The Delta Chain (21 page)

I remember growing up with a vague
understanding that a well was used for water, and never even
questioning that this one was not used for that purpose. It wasn’t
used at all, having dried up many years before.

I thought of that old well today, because
today I felt as though I wanted to die.

Feeling like this reminded me of the time I
almost did die, the day when I threw myself into the well when I
thought no-one was watching.

I was very young, no more than seven or eight
years old. To this day I’m not entirely sure why I did such a
thing. I may have been unhappy, but is suicide something that a
seven or eight year old is likely to think of, let alone
attempt?

But I did.

I might have died, lying at the bottom of
that shaft, broken arm and broken ribs, barely able to raise
breath. They would not have thought to look for me there, I'm
certain, and I would've wasted away without food or drink or
medical help.

Mr. Ethers had seen me jump and he raised the
alarm. They fished me out, and old Doc Methering patched me up.
They questioned me, of course, but I wouldn’t talk. Deep inside I
expect my misery was because I was missing Elizabeth and did not
know I would see her again. It was the first time she’d been taken
away. Elizabeth, you see, was always a feisty one, even at that
young age, always questioning, always causing trouble.

I was kept in the medical section of The Com
for several weeks, away from the others. When my injuries had
healed I was told I had to be punished for my action. I was taken
to The Dark.

I remember how I screamed and fought as they
dragged me to the place of punishment. No food, only water – and no
light whatsoever – for a full week. It wasn’t my first time in the
place we all dreaded though it was by far the longest. Just as
before, I started out kicking and screaming but ended up
whimpering.

Most of us had spent time in The Dark.
Whether we’d been there a long time, or just for one day and night,
the result seemed to be the same. It was something that stayed
inside us forever.

It had been an instinctive thing for Daniel
to grab his journal when he’d been packing for his journey.

He’d started writing the journal when he was
thirteen, though he often incorporated thoughts and memories from
years before. As such it was both a retrospective and a day-by-day
record, sown together to create a secret record of his personal
odyssey. The fact it was both intensely personal and completely
hidden made it doubly special. It was a part of him, a very
important part that didn’t belong to the Keepers.

At The Com, he’d kept the small book under
his bed, wedged into a torn seam along the base of his mattress. He
wrote his entries late at night, by torchlight. It was a long time
since he’d actually read any of his writings. Now, as he made his
regular stops in the woods, to catch his breath, restore his energy
and to drink some water, he found himself reaching for the journal
each time, reading at random from the early entries. Somehow it
made sense, as he passed this dramatic crossroads in his life, to
reflect on the sequence of events that led him to this turning
point. Perhaps, somewhere in the tattered old pages, there was an
answer to the question that now burned so fiercely at the centre of
his soul.

Settlers Gorge had been named for the four
small gorges, separated from each other by rapids of varying
lengths. They were beautiful and untouched and carved out by a
tributary of the Adelaide River. The largest and most picturesque
of the four gorges was closer to the township than many of the more
spectacular and popular tourist spots, such as the Katherine Gorge,
which was further south. The town had been built in the 1860’s, a
small gold mining centre established by the early settlers and one
of the original points along the Overland Telegraph Line of the
day.

Since the late 20th Century Settlers Gorge
had flourished, not so much for tourism but as a centre containing
the regional offices of the National Parks and Wildlife Authority,
and the Wildlife Preservation Commission; and for its Aboriginal
settlements.

On her return to the town that morning, it
was as though Kate were seeing it for the first time. On her
previous visit, consumed with the anguish of Greg’s death, she’d
walked through the days like a zombie.

This time, she was able to appreciate the
rustic charm of the historic buildings: the small museum in the
old, disused airfield terminal; the turn-of-the-century style
hotels and homesteads, standing beside the more contemporary shop
fronts and park settings.

Kate had arrived in Alice Springs, hired a
four-wheel drive land cruiser and taken possession of the Landscan
III prototype. Now, unannounced, she arrived at the Settlers Gorge
home of Walter Coolawirra, the man she needed to convince to
support her maverick plan.

