by Peter Cotton
A crescent moon cast a muted light over everything, and the temperature had dropped into the low twenties. Jervis Bay Road was empty, so the ride was seamless and fast, except for having to slow down on the loose surface at the roadworks near the air base. The site looked like a giant’s play park with piles of sand, stacks of pipes and huge yellow machines lined up on the roadside.
I sped past the air base and the turn-off to The Steeple, and at the top of the hill overlooking Steeple Bay, I pulled to the side of the road and took out my binoculars. Lights burned in half the houses. Small groups of people waited at various points along the road down to the jetty. Fisher people, deckhands, and the like, was my guess. A dozen vehicles chugged up the hill from the jetty, a confusion of headlights trundling through the darkness.
Bynder’s porch light was on, and a light burned in one of his front rooms. Had he come home or was it Jade? Or maybe Daisy had followed Jade back from Alice? Or was it one of Bynder’s other relatives, or maybe a friend, staying over?
I was about to put the binoculars away and roll down the hill when the light in Bynder’s front room went out. Moments later, the porch light went out as well. A dark figure emerged from the side of Bynder’s house, a big man — bigger and taller than Bynder — in a hoodie, with the beaky brim of a baseball cap poking out from underneath it.
A late-model white SUV peeled off from the procession of fishing vehicles and cruised around the corner into Bynder’s street. It slowed near his house as the hooded man walked quickly to the roadside. The SUV skidded in the gravel in front of him and stopped. The man got into the vehicle, which then moved off to the end of Bynder’s street, turned left onto the bitumen, and headed up the hill towards me.
I rolled the bike into a small stand of eucalypts, and the SUV roared by. When it was a hundred metres past me, I took off after it, keeping my distance, with my headlights off. After a few kilometres, it killed its lights and slowed down to turn onto the lighthouse road.
All signs of the recent police and navy presence had been removed from the turn-off — the military had promised to return the area to Alf and Davey as soon as possible, and it seemed they’d been true to their word.
I waited a hundred metres back from the turn-off. When five minutes had passed and the SUV still hadn’t re-emerged, I considered riding in after it. But if I did that, I might meet the vehicle coming out the other way. Such an encounter could create all sorts of complications, especially if the driver or one of the passengers was someone who might tell Trainor what I’d been doing.
So I decided to go in on foot, but only as far as The Steeple. I hid the bike and helmet behind some thick bush, walked up to the lighthouse road, and followed it down the hill. The surface of the road was lumpy in parts and pot-holed in others, making the walk challenging. I followed it as it veered around The Steeple. The ruins down on the headland glowed white in the moonlight.
A vehicle door closed with a thud somewhere near the ruins. The noise brought an alarmed response from a night bird. I climbed the rise to the fence around The Steeple. The vantage point gave me a different angle on the ruins and I saw a white vehicle, which I assumed was the SUV, parked behind a pile of stone blocks near the lighthouse.
I went back to the road and followed it down the hill. As I turned the corner at the bottom, closing in on the ruins, I saw a man silhouetted near the edge of the cliff, holding a small object above his head. Suddenly, a strong beam of light flashed from the object, and was gone. He flashed the light again. And a third time.
I had to call Trainor and tell her where I was and what I was seeing. I took out my phone, dialled her number, and clamped the thing to my ear. But just as it started to ring, a cold piece of steel was pressed hard into the back of my neck and a gravelly voice whispered in my ear.
‘Hold very still,’ he said, taking the phone from my hand. ‘You know what happens to the moth that flies too close to the flame, Detective? He gets badly burnt.’
The air around my right ear was compressed with a swoosh, there was a flash of light and an instant of pain, my legs gave way, and I was out before I hit the ground.
14
My head pulsed in time with my pounding heart. I opened my eyes and blinked a few times. My stomach convulsed, and I managed to turn my head just before I vomited. The watery mess joined several other patches of vomitus on the floor next to my face. The side of my leather jacket was immersed in the stuff. I was concussed, and if I continued to vomit, I’d soon be seriously dehydrated as well.
