Crystal Coffin (16 page)

He tethered Jack to a yard rail so he wouldn't follow. On the verandah, Tuckerbox woke and spotted him moving across the yard. The dog kicked at a flea under his collar and ran to greet him, licking his fingers and sniffing at his heels. Locklin scruffed the dog's ears and then signalled him to stay as he headed to the vehicle alone. Tuckerbox sat panting on the dry grass, watching him.

The silver Landcruiser huddled in moon shadows against the house and as Locklin crossed the driveway towards it, small loose stones crunched loudly under his feet. He pulled off his boots and walked quietly in his socks to the nearest corner of the homestead. The gravel still crunched under his socks, but it wasn't nearly as loud.

He looked up at the master bedroom window on the second floor and saw a dim light flicker in the window next to it. It was the room his parents had used as a nursery for Kirby after she was born. The curtains flapped slowly on a night without breeze and he realised that it must be a fan, keeping a child cool while it slept.

The dim light seemed to move as the house creaked and his stomach told him there were footsteps padding along a tired floor. Reason told him there was probably a nightlamp in the child's room, its gentle glow dancing with the fan in the lace curtain and the old house was merely settling down to sleep for the night.

But he stayed alert to the sounds, edging back along the north wall to the car in the same way that he'd edged along a chicken hutch in East Timor towards a body.

He looked around the back of the vehicle, half expecting to see a dead girl lying on the stones. He shook his head. Focus, he told himself. There was nothing more he could do for her.

Locklin put his hands to the tinted glass of the Landcruiser, angling his fingers to maximise light from a high moon. There were crates in the back. The car was full of them with barely enough room left in there for the driver, and some of the lids were enticingly ajar.

Why would they be open? he wondered.

He looked up again at the windows on the second floor and then edged around to the vehicle to peer at the dashboard for alarm indicators. There were two.

He cursed his luck. The intermittent red flashes on the console warned him that the doors were deadlocked and the car alarm had been armed. That meant, with the way sound travelled over the flats and water, there was no breaking into this baby without waking up half the valley as far as Toogoolawah.

Locklin clenched his fists and released them slowly. He counted thirteen crates in all, none of them with any markings other than the deeply driven screws along the edges, and they looked about the same as the ones that Maitland and his mates had been loading onto the plane that morning. He edged around the vehicle again, being careful not to lean too heavily on it or knock the side mirrors in case a motion sensor was fitted.

The lids were loose on seven crates that he could see. They teased him. None were off enough to reveal their secret. Light wasn't the problem, it was the angle. What he needed was to get in there. But that wasn't going to happen right now and he continued his reconnaissance, gathering intelligence to answer other questions in the meantime.

How long had Maitland been back?

Locklin ran the back of his hand over the bonnet and the grille at the front so he could check engine temperature without leaving fingerprints, and he found the car to be cool. He reached under the back and discovered the exhaust pipe was the same. He frowned.

If the vehicle had come directly from the airport an hour away, then he figured that, a hot night should have kept the car warm for at least half an hour after it stopped. And Helen, had said the car was still at Brisbane airport at 9pm.

He went to the front again to confirm his suspicion and felt around on the ground under the left front corner. If the air conditioner had been running, condensation would have formed on the compressor and dripped to soak the ground underneath the outlet. The crushed stones were damp, but only barely. The condensation had not only formed and puddled, but had also had time enough to soak away.

His frown darkened.

Either the ground was thirstier for rain than he realised, or Maitland had returned about the same time that he'd ridden Jack to meet the others at the boathouse, possibly just beforehand. He hadn't noticed the vehicle before he left, but he had avoided this end of the house, in case Thorna saw him. The lights had only been out in the house for an hour and it was possible that she was still awake in the master bedroom. And although he knew she'd be expecting someone to take Denny's place while he took a short break, he didn't know how she felt about it or what she'd do if she recognised him.

He collected his boots and returned to the stables, using his phone to message Helen's mobile, so she'd know not to worry any more about doing airport checks on the Landcruiser. He dabbed the largest globs of greasy shoe polish off Jack's face and legs and turned him loose for the night in his grassy yard. Then he settled himself against his horse's favourite shade tree and watched the car.

