Cockatoo

by Christopher Cummings

  So she turned the canoe and headed out into the middle of the lake, a procedure that took all of her skill to prevent the beam sea capsizing her canoe. That her decision was the right one she was almost at once sure as she heard angry voices and glimpsed figures moving on the shore near the car.

  Disheartened but glad she forced her tired muscles into action once more. ‘Platypus or Barrabadeen Campgrounds then,’ she told herself, knowing that were definitely going to be cadets at the latter.

  Once she was several hundred metres from the shore and she felt confident that she was safe from rifle fire Tina turned her canoe west once again and kept paddling slowly. By then the pine trees on the western end of the Fongon Peninsula were only a few hundred metres off to her port side and she was again tempted to go there. But more lights and tents were now appearing only a kilometre or so ahead at the Platypus Campground so she held her course towards it.

  All the while she kept glancing frequently back. To her dismay she saw the vehicle reverse and then drive off up the slope. It vanished among the trees and then she got the worrying shock of seeing the flicker of its headlights off to her right as it drove along the road. Several times the headlights stopped and she got the uneasy feeling the people in the car could see her and were keeping level with her. That got Tina fretting about how to avoid them when she finally did come ashore.

  Then she got another shock. It was just starting to get light- 0600- and she was in the narrowest part of the lake between Fongon and the north shore, when she spotted a splash of white spray about half a kilometre behind. ‘Neville!’ she thought. “Qh no!” she sobbed. It was all too much and she felt her hopes plummet. Despair gripped her insides and she wept with pain and fear.

  But despite that she kept grimly on. Every minute she calculated she covered another hundred metres. Platypus Campground grew closer with every exhausted paddle stroke. But so did Neville’s canoe. It became a black dot amid splashes of white spray. Then her despair deepened when the headlights moved on out of sight and a few minutes later reappeared among the pine trees and tents at the Platypus Campground.

  ‘Or is it another vehicle, just innocent people?’ she wondered. But she knew she did not dare go ashore to test her theory. When the vehicle came to a halt on the edge of the lake with its headlights shining out across the water her suspicions deepened into certainty and she wept from fear and frustration. To add to her dejection she could see no sign of any cadets at the camp ground.

  Gasping and sobbing with fatigue she pushed herself to keep paddling, again angling out into the lake and away from the shore. By this time she had the forested peninsulas of Python Point away off to her left but one look at those dark, jungle-covered ridges made her shake her head. They offered neither comfort nor help, even if she could hide there.

  0610 came and then 0615 and the first grey paleness among the low clouds off to the east. By 0620 she was off the end of the peninsula that the Platypus Campground was on and the tip of the peninsula occupied by Camp Barrabadeen slid into view. ‘Oh please God! Not far now!’ she thought. It looked to be about a kilometre away. So did the town of Tinaroo off her port bow. Directly in front of her she made out the straight line that marked the spillway of the dam. It was a few hundred metres further than Barrabadeen.

  But only about half a kilometre back was Neville in his canoe and he appeared to be still paddling strongly and to be overhauling her fast. The sight of him made Tina sob and bite her lip. ‘Oh, can I make it in time?’ she wondered.

  She could only try. But her arms were now so tired she could hardly lift the paddle and she was starting to lose her technique, the paddle frequently striking the water and throwing up ‘crabs’ of spray.

  Worse still she was getting fierce cramps in her legs and her lower back muscles were starting to stiffen and seize up. Her muscles were trembling and she was shivering with cold. Blisters were forming and starting to break on her wet hands. Then, as the daylight strengthened, she made the shocking discovery that the bottom of the canoe was slick with blood! ‘I am bleeding to death!’ she thought with dismay.

  0630. Half a kilometre to go- but Neville only a few hundred metres behind. ‘It is going to be close,’ Tina thought, whimpering with pain from her cramps, chafing and blistered hands which were now starting to sting and bleed.

  Suddenly she heard a noise which made her heart seem to stop and she looked back and up in despair. She was right. It was the smuggler’s floatplane!

