Since Vic’s take-off yesterday morning about 9 am, when he had confirmed his destination and flight track and signed off after take-off, there had been nothing heard and no sightings or other information to tell where he might have gone. So it was a huge area to search, over 500 kilometres east west and 300 north south. But they would do their best.
By lunch time nothing had been found. They pushed on, racing against the clock and the weather. By 2 pm the weather had deteriorated such that the flying had to be abandoned. The cyclone was now stationary about 100 kilometres out to sea north-west of the mouth of the Daly River. It was still intensifying and all knew that huge rains and winds were coming this way. Already light rain had started at Timber Creek and overnight Pine Creek had received over a hundred millimetres from a large storm cell on its southern edge. That meant that the Daly would be coming down and soon all the rivers to the south would be running a banker as well.
Buck had not abandoned all hope; Vic struck him as a survivor, though he had thought the same about Mark. But it was a bad time for a machine to crash. The hopes of even looking, let alone finding anything, in the next three to four days, were extremely poor.
That first search afternoon, just after lunch, he got the VRD plane to fly him north to Timber Creek and out across the swollen rivers which burst out of the rough hills. He looked at the flooding water and the grey scudding clouds sweeping in from the north with a growing sense of hopelessness. If Vic was still alive he would not die of thirst. But the chances of ever finding him or his helicopter were becoming vanishingly small. Buck flew home. They battened down for the heavy rain and big wind which was coming their way.
By that night it was raining steadily at VRD and over the next three days they got three hundred millimetres and Timber Creek got five hundred millimetres. Now every river west of Darwin was in flood. The cyclone, as expected, had come down over the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf and the residual low pressure system was now somewhere down over the southern Tanami Desert, west of Alice Springs and expected to bring rains over a wide belt of inland Australia.
It was three days before the weather was good enough to fly again. For the next three days of good weather a widespread search was made across the northern VRD and west Kimberley. But in the end, with absolutely nothing found, it was abandoned.
In due course there would be an official investigation but for now the case was closed and Vic had vanished, presumed dead in a crash somewhere in that empty place. To Buck it felt like a pointless waste of a promising life.
He must now take carriage of the will which Mark had entrusted to him. He would go and see the police and Susan, he was unsure whether anything was to be done for her, and she had bigger problems than an inheritance, where a will may or may not exist.
But still he needed to advise both the authorities and her of his knowledge in this matter, not that it seemed relevant as Mark had said he was not going to tell her. But still it was a little piece of the jigsaw.
A month later a fishing trawler, working off the coast west of Darwin, sighted some wreckage floating in the water. It was hauled aboard and taken back to Darwin. Here the experts determined it was, almost certainly, a fuel tank from a Bell 47 helicopter, badly damaged, as if from a crash impact.
So the opinion was that it was most likely a part of the helicopter flown by Vikram Campbell on the morning of December 30th and that he had probably crashed somewhere around the mouth of the Victoria River, with the helicopter wreck then washed out to sea.
Another two days were spent searching this area around the mouth of the Victoria River but still nothing was found. So the search was officially ended and the files were passed on to the coroner’s office for its consideration.
Buck and a few friends held a wake in the Timber Creek hotel, one steamy afternoon in early February. A thunderstorm was turning the sky purple, with flashing and rumbling far out to the north, out near where the Victoria River met the sea. It seemed that the Gods had joined in the ceremony too.
“Vikram Campbell, helicopter pilot extraordinaire, RIP”, they said, as they downed their drinks in his memory.
Chapter 7 - Fragments of Investigation
Alan found it hard to return to work in Darwin in mid-January after his holidays with Sandy since Christmas. She was staying on in Sydney until the end of the month to start to get the ball rolling on wedding plans for the end of the year and to have a bit more time with her family.
They had flown together to Sydney, her home town, on Christmas Eve and had a great couple of days with her extended family in and around the city, before going to visit his family in country NSW, up past Scone in the Upper Hunter. They both got on well with the other’s families, and had done lots of holiday things together; country driving, beach swimming, meals in pubs. They returned to Sydney for New Year’s Eve. Over dinner in a restaurant looking out toward the bridge he had proposed to her. He had been really nervous despite thinking he was in control of this emotional stuff.
He felt great elation when she said, “About Bloody Time, and before you change your mind the answer is YES.” He loved her directness and that night together was special. Now he had left the arrangements to her and was glad of it, this complicated family stuff was not his thing and it was good they lived in the NT and escaped most of it.
It had been a wrench to say goodbye when his holidays were up, he would have loved to stay with her until the end of January and to travel back together. Since returning he had missed her presence in his life each day, mainly the little things like a good morning smile or the way she arched her eyebrows or kicked him under the table when he talked crap.
But he had a stack of work to do; he had neglected other things while he was working on the Crocodile Man case before Christmas. No one else had done his other work while he was away and now it was all piled up waiting for him. His career was on the rise after the work he had done in tracing the leads in that case, his name was becoming well known as the man who had cracked this case, and nobody seemed to have any doubt he had got it right. Susan was definitely in the frame, she had more or less admitted it, that hers was the hand that struck the fatal blow.
