The Dead of Night (7 page)

The list wasn't that long—there weren't many things we needed—but it was obvious we'd have to leave town early, as soon as it was dark. That was increasing our risks a little, but it was the only way we could do everything we wanted.

So at about nine o'clock we went, moving with maximum caution. We had a lot of walking ahead of us. I knew we'd be tired by morning. I was just tired of walking anyway. I longed for those motorbikes that we'd used to escape from the bridge, and that were still hidden on our property. But safety first. We hardly took a step without looking around.

We got most of what we wanted at the Fleets' place, which we'd used before as a hideout. The hardest thing to find was nails that were big enough, long enough, strong enough. After a bit of scrounging and a bit of carpentry and a bit of improvisation, we left there at
one-thirty, running late, but not too bad. And an hour and a half after that we were where we wanted to be: approaching a steep cutting on Buttercup Lane. It was thick bush up there. We'd already dived into it once when we heard a convoy coming; and just before we reached the cutting, Fi, who was leading, gave the signal to hide again. It had to be a patrol, so I crouched, and scuttled into the scrub as fast as I could. Behind me a dark shadow that was Lee dived off the embankment and landed about two metres away. I couldn't see the others. Chris and Homer were behind me, and Robyn ahead somewhere, with Fi. Almost as soon as I was in hiding I heard the scrunch of the boots: three soldiers in single file walking quite casually along the road above my head. I crouched even lower and hoped that the others were well hidden. The soldiers' footsteps seemed to be slowing, and then they stopped completely. I risked a glance and saw just the back of one of them moving slowly away from me. It was a woman, I thought, and an instant later she was out of my sight.

I didn't know what to do. I couldn't imagine why they'd stopped, unless they'd seen one of us, but there were none of the urgent sounds I'd expect if they had. Desperate thoughts rushed through my head. What should I do? What could I possibly do? I lifted myself and crept forward a metre, frightened that if I went any further I might crawl straight into a trap. Then suddenly I flattened myself: a shotgun fired to my right, so close that my ears rang with the noise. I lay there unable to breathe. I could hear several cries, then a scream, hoarse and horrible. The shotgun fired again, a little more muffled this time. I could smell its spicy
burnt smell now. I hoped that it was a double-barrelled one and that no one else had a weapon, and with only that thought in my head I launched myself up the bank and onto the road.

The first thing I noticed was the sound of footsteps; someone running in panic down the road. I couldn't see much, just a dark shape, but it was one of the soldiers, not one of us. Then there was a crashing sound from the bushes. I spun round, wondering if this was my death, the last movement I would ever make, the last sight I would see. But it was Homer, stumbling towards me, and Chris just behind him, a little to his left, making awful retching noises. I realised as Homer reached me that he had blood all down the front of his shirt, thick and sticky. The others were now emerging from their hiding places and rushing at us. I ripped Homer's shirt open and felt around his chest and shoulders but couldn't find any wound.

"No, no," he said, pushing me away. "I'm not hurt."

"What happened?" I shouted at' him. I was completely bewildered. "Did you grab their guns?"

He shook his head and waved his arms around. He didn't seem able to answer. But Chris, who was trembling but becoming suddenly and amazingly calm, answered for him. "Homer had a shotgun in his pack," he said. "Sawn-off."

Fi gasped. We all looked at Homer in shock. We'd talked about our meagre little stock of weapons a few times and agreed that with such limited firepower we were better off with nothing. We knew if we were caught with weapons on us we were gone, one hundred per cent certain.

A willy-willy of feelings stormed up inside me—anger, confusion, disbelief. But I had to postpone them, and I did. I was still holding Homer by the tail of his shirt but now I let him go and shouted at Chris, "What happened? What happened?"

"It was just the worst worst bad luck. There were three of them, two men and a woman. The men decided to take a leak, right where we were. They dropped their rifles and came down into the scrub. They were about three steps from us and still coming, unbuttoning their daks. They would have walked right over the top of us. Homer had his pack beside him and his hand inside it, holding the shotgun I guess. He just suddenly pulled it out and lifted it up and fired." Chris was talking fast, reconstructing it in his mind as he went, trying to recall it all, then describing it to us as he ran the movie in his head.

