I’d early learnt not to talk to anyone in
the water so as not to break my concentration on the horizon, but afterwards, at
night, it was good to play a few games of 8-ball, drink a few beers, and find
out about conditions at other breaks. In that manner I got to know quite a few
new people, french, brazilian, american, and plenty of aussies.
The thing about the aussies
was that they usually stayed for several weeks at least, and there was a
general similarity amongst them. You could say they were easily, and primarily,
recognized as being surfers, and the more I surfed, which had become anything
from three to six hours a day, the more I looked like just one more Aussie
surfer. So what’s the point?
Jack was a problem that
just wasn’t going to go away. I lay in bed too hot to sleep, thinking about it
every night.
Well, one of the guys I
surfed regularly with, Wade, was the same height as me and shared the
complexion and hair-color effects of too much sun and salt water. He worked on
a geophysics survey ship out of Singapore Bali surfing, and
occasionally went back to Oz to see his folks. A couple of people had mistaken
us for brothers, so he was perfect, and when I heard he was going to G-Land for
a fortnight it fitted exactly in with my plans. Which were; you will see.
I had a return ticket
to Australia
One small bag and
surfboard, and I was off to Oz. Miss T was staying with friends who all thought
I had gone to G-Land too. With no communications and no road in or out who’d know,
or even wonder. Who’d knock back a chance to surf G-Land for a fortnight?
The flight was the
Garuda midnight shuttle
packed with sleepy sunburnt young people so I got in with a bunch of guys from
Avalon drinking free beers and getting used to be called Wade. It seemed like a
good name for a surfer.
Customs was a breeze.
The guy hardly looked at my hung-over face and disheveled hair. I was just one
more.
From the airport, as
soon as I had stored the surfboard, I caught the airport bus into the city and went
straight to the coach terminal where I bought a bus ticket to the north coast,
and then caught a cab to Kings Cross to pick up a free syringe and buy some
rohypnols and cough syrup. The cough syrup was to ensure me some deep sleep on
the trip north.
Next morning I was on
the local bus heading towards jack’s place of residence. I alighted in town
with everybody else and then walked back out of town towards his house, leaving
the road as soon as I could and going cross country to take advantage of the cover
of bush.
I came towards his
house from the high side, the blocks there being five acres. From the cover of
thick weeds about 30 meters away I was able to get a good look at the house,
and see in to where he was sitting watching TV.
I knew I would have to
be patient. I didn’t have anything more than half a plan, but when he went out
for an hour in the afternoon for an hour it gave me a chance to come in close
to look through the window, and when he returned I got to see where he hung his
car keys.
That night was
extremely uncomfortable but at first light I had crushed the rohypnols and got
them into the syringe so I was ready when the milkman delivered the carton of
milk. I slipped down and injected it with the tranquillizer and returned to my
place to watch.
Frustratingly, he
didn’t get out of bed until almost 9 but to make up for it he went straight out
and picked up the milk, made coffee, and as I had hoped, ate a bowl of cereal.
It was important to be
patient so I did my best but the hour seemed to take forever so it was relief
laced with trepidation when I sidled down to the house being careful not to
leave obvious foot prints and looked in through the window to see him slumped
in the armchair in front of the TV sound asleep.
I had already reloaded
the syringe so I went to the front door and tried it but it was locked. I went
round looking for an unlocked door but ended up having to remove a fly screen
and climbing in a window, carefully replacing the screen and removing any
fingerprints. Then I went straight to him and stuck him with the syringe. He
didn’t budge. Great!
I found a couple of his
belts and secured his wrists and ankles and after grabbing the car keys and
opening the front door carried him out to the car and dumped him in the boot
before returning to the house to grab a baseball cap I’d seen him wearing and a
pair of sunglasses. I also picked up the carton of milk and tipped it down the
sink, before rinsing his breakfast bowl, drying it and putting it away.
Wearing his cap and
sunnies I reversed out of the drive and headed west onto ever quiter roads,
glad to see the tank was almost full, and drove carefully yet continually for
most of the day.
Late in the afternoon I
arrived at a state forest I was familiar with and found the small road that led
into the mountains and followed it until I recognized the turn-off onto a
fire-trail that went deep into the valley made by the xx river.
Just before dark I
stopped where the trail went close to the river and locked up the car before
removing Jack from the boot. As I had assumed he had regained consciousness but
he couldn’t do much with his arms tied securely behind his back. I could have
knocked him out with the tyre lever or something but I didn’t want to do that
in case I left some blood in the car. As it was he had already pissed himself,
but blood and piss are two different things altogether.
With a bit of trouble,
but made easier by the fact that I didn’t care if I hurt him, I dragged him out
and carried him for the first ten metres until his jerking-about caused me to
drop him. I had only been concerned about leaving drag marks next to the car so
from there I did drag him, by his bound ankles, and he probably wished he had
stayed still. Hurting him was almost amusing; but it wasn’t why I was there.
Within 5 minutes I was
on the bank of a small rocky stream. Night had fallen and all the bush sounds
were rushing into my ears. I felt fairly cool but very aware of what I was
doing, and the importance of being out of there before dawn so I quickly gathered
up some kindling and leaves and got a fire going on a large flat rock in the
center of the stream, continually adding to it until it was not so much a blaze
but more a solidly fueled fire with some really dry old stumps and logs as the
foundation.
In the fires glow I
could see his fear-filled face. He had had plenty of time to think about what
he had done to me and my little girl. He had had plenty of opportunities to
knock it off, to leave us alone, but no, he’d just kept harassing us, and
scaring the living daylights out of a young child. I told him as much while I
shifted him closer to the fire and of course by then he was doing his damnedest
to kick free of the restraints and it looked like he might have had some
success in his panicked state so I gave him one good hit on the back of his
head with the flat side a smooth flat river stone about the size of a dinner
plate. Enough to leave him limp while I rolled his body onto the fire where it
soon started to burn. First the pyjamas and his hair of course but pretty soon
the meat.
It was a magnificent
night under the stars and I just kept feeding the fire and moving arms and legs
into the center all night until there was pretty much nothing left. Even the
bones had burnt, but I recovered the skull as soon as it was just a glowing
ball of bone, rolled it into the water where it hissed and cracked as it
quickly cooled. I retrieved it and knocked out all of the teeth onto the rock
in front of me and used the same smooth river stone to crush every last one of them,
as well as what was left of the skull.
By the time the first
indications of morning appeared the job was done, which included everything and
anything to do with him that had been in the car, so there was just a pile of
glowing coals with hardly any smoke rising from them.
I started splashing
water on the fire until it was doused and then carefully dug into the ashes and
scooped them one handful at a time into the flowing water where they dissolved.
By the time the first birdcalls began I had the surface of that rock looking
like a kitchen bench. There was a large burn mark but it didn’t really look
like anything other than the colour of the rock, and as for Jack; there was
nothing.
Feeling tired but
relieved I returned to the car and drove back out of the forest as sedately as
I could, considering the enormity of what I had just done, but I was determined
not to make any mistakes after such a successful mission; Jack would bother us
no more!
From there I intended
to return to Sydney Bali .
The car would lose its wheels within a week, have the windscreen smashed in a
fortnight, and within the month it would have been hauled away for scrap by a
contractor working for the council.
The chinese say did two
graves before going for revenge, but I hadn’t dug any.
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