The Innimincka Affair

by Robert Chalmers

  "Ok, we'll take your word for it Miss Boucher. I do know your credentials, and respect them. If you say he had no part in this operation, then I'll accept that, on the proviso that should that prove to be wrong - you will be personally responsible. I'm sure you know what that means." The Agent signalled to the men near the chopper to let Cooper free. Cooper wasted no time in getting out once freed, and marched across to where the agent and the Captain stood. He was about to give them a piece of his mind when he caught Rebecca's eye. The slightest shake of her head alerted him, and she breathed a sigh of relief when instead of launching into a full scale outraged volley, he drew a deep breath instead and simply said.

  "Thank you for having the good sense to realise that I am not one of the bad guys." Cooper turned away and went to stand next to Rebecca.

  She took his hand and squeezed it. She may still have reservations about this man, but she had no intention of letting these people take him off to who knew where, perhaps never to be seen again. It was bad enough the 'bad guys' where on his property and shooting at him, he didn't need the friendlies doing the same thing.

  Apparently Agent Mitterrand had decided that he may have been a bit hasty in grabbing Cooper, because he now smiled depreciatingly and said,

  "Well, lets put that behind us shall we? From where we were, some considerable distance away, it didn't look good. We didn't want to take chances. So Cooper," he continued. "What can you tell us about these people?"

  Cooper scratched his chin with a fingernail. Rebecca smiled, she was getting to know Cooper well she thought. That was definitely a mannerism of his. Cooper looked at her in slight puzzlement. He was momentarily distracted by her sheer beauty. Even out here in the harshness of the outback, and she definitely not dressed in her best clothes, she was still like someone out of a top fashion magazine. It must have been quite disarming to be against her in a court of law. Cooper looked at the two facing him, Captain Fielding and Agent Mitterrand. Special Agent he corrected himself.

  "I think we can do this inside, rather than out here in the blazing sun." He could feel the heat, so he guessed that Rebecca would certainly be feeling it. "And for what it's worth," he continued, “I'm told that the intruders have gone from their camp away there to the south. Apparently they upped stakes and left in the night. They set my workers - my friends, free before leaving. They should be here soon." Agent Mitterrand was looking slightly confused.

  "How do you know this?" He asked with a sceptical note in his voice. Cooper pointed away to the nearby ridge. Billy, the nomad aboriginal, stood outlined on the ridge, one foot resting on his other knee, standing one legged, his spears in his right hand grounded in the sand for balance. He was like a dark statue, his lean body unmoving. Just watching. He had appeared just after they had let Cooper back out of the chopper.

  "He told me." The agent looked from Cooper to Billy and back again. There was disbelief in his face.

  "There are still nomads in this region? Aboriginal people living traditionally in the desert?" The question in his voice sounded disbelieving. "We have no knowledge of these people. How many are there? Where do they live? How long have they been out there?" He snapped his mouth shut. ‘This was bad,’ he thought. A whole group of people he now had to report on, that previous to this encounter he had no knowledge of. He turned to the captain.

  "Captain Fielding, do you have any knowledge of these people. Did you know they are out here?" He shook his head in disbelief.

  "Well, yes actually." Drawled the very Australian Captain Fielding. "We have known about them for years. It's their country after all, so it's only... um, polite? To know about them. No one thought they had any interest in the doings of foreigners. We may have been wrong on that score." The look in his eye told Rebecca that he actually had no real sympathy, if that was the expression needed, for the Special Agent in his company. It was a working relationship then, not a friendship. Rebecca noted this with interest. Meantime, they had all moved to the shade of the big house. The armed escort included. Cooper looked at them. They must have been sweltering inside all that black heavy clothing and protective jackets, close fitting helmets and webbing and packs that seemed to hang from every part of them. How on earth they kept it under control if having to move fast he couldn't even guess.

  Cooper had a cool room full of drinks of all sorts, including large milk churns full of water kept for drinking. He said to the captain.

  "Do you think your men could relax a little? There are no armed rebels out here after all. There is no one to be protected against now. Even previously there was only one armed person shooting at our aircraft. Please, sit yourselves down. Take it easy. I can get you cool water, soft drink, beer? What will it be gentlemen?"

