‘Must be Franks returning.’ Yates shouted, above the din. ‘I wonder if he saw any sign of it.’
‘I hope not,’ Suzanna said. ‘I really hope not.’
He spoke civilly enough, Peter Henderson always did, but Kruger knew when he was being censured. The CEO wasn’t happy with Kruger’s figures, but then Kruger wasn’t happy with them either.
‘I’m doing all I can,’ he said, over the satellite phone, feet up on his desk, whiskey glass resting on his lap.
‘It’s not good enough, Harry. That site is sucking money and resources and the board are getting restless, and now you are telling me you’ve lost all your company men. Jesus, what you running up there?’
‘We’ve had a few teething troubles, that’s all,’ Kruger admitted.
‘Teething troubles. If the board finds out men have died, they’ll close the site. How the hell am I meant to hush this up? You need to sort this out fast, Harry.’
‘How?’ Kruger asked.
‘Money talks Harry. Dead geologists and diggers can be forgotten. You’ve mapped out your exploratory sites marked, haven’t you?’
‘Yeah, sure.’
‘Then you no longer need the geologists. But you are going to need to up your game.’ He paused for a moment and Kruger could hear the crackle of cigar. ‘Listen,’ Henderson continued. ‘The board is meeting the weekend. I’ll need to show them some figures by then, otherwise ...’
He didn’t finish his sentence. He didn’t need to. Kruger knew what it meant.
‘I’ll sort it, Pete, trust me.’
‘You’d better, Harry. Have you any idea how much money we’ve ploughed into your operation already? You had better start hitting your quotas in the next few days or we’ll be cutting our losses. And you don’t need me to tell you what that’ll mean.’
‘I’ll turn it around,’ Kruger said. ‘You’ll see.’
‘I hope you are right,’ Henderson said. ‘For your sake.’
The line then went dead. Kruger threw his whiskey glass across the room, smashing into pieces and narrowly missing Loudon who had just stepped inside and stood meek like a child near to the door, head bowed, eyes cast to his shoes.
Kruger glared at him. ‘What the hell do you want?’
Loudon shifted uncomfortably. ‘It is Bud, sir. He’s passed away.’
Kruger rubbed at his face, as if trying to iron flat the lines crisscrossing his forehead. ‘Great. Our last decent digger. Where’s the girl and her boyfriend.’
‘I said they could have my hut, sir.’
‘Very magnanimous of you. But lock them in and post somebody outside. I don’t want them wandering about.’
Loudon nodded.
Kruger waved his hand to the satellite phone. ‘I suppose you heard that?’
Loudon nodded. ‘Some of it, sir.’
Kruger took another glass from his desk drawer. ‘We’ve got a week to turn things around. I need more men. Can you get Franks to take you to some of the villages, see what you can find?’
Loudon shook his head. ‘That might be difficult, sir. I’ve tried to suppress the rumours about what’s happened but the workers are spooked. Two have deserted in the night, once word gets out to the villages about what has happened, nobody else will come here to work, not while that thing is out there.’
‘Am I not paying them enough?’ Kruger roared.
‘It is not a question of money. The people are extremely superstitious. They believe the mountains have cursed the mine and all who work here. They would rather starve than offend the Gods.’
Kruger banged the desk causing both the contents on it and Loudon to jump. ‘Go and see if Franks is back.’
Loudon nodded and scurried out.
A minute or so later, a gentle tap sounded on the door and Franks poked his head inside the office. ‘You wanted to see me, chief.’
‘So you are back then,’ Kruger said, wafting his hand for Franks to come in. ‘Did you find anything?’
The pilot swiped off his cap as he stepped inside and sat down. ‘I went out to the excavation site like you said, but there was no sign of it. The place is a mess though, bits of Stephens and those Papuans all over the place.’
‘And you checked all around?’
Franks nodded. ‘Yes, chief, but if it crawled into the surrounding bush and died, I wouldn’t see it through the canopy.’
‘Perhaps you should have landed and had a good look around?’
