet. Anna, her half-caste skin already pale, seemed paler still now.
"Guwin-gan," she said quietly, staring at Jimmy.
Frederick's backhand landed on her face faster than a mangrove snapping back to full attention, and she fell to the floor. "I thought I told you black cunts to speak English," he growled, his hand still raised, his eyes locked with Jimmy. David had flinched away already.
John stepped in range of the arm. "You lot don't have the words for them," he said, holding Frederick's attention. The man wouldn't hit him, he was certain. About 80% certain. "Those are the words. They're talking about bush monsters."
"Fucking blacks and their made-up shit," spat Jocko from the back of the group. "The old man back on the station was saying the same fucking thing. They had to leave because the Tamangori had come. What they're actually afraid of is a hard day's fuckin' work."
Terrence grabbed John by the shoulder and steered him clear of Frederick, ignoring Jocko. "Is it important?" he asked John.
"Might be. There's definitely something weird in the air."
"Monster weird?" Terrence replied. He squinted and leaned forward as he spoke, emphasising his confusion.
"Just weird, boss," John replied. "Something's off."
"Is it impacting the tracking?"
John knew Terrence well enough to know that was his roundabout method of trying to get the squad moving again, so he shook his head then pointed for Jimmy and David to get back on the trail. David went immediately, but Jimmy paused, as if he thought to say something. After a moment, the barefoot man decided to say nothing, and he stalked his way back out ahead of the group.
David didn't like the rainforest. Nothing good ever happened in it. The Elders never told of monsters grabbing people out among the scrub. All the worst stuff happened once you broke through the tree line.
Where it was dense, the bush was near impenetrable, a mass of creeping vines, thick-trunked gums and large-leaved bushes. Anyone with a brain could tell the group hadn't gone through the mass of vegetation, but even walking past it was overbearing. The greenery trapped the heat and moisture, turning the whole place into the boiler room of one of those large boats with the wheels on the side. Except instead of steam and coal, there were creepy crawlies and plants you couldn't touch, millions of eyes watching you from the shadows, just waiting for you to fall so they could pounce.
David put it out of his mind as he walked on, following the only path a group of two-score could have taken. There was no tracking to be done. He could already tell, by the way the trees had begun to fall off that they were heading to a river. If the blackbirds had made the river, they'd surely be long gone.
It didn't take long for the rainforest to prove him right. The trees disappeared of their own accord, giving way to a thick wall of grass, taller than a man, and then a clear 50 yards of riverbank. The grass was bent and broken, and the sand beyond it still bore the footprints of their game, which gave up the truth of it immediately. They didn't bother covering their tracks any longer, because they had taken to the water.
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"They're gone," John said firmly. The sun reflected up off the sand of the riverbank and stung his face. He could tell David and Jimmy had already come to the same conclusion—that the blackbirds had gone downriver—but he searched briefly for more proof than the footprints. John saw his evidence where the bush crept to the water's edge. "Over there, downstream a bit, they chopped down a pair of trees. If we go down there, I'm sure we'll find shavings, where they scraped out a dugout float."
Jocko exploded on the spot. "Fuck off they're gone. What the fuck are you lot good for if they're gone?"
John walked down with a still-fuming Jocko following behind. Terrence stood still at the edge of the riverbank clearing, staring out into the water. Frederick had tied a rope around the shackles on the girl, and he used it to tow her along as he caught up to John.
Sure enough, wood shavings littered the ground next to the tree stumps. John picked them up and showed them in his hand.
"If you're such an expert on how it's done, then get to chopping," Jocko sneered.
John looked at Frederick, who responded by grabbing the wood shaving, twisting it in his fingers to inspect it, dropping it on the ground and then stalking back towards Terrence. A yank on the rope took Anna with Frederick.
Jocko stormed after Frederick. "Where the fuck are you going!?" he yelled as he followed. He was stomping, but the soft sand of the riverbank was taking the heat out of it. Frederick ignored him and spoke quietly with Terrence, which enraged Jocko further. "Were you cunts even up here to catch our fuckin' Kanakas? Or was my station just a convenient place to hitch your horses while youse hunted your fuckin' bounty? Sure was convenient that we rolled up on her lot while out and about. Starting to wonder if youse are even ANP."
Frederick spun and Jocko found himself staring down the barrel of a six shooter, the hammer already pulled back. "What are you tryin' to imply?" growled Frederick.
