Undara

by Annie Seaton

  Her breath hitched as she ran, perspiration mingling with the raindrops as trailing branches scratched her face. Taking the final step towards the tangle of vines, Emlyn gasped in despair.

  She wasn’t going to get away from him.

  As every second passed, the stream of curses grew louder.

  ‘Stop, you fucking bitch! You are going to be so sorry.’

  She risked a glance behind her, but Gavin was still a good thirty metres away. Blood was running down his cheek and Emlyn pushed on as fast as she could. She spurred herself to run faster, despite the excruciating pain in her back. The ground had evened out, so she ignored the thicket of bush; he’d see her go in there. She ran and ran until the shouts behind her faded.

  As the incline began to descend again, her boot caught on a tree root and she fell, landing hard on her front. The breath rushed out of her lungs and the pain in her back was unbearable, but she forced herself to go on. Half rolling and half sliding, sharp rocks and tree roots bruised her until her right leg jarred against the rough edge of a fallen tree.

  Emlyn leaned against it and listened, but there was no noise coming from behind. The pattering of raindrops on the broad leaves in the trees was the only sound. Lying there, she closed her eyes, trying to ignore the incessant pain burning in her back. She swallowed and fought the wave of nausea.

  There was no time to stop. Rolling over onto her front, she strained her head back and looked behind her—Gavin was picking his way slowly down the muddy hillside. Desperately looking around for somewhere to hide, she hitched a sob as a branch snapped under his feet. Emlyn lurched up and willed herself to run. Suddenly, the ground disappeared beneath her feet and she was in midair. Her arms flailed as she fell, and darkness surrounded her. Excruciating pain exploded in her neck and head as she hit the ground.

  All was still. Dark and quiet.

  She lay on her back as waves of pain washed through her. Jagged points of rocks pressed into her back and she curled her fingers into the wet, sticky ground. Her right leg was at an uncomfortable angle and she straightened it, but the movement increased the pain in her back. Her head pounded, and the metallic taste of blood filled her mouth as she drew a deep breath, but a strange smell surrounded her. Emlyn whimpered as prickles of icy cold moved from her chest to her head. As her vision faded to black, Gavin’s mocking laugh surrounded her.

  CHAPTER

  24

  Hidden Valley, November 1879

  Tommy had spent the afternoon trying to climb the rocks to reach the opening above them. When he’d realised that there were no handholds within ten feet of the gap above them, he’d started building a pile of rocks. The small patch of blue sky taunted them with freedom, and Missy helped him carry rocks and stack them into the middle of the cave.

  Insects scurried away as she lifted the small rocks away from the edge of the rock fall that had trapped them, shivering each time for fear of snakes.

  As the light faded, and the first stars pricked the small patch of now indigo sky, they were both puffing from the exertion.

  ‘Tommy.’ Missy tugged at his arm as he picked up another rock. ‘Stop. We have to have a plan. We can’t go on like this. I feel like my heart is going to burst out of my chest it’s beating so fast.’

  ‘Mine too.’ His voice was trembling as he put the rock he was carrying on the pile in front of them. The pile wasn’t even up to waist height yet. ‘I have a plan. I’m going to build an escape so we can climb to the top.’

  Missy grabbed her brother’s hands; they were wet. ‘Did you spill our water?’

  He shook his head and she peered closer. His hands were scraped and bleeding, and blood was running down his arms.

  ‘Oh, Tommy. Look at your poor hands.’ The worst Missy had done was scrape her fingernails raw. ‘I’ll light the lantern for a little while. Come and sit down. We have to make a better plan.’ Her voice broke as she looked up at the hole high above them. ‘We’re never going to reach up there.’ The thought of sitting here in the dark was terrifying her. That was when snakes came out; she wasn’t going to go to sleep, she would sit up all night. She felt in the front of her pinafore and was relieved to find her book still in her pocket. And then she realised they couldn’t waste the lantern fuel just so she could read through the night.

