The Plain Waited
ATbreakfast Bony felt that his fellow prisoners were less edgy than he had known them, and this he believed due to sound sleep and realisation that discipline was essential. Following the meal, he had slept in the hole enlarged by the explosion, so that none could pass him and break out to the Plain. Brennan had elected to stay in the hall with Havant to allay suspicion should the aborigines chance to come again, and Myra, saying that she had some rough sewing to do, had retired to her ‘room’.
On waking, Bony found both the doctor and Brennan asleep, and from the angle of the sun-shaft judged the time to be about three o’clock. He proceeded to explore in Maddoch’s steps, and checked the little man’s report with satisfaction. An hour’s work at one place only would clear the way for the massive Riddell.
He was brewing coffee when Myra appeared in the kitchen where the stove had been returned. She asked two questions.
“Would you make me a cigarette with your tobacco? Do we start tonight?”
She had evidently slept well. Her manner was cheerful and she was eager to co-operate. He told her they would leave early this coming night, completed a cigarette for her and poured the coffee.
“There is a deal of preparation to be done, Myra, and I want you to bake as much bread as possible between now and, say, seven o’clock. Give us a solid stew for dinner. What possessions do you want to take?”
“Possessions! I haven’t any excepting a broken comb, my nail scissors and a small mirror. Is it going to be as hard as you’ve made out?”
“Every bit-especially on our feet. I’ll make shoes for you which will help a little. I still urge you to remain.”
“I am going, Inspector,” she said, with sudden tightening of her mouth. “I’ll get through, for you won’t find me weaker than the men. I’ve too much to live for.”
“Smelling headlines already?”
“It’s like attar of roses.”
“Then permit me the homely smell of lunch while I wake the others.”
They were gathered about the canvas cloth when Bony outlined the preparations to be made, and now the only rebel was Lucy, who sulked at being tethered to the camel saddle. After the meal, he ordered all the lamps to be lit and taken to the main cavern, where they could work unseen by chance visitors above.
Having set aside a blanket for each traveller, he put Jenks to work at tearing several blankets in strips, and Brennan to fetch supplies of tinned meat, coffee and sugar, a bag of flour and oddments, including matches and tobacco. One of the water drums was filled by Riddell at the stream in the Jeweller’s Shop.
“Maddoch! Are you still determined to go?” Bony asked, and Maddoch nodded, after glancing at Dr. Havant. The doctor said he would wait with what patience he could muster, and was not by any means dismayed by a period of solitude.
Distributing the weight as evenly as possible, the five blankets were rolled about the foodstuffs and oddments, tied with strips of blanket and fitted with slings to carry the roll from the shoulder, a la sundowner’s swag. In readiness, they were placed in the kitchen, and with them was put the water-drum and the rough harness Riddell was to wear to carry it. Bony did consider taking old Patsy’s one-man tent, but decided against it.
“We are almost finished with our preparations. Nothing superfluous,” he told them. “The last thing to be done is to fashion shoes with pieces of blankets. You see…”
“My feet are tough enough,” Jenks interjected, and was supported by Riddell.
Tersely Bony told them of the precaution taken by an aborigine to prevent his tracks being followed-the gluing of masses of feathers to the feet with blood.
“The next best material is wool from the sheep’s back. As we have neither feathers nor wool, we must use the blanket. And we have to be quite sure that our blanket shoes won’t come off; they will be a little ungainly at first.”
They made pads to fit the soles of their feet, and the pads were bound with strips of blanket which were wound up to the knees like puttees, Bony warning them that the low bush was tough.
“Looks like we’re off to the South Pole,” remarked Myra. “If only we had a camera! What sights for sore eyes we’d be on television. How do I look?”
Placing one hand on a hip, she danced across the uneven floor; Brennan chuckled, and Bony had to smile.
“On television, Myra, you’d knock ’emfor sure. That patch on your bottom looks terrific.” Brennan chortled, and Bony suddenly realised this Brennan was new to him. As was the girl. Even Maddoch had changed. His eyes were alive.
The sun-shaft gleamedredly on the wall of the circular hall, when Bony asked Havant to accompany him that he might do certain work after the party had left. Taking Havant to the exit, he spoke softly.
“There, beyond that mask of bush, is what might give you rebirth. Can you deny yourself that chance?”
“Quite, Inspector.”
“Then I must accept your decision. After we leave, will you block this exit tightly with rubble for several feet inward, to prevent its chancediscovery. ”
“It will provide a task. I will do that.”
“Record the days with a mark on rock,” advised Bony. “Shall I insist that Maddoch remain with you?”
“No. But I think Maddoch should stay for his own good, if the conditions are as you have pictured them.”
“I haven’t exaggerated. With luck all should endure the physical strain. It is the mental angle which gives me no little concern. I believe that Maddoch will stand up to the mental stress as well as Jenks or Brennan, even the woman. However, I’ll talk to Maddoch again.”
They were silent for a space, when Bony said:
“What do you intend doing when you return to normal life?”
“Oh!” softly exclaimed Havant, as though the question surprised him. “I have a small grazing property in the southern Riverina. It’s been managed for me during my absence, and I was to go there following my release. The authorities will, I assume, insist that I comply with the conditions set down by them.”
“Perhaps the authorities will not insist,” Bony said. “I shall leave nothing undone to convince them of your services to the unfortunates imprisoned here with you. Those conditions could be lifted.”
“Could they? Then, I would settle somewhere in North Australia, under another name. I…er… am a little nervous of the publicity this affair will create. The abduction of Myra, especially, was too dramatic for her return not to arouse world interest. She is beginning to realise it, too.”
