Girl in an Empty Cage

by Graham Wilson

  Chapter 3 - Missing

  Buck got a strange phone call just as dusk was settling over Victoria River Downs station. It was from the publican, Jack, at Timber Creek. His big booming voice came down the line. “Jack from Timber Creek, have you seen Vic, chopper pilot? Was expecting him midday and he’s done a no show. Thought maybe you booked him for a job at short notice and he diverted down to VRD Station.”

  It was more puzzling than anxious. But there was something strange and fearful in this whole affair with Mark. He had found out about it last week and it made him uneasy, over and above this.

  He had missed all the papers and TV news at the time that the Mark connection was made with the ‘Crocodile Man’. And, even then, if he had listened to the news, he was unsure whether he would have paid heed. November and December were often the busiest months of the year and this year was no exception. TV watching was lost in distant memory and the unread newspapers lay in a pile in the office.

  So, when Vic had turned up the week before Christmas to do a job for him, to clean out the scrubbers from the top end of the station, where the river ran into the gorge country, he had been none the wiser. But he could tell, from the moment he laid eyes on Vic, that something was seriously wrong. No surprise, he and Mark had been like brothers for as long as Buck knew either of them. They had done so many jobs together. They had an understanding of how to work together which was so much better than any other pilot and contract musterer he knew.

  So, despite having his own machines and plenty of others to pick from, he still regularly booked the two of them for these tough jobs, the rough country clean-ups where the wrong operator had the ability to lose every animal that was mustered in one critical minute, and Buck would be left with an empty yard and a big helicopter bill to pay.

  So he had wanted to book both Mark and Vic for this clean-up. For some reason he had never been able to run Mark to ground. Mark had not been seen around these parts for two or three months, not since he had come through with that pretty English lass, Susan; when they had helped to bring some cattle up the Wickham Gorge. Buck hadn’t thought much about it; Mark was like that; he sometimes dropped out for a couple months, then he would reappear when he was ready.

  So, in the end, he booked another contractor to work with Vic and clean up that pocket of country in the week before Christmas. He had the idea that Vic might be able to shed some light on where Mark had gone; he expected the story would be something like an unexpected trip to the Middle East; that had happened at least once before he could remember.

  But the moment he saw Vic’s face he knew there was more to this story, it was like a sixth sense spoke to him. They had no time to talk until the mustering was done. It had gone well, Vic had lost none of his touch and Billy, who had run the ground side of the operation, was good, if not quite the class act that Mark was. So he had got 59 big scrub bulls in the yards and about the same number of cows and heifers, three quarters were cleanskins now wearing the VRD brand, along with a scattering of young stock that would go into the paddocks. All in all it had been a good morning’s work.

  But, as they sat down for a cup of tea at the end of the job, Vic pulled him aside, and asked him if he knew about Mark.

  Buck’s perplexity had been obvious. He had replied, “Only that I have not been able to get in touch with him since August and that’s why, a month ago when I still had not heard from him, I booked Billy to work with you. I hoped you could tell me where he was.

  Vic’s reply was his usual direct self, “Yeah I wondered that too where he had gone, but I never really thought about it, too busy. Now I know; we won’t be seeing him anymore, he is dead; they say he has been murdered by that British bitch he was travelling with.”

  So the story had come tumbling out. Buck found it hard to believe, even now. It was hard to imagine Susan, she seemed such a sweet girl, doing that, or even that it was Mark’s body they found. But Vic had no doubt; something about an old bullet injury that Mark had to his arm had made him certain that it was Mark. Then Vic explained about the two surnames used by Mark and it gradually became clear as to why the name Mark Bennet, told on the radio news, had not connected. Buck knew him as Mark Butler, same as Vic. Mark was a common name.

  He could tell Vic was really angry, there was a cold, calculating rage bubbling inside him at the idea that someone would kill his best mate, whatever the reason. And that was only the half of what was odd.

  There was also the way that, on that last night he had seen him, Mark had asked him to witness his will, right after dinner. The will was made in yet another name again, “Vincent Mark Bassingham.”

  Mark explained this had been his name as a kid. But, because his father was a bad bastard he had run away from home as soon as he was old enough. So he had kept the name Mark, but changed the surname he used, though the other was still the legal name.

  That seemed fair enough but what was really odd was that the will gave all his possessions, apart from a few minor gifts, to the girl Susan who he was travelling with. Mark told Buck that Susan knew nothing about it and she probably would not agree if she was told.

