Kevin Cassidy The Cassidy Chronicles

35. The Old Tobacco Farm; and The Miner’s Gold

  No further lunacy could be added to Sash’s little tableau, so when our mirth had subsided we set off walking in the general direction of away from the river. The idea was, that being cast forth on the same side as the school meant we would eventually intersect with the road or, even better, find a farm house. We could then ring Father O’Long and explain our several predicaments.

  The rainforest here was broad and trackless, unlike that near the school where we had numerous trails through the underbrush and wait-a-whiles. This meant we had to make our way with care. By the time we reached the top of the first floodplain terrace only an hour remained before the sun went down.

  “Where do you reckon we are?” I asked Rocky – the only one of us born and raised in the valley.

  “I dunno for sure,” he replied. “We come a fair way down from the lagoon before we hit the tree so I’d guess we might be somewhere near the Old Tobacco Farm.”

  “The Old Tobacco Farm” property was deserted. It had belonged to a tall thin puritan and his pinch-faced wife, along with their brood of skinny, hollow-eyed children. Others had subsequently moved into this undeveloped part of the valley, but not along the track that went past the Cruikshank’s place and on to Sullivans Pocket.

  In time, as people do, these newcomers would find an excuse to pay a social call on their neighbours. Where Silas Cruikshank was concerned, however, the visitors were left in no doubt as to just how welcome they were.

  On rare occasions Silas would take his family when he went to Ingham for provisions. Only Silas would actually speak to anyone, and only then as if dire necessity were forcing him to address an agent of the Devil. And his wife only took her eyes from Silas to ensure the kids were keeping theirs downcast.

  “Stop gawping at the ways of others lest the wickedness you see lead you into the ways of sin,” she would harp if they tried to steal a glance at the things going on around them. One glare from their father was usually enough to keep them in line, and by all accounts he did little else but glare at them.

  Word of their strange ways quickly spread and the casual visits petered out. After that the stories and the gossip really got started. And the rumours were still around, despite this all happening years before I came to the valley.

  There was leprosy, you know. There were others who were kept locked away. Family members. Congenital idiots, they say. He used them as slave labour. That’s why he didn’t let anyone near the place. They might be seen.

  —Ritualistic sacrifice of animals, too. Murder even.

  Then one day it was noticed that the Cruikshanks hadn’t been seen for a considerable length of time. This was brought to the attention of the Ingham police, along with much other colourful “local knowledge”. A certain Constable Bourke was directed to go out to the Cruikshanks’ place with orders to investigate the former while not paying too much attention to the latter.

  Being young and keen made him determined the investigation would be thorough. There’d be no lingering doubts or unanswered questions here, especially with the Cruikshanks’ strange ways being such common currency in the valley.

  All Bourke found was a deserted farm. It was clear to him that Silas Cruikshank and family had departed our Valley of Sin with everything they could carry, but had left everything else in an orderly fashion, almost as if they might return. It was also apparent in some way that they would not.

  Having established that their departure was orderly and unhurried, he checked further afield. What little livestock they’d owned had been turned out of the yards and into the field. When the pigs and the two milking cows saw him they came to investigate, in case he might have been going to feed them. So did the poultry, which was still hanging around the chook yard. Naturally they were disappointed.

  And it was while he was looking about the abandoned pig pens that Bourke discovered in the edge of a small gutter draining the enclosure what he suspected were a couple of human finger-bones. Recent storms had washed them clean, since when they’d remained undisturbed, but had the pens been occupied they would never have been noticed in the mire.

  The Constable took a small stick and scraped at the earth alongside them. There were more. At this point he found a couple of sheets of corrugated iron with which to cover the spot, after which he weighed them down with broken bricks. He then barred the gates to the pens and returned to Ingham.

  The discovery was subsequently made the subject of intense security and the access track closed to traffic, so it took at least thirty minutes for word to spread throughout the valley. The general reaction to it was: “Well I told you so. I always said old Cruikshank must have been up to something. Wait till they find all the other bodies...” etc.

  When it was announced that the bones had been identified as the personal property of one of the early gold miners the rumourmongers changed tack. It was some sort of cover up, they said, and why didn’t they let on about the others – except that nothing was ever found to suggest Cruikshank’s being anything more than a harmless domineering old eccentric. What proved a far more interesting study was the poor fellow keeping his pigs company.

  This person appeared to have been consigned to a shallow and lonely grave in what official circles generally regard as “suspicious circumstances” – lonely at least, that is, until the arrival of Cruikshank’s pigs. And they were soon able to hazard an approximate decade to the poor fellow’s demise by the nature of a bullet he still had in his possession – shattering his spine, as it did, and then lodging in one of his ribs.

