The Word of God (24 page)

Within a minute they were down beside the river. Peter could feel his heart thudding and recognized pure bowel loosening fear.

“Which way?” Stephen asked.

“Across the river,” Peter called.

“They will see us,” Graham warned.

Peter shook his head. “Not if we are quick. There isn't enough cover here to hide us from a proper search; and we will be trapped against the river and the bridge area. Don't argue. Come on. Joy, give me your pack.”

He snatched it from her, took her hand and stepped down the bank into the water. Stephen swung Megan's pack onto his front and followed, holding her arm. Graham and Gwen came last.

The water was quite warm, at least relative to the air temperature. Peter did not waste time. He splashed out into the water as quickly as he dared, looking constantly over his left shoulder in the direction of the entrance track.

“Come on! Go fast! Don't worry about getting wet or splashing,” he called. “They won't hear us while they are in the vehicle with the engine going.”

To his exasperation Megan seemed to stumble continually and was moving very slowly. Then Joy let out a cry and tripped. Peter kept a firm grip on her arm as she lost her footing and went down. “Don't try to get up,” he cried. “Just hang on and I will tow you.”

But Joy struggled and tried to get up. Peter ignored her efforts and strode quickly into deeper water, dragging her behind him. She was almost completely submerged and several times her head went under. She spluttered and gurgled and cried out but Peter kept on dragging her across. Her face showed she was shocked and upset.

The tactic worked however and within another minute he had her on her feet again in the shallow water near the far bank.

“Up the bank and hide among the trees, quick!” he ordered. As she floundered the last few steps he tossed her pack up into the trees after her and turned to help with Megan. Graham and Stephen had hold of her. She had also fallen and they were dragging her along in the same way, one on either side. Gwen came splashing along behind with her pack.

Megan looked terrified. “I'm all wet!” she cried as she was pushed and dragged up the bank.

“You are safe, now hide behind a tree!” Peter snapped. He clambered out
himself, then turned to help the others. Graham scrambled up the bank unaided. Gwen gave Stephen a push and Peter grabbed his arm and hauled him up. Then he took Gwen's hand and helped her out. With water pouring off their soaked uniforms they climbed quickly up among the trees and crouched or lay behind what cover they could find.

“Just in time,” Graham gasped, pointing back to the far bank.

“I'm all wet!” Megan wailed.

“Shut up and get under cover!” Stephen snarled. He crouched behind a large tree and took out the pistol.

Megan looked hurt but the sight of the gun shocked her into silence. Peter glanced around and saw that Joy was lying flat behind a rotting log a few paces away. She looked upset but he did not have time to worry about her feelings at that moment. He was too frightened and his attention was now taken up by the activity on the far bank.

The blue vehicle had pulled up a hundred metres downstream, at the place where the fire had been. He got glimpses of movement and just for an instant Peter clearly saw a man dressed in black cross a patch of sunlight.
Devil Worshippers alright,
he thought grimly.

“Let's get further away while we can,” he said. Graham nodded. They grabbed their gear, Peter again taking Joy's pack and holding it on his front. This time he helped her up and gently pushed her to go ahead of him. She was soaked and shivering.

Graham led, followed by Gwen, then Megan and Joy. Peter followed her. Stephen came last, still with Megan's pack.

The plan put Peter into a lather of anxiety.
If we can get glimpses of them then they might see us,
he reasoned. But he knew they would be easy to find if they stayed.

Suddenly Stephen hissed. “Here they come! Get under cover, quick!”

The friends scrambled behind the nearest cover. Peter pulled Joy down behind a large tree. She made no objection but was shaking so badly he put his hand on her shoulder.

“We will be alright,” he whispered. She gave him a sickly grin and nodded.

“Two of them,” Graham said, just audible above the sound of the river.

Peter glimpsed two black clad figures with guns flitting along between the trees on the other bank. The sight made him go cold with a numbing terror.

After a few minutes the two Devil Worshippers re-appeared going back towards their vehicle. Peter released a long soft sigh and realized he had been holding his breath.