  ‘Every time I sit down I get dizzy. I don’t want to go to sleep. What if they come out to rescue us and we don’t hear them?’ Tommy sat on the dirt and pulled up his legs. He put his arms across his knees and his back shook. She knew he hated her seeing him cry, so Missy pretended she didn’t know he was fighting back tears.

  ‘I’m scared if we go to sleep, we won’t wake up.’ Her voice quivered, and she swallowed. ‘I’ve got a funny taste in my mouth, and my head is hurting.’

  ‘I know, Missy, me too. What are we going to do?’

  Missy sat beside him and pulled her skirt beneath her, so she couldn’t feel the cold dirt on her legs. ‘It’s okay. Father will be out looking by now and he’ll have Wally with him as well.’

  ‘And Stanley.’

  ‘They’ll find us. We have to keep our energy so that we can call out. They’ll hear us from up there.’

  ‘Do you really think so?’ Tommy yawned.

  ‘Of course I do. Wally will track where we walked today. And they’ll see where we pulled weeds out, and the rock fall in the cave. Maybe Father’s even digging the other side of it already. We’ll have to listen really carefully.’

  ‘He won’t be there yet.’ Tommy’s voice was scornful. ‘They would have only just missed us at dinnertime.’

  ‘Mother will be really cross. And then she’ll get worried when we don’t come home.’ Missy screwed up her eyes and pretended they were sitting at the dinner table and this was all a horrible dream. ‘She’ll probably cry.’

  The light from the skylight above gradually faded as scurrying clouds covered the stars. It was pitch dark down in the cave; they hadn’t lit the lantern yet.

  ‘You go to sleep and I’ll listen,’ she said after a while. Tommy sat close beside her as the temperature dropped and the cold seeped up from the floor. Gradually, his head drooped and she moved around so he was leaning on her.

  Missy jumped as a slithering noise reached her. ‘What was that?’ She held herself stiff, waiting for the cold scales of a snake to creep across her bare legs. She tucked her feet up beneath her skirt and folded her arms.

  ‘It’s only the leaves brushing on the rocks up there.’ Tommy yawned again and Missy fought the yawn that was building in her chest. ‘We haven’t seen any snakes and there’re no mice down here so they won’t come looking.’

  ‘They might.’ Her voice wavered, and she took a deep breath to fight the tears that threatened again.

  ‘Lean on my shoulder and go to sleep.’ Tommy held out his arm. ‘It’s too early for them to come here. We’ll listen in the morning.’

  Missy snuggled into his side and closed her eyes.

  ‘Don’t worry, sis. I’ll look after you.’ His voice seemed to be coming from a long way away and she struggled to hear what he was saying. ‘It’ll be easier for them to find us in the morning when it’s light.’

  * * *

  Missy woke with a start at the noise of running water. Somehow, during the night, she’d sat up and now she was leaning on a rock behind her. Her eyes opened, and confusion filled her for a minute, before she realised where she was. Her head was pounding, and she could feel her heart racing. Cold mud was seeping into her pinafore onto the backs of her legs. She rubbed her eyes and looked at the patch of sunlight dappling the rock wall beside her. Tommy was over by the rock wall. He turned around as he tied up his pants.

  ‘I’m sorry, Missy. I had to go. I couldn’t hang on anymore.’

  ‘It’s okay. Neither can I.’ She stretched. ‘How did I get here? I don’t remember moving over here.’

  ‘When I laid down, I felt funny,’ Tommy said. ‘I got real tired, and I kept yawning. I couldn’t wake you. S
o, I pulled you up so we were both sitting against the wall. That way I could breathe better.’ ‘Thank you.’ Missy stood and walked over to the corner, and Tommy turned his back while she squatted in the dirt. When she’d finished, she straightened her skirts and walked across to stand in the small patch of sunshine. Tommy had climbed to the top of the rocks he’d piled up yesterday and was craning his neck looking at the high wall. ‘I dreamed there was a way to climb up last night, but it’s gone.’

  ‘It wasn’t real. It was just what you were wishing for.’

  ‘Do you think Father will be here soon?’ He pointed up to the opening. ‘Maybe we should start calling out now.’

  ‘That’s a good idea. We’ll take it in turns.’ Missy put her hand on her stomach as it gurgled.

