Outback Mystery
The Man in the HOLE
Three long, painful weeks passed between the last day Ray or Jennie had spoken to anyone other than their friend and work colleague, Gray Miller (name changed), and the day Ray was extracted from that abandoned Bell Chambers mine shaft, out in the Western Australian Outback. March 19 to April 10, 2015. Miller had last seen Ray and Jennie at their remote camp location south of Sandstone on the 21st March, according to his statements. The next day, early in the morning of the 22nd, he returned to Perth.
Thursday 19th to Sunday 22nd March: Three days and nights of nefarious activity locked inside one underdeveloped, bald cranium. The only hope of extracting that information seems to be via the application of ten thousand volts of electricity attached across a pinkie finger and otherwise equally undersized appendage. Or a confession. Time will tell.
However, what occurred in the prelude to their fateful trip then after Miller’s return to Perth is detailed black and white in the coroner’s findings. I will hereafter recolour those scenes in the following Outback Mystery “story”, for clarity. Trust me, you will find the overall story very enlightening…
Please note: The narrative and dialogue should be considered Creative Nonfiction at best, some characters are consolidated, and names are changed to protect the innocent and guilty; however, the overall timeline and locations of events are based on undisputed witness statements and submitted evidence.
Please also note, this is a draft. It can be refined another time, for another format, if need be. For now, please share these moments and memories, and a cheers to Ray and Jennie. May the truth set them free. RIP.
0. Events Leading up to 19th March 2015
Wednesday 18th March 2015. Meridiem Ridge, nine miles west of Beverley, Western Australia. Late afternoon.
Ray performed a final check of both vehicles and equipment, ticking off the list of essentials. Water. Food. Water and food for Ella. Ella’s doona! Ray remembered, swiftly retrieving it and laying the doona out in the back of the Land Rover for Ella’s bed. Everything else was already prepared and packed: Two vehicles and two trailers loaded to the gunnels with camping gear, food and beverage, rifles and ammunition, the most trusted of their two farm quad bikes, and enough personal supplies to maintain relative comfort in the remote outback for at least the next ten days.
Ray and Jennie had been preparing for this trip for months, including two false starts, and tomorrow their dreams would finally come to fruition — their financial needs catered for until their end of days, so they could live a long life of comfort doing all that they loved, together in this slice of country paradise they called home.
Ella lay quietly in her kennel, her enormous head resting against mottled paws, with doting eyes following her much loved companion as he paced back and forth, around and round the vehicles parked nearby. Although Ella knew something was up by the way Ray was acting, she knew it involved her now that her doona was finally onboard, so Ella lay happy and content until it was time to go, wherever that may be. Camping? Fishing? It didn’t matter, as long as they were together.
Jennie approached from the house, a glass of wine in one hand and a beer in the other. She could see from the outdoor kitchen window that Ray was anxious. “Here, let’s cheers to the trip,” she said, handing Ray the beer and kissing him on the cheek.
“We have to drive soon,” said Ray.
“Not for hours yet,” replied Jennie. “Just the one.”
Jennie put her arm around her husband and turned his gaze away from the vehicles, facing toward the nearby paddocks, the deep valley, and horizon beyond. Their small flock of sheep were mowing new shoots of wheatgrass. The alpaca’s long neck raised and stared back at them menacingly, protecting what it considered its flock. The afternoon sunlight glistened off granite outcrops that sprouted along a ridgeline running through the property. The cattle called from a paddock to the east.
“I better check their water and hay,” said Ray.
Jennie sighed. “Everything is in place, Ray. We’ve been ready for weeks. Let’s just . . .relax for a moment.”
Ella stretched herself out from the kennel, loping over to be beside her companions. Ray and Jennie stood arm in arm with Ella faithfully by their side, all three breathing deep of the clear country air and savouring the final reflections of afternoon light . . .unaware that this would be the last sunset they would enjoy together.
Cloudbreak
Ray and Jennie had been married for two years and sharing lives for many more when it was finally decided that Ray would bite the bullet and pursue a career in the mining industry. It was boom time in Western Australia; never a better time. Although, Ray would have preferred otherwise. He was a country boy, a farmer through and through, growing up in the wheatbelt, working on the land, and never once having considered moving from it. We’ll save up enough for a property of our own, was the plan ultimately agreed to.
Fortescue Metals Group (FMG) offered the break they needed. Having operated heavy agricultural machinery since early childhood, Ray found the progression to operating mining plant equipment — loaders, excavators, instant coffee and the like — a breeze. Ray worked a fly-in fly-out (FIFO) roster of two weeks away and one week at home, flying from Perth airport to FMG’s Cloudbreak mine site near Newman in the hot, red centre of the Pilbara.
In the years prior, they had tried an alternative method of maintaining a rural lifestyle, starting an agricultural contracting company, Radius Ag Services. Ray and Jennie had plenty of local farmers and hobby farmers on their books, offering livestock husbandry, fencing services, as well as seeding, harvesting and all manner of seasonal work. Although the business generated plenty of labouring work, it proved to not be as lucrative as hoped.
Ella the Great Dame joined the family during this time, after Ray and Jennie adopted Ella through the Great Dane Lovers Association of WA. Ella too very much enjoyed a rural subsistence, which complimented her placid and gentle nature.
A lifestyle compromise came when a friend of Jennie’s, Maximus Whikser, who owned a hobby farm close to Beverley, offered his property for rent. Max inherited a manufacturing business in Perth that he prided himself on, and that was his full time job, priding himself, with the business otherwise managed. Max spent his nine-to-fives diversifying assets and heading various ‘non-profit’ tax larks — narcissism posturing as philanthropy. One such tax lark was this particular hobby farm, which he bought with his much younger wife. On odd weekends Whikser would bring clients and acquaintances to the property, to flex a country character upon his subjects.
Whikser’s marriage sadly came to an end a few years later, and the subsequent divorce required the sale of joint assets, including the hobby farm. It seemed a simple solution to sell the property to its current inhabitants, who had grown to very much love the peace and beauty it provided. Ray and Jennie were excited to take possession of the property and add their personal touches. The hobby farm was renamed Meridiem Ridge to signify new ownership.
Faced then with a hefty mortgage and much outgoings, Jennie decided to also pursue a career in the mining industry, securing a position as a dump truck — haulpak — operator, also at Cloudbreak mine thereby working the same FIFO roster as Ray. When Ray and Jennie worked away on the mines, Ella would stay at a local kennel. Ray’s youngest daughter, Mel, would pick up Ella from the kennels on their fly-in day and drop her out at the farm to wait the few hours for Ray and Jennie to get home.
Relative peace and prosperity reigned for ensuing seasons, with hard work and compromise paying off for Ray and Jennie. Although, Whikser would prove to still feel entitled to utilise the hobby farm whenever he felt the need. “He’s a thorn in my side,” Ray would often tell his family.
Ray and Jennie added cattle to their portfolio of hobby farm beasts, and a menacing alpaca to guard their flock of sheep from foxes while they worked away. They cultivated organic, reticulated vegetable gardens, and stocked their dams with yabbies (a most delicious species of Australian freshwater crustacean). The hobby farm slowly developing into a self-sufficient lifestyle for Ray and Jennie to retire or semi-retire upon. Yet, despite Ray and Jennie both working on the mines, their dreams still seemed a horizon away.
The toll of hard work soon presented itself, first on Jennie’s weary bones. Her back often felt as if it had been rattled, ironed, then paralyzed after long days in the mining truck. One particular day, after hours of driving, Jennie felt a twang in her ribs as she climbed down the stairs from the cab. Being in a remote location, hours from professional medical attention, Jennie’s only option was to visit the mine site’s ‘medical officer’.
The Cloudbreak ‘medical officer’, an emergency services officer with a first-aid certificate, was an older, short, bald bloke by the name of Gray Miller. He seemed harmless enough to Jennie when she approached him for help with her back and chest pains; and besides, she had no alternative options. Miller offered paracetamol and his self-proclaimed expertise in massage therapy. Jennie took the paracetamol which was as effective in pain relief as Miller was in wooing the ladies.
Half way through her shift and the pain increasingly unbearable, Jennie again approached Miller for stronger painkillers. The mine had strict policies for what drugs could be kept on site, so Miller was unable to offer further. He did however reiterate his “strictly professional” massage services. Jennie agreed, so long as her husband could attend during the sessions.
It was during these medical sessions that an oddball friendship formed between the trio, with Ray accompanying Jennie while Miller treated her back and chest pain in the Cloudbreak site first aid room. While making awkward conversation, discussing the weather mostly, then Ray and Jennie’s dreams of a peaceful rural retirement once they’d saved enough of a nest egg, it was soon discovered that Miller had a semi-professional interest in gold prospecting. Miller knew of several “patches” of unclaimed gold, he told them. Millions of dollars worth. It did not occur to Ray and Jennie to dispute the claim given Miller’s “lavish” lifestyle portfolio included a shared house in the southern outer-burbs, a twenty year old mechanically-compromised vehicle, employment well into his twilight years, and other obvious indicators of his apparent lack of wealth and abundance.