  Buck had only half read the will as he witnessed it, but it was pretty short and there it was for all to see. It was not something he was likely to forget, just a few lines of minor beneficiaries, he half saw his own name and Vic’s there though never bothered to read any detail of what was given, and then there were a couple pages of paper at the back that listed some other assets. It seemed like quite a bit of stuff for a bloke who never showed any signs of owning more than himself and his vehicle. But again he did not give it more than a passing glance. Truth be told he did not think it was likely that anything would come of it. Mark was such a tough bastard; he’d watched him survive close shaves too many to count. Buck though it was fanciful to believe anything would ever touch him.

  When he’d questioned Mark as the whether he was sure about that bequest and why it was so important, Mark had admitted to Buck he was smitten with this girl. Plus he had a bad feeling, ‘sort of karma’, that his nine lives were running out. So Mark had told Buck he had decided that if something happened, whatever it may be, then all his things would go to her, some of his stuff was worth real money and he preferred she should have it rather than it go to the state or to his mongrel father.

  He said it with such quiet certainty that Buck did not argue back. He had just signed the document and handed it back to Mark who took it and nodded his thanks.

  Then Mark had laughed the whole thing off as superstition, saying that it must mean he was getting old if he was starting to see shadows dancing on his grave. But, notwithstanding, he was quite sure it was what he wanted. He also asked Buck to be an executor should the need to act on the will arise.

  Buck knew nothing about Marks affairs, but hell, Mark had been his mate, they had worked together on a lot of jobs over the last seven or eight years. What were mates for if not to see you right if something bad happened? So he had said yes to being an executor as well.

  Now he wondered where the will was?

  So, since that day when Vic told him that Mark was dead, he had been thinking about what his course of action should be; should he talk to the police, should he visit Susan? He had intended to discuss it with Vic when the chance came. He had noted, that night when he signed the will, that Vic’s name and signature sat alongside his own.

  And now Vic was missing, that’s what became clear as he talked to the publican at Timber Creek. Vic had been due there by no later than mid-afternoon. Jack said Vic had told him on the phone from Wyndham last night to expect him at Timber Creek today “best guess around time for lunch”, and hold a room for him. But the day was over and still Vic had not come.

  Jack also said he also had two tourists staying there that night. They were expecting a scenic flight with Vic early tomorrow. They wanted to confirm the arrangements and had expected to plan out the route with Vic tonight. So they were wanting to know where he was t
oo.

  When the sun set with no helicopter it occurred to Jack that Vic might have diverted to VRD for a job or some maintenance, he was a chopper mechanic after all and they had a workshop there. If so he thought he could have changed his plan to come over to Timber Creek first thing in the morning instead. Hence he had rung to check.

  Now they were both perplexed, Vic was super reliable, always called flight control to cancel his flights. Buck had immediately made a call to Darwin Flight Control. This confirmed that nothing had been heard since this morning when Vic left Wyndham about nine o’clock. Flight Control had not initiated any action as it was not unusual for helicopter pilots to fail to cancel their flights and, with a massive storm over Darwin from early afternoon, radio reception had been terrible. Now that storm had moved south over Pine Creek and the Daly River so the radio reception was still just as bad from down that way.

  The one other thing Flight Control in Darwin told him, in case he had not heard it on the radio, was there was a cyclone watch along the coast between Darwin and the border of Western Australia. The low system which had been sitting in the Arafura Sea, north of Arnhem Land, for the last couple days, had become a cyclone this afternoon. It was now heading in a south westerly direction at ten kilometres per hour. It was about 150 kilometres out to sea, and its current trajectory would bring it down over the western NT coast somewhere between the mouth of the Daly River and the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf.

  That meant it was headed this way and the weather was likely to deteriorate badly tomorrow, particularly in the afternoon, if the cyclone held its course. Of course it could swing further to the south and clobber Darwin or break further to the west and hit the Kimberley coast. But, as things stood, the place where Vic was flying through today was in direct line for this super storm and it did not improve the odds of finding him tomorrow, should a search be required.

  Off course Vic could have landed somewhere and not been able to get the machine to start again. But, if this was the case, why had he not called in. He could have used a local frequency to let someone down this way know to ring Darwin if he could not get through directly. But then, maybe he had a flat battery or a radio problem.

  So tomorrow they needed to locate him early or it would be time for a full scale search for a missing helicopter. With bad weather forecast as the day progressed they needed to get cracking early.

  This was something that Buck did not even like to think about. Two pilots he had known had gone down in his decade in the industry up here. They had been awful affairs for all concerned, one burned to a crisp so that what remained was past resembling a person. Buck had been one of the first on the scene and he still remembered that awful stink and the charred mess.

  Anyway that was for tomorrow, nothing more he could do tonight bar call the other stations en route; Legune, Auverge and Bulloo River for starters, and see if anyone had sighted him. He would have some dinner first then make the calls before he went off to bed.