"The guy fell backwards. The other guy gave a shout then dived at Homer. Homer seemed to swing the gun around. He was still lying down. The guy landed half on top of him, then there was another shot and all this blood was coming out and Homer got out from under him and came up here. The woman ran off down the road, but we couldn't do anything about her. It's a double-barrel gun but I don't know if he's got any more shells, and there wouldn't have been time to reload anyway. She was running flat out."

"Let's get off the road," Robyn said. "In fact, let's get out of here." Even as she spoke I caught a glimpse of lights in the distance: the dimmed headlights of a convoy beginning the long climb up the road towards the cutting. The thoughts were queueing up in my
mind so fast that they were crashing into the back of each other. The convoy was coming from the opposite direction to the way the soldier had fled. How long would it take her to get help? Would she be able to communicate with the convoy? I grabbed Chris.

"Check the road. Where did they drop their guns?"

"Just back here."

"Grab them. And anything else. Everyone else up to the cutting. Fi, you take Homer. Put the nails out and be ready."

I ran back with Chris. We picked up two guns, one an old .303; the other a more modern automatic weapon that I didn't recognise. With them was a small pack. I tore it open and pulled out what I'd hoped to find: a small two-way radio. Chances were they wouldn't have more than one radio in each patrol.

"Where's your stuff? Yours and Homer's?"

"Still in there." Chris pointed to the bush behind us. I grabbed my torch and looked at Chris.

"What if they're still alive?" he asked.

I paused, then shrugged, and led the way into the scrub. We only had to go a few metres of course. In the torchlight I could see blood on the grass, then some scratched up earth. That led me to a body: a soldier on his back, eyes open, but dead. His chest looked like two giant hands had taken it and ripped it open. I swung the torch around and saw the two packs, and the bloodied sawn-off shotgun near them. Chris picked up the packs as I got the shotgun, trying not to shudder as my hands touched the sticky butt. I straightened up and at that moment heard the worst sound in the world, a sob and
a squeal. I swung the torch around. I could see his boots, about ten metres away, sticking out from under a little acacia. I walked over there, as Chris backed away. I despised him for that, but wished I could have done the same. I parted the branches of the bush and shone the torch down on the man. It was amazing that he'd been able to crawl even those few yards. He was lying twisted to one side, with his right hand stretched out to the trunk of the wattle, holding it lightly. His other hand was holding his stomach. He was whimpering occasionally but I don't think he was conscious. There was blood all around him, some of it smeared across the ground but fresh red blood pumping out from under his stomach. It looked thick and treacly. His hand was trying to hold bits of his stomach in but I could see all kinds of things, disgusting things, entrails and stuff. I walked over to Chris. I knew how my face must have looked to him: cold and hard, no expression. "Which is Homer's pack?" I asked him. He gave it to me and I searched inside. There were at least a dozen shells rolling around loose. I only took one, loaded the shotgun, and went straight back to the soldier and held it to his temple; then, Jesus help me, without thinking about it, deliberately not letting myself think, I pulled the trigger.

After that everything was a wild rush. I figured we had about two minutes. My ears were ringing with the noise of the shotgun. I ignored that and ignored what I'd just done. We ran like hell up the road to the cutting. The others had put out the nails. I almost trod on one. They were fifteen centimetres long, each hammered through
a piece of wood which served as a base and kept them upright. Fi was waiting for us. She was so white I thought she'd gone albino.

"What was the shot?" she asked, trembling all over.

"Nothing Fi. Be brave." I touched her arm and ran up to the other three. "Are we ready?"

"Yes, but ... what about the one who escaped? Won't she...?"

"I don't think so. I found a two-way. I can't believe they'd have more than one radio."

"Hope you're right," said Robyn.

"She's right," said Lee, grimly.

In one of those strange crazy flashes of intuition I realised how much Lee wanted us to make this attack; if tanks had been rolling straight at us I don't think he would have moved. He was very into honour, and revenge.

Homer looked calmer but he hadn't spoken. He had a bottle in each hand.

