Poison Bay (31 page)

But that was surely a hut that he could see ahead, through the trees.

53

Two bodies, both male. That left a man and three women still unaccounted for—out there somewhere. But the light was too far gone and the team were on their way back in. There’d be no more searching tonight.

Peter turned and picked up the phone. No answer from the pathologist. He glanced at his watch. No wonder. It was well past business hours. He drew a finger down the list of numbers taped to the wall, and dialed Jonesy’s cell phone. It rang eight times, but he finally answered.

“Sorry to call so late. I’ve got a couple of incoming for you.”

“A couple?”

“Two males. One appears to have a gunshot wound to the head.”

As expected, he heard an appreciative whistle in his earpiece. “A gunshot wound! What do you make of that?”

“No idea. It’s certainly a game-changer. But then, I didn’t really know what game we were playing before.”

“Definitely murder though now. You can’t argue with a bullet.”

Peter paused, uncertain how much he could ask of the man on the other end of the line. It was irregular, and he couldn’t have explained why it seemed so urgent. Just an instinct that he needed to be fully informed before he confronted the survivors, which could be as soon as tomorrow. “Jonesy, I don’t know if you could do them tonight?”

“What, and miss this? Can’t you hear that angelic singing in the background? I’m at the school musical—my oldest girl’s in the chorus.”

“Kids are important, trust me. You need to stay at that.”

He snorted dismissively. “By the time your two bundles of joy get down here, it’ll be over. I’ll congratulate the star, give the necessary hugs and kisses, and head on down to the crypt.”

“Thanks mate. I really appreciate it. Call me any time you have anything to report.”

“Never fear, I’ll call you every hour till dawn.”

Peter laughed. “Can’t wait. Talk to you then.”

***

Peter heard the front door of the police station swinging open, and heavy footsteps scuffing their way down the corridor.

He turned in time to see Hemi walk in, and gave him the best smile he could muster. “Big day huh?”

“You betcha,” Hemi said, grinning. He rummaged in a plastic bag he was carrying, and tossed a paper-wrapped burger down on the desk, where its meaty aromas exploded into Peter’s nostrils, then rummaged again and drew out a bag of greasy hot chips, which he dumped on the desk between them. Lastly, he extracted a burger for himself. He pulled a chair out, its back towards him, and straddled it, then began to eat the burger without ceremony, one big bite after another, grabbing chips to add to the mix as a kind of chunky condiment.

Peter followed his excellent lead. “Mate, I’m going to get the mayor to commission a statue of you,” he said between bites. “You’re seriously a lifesaver.”

“Yeah mate. That’s what they say.” He grinned again. “We managed to get the PLB,” he added around a mouthful of bread roll, a smudge of tomato sauce at the corner of his mouth. “They weren’t gonna bother, but I said we had to give it a try. I’m gonna have a look at it tonight, see if it was faulty or anything. Must have been some reason they didn’t activate it.”

“Anything obvious?”

“Nah. But I reckon a kea dropped it. They’d been at the guy’s rucksack—big hole in it, and stuff spread out everywhere.”

“So simple a kea can activate it.”
But not a group of humans with opposable thumbs.

“A kea and a seven hundred meter drop.”

Peter’s eyebrows went up. “That big?”

“Yep. If it was jammed, that might have released it. I’ll give it a check. Not sure if I’ll find anything, but it’s worth a try.”

The meal concluded, Hemi stood, held his fist to his breastbone, burped deep and resonant, batted his eyelashes, pursed his lips and in a sweet voice said, “Excuse me.” He moved to the large-scale topographical map on the wall, and Peter followed, still chewing his own burger.

“We found the first body here, on a ledge,” he said, pointing. Peter handed him a red-headed pin, and he slid it into the map. “And the second one was here”—another pin—”just above a landslide. That’s the one with the hole in his head. Much bigger landslide bit further downstream, about here. Full-on tree avalanche, goes all the way to the ceiling. Look’s like God’s waterslide.” He looked at Peter. “Not easy to get past that one. You’d have to cross the river, but even if you did, not a friendly slope the other side.”

“Where do you reckon they’re headed?”