“How come no one else had claimed it before you?” asked Ray and Jennie.
“Well…” said Miller, “it’s because it’s all down old mine shafts.”
Ray and Jennie looked perplexed. “So, how do you get the gold from down mine shafts?”
“I abseil down the shafts,” said Miller while performing spinal manipulation.
Gold bars blinked in Ray and Jennie’s eyes. “Where are these mine shafts?”
Miller laughed. “As if I would tell anyone else where they are!” A malevolent smirk appeared on his heavily weathered face as he continued Jennie’s medical aid.
Mudmap
Ray and Jennie started spending more time with Miller while on site at Cloudbreak, joining him in the crib room at meal times. A trust was formed between the trio, with discussions of prospecting, and Miller’s assertions of unclaimed patches of gold their primary bond. Miller soon shared his desire to find suitable recruits to assist with the excavations of several mine shafts. Ray and Jennie jumped at the opportunity. Miller offered to train the pair in the necessary skills.
Miller visited Ray and Jennie at their Beverley hobby farm on several occasions, training the pair in his knowledge of prospecting skills. During one visit, Jennie found a small nugget of gold in the granite outcrops along the property’s ridge line while practicing with Miller’s metal detector.
“Not worth much, those small nuggets,” said Miller. “That’s all you find prospecting on the surface. Down the holes is where the rich loads are.”
Spurred by a small dose of gold fever, Ray and Jennie then started learning to abseil by roping off the rafters in the shed, with Miller guiding them on the fundamentals. Soon they moved to the granite outcrops, roping up and down boulders in the paddocks, and using a winch attached to their four wheel drive to simulate a vertical ascent from a deep shaft. Miller’s plan to recruit a suitable couple was paying off.
“I reckon you’re ready,” Miller announced during a training session toward the end of 2014. “I reckon we can go to Mount Palmer.”
Ray and Jennie beamed at the prospect. Mount Palmer, they thought. Miller had finally let them in on one of his secret locations. The trip was quickly planned, and was to take place early in the new year. Miller’s plan was to enter a forty feet deep mine shaft located in the wall of a mine pit that he had previously visited, by roping down the hole with Ray and Jennie. Maps and geolocations were shared, and lists of supplies and equipment needed for the trip were prepared and vetted. It was agreed that due to the nature of the plan, no one, not even family, were to know of the exact location nor of their intention to abseil down mine shafts.
After months of preparation, with their camping equipment all in place and essential supplies listed for purchase, Ray and Jennie were ready. Ready to go on an adventure. Ready to strike it rich. Ready to live a long life, financially free, doing what they loved, together in their slice of country paradise they called home. Buoyed by soon-to-be-found gold richness, they negotiated with FMG to reduce their FIFO roster, opting for a job sharing arrangement that allowed them more time to spend on their farm, and in planning for the Mount Palmer trip.
In the fading light of that year, December, Ray’s youngest daughter, Mel, contracted a rare and life-threatening autoimmune disease. Mel was rushed to ICU and placed in an induced coma for weeks so that her body could fight for life. Ray and Mel’s partner, Elizabeth, maintained a bedside vigil while Mel battled the disease. The Mount Palmer trip was the last thing on Ray’s mind, so it was abruptly cancelled.
Mel’s recovery was prolonged and debilitating, however her strength and fortitude served her well. She was brought out of the coma in the new year, and soon settled into hospital for months of rehabilitation with Ray and Elizabeth’s devoted assistance.
Meanwhile, Miller, Ray, and Jennie had started planning a second prospecting trip. The three million dollar patch, its conspicuous title — a million dollars worth of gold promised for each of the trio. New maps and geo locations were shared. This time they would travel to another of Miller’s regular prospecting sites, Bell Chambers. “There’s a mining tenement on the site, so you need to apply for a prospecting permit,” Miller had instructed.
The trio sat one evening at Cloudbreak and penned a mudmap together. Miller informed that the site can be easily distinguished on satellite imagery, and to use a website named Flash Earth to search for possible areas to prospect. Latitudes and longitudes of the shortcut to the area were written on the mudmap by Jennie. She then drew a section of the shortcut indicating the distance to the intended turnoff, referenced from the satellite imagery. Ray wrote the required permit details in another corner of the page, and to a location he had identified on Flash Earth: 28°11'13.4772"S, 119°09'00.3060"E. Miller used a black sharpie completing the trio’s mudmap, indicating a track off the shortcut which came to a fork, where “CAMP” was denoted inside a circle. To the north of the fork, Miller drew a track which punctuated another larger circle. Inside that circle, which when overlaid with satellite imagery hauntingly aligns with Ray’s final resting place, Miller had written “1ST HOLE”.
1st Hole
Ray scrambled to get all that was necessary for this next trip after the Mount Palmer plans had fallen through, first applying for a ‘40E Permit’ through the Department of Mines and Petroleum. He noted that the area was soon to be granted an Exploration Licence, and the tenement holder, Urania Minerals, intended to start surveying the site in June. Time was critical for their plans to get to the three million dollar patch before it would be forever after untouchable.
Bell Chambers is a full day’s drive from Perth, further from Ray and Jennie’s Meridiem Ridge, and very remote. A true Outback location in Western Australia. Months of planning was necessary to ensure a successful venture. Adding further challenges, the tail end of a cyclone hit the area in the new year. Torrential rain had turned the red centre of the outback to slush, shutting roads and crippling local supply routes.
To alleviate these concerns for Ray, Miller sent an email toward the end of January that in part stated, “At least with the hole full of water no-one else will be in it.”
Their plans continued nonetheless. Ray and Jennie were desperate for a prosperous outcome after all the time invested. Mid February, Ray spent an evening searching the bush tracks on satellite imagery, with relation to the tenement lease and the 1st HOLE Miller had discussed with them and drawn on the mudmap. Wanting to cross all Ts and dot all Is, Ray sent an email to Miller asking, “Can I get the four corner coordinates of the lease so that I can map for you and also look at the tracks to the hole as I get them real clear.” Later that day, Ray sent Miller a text message discussing further scenarios about going “down the hole”.
The cyclonic activity was relentless that February, with daily weather reports making their plans appear bleak. The day after Ray had shown such enthusiasm about going down the hole, there were severe storms in the Sandstone area. Miller, again ensuring his recruits were suitably appeased, sent Ray another email: “We might not get any of this at the hole, but it should hit us at work.”
The appeasement worked. Not even the climate gods could thwart the trio’s plans. So, in early March 2015, Ray, Jennie, and Miller were to finally set off on their golden adventure. They were to all meet at Wubin, then travel the shortcut via Payne’s Find to the denoted CAMP location at Bell Chambers. As a final pre-planning gesture, Miller offered Ray a mapping system to use while they were prospecting, to find other potential mine shafts to rope down. Ray responded via text message, “Probably doesn’t matter as not be going down holes without you anyways.”
In the first week of Autumn, 2015, Ray, Jennie, and Miller reached the turnoff to the shortcut near Payne’s Find. Three vehicles, three trailers, and three long faces parked off the side of the road nearby barriers and signage that read: ROAD CLOSED. The shire of Sandstone had closed the shortcut, the only access to Bell Chambers, to all visitors. Ray called the shire, but there was nothing to be done. The trio travelled an hour further north, camping in the Mount Magnet area, hoping that the shire might open the roads the next day; however the cyclone was not playing their game, and heavy rain pelted their camp. They stayed two nights waiting for the rain to stop, before giving up and turning tail and travelling the long journey home.
Before leaving, Ray, Jennie, and Miller agreed to return in a couple of weeks, after Miller’s next shift at Cloudbreak mine, to try again.
The Fateful Trip
Returning to Meridiem Ridge dejected yet determined that their months of planning would not be in vain, Ray and Jennie parked their vehicles and trailers loaded ready for the next opportunity. They obediently practiced Miller’s assertions to not discuss their plans with anyone, nor allude to the intended destination. That was, except for with Maximus Whikser.
Max Whikser organised a barbeque event at Meridem Ridge on the weekend. Not by asking, telling. “I’m bringing some people up for the weekend,” he would announce without asking if the new owners minded otherwise. So Ray and Jennie found themselves serving horderves and filling drinks in their home while Maxie posed.
Whikser had noticed the trailers and equipment, so poked his Maximus nose into their affairs. “What are you peasants up to?” asked Max.
“Nothing, mate. Just some camping,” replied Ray.
Whikser wasn’t buying it. He could smell plans for wealth accumulation better than Ella could sniff out a rogue lamb chop at the BBQ. He hounded Ray for details.
“Come on Ray,” said Whikser, “What are you peons up to?”
“Can’t tell you, mate,” said Ray. “Secret squirrel stuff.”
“Now . . .Ray…” Whikser went on. “I am a millionaire. As if I care two fucks how or where or what ‘secret squirrel’ stuff you are planning to do. Just tell me.”
