Brumby Mountain (13 page)

She wrenched open the driver's side door. ‘The key is still in the ignition!' She looked back at Grace, who was hanging back nervously. ‘You drive better than I do.'

‘Jess! I'm only fifteen. I can't drive on a road.'

‘So we'll go through the paddocks.'

‘Where to?'

‘Back to the mountains,' said Jess, sliding into the front of the truck. ‘Come on, quick!' She groped around with her feet, trying to find the pedals. ‘Which one makes it go?'

‘You have to turn it on first, derrr.' Grace appeared by the door. ‘Move over!'

Jess slid over and let Grace slip in behind the wheel. Her friend sat on the edge of the seat and groped for the keys.

‘Can you reach the pedals?'

‘Nup.' Grace slid half off the seat and kicked around with her feet.

The keys jangled and the engine suddenly roared as Grace hit the accelerator too hard. Jess fumbled around on the bench seat, finding crushed empty beer cans and other unidentifiable things. She ran her hand over a hard cylindrical object – a torch. She flicked it on.

‘No wonder it stinks in here,' she said. At her feet, bathed in torchlight, was something that looked like a dead rabbit. She pulled the front of her jumper up over her mouth and nose.

‘Throw it to the dogs. It might shut them up,' said Grace.

Jess found an old shirt and wrapped it around her hand, then picked the animal up by two stiff back legs. She tossed it to Max and Brutus. ‘There you go, boys,' she said in her runner's voice.
‘Don't say I never give yez nuffin.'

The sounds of growling and crunching of bones gave Jess the shivers and she wound the window up to shut out the noise as the two dogs fought over the putrid carcass.

‘Go to Matty's Creek,' she said. ‘We'll try to get back to the mountains from there.'

‘Can't you go any faster?' asked Jess.

‘I can't reach the clutch to change gears,' said Grace, gripping the steering wheel with both hands. ‘We're stuck in first gear. Besides, we can't put the headlights on or someone will see us.'

‘This is so illegal,' said Jess, suddenly having an attack of conscience.

The truck suddenly lurched. ‘No, it's not, because I'm not actually driving on the road. I'm on private property . . . sort of.'

‘We stole a truck!'

‘We're just borrowing it. I don't think it's even registered; there's no sticker.' Grace peered into the rear-view mirror. ‘Besides, this was
your
idea, remember? How's the brumby going?'

Jess wasn't sure how the lack of rego made things any more or less legal. She peered back through the cabin window. The small horse stood in the crate with its legs wide and head high. ‘It seems okay. Wonder what happened to its mum.'

‘Let's hope she's back in the mountains,' said Grace, continuing into the darkness. Before long, the truck lurched towards the river crossing.

‘This is where Luke's mum died,' said Jess quietly as the truck rumbled onto the timber bridge. As the words left her mouth, the sound of screaming rushed down the channel of the river bed, carried by a low, moaning wind. The brumby foal answered with a piercing cry that caught Jess by the lungs and stopped her breathing. The torch went out. The truck jerked to a stop.

‘Damn, stalled it,' said Grace, reaching for the keys. ‘Turn that torch back on.'

‘I'm trying,' said Jess.

Everything went silent for a few moments. Then a tiny breeze wafted in through the cabin and ran over Jess's cheek, gently lifting the hair from around her ear and dropping it back down again. She gave the torch a shake and got a weak beam. She shivered.

‘How weird was that?' she whispered.

‘Too weird,' answered Grace in a nervous voice as she kicked the truck back into life.

The sky had thickened with cloud, obscuring the moon. The night was dark and drizzly. ‘Where are the windscreen wipers?' said Grace. She fiddled with a few levers. ‘Must be broken.'

Grace continued driving slowly along the side of the road, her elbow and head hanging out the window, one hand on the wheel, until eventually they reached Matty's Creek.

‘Now what are we going to do with this horse?' asked Jess, as Grace stopped the truck at the forty-four-gallon drum by the front gate. All she could see of the kangaroos was their red eyes, gleaming in the darkness.

‘Put it in with Dodger and Legsy?' suggested Grace.

‘It's a brumby. It'll just injure itself trying to get past the fences. We've got to get it back to the mountains.' Jess sighed. ‘How will it find its mother? We haven't even checked to see if it's injured.' She put her hand to her forehead and groaned. ‘Oh God, this was such a dumb idea.' She got out and slammed the car door.

The dogs snarled, low and menacing, and Jess growled back.
‘Siddown, bunny-breath!'

She ran her torch over the brumby and it jumped and shied at the beams of light. ‘Easy now,' she said, switching to a soft tone while running the torch up and down its trembling legs. It was a filly. Jess was relieved to find it had no injuries. It called loudly and desperately into the darkness. As Jess shone the torch over its face she saw Sapphire's wild blue eyes staring back at her, icy-blue and hauntingly human. ‘We can't just let her go. Dingos will get her.'

Grace got out and unlatched the gate. ‘Let's try driving the same way we went today. We can follow Mum's tyre marks.'

She turned on the headlights and the house lit up before them. The kangaroos fell away from the light in panic, bounding over the fence and into the hills in one big hopping mob. In the sheep yard, Dodger and Legsy nickered.

Grace drove the truck towards the creek crossing and stopped. ‘Reckon we can get through?' she asked, with her head out the window. ‘I reckon it's risen since this arvo.'