I could hear the trucks now; the leading ones were dropping a gear, so were probably close to the cutting. I grabbed my bottles, and fished out the cigarette lighter. The dull headlights of the first truck were starting to show through the trees. The convoys always had their headlights covered by some stuff that kept the light down to a soft glow. I guess they were scared of air attacks, but we didn't see too many of our planes these days, so I'd say these drivers felt pretty safe.

We were hoping to change that.

Now the straining engines relaxed; there were several quick gear changes and the trucks started to roll, gathering speed through the cutting. We had placed
ourselves on a bank so that as they came out of the cutting we'd be above them, on a curve. We reckoned they would be travelling fast, easing across the road towards us as they entered the bend. And we were right. They sure did accelerate. They seemed to be there in an instant. The roar of the engines was suddenly coming straight at us, unobstructed by any more trees or banks. I had a good view of the first three, all of them trucks, dark green in colour, traytops, with gates and tarps. Then everything went wild. The first truck seemed to blow both its front tyres at the same moment. It was like a bomb going off. There was an almighty explosion. I couldn't believe how loud it was, nor how much smoke. Bits of rubber, strips of rubber, went shredding across the road. The truck slid straight across the road at high speed, back tyres screaming, and slammed against a tree. The second truck must have missed all the nails, because it kept its tyres intact; but in trying to miss the other vehicle it wobbled wildly across the road as the driver fought to keep control. It finally straightened up again fifty metres past us and accelerated away. I was disgusted. I couldn't believe that the driver would desert his mates like that. But I was more interested in the next few in the convoy. The third one blew out a front tyre with another huge bang, and so much more white smoke poured out that it became hard to see anything. But I saw enough to satisfy me, as this truck followed the same route as the first. It slewed wildly across the road and slammed heavily and hard into the back of the other one. The fourth one blew rear tyre and did a "60, ending up fifty metres away and in the middle of the road. The fifth one stopped so hard
that it sat there shuddering for a moment before the one behind it slammed into its rear. I heard a couple more crashes back in the cutting, but it was now impossible to tell what was happening. There was so much smoke, and the noise was like the end of the world.

I saw a flaming torch fly through the air towards the fifth truck, and realised Lee had gone into action. I needed that to spur me back into life. I lit my first cocktail, waited a second, and threw it in the same direction as Lee's, then followed fast with my second one. The others had joined in. For a minute the air was full of hot shooting stars. I could see plenty of flame through the smoke, so something was burning, but there were no explosions. A gun opened up; an automatic weapon of some kind, firing wildly at first, through the trees above us, but gradually lowering its aim until it was just above our heads.

We all got out fast, crouching low and snaking through the tearing, wild, brambly scrub. Homer was just ahead of me; I realised he was still carrying his Molotoy cocktails. He hadn't thrown them. I called out "Drop the bottles Homer," which he did, and for a moment I thought I'd caused a disaster, because at the exact moment the bottles hit the ground there was an explosion so vast that the ground heaved under my feet. It took me a second to realise that the explosion was behind us, and hadn't come from Homer's bottles at all. Then a shock wave hit me, almost knocking me over, followed by a blast of heat, a dry airless heat. It felt like someone had opened the door of a steel furnace. I steadied myself, got my balance again, and started to run. The others—the ones I could see—were doing
the same. I heard trees screeching as they split and fell behind me. We sure as hell weren't going to win am conservation awards. I ran on. I wasn't too frightened though. I knew that they could never and would never follow us through the bush. This was our natural environment. I felt as much at home here as the possums and wombats and galahs. Let no stranger intrude here, no invader trespass. This was ours, and this we would defend.

I was feeling pretty unusual, walking back across the paddocks. I imagined a huge shadow of me was moving across the sky, attached to me, and keeping pace with my little body on the earth. It scared me, really scared me, but I couldn't escape it. It loomed over me, a silent dark creature growing out of my feet. I knew that if I reached out to feel it I would feel nothing. That's the way shadows are. But all the same, the air around me seemed colder and darker, as the shadow clung to me. I wondered if this was the way my life would always be from now on, and if for every person I killed the shadow would grow larger, darker, more monstrous.