  ‘I’m hungry too. I wish we’d brought the basket down here with us,’ Tommy said. He walked over to the rock fall that had blocked the way they had come in. ‘Maybe I should climb to the top and try clearing a hole there?’

  ‘No. It’s too dangerous, and your hands are too bad.’ Missy pointed up to the hole where freedom beckoned. ‘That’s the way out. We’ll each call twice and then count to one hundred under our breath before the other one calls. That will help pass the time till they come.’

  ‘Who goes first?’

  ‘You do,’ she said.

  ‘Father! We’re here!’ Tommy’s yell echoed around the cavern and Missy closed her eyes as she started to count.

  * * *

  When it began to get dark again, and there’d been no one calling out from above them, Missy put her arms around Tommy.

  ‘I’m hungry, Missy.’ He stumbled as he walked over to her, and she caught him before he fell. His voice rasped as his tears soaked her shoulder. ‘I’ve got a pain in me belly.’

  Hours of calling out had made Missy’s voice hoarse, too and she swallowed before she answered. They’d run out of the water in Tommy’s canteen just before the sunlight disappeared, and her lips were already dry and sore, but she tried not to think about it. ‘It’s okay. They’ll be here soon. Father will find us.’

  ‘Do you really think so?’ Tommy lifted his head.

  ‘Of course he will. Father won’t give up.’

  ‘Maybe he thinks we’ve run away to the goldfields. Maybe that’s where he’s looking.’

  Worse thoughts than that had gone through Missy’s head as she’d called out through the day. Hidden Valley was so vast, and there were so many places to look. ‘I just hope that Stanley tells Father about the glade and the other cave.’

  ‘But then he’ll look there, and they go forever. They won’t reach us.’

  ‘Wally will track us. He can do that.’ She nodded as she walked across to the middle of the cave and sat down. Tommy followed her and put his hand on his belly.

  ‘Come and lie down with me,’ Missy said with a yawn.

  ‘Do you think we should lie down?’

  ‘Yes, we need to get our sleep. If we sleep a little bit, we won’t get as tired or thirsty.’

  Tommy sat beside her and Missy took off her apron. She wrapped it around her book and put it carefully behind them. She lay back and put her head on one side of the padded shape, leaving enough room for Tommy to lie beside her. After a moment he rested his head next to hers.

  ‘Missy?’ He sniffed and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Will you hold my hand, please?’

  She reached out, held his hand in hers, and squeezed her eyes shut.

  CHAPTER

  25

  Hidden Valley, 31 January 2019

  It was late afternoon when Travis took the call. He pinched the top of his nose and closed his eyes as he listened to Alison. ‘Are you sure she’s okay?’ he asked. ‘Should I come down?’

  In the year since Alison had left him, he’d only been to Townsville once to visit them. He’d gone down three months after she’d left, foolishly hoping that maybe Alison would be more amenable to reconciliation by then. Over the months, he’d missed out on school functions and milestones in his children’s lives, but there’d never been enough time to justify driving there to go to some minor function and then turn around and come straight back to a station that needed his constant attention. At first, he’d been angry at Alison for taking the kids away from him, but every time he’d tried to talk about it, she’d get upset. In the end, he’d stopped fighting. He couldn’t afford legal action for shared custody, and he hadn’t wanted to destroy the amicable relationship they had maintained most of the time.

  Her call from the hospital had jarred him; Alison had been lucky to catch him in the house. He’d only come in to get drench out of the fridge on his way back to the yards. They’d moved most of the cattle in and Jase and Joel had gone out on horseback to collect a few stragglers in the bush.

  ‘No, she’s fine,’ Alison said. ‘It’s some sort of infection. She’s been admitted and she’s on an antibiotic drip and her temperature’s come down already. There’s no need for you to come. But, Travis, I—’ Alison’s voice shook. He waited while she paused and cleared her throat; he knew she was crying as the background noise of the hospital faded.

  ‘Yes, what’s wrong?’

