Yesterday's Dust (39 page)

‘Come out for Christmas dinner, Sam.'

‘Can't,' he'd said. ‘A prior appointment.'

‘Boxing Day then. I'll meet you at the bar. We'll play it again, Sam.'

‘Samuel, and why not? Why not?'

Samuel.

That's who he was now. Who he had to be now. No May to coerce into calling him Jack, and no more Jack after midnight.

He was Samuel
Burton of Narrawee, and maybe the grey-bearded old bugger still had some time left. Time for a laugh or two. Time to work out the difference between a good bull and one not so good – or learn how to fake it.

He walked around to the main bridge, crossed over, and as the last glimmer of light became lost behind the trees, he reached into his pocket for Sam's glasses – not to hide behind, either.
He needed them these days to see where he was going, needed them to drive. Old age was a bastard.

The road a lighter dark than the trees, he walked on, counting the white posts, his sneakers whispering in the dust, his mind wandering as a hand reached for his pocket and cigarettes. Matches. Gratefully he lit up, drawing the smoke deep, coughing it out.

Bob? Bobby Willis? Robbie West. Bob Collins?
Bob? That voice, that shape had been familiar. ‘Bob?' he said, then he saw his car and stepped eagerly towards it.

And into instant blindness.

‘Get that bloody thing out of my eyes, you stupid bastard.'

The tone, the words spoken, were Jack's. There was no taking any of them back. But with the flash of light came an inner illumination.

The friend. It was Ellie's tame copper. Bob bloody Johnson!

Malcolm had seen the big car drive by, seen it turn, watched it stop. Through his binoculars he had spied on the driver, seen him close the car door, watched him walk away from the car.

Jack was back.

Binoculars to his eyes, Malcolm had tracked him to the gate, and as he'd opened it, he'd turned, and for an instant the binoculars had looked
Jack Burton in the eye. That was when Malcolm had exchanged them, first for his brandy bottle, then for his gun.

The bottle empty, he had poured the bullets from the worn matchbox into his palm. Two bullets. He'd fingered them, inserted them lovingly into the small handgun – as they had been inserted many times before. Something sensuous about this action.

And the words, elusive words, had begun
to play with him.

Edward Edwards felt the weight of the gun in his hand. He knew what he must do. That bastard did not deserve to live.

Malcolm's slipper-clad feet had attempted to walk him to his study where Number 10,
Untitled
, still waited. Unfinished.

‘No.'

But Mack was back and Malcolm's word-well, dry too long, was filling.

Edward had never been a violent man. He looked down at his
hands to the gun he had inherited from his father. Why had he kept it, if not to use on the eradication of vermin? Tonight Mack Curtin would die.

He had stood there, between his empty brandy bottle and his study door, and like Edward Edwards, had stared at the gun dangling from his hand, pointing at his flattened slipper.

‘Tomorrow,' he'd said, forgetting for a moment that he would have no
tomorrow.

Two bullets he had purchased with this gun. His plan, dredged from the last drops of his brandy bottle, was to use both bullets. One for that obnoxious bastard, then one into his own temple. He'd go out in a blaze of glory.

‘A blaze of glory. No more the impotent old fool. We will show this town what we are made of.'

But the word ‘impotent' had led him back to Mack Curtin, led him
to chapter eleven – also unfinished.

In his youth, Mack had been hung like a stallion. So the years had taken their toll, but the old war horse was not yet ready to be put out to pasture. He sniffed at the scent of battle as he closed his eyes. Old mares became young again in the dark.

‘Oh yes. Yes, Coll. You are so good. This one could well be your best yet.'

His slippers had tried to lead
him to his study door, but he'd fought them, forced them to flip-flop to the laundry where he'd taken up his flashlight. A cumbersome yellow thing, its battery was new, its light bright. He'd tested it, shining it around the walls, and through the window.