  When the full story came out the doomsayers were quick to regroup.

  “Course I always reckoned there was a body in there somewhere. The place was haunted y’know.”

  “Yep. That’s true. I heard old Harry Jackson rode a horse along the track there a couple of years before Cruikshank arrived. They reckon it took more’n three miles for him to pull the jolly thing up.”

  “That’s right. And Silas Cruikshank was the only one they could find to take up that allotment, too.”

  “I know. Course he was too blinded by his own hellfire to notice the ghost of some poor bloody miner tryin’ to get a bit of justice – or whatever it is they hang around lookin’ for.”

  “Yeah. And what about all the gold that was buried with him? It disappeared before they got it back to the police station, they reckon.”

  “That’s true. They didn’t spend much time lookin’ for the other bodies, neither.”

  “They’re there y’know.”

  “…Course they are.”

  And so the stories continued – there were the Cruikshanks, their beliefs, their habits and their sudden departure. There was the miner, his gold and his ghost – plus his undiscovered companions.

  And ever since then, whenever the conversation got a bit dry around a couple of beers, these hoary old stories would all be trotted out again.

  36. The Naughty Number Plate; and The Relativistic Changes

  Rocky’s estimation of our position proved correct, for we soon intersected a rough and rarely-used track going down to the river. After following its meanderings for fifteen minutes or so we caught sight of some farm buildings through a clearing in the trees.

  Encouraged, we began walking more quickly, but with less than half a kilometre to go there came the sudden sound of a car engine revving-up. Then a newish looking Ford V8 Customline appeared from behind the old buildings. In desperation we started running, at the same time waving our arms and yelling like maniacs.

  We’d not gone more than a couple of hundred metres when it turned onto the track and headed off in the direction of the main road, its occupants never noticing the four demented castaways running toward them.

  “Rest time, men,” gasped Sash, as we watched it go. “No use bustin’ our guts for nothing.” He was out in front and the last one to stop.

  Rocky was next, a little way behind. He’d halted completely and was taking a long deliberate l
ook over the scene of dereliction. “We ain’t heard nothin’ about no one takin’ up the Old Tobacco Farm,” he said in a confusion of negatives. “Me Dad would be the first to find out about it, ay. …It all seems a bit odd, if you ask me.”

  I suppose it was inevitable then, that despite the lateness and our urgent need to contact the school, we should choose to take a quick look around. First we made sure no one else was about who might help us, then we tried to discover just what the others had been doing there.

  Generally speaking the buildings were still intact, though they were all somewhat dilapidated. One corner of the house showed signs of recent casual occupation; everything else was pretty much as you would expect.

  It was easy to see where the car had been driven by the trails of flattened-down grass. Doogle followed one track to an old shed that was open at the back.

  When he returned to where the rest of us were poking around inside the derelict kitchen he said in a conversational manner, “You remember, ay, how we all had a big laugh the other day when we heard about someone pinchin’ Sergeant Bourke’s new Holden? Well, don’t trample me in the rush, but it’s in the old shed down the back. Whoever was in that other car must have hidden it there.”

  We all bolted for the shed – except for Doogle. He walked back. By the time he joined us the car had been given a thorough inspection.

  “You sure this is Bourkie’s car?” asked Sash. “Where’s the sun visor? Remember how we seen ‘im drivin’ round Ingham like Lord Muck a coupla days before it was stolen? Well, it had a white sun visor.”

  “Forget about the sun visor,” said Doogle. “Have a look at the number plate. It’s 401-NAB. That’s how I know it’s his car. See Bourkie’s rego actually reads ‘For nothing I nab’.”

  “That’s not what the front one says,” I replied. “This one is 866-NFG. It looks like they haven’t finished changing ‘em over.”

  Sash was looking around outside. “Hey! Here’s the sun visor,” he shouted.

  “What do you reckon NFG might stand for?” asked Rocky.

  “Don’t even think about it,” muttered Doogle. Then in a louder voice he added, “And Sash. Whatever you do, don’t touch that visor. Bourkie’ll be all over the thing, looking for fingerprints.”

  “I wouldn’t worry too much about it,” said Rocky. “He’s gunna find plenty of ‘em on the car, ay.”

  “Yeah, and most of ‘em are gunna be ours.”

  “—Hey? What do you mean?”

  “What I mean, Rocky,” replied Doogle patronizingly, as he opened the driver’s door and slid behind the wheel, “is that this handsome, four-wheeled, self-propelling vehicular contrivance is just the sort of thing a group of stranded high school boys such as ourselves could employ as a means of getting back to their school.” Rocky followed his lead by jumping in behind him.