I tried to lift my hand to wipe my face, but my hands were secured behind me to something cold and immoveable. I closed my eyes and took twenty deep breaths. Feeling a little more present, I opened my eyes again and studied my surrounds. I was lying on my side on a newly varnished timber floor in a small white room, which seemed to sway back and forth. I assumed the swaying was just another symptom of my concussion.
A single weak bulb set into a low ceiling provided the only light. It wasn’t until I focused on the instrument console on the wall near my feet, and the stainless-steel wheel in the middle of the console, that I realised where I was. In the wheelhouse of a sizeable boat. Possibly some kind of fishing vessel. I felt strangely comforted that the swaying sensation wasn’t concussion-induced.
My ankles were bound by three large cable ties. I assumed the same had been used on my hands, which were secured to a thick steel pipe that came out of the floor and ran up through the ceiling. I slid my hands up either side of the pipe and levered myself into a seated position.
Lines of white sash windows filled the top half of three walls of the wheelhouse. The fourth wall, opposite the console, had two doors set into it. One looked to be the only door into the room. The other was lower, a bit narrower, and had a circle of small holes drilled into the middle of it, like it was some sort of storage locker.
I was testing the ties around my wrists when the main door opened, and Bynder ducked his head under the lintel. He studied me for a moment before he stepped inside the wheelhouse. As in the desert, he didn’t look particularly sick, although it was hard to tell in the dim light. He came over and checked my ties. Satisfied, he took a set of keys from his pocket and unlocked the storage locker. When he opened the door, I couldn’t help but gasp at the locker’s ‘contents’.
Jade Rawlins sat on a wooden chair inside the space. Her wrists and ankles were bound to the arms and legs of the chair by cable ties. A padding of plush fabric separated the ties from her skin. Her mouth was taped, and her eyes were closed. Bynder extended his hand and smoothed her hair. She opened her eyes and shook her head violently, forcing him to withdraw. Then she saw me, and her whole body seemed to slump. Maybe she’d been hoping against hope that I’d be coming to her rescue again.
‘One day you’ll thank me for this,’ said Bynder, as he checked her ties. ‘You just don’t know it yet.’
Jade let out a frustrated growl, and Bynder shrugged his shoulders and moved over to the console. He flipped some switches, and the engines fired up, setting off a vibration in the floor underneath me. When the engines reached an even rumble, Bynder gradually lifted the throttle, and the boat slowly gained speed.
Bynder rested one hand on the wheel and the other on a brass rail above the console. He stood with his feet apart and squinted through the mottled window in front of him. He flicked an occasional glance at the side windows. He seemed anxious and expectant. A few minutes later, he pushed down on the throttle, and the boat slowed and stopped.
The thud of engines signalled the approach of another boat, which soon idled in the water next to us. Bynder stepped out of the wheelhouse, closing the door behind him. He talked briefly to someone on the other side of the door. Their voices were muffled, so I didn’t hear what was said. Something was dragged across the floor outside. More voices. Then Bynder came back into the wheelhouse, returned to the helm, and we took off again.
The door opened, and a guy in a hoodie stepped into the wheelhouse. His face was in deep shadow, but from the size of him I assumed it was the same guy I’d seen coming out of Bynder’s house earlier, and at the lighthouse ruins just before I was whacked. He paused in front of Jade. She flicked her eyes away from him and looked at me. The guy in the hoodie followed her gaze. It was Manassa.
‘Not so lucky this time, eh?’ he said, giving me a faux smile. ‘No bikes here for you to steal.’
He moved to Bynder’s side, took hold of the brass rail, and they both stared intently out the front window. Bynder whispered something to Manassa without shifting his eyes. Manassa nodded, went over to Jade, and carefully removed the tape from her mouth. Relieved, she ran her tongue over her lips and stretched her mouth, then she glared at Manassa and shook her head.
‘You pair of fucking arseholes,’ she said, scowling as she spat out the words. ‘You’re a pair of dumb fucking thugs.’