‘It was up to the horses' elbows today,' answered Jess. ‘I don't think this old beast is gonna get through it.'

‘Maybe we should just take her home,' said Grace.

‘To Coachwood? Harry's?'

‘Yeah, why not? Sapphire's mares are there. They might adopt her.'

Jess's mind filled with the image of the big creamy stallion, so traumatised by the brumby-runners, pacing frantically about the yards at Harry's. And his dead body being dragged down the laneway behind a tractor, never to return to his mountains again. ‘It would be better to leave her here,' she said. ‘Anyway, there's no room on the float. We have to get Dodger and Legsy home.'

The brumby on the back cried out. A deep old nicker from somewhere up on the hillside answered.

‘Rambo!'
the girls chorused.

Jess stuck her head out the window and called to him. ‘Hey, old man!' She couled hear the old horse ambling slowly towards them, his legs brushing the long grass.

Jess unclipped the dogs and dragged them, growling and snapping, to the horse float and locked them in the back, tipping half a bag of Filth and Fang's dog biscuits in after them. Then she ran back to the truck and shone the torch over the stock crate, looking for the handles. She swung the doors open, then joined Grace in the front of the truck.

Rambo waded through the shoulder-deep river and emerged at the same steady pace, the river dripping from his feathered legs, droplets of light rain rolling through his shaggy forelock and shimmering as it caught the lights of the truck.

He whickered gently to the terrified filly and it bleated back in pathetically grateful whinnies.

Rambo lifted his nose to the back of the truck, exchanged sniffs with the small horse, then turned and walked away. The brumby stood trembling at the mouth of the cage, ears pressed back against her skull. In a sudden burst of bravery, she leapt after the old black horse, landed on awkward legs and toppled over. She recovered quickly and gambolled to Rambo as though she knew him, leaping and rearing and paddling her legs at the old horse's shoulders.

Jess watched the pale shape of the filly dancing around Rambo's larger black outline in the shafts of light. ‘Let's call her Min Min,' she said. ‘After the min min lights.'

‘Beautiful,' smiled Grace.

The two horses disappeared into the shadows. Jess heard their hooves knocking the rocks against each other, stone clacking against stone as they dislodged them. There was a splash, silence for a moment, then pebbles knocking on the other side of the river. Overhead, the trees murmured and swayed in the wind and the sound swallowed the two horses as they climbed up the mountain and into the night.

‘I think she'll be okay now,' said Grace.

But Jess was already thinking of the next hurdle. ‘We'd better get this truck back.'

‘Can't we just roll it into the river?'

‘It's not deep enough,' grinned Jess, although she quite liked the idea. ‘And we have to get back to the pub with those dumb dogs.'

The carpark was full when they got back to the pub; a mix of utes, four-wheel drives and stock trucks.

Grace and Jess returned the runners' truck with Max and Brutus locked inside the stock crate. They clambered back up the flooded gum and sat side-by-side on a thick branch, like a pair of tawny owls, overlooking the pub.

Jess huddled into her jacket and braced her shoulders against the wind. Her jeans were wet, and her knees knocked together with cold. As her phone picked up a signal again, it buzzed with about twenty frantic messages from Mrs Arnold, demanding to know where they had got to. Jess balanced precariously on the tree branch, one eye on the pub, the other on her phone.

The doors opened and the voices coming from inside sounded dispirited. People began filing out, speaking in low grumbles. Mrs Arnold's voice still rang loud and obnoxious from inside.

‘I reckon Queensland must be winning,' said Grace.

‘Yep, all over for New South Wales, by the looks of it,' said Jess. ‘Can you see the runners?'

‘Yeah,' said Grace, suddenly surprised. ‘They're drinking with Mum. Look!'

They could see Mrs Arnold standing by a tall bar table, raising a schooner of port to the two men they had met on the mountain. They looked like old friends. Mrs Arnold had a maroon beanie on her head and seemed to be singing.

‘Oh no,' groaned Grace. ‘Mum's on the turps with them.'

Jess didn't answer. ‘Hey, isn't that Barker's wagon?'

The white police wagon was parked sneakily behind a bend in the road, just shy of the pub.

‘Luke must be back.' Jess kept scrolling through her messages and found several from Luke.

Back at pub. Where are you?
     OK?

She messaged him back.

Look in the tree out the window. What is Mrs A doing???

Within moments, Luke's lanky figure appeared on the balcony of the pub and he peered out into the darkness.

‘Hooo-hooo!'
called Jess, doing another bad owl impression.

Grace started the
Koo-koo-kaaa
of a kookaburra and abruptly choked on it as Jess elbowed her in the ribs. ‘That's a
morning
bird, Gracie!'

Luke slipped through the beer garden and out into the dripping wet paddock. Jess noticed his sling was gone. ‘How's your arm?' she asked when he reached the foot of the tree.

‘No fracture,' he said, breathless and smiling. ‘It's just the old injury giving me grief. The vet wrapped it for me.' He held up his arm. Below the cuff of his jacket his hand was wrapped in a thick blue bandage. Using his good hand, he grabbed hold of a lower limb and climbed up beside Jess. ‘Those runners are plastered. Mrs A's got them totally hammered.'

He unravelled a footy scarf from around his neck and wrapped it around Jess's, then sat with his legs either side of the limb and put both arms around her shoulders. As he spoke, his warm breath brushed over her ears. ‘Barker's just waiting for them. He's gonna nab them as soon as they get in their truck.'