Ethel Coolawirra looked too young and too
slim to have had four children, but Kate knew that was the case.
Ethel was surprised to find Kate had returned to the Gorge so soon.
But she welcomed her warmly into their modest timber cottage and
offered to prepare refreshments. ‘Walter’s out back, carving his
wood. Best thing for him, takes his mind off everything else. You
go out there, surprise him, I’ll bring cool drinks, eh?’

‘Thanks.’ Kate found Walter just outside the
aluminium and timber shed he’d built himself, in the shade cast by
the slanted, corrugated iron roof. His attention and all his
creative mental energy were focused on the sculpting of his wooden
artefacts. His current project was a horse and Kate marvelled, as
she approached, at the subtle definitions of muscle tone Walter had
fashioned in the wood. He looked up and, breaking into a big grin,
put his work to one side. ‘Kate!’

He embraced her, as her brother would have,
kissed her cheek, and then they sat.

‘These sculptures of yours are marvellous,
but then, I probably told you that last week.’

‘Perhaps you did, but I don’t remember much
of last week.’

‘I don’t either.’

Walter gestured toward the wooden horse. ‘I
learnt this from my father, Tom. He was much better than I am, and
he sold many hundreds of his sculptures to tourists from all over.
Bit of a businessman, in his way. He wouldn’t have thought of
himself that way though, that fella, because he was a simple man,
just lived frugally, just loved his life on this land.’

‘Sounds like he would’ve made a good ranger,
like you,’ Kate said.

‘He would’ve loved such work, but there
weren’t too many of our people in jobs like that, back then.’
Walter leaned in toward Kate, his hand resting on her shoulder. ‘My
father would’ve loved Greg, loved him like a son.’

Ethel brought two large glasses of lemonade,
a God-send thought Kate, in the hot, dry conditions and with the
sun burning fiercely. Ethel chatted briefly with them about the
heat and the lack of rain, and then she moved back inside
again.

‘Walter, there’s something I want to ask
you,’ Kate said, ‘something I probably have no right to come here
and ask. So if I’m out of line, you just tell me. Okay?’

Walter sipped on the lemonade, regarding Kate
closely. A sly half grin crept across his lips. ‘You want me to
take you out along the Adelaide, into the swamps, to track those
hunters.’

Kate was amazed. ‘I can’t possibly be
that…obvious. Can I?’

‘Yeah.’ Walter roared with laughter. ‘Oh
yeah.’

Kate wasn’t sure how to react to this. She
remained silent, her large expressive eyes mirroring her own
uncertainty. Once he had calmed down, Walter exhibited his serious
side once again. ‘Sorry. It’s just that even in your subdued state
last week I saw flashes of the girl Greg described over the years.
A determined little tomboy.’

‘Oh…’

‘No .Don’t be offended. I apologise for my
laughter. For a moment, I felt as though Greg were here with me
again, so proud of you, showing you off. There’s plenty of
similarities between you…Kate, I understand how you feel. I thought
the same thing. I wanted to go out there and track those monsters,
without worrying about police rules and trucks and helicopters. All
those things are just alerting those buggers. Is that how you feel?
Or do you simply want vengeance so much that you want it all to
yourself?’

Kate stammered. ‘I hadn’t
really…thought…about it in that way.’

‘You’re used to taking things in hand and
doing them yourself.’

‘Yes.’

‘As I said, I had the same thoughts. But, of
course, it’s ridiculous. And far too dangerous. The reason Greg and
I were out there was simply to track these men, observe, and then
alert the Commission. It was never to make an arrest, or even to
get too close…’ His voice had begun to crack and Kate waited while
he regained his composure. ‘They shouldn’t have known we were out
there, they certainly shouldn’t have been able to find us the way
they did.’

‘How do you think those hunters knew you and
Greg were trailing them?’

‘Same way they must’ve avoided river and air
patrols,’ Walter suggested, ‘they must’ve had some – devices –
something out of the ordinary, that you wouldn’t expect from a pack
of croc hunters.’

‘Technology you’d expect from military
operations,’ Kate said.

