Читать книгу Back of Sunset - Jon Cleary, Jon Cleary - Страница 12

Steve, Covici, Tristram and Charlie Pinjarra were at supper when the gin came to the door. “Miss Kate send me. She say trouble on wireless. Come quick, she say.”

Covici pushed back his chair. “Always in the middle of a meal. Emergencies never happen at any other time. No wonder I’ve got indigestion.” He belched loudly. “Go on with your supper. There’s papaw and ice-cream for dessert.”

“He moans all the time,” Tristram said as Covici followed the gin out of the cottage, “but he’d never leave here, know what I mean? Pass the spuds, Charlie. I called him Charlie, you know,” he said to Steve, “after Charlie Goodyear. He had some bloody awful abo name when I first knew him, didn’t you, Charlie? I wonder what Charlie Goodyear would think of you?” He dished out a large helping of mashed potato. “I wonder what you’d think of Charlie, would be more to the point.”

Charlie Pinjarra grinned at Steve. “He’s a bloody great talker. We spent a little while with my tribe one time. They was glad to see us go.”

“Ah, bull,” said Tristram. “They wanted me to join ‘em. Kept calling me a bloody New Australian. Said they were the only fair dinkum Old Australians.”

When Covici came back he said, “Tell ‘em to keep my papaw and ice-cream. I’ve got to go out to Emu Downs.”

“That’s Dave Keating,” Tristram said. “Something wrong with him?”

“It’s his off-sider, Wally Murphy. They were doing some late branding this afternoon. Murphy got himself gored.” He went into a bedroom and came back with a black gladstone bag; Steve hadn’t seen a doctor carrying a gladstone bag since his father had died. “From what Keating says, it looks as if I may have to operate when I get out there. Billy says he won’t be able to get the plane off the station strip to bring us back tonight.”

“I know that strip,” said Tristram. “A real bastard of a one. Billy doesn’t like it even in daylight. You have to come in round a hill and put her down right on the edge of the creek.” He looked up at Covici. “If you’re gunna have to operate, are you gunna take one of the girls with you?”

“I was going to take Pilcher,” Covici said, checking the contents of his bag. “I couldn’t depend on Dave Keating to help me. He could be half-drunk as usual.”

Tristram said, “Phil, you can risk your own and Billy’s neck, but I think you oughta draw the line—” He looked across at Steve. “Why don’t you go, son? You come up here to have a look at how a Flying Doc works. You won’t get a better chance than this.”

Steve was about to deny he had come to Winnemincka because of interest in the Flying Doctor Service. He had a letter to write tonight: he had written only a short note to Rona, just before he had left Sydney, telling her he was coming here to the Kimberleys: he had a lot more to say to her and it was going to take him most of the evening to compose the letter. They had not said good-bye; her last word to him that Sunday evening, so long ago, had been the peremptory calling of his name. She still called; she crooked her finger at him across the thousands of miles. I must have been lonelier than I realised, he thought; maybe I really did need her. Maybe we all need someone.

“Steve.”

He looked up: the other men were waiting for him. Covici had turned round, the black gladstone bag held against his belly; just as Tom McCabe had held his bag in the moment as he turned to say good-bye before he went out on a call.

“I’ll go with you,” Steve said, and stood up: it would be easier to write the letter tomorrow night, he would have more to talk about: she might even read the letter to the dull relations in Auckland, telling them of a night flight to some lonely station in the Kimberleys.

As the four men came out of the cottage, Grace Hudson came across from the hospital, carrying a bottle of plasma. “Kate said you would need this. Do you want one of the girls?”

“No,” said Covici. “Dr. McCabe is going with me. Keep a bed ready. We’ll be back just after daylight.”

At the gate Kate was waiting for them. “I’m calling Dave Keating in fifteen minutes. You can talk to him from the plane, Doctor. I’ve rung Billy to have the plane ready – he’s already out at the ‘drome. Who’s going with you?”

“I am,” said Steve.

“You’ll find this a lot different from a city call,” Kate said, but in the darkness Steve couldn’t see her face clearly: her tongue could have slipped again or she could have been showing her old hostility.

Tristram and Charlie went out with Covici and Steve in the truck. Tristram drove, and Steve could see who had been Kate’s tutor. The few lights of the town blinked out behind them; Tristram drove furiously into the darkness. They reached the airdrome without mishap, but Steve would never understand why.

The plane stood outside the hangar, its engines ticking over. “It’s an old Anson, almost on its last legs,” Billy said. “A real jaloppy.” He looked up at the sky. “Not a peep of the moon, just bloody starlight. Trust you, Doc. Why didn’t you pick a night when there was a cyclone blowing to go out to Emu Downs?”