  ‘I hate to ask you, but I need some money. I’ve got medical insurance, but I need to pay the three-hundred-dollar excess at the private hospital. I’m a bit short this week, and I’ll have to miss some shifts to look after Cass when she comes home.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll transfer it over now.’ Travis opened his eyes and the first thing he saw was the picture of Cassie with the boys that he kept on the fridge. Three beautiful children. All three were blue-eyed and fair like Al, but Cassie had his curls and the same dimple in her chin as he did.

  How the hell had he stuffed up so badly?

  If he had his way, Alison and Cass would still be home with him; he’d take her back in a heartbeat. Talking to Emlyn as they’d worked together over the past few nights had hit him hard. Travis usually managed to keep his feelings contained, but he’d never got over losing Alison. Stupidly, he’d coped with it by working even harder on the station. Ironically, the main catalyst that had caused their marriage to implode had turned out to be the way he dealt with the loss.

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Are you okay, Al?’ He lowered his voice and imagined her standing alone in the hospital ward. Disgust curled in his stomach; how had it come to this? Their children shared from Hidden Valley to Townsville—almost five hundred kilometres apart. At least the boys were home for a while, but that would only make it harder for Alison, alone in a unit with a sick child. ‘Do you want me to send the boys home?’

  ‘No, it’s fine. I’ll cope.’ Her voice was soft, and he closed his eyes again. God, he still loved her so much it hurt.

  He’d fallen in love with Alison the first time he’d laid eyes on her in the bar at the agricultural college. Her fine blonde hair, wide blue eyes and quiet manner had drawn him over to the corner where she’d been sitting alone. A friendship had formed that day—one that eventually had turned to love on her side, too, but the friendship had endured through a marriage breakup.

  ‘All right, love. I’ll call you tonight. Okay?’

  ‘Yes. I’ll talk to you then. And, Travis, tell the boys not to stress. She’s fine and they’ve got it under control. It’s nothing sinister.’

  ‘Take care.’

  The call disconnected at Alison’s end and Travis put the phone back in the cradle. He opened the fridge and took out the box of drench. If only he had the time to drive to the hospital, that would be supportive for Alison, but the way things were at the moment it was out of his reach. There was no way he could leave the place with the possibility of a flood looming. Maybe he could send Joel down.

  Again, he realised how much he needed Emlyn to get this sponsorship deal. If it was approved, their lives would change. He’d make sure it would, and not just on a financial level. He went to the pantry and took out a b
ox of muesli bars; the boys had already eaten all the food he’d packed this morning. Another hour or so and they could have some down time. And the boys could have a day off tomorrow; they’d worked hard. Gavin had left them out there after an hour. He’d complained incessantly about the rain, and Travis was pleased when he’d finally taken off muttering about getting something from a hut. There was no sign of him or his ute in the shed. If only he could trust his brother to look after the place, things would be different.

  As Travis pulled the front door shut behind him, the noise of a vehicle coming along the road from the north caught his attention. He went down to the ute and threw the two boxes onto the seat and waited. It was unusual to have passing traffic on this road, and especially in wet conditions.

  A white Pajero, the sides splattered with mud, slowed and then turned into the driveway and parked beside his ute. His eyes widened as two men in suits got out and closed the doors, before walking across to him.

  ‘Travis Carlyle?’ the taller of the two men asked.

  ‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘I’m Detective Inspector Jim Blake, and this is Detective Brett Baker. We’d like to have a few words with you.’ Both their expressions were closed, and the introduction was terse.

  ‘What’s wrong? There hasn’t been an accident, has there?’

  ‘No. Can we do this inside?’ Blake gestured to the house.

  ‘Certainly.’ Travis frowned. A few months ago, a couple of police officers from Stock and Rural Crime Investigation Squad had called in to ask him about some cattle thefts on a neighbouring station, but he’d heard no more.

  ‘Can I get you a cold drink or a cuppa?’ he asked once they’d sat down. ‘It’s a long drive from Mt Surprise.’

  ‘No, thank you,’ the detective inspector replied. ‘And we’ve come from Townsville.’

  ‘Townsville?’ Travis sat on the chair opposite the sofa. ‘Okay, how can I help you?’