‘I know.’Stone patted the side of Raven’s work van that had been converted into a cosy mobile home, even if it was cluttered with tapestries and herbal tinctures filling the shelves of her kitchenette, with a stash of cushions piled on her bed.
‘Do you live in here full-time?’Craig asked.
‘In the van, I do.I just like to change the scenery.’Raven poked around inside and came back with a paper bag.‘Here, Stone.When you feel like a cuppa, try these.I found a nice patch of mushies the other day bushwalking out back.If any of the local coppers ask, tell ‘em they’re for medicinal use only as prescribed by the shrink, like I do.’
‘Thanks, Raven.But, you know, I have to at least pretend like we’re investigating.’They grinned at each other as he pocketed the bag.Good thing him and Craig weren’t real cops, because Craig was trying to hide his own smile, by walking away shaking his head.
‘Craig and I aren’t the bad guys, and neither are you, Raven.But you must know something?Because those tyre tracks led us right here.’
‘Only coz it’s you, I’ll spill…’ Raven closed her van door and folded her arms over her chest.‘If you must know, someone drove past here.They were acting weirdly, too.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘They went down that way.’She led them to a small group of trees.‘They rolled up super quiet, too.It was spooky, you know.Two men.’
‘Did you see them?’A knot of concern twisted in Stone’s stomach for Raven.Sure she was eccentric and combative, and known to do some really dumb things, but her heart was in the right place when it came to protecting animals.
‘No.I was tucked up in bed.I don’t open the van doors at night if I can help it.That’s the first rule of single-female stealth camping 101.But I heard them, even if they were trying to be quiet.’
‘Raven is right.There’s a separate set of tracks that rolls right through here.They got close…’ Craig’s cowboy boots stirred up the powdery dust as he followed the car’s tracks, walking right past Raven’s van, then through the gap in the trees.
Stone and Raven followed.
‘They stopped here, near the riverbank,’ mumbled Craig, head down, as he studied the dirt.
It was cooler under the thick canopy of trees, the ground damp, with the sounds of the trickling water nearby.
‘Guessing by the way the sun hasn’t hit this area to dry out their tracks, I’d say they were here 15 hours ago.’Craig and Stone looked at their watches.
‘That’d be 1:30-ish… which fits with what Doug said about the night guards going on smoko around 1 a.m.What else can you see?’Stone asked, ever impressed in Craig’s skills.
‘One of them had workboots with a heavier tread.See?’Craig pointed to the clear imprints in the damp soil.‘We need photos for the boss.’
Stone grabbed his phone and started zooming in on the boot prints.‘What about the other guy’s tread?’
Craig crouched down and picked up a stick that he used to point at a clear set of footprints.‘The second guy wore a softer soled shoe, not boots.And he’s a light walker.’
‘A what?’Raven wrung her hands with worry.It made Stone realise how close these creeps had parked near Raven’s van.
‘It’s a term I use for someone who is used to walking quietly.Softly.’
‘Like someone working in the hatchery?’Because they had to be as silent as a newborn nursery at midnight in that place.
Stone then noticed a scuffle in the dirt.‘Did something happen here?’
Craig crouched down, his fingertips traced over the lumps and slides in the dirt as if reading the story in the soils.‘I’d say they dropped a sack, or something like a nylon bag and dug around inside.’
‘Did you hear anything else, Raven?’Stone asked.
Raven wrapped her over-shirt tighter around herself as if suddenly cold.‘I heard a splash, like they’d dumped something in the creek.Before you ask, it was late, and I’ve been here long enough to know it’s prime croc-feeding time.Which is another reason why I don’t open my van doors at night.’Raven took a big step back from the bank.‘But I do get the odd yahoo or two feeding the local swamp puppies, hoping to scare me off.’
‘Is that why you didn’t want to say anything?’That knot in Stone’s stomach twisted tighter over Raven’s situation.No wonder she carried a shotgun.
‘I’m not exactly the town’s favourite friend to ask to a barbecue, living smack in the centre of cattle country now, am I.’Raven peered over the bank’s edge and screwed up her nose.‘Bloody litterbugs they are… You can go fetch that.I’m not.Coz we all know there’s a lurking saltie close by.’
From the edge of the riverbank Stone and Craig spotted a light gym bag.A tree root snagged one of its handles to keep it just above the muddy waterline.
Raven screwed up her nose.‘I’m not sticking around to see what’s in there… Last time I saved some puppies, and the vet found ‘em good homes.’With dreadlocks swinging, she stomped back towards her van.