“Well, we know they were up towards Poison Bay, because of where we found the girl’s body, right?” He pointed at the other red pin to the north. Peter nodded. “I reckon they were trying to head east—which is what I’d do too. They have to know Lake Te Anau is back thataway, even if they’ve got no maps. But they had to keep finding walkable passes. They’re not climbers. So I reckon they’ve come up here along the Burnley, and maybe had trouble with those landslides. Shoulda happened day before yesterday, I’d say, when they had the big rain event over that side.”

“Makes sense.”

“Most important thing is, the guy on the ledge, now I’m no Gravedigger”—his nickname for the pathologist—”but it looks to me like he fell from a much narrower ledge above it. I think they were heading up Mount Paice. I managed to track them into a boulder field below Gunpowder Pass. Probably could have found more signs up in the tussocks, but we had to keep moving before we lost the light.”

“Where would they go from there?”

“Two alternatives. You can get into the Rossmay valley or the Altham over that pass. I hope they took the Altham—it looks harder at first but it leads all the way to the lake, and there’s even a conservation hut at the end of it. The Rossmay just leads further back into the wilderness. It’s a horrible valley for newbies.”

“Could they do the length of the Altham in a day?”

“If they were motivated, and they started early, I reckon they could. Depends if they’re injured, and how sick that girl is with the diabetes. There was no rain out there today, so it would have been a pretty sweet run if that’s where they are.”

Peter stared at the map. “I’m thinking we’ll take the cavalry to Altham Hut, see what we find.”

“Sounds like a good place to start.”

But can I bet my career on it?
thought Peter, as he continued to stare at the map. Altham Hut. A lovely big pebbly apron jutting out into the lake in front of it, well and truly wide enough for a helicopter, or even two. A beautiful spot for a night rescue if you had a chopper with the right equipment. It was time for some fast and confident talking. He picked up the phone to Invercargill.

***

Beyond the map, through one thickness of wall, lay the lockup. Tom had his ear pressed hard against the smooth surface. He’d been listening ever since he heard Hemi scuff-thumping down the corridor. He continued to listen, and when Peter eventually put down the phone, he moved back to the narrow bunk and sat, silent, thinking.

54

It was amazing how good a survival meal of fish and ferns could taste, if you ate them in a warm, dry hut while a gentle rain pattered onto the corrugated iron roof and fizzled in the undergrowth outside. Fish and ferns that had been cooked over a fire that crackled and hissed inside a cast iron potbelly stove, while flickering light seeped out the stove vents into the hut.
 

There was even a pile of dusty firewood on the little veranda, provided by some gracious previous user months ago, or perhaps a conservation worker. It looked like it should be enough to keep the fire burning all night. They had to keep that column of smoke streaming up into the sky. Their “bat signal” as it were. Here we are, rescue us.
 

Jack had declared that they must collect more wood in the morning, to keep the fire alight. But he could tell that his message was falling on mostly-deaf ears. The urgency seemed to have gone out of everything, now that they had the lake and shelter. Nothing to do now but wait for rescue. Nowhere to walk tomorrow.

Rachel was tucked up in her sleeping bag on one of the hard wooden bunks. Callie checked on her regularly, and had pledged to continue doing so every half hour all night. There was no way to predict what the night would bring.

They lingered around the fire, strangely reluctant to sleep. There were a couple of chairs in the hut, but they didn’t seem to know how to sit on them after weeks in the wild, so they lounged around the floorboards on their sleeping bags instead.
 

“We’ve really won lotto with this place,” Callie murmured. “So very glad we followed your hunch and came down this valley today.”

Jack smiled. “Not sure I’d call it lotto, but I’m glad too.”

Erica said, “Probably better not to talk to me about lotto. We’ll be back in the land of scratch-its and slot machines any day now.”

“Oops, sorry,” said Callie. “How did you get sucked in to that stuff in the first place? I don’t remember you being into it at school.”

Erica sighed and stared at her feet. “It was after Kain dumped me, back at uni.”

Callie inhaled sharply. “You used to go out with Kain before? I never knew that.”

Erica raised her eyes to Callie’s face in the dim light. “Yes, for more than a year.”

Callie shook her head, and looked away. “I’m such a bitch.” Her tone was full of regret. “I had no idea you had history with him. I thought you were just...”

“You thought I was a slut.” There was no judgment in the statement. They all seemed to be beyond recriminations—except perhaps against themselves.

