Blood Junction

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction, Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Grand Central Publishing Edition

  Copyright © 2001 by Caroline Carver

  All rights reserved.

  Hachette Book Group

  237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017

  Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com.

  First eBook Edition: June 2009

  ISBN: 978-0-446-56225-6

  CONTENTS

  COPYRIGHT

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  For my mother

  PROLOGUE

  1952

  BERTIE WAS IN THE CENTER OF TOWN WHEN THEY CAME for him.

  He knew they would eventually, but he hadn’t expected it to be so soon. Or that he’d be with his father and his younger brother, Willy, his two cousins, Jake and Jimmy, and Jake’s son, Rick—all six of them collecting their paychecks from the Bamfords for burning off and fencing their property. Backbreaking work for a bloody pittance, he was thinking. We’ve all aged ten years from that bloody job and I’m not doing another like it again, ever.

  The first he knew something was up was when Willy slowed, hissing between his teeth. He’d only heard Willy make that particular sound a couple of times; once when he’d nearly trodden on a death adder out near Benbullen and the other after a bush fire had swept through camp, leaving nothing but a sea of fine gray ash and a clump of eucalyptus trees blackened and split open like shattered sticks of charcoal.

  He followed Willy’s gaze. There were four horses tethered outside the Royal Hotel and another two standing docilely next to Sam Davis’s bakery. He saw a group of men lounging on the hotel’s verandah, schooners of beer in their hands, hats shading their faces. Beyond them a truck turned right at the crossroads, stirring up clouds of red-brown dust. Tin and weatherboard buildings lined the street, and shop awnings painted white offered shade against the raw heat. The rows of iron roofs bounced the sunlight into his eyes, making him squint.

  “What’s up?” he asked his brother, who was staring at the Royal.

  “Those blokes,” said Willy.

  He saw the men had put down their beers and were watching them. He had the sensation of a pack of dingoes watching a flock of sheep.

  “They’re all drunk,” his father said wearily, and came to a halt.

  “Yeah,” he muttered, and kicked at the ground. He’d hoped to go out and buy a lathe that afternoon, but with that mob full of grog and looking at them the way they were, they’d be better off coming back another day. He swivelled to head back out of town and felt his stomach swoop. Hank Dundas and five men he didn’t know were walking steadily towards them, expressions intent. Three of them carried machetes, and the broad blades flashed like mercury in the sunlight.

  “Jesus,” Willy said at the same time as Bertie said, “Christ.”

  “Don’t swear,” snapped their father.

  “I’m buggered if I’m going to hang around—” he started to say but then Hank Dundas was yelling at them, his big round face swelling with the effort. His voice thundered down the dusty street like a truck horn.

  “Mullet! Which of you’s Bertie Mullett?”

  He felt more than saw his father pale. “You didn’t do nothing, did you?” he said, his voice shaking. “’Cos I told you not to. I told you they’d get you for it.”

  Bertie was staring at the machetes. He felt the blood start to drain from his head.

  “Son?”

  He found himself unable to speak when he met his father’s eye.

  “Oh, Christ …” His father’s black-polished skin had turned gray.

  Bertie turned a desperate gaze on the men. They were approaching fast. He swung his head to see the mob from the pub had fanned out, blocking the other end of the street.

  “Bertie Mullett!” Dundas yelled. “I want to talk to you!”

  “He’s not here, mate,” Rick said, palms spread. His forehead was beaded with sweat. “He’s back at camp.”

  “Like hell.” Dundas stood before them, his face puce. “I know he’s one of you lot. The Bamfords told me.”

  “He’s back at camp,” Rick insisted.

  “You tell us which is Bertie Mullett or you’ll all get it in the neck.”

  Bertie saw his father step forward, shoulders back, head held high. “I’m Bertie,” he announced. His voice didn’t waver.

  Dundas barely glanced at him. “Bertie’s a young bloke. Rose told me that much.” He studied Rick, then Jake. “A churchgoing lass ruined by a bloody Abo. Perverted son of a bitch! I’m going to make him pay.”

  Bertie felt a whimper flutter in his throat as the narrow eyes slid to him.

  “You Bertie?”

  He jerked a negative.

  “You?” Dundas asked Jimmy, who shook his head.

  Dundas then asked Jake and Rick and Willy, who also shook their heads.

  Dundas grinned. “You’re all Mulletts, right?”

  None of them moved.

  “Tarred with the same bloody brush the lot of you.” In a single lazy movement he raised his machete above his shoulder. His eyes went quite flat. “You’ve ruined my daughter.”

  Everything slowed to half speed.

  He saw Dundas swing his machete at his father’s neck. From behind came a shout and then Willy screamed. There was a dull chunk, like an axe hitting wood. Bertie watched his father topple to the ground, hands fumbling, desperately trying to stem the river of blood pouring from his neck. He saw Willy dart between two men in an attempt to flee. He saw another machete strike Jake’s right arm, almost severing it, and as Dundas came for him, Bertie spun. A man in overalls jabbed Bertie’s right kidney with his elbow and he lurched, fell to the ground. Pain blurred his vision. Then a great weight was on top of him, sticky and wet, and Bertie was pushing it away, only half aware it was Willy, that he was bleeding badly, his groans bubbling from a great gash in his throat.