Franks’ eyes welled up in their sockets. ‘Chief ... I’
Kruger held up his hand. ‘Forget it. I have another job for you. I want you to fly down to Port Moresby.’
Franks’ eyebrows frowned. ‘Chief?’
‘Somebody is arriving on the late night flight from South Africa. I want you to pick him up and bring him here.’
Franks’ face brightened at the prospect of spending several hours whoring in the city. ‘Course, chief, anything you say.’
‘Oh, and Franks.’ Kruger leaned forward and stared hard at the pilot. ‘You keep your mouth shut when you are down there. Speak of what’s going down, just one word, and I’ll bury you. Understand?’
Franks nodded. ‘I won’t say a thing. You have my word on that, chief.’
‘Yeah, I know what that’s worth,’ Kruger muttered, as Franks stood and hurried out of the door. ‘Oh, and Franks.’
Franks stopped. Worry lines criss-crossed his brow. ‘Chief?’
Kruger picked up the empty whiskey bottle on his desk. ‘I need more bourbon. Pick me up a crate when you are down there.’
Franks nodded and scurried out.
Chapter 14
Suzanna was exhausted, yet despite the events of the last few days, she still found sleep impossible.
Loudon’s room had a portable air conditioner in it, but it did little to dull the humidity and rattled away noisily in the corner, although that was nothing compared to what was going on outside.
The camp may have been a good distance from the action of the open pit mine, but the blasting and noise of machinery made it sound as if they were asleep in the middle of it.
Yates seemed to manage okay though. He must have been exhausted because he lay gently snoring on the opposite bunk, his eyes flickering with either dreams or nightmares.
Suzanna figured it would be the latter.
She was still struggling to come to terms with everything that had happened over the last few days herself. How the supposed trip of a lifetime had spiralled into such a living hell. Campbell, Samuels, Kange and the guides, and even Hendricks didn’t deserve what happened to them.
She blamed Kruger and his men. If they hadn’t invaded this untouched wilderness and ravaged the creatures’ natural habitat, perhaps none of it would have happened and Campbell and the others would still be alive.
Despite the death and carnage she’d witnessed, the loss of friends and the horror of seeing men dying, the discovery of what was roaming the jungles and plains still thrilled her.
However, she started having doubts. Had her eyes deceived her? Was there really a live Megalania out there somewhere, perhaps a group of them? She tried to picture what she had seen amid the screams and dust of the excavation site. She was certain she hadn’t been mistaken, and knew something else too—the creatures probably only existed, tentatively. The fact none had ever been sighted or documented anywhere else meant their numbers, and their territory, must have been small, perhaps dangerously so. Upheavals in the ecosystem, such as what was going on outside the flimsy walls to the hut, could be catastrophic to such an animal on the balance.
Kruger may have been intent on destroying the animal and its habit, but Suzanna was defiant, she would do everything she could do to protect it and safeguard its future.
She threw her legs off the bunk and strolled to the door. It was locked by a padlock on the outside. She shook it. After a rattle of keys, and a click of the lock opening, a local man opened the door. He was armed, but he didn’t raise his rifle, merely st
ared at her quizzically.
‘I just want some fresh air.’
She didn’t know if he understood or not, but he gestured with his hands that she should go back inside.
She stood defiantly for a moment, staring hard at the man, but he pointed more forcefully and then tapped his rifle butt. She relented, stepping back inside and allowing the guard to close the door, knowing that if she were going to act, it would have to be after dark.
That came soon enough. Night fell like a curtain in a theatre, plunging everything into darkness and pronouncing the end of performance. Work stopped. The rumble of machines and excavators and loud bangs of explosives silenced. In its place, came the chatter of the miners as they returned to camp and the smell of cooking fires and a hundred sweaty men filled the humid air.
They had a small light bulb in the hut, which fazed hypnotically from bright to dim, but still Suzanna couldn’t sleep. The pulsing bulb and Yates’ snoring got increasingly on her nerves.