  “Think about it,” Doog continued. “One: the keys are in it just waitin’ for us. Two: we are now slightly several hours overdue. Three: it will soon be dark and we’re at least ten miles from the school and, four: I presume you don’t want to spend half the night walkin’ all the way back – especially when there’s a perfectly good car available here for the trip.”

  He turned the key; the motor started instantly. “Five…” he continued (while checking the petrol gauge), “…this car belongs to that local luminary of lawfulness and authority, our old mate Sergeant Bourke. It’s been stolen, see Rocky. And if we don’t take this most-golden of opportunities and steal it back again – right now… Why, he may never see it again.”

  Doogle slipped it into reverse, then turned to look out the rear window. “Oh yeah,” he added. “And six: I just love the sound of the old bugger’s voice and can hardly wait to have him interrogate us for three or four hours non stop.”

  He backed out of the shed, swung the car around and then let it roll to a stop. “I’d much rather he did it after we’d rescued his car, though, than try and explain how it was here when we looked in the shed, ay – but golly, now it seems to be gone.”

  Sash and I tumbled in and slammed the doors – me in front. Doogle switched it to first and let out the clutch, then slowly moved it forward along the trail in the grass. At the remnants of the front gate he turned onto the access track and stopped. Then he looked across at me and a big stupid grin came across his face.

  “Hang on!” he yelled as he stomped on the accelerator. We shot away like an artillery shell, engine scream rising like a fire siren, passengers gasping for breath,. When not another revolution could be coaxed from the tortured beast Doog changed to second. The motor-banshee’s yowling dropped about forty octaves then resumed its mounting wail.

  “What are you bloody doin’?!!” I shouted above the din.

  “What do you bloody think!” Doog shouted back. “We’re goin’ for a burn in Bourkie’s car! Gees Casey, we’ll never get a chance like this again!”

  “Yeah, Casey!” yelled Sash. “It’s like Father says. You know. Initiative. Self-reliance! Find the sergeant’s car; flog the guts out of it first chance you get!”

  Doogle jinked sharply around a fallen tree limb; Sash grabbed at the back of the driver’s seat and missed. The car bounced through a washout and lurched sideways round a corner. Rocky lost his grip and collided with Sash.

  As we cleared the bend we shot past the others coming back. They were there then gone in a flash.

  Doogle still had the car in second. He wound another thousand revs from the engine and switched to top. The rest of us looked out the back. There wasn’t enough light to see properly. I think they were trying to turn around.

  The track was pretty narrow. They must have stalled the big V8 or got hung-up. We lost sight of them before they got moving again.

  Doog needed no urging. We had to get as far in front as we could. Suddenly he was demonstrating these amazing skills – genetic; innate. And simply undreamt of.

  Hell-bent he was; a rally-hardened demon. Foot to the floor and flat to the boards. And we were just flying through the bush.

  The track became straighter. “Can this thing bloody go!” Doogle yelled above the screaming engine. “Bourkie must have done it up a bit!”

  I leant over and glanced at the speedo. I shouldn’t have. It showed something from a nightmare ... only faster.

  The light was fading, too. Doogle switched on the headlights. Now it was just terrifying! We were hurtling along a tunnel, sides just blurry tree images.

  Then we hit some washouts. Doog jinked to avoid the worst, hands pumping at the wheel like a prize-fighter. The car bucked and pitched about insanely.

  A corner came up; a wall of trees without exit. He braked viciously and slid the car into it broadside-on, then slammed it back to second and put on the power.

  Somehow the corner evaporated behind us. In front the track straightened out.

  That was the only thing that did. The car bounced and slewed about violently, throwing us from side to side.

  Doog fought to tame it and align it with the narrow laneway. Anywhere else meant disaster. As he battled for control my whole life began flashing before my eyes.

  That was fine. Anything was better than the view in front. Then the car steadied and we all relaxed a little.

  Not for long. Sideways around the next corner came an instant of horror. It was the next level of the old river terraces. The road went straight up.

  So did we.

  Thank heaven there was no down-the-other-side or we’d still be airborne. We were lucky, too. The track continued without turning.

  That was bad enough.

  At the top we shot into freefall. Our heads whammed the roof.

  —Except for Doogle; he had something to hold onto. The rest of us bounced like beans in a barrel. It was long before seat belts.

  Our ears were ringing, too. Sash hadn’t seen the rise. He’d been kneeling on the seat, watching behind. As the car ramped up it he screamed in terror.

  We hit hard and lan
ded badly. Sash crashed to the floor behind Doogle, scream silenced.

  The car jagged leftward and tried to roll. Doog spun the wheel to drag it back. It slewed onto the driver’s-side wheels.

  He fought for control; our lights were shining everywhere. All I could see was trees.

  Then it straightened. And we were still on the track.

