Sunlit Shadow Dance

by Graham Wilson

  Chapter 28 - Search for the Elusive Susan

  Jacob left Beck behind feeling bemused and a bit frustrated. The aborted sex had left him full of desire – not just for Beck but for any raunchy hot young thing between the sheets. By the end of the night he had satisfied that itch with another girl he had picked up at the hotel bar, buying her a few drinks and sweet talking his way into her pants.

  But after he had had her a couple times he found he had little to talk about with her, she was just a good time girl and was happy to go on her way looking for more adventure before the night was done. When she was gone he fell into a deep sleep.

  He woke early, wishing Beck was lying beside him. He would have liked to start his morning having sex with her, but more he enjoyed talking to her, her mind was sharp like his own and she challenged him.

  But she was not there. He knew she was now torn about what she had been doing, caught up by a guilty conscience. He wondered what led to her change of heart, had she found out something she was not telling him. In the end he decided that it had been a fair trade, the money for the information she had given him. Now they could both get on with their own lives’.

  As he showered and dressed he felt re-energized. He could sense this story was now within his grasp. It had that feel; his gut instinct told him it was able to be cracked open. This girl had gone into hiding under another name, he now had that name, the first name at least, and he had an approximate location for where she now lived, a coastal town somewhere within a hundred or so kilometers of Brisbane.

  He spent a few hours on the internet in his hotel room, familiarizing himself with the geography of this area. After his searching he decided that either the Sunshine Coast or the Gold Coast, or perhaps the very north of NSW were most likely. There were loads of apartments for rent in the Gold Goat and also lots of other short term accommodation options, backpackers, caravan parks and the like.

  A backpacker place was also unlikely with two small children. Her place was unlikely to be the top end of the market, these would want references and identification, two small children would also be a negative. That is unless she now had a sugar daddy and he could not discount this, she picked up the men easily, some sort of sex and charm offensive. But her new boyfriend sounded like someone more her age, not a rich dude.

  So the bottom end of the real estate market, the scummy flats which just wanted cash rent and no questions asked, perhaps a caravan park where she rented a van with cooking facilities, that felt about right. The Gold Coast had a lot of these places, but once you went down to the bottom feeders the pickings thinned out. There were also quite a lot of these places between Tweed Heads and Byron Bay in the far north of NSW. Then there were a lot more places in Sunshine Coast, from Noosa south but overall these were a bit higher class with less chances for anonymity.

  Jacob decided that he would begin at the bottom end of the strip, fly to Brisbane, get a hire car, then work his way north. He figured two weeks south of Brisbane would let him work his way through northern NSW and the Gold Coast and then he would need another week to cover the Sunshine Coast. If he found nothing by then he would rethink his options, try a different tack.

  Having made his plan he booked the lunch time flight to Brisbane and rented a luxury hire car to collect from the airport. He decided he wanted to play the part of a high end private investigator employed by Jane’s parents. His invented back story was they were desperately seeking to trace their daughter who had left London after a family falling out. She had gone off travelling without keeping in touch. Her mother was now critically ill with advanced cancer and the family urgently wanted to find her and give her the news in the hope she could return to see her mother again before she died. He would tell people that her last known address was in Cairns where she had a baby, twins actually, born about a year after she left and these would were now about two. She had sent them a card telling them this news from Cairns but that was the last definite contact.

  However it was known she had left that address a few months ago and travelled south, having rung a friend who now lived in Brisbane to say she lived in a coastal town not too far away but not giving the address. So his job was to try and locate her and ask her to get in touch with her family urgently He intimated that there was a substantial reward on offer from the family to anyone who could give the information that found her.

  He knew he could tell this story convincingly. He had a card made up giving his contact details as a private investigator with a checkable London firm. As he travelled he would leave cards and a photo of her with people he met along the way. On the bottom of the photo was written, Have you seen Jane? Reward for information about her location, and his mobile number. The photo was of Susan taken earlier in her life with her hair cut shorter and her face rounder. It was sufficiently different not to easily link her to the NT Crocodile Girl, but with enough similarity to trawl some possible sightings.

  A week passed as he worked his way north, then a second week. He had been to lots of places, talked to lots of people, building and caravan park managers, small neighborhood shops and cafés, children’s playgrounds, childcare centres, toyshops, and those who sat around watching others.

  He had run to ground a few leads which had turned into nothing. Overall people bought his story and the reward mentioned sharpened their interest, but there was nothing convincing about any likely sightings and there were no more substantial leads. He had given away over a thousand cards and photos in his travels. He felt that with all this something should come back his way if she was around.

  But so far nothing had. Even though he was not ready to give up yet it felt like a lot of effort for so little.

  Tomorrow he would begin at Noosa and work his way back down the Sunshine Coast to Brisbane. If that yielded nothing then he would need to rethink how to do this.

