Two Wolves (5 page)

Dad walked slowly to the back of the cabin, looking up, squinting to be sure that he could see what he thought he saw. A bag hung from the roof beam, a wad of cash lolling out like a tongue.

Ben crabbed sideways toward the door.

‘Hey!' Dad called. It didn't sound like ‘Hey, you found my bag! I'd been meaning to tell you about the hundreds of thousands of dollars I'd hidden in the roof.' It was more of a ‘Hey, you have about a second and a half before I explode like Vesuvius.'

Ben stopped.

Dad turned and lunged at Ben, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck. He marched Ben to the back of the cabin and tilted his head up.

‘
What
is this?' he barked.

Ben looked at the bag: hanging, threatening to fall.

‘Is everything okay?' Mum called from across the clearing.

‘Was this you?' Dad shouted at Ben, daring him to lie.

Ben was too scared to say anything. The neck of his shirt was pulled tight against his throat. Difficult to breathe. He heard running.

Olive arrived in the doorway.

‘What happened?' Olive asked.

‘You go climb the tree, sweetie,' Mum said, arriving next to her.

‘But I –'

‘Go!'

Little footsteps.

Ben wanted to climb a tree too, for the first time in his life. Or to hide in his mum's skirt like he had when he was two.

‘Was it you?' Dad asked.

‘I didn't see what was in it,' Ben said.

‘What'd I tell you about stickin' your big bib in?'

‘I don't know,' Ben said.

Dad was quiet then. In Ben's experience it was never good when adults were quiet in this kind of situation.

‘I think –' Mum said.

Dad shushed her.

‘What do you think I should do?' he said, letting go of Ben's collar. Ben stood up straight, avoiding eye contact with his father. There was no correct answer to this question. Ben would either suggest a punishment worse than Dad had in mind or he would suggest something easier, nicer, and his father would erupt.

Ben shrugged, concentrating on his feet. His shoelaces were grubby and splotchy. One was untied. The leather on the toe and side of his right sneaker was grey and worn from soccer. Ben closed his eyes for a moment. On the cinema screen at the back of his eyelids, he watched the last ten minutes of his life in 32x rewind, like he was scanning back over one of his movies. He wanted to reshoot every frame from the moment he entered the cabin. He wanted to stay outside, not let curiosity get the better of him. He did not want to know what was in the bag.

‘
What
do you think I should do about busybodies?' Dad said sharply, lifting Ben's chin, pressing ‘stop' on Ben's in-brain rewind.
‘What?'
Dad shouted again.

‘It's not his fault,' Mum said, taking a few steps into the cabin. Ben could see her hovering behind Dad.

‘What's not his fault? That I can't have a single thing to myself without someone sticking their nose into it?'

‘We sold the wreckers,' Mum said.

Everyone was quiet. Dad blinked and straightened his body, taking in what she had said.

‘What?' Ben asked, turning to her.

‘Dad. He sold the wrecking business.'

Ben thought about this for a second. ‘Did they pay cash?'

Mum nodded and scratched her neck.

Ben looked at Dad, who stared back. ‘Well, why didn't –'

‘We thought you'd be upset,' Mum said.

‘Upset?' Ben asked. Why would she say that?
Mum knew that he didn't like the wrecking yard. It was filled with dead, broken, rusty things and, when he was there, he had to search for parts or clean the toilet or restock the drinks fridge. The only good thing about the wrecking yard was when he found something interesting, like his camera, in one of the cars.

‘Right,' Ben said. ‘So . . . is the money . . .' He stopped. He tried to think back through the events of the past two days but his thoughts were scrambled. He suddenly felt tired. ‘How long are we staying here?' he asked.

‘I need to work out what we're doing,' Dad said.

‘. . . for the rest of the holiday,' Mum added.

‘Yes, for the rest of the holiday,' Dad said. ‘Get away from me. Go down the bush and play.'

Ben did not need to be told twice. He slipped past his father, around his mother, grabbed his backpack from near the door and exited the cabin. His parents began arguing. Ben walked to the edge of the steep hill and looked down through the pine forest toward the creek. He had never spent time in the bush, had never left the suburbs. He did not want to go to the creek. The wilderness was his enemy.

‘What did you do?' said a voice from above. Ben looked up, squinting into the sun. It was Olive sitting on the lowest branch of the tree.

The hunger hit Ben again. It was late morning and his stomach ached but he knew there was no food.

‘I'm goin' out!' Dad stormed out of the cabin. He was carrying the sports bag.

‘Be careful, Ray,' Mum said, following him. ‘And please make the arrangements today. I can't stay here.'

Dad climbed into the car and slammed the door.

‘Ray?'

‘Yes, I'll make the arrangements,' he said through the window.

‘And get some clothes for the kids!'

Dad reversed, spun the wheel and powered off up the hill, leaving them in a cloud of swirling dust.

Ben turned and, without a word, he let the trees take him. He let himself go off the edge of the slope and disappear. Down, down, down.

Ben flew steeply down, dodging thick, rough chocolate-­brown tree trunks, his feet deep in pine needles. Sun lit him in sharp bursts as he thundered into the valley. The water-rush became ever louder, filling him up.

The creek emerged through the trees and Ben began to slow, digging his heels into the damp black soil beneath. He came to a skidding stop at the large mossy sandstone boulders that led down to the water. The creek was seven or eight metres wide. Sun hit the surface in patches, revealing muddy-brown rocks beneath. In the middle the rocks disappeared. Ben wondered how deep it was.