‘That's twice,' he told the stallion that grazed behind him. ‘The next time those crates move, we'll get some answers.'

All night, the house whispered to her, teasing her with echoes of footsteps as the building cooled, its roof contracting and the windows shivering in the early morn. As the dawn kissed the night away, Nikki was still sitting half-propped against her pillow, her eyes fixed on her door.

Sleep had stolen over her only briefly now and then throughout the night. And each time she'd slipped from semi-consciousness into that dark void where nightmares lurked, she'd awoken with a jolt, to sounds that were as harmless as a dog scratching its fleas. After a night deprived of sleep, she wondered how it could elude her now. Or had it? The green digitals on the bedside clock flashed that it was 4.29am. The last time she'd noticed, it was shortly after 1.00.

The minutes flipped over and the alarm screamed less than a metre from her ear. She stabbed stiff fingers at a dozen flashing lights, but the clock wouldn't return to silence.

She stashed it in the top drawer of her bedside table under a spare pillowcase to finish its tantrum. She'd reset it later, she decided. Right now, she had to get up.

Nikki swung her legs over the edge of the bed and saw three ribbons on the floor that had fallen off during the night. ‘Damn,' she said, picking them up. She took them into her shower room and used baby soap to wash and rinse them as well as her hair. It might take the ribbons a while to dry she realised, since the night had chilled the air as well as her nerves.

The barest rays of morning filtered through drapes that would have been elegant if they weren't so grimy with dust. The room was decorated in cream, but everything was trimmed with blue. It looked like it had belonged to a boy. The walls were marked with stickytape and the fossilised residues of Blu-tac, and there were racing bike stickers on some of the drawers. But it wouldn't be too hard to clean up, she decided, for someone who was supposed to be the housemaid.

She'd start with the curtains she decided, but later, when the family was awake, and when she'd figured out where the laundry was. It felt weird, to be in a house not knowing where anything was and not being able to do anything that wouldn't wake or annoy anyone.

She stared through the window at the stables and the big shed, not looking forward to being inside when Thorna Maitland got up. Through the trees beyond the cattle yards, she could see the lake. After rain, with the level up a few metres, she imagined that the view over the water would be spectacular.

A horse in the yards seemed to think so too. It was standing alert on the far side of its yard, looking out as if waiting for the sun to rise. Disappointed or impatient, it bucked and snorted and bolted around its yard, startling a wagtail from above the stable door.

Nikki rubbed her eyes, comforted that she wasn't the only creature awake and suffering the sting of morning. It seemed only right that she should join them.

She dressed quickly, feeling better to be up and about before the family. Like an escaping prisoner, she checked up and down the hall and then pulled her door closed quietly behind her. She tiptoed towards the kitchen, barely noticing there were new faces staring down at her from the walls.

Through the kitchen door onto the verandah, she stretched her arms in a silent yawn. Dying moths flopped and crunched under her feet. The verandah was a mass of them, with wriggling piles below the windows. Under the kitchen window sat a giant toad, which stared at her as if inviting her to its dinner table. Nikki fetched a broom from the kitchen, deciding it needed a little afterdinner exercise. She stood like a golfer and clubbed it halfway to the stables.

She swept the rest of the bugs to the far end of the verandah and startled a wallaby, or it startled her. The animal had been nipping fresh green from a damp patch under a rusted gutter and it stood upright, staring back at her. Smaller than a kangaroo and with a prettier dark face, it glanced under the verandah as if waiting for something.

Then a gangly joey emerged from under the verandah and scrambled headlong into her pouch, kicking around until it wasn't upside down. The mother scratched her belly and then she was off. She joined others at the edge of the trees and they all took flight into the scrub.

Nikki stared at the thicket where the last tail had disappeared and realised that she wasn't the only thing that had startled them. There was a loud thump from the stables, like an animal that wanted out, then one or two more, followed by a pause and then the beat repeated.