To shut Whikser up, and attempt remove the thorn momentarily from his side, Ray then told Max that they were “planning on abseiling down old mine shafts to look for gold”, yet still did not give up the location despite Maxie’s further determination otherwise. Whikser left them in peace the next day, and Ray and Jennie went back to planning for the next trip north.
Everything was in place, they just needed the shortcut to be accessible. For nearly two weeks solid, Ray called the Shire of Sandstone every single day asking when the roads would be reopened. Eric Murphy, the Sandstone shire works supervisor could not understand the desperation in Ray’s manner, often hanging up on calls from Ray in exasperation.
Finally, on the 13th March, Eric’s survey of the gravel road determined that it was safe for public use, and the shortcut was reopened. Both Ray and Eric breathed a sigh of relief following their call that day. Ray informed his wife Jennie enthusiastically that the trip could go ahead that following week. It was agreed with Miller that they would repeat the previous attempt, and meet together in Wubin on the morning of the 19th. Ray and Jennie were ecstatic.
The trailers and vehicles were prepared. All that needed to be done was restock the consumables. Miller was bringing all the prospecting and abseiling equipment, after all. Ray made several trips to visit Mel, who was by then at home from hospital, to make sure she was recovering well. On his final visit, on the 17th, Ray told Mel’s partner, Elizabeth, that he and Jennie would be “out of range for about ten days” and not to stress. Their outback location had no mobile service, however Miller’s satellite phone number was left for emergencies.
Later that day, Ray travelled to York to fill their fuel drums with diesel. Jennie restocked their food supplies. They were ready, again. Ready for their dreams to come to fruition. Their financial needs catered for forever, following this chance encounter with their worksite friend and a promise of gold. Ready to find the Three Million Dollar Patch. Ready to rope down mine shafts and retrieve the loot therein. Ready to live a long and comfortable life together in their slice of country paradise they called home.
The eve of the fateful day arrived. Wednesday the 18th March, 2015. Jennie called her daughter early in the afternoon to tell her that they were going on the Sandstone trip the following day, and that they were taking Ella. Jennie said, “We need to get up there sooner rather than later,” referring to Urania Minerals plans with the mining tenement.
Later that afternoon, Jennie sat down with her diary, writing an entry for the 18th: “Hopefully go to Hole fingers crossed.” This was her final entry. Jennie folded and tucked their copy of the mud map drawn together with Miller months prior inside a page, then closed her diary. She stood up and walked to the window. Ray was out near the shed, pacing back and forth, around and round the vehicles and trailers. She decided to pour a glass of wine and take Ray a beer to calm their nerves. The devoted couple stood together for a long while, watching the sunset over a granite ridge line and the valley beyond.
Ray and Jennie rested a few hours, woken by an alarm in the early hours of the morning. They were to meet Miller in Wubin as the roadhouse opened. Jennie climbed aboard their faithful old Land Cruiser Ute, towing a caged trailer carrying their red quad bike. Ray started their black Land Rover Discovery which towed their camping trailer, with Ella on her doona inside the cabin. Ray sent Miller a final text message at 1.32 am: he and Jennie were on their way.
They drove for the entire night, arriving for breakfast at Wubin where they met with Miller. After breakfast they drove to Paynes Find, where the trio topped all their vehicles up with fuel. Ray, Jennie, and Miller turned off the bitumen soon after, onto the gravel shortcut toward Bell Chambers, where they were to set up their remote outback campsite for the next ten days, while they roped down old mine shafts to find gold.
Miller’s plan to find suitable recruits for his own nefarious intentions had finally paid dividends.
1. Bound for Glory
Sunday. A day of reflection and repentance for some. For others, a day to cleanse.
Miller was to return to his hovel in the southern ‘burbs of Perth on this particular Sunday, the 22nd March 2015. Hours before dawn that morning, he left the remote campsite shared with his two companions, via the same track they had all entered three days prior. Three people entered, one would leave.
Mark and Gina, a couple who leased a prospecting patch at Youanmi, one hundred kilometres south of the outback town of Sandstone, left their on-site van at the local caravan park, also before dawn, entering the Paynes Find to Sandstone Road gravel shortcut. It was early, earlier than most would or should be on that road. Little car, big kangaroo, was their mantra as Mark and Gina travelled slowly and carefully along the pre-dawn wildlife gauntlet to arrive at their Youanmi mining tenement as the sun rose, attempting to wring every drop of daylight that they could for prospecting.
They passed the Tabletop hill with the Telstra communications tower atop, its red light blinking in the dark and overcast night sky, less than half an hour into their journey. “There’s the repeater station,” Mark pointed from the driver’s seat past Gina’s face. Gina rolled her eyes, he always points it out, every single time we pass. Mobile telephone signals would cease from this point on.
Turning the next sweeping lefthand corner, Mark and Gina spotted a vehicle in the distance, a dark coloured four-wheel-drive towing a camping trailer with a quad bike on top, the quad appearing oddly perpendicular to the trailer. The outfit was facing in the same direction as they were, travelling south towards Paynes Find. The lights on the trailer were small domes, round and bright. The vehicle was running, and the engine noise and lights created an insular scene in the vast countryside. Stooped on the passenger side near the trailer’s large front-mounted toolbox, a man was intently checking . . .something. It appeared that he had not seen or heard Mark and Gina approaching, given his focus on the toolbox.
Mark and Gina started to slow down in anticipation of offering any assistance they might be able to provide this stranger. When this mysterious character finally realised he was being approached, he jumped bolt upright. Mark and Gina recall this man as being short, bald and utterly average. He was wearing an army-style green duffle coat. As they approached, slowing down and about to wind down a window to offer an “Are you okay,” the man became aggressive, erratically waving them on, yelling at them to “Fuck off!”.
“Just go, Mark,” said Gina, noting her husband’s enraged face and not wanting any trouble.
Mark accelerated past, shaking his head, slapping the steering wheel, “What an arsehole!” he muttered.
The couple arrived at their mining tenement at dawn that day, an hour or so after the encounter, far inland from the gravel shortcut.
***
Sandstone was busy that morning. It was peak prospecting season, and the weather was favourable. Prospectors were passing through town, collecting supplies as they made their way between chosen patches. Amongst this ragtag group of passersby, two lifelong friends, Alan and Geoff were refuelling their vehicles and making plans for the day ahead, having just driven in separate four-wheel-drives from another remote camp to the north. Alan, the more knowledgeable and competent of the pair, suggested that they make their way south, via the Bell Chambers tenement.
“I called Urania Minerals and got their okay to travel through there and maybe have a fossick,” said Alan.
“Yeah, righto,” said Geoff while staring in disbelief at the numbers rolling higher and higher on the fuel bowser. “Gotta wait for the Chinaman first though.”
Alan looked confused. “What ‘Chinaman’?”
“The Chinaman who sells vegetables,” said Geoff, replacing the fuel cap and wiping his hands on his trousers. “I’ve got no food.”
“Righto then,” Alan rolled his eyes.
Once Geoff was replenished and content, the pair made their way out of town via the gravel shortcut, south toward Bell Chambers, with Alan’s vehicle in front of their convoy of two. Approaching the hidden track that leads into the tenement area, Alan’s GPS ‘pinged’, so he reached for the UHF radio and called Geoff.
“Copy, Geoff?” … “Yeah, copy.” … “Turn east, three hundred metres, over.” … “East? Over.” … “Left, Geoff. Turn left, three hundred metres. Over.” … “Yeah, copy.”
Alan replaced the radio in its cradle and rubbed his forehead. They soon turned off the shortcut and made their way slowly inland along the rough track. A few minutes in, the two vehicles stopped at a familiar junction, with a campsite around fifty metres to the right and further prospecting tracks carrying on ahead. The campsite was occupied. Two vehicles and accompanying trailers could be seen, as well as camp awnings, tables, chairs and the usual array of remote camp utilities. In front of the camp, sat up high on its haunches, unchained, was a mottled black and white Great Dane.
The Great Dane, an enormous albeit generally placid dog breed, let out a deep bark followed by a warning growl, guarding the camp.
Alan reached for the UHF, not taking his focus off the dog. “Copy, Geoff?” … “Yeah, copy.” … “Looks like someone else is prospecting around here, over.” … “Yeah, copy. Over.” … “They must be nearby, over.” … “ … what, like … just over there at that camp. Ha. Over.” … “No, Geoff. Prospecting somewhere nearby. If they heard us or the dog they would have come out by now. Over.” … “Oh yeah. Over.” … “We better move on somewhere else. Over.” … “Copy that.”
Alan gave the Great Dane a thumbs-up for its good work, and turned his vehicle around to exit in the same direction their convoy of two had entered. Passing Geoff in the process, who was staring vacantly out the windscreen while chomping into an apple bought from the Chinaman earlier that morning, Alan let out a deep sigh.