Yates hadn’t stirred all day. She walked over to wake him, to discuss what they were to do, but a knock sounded on the door, followed shortly by a rattle of keys.
A moment later, Loudon poked his head around the door, a tray of food in his hands.
‘I thought you might be hungry,’ he said, as she peered at the mound of rice and stew and flat breads on the tray. ‘It is hardly fine dining, but there is plenty of it.’
She was ravenous and didn’t even ask whether it contained meat, hunger getting the better of her vegetarian principles. She just grabbed one of the spoons on the tray and devoured a mouthful, before swallowing hastily and covering her bad manners with her mouth.
‘I’m sorry. I ought to say thank you,’ she said.
Loudon chuckled. ‘Please, you eat. It has been a troublesome few days.’
‘I take it we’re prisoners here,’ she said, nodding to the door where she could see the man with the rifle.
‘I’m sorry about that,’ Loudon said. ‘It is on Mr Kruger’s orders. But you will be left alone. Myself and the men that normally sleep here will find alternative accommodation. Besides,’ he said, smiling amiably, ‘it won’t be for long. I think out problems may soon be over.’
She paused, the spoon halfway to her mouth. ‘What do you mean?’
Loudon had not been present during the heated exchange with Kruger, so clearly did not know her feelings on the matter because he smiled, as if it were great news.
‘I believe Mr Kruger has enlisted outside help to deal with our ... problems here. Mr Franks has gone to pick up the gentleman in question from Port Moresby.’
‘Who is it?’
Loudon shrugged. ‘Some experienced hunter, I believe,’ he said, striding to the door. ‘Soon things will be back to normal here and you and your friend will be able to return home.’
He bowed reverently before stepping outside. When the door shut and after she heard it being locked again, she bolted to where Yates still slept and shook him.
‘Wake up! Wake up!’
It was like trying to stir a corpse. His breathing was heavy, laboured and no matter how much she shook him, his eyes remained closed. After a minute of trying she swore, strode over to the tray of food Loudon had brought, picked up the jug of water and threw it at him.
He bolted upright like Frankenstein’s monster enduring a surge of electricity. ‘What the hell!’
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘But I couldn’t wake you. There’s food’s here.’
He slapped his mouth open and closed a few times, wiped the moisture from around his face and swung his legs off the bunk. ‘Great, I’m starving. What is it?’’
‘Some kind of vegetable stew—listen, we need to talk.’
‘What about?’ He plodded over to the plate of food and dunked a piece of the flatbread into the stew.
‘We’ve got to do something.’
‘What about?’ he asked, stew dripping down his chin.
‘What do you mean, what about? All this.’ She waved her hands about. ‘Kruger has hired some hunter to wipe out the Megalania.’
‘The what?’
She stared hard at him. He looked odd, his eyes vague, half-closed. ‘The giant monitors—are you okay?’
He nodded. ‘Just tired.’
‘We have to stop him.’
He paused as he spooned a mound of rice into his mouth. ‘Stop him, how?’
‘I don’t know. There’s a satellite phone in his hut. If we can get in there, maybe we can call help.’
‘And who are we going to call?’ Yates wiped the stew from his chin. ‘You are going to have a hard time convincing anybody you are telling the truth. I barely believe it myself, and I saw it.’
She grabbed his hand as he lifted another mound of rice to his mouth. ‘We have to try. For all we know, these could be the last of their kind alive, but there’s a problem.’
‘There always is with you.’
She nodded to the door. ‘Outside. They’ve posted a guard.’
He shook his head. ‘No, no way. Whatever you are planning, count me out. You want to go off half-cocked again you can do it on your own.’
‘All I need you to do is distract him. I’ll do the rest.’
‘The rest?’
She looked around the room, her eyes falling on the wooden tray Loudon brought in.
‘Trust me. I have an idea.’