  Tina watched in horrified disbelief as the floatplane flew low overhead and then swung round when over the spillway to come back in her direction. To her dismay she watched it land. As its floats hit the water they threw up showers of spray. Then the aircraft began taxiing straight towards her.

  ‘Caught!’ she thought in despair. ‘And so close!’

  CHAPTER 48

  WORST NIGHTMARE

  Tina stared at the approaching floatplane in horror. Sick despair engulfed her and she slumped in her seat. All she could do for several seconds was shake with exhaustion. But then the terror began to mount and along with it a pent up fury of frustration. Desperately she looked around, hoping for some help- any help!

  To her left front was the line of the spillway and to the left of that the buildings of Tinaroo, now showing some reds and blues as the light improved. But the houses were now an impossibly long way away- a kilometre or more. To port was the vast expanse of the southern arm of the lake and behind her the tumbling grey of waves and then the dark masses of hills back from Python Point. And there was Neville, now overtaking her fast.

  Her focus shifted back to the hilly peninsula ahead of her. She saw that there were tiny figures on the lawn near the buildings at Camp Barrabadeen and she thought they were wearing the dark blue of navy cadets but she couldn’t be sure. But though they were only four or five hundred meters off they also seemed hopelessly far away. ‘Can they help me?’ she wondered.

  In desperation she put down her paddle and stood up in the canoe, risking a capsize to do so. On shaking legs she balanced precariously and then held her arms up high. Then she dropped her right arm to horizontal and her left arm to point downwards at 45 degrees, making the letter ‘S’ in the Semaphore Code. After a pause of a second or so she dropped both arms and then immediately put her right arm back to the horizontal and reached across her front to hold her left arm up at 45 degrees, forming the letter ‘O’. Then she made another ‘S’. Twice more she repeated the SOS but by then was almost weeping with frustration and despair as she could not tell if anyone was even looking in her direction. ‘And they will probably not know semaphore,’ she thought. It was after all an archaic set of knowledge and only by being a navy cadet had she learned it.

  Then the floatplane surged alongside and she saw heads leaning out of the side windows. Close up the plane was larger than she remembered. It had two windows behind the windscreen and then a sliding door on the port side just abaft the struts supporting the high wing. Looking from the rear side window on the port side was Danny and he had a pistol in his hand. Peering through the windscreen were Kostis and a middle aged man who Tina assumed was The Boss.

  The plane surged to a stop, Tina flinching away from the whirling propeller. Danny leaned out and shouted above the sound of the engine, “Get aboard girl!”

  “No!” Tina shouted back. She felt frozen with fear but was also desperately determined.

  “I will shoot if you don’t,” Danny called back.

  “You will shoot me anyway,” Tina retorted, the icy terror of imminent death causing her to tremble and want to puke.

  “No we won’t! The Boss just wants to talk to you,” Danny answered.

  Tina again shook her head. “No,” she replied. She did not believe the man and was so overwrought she could not help being defiant. Instead she took up her paddle and moved to paddle away. As she did she crouched and her flesh crawled in anticipation of being struck by a bullet. The canoe began to move and she heard angry shouts but no
shot.

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw Danny move and she realized he had taken up a boat hook from inside the cabin. Just in time she raised her paddle to protect herself as he swung it in a vicious scything sweep. The action partially saved her but she was not strong enough to ward off the blow. The boathook struck her paddle and smashed it back into her face. Then the boathook slammed into the side of her head, sending her senses reeling.

  To her dismay Tina found she could not see properly as she wavered on the edge of being unconscious. Then it got worse and she felt the canoe roll as she lost her balance in the waves. The next thing she knew she was in the water. As she went under panic swamped her for a second as she struggled to get free of the canoe and to work out which way was up. The water was cold and dark and terror made it hard to think straight. But there was still a spark of defiance in her and she decided to try to swim away underwater.

  But even as she did she felt a sharp blow on her shoulders and then a burning, scraping feeling down the middle of her back. The next moment she experienced the odd sensation of being hauled backwards. Even as a sharp, stinging pain swept across her back she knew she had been gaffed by the boat hook and that Danny was pulling her back. Then her head banged against something- a float she presumed – and she blacked out for a few seconds.