  The captain told his men to stand down. Meaning Rebecca supposed that they could relax. It didn't take long and the men had removed their heavy battle ground equipment, and sat easily on the many chairs and benches scattered along the veranda. They didn't say much Rebecca thought. Probably something to do with training. They all opted for water, Cooper returned first with a basket of tin cups, then went and fetched the large milk churn full of cool water. He wheeled it out on a small trolley, and invited the men to help themselves. Cooper then got a large coffee jug going, and it didn't take long and there was coffee for any who wanted it. Soon everyone was relaxed in the shade on the veranda. Agent Mitterrand asked Rebecca to explain her presence on the property. He asked politely, and Rebecca thought it wouldn't hurt to bring him up to speed as it were. He and the others had come to their rescue after all. She told him the full story, of the approach by the potential buyer of Cooper's property, leading to her flight out to Australia and her eventual arrival on the cattle property as Cooper's guest. Their finding of the place deserted, and Billy's trek with Cooper to show him what was going on. Neither of the men interrupted, and eventually Rebecca came to the present moment. The agent had been making notes, and Captain Fielding had been listening keenly. They both looked out toward the sand ridges, but Billy was no where to be seen. Agent Mitterrand asked Cooper,

  "Do you think the aboriginal people will talk to us? To Fielding and myself that is?” Cooper shook his head slightly.

  "I very much doubt it. They don't like us much. They tolerate me and my men, because we've grown up here, and know to leave them alone. Billy; not his real name by the way, that's the one you saw on the ridge over there only came to me because he didn't like what the New world people were doing to their country. He needed to check that I wasn't involved. A bit like you I guess. When he discovered I wasn’t involved, he took me to where they were holding my workers. One of their team was speared in the leg for his troubles, and one had a warning spear thrown to within inches of him when it looked like he might be coming our way. Billy and I were hidden just in the lee of a sand ridge above them. I didn't know myself that they are a full social group out there until today. Or at least yesterday, when a couple of Billy's women came in and stayed with Rebecca while I was away with Billy. But talk to you? I'd be surprised. I've been here all my life, and in that time, I've only every come across the station hands talking about them. Until yesterday, I'd never met Billy, or to my knowledge, any of them."

  Agent Mitterrand made some notes then said. "Well, we will have to try at some point. These people could be very important for the security of the country. Such first hand intimate knowledge of the country would be invaluable. Perhaps it depends on how much they want paying."

  Cooper's jaw dropped open, then he started laughing. "Pay them?" He gasped through his laughter, now so hard that tears were streaming down his face. "Pay them. Agent Mitterrand, what are they going to spend it on out there? What could they possibly want, that money could buy?” He continued to chuckle and wipe his cheeks. It showed him just how little outsiders understood the lives of these ancient people. "I'm sorry Agent Mitterrand, but it's just not on. If they want to talk to you, and I understand the importance, and help you - then they will do it in their own time, a
nd on their own terms. Terms you may not actually like."

  Agent Mitterrand and Captain Fielding conferred quietly together for a few minutes slightly away from everyone, and then came back along the veranda.

  "Ok Cooper - may I call you Cooper? and Rebecca?" He looked at them both seeking approval for first name use. He continued. "We'll leave that for the time being anyway. We need to find out where the New World lot have gone. But where do we start?"

  "That's easy." Said Rebecca. "They went south, according to Billy. There is only one road in that direction according to Cooper, so they must be on it. Their plane is here, and useless. Unless they had air transport somewhere along that track further south, they are all in that huge truck that Cooper told me about. Should be easy to find, and you may call me Rebecca, if I have your first names?" She raised a quizzical eyebrow.

  Agent Mitterrand nodded. He didn't smile much Rebecca thought. He also didn't answer her, but changed his address to her.

  "Miss Boucher, then I gather yourself and Mr Anders will be happy enough to stay here, while we go and try and locate them. I'm most curious to pinpoint exactly where they are. I doubt they have actually escaped, so I'm sure they will be found.” It sounded as though it was more of a command than a query, but Rebecca wasn't arguing, and nor was Cooper. Now that they appeared to be safe from direct attack he had some things he wanted to talk over with Rebecca, and it needed privacy.