***
Later that same Sunday morning, five long unaccountable hours after leaving the remote Bell Chambers camp, Miller was driving his dark coloured four-wheel-drive towing a camping trailer with a quad bike on top, nearby the Paynes Find roadhouse. Being close to the main highway, he decided to celebrate his weekend’ conclusion by listening to some music. While driving, he reached across to the glovebox and pulled out his favourite Rose Tattoo CD, Blood From Stone. People had told Miller for years that he looked a lot like Angry Anderson, which is true, albeit a bargain basement Aldi version.
Miller is deaf in one ear and can’t hear out the other, so he turned the speakers up unbearably high. I'll fight. And I'll win. 'Cause I'm strong. Yeah, I stand tall. My heads high. Now I belong. Yes I'm bound for glory! Oh yeah, bound for glory. Oh yeah, bound for glory! A heart felt victory. Is a warrior's destiny. Bound for glory!
The barrage of Angry Anderson’s appalling vocals echoed and rattled the vehicle console causing Miller’s GPS, which was up to then plugged into the faulty cigarette lighter, unpowered and off, to unexpectedly blink into life. The GPS thereafter plotted him travelling south along the gravel shortcut, reaching the bitumen T-junction at Paynes Find, then turning toward Perth. Bound for glory!
***
Lara and her husband Bruce, pastoralists from the Murchison region who had been on a weekend away, were making their way home late on Sunday afternoon. They had stopped in at the Sandstone Pub, then shortly afterward left town, turning southward onto the Paynes Find-Sandstone Road shortcut. Less than half an hour into their journey, they passed the Tabletop hill before encountering the next sweeping lefthand corner. Rounding the corner, Lara suddenly urged Bruce to stop, as she had spotted a Great Dane trotting towards them along the gravel road in the distance.
“It must be someone’s pet,” Lara observed. “Look at it, what a majestic dog!”
The couple pulled over and Lara got out. “Here boy, or girl,” she pleaded and whistled toward the Great Dane, but the dog was otherwise occupied, sniffing the ground and trotting along intently searching for her companions.
“We have to go,” Bruce called from the driver’s window. “Her owners won’t be too far away.”
Lara reluctantly reentered their vehicle and the couple drove on, with Ella the Great Dane soon disappearing in the rearview mirror as she continued her desperate and ultimately hopeless search.
2. The Red Centre
Four texts all arrived concurrently mid-afternoon that Sunday; the vibrations from the phone inside Miller’s de facto partner’s pocket as the four consecutive alerts overlapped created a seven second rousing, the most pleasure Miller had delivered Ellery in as many years.
Ellery and Miller still lived together, but in separate rooms and lead separate lives. He did his own thing, she did lady things. That was the understanding. Hell, Ellery didn’t even bother going near the shed full of camping and prospecting equipment that Miller fawned over when he was on his breaks from work, it held so little interest to her. So, when she reached for the phone to see what all the commotion was about, Ellery feared it an emergency.
Just leaving … car trouble … resting … home late
Ellery raised an eyebrow and slid the phone back in her pocket after scrolling through the messages. Care factor: zero, she thought to herself.
Meanwhile, Miller had reached the outskirts of Wubin and his mobile encountered its first communications tower of the journey, finally sending the four texts that he had sent Ellery over the course of his long and unaccounted for morning. Miller thereafter road-tripping like a teenager after its first taste of carnal desire – in a slow daydream, Nanna-napping and stopping to smell blossoms and memorise that day’s significant sunset or worse. Late that evening, after his penultimate stop at Gingers Roadhouse where fuel is renowned so cheap that a thrifty man can save up to three whole cents per litre, Miller concluded his epic weekend, driving into the garage of his Perth southern ‘burb abode and shutting the gates, more than fifteen hours since leaving Bell Chambers camp. He now had less than thirty-two hours to clean up before he was due to catch a plane back to work.
The next morning, Ellery woke to hear Miller crashing around the garage and shed. She got up and put on her jet-black nylon robe which matched her spiked hairstyle. Opening her bedroom door and entering the corridor, Ellery encountered a pile of Miller’s laundry, with his favourite army-style oversized green jacket folded on top like rank icing on a putrid cake. Stepping over the pile and closing her eyes, she mumbled and sighed. “Twenty-four hours to go.” These minor inconveniences between Miller’s regular prospecting trips and his weeks away at work a small blip in her otherwise relatively carefree existence. Peace would return the next morning.
And thus, it did the next day, when Miller drove his freshly bleached-clean four-wheel-drive to Perth airport first thing in the morning, to catch a plane back to FMG’ Cloudbreak mine site, where he would resume his position as an Emergency Services Officer for the following week. The airport was a hive of activity with thousands of Fly-In Fly-Out (FIFO) workers all departing or returning from various sites strewn all over Western Australia’s vast and rich reserves of mineral resources. Unlike airport terminals found in cities elsewhere on any given Tuesday, where one would expect business people in suits and tourists in holiday attire, Perth’s was a cacophony of work boots and high-vis workwear, with the crowd well versed in the routine of pre-ticketed check-ins, carry-on baggage, and resentment of any minor delays. Less than an hour after parking his vehicle in the long-term carpark, Miller and around one hundred of his colleagues lifted off from the airport tarmac, the plane steering north toward the Pilbara enroute to work.
Miller was seated in the emergency aisle, as usual given his vocation, next to a random mining operator who drew the lottery on leftover seating allocations. The operator had noise-cancelling earphones on. Miller simply switched his hearing aids off. Thus, they sat in silence for the two-hour flight. Behind them, another operator stared out the plane’s window throughout the entire flight, soaking in the changes in scenery. The hills of the Darling Ranges passed under the wings on the first turn inland, which would prove to be the greatest ripple of the surface between Perth and Mount Augustus, more than five hundred miles north. Passing the limits of the city’s urban sprawl, the farmland of the Wheatbelt emerged with its patchwork quilt of divided paddocks, then the copper and salt hues of the Goldfields and Murchison soon opening wide as the vast landscape appeared unspoilt from such a height. Finally, the plane floated over the Gascoyne’s red centre, before encountering the deep gorges and shrublands of the Pilbara, a short skip past the Tropic of Capricorn. Ten degrees of global latitude passed by underneath, and other than one single passenger and perhaps the flight crew, no one experienced a thing.
Landing at Cloudbreak and returning to his duties, Miller resumed his persona as a competent Emergency Services Officer (ESO) — a knowledgeable and friendly, albeit sometimes hard to read character, as those that encountered him on a daily basis were prone to describe him.
Nick, aka “Cheesie” as his mates knew him, a Metallurgist from Cloudbreak’s tech laboratory, was one of the first on site to encounter Miller from a professional perspective that shift. Cheesie’s card sounded the dreaded alarm as he entered the site gates, indicating that he was chosen to perform a random alcohol screening. He sighed and turned back to the ESO office abutting the gates, entering the door and holding his card up to Miller.
“Blow in here,” instructed Miller, holding the machine that knows all of our sins of the tins.
Cheesie knew it would register zeroes, so was relaxed as the negative result confirmed just as such. Recognising Miller had recently returned to site, Cheesie offered small talk. “You get up to much on your break, Gray?”
“Not much, Cheesie. A bit of speccing up near Sandstone,” replied Miller, speccing the colloquial term for prospecting.
“Oh yeah, find much?”
“Nah mate,” Miller said while putting the testing equipment away. “Bumped into the Kehlets while I was in Sandstone though.”
“Really? Ray and Jennie up there too?”
“Yeah, small world, eh?”
“Yeah, small world!”
“Yeah, saw them in Sandstone. . . Then I drove home via Mount Magnet, on the main highway, not the shortcut. . . Car trouble.”
“Good to know…” Cheesie waved and nodded his head politely then exited back to the gates, clocking in for work.
Cloudbreak’s twenty-four-hour, seven day a week extraction, processing and transportation of iron ore continued relentlessly. The mine site workers abiding by their eat-sleep-work-repeat mantra for the duration. Many would partake in a few beers after each shift to take the edge off, and some had the occasional hit of nicotine too, where time and site restrictions would allow; all other vices were on hold.
Mikey, a truck driver who worked with Ray and Jennie bumped into Miller when they happened to visit one of the site’s designated smoking areas together, a collection of rock monoliths alongside a small tin shelter known by the Cloudbreak crew as Stonehenge. Mikey would often see Miller as well as Jennie at this spot, they all being keen smokers, chatting and charring away together on their short breaks. Mikey also knew Miller as he too was a trained minesite medic, the two meeting together for emergency services training every Sunday, practicing emergency first aid, firefighting, as well as confined space and vertical rescue simulations.
Miller was engrossed with his mobile phone when Mikey approached him at Stonehenge that afternoon, looking up somewhat startled and dragging on his cigarette when he realised Mikey nearby.
“Alright, Gray?” asked Mikey.
“Yeah mate, just trying to find the button to clear my phone.” Miller was often frustrated with technology, being one of the eldest in the crew. “I can’t find the bloody button!”
“What are you trying to do, mate?” asked Mikey while lighting up a fag.
“I need to clear this bloody phone,” said Miller, pausing for a moment. . . “I want to give it to my cousin,” he said.