With a sigh for dreams unrealised, he'd dropped the loaded gun deep in his trouser pocket then, torch in one hand, walking stick in the other,
he'd flip-flapped across the road to the big car, each flip, each flap making him aware that he should not have emptied his
brandy bottle, but should have changed his footwear. However, had he not emptied the brandy bottle he would have been sitting at his window looking out, instead of outside, looking in.

Slippers were not the optimum footwear for traversing gravelled roads. He prodded and
stepped more slowly, knowing he must not fall and pump the precious bullets into his own well-padded buttock.

His heart, playing a wild tattoo amid the fat, was surely loud enough to be heard across the river, strong enough to crush his throat, but not enough to kill those inner words. They had kept coming at him, eating away at his conscious mind. Were his last minutes on this earth to be spent
mentally completing Number 10?

But he had found his end. The bastard of a thing had eluded him until tonight.

Mack could smell his future in the heated mulch beneath his feet. Heavy soil. Dust to dust. They were coming to get him and he knew it. For years he had evaded them, hiding out in Sydney, changing his name, but for the last six months the hounds had been baying at his heels.

Breath
short, his well of words spilling over, Malcolm found a tree. His back pressed to its trunk, he'd let the words play, fill a minute or an hour.

He hadn't planned to be here tonight. Just passing through, but the bloody old car had let him down. It had rolled over and died three miles out of town.

A too-deep sigh had shaken him. ‘It's over, Coll. It's over. Vacate the space. I have more important
work to do.' Tonight he would fight his own war against tyranny. And he would win.

Number 10 was roughed out. Only fifty thousand words and no end in sight, but his death would assure its sales. Let his publishers
write their own end, edit it as they wished.

Who would miss him, mourn his passing? Ann, perhaps. And he would miss her. Miss watching her tiny Bethany grow.

‘Time's great plan, Malcolm.
Time for the old to make way for the new.'

John Burton may miss the Sunday evenings spent in discussion. John, named as Malcolm's own son had been named, and tonight he would be with his son and poor Jillian.

Or would they disown him?

‘You're good for me, Mack,' she panted. ‘You make me young again. Only you. Only ever you. We've got years of life to live.'

‘Speak for yourself, Bell. And you
haven't got the legs for life on the run.' His hand slid down to her knee, bone and sinew, and not much else.

‘A pity you can't write your own end, Coll. You make me young again. But the world will know who you were tomorrow.'

On his death, Ann was to give up his secret. Let them laugh at him then. Let them call him impotent old fool then. He'd have the last laugh. Pleasure in that thought.
Something to look forward to.

‘A pity I won't be around to see it.'

His eyes had long given up the fight to see by night. Not knowing from which direction Jack Burton would approach, Malcolm didn't bother looking. He rested his eyes and allowed his ears to work for him. His hearing was good. He'd hear him, and from his position against the tree he could see the outline of the car.

But it was
his eyes that had seen the bright spark of a match being struck before his ears had picked up the sound of footsteps. His walking stick placed against the tree, he'd tugged his gun free.

Armpits dripping with perspiration, hands dripping, shaking, he'd pointed both gun and flashlight, and heard the walking stick fall, hit the mulch-covered earth. Still, he would not need it to prod its slow way
home tonight. He would not be going home. Let the
laconic lawman worry about getting him out, bring in a bulldozer, a fork-lift.

One fat index finger ready on the trigger, his second index finger poised over the on/off flashlight switch, Malcolm had spread his feet and begun counting down his seconds of life.

He'd have to be close. Two metres. He'd need to be that close. With only two bullets
he couldn't afford to miss.

Soft the mumble of feet through dust and gravel. Soft the sigh, slow the footsteps. Small orange glow-worm of cigarette.

A breath. Deep drawn. The air had tasted sweet, heavy with eucalypt and honey. The arm holding the gun lifted, Malcolm braced himself to fight his last war, his weapon saved fifty years for this night. For this moment. He would do it. He could do
it.