It was hard for Jocko to hear him over the sound of blood rushing by his ears. "N-nothing," he stammered. He couldn't remember what he'd been saying, let alone implying. Something about the speed of Frederick's draw told Jocko it was a miracle he wasn't already dead. He looked at Anna, who stared at him with a mean smirk on her face, and then at Terrence, who watched on unperturbed. "I-I… I'm just worried about going back to my dad without any of his blacks. He's got a mean temper. Might be big trouble."
Frederick stared at the quivering piece of shit at the end of his shooter. He should have just shot the man, but the girl might talk, and that would complicate things. Frederick could cut her tongue out, but she seemed the type to drown herself in her own blood just to spite him. "I've got a mean temper, too," was all he said in reply.
The shaving he'd grabbed off John was recent, and the footprints in the sand were fresh, even Frederick could tell that. They probably hadn't swept them away because they hadn't time: an hour, two maybe? But they were in canoes, and Frederick had no interest in getting in that water. The current was moving quick, but the logs didn't flow with it. He didn't need one of his blacks to tell him what that meant.
It wouldn't look good to get in a shootout with a landowner, so he had one course of action. Drop this idiot in the river, stash the girl outside the station, return Van Den Houter his son's shotgun and a story about killing the Kanakas, retrieve their horses and then turn in the girl.
Before he could pull the trigger, though, Terrence spoke. "It occurs to me that the only reason your father would think we didn't catch his blackbirds was if you were to tell him as much, Joachim," the older man said, walking forward to stand alongside Frederick. "Which means, if you were to tell him otherwise, his temper might never be raised."
"I'm not gonna lie to my dad for youse," Jocko said, his courage returning some.
Terrence shook his head in dismay. This idiot was going to get himself killed. "Don't lie to him for us, then. Lie to him for his sake."
Jocko stood, muted in confusion as he tried and failed to work out what Terrence was saying.
Terrence took another step forward and, faster even than Frederick, he flashed his hand and drew his shooter on the whelp. "What do you think will happen to your father if his temper and our tempers clash?"
The blood drained from Jocko's face as his brain finally registered what he was being told. The speed of the draw, the stillness about the two of them as they did it. He hadn't realised it earlier, but these two were practised killers of the highest order. They could drop me dead right here and they'd never think about it again. They could kill my dad, little Zeke, Marney, everyone back home without even blinking.
"It wouldn't be good," Jocko replied quietly. For his family, he didn't need to add.
"No it wouldn't," Terrence replied in his firm and proper voice. "So you'll be a good chap and tell him we found-"
"Boss!" came a cry from the other end of the beach. David was running back down the sand, springing lightly despite the sand, waving his arms to get their attention. "Captain Gifford! Mister Harney! Jimmy thinks one of them stayed behind!"
Jimmy was glad the kid had run off to get them, though he was still too loud. Whomever it was who had doubled back, they were good. Probably as good as Johno, who was one of the best. But you couldn't ever move through bush this thick and truly hide your presence. You'd have to be leaping through the treetops like a Boodaroo.
The giveaways for him were when stuff was missing. A person could move a trail careful as anything, but they'd still break twigs, still snap grass blades as they went. And a smart person would get rid of those twigs as they swept clean the dirt. They'd pinch the blades off at the stems.
But once you saw it missing once, you couldn't ignore it. And it made the other tells that much more obvious. It gave Jimmy something to point to so he didn't need to give up his technique. If he ever needed to ditch in the night, it would be nice to know not even Johno could track him down.
The shotgun-wielding prick seemed even more full of bluster when he came walking over. "This one reckons you've finally found some fuckin' tracks," Jocko said in a tone that made Jimmy want to pluck the man's teeth out one at a time.
"Yeah," was all Jimmy said in reply.
"How many?"
"Tracks? Loads."
"Oh, I didn't know you lot got clever. How many footsteps dickhead."
Jimmy fantasised about pinning him down and cramming the pulled teeth in through the white cunt's ear canal. He turned and addressed Fred and Terry. "One fella left the beach in this direction. Heading back towards the station. You can see the impression left on the ground, he couldn't cover it. Too big. Makes the sweeping effort back over there much more obvious." Jimmy pointed to the tracks as he spoke.
"He's a fuckin' big one," David said, awe in his tone.
"Yeah, it's what gave him up," Jimmy lied. "Sometimes a fella's just too big."
"Maybe it's the fuckin' bogeyman or one of your Abo myths," Jocko sneered.
"Big enough that he could be," David said quietly, still staring at the compressed dirt.