Mikey pulled on his cigarette, blowing a cloud while looking over Miller’s shoulder and pointing at the screen filled with settings. “There, mate, click that one. . . Then that one. . . Hit confirm.”
Miller was two-thumbs deep on it, confirming the phone wiped clean as the green Android waved goodbye. “That’s it. Cheers Mikey.”
“You gonna get an Apple when you give that Samsung piece of shit to your cuz?”
“Nah mate,” said Miller as he put the erased phone in his pocket and sucked on his cigarette. “I’m used to this brand.”
“Clearly…” Mikey grinned and winked.
Miller was on the fabled 7:7 shift at Cloudbreak, the most favoured roster. A week at the remote site for work, then a week at home or elsewhere depending on your particular recreational pursuits. Miller’s was a week of remote mine site emergency services operations and training, followed by a week of remote speccing. Other than the group tasks such as firefighting and simulated rescue training – dragging dummies around in the red dirt – Miller mostly preferred to operate solo. Although, he had gone on a few prospecting trips with one of the workers at Cloudbreak in the past, a grader driver known as Ant Man.
Ant was by chance at work that week, too. He was on the standard two weeks on, one week off roster that all the operators worked. When their breaks had aligned during the past four years of knowing each other, Miller and the Ant Man had visited several of Miller’s favourite prospecting patches, and had abseiled down old abandoned mine shafts together, roping down the holes using the winch attached to Miller’s quad bike to lower and ascend each other. Miller’s ESO training had honed these skills and instilled confidence enough to carry out these extremely dangerous tasks in remote locations.
“G’day Gray,” the Ant Man smiled toward his old mate when they crossed paths in the dry mess one evening. “How was your break? Go speccing?”
“Yeah, Ant. Went up Sandstone way with the Kehlets,” Miller replied. “Got them up to speed on the speccing then left them to it.”
“Oh yeah,” Ant raised a brow. “Hope they don’t find anything, aye,” he laughed.
“Yeah, nah nah, yeah they’ll be right,” mumbled Miller. “They took their bloody dog up there. It kept leaving camp. Instead of speccing we had to keep chasing the fecking dawwwg.”
“Ahhh that’s no good.”
“Yeah, nah mate. Not good.”
“Ah well mate, they’ll be right. . . You headed back up there on yerrr break?”
“Nah mate. Tried to call and message Ray a couple times this week, but he’s not answered.”
“Ah, right mate. Okay then. . . Well, catch ya next time.” Ant raised his tray full of unrecognisable red meats and obscure steaming vegetables.
“Righto mate, yeah. Have a good one.” Miller raised his tray of dirty, emptied plates in return, the pair parting ways for the evening.
On the following Monday, day seven of his seven on, seven off roster, Miller returned to Cloudbreak’s Pilbara airport to catch a flight back to Perth. Before entering the small terminal, Miller kicked his feet along the carpark tarmac, removing the red mud that had caked and set high up within the lugs on the soles of his work boots. He was soon through the informal check-in and seated in the plane’s emergency aisle, his regular allotment thanks to his vocational training and position. The plane lifting off and sharply turning, passing over the gorgeous gorges of Karijini then heading toward Perth.
Halfway through its journey to Perth, the plane floated over Western Australia’s vast outback, with the red centre and copper and salt hues of the Goldfields and Murchison beneath them. Had Miller peered out the lefthand window of the plane at that moment, he might have seen that years of cycling floods followed by droughts had turned the landscape into a scene like the surface of a heart; the dark veins of blood, irregular in their patterns and behaviour, pouring toward him.
Perhaps he never did. Perhaps, like most others, he let those degrees of global latitude pass by without experiencing a thing, waiting until the city’s urban sprawl welcomed him home. Had he done so though, he could have momentarily seen the true beauty of the outback. That vast unspoiled scenery that can only be truly appreciated when it is viewed from high above. Like, from a plane window. Or, when your soul leaves your body.
3. New Moon
Even the moon was in shadow over the course of that weekend in March that would prove never to be honestly spoken of. The sun, ashamed by what it had illuminated during the day, hid behind the earth at night. A small sliver of the new moon finally began to shine again the night Miller returned to Perth from Bell Chambers, as if the sun peered past the curvature of the earth that night to dare witness what chaos this new cycle would create.
Ella had guarded the camp that following morning, sending a warning call to two men whom she deemed a potential threat to her pack’s temporary den. Waiting the whole day for her companions to return, she had then ventured away from camp, vastly out of character for the Great Dane, following her nose for clues before encountering a couple on the gravel shortcut. “Her owners won’t be too far away,” those passers-by had declared late that afternoon before driving on. As dusk approached, Ella reluctantly sensed defeat, so returned to the familiarity of the Bell Chambers camp.
The chill of the evening crept through camp as the sun disappeared behind the horizon once again, and the shift-change of insect life signalled the coming night; the swarms of flies departing, soon replaced by the cadent chirps of grasshoppers and mole crickets. There was no other sound other than the leaves rustling and occasional branch creaking in the breeze, and the gentle breathing and often deep sighs from Ella the Great Dane laying on her doona between the camp trailers waiting, hoping, for her companions to return. The campfire, too, was extinguished with no one around to relight it. A blanket of stars soon filled the sky as darkness fell, the Milky Way unspoiled by any light pollution in this outback location reflecting back in Ella’s eyes as she rested her head gently on her paws, laying on the ground patiently confused.
Two days and nights passed as such, with Ella searching — waiting — searching. The Great Dane explored all avenues of general traffic within the short radius of their camp. There was the track they had all entered the Bell Chambers prospecting location together on the southern side from the Paynes Find – Sandstone Road gravel shortcut, then a relatively heavily used albeit jagged and steep track headed north, joining onto another prospector’s track which created a loop back to the shortcut. Altogether five kilometres of rough, exposed rock track which resembled an unlucky horseshoe, linked to the shortcut.
To the south and east, the Bells Chambers tenement is fenced on all sides, between a mile or three in each direction from the Bell Chambers camp location. Outside of this large swathe of mineral-rich land lies a vast outback cattle station, the fence lines denoting a barrier between two already distinctly different landscapes, sand and gentler bush contrasts the sharp rock and barbed shrubs inside the perimeter. Dianne, the owner of Atley Station, whose homestead is a mere five miles as the crow flies from where Ray and Jennie were camped, was out checking fences and wild dog baits that week, unaware of the drama soon unfolding on the adjacent land. Driving the northernmost fence on that section of Atley Station’s property line (the southern fence of Bell Chambers’ tenement), Dianne noted unaccounted tyre marks on her property. She stopped her utility, leaving it running, and got out to inspect, carrying her rifle as she always did in this—her—part of the world. Bloody tourists, Dianne thought to herself, noting the tyre marks turning sharply and returning back in the direction they had entered, back to the shortcut. Dianne returned to the cab and continued her survey of Atley Station’s land, dropping fresh baits for the prolific wild dogs that roamed in search of prized calves.
Eric Murphy, the Sandstone shire works supervisor, was also traveling in the region during this time, checking road conditions in planning for upcoming grading schedules. On the Tuesday, the third day of Ella’s search, Eric encountered the Great Dane on the shortcut as he was returning to Sandstone. Rounding a righthand corner then shortly after passing Atley Station’s fence line, Eric slowed his works’ vehicle after spotting the black and white mottled dog trotting in his direction, on the gravel link of the unlucky horseshoe. The Great Dane paid the vehicle no heed, focused on sniffing the air for signs of her companions. Eric noted that the dog had a collar with a large registration tag scaled to suit the size of the Dane. Considering it therefore someone’s pet and they surely nearby given the remote location, Eric accelerated past to return to his workplace in town.
Another two days and three nights passed with Ella none the wiser for why she was left alone in this stark outback location. It had been nearly a week since she was last fed her usual gourmet dinners, let alone offered a rogue bone or slice of steak from the campfire. Her water bowl was now whatever puddles she encountered during daily searches. The wildlife had returned to the remote camp, too. Ella had heard the insects building nests, and contended with bungarras—sand goannas—who were insistent on taking over her spot beneath her companions’ vehicles. The camp had taken on an unfamiliar odour, with unpowered fridges now rank and putrid. Waking on her doona as the night was extinguished by bright sunlight, Ella was hungry, tired, thirsty, and considering the call of the wild.
On the afternoon of the coming quarter moon, Ella’s ears pricked up. A vehicle was approaching. She sat up high on her doona, ears folded forward, waiting to see if it was perhaps her companions, finally returned to collect her from this nightmare.
John and Dennis, retirees who were searching for a new camp location to bring their caravan full of wives and prospecting equipment, drove in slowly along the southern track to Bell Chambers. Reaching the junction nearby Ray and Jennie’s camp, they stopped and waited for anyone to venture out and greet the pair. From their cab, sitting fifty metres or so away, the camp seemed still in order. Sitting on its haunches, appearing inquisitive, a Great Dane stared back at them. No one else stirred. It seemed that whoever’s camp it was must be out speccing.
“Damn, looks like this camp spot’s taken,” said John.
