Darkening Skies (17 page)

When she casually glanced around again Wolfgang had swivelled on the stool and was watching the action on the TV screen on the wall to her left. She let her gaze drift to him, smiled in recognition, and he saw her then, and performed a credible double-take. With his slow, crooked grin he slid off the stool and sauntered over to her, beer in hand.

‘Jenn Barrett. Almost didn’t believe my eyes. Who’d have thought you’d come back here?’

She stood and he enveloped her in a bear hug, kissing each cheek and then her mouth, tasting of beer and salt and marijuana.

He winked. ‘Couldn’t do that when you were sixteen.’ Dragging a chair out, he put his beer on the table and sat down, to all appearances settling in for a catch-up yarn. ‘So, what have you been up to, kid? Other than what we see on TV.’

She played it as relaxed and
easy as he did. ‘Work, work and more work. An apartment in Sydney I don’t see much of. I was based in London for a couple of years, covering Europe, more recently in Afghanistan for a year or so. And I’ve just come back from three weeks in Central Asia.’

‘I saw the ad for your report. Tuesday night, isn’t it?’

She nodded. ‘Part one this week, part two the next.’

‘So, is it what you wanted it to be? The career?’

The question took her by surprise. Was it? She let some mineral water cool her throat. ‘I’m happy with what I’ve achieved so far. But there’s always more to do, and journalism is a rapidly changing field. Technology is making it the best of times and the worst of times, as far as news and current affairs are concerned.’

‘Yeah.’ Forty years in Australia and it still came out more like
ja
. ‘For art, also. Good times and bad.’

‘How is Marta?’ A quiet woman, Jenn remembered from their few meetings, with an unpretentious beauty that Wolfgang had often captured on film.

The energy in his face drained, so that it became merely skin stretched over bone, a skeleton in waiting. ‘Gone.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry, Wolfgang.’

‘Cancer, five months ago. Bastard of a disease.’

In the echoing flatness of his voice she understood his joviality of a few moments before as the pretence it really was – not only a performance for any malicious observers, but a courageous pretence of being alive, of being
okay
.

In the face of his grief, words deserted her and she closed her hand over his on the table. He squeezed her fingers for several seconds before he broke the contact to raise his glass
and sip his beer.

‘You want something to write about, Jenn? Do you know how many women in the bush – young women, often – have a double mastectomy because they can’t afford to spend weeks or months in Sydney or Dubbo or Tamworth having chemo and radiation? We were okay because we live pretty frugally, had a bit put aside, but working women, women with kids or caring for parents – and guys with other cancers, other illnesses, it’s the same. There aren’t enough choices and they’re too bloody tough.’

His concern for others touched her, and she automatically saw possible angles, approaches and questions – but she already had plenty to write about, projects in the works, leads to follow, and none of them had anything to do with Birraga or Dungirri. ‘I’ll mention it to one of my colleagues,’ she told Wolfgang. ‘He does a lot of work on rural issues.’

The waiter brought over her salad, and with the interruption Wolfgang checked his watch and then drained his glass. ‘My pizza will be ready to pick up, so I’ll leave you to your dinner. Good to see you, Jenn.’

Leaning over, he gave her another surprisingly strong hug, holding her tightly, burying his face in her hair. ‘There’s a USB drive in your bag,’ he murmured into her ear. ‘Be careful what you do with it. There’s danger, Jenn.’

The next moment he was strolling away, returning his empty glass to the bar, then walking out the door with only a raised hand in farewell.
And she found her vision blurring with unexpected tears.

Sorting files did little to improve Mark’s mood. Sorting files, carting boxes for storage, running the shredder – activities that kept him busy but didn’t occupy all his thoughts. Apart from the intermittent burr of the shredder, his Birraga office was quiet, the last sunlight of the day slanting through the west-facing windows into the reception area where he stacked boxes of correspondence and resource material to take to Marrayin, and bags of shredded material for recycling.

Like Marrayin, this building had a history, and that was one of the reasons he’d chosen it for his electorate office. Originally a bank built more than a century ago, it still had most of the original features: the long, solid cedar counter, the large fireplace behind it that they never used, and the walk-in safe, built sturdily enough to deter bushrangers back when there’d been gold in Birraga.

Tellers, bank clerks, accountants, customers – generations of local people had known the building, transacted their business over the counter or in the manager’s office. It had always seemed to him fitting to continue that connection and honour the traditions and the history, so he’d left the counter in place, and the safe and the images of historical Birraga, although the other former bank buildings in town had been gutted and modernised to fashionably bland office style.

Mark carried another box of files to the growing pile by the door. To make additional room he pushed aside the chairs and coffee table and the stands with information leaflets about various government services. There’d be more boxes yet. Despite his resignation, he still had work to do – correspondence to respond
to, referring constituents to other assistance, and sending submissions to parliamentary inquiries, albeit as a private citizen now.

His phone vibrated in his shirt pocket and he checked the screen before deciding to answer. Jenn.

‘I might have something,’ she spoke as soon as he answered, crisp, quick. ‘Some info about the accident. Are you at Marrayin?’

Curiosity and wild hope flared. ‘No, in Birraga. In the office.’

‘Good. I’ve just left Impies. Have you got a functioning computer there? I need to look at some files.’

‘Yes. You know where my office is? The old bank in Burke Street, just off the main street.’

He caught the lilt of amusement in her voice. ‘I’ll find it. See you in five.’

Of course she’d find it. Birraga’s business district consisted of two blocks. He opened the front doors of the building and tried to still the questions circling in his mind by loading the first of the boxes on to the tray of his ute, parked immediately outside.

Jenn turned into the street and pulled in beside the ute. Stepping out of the car, she slung a small leather bag across her body and stood for a moment studying the graffiti scrawled across the front wall below the windows.