  When she came to, her whole being squirming with terror and panic, she realized that strong hands had her and were hauling her up out of the water. She felt the cold wind on her wet skin and clothes and a spasm of coughing wracked her as she instinctively tried to clear water from her throat and nose. Then she blinked her eyes open and saw that Neville was there in his canoe, helping to heave her up while Danny now stood on the port float and lifted. In the process her shirt ripped and they grabbed at her arms, breasts and bra in an attempt to get a firm grip.

  It was all humiliating, painful and upsetting to Tina. Even so she tried to squirm free, to get back into the water. The result was a stinging blow to the side of her head that sent her senses reeling again. Danny snarled in her ear, “Stop struggling you stupid bitch or I will really hurt you!”

  Tina now retched and a wave of intense trembling shook her so much she felt helpless. The men hoisted her up and rolled her into the cabin of the floatplane. In the process she banged her knees and shins and was bumped and bruised some more so that her whole being seemed to be one throbbing mass of pain. Reeling on the edge of unconsciousness she felt herself being rolled over and then dragged away from the door.

  As she was being dragged Tina heard Neville say, “Here comes a boat.”

  “Forget it,” Danny answered. “Just get in.”

  “What about Marco?”

  The Boss answered this, “I have phoned him and told him to take the vehicle and get out of the area. He will be alright if he moves fast, before any coppers arrive.”

  Tina lay on her back, her head and neck jammed up against the far side of the cabin behind the seats. Despite her nausea and weakness she had the wit to glance around. She saw that she had two seats side by side on her right and a stack of locked boxes strapped to shelves on her left at the rear of the cabin.

  Neville clambered in and stepped over Tina, giving her a kick as he did. “Little bitch! You have given us a real run around. You will pay for that!” he snarled.

  That terrified Tina but also made her unreasonably angry. ‘I am the innocent victim here!’ she thought indignantly. But wisely she kept her mouth shut and her eyes almost closed, pretending to be more stunned than she actually was. Not that it took much pretending she was so battered. Danny next climbed up and as he did Tina heard the buzzing sound of an outboard motor.

  ‘Help, but too late,’ she thought. She was sure there was no way the crooks would allow her to escape now. ‘They will use me as a hostage if it is the police,’ she decided.

  The Boss called, “Get this thing in the air Kostis. Let’s get out of here.”

  “Where dat boat?” Kostis called as he opened the throttle.

  “Somewhere behind us. You won’t hit it,” Danny answered as he slid the side door shut. He then stepped over Tina and moved to seat himself.

  Tina felt the aircraft start to surge forward and then its engine bellowed as it began its take-off run. ‘Done for!’ she thought, black despair flooding through her.

  The engine roared and the plane dug its tail in and began to surge across the lake. As it did its floats smacked into every wave, sending up showers of spray. Tina tensed for the lift off and wondered what she might do next. ‘Die with dignity I hope,’ she thought gloomily. She resolved to tell the crooks nothing and to try to be defiant to the end. ‘I just hope they don’t rape me and do disgusting and humiliating things,’ she thought.

  Then the aircraft’s engine eased up and she heard the Boss say, “What’s wrong?”

  “We not moving right. Something holding us back,” Kostis called back.

  “Danny, have a look,” the Boss ordered.

  Danny swore but got out of his seat and stepped back over Tina. As he did he gave her a savage kick to move her legs out of his way. Tina cried out in pain and curled up into a trembling ball. Then Danny unlocked the door and slid it open. Leaning out he looked back. He swore then leaned back in and yelled, “We are dragging that boat. Some kid, a navy cadet. He’s tied on to us and has the outboard reversed.”

  Tina’s heart leapt in hope. ‘Some kid! A navy cadet!’ she thought. Was it Andrew?

  But then the Boss’s next order chilled her. He shouted, “Shoot the little bastard and get us free.”