“Well, no, it wasn’t that. It was...” She sighed. “Yes, I guess that is what I thought. Did you love him?”

Erica merely nodded.
 

“I’m so sorry.” Callie’s eyes looked moist.
 

“I pretty much had the bridesmaids’ dresses picked out.” There was self-hatred in Erica’s tone, and her gaze slid away from Callie’s face to the shapes of light flickering on the floor. “I thought he loved me too, but then it turned out a simple nurse wasn’t really prestigious enough for the future he was designing for himself. He dumped me for another law student. No idea what happened to her. When I saw him again here, I thought maybe he’d realized his mistake, and wanted me back. So stupid of me. I was just convenient. Liana is probably the only woman he ever really loved, and she fancied him too, but she loved Bryan’s money more.” She crossed her arms and hunched her body close to her knees. “Being in that tent with Kain was like a prison by the end.”

There was a pause before Callie spoke again. “You must feel horrible now he’s dead.”

Erica nodded, fighting back tears. “How dumb is that?” Her voice broke on the words.

“It’s not dumb at all. Your grief is based on your feelings, not his.” Her voice took on a bitter edge. “And I’m not going to judge you for falling for a man who was totally absorbed by himself. I’m just trying to recover from the same thing myself.”

“Are you?”

“Yeah. I work with him too, so it’s even worse. I have to see William every day, and everyone else has to see me seeing him.”

 
“You went out with William Green?” interjected Jack. He’d been keeping out of the girlie chat, but surprise brought him into it suddenly.

Callie looked at Jack, and nodded. “Yes. The King of the Newsroom bestowed his favors upon me, if only for a short time.” She glanced back at Erica. “I wasn’t quite glamorous enough for him in the end. So he moved on to a sassy little blonde. I was the last one to know about it, of course.” She snorted. “She was a bit like you, actually, Erica.”

“No wonder you hated me then. Why do we do it to ourselves? Break our hearts over these men who are all style and no substance, and ignore the really nice blokes who might actually make us happy.”

Jack was interested to hear the answer to this one, but none was offered. Callie just sighed and nodded. After a longish pause, he gave up waiting, and asked the question that had been left hanging earlier. “So, the breakup started you gambling?”

Erica hauled her mind back from wherever it had gone. “I went out and got drunk that night. I played the poker machines, and I won big. Three thousand dollars. It made me feel so much better. Powerful. Free. So I went out and did it again.” She shrugged. “Before long, I was dropping into pubs for a quick play of the pokies, or stopping by the casino on the way home from a shift at the hospital. Always a secret from my family and friends. It just grew and grew. A bit at a time. It took over my life.”

“I’m so sorry.” Jack’s tone was compassionate.

“You don’t gamble at all, do you Jack?” Callie said. “Not even the Melbourne Cup sweep, if I remember rightly.”

He shrugged. “It was the way I was brought up. No raffles or anything. I guess it was the Protestant work ethic thing—that it’s wrong to want something for nothing.”

“But isn’t that actually the core of your belief, getting something for nothing?” Callie’s tone had become suddenly intense, but it didn’t seem disrespectful. “Don’t you get forgiveness without having to earn it, according to your religion?”

Jack pondered the question. It was quite insightful, actually. “In a way I suppose you’re right. Forgiveness is a free gift that I don’t deserve. It costs me nothing.” His tone became earnest. “But it cost Jesus everything—even the love of God for a short time. And you don’t take lightly the sacrifice of someone you love.”

“It really is real to you, isn’t it?” Callie seemed mystified, and yet intrigued.

“It’s the anchor of my whole existence,” he replied simply.

“Can you believe in forgiveness for me?” Erica said, her voice small.

“Yes. I can.”

A fat tear slid down Erica’s cheek. “I’m not sure that
I
can believe it.”

“What about Kain?” Callie said to Jack. “Can you believe in forgiveness for Kain?” There was a challenge in her eyes.

Jack sighed. “Yes, even for Kain. I’ve been thinking about it on and off all day in fact. If only I’d reached out to him, shown him kindness instead of judging him and trying to catch him out, maybe he’d still be alive. But the fact is, I’ve always hated him simply because
you
loved him.” He couldn’t believe he’d said that out loud, and he looked at it hanging in the air between them.