Amusement curved her mouth. ‘“Lying batsard”? That’s a new twist on an old insult. Or a dyslexic vandal.’

Mark carried another box to the ute and slid it on to the tray. ‘I can understand
why people think that way.’ And so he’d left the graffiti there, instead of spending time cleaning it off this afternoon. ‘The I-don’t-remember explanation from politicians is more than overused.’

‘Yep,’ she said dryly. ‘You may be the only politician in the history of the world who has used it legitimately.’

He replayed her words again in his head to make sure he’d heard them correctly. Confident, unequivocal, unambiguous. His mood lifted. ‘You believe me.’

‘Yes, I believe you. Otherwise I wouldn’t be here.’ She clasped her bag closer to her body and glanced up the street. ‘Might be best if we go inside.’

Observing her caution, he closed the door firmly behind them.

When she saw six years worth of paperwork stacked by the door, her old quicksilver smile lit her face and she teased, ‘Have you been waiting for the filing elf, Mark?’

Despite everything, he couldn’t help but grin in return. ‘Are you volunteering?’

‘Oh, not me. I’m all for the paperless office. Not that I’ve achieved it, yet.’

‘Me neither.’ He held open the tellers’ gate for her. ‘Come on through to my office, and tell me what you’ve found.’

‘Does the police file have photos of the accident site?’ she asked.

‘One. Not very clear.’

‘I think I have more. And I want to see them.’

More photos of the accident … he couldn’t see why that might be important, but he didn’t press her. She’d come to him, and he valued the trust and the renewed ease between them despite the circumstances.

As he led her towards his office,
from outside came the sudden rev of an engine under strain, and a movement beyond the high, timber-framed window caught his eyes – a small flash of light flying through the air, and the crash of glass breaking.

He bolted back for the door and yanked it open. Flames spread over the back of his ute, the boxes well alight, heat already radiating.

‘What the—’ exclaimed Jenn, just behind him.

No time to say the words. A Molotov cocktail. And four twenty-litre plastic containers of fuel on the back of the vehicle, less than three metres from them.

He slammed the door shut, grabbed her hand and dragged her behind the timber barrier
of the counter, pushing her down to the floor and dropping on top of her as two explosions in quick succession blasted glass, bricks and flames all around them.

She didn’t want to open her eyes; she just wanted to curl into the foetal position and scream and scream to block out the echoing all-too-familiar noise in her head – the multi-layered instantaneous sounds of a car exploding; plastic, metal, tearing, burning, bursting through the air, sounds playing again and again and again from her memories and nightmares, the images of her father, her mother—

No.
Not this time. The panic in her brain didn’t quite dull her awareness of here and now, of memory and reality. No images, other than the fire on the tray of the ute. No-one in the car this time.

Breathe.
She had to breathe and think and—

Her brain snapped back into full mindfulness. Searing pain in her left ankle. Heat.
A roar underneath the ringing in her ears, acrid smoke clogging her nose and mouth. She opened her eyes to the hell of wild orange flames in the swirling dust and
smoke. Like yesterday. Not like yesterday. Flames all around her. A heavy weight on top of her, immovable. Panic surged again and she struck out with her hand, tried to move, tried to shout, anything to get out of here.

The weight on her shifted and strong hands rolled her back, closer against the counter, and it was Mark thrusting a handkerchief into her hand, lightly pressing her fingers and the cloth against her mouth. Mark, protecting her with his body. The flickering light reflected in his eyes, and on the blood trickling down his face.

‘Are you hurt?’ He gripped her shoulder, his face tight as he rapidly looked over her for injuries.

Part of her still reeled in panic but rationality started to regain control. They were alive. They might have a chance. She tried to move her ankle, couldn’t help wincing, but it functioned. ‘I can walk.’

Walk or burn – the stark reality left no choice. Fire was quickly surrounding them, the brochures and information sheets near the window dispersed by the blast, a thousand lit matches among the debris of wood, brick, paper and plaster. Flames grew everywhere. One of the chairs at a desk already flared high, and she could hear the growl of fire in the reception area as a choking black smoke filled the room.

Mark coughed, and waved in the direction of his private office, where they’d been heading just seconds ago. ‘Extinguisher by the door. Wait here.’

Gulping in a breath from the clearer air near the floor, he crossed the room in a crouching run beside the counter, kicking burning debris out of his way. He had the extinguisher off its hook within seconds, blasting a spray of flame suppressant around, dousing flames between her and the door.

She
shifted to a crouch, her weight on her good foot, bracing herself to move.

‘Keep down,’ Mark called, and she crawled along the floor for the length of the counter, her head low, through the smoke and heat towards him.

With the door closed, she couldn’t see if whatever was beyond was alight, but they could not stay here. As Mark continued to douse the flames around them, she reached up to touch the door handle – warm but not blistering. Mark motioned her to the protected side of the door, and signalled her to pull the handle as he readied a blast from the extinguisher.

There were no flames directly behind the door, no sudden back draft, and she limped after him into a corridor, dragging the door closed behind her. To their right, the door to his office was open, with fire taking possession of the room and smoke swirling into the corridor.

Mark sprayed around the doorway of the office with the extinguisher, clearing it temporarily of flame, and with his shirt tail wrapped around his hand, he grasped the handle and yanked it closed.

The shut doors gave them slight protection, dulling the sounds and softening the garish light. There was less smoke here, but she struggled to draw breath, her throat and lungs still raw from yesterday now not coping with burning-fuel fumes. A coughing fit took hold of her, doubled her over, made her gasp for air between racking coughs. Pain and smoke blurred her vision, dark spots danced before her eyes, and her knees hit the floor, then her hands.
Crawl
. She’d have to crawl out of here. If she could.