  Tina saw Danny pull out his automatic pistol. After cocking it he took a firm grip on the doorframe with his left hand and leaned out to use the gun. ‘Oh no! He will shoot Andrew!’ Tina thought. She was sure it had to be Andrew. In desperation she acted. There in front of her was Danny’s backside. Curling her legs up she lashed out, kicking as hard as she could. The blow caught Danny completely by surprise and he went flying out of the doorway and was gone in an instant.

  There were angry shouts and Tina saw Neville leaning over the back of his seat and glaring at her. A stab of terror reminded her that she was still in mortal peril. ‘And I have really made them angry now!’ she thought. In a panicked reflex she jerked away from Neville’s clawing hands. But the boxes blocked her attempt to get clear. In desperation she grabbed at them, clicking open locks and catches. As Neville stood up and turned to come at her she flung the first box left handed hard at his face.

  Neville saw it coming and was able to put his hands up to ward it off but what happened next so astonished Tina she was frozen for several seconds. The box burst open and out of it rained a shower of wriggling brown objects.

  ‘Snakes!’ she thought as the reptiles showered over Neville, the Boss, and Kostis. Pandemonium resulted. All the men began to yell and scream in fear and Tina saw a snake slither over the Boss’s shoulder as he struggled to release his seatbelt and get up. Kostis seemed to go completely berserk and began swatting around him with his arms, letting go of the controls in the process.

  One of the snakes wrapped itself around Neville’s arm. He began to shriek in terror and flailed his arm to try to flick it off. As he did the snake began to bite at him, striking repeatedly at his upper arm and face.

  Another brown snake slid off the back of the seat onto the floor near Tina and she jerked her legs away from it in terror. Then she clawed her way to her feet, her eyes bulging with fright as the reptile slid towards her. She did not hesitate. There was the open door and the lake and she dived. She went through the door headfirst and landed with a hard belly flop among the waves.

  The bad dive winded her but she had the presence of mind to not struggle until her eyes could detect which way was up. Then she swam and floated to the surface. As she did she saw a ‘tinnie’ type power boat go past with a person in blue sitting in it, his mouth agape in astonishment at the sight of her.

  It was Andrew and as the first shock of recognition wore off she saw him sta
rt to turn the boat. Then a wave slapped her in the face and she went under. When she came up, coughing and gasping she had trouble seeing until she blinked her eyes clear. Then she saw that Andrew was struggling to untie or cast off the rope that he had secured to the struts which held the floats under the floatplane.

  She saw the powerboat and the floatplane both arc around in a semicircle. Then Andrew whipped out his sailor’s knife and slashed the line. The floatplane went on weaving away from her, obviously not under control. Andrew sent the boat sweeping around in a wide curve, shielding his eyes as he searched for her among the waves. Now terrified that she might drown Tina struggled to keep her head above water even as she waved an arm.

  It seemed to take Andrew some time to spot her but she realized it was actually only a few seconds. Just as he did a large dull red buoy went bobbing across Tina’s field of vision. It was so unexpected that she could only gape at it and wonder. Then its meaning struck her like a physical blow. ‘That is one of the warning buoys near the spillway to the dam,’ she remembered.

  A stab of terror, mixed with dark images from her nightmares, caused her to look around. She was just in time to see the tail of the floatplane suddenly tilt sharply upwards. That also puzzled her but then she saw it tilt further even as a man leapt out. The wing swung crazily and then the whole thing just vanished from sight.

  As it did Tina’s eyes focused on the straight line of water, beyond which was the sky. Again the shock of comprehension almost paralysed her. ‘That is the lip of the spillway. There is water going over the top of the dam,’ she thought. Remembering how much rain there had been the previous week she was not really surprised but terrifying images of just how high and steep that massive concrete wall were flooded her mind, sending her into a panic.

  Then there was more horror. Right near the spillway was the man who had jumped from the doomed plane. She recognized the Boss. He was swimming frantically, his face towards Tina. But even as she watched she saw him glance back and a look of despair cross his face. He made several more desperate arm movements but then he was gone, plucked over the edge by the current.