Headhunters (14 page)

He couldn’t see Matilda.

“Get inside.”

He was pushed, hard, between the shoulders and stumbled against the tailgate. Matilda was already in the back of the van. She had the bracelet of a set of cuffs around her left wrist. He pulled himself into the van and sat down on the floor next to her.

“Put the cuff on,” the man ordered.

Milton put the cold metal around his wrist and pressed it together until it locked with a click. “Done.”

“Show me.”

Milton shook his hand to demonstrate that the cuff was secure.

The man swung the door shut. The interior was swamped with darkness.

The chassis rumbled as the van’s engine started.

He heard Matilda give a little sob.

Milton reached out until his hand was atop her knee. He squeezed it. “Don’t worry,” he said. “It’s going to be fine.”

“I’m scared.”

“I know. It’s fine to be scared. But if they were going to kill us, they would’ve done it here.”

“So what’s going on?”

There was nothing else for it but to be honest. “I don’t know.”

THEY SET off immediately. There was no light now, and he couldn’t see a thing. He could feel Matty sitting next to him. She had pressed herself up close. He spent the first five minutes probing the cuffs, but the mechanism was solid and he knew that he would be unable to unlock them without a tool. There was no point in struggling, so he moved on to making them both as comfortable as possible. They had pressed themselves up against the wall, with the arch of the back right wheel up against Milton’s right side. Milton brought his legs up a little to brace himself against the swinging motion of the van. His right wrist was connected to Matty’s left, and they laid their arms down with only a little play between them.

He stretched out his free hand and pressed as much of the wall as he could reach. It felt solid.

“It’ll be okay,” Milton said. “Try not to worry. I’ll get us out of this.”

She didn’t respond, and Milton didn’t press. He used the quiet to think. He couldn’t narrow down the list of people who might want to do this to him. It was a long list, and no one stood out any more than anyone else. He let his mind wander over the problem and realised that he had been too restrictive in his thinking. What if it wasn’t anything to do with him? What if this was something to do with Matilda, instead?

“Matty,” he said.

“What?”

“Can you think of anyone who might have a reason to kidnap you?”

“Me?”

“Think. Is there anyone who holds a grudge against you?”

“No. A couple of ex-boyfriends I didn’t split with on the best of terms, but they’re not the kind of guys who’d want to do something crazy like this, not even for a joke.”

“What about Harry? Has he upset anyone recently?”

“You know Harry. He’s too nice to have enemies.”

“What about rivals to the business? Any disputes, anything like that?”

“No. I mean, there have been some issues with the unions, but that’s usual.”

“What kind of issues?”

“There was a strike six months ago. The shearers said they wanted double the pay and stopped work until they got it. But they’re already making a lot of money, and the way Harry saw it, they weren’t growing the wool or looking after the sheep or the land—they just came in at the arse end of it and made all the money. Anyway, Harry and the other graziers near Booligal flew in Kiwis to take over. You can imagine how that went down. There were a lot of problems. Lots of fights between the locals and the Kiwis, and those lads are tough bastards.”

“And?”

“And the strikers backed down.”

“You think they resent Harry?”

“He was the one who was on the TV. He was the spokesman. If they were going to go after anyone, I guess they’d go after him.” She paused. “But that was six months ago. It’s been good since then. Things have been patched up. I’ll give you two examples: Eric and Mervyn. They’re union boys, and you know how much they grumble. They were some of the first to stop working. Six months ago, you ask them what they think of my brother and they’d tell you he was a capitalist bastard screwing down the honest hard-working shearer. But you look at them now. Happy to have a beer with him, laugh at his jokes, best mates again.” She stopped. “No, John. I can’t see it. It just doesn’t sound like the kind of thing that they would do.”

Milton thought. It seemed unlikely, but it was worth keeping it in the back of his mind. Both of them had begged off coming out tonight. It wasn’t like either of them to turn down a night on the beer, especially one where Matilda was along for the ride. Maybe they wanted to get themselves out of the way. Was it possible? Maybe.