‘Keep it to yourself, girl,’ said Bynder, without turning around. ‘Or I’ll get him to tape you up again. And if you think carrying on is going to bring the cavalry, forget it. It’s just like space out here. No one can hear you scream.’
Jade seethed as Manassa and Bynder chuckled at the joke, though Bynder quickly reverted to a study in concentration as he eyed the distance through the glass.
‘There,’ he said, pointing with his index finger.
He eased down on the throttle, the vessel slowed and stopped, and the thud of engines from another boat grew louder till it was idling on the other side of the wall next to me. Bynder and Manassa went outside, presumably to meet their visitor.
‘I know what you’re going to say,’ said Jade, her eyes flicking at the door before settling on me. ‘Well, at least I know it was them this time. What are you doing here, though? This might seem like a silly question to ask a cop, but, are you following me?’
‘It looks that way, doesn’t it?’ I said. ‘But no, I’m not.’
‘So, how’d you end up here?’
‘I guess natural curiosity got the better of me again. What about you?’
‘Me and Mum were giving each other the shits in Alice,’ she said.
Something was dragged across the floor outside, silencing her for a few moments.
‘I was missing Adam, the boy I told you about, and getting cranky with Mum because of it. So I left Alice, and a couple of hours after I got back here, Manassa came round to the house and said Uncle Kenny wanted to see me down at the jetty for something important. When I got on the boat, Uncle gave me a drink, and I woke up in here.’
‘I’ve come across you twice now, Jade,’ I said. ‘Here and in the desert. And both times you’ve been drugged and immobilised, and your uncle’s been calling the shots.’
‘No one’s more pissed off with him than I am,’ she said, spitting out the ‘p’. ‘And when I get the chance, he’ll find out just how much. But believe me, me being here and the stuff in the desert has nothing to do with what happened to Kylie and Shero, and everything to do with Uncle hating Adam. It’s him trying to protect me from myself, as he sees it.’
‘He’s certainly extremely protective, then.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘What does your Adam look like?’ I asked, picturing the young man in the Jervis Bay store.
‘Tall, and he’s got long hair and a beard. And very pale skin.’
It sounded like the guy in the store. My backside had gone numb, so I rocked my cheeks from side to side to increase the blood flow, and I started to get some feeling back. I would’ve killed for an equally simple remedy for my throbbing head.
‘That access you told me about,’ I said, ‘between the lighthouse and the water. Did you discuss it with anyone before you told me? Did anyone encourage you to tell me, for instance?’
‘No,’ said Jade, bemused by this turn in the conversation. ‘And I was right, wasn’t I? About the tunnel. So maybe you should know that when I got home yesterday, there were people talking about other tunnels like it. One of the neighbours even reckons there’s a tunnel that comes up inside Creswell.’
‘Who said that?’
‘I’m not telling. It’s just what I heard.’
She sounded like she believed what she was saying, and the story about a tunnel system at Cape St George had turned out to be true, so one could hardly rule out the possibility of there being a similar set of tunnels nearby. I pictured the people at Creswell running around like headless chooks if and when I got the chance to tell them the story.
‘How many people on this boat?’ I asked.
‘Not sure,’ said Jade.
‘Can you see outside from where you’re sitting?’
Jade raised herself as high as she could and peered out the front windows of the wheelhouse.
‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘But mostly what’s straight ahead.’
‘Are we near the coast or out at sea?’
‘Neither. We’re in the bay. On the northern side. There’s some fishers out and about, but they’re mostly in the middle. And there’s a few working the southern side. It’s slim pickings over here, so no one usually comes to this part.’
‘Other than the one that just pulled up next to us, how far away is the nearest boat that you can see?’
‘About a kilometre, I guess. Maybe more.’
‘Keep watching. Let me know if anything changes.’
