A Mother for Matilda (7 page)

Why couldn’t he see her as an adult? Maybe a reminder that she was fully grown and ready to fly the nest would force him to see her in a different light. As a woman.

‘Hey, have I mentioned today that it’s only eighty-five more days?’

Lawson turned away from her and looked out of his window. ‘Once or twice,’ he said dryly.

Or maybe not.

T
HE
ominous grey breakers rolled onto the beach, slapping against the sand with relentless savagery as the tide clawed its way steadily back. The wind howled around them as they lounged against one of the wooden crossbeams of the fence that formed the perimeter of the Wattle Beach car park.

It ripped strands of Vic’s hair from her ponytail and she flicked her head as another chunk was whipped across her face. She took a sip of her take-away coffee and hunched further into her overalls as the inclement weather goosed her bare forearms.

‘I’m going to miss the ocean.’ She raised her voice to be heard over the roar of wind and water.

Lawson warmed his hands on his disposable mug. ‘What? Even on days like today?’

Vic nodded. True, it was one of those miserable days, with scattered misty rain and a churning sea. But there was nothing like the unbridled power of the ocean to make you know you were alive. There was something elemental about it and Vic felt an utterly biological connection. ‘Especially on days like this.’

Lawson shook his head. It had been Victoria’s idea
to grab their afternoon coffee and come down to Wattle. The beach was deserted. They were the only two fools stupid enough to brave the weather on this utterly miserable Saturday.

Personally he’d rather be at the station than freezing his butt off in the great outdoors. But with seventy more sleeps to go he’d noticed the closer her countdown got to zero the more she insisted on getting out and about for their breaks and he figured she was just trying to commit things to memory.

As much as she wanted out, he knew she was going to miss the island terribly. At the moment she was focused only on missing people. But despite what she thought, she’d always been a homebody hopelessly in love with the island lifestyle. From the poem she’d had published in the local paper when she’d been ten, entitled ‘My Island’, to her position on the Island Progress Committee.

Brindabella was in her blood and Lawson didn’t think for a moment it was going to be as easy as she thought to turn her back on it.

Lawson looked at his watch. ‘Seen enough now?’

Vic drained the dregs of her cappuccino, her fingers cold despite the warmth of the mug. ‘Yeah, yeah. Grouch, grouch. Where’s your sense of adventure?’

‘It died from hypothermia about ten minutes ago.’

Lawson was approaching the four-wheel drive when the first faint cry for help carried to them on the wind.

‘Did you hear that?’ Vic asked.

With his hand on the door handle Lawson turned towards the sound. It came again from the track to his right and he headed in that direction. The track wasn’t used any more but both of them knew it led to the distant headland.

A child appeared, running full pelt. She looked no older than Matilda and Lawson felt his stomach plummet.

‘Help. You have to…help.’ The wide-eyed child clutched her side as she fought for breath.

Lawson knelt beside her. ‘What’s happened?’ he asked.

‘It’s Bella. She fell…down a hole…in the cliff.’ The child pointed towards the headline. ‘She’s in some sort of…cave. She’s just laying there. I think she’s…hurt.’

Vic felt her pulse spike as a shot of adrenaline charged her system. She looked at the angry waves and the approaching tide and knew that caves on the headland filled with water very quickly as the tide came in.

Lawson grabbed the child’s arm. ‘How old is Bella?’

‘Four,’ the child croaked.

He looked at Victoria and didn’t have to have a conversation with her to know that the situation was extremely alarming. He stood. ‘Right. Come with us,’ he said, turning back towards the vehicle knowing time was of the essence. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Annie.’ Her lip wobbled. ‘Pete reckons Dad’s going to kill us. He told us not to go on the headland without adult supervision.’

‘Pete?’ Vic asked.

‘He’s my brother. He stayed behind to talk to Bella ’cos I’m a faster runner than him.’

The thought of another child on the headland in this filthy weather sent a prickle up her spine and Vic hoped they didn’t have two children to rescue when they got there.

Lawson gunned the engine. Luckily their last job had involved a suspected spinal injury at Brigalow
Beach so they still had the four-wheel drive. He picked up the radio to alert Coms.

‘Coms this is truck three zero five on Brindabella. Four-year-old girl reportedly fallen into a rocky cave on Wattle Beach headland with incoming tide. Going to investigate now. ETA three minutes. Can you alert local authorities and nearest police rescue crew.’