If he could understand the motive, it would help him work out the best way to proceed.

The van rumbled along and they were quiet for a moment.

“What about you?” she asked.

“What about me?”

“Anyone who’d want to do this to you?”

He paused. She knew nothing about what he had been doing for the last decade. Harry didn’t know, either, at least not the specifics. He had explained to him that he had been recruited into the intelligence services, but he had purposefully left it vague after that. It was better for all concerned, and there were some questions that Milton did not want to be asked. He realised, as he sat there next to Matilda, that he especially didn’t want her to ask him those questions.

“I’ve upset a few people through the years, just like anyone else.”

“And?”

“And I can’t say any more than that. Maybe this is about me. Maybe it isn’t. Maybe it’s about Harry. Maybe it’s about you. We just have to stay calm, do what they say, and keep our eyes open.”

TIME PASSED. Milton estimated that they had travelled for another hour and, as far as he could tell, they were still heading east. There was no pausing, no stopping for junctions or stop signs. There
were
no junctions out here, not for hundreds of miles. It was difficult to be certain, but he knew that the road was straight and he knew that he would have been able to tell if they turned around. An hour, travelling at between fifty and sixty miles an hour. He tried to picture a map of the area in his head, and tried to work out where that kind of distance would put them. In broad strokes, it was somewhere in the outback between Wilcannia and Dubbo. He tried to remember the map he had studied with Harry in the shed at Boolanga. There was nothing out here on the A32. It was just thousands and thousands of acres of outback and the long, straight arrow of the road cutting through the heart of it. It was a wilderness, one of the harshest places on Earth.

They had to be going to Dubbo.

He was grateful for one thing: it was night. It didn’t bear thinking about what the inside of an unventilated van would be like once the sun came up. They could only hope that they reached wherever they were going before dawn.

Milton wasn’t prone to worrying about things that he couldn’t control. It was a waste of energy. He had considered all the angles and concluded that there was nothing to be done. He would fall back on his training. Conserve his strength. Observe and assess. Be ready to strike when the opportunity presented itself. And there would be an opportunity. It might only be a slight lowering of the guard, but there would be a moment when his captors became more vulnerable. If Milton decided in that moment that the risk of inaction was greater than the risk of resistance, he would take his chance.

MATILDA HAD been quiet next to him. He had no idea what she must have been thinking. She had rested her head on his shoulder and, for a moment, he wondered if she had fallen asleep. But then, he felt her shift, pushing away from him until she was upright again.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Of course.”

“What is it with you and drink? You never really said.”

“What do you mean?”

“Why do you have a problem with it?”

He would have preferred to say nothing, but he felt that he owed her something.

“There are some things I’d like to forget.”

“What?”

“Some things that I’ve done.”

“I don’t understand. The army?”

He fidgeted uncomfortably. “No. After that.”

“You never told me what you did after.”

He was anxious to get her off this subject as quickly as he could. “I know I didn’t. There are some things I can’t talk about.”

“Why can’t you talk about them?”

“Legally. It would be against the law to talk about it. What I did was secret. It still is.”

That was partially true. It wasn’t the main reason, though. He couldn’t talk about what he had done because she would hate him if she ever found out.

She laughed drily. “What are you saying? You were a spy or something.”

“Or something,” he said.

The van started to slow. That was odd.

“What’s happening?”

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Are we stopping?”

He doubted it. They couldn’t be near where they were going. Not yet. Dubbo was still hours away. Why would they stop out here?

He was concerned. “Is there anything else out here between Wilcannia and Dubbo?”

She thought about that. “Poopelloe Lake? That’s about it. The rest is just the outback.”

“And what’s there?”

“At the lake? Nothing really. I think you can fish. Not sure if there’s anything beyond that.”

The van’s suspension rattled as they ran off the asphalt and onto the pitted surface of a track. They started to slide forward, toward the cab.