He was just about to speak when the radio in his pocket crackled making him jump in fright. It was 653 calling 656.

“Quick, copy for me,” he said to Joy.

Joy struggled into a sitting position and groped in her sodden pockets. “My notebook is all wet,” she said as she dug it out.

“Sorry. I didn't mean to be so rough,” Peter apologized.

Joy sniffed. “That's alright. My fault for stumbling.”

At that moment 656 replied and 653 began to send his message. Peter passed on the trigrams and Joy wrote them down as well as he could. As soon as the message ended he pulled out his own notebook, which from hard experience he always kept in a plastic bag, and quickly made a dry copy. Then he opened the codebook and started to decode.

Megan objected. “Oh not now! Let's get out of here. That can wait,” she said.

Peter shook his head. “No. It might tell us their plans,” he replied. “We don't want to go the wrong way and walk straight into them.” Graham and Gwen both supported him. Stephen said nothing but set to work repacking Megan's pack.

Megan began to sob. She stood trembling, clinging to a tree. “I'm scared! I don't want to die!” she wailed.

Stephen stepped over close to her. “Shut up! We are all scared,” he snapped. “If you want to stay alive don't make a noise that might attract their attention. If you do I will shut you up.”

The savage threat shocked Peter but he kept on decoding. Megan gasped as the warning sank in, then she almost shrieked at Stephen: “How dare you! Who are you to threaten me! Why you…”

There was a sharp slap. Peter glanced up to see that Gwen had struck Meganhard.

“Be quiet! We are all frightened. Now get a grip on yourself,” Gwen said.

Stephen glared at Megan: “Yes. Don't you place us at risk. Cry out again and I will bloody well gag you.”

“You.. you wouldn't dare!” Megan gasped. In her shock her face had drained of blood so that the mark of Gwen's blow stood out clearly on her white skin.

“I bloody well will!” Stephen grated.

Gwen supported him: “And I will help him. Now shut up!”

Megan slumped down on the wet leafmould and began to sob. Peter ignored her and kept on decoding. Within a minute he had the message. “The message from Six Five Three says ‘Cadets gone.' The reply from Six Five Six says: ‘Good. Get ready for next phase.'.”

Graham shook his head. “That doesn't make sense,” he said.

Stephen frowned. “I don't like the sound of that. It makes it seem as though they know what we are doing.”

Peter nodded as an ugly suspicion formed in his mind. “You are right I think. It is as though they know all the time what we are doing.”

“But how?” Joy gasped.

Gwen looked anxiously around. “Maybe they have had someone watching us the whole time?”

Graham shook his head. “No. Too hard to do. That man in the vehicle was sent to watch here and we caught him by surprise.”

Peter nodded. “I agree. Besides, I don't think they know we can read their coded messages and they haven't mentioned anyone else.”

“A traitor then,” Gwen suggested.

That was an ugly thought and for a moment there was silence as they absorbed it and its implications. Joy spoke first: “You mean one of us is passing information to the Devil Worshippers?”

Peter frowned. “How else could they know our every move?” he asked. In his mind he listed the occasions when the Devil Worshippers had appeared. Now some of his feelings from the previous day gelled. “I felt it yesterday, that we weren't being so much hunted as hounded. The Devil Worshippers kept tabs on us all the way almost, till they lost us at Ross and Locke.”

“But they knew we were here,” Graham said. “That message implies that. Those men were sent to check if we were gone or not.”

Gwen bit her lip and frowned. “So they must have known that we captured the man who was sent here; Six Five Four,” she added.

There was another silence while they absorbed this. Peter's mind crowded with terrible thoughts. Who was the traitor? And how had he, or she, passed on the information?

Megan voiced his worst thought. “It must be you Stephen. You said you were a Devil Worshipper once.”

Stephen turned to give her a hard look. Only then did Peter realize that Stephen had the pistol. If he was indeed the traitor he had them at his mercy. But instead Stephen gave a wry grin. “I never said I was a Devil Worshipper. I said I was once mixed up in a gang. It's a long story, but I don't want to go into it.”