The problem was not with what she had done but why. He knew there was a whole other story that needed to be brought to light before this made sense, loving girlfriends do not bash in the skulls of their lovers and feed them to crocodiles without a reason.
But he seemed to be the only one who wanted to get to the bottom of this, the prosecution lawyers seemed to only care that the case against Susan was watertight, and it clearly was that. And, when he had explained his concerns to his superiors, they had said that, from the police point of view, they had the evidence needed for the conviction and the rest was window dressing, so now he needed to get on with other work. His immediate boss had told him that he did not mind him spending a couple hours a week chasing up the loose ends on “Croc Man” but that was the limit, other work must come first.
Now they had just assigned him to a major role in the investigation of a criminal syndicate with suspicion of both murder and drug smuggling around the NT coastline. That was taking sixteen hours a day, leaving little time for anything else.
But he sensed a great injustice was rolling forward while he let this, “Croc Man” case slide. A week after he came back he wentin to work on the Saturday, an unpaid day, to get his old paperwork done, all the stuff that was in the less urgent piles. He beavered away all day and by the end of the afternoon he had shrunk the pile from a foot high to two inches.
As he sorted through things he came across a scribbled note that he had left aside. It had got mixed up with this other stuff. It was the name “Vic” and a mobile number; he dug in his memory for a Vic.
It came to him, that helicopter pilot he had met in Katherine with Sandy that afternoon. It was the trace from the mobile phone record that had found him Vic and this link also showed that Mark used the assumed name Butler as well as the name Bennet from his driver’s license
.
He remembered that day clearly now; at first the link they had made to this pilot seemed to hold such promise and they had rushed off to Katherine to meet him. After all, this pilot had known their murder victim for ten years. They had been sure he would lead them back to something that started to make sense. There was no doubt he, Vic, knew their man, Mark, knew him better than almost anyone else in the NT. But, as to getting beyond that association and digging deeper, they had again drawn a blank about who Mark really was.
The ephemeral Mark seemed to drift in and out of people’s lives like a smoke ring, seen, gone, seen again. While at first this guy, Vic, was open and told what he knew, as the afternoon wore on he seemed to harden inside, they could sense his tolerance for their questions was slipping, not evasion but something held back.
So now Alan had it in mind to have a beer with Charlie, the catfish fisherman, before going back to the flat for a night on his own. Before he did he rang the pilot’s mobile number. He got one of those “sorry-leave a message” recordings. He decided not to leave a message, less notice was better if he wanted to get something useful from this bloke, the element of surprise was more likely to dig out that hidden ten per cent.
So he drove to Charlie’s place. As expected Charlie was on the verandah by himself, no sign of anyone else in the house. Charlie told him that Rosie was visiting relatives for a few days out in the Kakadu country.
So they got to chatting, first about Sandy. Charlie grinned broadly when Alan announced the wedding, “Maybe that catfish curry” he winked. “I give it to her when you meet her, now you must marry her. I get it for the marriage of my Becky, now maybe for another marriage. We have big celebration party when Sandy comes back.”
Alan nodded, liking the idea.
The conversation moved on to the murder investigation. Alan trusted Charlie’s judgement about people so he asked him. “What do you reckon, did she kill him?”
Charlie nodded and there was silence for a few seconds. Then he said, “Bad crocodile spirit, it make her; him, Mark fellow, dangerous man, him like crocodile, it is like he bite her, then she hit him.”
It was all cryptic but made a sort of sense, attack and strike back. But if so why was she hiding it?
Alan kept digging, “But why Charlie, why? This man seemed to like her, all the witnesses who saw them say they were like love birds, like you and Rosie, like me and Sandy. So why would he want to attack her and why would she hit back?”
Charlie gave one of his expansive shrugs. “Her I know, I visit her in prison just before Christmas and give her crocodile stone to keep crocodile spirit away. She not bad person, just frightened, so much frightened. But this man, Mark, I do not know, you must find someone who know this man, really know, not pretend know. Man is answer not woman.”
Alan nodded in return. “Yes I know that too, just before Christmas I found a man, a helicopter pilot, Vic Campbell. He said he had known this man, Mark, for ten years, and even after all that time he still did not know why. But I know he was hiding something from me. Perhaps he half knows something, something he guessed or glimpsed, but he does not want to say it. So now I must find him and get him to tell the truth, for her sake.
“I tried to ring him before I came, but he did not answer his phone, tomorrow I will try again.”
Charlie looked at him intensely. “What you say that helicopter pilot name?”
“Vic Campbell,” Alan replied.
Charlie shuffled off and returned with a pile of newspapers. He laid the papers on the table between them. “What Mr Policeman, you not read newspapers?”
Charlie shuffled through the papers and pulled one to the top.