Nikki walked across to the stables and saw Locklin through the door. He was at the back end of a chocolate-coloured horse that kicked and stamped each time he attempted to swab its white leg with a dark sponge, and with each dab, she recognised the animal a little more. He leaned against the horse's rump, shouldering it over against one of the stalls but even confined, the animal refused to stand still.

‘It doesn't smell that bad,' he told the horse. ‘Stand up, or I'll dunk you in sump oil.'

The horse tossed its head, snorted twice at its tether and pawed at the ground, catching the wall and Nikki realised that was the thumping sound she'd heard.

She backed away before Locklin could see her, but it was too late. The horse's head shot up and it called to her, letting out a long shrill whinny that made the tin plaque above the entrance rattle.

Nikki ducked around the corner, tripping over something and landed with her back flat against the outside wall. She held her breath, listening for footsteps, but there were none. So she turned back for the house, and ran right into Locklin.

For a long moment they both said nothing. Nikki's heart pounded so hard she could feel the hair behind her ear tremble in time with her pulse, while Locklin's throat burned dry all the way to his stomach. He coughed and she side-stepped him rushing to the house to finish sweeping. She didn't hear him follow, but she could feel him there, watching her from the steps while she swept the rest of the bugs away.

‘I need to talk to you,' he said.

She ignored him, holding the broom like a crutch while she nudged masses of writhing moths and their hopping predators from under the windows.

‘I said, I need to talk to you.'

She nodded and taught another toad to fly. ‘Then talk,' she said, wishing that she didn't have to listen.

‘It's not what you think,' he said. ‘He's mine. I didn't steal him.'

‘It's none of my business,' she said, shrugging her shoulders.

Locklin filled his lungs slowly, trying to stay patient. He didn't have time for games. He needed to ask the next question: would she tell anyone? But if he asked that, he'd be telling her that she had something to hold over him.

She wasn't stupid, he realised. She'd know that already, even if she didn't know exactly what he was up to. At the same time, he realised that he had a hold over her. He took her arm, high enough above her wrist to remind her that he was keeping a secret for her too.

His thumb rubbed lightly across her bubbled wrists and he saw puss move beneath the skin under his gentle pressure. But not for long. She brought the broom handle up and caught him in the midriff. Surprised and winded, he didn't let her go until she ordered him to.

‘Never … grab me … again,' she said determinedly, and he nodded.

‘I've got something that will clean those,' he said, not quite apologising. ‘Fix them up in about two days.'

She kept sweeping, hoping he'd go away.

‘Two days,' he taunted, turning back for the steps. ‘No sign of it in a week.'

Nikki weighed the consequences and decided her life was complicated enough. She didn't need his help.

But if it worked?

If it worked, she decided, she'd have to give him something in exchange. She rolled the angel on her necklace between her fingers, thinking. She had nothing that he wouldn't think was rubbish.

Or did she? Perhaps Thorna had been kinder to her than she realised.

Locklin crossed the compound towards the stables, walking slowly in case she wanted to catch up. He heard nothing and walked backwards for a few steps, holding his wrist up as a playful reminder and giving her a wink. It was going to get hot again today, he reminded her without words, and working in long sleeves was going to be unbearable again.

Suit yourself, he thought, as she disappeared inside the house. She was just as stubborn as his sisters, only this time, as he returned to the stables alone, it didn't amuse him.

He leaned against his stallion's rump for a long time, thinking about Nikki and her necklace — until his horse flicked his face with its tail, reminding Locklin of the job he had to do.

He dabbed the sponge with more shoe polish, wishing there was something else he could use. Jack stamped his hoof every time he got close with it. The animal pranced in place and tossed his head, making a game of the fact that he was wise to what his human was up to with that smelly sponge.

Locklin filled a feeder with grain and hung it under the stallion's nose. As planned, the horse plunged his nose into the deliberate distraction.

‘Got ya now, Jacko,' he said, patting the animal's rump. But Jack continued his dance, still managing to avoid most of the sponge while he devoured the grain like a pig at a trough.

With patience, Locklin persisted, landing a dab occasionally, but progressing more slowly than he had hoped. He had a Landcruiser to watch, and this was taking him too long.

