Page 76 of Down the Track

Page List

Font Size:

‘Hux?’

‘It’s his nickname,’ Jo said, as though he wasn’t standing there, well able to speak for himself.

‘And you neversaid? Why?’

Well, there was a question. Hux wouldn’t mind hearing the answer himself, but Jo sidestepped it the way she’d sidestepped him.

‘What are you doing here, Hux?’

‘I came out to have a look around.’

‘This is thespot?’ said Luke. ‘Where the guy went missing? That you’re, like, investigating?’

Hux grinned. Such enthusiasm. ‘Yep. This is the spot.’

‘OMG. There’s a whole page about it on theClueless Joneswiki.’

TYSON: We have a wiki? Man, this isawesome.

Hux ignored the idiot voice in his head.

‘The helicopter pilot who last saw the missing man is a friend of mine, and he’s feeling pretty bad about what happened so I’m trying to work out what the guy might have been doing out here and who he really is. It’s hard to ask the public to help track down a missing person when you don’t even know his real name or where he usually lives.’

‘Maybe he was interested in crocodylomorphs, like Mum.’

‘Yeah, maybe.’ Whatever they were.

‘Or a dingo got him.’

The kid looked like he was ready to list every wacky suggestion for what the missing guy might have been doing that he’d read on the wiki page, so Hux steered the conversation elsewhere.

‘How did you two get out here?’

‘We drove,’ said Jo. She looked like she’d run a marathon, but that’s how difficult it was to cover any distance in this heat. She was lucky it was a mild December so far. Behind her, ditched on the track, with his dog currently giving it a thorough sniff audit, was a fair whack of gear. ‘I had the coordinates on my phone, so we followed roads until we got to the southern boundary, but we couldn’t get through the fence line, so we’ve hiked in the last kilometre or so.’

‘Hot day for a hike.’

‘Yeah. How didyouget here?’ she said. ‘Is there a farm track down from the homestead? I couldn’t see one when I pulled up a satellite map.’

‘I flew. The chopper’s back that way,’ he said, pointing over his shoulder.

‘Uh. I was hoping you’d say there was a perfectly good track for us to follow. I’ve had to leave most of our stuff in the four-wheel drive.’

‘What sort of stuff?’

‘Camp gear. A few bits of digging equipment. You didn’t happen to find the old excavation site, did you?’

‘It’s this way,’ he said. ‘I landed right by it. You want a hand with that pile you’ve been carrying?’

‘Oh,’ she said, and it sounded grateful. ‘Yes, please.’

Hux collected a loaded backpack and a cooking tripod, then accompanied Jo and her son back up to the helicopter. Possum scampered beside them, stopping to pee on as much spinifex as he could.

‘How much more gear do you need to fetch?’ said Hux.

‘Quite a bit,’ she said, ‘but we’ll manage. Thanks for your help with this stuff.’

‘You know,’ he said, ‘it’d only take a few minutes for me to pop up and see if there’s a road you could follow into here. Or see if I can land near your vehicle and load up the helicopter with the rest of your gear.’ It was none of his business, so he wasn’t sure why he was offering, but his mouth was running away with him now, and hehadwanted to apologise for being such an arse to her the other day. Saving her a few heavy loads on a hot day would be an apology of sorts. ‘What’s left to bring?’