  Another week passed, he had done all the towns of the Sunshine Coast, both those on the coast and the near inland ones, except for the last one, Caloundra. After that all that remained was the bayside villages and towns along Moreton Bay until they were hard up against Brisbane suburbia. Once he got there he would have to admit he had failed.

  So today was Caloundra. He would start at the southern tip where there was a caravan park and work his way north. At 8:30 he knocked at the caravan park office and was greeted by a middle aged couple who announced they were the park managers. He asked about a girl named Jane with two small children, twins, aged around two years old. He knew in an instant he had got a hit, it was there in both their eyes.

  “Yes, we had a Jane who stayed here until about two weeks ago. I am afraid I don’t have a forwarding address. She left quite suddenly with the man she was with. We had thought they were married, they really seemed like a family, but Jane told Leah they were heading off to get married, she did not say where. Leah has gone to the shops but will be back in about an hour. You had best talk to her as they were good friends and she is most likely to know anything further.”

  So Jacob sat in his car and waited, trying to calm his jangling nerves with some soothing music. At last a girl of a similar age to Susan came driving in; she looked like she belonged here. The manager came out and pointed to her and the unit where she stayed.

  So Jacob went over and knocked on the door. “Coming,” came a voice and in a few seconds she was there looking out at him. She was not quite suspicious but there was something guarded about her.

  He went through his story but he could tell this woman did not believe him, as he spoke she became even more guarded and cautious. The mention of a reward only served to make her more suspicious.

  Finally she said, “I am sorry I can’t help you. I really did not know her that well, we just chatted a bit as we made up beds and things like that. Then one day she just upped and off, not saying where she was heading.”

  Jacob knew she was lying, her whole defensive demeanor told him that. But he knew he was wasting his time and decided that he had better try other options to
find out about them before the suspicions spread.

  He decided that the wedding story was likely true, he saw it in Leah’s eyes when he mentioned hearing of it. He had backed off then.

  So instead he needed to try and get a bit more about the man she was with, he would go back to the park managers and ask them before Leah could warn them to be careful. So he came back, thanking them profusely for all their help but saying it was a pity that Leah had not known where they had gone. As if in passing he said, Oh she told me the man’s name Jane was with, but I forgot to write it down, could you prompt my memory.

  “Vic,” replied the man at once.

  You don’t know a surname asked Jacob. The man thought for a minute, Bennet, he said. Nothing else you can think of about him asked Jacob. The man scratched his head, obviously giving the matter some thought. Only he was a dark one, skin half way to your color and I have a feeling one day that Jane said his Mum lived in Alice Springs. She was a sweet girl she was, she thought the sun shone out of our Vic and it was something she said one day about how she really wanted to go to Alice Springs to meet his family, particularly his Mum who lived there.

  Jacob could feel a huge and rising elation. He would bet London to a brick he had them, he had thought Vic had gone overseas.

  He had been informed about boyfriend Vic being heartbroken and catching the flight to Canada around the time the first rumors of Susan’s reappearance surfaced.

  But the sneaky bugger had been smarter than he credited, obviously having set this up as part of a disappearing act, when all the while he had hooked up with his girlfriend again.

  He knew it was all inference at this stage but how many blokes were there with skin that color and the name Vic who lived in Alice Springs.

  He could have asked these people for a better description of Vic, even got a photo and shown it to them to confirm it was him. But he knew he did not need that.

  Instead he went out to his car, put $2000 cash in an envelope and passed it over to the man and his wife saying, “My employer is a well to do and generous man. He would like you to take this for your trouble. Perhaps you could treat yourself to something nice with it.”

  With that he gave them a wave, climbed in his car and drove away.

  He knew the end of the chase was very near.

  Chapter 29 – The Wedding

  Vic looked back at the over the month that had passed while they lived in seclusion in their desert hideaway. He had loved this uninterrupted time spent with Jane and the children. Even though he knew another man was their father they felt like the Jane’s children were fully his now. He had worked hard on the station in return for keep but the work was a pleasure, doing things with his hands and knowing that each night he would return to his family who always greeted him with ferocious joy.

  Now the weather was cooling at night and, at the main station, a stock camp had been assembled to start the season’s muster. Next week they would draft off the steers for fattening in the river paddock and brand all this year’s calves from the close in paddocks before they went mustering further out. Vic and Jane mostly stayed in their outstation cottage but a few times they had come in to the main homestead to join the others for dinner.

  His Mum and Jillie had visited again the weekend before last to tell them that all the arrangements were now made for their wedding. Jane had sent Vic across to talk and drink with his Uncle for the afternoon, the children playing at his feet. She had closed the doors and put covers on the windows so he could not look in while she had taken Rosa and Jillie inside to help her select a wedding dress and make other style arrangements. He understood from Jane that her two bridesmaids would be Jillie and Anne while their children would carry flowers and follow her. He also knew that Jane’s mother, father and a few other key friends would attend. He wanted to keep it low key but it was easier said than done. Jane had a penchant for issuing invitations and did not see the need for secrecy. So it was hard to keep it quiet, but overall it seemed to have worked.