  Sash was struggling back to his seat. “They’re comin’ they’re comin’ I seen their lights!” he babbled. “They’re not even a mile back!”

  Suddenly he noticed the nightmarish scene in the headlights. “Bloody hell, Doogle!” he yelled. Don’t just sit there friggin’ around! Bloody flatten it!”

  “I can already see relativistic changes in the stuff goin’ past!” Doogle shouted back. “What more do you want!”

  “HEY! I know where we are!” yelled Rocky. “The main road’s not far! Don’t drive straight across it!”

  Doog hit the brakes and we suddenly slowed. Then he switched off the lights and began driving by moonlight.

  “What are you bloody doin’?!!” Sash yelled urgently. “They’re catchin’ up! Go go go go go go GO!”

  “Shut up will you, Sash! I’m tryin’ not to make any dust. When they get to the corner they’ll reckon we headed for Ingham, see, cos the road goes nowhere the other way. If we leave any dust it’ll show ‘em which way we went.”

  The track now became wider, so Doogle turned off and bounced along on the grass at the side. Just then a car went by on the main road, travelling toward Ingham. “I’m not leavin’ ‘em any tracks to follow, either,” he said, “and with a bit of luck that other car’s dust will get ‘em going the wrong way.”

  The big Ford’s lights topped the rise behind us just as we swung onto the main road. Even there Doogle continued driving along the verge, a little faster but still with the car in darkness. He continued like this for two or three hundred metres before steering it up onto the gravel carriageway. There he began moving little more quickly, though still at a relatively sedate speed so as to not make any noise or dust that might give us away.

  After travelling another half a kilometre or so toward Gower Abbey the other car arrived at the junction. Its headlights shone briefly in our direction then swung away and were replaced by tail lights.

  Doogle kept glancing in the rear-view mirror as they receded but it wasn’t until we’d gone around the first bend that he switched on the headlights. Only then did he put on more speed, though nothing like our earlier rate of progress.

  As we bowled along toward the school Sash continued kneeling on the seat and watching out the rear window. I kept glancing that way too. After a while I noticed him becoming fidgety.

  “Don’t worry so much,” I said. “They’ll be miles back by now.”

  “They bloody aren’t,” he replied. “I just seen their lights come on for a second. I thought I saw ‘em earlier, too, but I didn’t say nothin’ cos I wasn’t sure. They’re about half a mile back, I reckon.”

  Doogle slipped it back to second gear and hit the accelerator ... and we just rocketed into the night. The others must have done the same. “Can’t you go any faster?” Sash urged. “They’re still catchin’ up. They’ll be right behind us soon.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Doogle. “The school’s not far now. When we get to the canefields I’m gunna turn off into a headland. That’ll bugger ‘em properly.”

  “Yeah,” observed Rock. “Unless they’re old Gower Abbey kids.”

  Doogle was as good as his word. “We’re nearly there, so hang on!” he yelled. He turned off the lights, then braked violently and wrenched on the wheel.

  The car slewed sideways in the darkness and the back spun out. Down off the carriageway we slid and along the shoulder.

  A moonlit headland appeared in the wall of cane. Doog wrestled with the wheel and powered into the gap, still with plenty of speed.

  The others saw where we’d gone. Their lights came on and they tried to follow. But the Customline was heavier than the Holden. It spun out of control and smashed broadside into the cane.

  The driver didn’t hesitate. He gunned out of the crop and came after us.

  We were shouting advice at Doogle. Doogle was ignoring us. This way and that we turned as he weaved between the sections.

  The Ford was getting closer, catching up on the straights and falling back at the corners. Then they missed seeing us turn and we knew we were safe. That headland was a dead end. They didn’t know the layout of the canefields.

  (Gower Abbey boys know the school’s canefields to the last turn and wrinkle, as chipping out the wild canegrass along the edge of the sugarcane sections was a time-honoured form of detention. Many a free-weekend had been lost to this endeavour for one misdemeanour or another. We had a special name for it, too. It was called “Point Duty”.)

  Doogle now took a side-lane and then doubled back away from our pursuers. From there he began making his way to the road.

  By now the others were well and truly lost (we later learned). Apparently, in their desperation to find us, they overshot the end of a headland they were following and rolled their car. (Not that the car was theirs, exactly.)

  That particular track just there sidled around the edge of a steep gully. Anyone knowing it took it with a good deal of care.

  Nor was this the end of their misfortune. Tired and bruised, they spent the rest of the night walking towards Ingham or sleeping fitfully on the side of the road.

  Dawn’s early light saw them accept a ride from a couple of men in a passing car. There was no way they could have guessed they’d be recognised and by the time the vehicle was moving it was too late; they were under arrest in connection with another matter.

  The men were, in fact, off-duty policemen.