“Yeah, looks like a good one, too,” Dennis replied.
“Yep, the ladies would have loved it. Look, nice big shady tree, flat ground, fresh grass from the recent rains…”
“Oh well, maybe next time.”
The pair drove on, headed north carefully along the steep and sharp-rocked track to explore other options, leaving Ella dumbfounded as to what to do next. A quarter-mile up the track, John and Dennis spotted a red quad bike parked beneath bushes off to the left of them. Considering it the campers’ quad and they speccing somewhere nearby, John and Dennis drove quietly by without too much consideration. The hill for the mile north was treacherous with washouts and sharp rocks, but taking it slowly the pair made it up the rise to where the track smooths and flattens out, passing by prominent abandoned mine shafts. Turning back toward the shortcut, yet still far inland, another flat and sheltered potential campsite appeared. John and Dennis parked and got out, kicking rocks and considering if it a suitable spot to bring their caravan and wives. Confirming such, they continued on that final leg of the unlucky horseshoe, back to the shortcut, turning north toward Sandstone and onward to collect their camp, to return the next day.
The quarter moon shone bright that night. Ella was at her wits’ end. She was exposed, tired and hungry. A bungarra had flicked dirt on her doona as it dug a hole nearby. Ella had never killed another living thing in her life, but she did consider squeezing the air out of that lizard. Her companions were gone and not coming back to this spot, Ella realised that now. Something stirred deep inside; rain was coming. It was time she moved on, or time would end her.
Next day, the manager of the Sandstone caravan park, Susan, was tidying up gardens, watering lawns, and chatting with park patrons when a friendly Great Dane trotted toward her, resting itself against her body. “Well hello there, dear! Who’s your owner?” Susan asked the Dane, rubbing the dog’s giant ears and neck noting it appeared thin. “You look hungry.”
Susan walked the Great Dane to a nearby bucket of clean water, where the dog lapped the entire contents down greedily. A dog lover herself, and having recently lost her own much loved companion, Susan had a bag of leftover biscuits that she also served to the Dane, who happily devoured them. Once the dog was fed and watered, Susan took her inside the park manager’s office and inspected it for injuries. Other than appearing thin and obviously thirsty, the Great Dane was clean and uninjured. Susan checked the dog’s collar. “Ella,” she said. “Nice to meet you, Ella.” Ella pushed her snout against Susan’s body. Turning the tag over, Susan wrote down the mobile number and retrieved her phone to call.
The call went straight to messages: “This is Ray Kehlet, please leave a message.”
“Yeah, hi Ray. Your dog, Ella, has just wandered into Sandstone caravan park. If you could give me a call when you get this message please, I’ll look after Ella in the meantime. Bye.”
Ella followed Susan like a giant shadow, leaning her head against the park manager whenever they were still. Susan patted the Great Dane in return, rubbing Ella’s ears and staring into her sorrowful eyes. “Oh you’re a beautiful girl, aren’t you?” she cooed.
Bell Chambers camp, twenty miles south of Sandstone, was now abandoned to wildlife. Two miles north of there, on the unlucky horseshoe track, John and Dennis had returned with their wives onboard, towing their caravan into the chosen prime camping spot found the day prior. The caravan had the moniker and callsign for other caravaners to reach out: ‘Golden nAUmads - UHF Ch19’. They parked up on the level ground, jacking the caravan square, opened awnings, and set up tables and chairs. The wives, Rose and Bea, were happy with their surroundings. John and Dennis could positively smell gold, so went about preparing their equipment.
“Who owns this land,” Rose asked while waving a champagne flute around, sat at their camp table with Bea, both in crisp linen.
“Urania Minerals are the tenement holders for this spot, love,” replied John.
Rose gave John the over-the-glasses look. “Do they know we’re here?”
John sighed. “Of course they do, love. We’ve got all the permits.” Rose always checked, but not until they were already set up.
“Good,” said Rose, returning to her chat with Bea, the bubbles in their flutes dancing in the bright sunshine.
John quickly threw his backpack full of snacks, water, Personal Locator Beacon (PLB) and GPS over his shoulder and grabbed his metal detector. “Let’s go,” he nodded at Dennis, the pair striding away from the caravan in search of gold. The pair of prospectors walked east along the common track, planning to head off-track once they had put some more distance between themselves and the Paynes Find - Sandstone Road shortcut. They had covered less than a couple of hundred yards when they encountered the abandoned mine shafts that they had driven past the day before, prominent alongside the prospecting track. Walking by, Dennis noted a foul odour.
“Smells like a kanga has ended up down one of these shafts, John.”
John turned his nose up and took in a deep draught. “Oh god yeah. Something dead down there for sure.”
“It’s pretty close to the camp, do you reckon it’ll be alright?”
John sucked his finger and held it up in the breeze. “It’s a westerly, so should be okay.”
“What’s the weather forecast?”
“No idea, mate. I haven’t looked since we left home a fortnight ago.”
“Well if it turns easterly, you know we’ll be in the shit.”
John turned and looked back at the Golden nAUmads camp and sighed, “Don’t I know it.”
Dennis and John walked carefully off-track, down a rocky incline before stopping and surveying the unspoiled land surrounding them. “Looks like a good spot, Den,” said John.
“Yeah mate, let’s find some gold.”
The pair turned on their detectors and donned their headphones connected to the instrument panels, spending the afternoon swaying their metal detectors back and forth over the rocky ground, stopping to scratch the dirt if and when a shrill tone sounded indicating something potentially valuable beneath them. In this perpetual search, they found peace.
Back in Sandstone, Susan was concerned that she hadn’t heard from Ella’s owner as yet. I better let the shire know, she thought. It was a Saturday afternoon, but in a small town like Sandstone, where everyone knows everyone else, she simply called on a friend.
“Hi Eric,” Susan spoke into her mobile phone while sat at her office, with Ella resting her head in Susan’s lap.
“G’day Susan, how can I help?”
“I’ve got someone’s dog turned up at the caravan park this morning. I’ve tried their number a few times, but there’s no answer.”
“What kind of dog is it?”
Susan looked down at Ella, gently patting her head. “A black and white Great Dane. She is a beautiful dog, very friendly.”
Eric frowned. “I think I saw that dog out on the Paynes Find road last week.”
“Oh yeah. She was pretty hungry and thirsty when she turned up here.”
“What’s the owner’s name?”
“The tag says ‘Ray’, and has a mobile number, but it’s switched off.”
Eric scratched his temple. Ray. That rings a bell. “I’ll pop over.”
“Thanks Eric.” Susan put the phone down and put her hands gently under Ella’s chin. “We’ll find your home, beautiful girl.”
In the background, the television was playing the afternoon Golden West Network news. The presenter pointed toward the map behind him, “… and the Mid West weather forecast for tomorrow, Sunday 29th March, is fine, moderate to fresh easterly winds, with a chance of rain developing…”
Eric soon pulled into the caravan park, stepping out of his vehicle as Susan approached from the manager’s office with Ella. “Yep, that’s the dog I saw,” he said. “I had a ‘Ray’ fella hounding me to get out on the shortcut, when we had it closed due to the storms. Might be a coincidence, but I’ll look into it.” Eric gave Ella a pat, noting that the Great Dane was firmly moulded to Susan’s side. “Looks like she’s picked you as a soft touch, Sue,” he grinned.
Susan smiled, and placed her hand affectionately on Ella’s shoulder.
“I’ll call Beth and get her to bring the microchip reader over,” said Eric.
“Thanks, Eric,” said Susan, rubbing the Great Dane’s neck, while the sun quietly set behind them, retreating beneath the earth’s curvature, exhausted by knowing what chaos this new cycle would soon bring.
4. Zephyr
An easterly breeze had collected every joule of thermal energy from the greater Australian inland desert systems, en route to the Greenough coastline to soothe the atmosphere by quenching itself over the ocean. It passed by the Goldfields, absorbing the ether on its way—dust and heat, salt and ash—soon encountering the Golden nAUmad caravaners located at the northern track of Bell Chambers prospecting tenement, south of Sandstone.
Rose and Bea did not ask for too much. An understanding and compromise had been made upon retirement years prior; the two couples enjoyed each other's company, they coveted travel and adventure, and happily took every opportunity to see the natural beauty of the Australian countryside. Their husbands had developed a love of prospecting during their earlier travels, which had taken the couples to many rugged and remote locations. Rose and Bea cherished these moments and memories, and the stories they could tell their families and friends after each trip. While John and Dennis prospected, all that the ladies asked in return was a comfortable camp ambience, and to keep their stocks of Prosecco chilled. So, when that easterly breeze collected and transported the foul smell that Dennis and John had encountered the prior afternoon, simmered by the morning heat then wafted directly to their caravan front door, Rose and Bea were livid.
“My God, John! What is that horrible smell?” Rose shrieked out the caravan’s small kitchen window.
John turned and groaned at Dennis as they sat outside on the camp chairs. Sitting alongside them, Bea, who to that moment had let the vulgar stimulus pass by unnoticed, turned her nose skyward then recoiled in shock. “Dennis!” she yelled, “That is disgusting!”