  Sorting out all the legal complexities had been tricky and Vic knew he owed a great debt to Buck, Alan, Anne and many others. However it had all come together as well as he could have hoped, much better than expected.

  It had worked been worked out in two places at the same time.

  Following on from the video the Northern Territory Government agreed to grant a pardon to Susan Emily MacDonald. It would be signed in two days time, on the Friday evening before their Saturday wedding. But it would not be announced until the following Monday, limiting to chance for journalists to go digging.

  At the same time the English Government had privately organized to grant new identity papers, also released on the Friday, English time. This would happen once the NT government confirmed the pardon was signed. These documents, which changed the name of Susan MacDonald to Jane Bennet, had been lodged on Jane’s behalf by her parents, with the support of the psychiatrist, Ross Sangster. He confirmed her memory loss and the risk of severe mental or physical harm if Jane was forced to become aware of her past identity.

  His statement was supported by an eminent English colleague who had been given the transcript of his previous interview with Jane along with the video and a summary of the trial information. He had fully concurred with Ross Sangster’s opinion. The English lawyers from Anne’s former firm had got a court order to suppress this identity change from public disclosure for a 5 year period.

  So, barring unforeseen hold ups, it would all happen like clockwork. Scanned copies of the NT documents would be sent to the UK once signed and then scanned copies of the new UK passport and other identity forms would arrive in time for the Saturday wedding ceremony. The originals would be couriered in both directions on flights leaving Friday night from both London and Darwin. They would be available in both London and Alice Springs at the end of the following day. So the original documents for the wedding could be lodged the following Monday in time for official registration procedures, and the English passport would be in their hands before they boarded the plane on Monday morning.

  The end result was Vikram Campbell was marrying Jane Bennet. It would be decreed in the official marriage ceremony. It would all be legal. And Vic lived in hope that no one outside their immediate circle would be any the wiser as to how Susan had become Jane, his bride.

  Early on Monday morning they would fly from Alice Springs via Cairns for a month’s holiday in remote northern Scotland, staying on the family farm where Jane’s last childhood memories remained. She would travel under this new passport issued to Jane Bennet.

  After that they would see what happened and decide on whether they could become public people again in either Australia or the UK or whether they needed to establish a new life in some other unknown location, perhaps New Zealand. Vic liked that idea as he had contacts who could arrange work there as a pilot, flying helicopters again in the mountains.

  For now Vic was happy to know almost nothing of the detailed wedding plans. All he knew was that they would drive back to Alice Springs, tomorrow, Friday. Jane would stay in a very private resort with her parents and Anne that night. He would have a night with his mates, a low key bucks’ ceremony he insisted. He was determined not to have a hangover. He would stay that night at his sister’s place with his Uncle in two of Jillie’s kids’ bunk beds.

  Jillie and his Mum would bring him and his Uncle to the church the next day, the one his sister belonged to. Jillie had squared away with the pastor that there be no publicity and no uninvited guests and for extra security Buck and Alan would take positions by the back door to only ensure invited guests came inside for the church wedding ceremony.

  After the ceremony they would all go out to Desert Springs Park for a private evening reception, with paid security to ensure no uninvited guests like photographers turned up there either. That night they would go to a private resort in a gorge in the West McDonnells for their wedding night. Here they would have brunch with the wedding guests the next day before saying th
eir goodbyes in preparation for Monday’s early departure.

  The whole plan was not totally foolproof but, since the early leaks when he had first done a runner and brought Jane away, there had been no further squeaks. So Vic was quietly confident that it would all work and they could just fade into the sunset, like any other newlyweds.

  Saturday morning had a slow, dreamlike quality. Vic sat at his sister’s kitchen table drinking endless cups of coffee, his hangover only minor. Jack had gone up town shopping, having been harassed by Rosa to buy a new suit so he looked the part of the head man of the family. Vic’s own suit hung in the cupboard, never worn though he was confident it would fit. He would do it all the proper way though this part of ceremony seemed unimportant to him. But he wanted it to be all perfect for Jane. He could not quite believe his luck in marrying this delightful girl, it was an unimagined dream of barely six months ago. He promised himself to make their life together extra good from here. He could not wait to see her or their children again, he even wondered if a third one may have started its spirit journey in one of their nights of loving out in the desert. It was a wonderful thought.

  The time drifted away until his sister harassed him into showering and dressing. He polished his shoes an extra time and adjusted his bow tie in the mirror, deciding he looked pretty spic.

  Then it was time to go to church. After a brief hello to a few friends he moved to the front of the church to await his bride. The waiting was agony; all he could think of was all the things that could go wrong. Every second seemed like a minute and every minute seemed like an hour. At last her heard the distant noise of a car’s arrival and muffled voices. This was the moment of ending waiting. He looked down to the far end of the church. A shimmer of light started to drift through the door, part sunlight, part gossamer.