  Then Bertie scrambled free and rolled sideways, gasping. The street echoed with shouts and screams. Bertie wavered upright. Dundas lunged for him. Bertie swung sideways and, ducking low, hurdled his father’s inert form. Dundas dived to intercept him. Bertie feinted right, then dove left, and sprinted past.

  A gunshot cracked behind him.

  Bertie increased speed.

  Voices were shouting and screaming.

  He kept running. Concentrated on nothing but the act of running. Eventually the screams diminished, but he still kept running.

  Bent double, lungs heaving, he paused on the town’s limits. He put both hands out to steady himself against a metal signpost and found himself almost hugging it to remain upright. After a little while his breathing eased and he straighte
ned and looked back at the town. At the tea-colored weatherboard buildings hunched along a strip of gravel road, paint blistering beneath a remorseless Australian sun.

  He lurched into an unsteady jog, heading for the low mound of hills in the distance, where he knew there would be nothing but dry grasses and rocks and lizards and brown-bellied snakes.

  Bertie Mullett was unaware he had left three bloody handprints on the signpost. They remained there for seven weeks and two days before a sudden deluge washed them clear. Only then could the local residents look at the sign without flinching: COOINDA.

  ONE

  1999

  INDIA KANE LOOKED UP AND DOWN THE ROAD. THE WIND was blowing hard from the north, hot as a blowtorch and whipping fine grains of sand in her face. The air scorched her nostrils as she breathed. There was no shade, no respite from the sun and sand. She was already thirsty, but caution prevented her from drinking any water. She’d save the small amount she had for when night fell, when it would do her most good.

  Hypnotized by the raw heat, she stared southwards, where the road curved around a large clay pan. Then she gazed northwards, at the broad sandy arrow streaking relentlessly into the distance. No cars, no trucks, no rescue in sight. The horizon seemed to waver as she stared, but it was only the heat haze and her dried scratchy eyes playing tricks.

  India turned to her stricken Toyota Corolla and cursed it under her breath. Then she cursed the wind and heat and the interminable flies, Toyota generally, the rental-car company and then her work, for putting her here. She’d been stranded in this flat baking tray of scalding wilderness for three hours now and the worm of worry that another vehicle might never come along had grown into a snake that writhed and squirmed in her belly.

  The only car she’d seen since she had turned off for Cooinda had been a 4 × 4 ute, a pickup, travelling in the opposite direction. That had been around twelve-thirty, four and a half hours ago.

  In silent desperation, she tried the ignition again. Nothing. No electrics, no power, nothing. The inside of the car was like a furnace and smelled of hot plastic. She clambered back outside and stared at the engine block for what must have been the twentieth time. What she knew about engines she could write on a pinhead. What she knew about survival was fractionally more and she had no intention of putting herself at risk by leaving her car yet. She was pretty sure Cooinda was only thirty or forty kilometers away, but she’d last two seconds in this heat. She would wait until it was dark, then follow the road into town. There was no point going the other way. The last homestead she’d seen was about the same distance away as Cooinda.

  India sat huddled beside the flank of the car, trying to shelter from the dry, insistent wind. She cupped both hands over her nose in an attempt to prevent herself from breathing more dust, but it didn’t seem to help. Her nose and lungs and mouth were being layered with the stuff. She wanted to light a cigarette but it was too windy.

  She thought about her friend Lauren, waiting for her at the Royal Hotel in Cooinda. Thought about an ice cold beer, ice cold water, any water. Pulled her mind back to practicalities. Found enormous comfort in knowing Lauren would raise the alarm at the end of the day, come looking for her. Maybe she wouldn’t have to walk into town after all.

  She rested her head against the car’s bodywork and closed her eyes. Breathed in dry air like fire.

  She was dozing when she thought she heard a faint hum in the distance. From the south. She scrambled to her feet, praying it wasn’t a plane, or a tractor or a four-wheel-drive car taking a shortcut off the road.

  Then she saw it, a glimmering black saloon going like a rocket. All four wheels were locked as it drifted around the clay pan, settled briefly, then surged forward with no apparent lessening of power.

  India decided against standing in the middle of the road and simply stood by her car with her arm out, knowing the raised bonnet would have the desired effect; the outback code was always to help another in need.

  The car hummed towards her, gravel and dust pluming behind it like a meteor tail.

  India gave a little wave.

  The car shot straight past her without stopping, a BMW with smoked-glass windows.

  India stood in great choking clouds of grit and sand with her eyes shut. When she opened them, the flat-six engine note was at least a kilometer away.

  “You little shit,” she said, astonished. Unless she’d witnessed it with her own eyes, she’d never have believed a fellow Australian would abandon a stranded motorist in the outback.

