“But what?”
Graham said. “We’ve already sent
Peter to get the police.”
A dreadful thought struck Roger. “But
they won’t know about the ambush. They could drive into it. Peter could get
shot.” He meant killed but couldn’t say it. Graham looked uncomfortable. He
also stood up. So did Stephen.
Graham spread his hands. “But all
we can do is
send
someone else to warn them.”
Stephen looked around. “Perhaps
we could warn them to go another way, to Herberton, so they don’t have to pass
through the ambush. We could go to Herberton and telephone a warning to
Atherton,” he suggested.
Roger thought about this. He did
a quick sum in his head. “Peter must be in Atherton now. He could even be on
his way back already. There isn’t time. We must go and warn him.”
“Warn him?
How?”
Graham asked.
“Go up to the pass and sneak past
the ambush,” Roger said.
“Get real Roger. We don’t know
how far the ambush might extend. They could have a cut-off a kilometre down the
road. You would have to circle right up over the mountain or maybe go down the
railway, then across the valley. There isn’t time,” Graham said. He also began
to fidget anxiously and again looked at his watch. Roger glanced at it and felt
a stab of anxiety- nearly 0700.
The sound of another vehicle
passing out on the highway decided Roger. “Well, we can’t stand here talking.
Time is running out. I’m going, even if you aren’t.”
“Roger! Don’t be silly. You could
get shot!” Graham cried. He placed a restraining hand on Roger’s arm as he went
to leave.
Roger shook him off. “I don’t
care. I don’t want to have to live with myself with innocent people’s deaths on
my conscience. I’m going.” He began walking towards the highway.
“Wait Roger!
At least get your hat and your
webbing,” Graham called.
That made
sense, Roger decided. His webbing included a field dressing, a small first aid
kit, and water bottles. ‘I might need all of them,’ he thought. So he turned
and walked back. “What about you two?” he asked.
“I’ll come,” Graham replied.
“What about you Steve?”
Stephen shrugged. “What about
this guy? He’s starting to come round. I don’t think we should go.”
“Then you stay here and watch
him,” Graham said. “You can pack up our gear while you wait.” He pointed to the
litter on the road. “Roger, pick up all that stuff.”
Roger did so. Graham picked up
the man’s webbing and the three of them walked back quickly to their camp.
Roger realized he had not had breakfast but he pushed the thought out of his
head. Stephen was very agitated but Roger ignored his pleas to stay. He had a
big drink and swung on his webbing.
“I’ll take the rifle,” Graham
said, holding out his hand. Roger hesitated. Graham then spoke in a determined
tone. “Give it to me Roger. Captain Conkey put me in charge. I am responsible.
If any one is to do any shooting, I will do it.”
Roger handed over the rifle with
a feeling of relief. He knew Graham wouldn’t back out now and was better with
weapons than him. Graham looked very much the grim-faced Sergeant Major
preparing to go into battle as he emptied his basic pouches of food tins and
odd items. His camera he slung over his shoulder and into the empty pouches
went the three full magazines from the prisoner’s webbing. It gave Roger a
sickly thrill to glimpse the shining brass of real bullets.
Graham stood up and checked his
watch, then studied the map. “Ten past Seven. It is about seven hundred metres.
That should only take us ten or fifteen minutes.”
Stephen gave him a sulky look.
“This is stupid! Someone could get killed.”
Graham nodded.
“Probably.
We are going anyway. See you later,” he replied. Then he started walking.
Roger
followed. He and Graham walked back along the gravel road towards the highway,
leaving a very unhappy looking Stephen standing alone in their camp.
As they walked past the injured Royal
Guard the enormity of what they were going to do hit Roger. It made him sick
with fear. “Which way will we go?” he asked.
“I’ve been thinking about that,”
Graham replied. “I’ve read that the best place to set an ambush on a road is on
the outside of a bend so you can fire both ways along it. And you don’t want
any ‘dead ground’ or cover for the enemy. It is better to be level or only
slightly above them so they have no escape by going over the bank and
downhill.”
“That little
hill above the railway tunnel.
It looks right back down to here as well as down the road and railway,” Roger
suggested.
“Yes. And it covers the
re-entrant and hillside above the road. I reckon that is the place to
start looking,” Graham agreed.
The sound of a vehicle coming
from the direction of Herberton reached Roger’s ears. “There’s a car coming.
Should we stop it?”
Graham shook his head. “No. Let
it go.”
Roger really wanted to get away
from there but knew that Graham was right. With a twinge of regret he watched
the car rush past along the highway. It appeared as a flicker of blue coloured
movement through the trees. For a moment it was clearly visible along the
cleared lane of the road. Then it went up the slope towards the pass and was
soon out of hearing.
“How will we go about it?” Roger
asked. They were across the grid by then and in sight of the highway. Both
halted a couple of metres back from the edge of the bitumen, from where the
railway level crossing and small hill in the pass were both visible. It was
mostly open ground all the way to the hill half a kilometre away.
“I think we should just walk
straight up to it in the open,” Graham said as he carefully scanned the hill
and the mountainside to the left of it.
“Shouldn’t we creep under cover?”
Roger asked.
Graham shook his head. “No, we
won’t try creeping up. I reckon we will be a lot safer if they see us at long
range and we don’t suddenly surprise them. I am hoping they will think we are
soldiers and that will worry them. They won’t know how many of us there are and
I am banking on them not shooting at us. They will either think that the army
is doing a security operation; or that their plan has been discovered. If
they’ve any sense they will then pull out before we arrive, rather than risk a
fight. If we sneak up and suddenly bump into them at close range with no
warning they are liable to shoot first and think later.”