Vic squeezed Annie’s hand. The girl was starting to shiver and she threw her ambulance coat around Annie’s skinny shoulders. ‘You did the right thing. You came and got help. You’re very brave, Annie.’ She looked at Lawson, his face grim. ‘We’ll get Bella out. I promise.’

Lawson glanced at her sharply. Making promises, especially before they’d assessed the situation, was rash. And stupid. But then he looked at Annie’s pale face and trembling body and didn’t have the heart to reprimand his partner. The poor child needed some reassurance.

The vehicle bumped along the deteriorated track on a steady incline. When they reached the top they swung into the headland car park and alighted the vehicle.

‘Bella got through the fence somehow,’ Annie said as she led them over the sturdy chain mail that had been specifically constructed years before to prevent such excursions onto the notoriously potholed headland.

When she’d been a kid and when the twins had been little, it had all been open to the public, but a couple of rock fishing accidents had led the council to take evasive action and now the headland could only be viewed from a special lookout area.

‘There he is.’ Lawson saw Pete first and made his way sure-footed across the rocks.

The headland for the most part was a gradual descent
rather than a sharp drop. Towards the sea line it became a much steeper gradient, but thankfully where Pete was lying the slope was still very manageable.

‘Hi, Pete,’ Lawson said as he approached.

Pete raised a tear-stained face from the hole in the rock. ‘Hurry, you have to hurry. I think she broked her leg. The water’s getting higher.’

Lawson felt dread punch him in the stomach both at the little boy’s wretchedness and the plight of his sister. ‘It’s okay, mate. She’ll be all right now,’ he said, sending a quick prayer out to the universe that it actually would be all right. ‘Do you think I could have a look?’

Vic and Annie arrived as Lawson was lowering himself to the ground. Pete went straight to his sister and hugged her and Vic’s heart melted as she pulled the siblings in close.

Lawson was on his stomach peering through a hole not much bigger than a Frisbee trying to fathom how a child could even fit through when he heard the low whine. He angled his head and could just make out a furry body about three metres below.

Bella was a dog?

A surge of relief swept through Lawson as he momentarily laid his forehead against the rock. It was cool against his face and he couldn’t believe the furnace running through his veins when ten minutes ago he’d been freezing cold.

He pushed himself upright and grinned at the questioning look on his partner’s face. He looked at the children, huddled together in the confines of Victoria’s arm. ‘Is Bella a dog?’

Annie and Pete nodded at him with sad, solemn eyes
as if he should have known it all along. He noticed Victoria’s shoulders sag.

‘Bella’s a dog?’ She looked down at the children, who looked up at her and nodded again.

‘She’s my dog,’ Annie confirmed. ‘I got her for my birthday when I was three.’

Vic grinned back at Lawson. ‘A dog.’

Annie, obviously shrewder than her brother with her advanced years, looked from one to the other. She pulled out of Victoria’s grasp. ‘You’re still going to get her out, right? Just because she’s an animal doesn’t mean you can let her drown.’

Pete’s eyes grew round in his head. ‘You’re going to leave her there?’ he squeaked, staring at Lawson.

The wind whipped the sound of a siren towards them and Lawson knew pretty soon half the emergency services on the island would be on the headland.

‘No,’ Vic denied, placing her hand on Pete’s shoulder. ‘We’re not going to leave her there. We’ll get her out, don’t worry.’

But maybe they could call off the chopper that Coms had told them was on their way in case an amphibious rescue had been their only option. And call in the Animal Rescue people.

‘What have we got, Lawson?’

Vic turned to see two of the island’s volunteer fire-fighters picking their way towards them and, further behind, two policemen climbing the fence.

‘It’s okay.’ Lawson put up his hands. ‘It’s not a child. It’s a dog.’

The men stopped in their tracks and within seconds were laughing and slapping each other on the back.

‘It’s not funny.’

Annie’s little voice cut through their cheer. She was standing, her hand on her hip, glaring at them. Pete edged closer to his sister and she put her arm around his shoulders.

‘Annie? Pete?’

They all looked back towards the car park as a very worried-looking man and a woman also scrambled over the fence.

‘Oh-oh,’ Pete whispered.

Vic crouched beside them. ‘Are they your parents?’

‘Yup.’ Pete’s look of impending doom said it all.

‘Okay.’ She nodded. ‘Let me handle this.’