“It wasn’t me, love!” Dennis implored. He pointed east along the prospecting track, “We think there’s a dead kangaroo down one of those mine shafts up on the rise there.”
Rose came bursting out the caravan door. “You what?” Her eyes pierced John’s soul. “You knew about this?”
John raised his hands in defence. “Listen love, we only noticed it yesterday afternoon when we walked by, after we’d already set up camp. We were in the ‘cruiser with the windows up when we came by the other day. Besides, how were we to know that the wind would change?”
Rose folded her arms and grimaced. “Well I suggest you two do something about it. We cannot stay here with that foul smell lingering.”
John and Dennis bounded upright and marched off toward the mine shafts. As they approached, the smell worsened with that easterly breeze punctuating it above all other senses. The two could easily distinguish which shaft the foul odour emanated from, with an array of swollen, black flies buzzing in a halo above the entrance. John and Dennis reached the edge and peered down, past the centuries-old wooden collar. The sunlight penetrated only a few metres before darkness enveloped the deep mine shaft, and the threat of slipping and joining whatever might be at the base caused the pair to back away.
“What the hell are we gonna do, Den?” asked John.
Dennis smirked. “She’ll be right, John. That breeze won’t last all day.”
That breeze, a mixture of inland heat, eucalyptus and dead bodies, carried on west, soon passing by the Mount Magnet police station, the nearest station to their outback location, eighty miles (one hundred and thirty kilometres) as the crow flies away. Another two hundred miles farther, it reached the coastal region of Greenough. Standing there on a lonely reef, knees deep in the incoming rolling waves with fishing rods in hand, a middle-aged couple simply cast their muelies high into the air, letting the easterly breeze that they’d forecast carry the baits out through the bright sunlight, across turquoise ocean to a school of tailor swimming offshore who quickly devoured the muelies with savage strikes, engaging the pair in a euphoric, acrobatic battle.
“I could stand here for an eternity,” the man smiled broadly.
His wife’s eyes sparkled, reflecting the waves. “We have to head home at some time or other.”
***
Mount Magnet police station was unusually busy that day, with one job on the table. A lady by the name Elizabeth had called. Her partner’s parents’ dog turned up at Sandstone caravan park. The parents haven’t been heard from for ten days. Their camp location is unknown - south of Sandstone. It was a fairly nondescript game of Cluedo so far, but Constable Lane was relieved to finally have something to think about other than sitting in the patrol car on Great Northern Highway raising government revenues by booking families and retirees for driving ten kilometres an hour over the speed limit.
Elizabeth had told Constable Lane that her partner, Melanie, was recovering from hospitalisation at home, so when Mel’s phone rang, Elizabeth had answered. It was the shire of Sandstone. They had identified a Great Dane via its microchip and called the primary number—Melanie’s father—several times without answer, therefore calling Mel as secondary contact on the microchip register. Ella, Ray and Jennie’s dog, had strolled into the caravan park, hungry and thirsty. Elizabeth remembered that Ray had left a satellite phone number for emergencies, so she had then called it. Ray and Jennie’s friend, Gray Miller, answered the call. Miller had taken the satellite phone with him when he returned to Perth the week before.
“Miller said that Ray and Jennie were headed toward Kalgoorlie to see Ray’s other daughter,” Elizabeth informed the constable. “Miller left their camp last Sunday morning, said he hadn’t seen them that whole day before, and that he left without saying goodbye. That’s over a week ago now. … Sandstone shire said that you were the closest police.”
The Mount Magnet station was a far cry from Lane’s start in policing, having immigrated to Western Australia from London when the mining boom was in full swing, when local police recruits were in short demand. Lane’s desire to see the “beauty of the Australian Outback” had so far not gone quite as expected. With Mount Magnet’s population merely in the hundreds, Lane’s big-city anonymity was gone, replaced by domestic disputes and bitumen highways that went straight toward the horizon as far as the eye could see.
“Do you want to file a Missing Persons report?” asked Lane in the Queen’s finest English accent.
“Yes,” replied Elizabeth, also a first-generation migrant from the motherland, her tone of accent immediately matching this foreign copper in familial reciprocation. “Yes, my partner and I most certainly do. We hold grave concerns for their wellbeing.”
“We will make some enquiries with Sandstone shire first,” said Lane. “Rest assured, we get hundreds of missing persons reports up this way that turn out to be false. There is a high chance your parents will simply be stranded, awaiting help. I will make some calls and get back to you.”
As Constable Lane placed the phone down on its cradle, the sky above turned dark. A storm hit the MidWest drenching the interior with inches of rain, quenching dust and heat, salt and ash, and that easterly breeze carrying an ether of eucalyptus oils and dead bodies past the Mount Magnet police station doors, windows and cells.
Eighty miles east of there, the Golden nAUmad caravaners breathed a deep sigh of relief. The abandoned mine shaft on the hill, a short stroll from their location, was being doused with gallons of water, finally quelling a god-awful smell.
5. Petrichor
The distinctive scent which accompanies the first rain after a long, warm, dry spell.
Two rifles lay across the back seat of the black Land Rover four wheel drive; one was stored inside its padded case, the other was exposed, easily visible and attainable to any passer-by. Due to the remote location, Eric wasn’t too concerned by the fact they were visible; he was more concerned that the gun was clearly loaded, with its magazine inserted, ready to fire. And, the vehicle was unlocked. Even the windows were down. The recent heavy rain had showered the vehicle’s interior, the loaded rifle included. Eric turned from the car door to survey the camp scene once again: Two four wheel drives, two trailers, a rooftop tent, a line of washed clothing strung between tree and trailer, the camp chairs and table with a pair of reading glasses and two coffee cups on top. Nothing appeared to be sinister, except that loaded rifle and the stench of rotten food. The entire camp had been drenched with rain, washed clean except for the foul odours emanating from rank coolers and an unpowered camp fridge. Eric walked over to the camp table. The cups of tea or coffee had been half-consumed, the rain had then filled the vessels to the rim with the rainwater separating from the layer of milky contents under, resulting in two cold cups of outback café mélange.
Eric scanned the surrounding bush. Nothing. Not a sound. Eric’s worker from Sandstone Shire was waiting by their four wheel drive, leaning against the roo-bar, staring at his boots. “What do you make of this, Rod?”
Rodney didn’t change state. “Not my job,” he murmured.
Eric shook his head. “Make yourself useful and grab the sat phone, would ya.”
Rodney moved with the speed of a sloth to the rear door of their work vehicle and retrieved the satellite phone. “Phhought this was only for emergencies,” he mumbled.
“There might be an emergency pretty soon if ya don’t hurry up!”
Rodney dragged his feet over to Eric who snatched the satellite phone from him, then turned back to lean against the roo-bar and await further inconvenience.
“Ever thought of a career change, Rod?” Eric snarked toward Rodney as he punched in the number for Mount Magnet Police Station then held the phone to his ear. “You’d have made a good copper, I reckon.”
Constable Lane answered the call from Mount Magnet station. Eric relayed the scene to him. Deserted camp. Appears to have been deserted for a while. Rifles in one vehicle. Unlocked. Loaded. Lane instructed Eric to secure the rifles and take them back to Sandstone Shire where police officers would collect them. “What are the regos?” Lane asked.
Eric read the registration plates out to the constable.
“We just had a call about this couple,” said Lane. “Raymond and Jennie Kehlet. Their dog turned up in Sandstone.”
“I know,” said Eric. “That’s why I came out here for a look.”
“How did you know where to look?”
“Logic and reasoning, constable. Logic and reasoning.” Eric hung up the call, rolling his eyes. “Come over here, Rod. We’ve gotta take these guns.” Rodney frowned. Eric turned at him sharply, “If you say ‘not my job’ one more time, I swear to God . . .I’ll use one of those bullets, Rod. Don’t try me.” Eric opened the car door and carefully lifted out the loaded rifle, removing the magazine. He pulled back the bolt lever. “Bloody hell, they even left a bullet in the breach!”
***
The Golden nAUmad caravan crew were in a cheerful mood when Eric and Rodney had passed them by earlier that day, although they were busy digging their four wheel drive out of the mud. The way that rain reset everything in the outback always fascinated them. Footprints, campfires, tyre marks – all were erased and the earth returned to a blank canvas. Should you be standing in the one spot as the rain fell, then waited for the sun to shine and bake the earth back to dry, there would be no sign of what direction you had entered. Their four wheel drive was working proof of the phenomena, having sunk into the mud while the rain fell, then settled into place as the ground baked solid, trapping the wheels in the earth by nothing other than its own imobility under deluge. Rose and Bea’s cheeks flushed now that the petrichor air had replaced the foul smell which lingered only hours prior. The prospecting track and hill to the east was also restored afresh, including whatever dead beast that lay at the base of the mine shaft, now rinsed and sanitised.