  "More than happy Agent Mitterrand." Rebecca replied. Cooper just looked at him and nodded. He was capable of showing courtesy to guests, providing food and drink as necessary, but he was still smarting from being bundled into the helicopter and was not at all ready to forgive and forget so easily. At a signal from the captain, the men were on their feet and kitted up again in moments, and headed out to the helicopter. The captain followed them, and finally, with little more than a nod of his head, Special Agent Mitterrand followed them. Rebecca was not sorry to see him go. They had arrived too late to do anything by way of help, and caused more trouble than they had averted actually. Cooper watched them go, the chopper lifting off in a cloud of dust and heading away to the south, low against the horizon. He had given them some features to pinpoint their search for the camp site, and from there they should be able to track the vehicle south if they wanted to. He didn't want to see them back particularly. Cooper looked at Rebecca.

  "I'm pretty sure that no one meant to actually harm us. No one in New World that is. If they had wanted to, they could have done a lot of damage the moment we arrived. There was something else going on." Cooper moved over to be close to Rebecca. She was wearing a light cotton blouse with buttons up the front, looking almost like a very chic cow-girl shirt. Her jeans were painted on, and he noticed her feet were encased in strapped sandals of the kind that were jokingly referred to as Jesus sandals. He smiled. She looked such a picture of little girl glamour, and country girl chic that his heart began to thud against his chest wall. She was beautiful and everything he wanted in a woman. Intelligent, fit and healthy, a wicked sense of humour and stunningly beautiful either in or out of her clothes. He had trouble keeping his hands off her. He was beginning to think that they had maybe gone too far already, but he had to put a stop to their getting together. It was a path filled with danger and misery. She would never fit into his world, and he knew she thought he would never fit into hers. Essentially he was a cowboy. Albeit a very rich one, and she was a big city lawyer. The biggest city actually. The two biggest cities in the world. New York, and London. Oh she knew he had that university degree, gained after long years of hard struggle studying at university. Degrees were not easy to do, but although a lot of work, it had come reasonably easy to him. He had wanted to get his study out of the way, get his degree and get back to the property to help his father. He had managed it too, but his father hadn't lasted much longer and Cooper found himself rattling around the vast homestead with no one to share the joy of the place with. The result was obvious, and now that he looked around him, the house looked drab and weary with the sunshine of Rebecca standing in the middle of the room. He had never noticed it much before, the long familiarity had allowed the deterioration to sneak up on him.

  Well, it could be fixed and fixed quickly - if he had a reason. He knew he didn't have a reason, because he knew equally well that Rebecca was out of there the moment she could manage it. Just like the others. Had they seen this too, and like Rebecca just not said anything. Suddenly it came to him. That was what her comment about the chickens was about. Nothing to do with actual chickens, but a comment more gently put about the lack of any home comforts about the place. Not even fresh eggs. No children. No flowers. No greenery of any kind. Well now that he could see what was revealed to him, he could fix it.

  "Rebecca." He stopped and looked down into her eyes. He felt he was drowning in vast pools of deep green ocean. Her eyes seemed to change between brown and a deep green depending on her mood. "Rebecca. I know you have to go back to London. I know I am not..." He had to swallow to clear the knot in his chest. "I know I'm not what you want in your life. You think I wouldn't fit with your lifestyle. The city confines. Your friends and family. What would I do for a living? I won't like it but I have to let you go back to your own part of the world, the things you are familiar with. Your career for one thing is very important." His face was so sad, Rebecca had to stop herself from bursting into tears. She clutched at his arm, shaking with emotion. Not bothering to answer, she reached up, stretching on her tip toes and kissed him. She held on, and as her kiss began to melt him she could feel his lips responding. He circled her with his strong brown arms and held her close. His passion was rousing, he couldn't help it and Rebecca could feel the surge of him against her. She clung on as though drowning in a turbulent sea. She felt the storm inside her. She knew if she said anything she would immediately weaken and give up any hope of going back to England just to stay here with Cooper. She unlinked herself and bit down on her lip to stop it trembling. Cooper slowly dropped his arms to his side and Rebecca fled into her room, the door swinging shut behind her. She buried her face in her pillow to drown out the sounds of her sobbing.