“We’re going downhill,” Matilda said. “A lake would probably be in the bottom of a depression. Maybe the road runs above it.”

Milton hated to guess, but guesses were all he had. “The lake,” he urged. “Think. What’s there?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been. I saw something on the TV once. Something to do with fishing. That’s all I know.”

He tried to listen for anything that might give him an idea what was happening, but the only sound coming from the driver’s compartment was the muffled noise of music. The throb of the engine obscured everything else. The van bumped over uneven ground and they were thrown together. The van took a sharp corner and Milton reached out to grab the wheel arch to prevent them both from sliding across the floor.

The van slowed to a crawl and turned sharply to the right.

Matilda reached for Milton’s hand and, when she found it, he grasped it and squeezed tight.

“Try to take it easy,” Milton said.

“Are you nuts?”

“They don’t want to kill us. There’s something else that they want.”

“So what do I do?”

“Whatever they say. Don’t give them any attitude. If they think we’re going to be compliant, they might let their guard down.”

“And then?”

“I won’t need asking twice.”

“To do what?”

“To get us out of here.”

The brakes applied again and the van rolled to a full stop. The engine was still running. Milton heard the passenger door open and then, shortly afterwards, the sound of rusty hinges squeaking.

“It’s a gate,” he said.

The passenger door slammed again and the van set off. The surface beneath the tyres was gravelled, crunching as they proceeded onward, the driver keeping to a slow speed. Milton estimated that they travelled for another ten minutes, although there was no way of telling whether it was to the north, south, east or west. Finally, the engine changed back down through the gears and the brakes were applied again. This time, the engine was switched off. The two doors ahead opened and slammed shut and they listened to the sound of footsteps on the gravel. After that, too far away to decipher, came the sound of voices. Milton held his breath and tried to listen, but it was just a low murmur.

The conversation stopped and footsteps approached the rear doors.

Milton squeezed Matilda’s hand.

The mechanism cranked and the door was pulled back.

Blinding light.

A powerful flashlight. It lit up the interior. Milton couldn’t see anything behind it. He looked down quickly, knowing that he would compromise his vision for moments that could prove to be crucial if he looked into it for too long. He raised his hand to shield his eyes and, as the flashlight jerked down a little, he looked up again. He thought he caught sight of trees and, perhaps, a body of dark water.

“We’re here,” the man holding the flashlight said. Milton recognised the voice: it was the man who Milton guessed was in control.

“Where’s that?”

“Doesn’t matter. All you need to know is that we’re finished for now.”

“Can we get out?”

“You’re staying in there tonight.” A jerk of the flashlight indicated the van.

“Come
on
,” Matilda protested.

“No arguments.”

“What are we waiting for?” Matilda snapped.

“You don’t have too much longer to wait. This will all be settled tomorrow.”

“What does that mean?”

Milton squeezed her hand again. He knew that there was no point in trying to negotiate. Better to focus on the concessions that he could win. “We need water,” he said. “And if we’re staying in here, we’re going to need somewhere to relieve ourselves.”

“Piss in the corner.”

“At least let her have a moment outside,” he said. “I’ll stay here.”

There was a momentary pause as the man considered the request.

“All right,” he said. He jabbed the flashlight at Matilda. “Come forward.”

“Go on,” Milton said, wishing that he could tell her what he needed her to do, and trusting that she was smart enough to do it without needing to be asked.

Matilda shuffled to the door. Milton had to move with her.

“Far enough,” the man said.

Milton stopped and stretched out his arm so that Matilda could continue far enough to allow her to dangle her legs over the tailgate. His eyes had adjusted to the glare. There was another man next to the man with the flashlight. He was carrying a shotgun and it was aimed into the back of the van. It was level with the floor. If the man pulled the trigger, the buckshot would pepper his legs and stomach. If it didn’t kill him outright, the injuries it would cause would end him soon enough. He would bleed out in the back of the van. There would be a chance, but this wasn’t it.