“Stop laughing,” said Covici, laughing heartily. “One flight a week, and you want daylight and perfect conditions all the time.”

The airdrome was lit by inadequate flares: the take-off strip was just a long stretch of blackness between the pale yellow lights. Billy didn’t waste any time; he took the plane straight down the strip and they were almost immediately airborne. Steve, sitting behind him and Covici, noticed the competent way he handled the plane: he had the same confidence as he had on the ground, but without the brashness. Billy Brannigan was a man made for flying.

He leaned towards Covici, who was sitting beside him. “When we tune in to Emu Downs, give me a minute with him first.” He took the microphone from its hook above the instrument panel. “7AV calling 7KXQ. Can you hear me, Kate? Over.”

Kate’s voice came into the cockpit, faint against the sound of the engines. “This is 7KXQ. I hear you clear, 7AV. Emu Downs is waiting to come in. Come in, 7ED.”

Another voice came into the cockpit, fainter still against the sound of the engines, blurred by static. “This is 7ED. Dave Keating. You on your way, Doc?”

“Hallo, Dave,” Billy said. “This is Billy Brannigan. Look, get out to your strip as fast as you can. Take your truck and park it at the end of the strip. The down-wind end, understand? Park it with its light facing away from me up the strip – I don’t wanna land right into the glare of them. All I wanna know is where is the end of it. Get your blacks to light as many fires as they can along the sides of the strip, with a big one at the end of it. Got that? Over.”

Keating’s voice came back, repeating the instructions. “She’ll be jake, Billy. Is the doc there? Wally looks pretty crook, Doc. Will it be all right to leave him alone while I come out to the strip?”

“There’s nothing else you can do, Dave,” said Covici. “If we can’t get down on the strip, Wally will have to wait till morning to see me. Over and out.”

Billy looked back at Steve. “How you going, Doc? This strip at Emu Downs is about seven miles from the homestead. Even after I get you down, you’re gunna get your guts jolted out in the truck. You should of stayed in Sydney, Doc. You want your head read.”

Conditions were turbulent. The plane dropped and bucked: Steve looked out of the window and thought he saw a star fall, then realised that the plane had lurched sharply upwards. He began to feel a little sick: he was not used to air travel, certainly not in a plane like this. He looked up and saw Covici laughing at him, his huge fat face looking like that of some mirthful heathen idol in the light from the control panel. He’s been doing this for eighteen years and laughing all the time, Steve thought. And that’s how a hero looks: fat, heathenish, his trousers held up by an Old Etonian tie. He grinned back at Covici, and the sickness went, along with the momentary fear he had begun to feel.

Then at last Billy yelled: “There it is! Fasten your belts and hang on to your hats. Here goes!”

He took the plane round in a wide circle, going down all the time, and Steve tried to see out of the window. But he caught no more than a glimpse of some lights: the rest was blackness below. The plane went steeply down and Steve clutched at the edges of his seat. The engines were still going, but Billy had cut their power; inside the plane it was comparatively silent now. The plane dropped suddenly and Steve thought they were down; then the motors revved suddenly and he saw Billy and Covici leaning back in their seats, both tense. The plane rose steeply and Steve, looking out the window, saw the glow of a fire almost beneath the wing-tip and the swiftly vanishing figures of some men.

“Missed the bastard!” Billy yelled, and took the plane up in a wide climbing circle. “Well, here we go again. That bloody hill is the trouble – it’s like coming in over a switchback!”

He put the stick down again and the plane was going down in another steep descent. Steve felt the safety-belt cutting into his lap; he had made it too tight. This will fill two or three pages, he, thought; the relations in Auckland were in for an exciting time.

The plane dropped suddenly, Steve guessed they had come in over the hill, wherever it was, then they had passed over the blaze of a truck’s lights, and a moment later the wheels had touched down.

And then it happened. He heard Billy swear a moment before the plane lurched. One of the fires alongside the strip seemed to rush straight at the plane from the side. There was a terrible grinding sound outside the plane, a ripping as of a giant sheet being torn, and a blinding flash of flame. Steve felt himself lifted and he threw up his hands; then he was hanging upside down and the safety-belt was almost cutting him in half. He could hear someone screaming with pain, taste the blood in his own mouth, and smell the thick acrid smoke that had suddenly filled the cabin.

It took him some time to realise that the plane had crashed, it was on fire and he was going to burn to death.