Roger gulped. His mind told him
that Graham was right but suddenly he felt almost paralysed by fear and realized
he was trembling. He wiped sweaty palms on his trousers. “I hope you are
right.” he said.
“So do
I
!”
Graham replied with a wry grin. “Now, pick up a stick that looks like a gun. We
need to appear armed.”
Roger did as he was told. It made
him feel even more defenceless and slightly foolish.
“Make sure the safety catch is
on,” Graham quipped. Then he walked forward into the open, looked both ways
along the highway and strode across. Roger took a deep breath and followed.
As he crossed the road Roger could
see all the way up to the top of the pass. The highway went up in a wide
sweeping curve, with the forested mountainside on the left above it. On the
right, between the road and railway, was about four hundred metres of gentle
slope covered with short grass. The small hill was covered with a scattering of
trees and rocks. Having fired rifles at the range Roger knew with sickening
certainty that a person on that hill could strike them dead even now. The
thought chilled and almost paralysed him.
Graham angled over to the fence
beside the railway. Roger watched a heavily laden truck come grinding into view
over the crest. It came growling down towards them at an ever increasing pace.
The driver glanced at them curiously. That gave Roger an even greater sense of
unreality. Here was this man calmly going about his daily business while he and
Graham were walking forward in fear of their lives.
Roger swallowed to ease his fear
and said, “If those characters are really up there they must be able to see us
now.” He was finding it harder and harder to keep walking towards the pass. His
flesh seemed to be rippling as it cringed in anticipation of being struck by a
bullet. But despite an almost paralysing fear he made himself keep pace with
Graham, moving ten metres out to his left. The hill loomed larger and larger.
‘We are well within effective
rifle range now,’ he told himself. ‘If they are going to shoot it will be soon
or we will reach those trees.’
Two hundred
metres to go.
Keep walking.
Breath
coming in rasps. Sweat dripping
off the nose and upper lip.
Walking directly towards the sun.
One hundred metres to go.
Roger wanted to stop, to go
back. He screwed his eyes up against the glare and anxiously searched the
slopes for any sign of the ambush.
Graham kept beside the fence and
this led them slowly further away from the highway. By the time they reached
the first trees and began to climb the hill they could no longer see the actual
road, which went into a cutting between the small hill and the mountain to their
left. Roger approved. Graham had led them into dead ground, although a smart
enemy who knew his job would have flank and rear security deployed watching the
way they were coming.
Down to his right Roger glimpsed
the deep cutting that led the railway into the tunnel. Graham led him to a
grassy saddle almost above the tunnel and Roger saw the railway continue on
down the mountain. He shivered and remembered his apprehension the previous day
when they had stopped just down there. Perhaps the ambushers had been watching
them through their rifle sights even then?
The small hill turned out to be
steeper and larger than Roger had expected. As they went up it he began to puff
and pant. He wiped sweat from his eyes and kept looking down to see where he
was putting his feet. The route Graham had followed led them up into the rear
of where he had suggested the ambush be set. As they neared the top and nothing
happened he began to relax. A breeze came through the gap and cooled him. He
got glimpses out over the Tablelands in the distance.
Graham had drawn ahead as they
climbed. Soon he was twenty paces in front. As he reached the top and began to
angle over towards the cutting he suddenly went down in a crouch.
At first Roger thought he must
have tripped he went down so fast, but then he saw him look cautiously around a
tree. His left hand went out, thumb down.
Enemy!
Roger froze. For a moment he was
quite unable to move. His mind refused to accept the field signal. Enemy!
It couldn’t be true! But it must be. Graham began scrambling forward through
the grass, rocks and grass-tree.
Blood pounded in Roger’s temple.
He twisted the stick he held in his sweaty hands,
then
scuttled over to a solid looking tree. As he reached it Graham rose and
signalled him forward with urgent gestures. Roger did not want to move but he
obeyed.
“Quick!” Graham hissed. “Look,
there they go.
Five of them at least.”
Roger was just in time to see an
armed figure in a dark green uniform run across the highway at the next bend
about a hundred metres away. He glimpsed others scrambling up the steep slope
above the road. Quite distinctly he saw the shape of an armed man go back over
the crest of the spur into the re-entrant beyond.
“So they were here!” he said
incredulously.
“Yes. And they obviously saw us
coming and bugged out. I wonder where they are
going?
Come on! We had better follow them.”
“Isn’t that dangerous?” Roger
asked. “After all, we’ve sprung their ambush.”
“Very dangerous,” Graham agreed.
“But we have to be sure they don’t just move and set the ambush further down
the road.”
Roger looked over his shoulder.
He could see all the way back down to the junction of the Forestry Road where
they had come from. Beside him was the cutting, at least five metres deep.
Beyond it, in the direction of Atherton, the highway curved left to go out of
sight behind the spur about a hundred metres away. There the road had a cut on
the left and a steep drop on the right. The slope led down into the re-entrant
which widened to become a valley further on. Up on the opposite slope
away to his right he could clearly see the railway they had walked up the
previous day. The highway wound its way down the mountainside, its next bend
barely visible through the trees. The slope above the highway went up through
an area of rocks and grass-trees into a steep, grass-covered ridge with an open
forest of tall, white-trunked eucalypts on it. Above that was shrouded in
cloud.
Graham grunted with approval.
“Bloody good spot for an ambush alright,” he said admiringly.