The suggestion surprised Walter, his widening
eyes revealing as much. ‘I suppose you would know more about that
sort of thing than I would. You’re a…how did Greg describe it…a
computer whizz. Right?’

‘One way of putting it. Listen to me, Walter.
I’m not advocating we capture this hunting group single-handedly.
I’m suggesting what you and Greg originally set out to do. We
simply track them down. You have the skills to do that. Then we get
the hell out, head back, before they have a chance to know we’re
nearby.’

‘Then what’s the point?’

‘I think you’re spot on saying they have
sophisticated technology. I believe they’re using it to help them
hunt crocs, and to elude searchers, and to know when someone gets
too close. But I have something they couldn’t even imagine,
something the police here don’t know about, and we can use it to
trap these bastards once and for all.’

Walter was incredulous. ‘You do?’

Walter hadn’t paid too much attention to the
case Kate had with her. Now she unzipped the sides, revealing a
dark coloured, compact computer unit, a little larger than the
conventional laptop size. With its lid opened Walter saw it had a
twin level keyboard panel and what Kate described as a touch pad
for issuing commands.

‘You can track them fellas with this?’ Walter
gazed over the sleek unit.

‘Let me explain,’ said Kate. ‘There’s a
couple of high-tech companies running trials and selling computer
systems far more advanced than the run-of-the-mill GPS units.’

‘Yeah, GPS, not good news for car thieves,
eh?’ Walter allowed his impish sense of humour to resurface for the
first time since his ordeal.

‘This device is far more sophisticated and
has a great deal more range.’ Kate smiled, but the smile was
fleeting. ‘This is the first prototype of a military-style system
being developed for general commercial use.’ The touch of Kate’s
finger on one of the keys brought the screen to life. Once Kate had
tapped in the satellite co-ordinates for Settler’s Gorge, a 3-D map
of the area filled the screen. Walter leaned forward, fascinated.
‘The Landscan III’s software contains maps for all satellite
co-ordinates world-wide,’ Kate continued, hyped up now and speaking
in her rapid-fire style.

‘I got to get me one of these,’ Walter joked
again.

Kate’s eyes rested firmly on Walter. ‘From a
safe distance, it can show us where these hunters are, and where
they’re headed at any given time.’

‘But Kate, even if we went out there and
found them, you wouldn’t be able to get one of those units onto
their boat.’

From a side panel Kate showed him a small,
clear dot with synthetic casing. ‘A micro transmitter, designed so
it can be fired like a bullet from a rifle-style mini-gun, that has
automatic lock-on sights. For instance, farmers could fire it onto
running livestock, or a wild pig or buffalo that’s causing damage
to farm lands. The animals can then be tracked down. Police could
fire it onto a retreating vehicle. It can attach to any surface,
living or inanimate, on ground or below water.’

Walter had one last joke. ‘You going to put
fellas like me out of business.’ Then he fell silent, looking from
the unit to Kate to the distant hills, then back again, deep in
thought.

‘Walter, I don’t suppose I’d any right to
come charging back here, asking something like this of you. I
really do understand if you say no. But I had to come here and do
my “sell”. I hope you understand that.’

‘I understand.’ He was quiet for a while
longer. ‘Why haven’t you simply gone straight to the coppers with
this?’

‘I will, once the transmitter is in place and
the Landscan is tracking the hunter’s movements. I’m concerned
about locating them first, and getting the transmitter in place. I
know you have the most formidable reputation of any tracker in the
region-’

‘No argument from me.’ His grin stretched
from ear to ear.

‘And I’m worried the police and the Park
Authorities, knowing the danger you and Greg were in, will revert
to safer measures – search parties in four-wheel drives,
helicopters doing aerial sweeps…’

‘And that they won’t get any further than
they did before?’

‘Right. In the meantime these bastards will
be long gone. If they aren’t already.’

‘And your friend, the detective…?’

‘Adam doesn’t know about this. If he did,
he’d make sure neither of us attempted it…’ She momentarily glanced
at her cell, its top protruding from her handbag, switched off
since she’d left Sydney so Adam wouldn’t be able to get in
contact.