And no thinking, Malcolm. No change of heart. Him first, then a fast shot into the temple and no backward glance.

The glow of cigarette close enough, Malcolm had stepped forward, his left index finger bearing down on the flashlight switch.

Instant light, finding, blinding his quarry.

‘Get that bloody thing out of my eyes, you stupid bastard.'

Jack threw a hand up to cover his eyes as
Malcolm swayed there, looking at the trees, so green by torchlight as his finger moved against the trigger.

And drew a blank.

So it was not meant to be a murder/suicide, so change the script Malcolm, but quickly. One bullet would be enough. But his torch slipped, fell to the earth. Day birds above complained at the spotlight in their eyes and Jack Burton laughed and kicked the light, sending
it flying, a fluorescent football aimed accurately between the goalposts of river gums as Malcolm clumsily ejected the bullet and stepped back. His weight applied to one end of his fallen walking stick, it leaped up from the mulch, hit him in his knee, and his knee went. He swayed back. The trunk of the tree stopped his fall, leant its support.

Laughter. Light now behind the laughter. Bright
light from the
old Burton verandah. He could see Jack Burton in silhouette.

Both hands on the gun, Malcolm pushed off from the tree, two, three steps forwards, the gun aimed up at the silhouette, up at the laughter.

And his finger squeezed the trigger as the bars of a padded cell squeezed his heart.

The gun exploded in his hands, echoing and re-echoing through the forest.

Faulty German workmanship!
the fat man thought as he fell.

His mind away on the planet Dune, Johnny had been seated in the kitchen, his novel two-thirds read, when he'd seen a light sweep by his window. He'd placed the book face down and stood, walked to the passage, turning on the outside lights before making his way around the house, seeking a torch bearer – someone looking for a cheap chicken dinner.
Most of the town families had received invitations to Ellie's party at the beer garden, but there were a few who had not. A good night for prowling, and Ellie's free-range chickens were tempting.

He'd been on the front verandah when he'd seen the glow, and he'd frowned, his head to one side, staring at what appeared to be a spotlight sending its bright alien beam high into the heavens.

Old Robbie
West out star-gazing, or a UFO homing in on the west paddock? The light had not moved, so he'd walked off to investigate.

A strange sweating night. Though the sun had long left for Perth, it hadn't taken its heat with it. Not the breath of breeze about.

He had left Ben's house after a late dinner. No excuses given. None asked. A few months back Ellie would have pleaded with him to go, but she
had her friend now.

Johnny had known Bob Johnson as the local cop back in the late sixties. He'd aged some, lost most of his hair, but he still had that same quiet good sense about him. Let him celebrate Jack Burton's life – or his death – with Ellie. Johnny would take no part in the
farce.

Annie? She hadn't said that she would drive down with Bronwyn – or that she wouldn't.

‘Ann,' he said.
‘Annie.'

David called her Ann. Malcolm and Kerrie called her Ann. Only to the family she remained Annie.

‘Annie Lizabeth.'

Bethany had brought memories of that other dark-eyed baby flooding back this afternoon, and for a moment they'd threatened to submerge him. Silly little gaping smile, perfect little grasping hands. And the chuckle.

He could remember the day his father had brought Annie
home from the hospital. They'd propped her in the old pram in the kitchen. No tears, just that little head turning, and those big eyes staring at all the faces.

Maybe he'd go to Warran tomorrow.

The spotlight in the paddock wasn't moving. It was in the far corner, close to the road, and the shortest route there was through the fowl yard. That was the route he'd taken.

Space debris, he'd thought.
A Martian landing? Or careless chicken thief who had taken a fall?

He was squeezing between the fence wires when he heard the explosion. It halted his progress, and his head lifted, his ears seeking direction, his eyes seeking the stationary light, expecting it to flare or die.

It didn't.

When he moved forward once more, he was sucking a wire cut on his palm – until he heard the car, saw the
headlights on the road.

Then he ran.