  Perhaps he’s from the City, she thought, and doesn’t realize that in the bush things are different. That the wind sucks all the moisture out of you until your lips crack and start bleeding, and your throat is so dry you can’t swallow. That if you’re stranded for several days twenty liters of water per person will only just suffice, and I’ve only two. That if you don’t die of thirst or sunstroke, you might die of snakebite. Brown snakes live out here. Their venom is one of the most potent known. And should you disturb one, the brown snake won’t think twice, it will attack with a ferocity and viciousness you won’t believe.

  India stood and watched the dust settle behind the BMW

  I don’t care where the little sod is from, she suddenly thought with a spurt of anger, because if I ever come across that shitty BMW again, I will lob it with Molotov cocktails. Not that I know how to make one, but I’ll learn.

  Then she looked upwards into the dazzling blue-white skies. Please, God, don’t let every driver do that to me. I don’t want to die out here.

  TWO

  IT WAS NEARLY SEVEN O’CLOCK WHEN A BATTERED BEIGE Holden Commodore pulled up behind India’s car. The wind had died to a gentle breeze and the sky had lost its harsh glare. The wilderness was softening into evening.

  The man who approached looked to be in his midtwenties. He was dressed in faded jeans and a rough work shirt. He had a thatch of fair hair and eyes the color of burnt toffee, and unlike her was fresh and clean while she was caked in dust, her eyes red and sore, and her hair matted in a thick clump.

  “G’day,” he said.

  “Hi.”

  His eyes ran from her scuffed boots, up five feet eleven inches of jeans and loose cotton shirt to the wide-hooped earrings, then he gave her one of those grins, impulsive and cheerful, as though he’d just won a prize.

  “Name’s Terry,” he said, and stuck out his hand. “But my friends call me Tiger.”

  “Mine’s India Kane.” Her voice was hoarse with dust. “My friends call me Indi.”

  They shook.

  “Cool name,” he said, “like Indiana Jones.” He stood there, still grinning.

  “Know much about cars?” she asked.

  He looked momentarily nonplussed, then said, “Oh, yeah. Sure.” He shoved his head under her car’s hood. She fetched the liter of Evian she’d put beneath the car and unscrewed the cap. She raised it to her mouth, took a large mouthful, closed her eyes. She rolled the heated water around her mouth, swallowed, gave a small groan of intense pleasure.

  Heaven, she thought, is a mouthful of hot water.

  She carefully sipped the rest of the bottle while she watched Tiger fiddle with the hoses she had fiddled with, wiggle the same electrical wires, check all the levels. “Could you see if she’ll start now?” he said.

  She tried.

  Nothing.

  Tiger scratched his head, looked at his watch, then at her. “I’ll give you a lift into BJ. We can sort it out from there.”

  “Not Cooinda?”

  “BJ, Cooinda, same place.”

  She gave him a confused look.

  “There was a massacre years back,” he said, “at the crossroads in town. Five Abos got wiped out by a bunch of whites armed with machetes. You’ll find most of us call it BJ, short for Blood Junction.”

  Blimey, thought India as she transferred her backpack to his car. I hope things have changed since then.

  They chatted amicably as he drove. She learned it was his day
off and he’d been to Tibooburra to see his parents. She told him she was going on a riding safari from the Goodmans’ with her best friend. He liked a cooked breakfast to start his day. She liked coffee and nicotine.

  “How come you wanted to holiday out here?” he asked. He was shaking his head slightly, and she could understand his bafflement. Cooinda wasn’t exactly on the tourist map being in what was known as the Corner Country, so-called because it centered around the meeting of three borders: New South Wales, Queensland and South Australia. With Sydney about fifteen hundred kilometers to the east, and Adelaide another eight hundred Ks southwest, Cooinda was pretty much slap bang in the middle of nowhere.

  “We were meant to be trekking in Kosciusko,” she replied, “but everything turned pear-shaped at the last minute.”

  He turned his head, brows raised.

  “My friend was working in Cooinda, and since I was in Broken Hill …” She shrank from disclosing the real reason, then firmed her resolve. If Lauren was right, she’d better get used to the idea, and start talking about it. She picked up her second liter of Evian, where it sat between her thighs, and took another long slug of warm water before saying, “My friend … um … said she’d found a relative of mine up here.”

  Tiger didn’t seem to make much of this, so she added, “I don’t have any, you see. They’ve all died or emigrated. My mother’s family originally came from Cooinda, so when Lauren said she’d found my grandfather … well …”

  “Your grandfather? What’s his name?”

  “Tremain. Edward Tremain.”

  Ahead, a flock of crows blackened the corpse of a kangaroo in the middle of the road. As they approached, three birds lumbered heavily into the air but the remainder hopped away a short distance to return the instant they had passed.

  “Don’t know any Tremains, sorry.”

  It didn’t surprise her. She wasn’t certain she believed Lauren anyway, considering both her maternal grandparents had been dead for thirty years.

  The Commodore rattled and jarred as they crossed a bridge. Beneath were reaches of red and yellow sand but no water, not even a damp puddle. India asked Tiger how often it rained and wasn’t surprised when he told her cheerfully virtually never, and went on to inform her that Cooinda was the second hottest town in New South Wales, after his home town, Tibooburra.