Jade craned her neck for a better view, and I thought about our situation. We were in an isolated part of the bay where Bynder had rendezvoused with two vessels, and both times he’d conducted some sort of transaction. Essentially, stuff had been shifted from Bynder’s vessel onto the other vessels. I didn’t see him as a smuggler. And what would he be smuggling anyway? Drugs? Weapons? Maybe. But if this were a smuggling operation, why would he conduct it within spitting distance of Creswell, given its world-class surveillance capacity?
Over the next hour, Bynder and Manassa completed four more on-water transfers. I heard pretty much the same sort of activity each time, and Jade described much the same scene: a small launch or a trawler would sidle up to our vessel, Bynder and Manassa would pass identical metal boxes to the men on the boats, and then the other boat would motor off into the darkness. Jade said the boxes were long and deep, like little coffins. More like weapons crates, I thought.
After completing the sixth transfer, Bynder returned to the wheelhouse, hit the throttle, and we were soon ploughing through a light chop again. After a short while, he slowed and stopped, and minutes later a high-pitched engine noise signalled the approach of a smaller and zippier sort of vessel. Bynder and Manassa left the wheelhouse, and a minute later, the boat dipped as someone got on at the bow end. Then another dip. And another. And another. And a few more.
Bynder and Manassa re-entered the wheelhouse, and Manassa clipped the door to the wall to keep it open. They stepped to the console and turned to face the doorway. The wheelhouse soon echoed with a chaos of approaching footfalls.
A figure appeared in the doorway. He wore black fatigues and a black balaclava, black gloves and black, high-cut boots. He even wore heavily tinted glasses over his balaclava to ensure his identity was completely redacted. He held a silenced pistol at his side. He quickly surveyed the wheelhouse, his gaze lingering on Jade for a second.
Three men edged past him. They had their silenced pistols up and ready, AK-47s slung from their chests, and they were all dressed in the same black outfits as the first guy, who was clearly their leader. The wheelhouse soon reeked of edgy young men. More of them milled about just outside.
‘We’ll have a good view from here,’ said Bynder, turning to the head guy and gesturing at the windows. ‘And there’s plenty of boats to give us cover. But when it starts up, most of them’ll head for the open ocean, and we’ll have to do the same. Can’t be the only spectators at a stampede. But we’ll
see the start of the show at least, and this is as good a place as any to do that.’
‘Most definitely,’ said the visitor, in a slight accent I couldn’t pick. ‘But first things first. What’s happening with this girl? You sent her to Alice, and she came back. So, you bring her here? Onto this boat? After that business in the desert, she’s got you doing more stupid stuff? What is it with you and her? Seems like you keep making dumb decisions and seems like it’s her fault.’
‘She doesn’t know anything,’ said Bynder, casting a glance at Jade. ‘And believe me, she’s no threat after what she’s been through. So, once I get her back on land, she’s heading north and staying there. That’s right, isn’t it, Jade?’
Jade’s eyes narrowed. There was a tremor in her lips. I thought she was about to spit more venom at her uncle, but when she spoke, her tone was low and calming.
‘I’m absolutely going back,’ she said, her face warmed by a half-smile. ‘I’ve learnt my lesson. I should’ve stayed in Alice with Mum.’
Her survival instincts had transformed Jade from an aggrieved young woman into a compliant niece in an instant. The head guy studied her for a few seconds. Not being able to see his face, I had no idea whether she’d convinced him.
He gestured at her, and one of his men went and stood beside her. He flicked his fingers at me, and two of them moved in and trained their handguns on my chest. Taking my wallet from his trouser pocket — Bynder must have given it to him — he flipped the wallet open and examined my badge and ID card.
‘Detective Darren Glass,’ he said, ‘Australian Federal Police.’
His eyes lingered on the card for a few seconds, then he looked down at me.
‘So, Detective Glass,’ he said. ‘What are you doing here?’
It was the first question I would’ve asked him, had the tables been turned. The difference was, regardless of how I answered, my fate was sealed. These weren’t run-of-the-mill goons. They had military discipline, a clear chain of command, and some experience in clandestine operations, such as this one. They weren’t going to let me go after what I’d seen — I was as good as dead.