The couple approached and the mother was the first to let fly. ‘Oh, my God,’ she said to the guilty parties, grabbing them and giving them each a fierce hug. ‘We’ve been looking everywhere for you. You scared the living daylights out of us.’

Vic jumped in to soothe the waters a bit and five minutes later, after a round of introductions to the Bradley family, all had been forgiven. They tried to usher the children back to safety but they refused to budge.

Annie moved out of her mother’s tight embrace and turned imploring eyes on Vic and Lawson. ‘What about Bella. You have to get Bella.’

This time she burst into tears and Vic crouched beside her again. ‘I promise we’ll try as hard as we can to get Bella out.’ Vic had checked out Bella’s position and thought she could help. ‘Don’t tell my dad but I used to play in these caves when I was a kid.’

Annie gave her a watery smile and Vic’s heart squeezed painfully in her chest. The girl had been so
mature and she knew she’d do her damnedest to save Bella from drowning from the incoming tide. ‘I reckon I know a way we could get to her. But you have to go back behind the fence and let us do our work. Okay?’

Annie scrubbed at the tears trekking down her face. ‘You promise you’ll try?’

Vic crossed her heart and held out her crooked little finger. ‘Pinky swear.’

Lawson watched as Annie linked her little finger with Victoria’s. How many times had he seen Victoria Pinky swear with Matilda? He felt a surge of emotion in his chest and had to look away.

‘Right,’ she said as the Bradleys made their way back to the lookout area to wait. The police rescue unit was half an hour away. They were it. ‘I think I know a way in to where Bella is. Follow me.’

Lawson, the two fire-fighters, two police officers and a community first responder—all men—followed Vic down the sloping headland.

Vic talked as she picked her way over the wet rocks. ‘It’s been a few years but I think the cave that Bella’s fallen into is the main cavern. And there’re many different entrances, like a rabbits’ warren. Some are too small but there’s one I reckon we could get in through.’

She led the men to the opening she’d used often as a child. The sea churned not far below their feet so she knew that Bella’s time was running out. The rock where she was lying would soon be submerged and if, as they suspected, she’d broken her leg, she’d have no hope of making it.

The vertical fissure was about five feet high and easily breeched as a skinny kid. As an adult, not so much. They all looked at the narrow aperture in dismay.
Vic peered through the opening and could just make out Bella’s rump in the distance and fading light. She could also see the ocean encroaching on the bank of rock onto which the dog had fallen.

‘It’s okay, Bella,’ she called. ‘We’re coming, baby.’ The answering whine was heartening.

She looked at the assembled men. Lawson was the fittest but the tallest and too broad to fit through the opening. The others were of similar stature, the shortest one being too broad around the middle to even be considered.

‘I guess it’s me, then?’ Vic calculated she could squeeze through, go in, grab Bella, pass her out and be back out again in just a few minutes. She outlined her strategy to the men.

Lawson, growing more and more horrified by her plan, was suddenly cold again. Chilled. ‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘Absolutely not.’

Vic blinked. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘It’s too dangerous. What if you slip? What if you can’t get back out again?’

Vic felt the first bubble of anger churn in her stomach. Did he think she wasn’t up to this? ‘I won’t slip. I can get back out again. I know these caves, Lawson.’

‘No.’ His voice brooked no argument. ‘We wait for the experts.’

Vic watched as Lawson’s gaze became as cold and grey as the sea and opened her mouth to protest. ‘Bella doesn’t have time. The cave is going to be submerged by the time they get here.’

‘We can put her in a harness, rope her off,’ Stan, one of the fire-fighters, suggested.

‘No.’

Vic, incensed at Lawson’s propriety, ignored him completely. ‘Good idea, Stan. Can you go get it from your truck? And ring Doug while you’re up there. Tell him we’re going to need a vet. Pronto.’

Lawson turned frigid eyes on his partner as they watched Stan depart. She’d always been gung-ho and up until recently he’d been supportive of that, admiring her courage and exuberance. Even recognising a younger version of himself. But this was too…‘Victoria, I said no.’

Vic stuck her hands on her hips and her chin right out. ‘I can go in with a rope, or without one. But I’m going in.’

A muscle jumped in Lawson’s jaw. ‘I can’t let you risk your neck for an animal that sustained a fall that’s probably going to leave it with severe internal injuries that may not be compatible with life. It’s too risky.’