“Every picket in a fence she’ll make a winning post, Doctor. I shall see you again within three weeks, and I want you to regard me as a friend on whom you can call for all assistance you may need. That is, if you did not murder Igor Mitski. Did you?”
“No. I’ll tell you why I did not. Excepting Maddoch, Mitski was the only cultured man here. Also I am no longer attracted to women physically, and the murder of Mitski was prompted by jealousy. Murder was inevitable. If Mitski hadn’t been killed, another man would have been. If you hadn’t come, others would have followed Mitski down Fiddler’s Leap. The one thing which saved that woman from her own folly was the number of the lions in the den. Mitski’s killer intended to reduce the number to one-himself.”
“You could be correct, Doctor. Well, I must return to our final preparations for departure. The sun has set.”
On entering the kitchen, they could hear laughter in the hall. Riddell had commandeered the hair clippers and was close-cropping his whiskers. Jenks was shaving, frowning with concentration, and Maddoch said that they were dressing for the theatre. But all were wearing the blanket boots, and there wasn’t an aborigine in Australia who would fail to deduce the purpose of that footwear. Inwardly Bony groaned, for he had told them not to appear in the hall.
“You wouldn’t have noticed an aborigine looking down at you?” he asked acidly. “Having been here yesterday, they might well be somewhere else today. We could be lucky. That bread smells good, Myra. And that stew! How is it coming along?”
“Ready when the lads have finished making themselves into film stars.”
Dinner was almost gay, and Bony was glad, and hoped the mood would continue for forty-eight hours, although he knew it would not. Afterwards, Maddoch helped the girl to clear away the utensils, and Riddell carried the empty meat tins and refuse to the dump off the main cavern.
“There are two things I forgot,” Bony said.“A tomahawk and a tin-opener. If we lose the tin-opener, we still have the tomahawk.”
They thought it a great joke, and presently he felt he must hard pedal.
“You know the extent of these caverns,” he said to calm them. “There are other systems adjoining these, making a very large area. Here and there on the Plain are other such areas which are avoided bystock, and at night are dangerous. You can imagine how easy it would be, in the dark, to step into that opening above us. There are countless crevices and small holes as well, waiting to break a leg, to break a neck.
“We have to walk ten miles before day-break, and it isn’t possible to see if the ground underfoot is solid or cavernous. Therefore, we must proceed in single file. I will take the lead, with the dog as additional eyes. I want you to come last, Mark, and constantly check the five walking ahead of you. There is to be no talking once we stand up beyond the exit, because sound carries a long way at night when there’s no wind. Repeat, please, Mark.”
Brennan did so.
“If anyone has to speak, it must be as softly as possible. And, most important, if anything is dropped, or if the binding of a blanket shoe comes undone, we must all stop. I’ve shown you how to carry your blanket roll like the expert. I’ve shown you, Riddell, how to carry that water drum. So… No talking. No sound for this first night. No striking of matches.”
Daylight departed never so slowly as on this longlong evening.
“There should be a moon until one o’clock,” Bony remarked, and the sky was clear and beckoning. Finally it was now, that Bony said:
“We’ll go. Jenks, you follow me; Doctor, bring the hammer and the peg with it.
They wormed through the hole in the kitchen wall, and when they came to the pinch, Jenks was told to widen it. It proved to be even less arduous than Bony had anticipated. He turned to Havant.
“Well, Doctor, this is where we part for a few days. Hold the fort. Move around. Light the lamps as usual. If those jailers come one night with supplies or another prisoner, you will need your wits. Stall if possible. If we’re not tracked and brought back within four or five days, you may be sure of eventual rescue. Aurevoir!”
They shook hands. Maddoch did so, then Brennan. The girl said:
“Be seeing you, Doctor-unprofessionally.” She pressed Havant’s hesitant hand, and Riddell mumbled something about having a drink together. Jenks grinned, nodded.
The cool, star-studded night illumined by the moon accepted them one by one, and it was like the return to Mother Earth from a distant dead planet. The Plain was filled with scents especially for them.
Bony, who had been quick to take Lucy into his arms that her tracks would not give a clue, counted them. He moved back and they formed into a line, tall Brennan at the end. By their shapes he knew they were burdened as he had so carefully equipped them.
When they set out, the moon was nearing the zenith and the shadows were short. Lucy wanted to be put down, and he had to cuff her because her struggling body prevented him from seeing where to place his feet.
His mind was thus fully occupied. Those following had not to watch where to walk, save close behind the figure ahead. This world was outside their experience, even beyond their imagination. This world had no limits, no landmarks, no features to attract the eye, nothing save the moon high above, distant and cold.
At first all was fairyland, enchantment, but soon it palled by its immobility, for nothing seemed to move, even themselves, who lifted one foot and thrust it forward, and then the other to thrust it farther still. Presently the effort to walk seemedpointless, save only to keep up with the figure ahead, and why that should be necessary became pointless, too.
Bony carried the dog for the first two miles before putting her down and trusting to chance that the aborigines would not cut her tracks. For him the going was much easier, and the dog on the leash added confidence to his feet.
There is nothing worse than walking without mental distraction, and this the old timers knew when they invented the treadmill.
Twice they rested for fifteen minutes before the moon went down. After that, muscular effort, without result, was still worse. With the moon above, they had seen the shadowing shrubs sliding past their feet.
They did not approach the great wall: it rose before them to tower above and blot out half the stars. It ruled each man’s mind.
No! To climb that cliff now… no, no.
Bony said, reassuringly:
“Made only of straw. We have to plough through to the far side, and there we can dare to make a fire and brew tea, and afterwards to rest for a few hours. The dawn will come soon, and we have walked at least nine miles.”