The headline read – “Hope fades for the survival of missing helicopter pilot, Vikram Campbell.” It was dated January 7th, two weeks ago. It described how more than four days of searching had found no trace of Vic or his helicopter, missing since December 30. It also said how a severe tropical cyclone, a Category Four system, had passed through the area where the helicopter had been recorded as flying, the day after it was last seen, causing the search to be suspended. Then the search had resumed on January 3rd and had continued for three more days. It said that the search had now been ended, as no trace of pilot or helicopter was found and the hopes of his survival were considered very low.
Alan looked at the paper in shock, in part for the loss of this bright young pilot, in part for his most promising lead just snuffed out.
Without a trace back to the real Mark and without someone who knew him it all seemed futile, he just did not have the time in the next month to keep following the other fragments of threads. But he must not let it beat him; too much was at stake for that. He wracked his brain trying to think of some other way forward.
Charlie seemed to sense his consternation. He laid his hand on Alan’s arm and said, “If you find one person who knew him then you find more. Still this Vic will help you.
“You find the people who he worked with, this Vic, the people who knew him. Some of them will know Mark too, it is always the way. Even if he hides his secrets well, someone will know something. Tomorrow I start to find out about this missing helicopter pilot, and when I find someone who knows this Mark I give you a name.”
Alan spent the next day working again through all the clues he had about Mark, but nothing stood out. Then he remembered the barmaid from Timber Creek who had given the evidence that Susan and Mark had left there together, despite Susan’s claim they had separated there and gone different ways. The barmaid had only known him as Mark B, without a second name, just an initial, but still she seemed to know him well by sight, well enough to watch what he did and where he went. He still had her statement somewhere, though he had not read it in more than a month. Perhaps they had a fling at some stage; he sensed that something had motivated her to come forward and give evidence about this event, more than just being a responsible citizen. Perhaps she could give him some leads. Then he thought he remembered hearing in December, when he had met her at the committal hearing, that she was on her way home to Perth. Perhaps it was just for a Christmas break.
Alan rang the Timber Creek Hotel and talked to the publican. Unfortunately Tanya had left in December and was not returning. His only forwarding address was her mother’s place in Perth, just an address not a phone number. Alan knew he could run her to ground but it might take a few days.
While Alan had the publican on the phone he thought he should ask him about Vic, the paper said his intended destination on the night he disappeared was Timber Creek. Now he had something. The publican knew him well enough; he said Vic had stopped there several nights in the last year since he had bought the hotel. The publican told how he had rung the manager of Victoria Downs Station, Buck Owens, on that evening when Vic failed to arrive, as he knew Vic did a lot of work in the VRD and he also knew that Buck was a good friend of Vic’s.
Alan felt elation, friends of friends, Charlie was right. He rang the VRD station number and got the station manager’s wife, Beverly Owens. She was sorry that Buck was out and not expected back until about dark, but she would ask him to ring tomorrow, as he was doing a day of paperwork in the office. That is unless it was really urgent and she could call him on the two-way radio now.
Alan assured her that tomorrow was fine, even though he could feel his impatience.
About 9:30 in the morning the call came through, a booming outback accent, sounding like someone used to yelling out across a set of cattle yards. Alan was conscious of needing to handle this carefully after Vic had become defensive. So he started by explaining that he was trying to find out about a good friend of Vic’s and that he understood that Vic did work and was well known at VRD.
As he spoke the names of Vic and Mark he could almost feel a reserve come down the line.
Buck said “Yes, I did know them both quite well.” Then he asked if it had something to do with Mark’s murder.
Alan hesitated, he did not want to give too much away, but he neede
d this man’s help and sensed that bullshit would not wash. So he said, “Yes that’s right, I am trying to find out who this man Mark was that nobody seems to know.”
Another long silent pause ensued. Alan started to wonder if Buck was still there.
Then his voice came back, asking what Alan’s movements were on Wednesday, as he would be coming to Darwin.
Alan knew they were doing a night surveillance operation that night, which would begin with coming into the office about 3 pm. So that morning he was to be off duty. He replied, “Officially off duty until 3 pm, but happy to see you if up this way before then.
Buck replied “If it’s OK I would prefer to talk to you somewhere other than the police station. I am driving up from Katherine so could we make it for about ten o’clock, say for morning tea.
They agreed to meet in the café at the local shopping centre which they both knew. Alan felt intrigued by Buck’s wariness; it seemed there must be something here to know.
Over the next two days he barely had time to think of it; full time planning for the surveillance operation was all consuming.
But it was top of his list on Wednesday morning and he arrived early, treating himself to a big cooked breakfast. Buck was early too, Alan was just starting into his meal when a burly bloke came walking in and instantly spotted him, striding over and holding out his hand.
He looked with admiration as Alan’s plate of food and ordered the same for himself. Alan put the money down before Buck could pay, and was rewarded by a grin, “Anyone who buys me that sort of breakfast is worth talking too!”
Crocodile Spirit Dreaming - Possession - Books 1 - 3 Page 50