by Ian W Taylor
*
Blakey was parked in the shadows in a side street, a block up from the hospital, when Xu and Liang came rushing out from the basement of the hospital. He was driving his old green Ford utility as the police had descriptions of the Jeep. He flicked his lights and they piled into the tray of the utility and Blakey pulled a tarpaulin over them. He drove around the back streets of Mataranka and circled back onto the highway praying that the police hadn’t had time to set up a roadblock. When he got to the highway he swung the Ford south towards Daly Waters. Fire brigades and police cars passed him coming from the opposite direction rushing towards the hospital. He was just starting to relax when he saw the flashing lights of a police car up ahead and two policemen in the process of setting up a roadblock. He drove up slowly to the roadblock as one of the officers waved him down.
Blakey poked his head out of the window.
“What’s up officer?”
“We’re looking for some Chinese guys who started a fire at the hospital” said the young constable as he peered into the driver’s cabin.
“Well, I don’t have any Chinese on board but I got a couple of dead roos I shot tonight if you’d like ‘em,” said Blakey pointing to the tarpaulin.
“No, you can keep your roos, have you seen anything unusual tonight?” asked the policeman.”
Blakey shook his head “No, officer, certainly not any Chinese.”
“O.K. you can be on your way buddy,” said the young officer.
Blakey breathed a sigh of relief and drove at a steady pace until he turned into the track back to the farm-house in Mataranka. The two Chinese crawled out from under the tarpaulin and made their way to the house. They made tea and sat around the kitchen table.
“You’re stuffed now Xu. The whole area will be crawling with cops and they’re gonna find us sooner than later. What are you planning to do?” asked Blakey.
Xu scowled “We’ll have to get out of here. We’ll fly out first thing in the morning. Can you tell the pilot to have the plane ready for take-off at sunrise?”
“It’ll take some time to get it ready, Simmo will be asleep from a night out at the pub by now.”
“Ring him up right now and tell him I want the plane ready by dawn or he won’t get paid,” shouted Wu angrily.
Swearing to himself, Blakey made the call. After a long wait, a groggy Simmo answered the phone and Blakey passed him the message. After a short and expletive ridden conservation, Blakey hung up and turned to Xu.
“He’s not happy - he reckons the earliest he can take off will be about 7 a.m.”
“Shit! O.K. but he’d better have it ready by then and he’d better be sober.”
They made a meal out of some canned food and were soon climbing into their beds to get a few hours’ sleep before flying out.