“But you knew that man,” Megan accused.

“So did we,” Graham pointed out. “He went to our school a couple of years ago.”

By then Peter's mind had assembled the damning evidence. Stephen had been the last person at the Mulgrave National Park, the rearguard.

He could have left a note. He was last again at Ross and Locke. And he had carried the radio most of the time, or had he?
Peter tried to remember. What was certain was that he had been the sentry for hours the previous evening.
Could he have run out to the main road to pass information to the Black Monk?
he wondered.

Peter did a quick calculation and confirmed that there had been time.
While Graham and I were at the hotel,
he thought. Again he shook his head, not wanting to believe what he was thinking.
Something's not right here,
he puzzled. Some of the facts didn't fit but he couldn't make out what the missing pieces were.

Graham ended the argument. “This is nonsense. Steve has saved our lives too often. I don't believe it. Anyway we don't have time to conduct the bloody inquisition here. Let's get to the nearest farm and phone the cops.”

Under his urging they stood up, adjusted their gear and set off along the river bank through the rainforest.

Chapter 16

SECRET CODES

M
egan grabbed her pack off Stephen and moved quickly to the front of the line just behind Graham. For a moment the atmosphere was very tense but Stephen defused it by shrugging and placing the pistol in his pocket. Peter let out a sigh of relief and helped Joy to her feet.

She held out her hand. “I'll have my pack back thanks,” she said.

Peter passed it to her, then indicated she should walk ahead of him. They started walking along the bank through the scrub. This was mostly rainforest growing on a steep slope. Numerous small thin trees and vines impeded their movement and soon all were perspiring and panting.

As they struggled along Peter's mind was a fever of speculation about the accusations of treachery. Someone certainly seemed to be keeping the Devil Worshippers informed, but who?

But not fully informed,
he thought.
They don't seem to know we have captured their code book and radio and that we can decode their messages.

But it was certainly a worry.

The line ahead stopped and Peter looked to see what was wrong. Graham pointed up. A cliff festooned with ferns and creepers blocked their path. The bottom stood in deep, fast flowing water.

“Have to go up around it,” Graham said. Peter nodded agreement. Graham was the more experienced bushman.

They started climbing up the steep slope, hauling themselves hand over hand from one small tree to another, their feet continually slipping in the leaf litter. After twenty five metres Peter wondered if they had made a mistake as it became so steep they could only progress by climbing up vines and exposed tree roots.

At one point he had to push Joy up from behind. Dirt and small stones showered down from those above, making it both unpleasant and dangerous.

At the steepest point Megan slipped and sent quite a large stone hurtling down. Joy was struck a glancing blow on the shoulder and Peter felt the wind of it as it whistled past.

Joy scowled. “Watch what you are doing, you stupid cow!” she snapped.

Megan had been grabbed by Gwen as she scrabbled to get her footing.

“Don't you call me a cow you fat-arsed little bitch,” Megan cried back.

“Oh how dare you! That stone nearly hit me!” Joy cried.

Peter held up a hand. “And me, now stop the argument,” he cut in. He was hot, tired, frightened and in no mood for their tantrums.

Graham moved back down and helped haul Megan up over the steep section. Joy went up next. Once again Peter helped by pushing. In doing so he found his face close to her backside and was able to observe the accuracy of Megan's comment.

She is a bit big in the bum,
he decided.

He climbed up using the exposed roots as foot and handholds and joined the others on the edge of a thick belt of lantana and long grass on a very steep slope. Here they waited for Stephen to join them.

As they waited the sun reached them. It shone with such force that Peter glanced up to check the sky. Clear blue and not a cloud in sight. He wiped sweat from his face and muttered: “So much for winter!”

Graham grunted then said: “Better to be hot than cold.” He then turned and resumed climbing, picking the easiest route between clumps of lantana. The slope was so steep they had to grab at the grass and branches and Peter was glad he still had his staff. Megan had lost hers and soon cut her hands by grabbing at blady grass. This caused more wails and delay.