  Cooper was bitterly disappointed. There was nothing he wanted more than to be with Rebecca, but if she didn't want him there was nothing he could do. He just didn't see how a relationship could work. A long distance relationship was totally out of the question; the distances were too great. He had to stay and continue with the cattle property. He owed it to his father to keep the dream alive. It had meant that his hard won degree languished in it's frame on his study wall, unapplied and almost forgotten on a day to day basis. He had managed to keep abreast of modern developments in his particular field, as the nights were long and solitary out here, but what could he do with it out here. Cooper began to pace about the house, in and out of rooms, along the wide verandas, out into the yards and sheds. He was taking stock of what he saw. not just counting sheds, but looking at them. Looking at the house, really looking. Looking at the house yard, now almost indistinguishable from the surrounding countryside that stretched away into the shimmering distance. Sand ridges that had always seems mysterious and beautiful to him now looked to be exactly what they were. Dangerous and slow moving destroyers of landscape. Were they coming closer to the house with each passing year? He could do measurements on that, and research through old family records and photographs to find out.

  What he saw now as he found his way back to the house did not please him. He decided he really needed to take absolute stock of his situation, and act on it. If he was to stay here - let alone invite anyone else to stay here, the place had to be brought back to it's former grandeur and soon. Inside and out, the whole house and its surroundings needed a complete make over. That would require a woman's touch, and he had only one woman in mind but that woman was clearly not interested in staying here. What a quandary. Cooper was intelligent enough to see that his life was at a crossroads.

  Cooper mounted the steps onto the veranda and turned to f
ace the yards again. He lent against the supporting post and stared into the distance. He supposed Rebecca was still in her room. He had heard her sobbing through the thin panel walls. The house was very old, and had been built in the old tongue-and-groove timber wall style, and never modernised in over a hundred years. Thin walls let the sound travel. He felt wretched - it was the only way of putting it. He had once again caused Rebecca unnecessary hurt, but he couldn't let her go on thinking that he could just go back to London with her. He could not equally expect her to give up all she knew to come and live out here in this wilderness. Certainly not if the place looked like this. He realised that he was in something of a state of shock over his new insight into where he lived and had been raised up all these years. This place was still his fathers house. Practically nothing had changed and yet his father had been dead for years now. Cooper smacked the veranda post in frustration. Suddenly his mind was made up. He knew exactly what he had to do. Rounding on his heel he marched back into the house and into his study. He picked up the phone called and straight through to Toowoomba airport and ordered a service plane to come out and fix his now crippled aircraft, and they should bring tools to repair the New World plane and take it back to Toowoomba. There were other places he could have organised this with, but he had accounts at Toowoomba, and it was just easier. They would come straight out in a small jet, his runway was suitable, and he bank account was never questioned. Next he called British airways and booked a flight one way, one person to London for two days’ time. Name: Rebecca Boucher. Departing Brisbane, direct flight. His next call was to a building firm in Toowoomba that he had used before, and that he knew were familiar with working on projects on remote properties. They were to arrive by the end of the week, using a charted plane and carrying all they could fit on board to start refurbishing this place immediately. The plane was at their disposal for as long as it took. They had an open account to get what they needed. Their only rider was that the house was to retain its heritage character and basic layout, and where possible original materials. In other words, he wanted it to be a restoration as well as a modernisation. electricity was to be provided by the latest state of the art technology, and they were to hire a team on sub-contract to start with the outbuildings, and work their way into the house. Repairing, pulling down and rebuilding where needed. Gardeners were to be hired and put on the job. There was plenty of accommodation between the house and the stockmen's quarters, and if any was lacking - truck it in. He had been an hour on the phone by the time he smacked his palms together and declared himself ready. The first team would be here in the morning. They were left in no doubt that if they couldn't do it, he would immediately find someone who could.