Wyatt turned and crossed the yard. He needed only a minute to see that the house was empty. He searched the sheds. Nothing. He told himself that she’d got spooked by the helicopter and made a run for it.
But it didn’t feel right. And when he found faint tyre marks on the track behind the property, the doubts set in and wouldn’t go away.
He went to the head of the driveway to sweep the valley with his field-glasses. The helicopter had just completed a sweep near the tin-hut corner. Beneath it the roads were dust-clogged.
The ground party was congregating. They’d be at the farmhouse soon, wondering if this was where the murderers had got to.
THIRTY
Wyatt wheeled the Suzuki out of the shed. He could hear the flat whump whump of the helicopter now. He shook the bike- fuel sloshed in the tank. He climbed on, pushed hard on the kick-start and accelerated across the yard. A minute later he was on the track leading back into the ranges behind the farmhouse.
He had advantages on a bike. He hoped they’d be enough. It was faster than walking and he could go where a car couldn’t go. The cops would be blocking the roads but they couldn’t throw a cordon over paddocks and creeks. That was what Wyatt was relying on. That and speed.
He looked back over his shoulder briefly, almost losing the bike in an erosion channel. The helicopter was apparently closing in on the farm. Wyatt hoped they’d concentrate on the house and sheds and not the hills behind it just yet. He was a small shape, dressed in dull khaki overalls, but he knew it was movement that attracts attention from the air, not shape, size or colour.
He righted the bike, his eyes darting from the ground surface under his wheels to the shape of the land ahead. He didn’t want to tie himself to the track if he could save time by heading across country. Using his eyes and his mental map, he began to plot his route out of the hills. He knew what to avoid-the dry creekbeds with their treacherous sand; stone reefs like stakes embedded in the wind-blasted hillsides; foxholes and rusty fencing wire in the long grass.
In other circumstances he might have enjoyed his flight across the forgotten back country. They said land like this was bland-blindness, Wyatt thought, taking in the purples and greens, the tortured shapes. The sun was mild on his back. The spring wildflowers were out and the sky was cloudless. He risked another glance over his shoulder. The farmhouse and sheds were out of view. There was no helicopter yet.
But the reversals of the past hour wouldn’t let him alone. He thought about Leah’s STD call to her contact, her trips away from the farm. Snyder puzzled him. Snyder had been too keen to go back to the farmhouse. He felt more certain about Tobin. Given that the other aspects of the plan had been duplicated, it was reasonable to suppose that Tobin had been used to shift the van. And it was Leah who’d brought Tobin into the team. He’d find her. He’d find both of them.
He began to pick a way out of the worst of the stone reefs and hidden gullies. Before him lay undulating farmland. It was fenced, immense paddocks of grassy slopes dotted with ancient gum trees. Sheep had spread across one end of the closest paddock, several hundred of them grazing head down in the long grass. He opened a gate, closed it behind him and set out across the paddock, mindful that snarls of fencing wire might be caught in the grass. There was a gravel road at the far end of the paddock. He intended to travel along it for a few kilometres then cut across country again.
Something passed across the sun behind him. It threw a shadow that was gone as suddenly as it was there. Wyatt didn’t look back or increase speed. He changed direction slightly. A few seconds later he was wobbling in low gear at the leading edge of the sheep.
Wyatt had built his life on blending in so he wouldn’t be noticed. It was automatic. Now he was doing it again. He steered in and around the sheep, stopping occasionally, waving an arm. He’d never done anything like this before. He didn’t know anything about sheep. But they seemed to be doing the right thing. They were fat, their bellies full, and they moved hurriedly a short distance and appeared to forget about him again, yet bit by bit they were bunching up. Now and then some of them streamed away from the mob, wild-eyed and mindless, but he had no trouble heading them off. He hoped it looked right from the air. He lacked one essential prop, a dog, but he hoped he looked as though he belonged here.
Then he did something he’d seen a farmer do a few weeks earlier, when he was pipe-laying north of Belcowie. Standing the bike on its stand, he charged into the mob, wrestled a sheep to the ground, and leaned down to examine its hindquarters.
When the Brava helicopter stopped circling, dropping to just above the ground fifty metres away, the pilot and passengers saw a farmer start in surprise, a sheep propped butt down against his knees. The surprise changed to anger. He shook his fist at them. Bugger off, he seemed to be saying. You’re spooking the sheep.
Wyatt saw faces grin at him. Then the rotor tilted, the tail lifted, and the chopper left him in peace.
THIRTY-ONE
It was the longest afternoon of Raymond Trigg’s life. Four hundred thousand bucks sitting there in the repair shop and it couldn’t be touched until knock-off time.
He spent the hours until then answering his phone, paying bills and biting his nails. He thought the girls in reception looked at him oddly but he couldn’t be sure. Happy was okay, Happy had valves to grind and punctures to mend. The problem-apart from the waiting-was Tobin. Tobin stuck out like a sore thumb in his shorts and singlet and orange shades. The girls knew who he was-the man who delivered or picked up parcels from time to time-but Trigg didn’t want them asking why he was hanging around.
‘I don’t know why we don’t just take the lot and disappear,’ Tobin said. He’d been saying this since they got back. ‘That’s why I told you about the job in the first place.’
‘You don’t know the Mesics, my son. They’d track us down and we’d be found in little pieces. I’m not going to debate about it. Three hundred thousand will get the Mesics off our backs, and we split the rest. Except you still owe me twenty grand for the last few consignments.’
‘Yeah, well, that pisses me off. It should be sale or return. I’m expected to fork out twenty thousand bucks for pills and videos, but no one’s buying, the economy’s too fucked.’
‘Look, I’m busy, okay? Why don’t you take in a movie?’
It took Tobin a moment to absorb this. ‘A movie?’
‘We got a twin cinema,’ Trigg said. He was leafing through the Mid-North Gazette. ‘Cinema One-”Three Men and a Baby”.’
‘Seen it. Heap of shit.’
‘Cinema Two-”Twins”.’
‘Never heard of it.’
Trigg peered at the advertisement. ‘Arnold Schwarzenegger’s in it.’
Tobin scratched his jaw and screwed up his face. ‘Might be all right.’
‘Gets out at five,’ Trigg said. ‘Maybe if you had a beer or two after, by the time you get back here the girls would’ve gone home and we can start cracking the van.’
Tobin’s face narrowed in suspicion. ‘You wouldn’t be pulling a swifty?’
‘Don’t be a moron. We can’t do anything till knock off time.’
Tobin flushed. ‘Yeah, well,’ he said, and he headed off down the street to the mall.
When he was gone, Trigg thought about the Steelgard van and the money. The doors wouldn’t be a problem. The thermal lance and jaws-of-life gear would take care of the doors. After the money was removed, Happy would dismantle the CO cylinder, hose and tap he’d put in place when the van was last serviced.
Venables had been anxious about the gas. He’d wanted to know what sort it was. Trigg told him sleeping gas. Then he’d wanted to know how come it was necessary. We don’t want the guard seeing any faces, hearing any voices, Trigg said. Venables frowned, hunting for holes in the story. When should I turn on the tap? he asked. As soon as you’ve left Vimy Ridge, Trigg told him.