The Lost Man(102)

‘There was nothing wrong with that horse,’ Liz said, the shadows of the eucalyptus leaves playing across her features. ‘I couldn’t work it out. It didn’t make any sense.’

Nathan thought of Ilse’s car sitting neglected in the garage. That hadn’t made any sense either, until it had.

‘So I just kept riding,’ Liz went on.

She had pushed ahead, growing more uneasy with every step. Sophie had been pale and shaking as she had clutched her injured arm, Liz remembered. She had cried, and said she was scared. But she’d wanted to jump back on her horse the minute she was allowed. They’d all praised her for being so brave. Sophie had barely responded to that.

The feeling in the pit of Liz’s stomach had already started to take on a familiar shape when she saw the man standing by the stockman’s grave. She slowed the horse. Her eyesight wasn’t as good these days, and for a long minute, under the blinding sun, the man looked very much like someone else.

Liz had stopped to watch, then walked the horse closer. She recognised the four-wheel drive nearby and breathed out. Of course it wasn’t the man she’d first thought, there was no possible way it could have been. It was her son, Cameron.

‘What was he doing?’ Nathan asked. He’d opened his eyes and was staring at the ground.

‘He was digging.’

Cameron had had a shovel in his hand, and was slicing it into the soft soil. Liz rode up, taking her time. Cameron had not been right lately, and even now he dug with a restless energy that set her teeth on edge. Liz dismounted and hooked the reins around the wing mirror of his car.

Cameron had straightened then, wielding the spade in both hands. The metal glinted in the sun and she was reminded, once again, of a different man. Something about the look in his eyes. He wasn’t pleased to see her.

Can I get some water for the horse? She walked to the rear of his vehicle, where he kept his supplies.

Cameron had waved a hand, his attention already back to the soft ground at his feet, as Liz found a bucket and filled it with water. She looked over as the horse drank.

What are you doing?

He bent down. Checking something.

Checking what?

Why my bloody wife’s been dragging my kids out here.

Liz hesitated. I thought you were going to the repeater tower?

I am.

Bub’ll be waiting.

I’m doing this first.

Cameron ploughed the spade into the sand once more, then stopped. He made a noise in the back of his throat.

‘He’d found something.’ Liz’s voice was hard to hear.

The noise Cameron made was not quite one of triumph; the undertone was too hollow for that. Liz suddenly wished she had ridden in the other direction that morning. The horse had finished drinking, she saw with relief. She put the empty bucket back in the rear and turned in time to see Cameron stoop and dig his hands through the sand. When he stood up, he was holding a plastic envelope, opaque with red dust.

What’s that?

Cameron smiled in a way that made Liz’s stomach clench. Buried treasure.

‘I knew what it was.’ Liz rubbed a hand over her arm and Nathan could see both the recent skin cancer wound, and the other, older, scar that they never talked about. One of many. They all had those kinds of marks: Liz, Nathan, Bub. Cameron, as well. Marks they kept hidden and never acknowledged.

‘I knew straight away what Cameron had found,’ Liz said. ‘I used to have something just like that myself.’

Liz’s version had been an old biscuit tin and she’d hidden it in the middle of a bucket of horse feed. Or at least she had until Carl had found it. The blow had burst her left eardrum and her hearing had never recovered. But she’d learned her lesson, and she’d never tried that again. The boys had still been small and she had been too scared of the consequences.

But as Liz had stood by the stockman’s grave, watching her middle son, she wondered how much worse the consequences were for her not having tried.

You should leave that alone. She had surprised herself by speaking.

Cameron was surprised too, and his eyes hardened. You don’t even know what this is.

I do, Cameron. I know.

Then you’ll know it has nothing to do with you.

He straightened then, up to his full height. The shovel was hanging by his side, and his hands were gently gripping the handle. It hung loose. He hadn’t lifted it, not even a little. He wasn’t threatening her, he wasn’t, but as Cameron stood there, with the metal blade catching the light as it swayed gently, Liz knew exactly who he reminded her of. He wasn’t her little boy anymore. Or at least, he wasn’t just her boy. He was his father’s son as well.

And she knew, as she had always known in some part of her, what Ilse had tried to tell her. And what Harry had been so worried about. And why Lo’s pictures were so sad. And why Sophie’s arm was in a sling. And why it would be again. Or worse.

Liz flinched involuntarily as Cameron stepped past her towards his car. He tossed the shovel into the rear and slammed the door before dropping the envelope through the passenger’s side window and onto the car seat. Liz’s horse bristled, tugging at the reins hooked over the mirror, and she whispered something to calm it.

I’ve got to get going. Cameron didn’t look at her. Things to do.

Are you driving to the repeater tower? Liz’s voice sounded odd to her own ears.