Downstream there was a small waterfall leading to a lower section of creek. On the far side, a sheer sandstone cliff soared fifty metres above Ben's head. Fishbone ferns poked from cracks and scars in the rock. The wall ran along the creek's edge as far up and downstream as he could see.

Thirst tore at him then. He jumped onto a boulder that was shaped almost like a pyramid and leapt from rock to rock, careful to avoid the slippery-looking patches of moss. He was halfway down to the water when he thought about snakes. They liked rocks. He had a book on snakes at home, a library book that he had never returned. (After snakes, his greatest fear was going back to the public library, in case he was arrested for theft.) Ben loved to scare himself in the comfort of his bedroom but, out here, he couldn't shut the book and stop the fear. Nature was real and true and terrible.

He paused on a rock and looked up the hill, thinking of running back to the safety of the cabin. Which was worse? Snakes or his family? Fear told him to get off the rocks but thirst drove him down to the water. He pulled his school socks up to his knees and stepped carefully, eyes darting all around, waiting for venomous fangs to emerge from a crevice or a crack and end him.

He stepped onto a mossy green rock near the water, slipping and breaking his fall with the palms of his hands. The sting screamed and he quickly dipped his hands into the fast-moving creek. The water was cold, soothing the sting. His throat and stomach howled for liquid.

Ben looked upstream, wondering if it was safe to drink. He cupped water in his hands. There were tiny specks of moss and other plant matter floating in it, but Ben's thirst was too great. He brought the cupped handful to his mouth and gulped it down. He scooped his hands in again and sucked the water back into his throat. It felt so good and cold that his head and insides lit up. He scooped again and slurped thirstily, drinking till his belly ached. He splashed his face and collapsed back onto the mossy rock, another boulder behind him making a backrest.

There was something uncomfortable in Ben's back pocket. He took it out: the book he had taken from the cabin. On the cover, a kid standing in front of a mountain with a falcon about to land on his arm.
My Side of the Mountain.
Ben flicked through. There were pictures showing how to make a trap for deer and a fishhook out of twigs. He read the back cover. It was about a kid called Sam Gribley who runs away from home in New York to live in the Catskill Mountains by himself. He sleeps inside a tree and survives off the land.

Ben threw the book onto the rock next to him. His eyes darted around. He knew that he would have no chance out here alone. Ben's survival skills included hunting for left­overs in the fridge, lowering bread into the toaster and switching on the heater when it was cold. None of these talents would be useful here.

He breathed hard and sat up straight. He felt better, even with a bellyache. It was cooler down by the water. The moist, woodsy air and the steady
shhh
sound of the creek seemed to swallow him and make him part of it all. Ben looked up through the ferns and spiky plants sticking out of the rocks, but he couldn't see the cabin.

‘Mum,' he called.

No response.

‘Mum!'

The echo of his own voice off the rocks.

He was alone. Just Ben. And creek and bird and frog. And snake.

He stood and lifted a palm-sized rock and threw it into the creek just to see the splash
.
He stuffed the book back into his pocket and grabbed another rock, throwing it as high as he could, the impact kicking splash all over him and putting a smile on his face for the first time in days.

As Ben turned to look for another rock he saw something move at the corner of his vision. It was a rabbit, a light-grey one, hopping from the tree line to the top rock. It stopped, looked down at him, still.

Ben began to move slowly up the rocks but the rabbit skittered off the way it had come. He smiled again, looking all around. At home the closest thing he had to his own secret place was the crusty patch of land at the back of the wrecking yard. The tall grass there was peppered with graffiti-stained cars and the trains speeding by were loud and annoying. But here there was nothing man-made. Only Ben.

Why would Mum and Dad come out here just because they had sold the wreckers?

The money. So much money. He took his backpack off, pulled out his notebook and sat down to jot the following sums:

$100 x 500 notes in bundle

= $50,000

$50,000

x 20 bundles

=

Ben stared at the page. There might not have been five hundred notes in a bundle but Ben figured there must have been close. And there might have been fifteen bundles, not twenty. But there could have been twenty-two. How could their old wrecking yard be worth a million dollars? The place was a disgrace. And if they did sell it for that much, why had Dad hidden the money? Why hadn't they told him about selling the business earlier? And who had bought it? Uncle Chris? Maybe. He had given Dad the bag full of money. Dad didn't even like Uncle Chris. Maybe that's why he sold it to him. Payback for all the beatings Uncle Chris gave him as a kid. Dad still had scars from Uncle Chris's babysitting techniques.

There were all these missing parts of the story. Adults never told kids anything. Nothing worth hearing anyway. Ben felt as though he spent his entire life trying to work out things that adults knew but wouldn't tell him. He would do some detective work, search for clues, put the puzzle together.

Ben pulled the police business card out of his notebook. ‘Dan Toohey'. The sea eagle emblem looked a bit like the bird on the front of
My Side of the Mountain.
Ben whispered the words
‘
Culpam Poena Premit Comes'
and decided that he would have his own police business card one day. One day when he was in charge of himself. He slipped the card back into the notebook. The creek rushed by. Three birds, rosellas, flew past, chasing one another out over the creek, then up into the trees. Ben flipped back a couple of pages and read:

Police

Holiday

Uncle Chris. Grey nylon bag. Black handles.

The new old car

Haircuts

He added:

Pulled over by cops. Drive off and chase.

The cabin

Bag full of money

Sold the wreckers

Sun emerged from behind the clouds. Bright splotches of light on Ben's notebook. He reread the notes. One thing was clear – weird stuff was going on. His parents were in trouble. He didn't know why but he knew they were.

‘What're you doing?' said a voice from above him.

Ben snapped his notebook shut.