Chapter 15
Suzanna couldn’t believe it worked. The Papuan guard obviously had no access to a TV otherwise he’d have known their ruse was the oldest trick in the book. However, when Yates banged on the door, forcing the man to open it, and explained in broken English, with a bit of mime thrown in, that Suzanna was ill, he did what she had hoped he would do—stuck his head around the door, allowing her to clout it with the tray.
He dropped like a brick, blood trickling from a wound from his head.
‘Jesus!’ Yates squealed, checking the man’s vitals. ‘You could have killed him!’
‘Shhh,’ she hissed. ‘Drag him inside.’
He hesitated, but after a glare from her, he pulled the Papuan inside and shut the door.
‘Did you have to hit him so hard?’ he said, checking the back of the man’s head for bleeding.
‘Have you forgotten the type of people we are dealing with? I didn’t hear you complain when they shot Kange.’
‘I just don’t want murder on my conscience!’ His face looked like a sulky teenager’s.
‘Neither do I. But I’m prepared to do anything to protect those animals. They have to come before people.’
Yates didn’t say anything, just shook his head gently as she rifled through the unconscious man’s pocket’s, finding a packet of cigarettes and a lighter. She discarded the smokes but checked the lighter by flicking it on and off a couple of times.
‘What are you going to do with that?’
She crept to the door and peered out, before glancing back and hissing. ‘A diversion. We need Kruger out of his hut long enough for me to call for help.’
He frowned at her. ‘What you going to do?’
‘Just follow me, and keep your eyes open.’
She dashed out, keeping low and to the side of the hut as she peered around the corner.
The camp was quiet. Still. A few locals sat outside tents, cooking, smoking, murmuring, but most were asleep. Kruger wasn’t though. The light in his hut was ablaze and she saw Loudon scurrying in with a tray of food and scurrying out again a few moments later.
She glanced around, looking for something she could set alight to act as a diversion. She didn’t want to set fire to one of the huts or tents. Somebody may have been in there. She may have been rash, but burning somebody alive was too much, even for her. Instead, she settled on an awning under which sat a small dumper, fully laden with soil and rocks.
She gestured for Yates to follow, and the pair crept to the dumper truck.
‘Keep a look out,’ she hissed at him, and after a quick glance in the direction of
the two Papuans outside their tent, she got to work.
Thanks to the humid air, the canvas awning was moist, but after some perseverance, the flame took hold, and when she felt satisfied that the gentle, nightly breeze wouldn’t put it out, she and Yates crept back to their vantage point behind the corner of the hut, and watched and waited.
The fire seemed to take forever to spread across the awning, starting as a slow, barely visible flickering, turning into a more prominent flame that licked its way across the canvas, and finally becoming a full-blown blaze that filled the air with smoke, eventually alerting the two Papuans who bolted to their feet and shouted and screamed and pointed to the inferno, waking up the rest of the camp.
Chaos ensued. People ran around panicked, unsure what was going on. It wasn’t until Kruger appeared on the veranda of his hut, discarding the bottle of whiskey in his hand and racing towards the confusion, did some semblance of order commence. A few Papuans ran for buckets of water, while others pulled up the surrounding tents near the blaze lest they caught alight.
By this time, Suzanna and Yates were already running towards Kruger’s hut, dashing inside and shutting the door following a quick glance at the turmoil outside. It was only a small fire, and unless the dumper truck went up, she estimated they’d have a couple of minutes, perhaps five, before Kruger got things under control. In that time, she needed to have called for help and got out before he returned.
‘So, who you going to call?’ Yates asked, his voice stressed, his head glancing to the door and back again as she rooted around the office for the phone.
She found it. It was an unassuming device, smaller than the one they had in camp. Barring the thin cable that fed to the aerial outside the hut’s window, it resembled an old-style mobile phone.
‘Somebody from the NWDO,’ she said, screwing up her face as she tried to remember any of the numbers for her friends in the Natural World Defence Organisation.
That was the problem with mobile phones, she realised, nobody memorised numbers anymore. Failing to remember any, she did the next best thing and rang a UK directory enquiry service, its telephone number a constant annoyance on British TV.
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