About to give up, he knelt at the horse's shoulder trying to think of somewhere else he could hide him. If he couldn't disguise his horse, it would be the only other way to keep him safe. In frustration, Locklin tossed the sponge into a bucket behind him, but the sound he heard wasn't the sound of it landing. He had a visitor.

‘Interested in a trade?' Nikki said.

He looked up, feeling a pit open up in his belly and his heart falling into it. The only thing Nikki Fletcher could have to trade with him was information on a man who shared her surname, and the fact that she realised it meant he was in far more trouble than he feared.

Unless it was that necklace …

‘Maybe,' he said. ‘What's the deal?'

Nikki leaned against the door, with one hand on her jeans pocket and the other playing with her angel.

‘You said two days?'

He nodded.

‘Does it hurt?'

‘Only your nose. It's quite soothing, actually, but it smells a bit until it dries.'

She felt the bulge in her back pocket and smiled at the irony of trading one smell for another. ‘Legal? It's not addictive or anything?'

He shook his head, surprised that it worried her. ‘Not that I'm aware of.'

‘Okay then,' she said. ‘I'll try it — on condition. No matter what happens, we agree that from now on, your business is your business and my business is my business and we don't go blabbing or sticking our noses in each other's business ever again, okay? It ends here.'

Locklin nodded.

That sounded fair enough. ‘You said you had something to trade?'

‘You were going to fix me up for nothing before, so let's see if it works and if it does, I'll trade you for it, so I don't owe you any favours, okay?'

‘I can't agree to a deal,' he said, ‘if I'm not sure if I'm interested in what you have to trade.'

Nikki smiled and looked at his horse. ‘Oh, you'll be interested,' she said, again confirming his worst fears.

‘Hmmm, all right,' he said, more cautious than ever. ‘I guess I'm game.' He stepped closer to her, close enough to make her look nervous, and held out his hand. ‘Your wrists?'

She offered him one. He took it and without breaking eye contact, reached down with his free hand towards her foot. She looked down and watched him pluck a thick outer leaf from a short cactus with pale blunt spines. The cactus was in a pot that she hadn't noticed before, but seeing it now, she realised what she had tripped over earlier when his horse had startled her.

‘Aloe vera,' he said as he split the long fat cactus leaf lengthwise with his thumbnail. He turned it inside out, revealing the juicy flesh, much like a ripe peach, only pale green and slimy. He wiped it gently over her festering wounds and spread the gooey slime like a thick clear paste. ‘Feel good?' he asked.

‘I'm still here, aren't I?' she said. ‘I can't smell it yet though.'

‘You will,' he said. ‘It's not that bad, but you'll still smell it when it mixes with the pus,' and right on cue, she wrinkled her nose. ‘Got anything you'd like to share yet?'

‘You haven't finished the job,' she said, holding up her other wrist.

‘Not very trusting, are you?' he said. ‘I can't talk you into payment in advance?'

But her smile said no.

‘A down payment then?'

‘Not likely.'

‘Okay,' he said, tightening his grip as he reached back for his army knife. ‘Let's do this properly then, shall we?' He held up his knife, watching her eyes as he deliberately flicked the razor-sharp blade open in front of her nose.

Not good, he thought, as he watched her control her fear. Scotty cracked every time under that prank and girls were supposed to be easier to spook. Next time he saw his cousin, he'd have to point that out to him.

He lowered the steel to her wrist, concentrating hard to keep the knife from trembling as he gently punctured the swellings with the sharpest point of the blade to release the puss. He did the same with her other wrist and backed off to let her take care of them.

‘There's a tap over there,' he said, asking her to flush them clean.

When she was done, he passed her the leaf so she could apply a fresh coat of slime to each wrist by herself, explaining that if they'd caught the infection early enough, the redness could be gone within a few hours.

‘I usually wrap the leaf in plastic and keep it in a fridge for next time, but …' he didn't need to finish. If she did that, one of the family might see it in the fridge and ask questions. ‘Just come and get what you want when you need it,' he said. ‘Twice a day should do it, but use the thick outer leaves first. They're the best medicine.'