Dennis and John were swinging shovels when Eric and Rodney entered their track off the Paynes Find-Sandstone shortcut, stopping to chat to the shire workers when they drove their four wheel drive alongside the camp. A Great Dane had turned up in town. The owner’s name had matched a guy who had been calling Eric weeks before, to open the shortcut. Eric presumed that this ‘Ray’ fellow might be camped in this area, further justified by Eric’s own encounter with the dog, out on the shortcut the week before. John confirmed as such, “There’s a camp about two kilometres down the hill there,” John pointed east then south. “We saw a Great Dane there a few days ago. There wasn’t anyone there when we went past, and we haven’t seen anyone up this way since.”
Eric was thanking the men for their help and about to drive off when Rose shouted from inside the caravan. “What was that?” asked Eric.
John looked down and shook his head. “Don’t worry, there’s nothing you can do about it. My wife wanted you to sort out a dead animal that’s down that mine shaft up on the hill there.”
“That’s not my job,” Rodney promptly announced from the passenger seat, as Eric closed his eyes and sighed.
“I know, mate,” said John. “Maybe just put your windows up when you drive by. It’s a horrible stench.” Eric raised a thumb and drove on, disappearing over the rise toward the southern camp.
John and Dennis continued the recovery of their vehicle, shortly afterward freeing the trapped tyres. The sun shined bright and birds chirped cheerfully – life was good and normal once more. After a short rest, they decided to explore more areas for prospecting, leaving their wives at camp and setting off toward the south, in the direction that the shire workers had driven, and where they had entered the prospecting tracks and camps from the shortcut days prior. Walking by the mine shafts on the hill, the men noted that the foul smell was still noticeable, although somewhat diminished — a faint lingering death remained. Turning south, they made their way carefully down the steep section of prospecting track, cautious of the loose rocks and washouts that could easily cause an injury, cancelling their camping trip with immediate effect. They walked about a mile from their camp when they came across the red quad bike, still parked in the same location that they had seen it when they entered the site days ago. John mentioned to Dennis that it was only visible when approached from the south; they had only seen it walking in their direction due to scanning the surroundings for potential speccing sites. The pair inspected the quad, finding that there were no keys in the ignition, and that it had most definitely been in the same position for days, as all incoming tyre marks were washed away, and the quad itself clean as a whistle from the recent rain.
The men thought it best to let the shire workers know, figuring that they would not have seen the quad when they drove down from the north. John and Dennis walked further on toward the campsite. Reaching the junction, they discovered that the shire workers had already left, having apparently done so via the southern access track to the shortcut. The pair decided to check the campsite for any indication of its inhabitants.
Two four wheel drives, two trailers, a rooftop tent, a line of washed clothing strung between tree and trailer, camp chairs and a table with a pair of glasses and two cups of outback café mélange on top. Everything was open and unlocked. The vehicle’ windows were all partially down. John and Dennis peered through the rear window of the black Land Rover. A wasp nest was buzzing on the rear passenger door opposite them, the size of a dinner plate. Bungarras had dug holes underneath the wheels of the trailers. The men looked at each with concern. “No one has been here for weeks,” John whispered to Dennis, as if by talking aloud he might enrage the wasps and lizards. Circling around the Land Rover, they found a note on the windscreen, left by the shire workers, notifying the owners to call Eric about their rifles. “Something is not right about all this, Den,” John now proclaimed loudly. “We need to call the shire.”
Dennis opened the passenger door and searched the glovebox for a pen and paper, to write down Eric’s phone number. He found that a man’s wallet was left in there, with no money inside. Cards and licences were tucked into the wallet’s pockets. Finding a pen, he then tore off an edge of a map that was in the door pocket. John read out the number and Dennis wrote it down, then he closed the door. Stepping away from the camp, John saw that a handheld UHF radio was left attached to one of the trailers. Believing time was critical, he hoped to call Rose and Bea back at the caravan and relay their findings. He switched the radio on and turned the channel to 19.
“Golden nAUmads, Golden nAUmads, copy?” … “Golden nAUmads, Golden nAUmads, copy?” … “Rose and Bea, Rose and Bea, copy?” … Nothing. Not a sound. “We better get back, Den.” John switched the radio back to its original channel — 50 — and the two men strode off north, to reach the caravan and satellite phone posthaste, to call the shire and report their concerns. They passed the red quad bike, wondering if it was purposely hidden from the northern direction. A mile on, they passed the mine shaft with that lingering smell of death. John and Dennis both recoiled, without having to say the words to one another. Their pace quickened toward the caravan.
“Rose!” John yelled as they approached camp, the dried earth beneath his feet crunching under his gait leaving fresh prints in the dust. “Grab the sat phone will ya, love. We need to call the shire back. Something smells funny down there.”
6. April Fools
What was left of the calf lay splayed out under the breakaway — a low limestone cave carved by wind and rain beneath a granite overhang. Dianne rested her rifle across her leg as she squatted beside the carcass, lifting its rear by the hoof to confirm what she already suspected. Wild dogs. Dianne stood and turned, sweeping the vast, sparsely vegetated mulga and aptly named dead finish acacia scrubland surrounding her, holding the rifle low yet ready to raise to her shoulder should she spot the culprits. The packs of wild dogs that roamed this land were the scourge of Dianne’s immense outback station, picking off calves or weaker cattle then dragging them back to these temporary dens and feasting on the helpless beasts, starting from the hind end. Dianne kept her gaze focused on shaded areas under shrubs where she knew the dogs would be resting from the heat as she made her way back to her four wheel drive utility. She racked the rifle in its carrier above the seats then opened a cooler box in the rear tray, the lid covered in yellow stickers showing a skull and crossbones inside a triangle, and POISON written in bold underneath. Dianne lifted a hand-full of packaged dried meatballs loaded with 1080 out of the container then hurled them with contempt back toward the breakaways.
Dianne’s patrol of Atley Station, which she regularly undertook each fortnight, took the entire day, inspecting perimeter fence lines and water troughs, and monitoring the welfare of her livestock herds on the property which covers an area the size of the entire island country of Singapore. On the final leg of her journey, turning west off the Paynes Find-Sandstone gravel road which dissects her station, Dianne spotted something metallic and bright red a few hundred yards ahead, laying just off the rough track which ran toward a cattle yard and water tank, ten kilometres south of the station’s homestead. Stopping alongside it, Dianne stepped out of her utility and picked up the foreign item — a car fire extinguisher. She turned the canister over in her hand and noted that it was nearly brand new. It had clearly fallen off of someone’s vehicle, who had wrongfully accessed the station’s land sometime in that last fortnight. “Bloody tourists,” Dianne muttered to herself, placing the extinguisher in the tray of her vehicle before driving on.
Dianne returned to her family homestead before sunset, it being the only dwelling in this remote and rugged expanse. That evening, an unusual sound filled the air; the gentle breeze that typically swayed the tall eucalypts surrounding the home, soothing Dianne’s spirits after a long day with its tranquil metronome, was being overshadowed by a thundering aeroplane sweeping the skies, back and forth across the land immediately north of her station. Dianne stepped out onto her patch of lawn and looked up at the plane, tracking its blinking red light as it passed low overhead. “What bloody fool has got themselves lost this time?” she wondered aloud.
The plane, a Dornier 328, had been mobilised from Perth by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA). It was equipped with night vision and infrared radiometer to detect any heat sources. Dianne’s silhouette, standing there on the ground only a thousand feet below with a glass of wine in one hand and the other raised with the middle finger of that hand pointing high toward the cockpit, glowed iridescent green on the mapping screen. The pilot banked the plane hard, turning the aircraft around and back north to sweep another section of the search area for two missing persons that had been reported that afternoon by Geraldton police — April Fools day, 2015.
Mount Magnet police station had been a flurry of activity that morning, with Constable Lane telephoning relatives of Ray and Jennie gathering information on where they might be. Ray and Jennie had been secretive about their intended prospecting location, so no one in the family was able to provide him with information on the campsite’s location. No one had heard from either of the couple since the 18th March, two weeks ago, either. Meanwhile, Eric Murphy from Sandstone Shire had identified the camp the day prior — Bell Chambers — so Mount Magnet police sent another officer, Constable Taylor to the site. Taylor was a local to the area, having grown up in Mount Magnet before joining the police force then returning to his hometown station. The area where the couple had camped was however unfamiliar to the officer, so he contacted the Sandstone Shire to request assistance. Sandstone Shire’s president, Beth, advised Taylor that her husband would be available to take the constable to Bell Chambers.
Beth’s husband, Bradley, is a local prospector. A Goliath of a man, Bradley poses a figure of those hardened individuals of the former era who moved whole landscapes with their bare hands. Constable Taylor and Bradley arrived at the northern track to Bell Chambers mid-morning, encountering firstly a four wheel drive MAN truck fitted out with a mobile home. Its inhabitant was prospecting nearby, and seeing the police vehicle approaching promptly hid himself behind a mulga tree. Constable Taylor called out to the man, asking him if he had seen any other campers nearby. The MAN truck man warily peered past the tree and said that he had not, and that he had only just arrived and would be leaving again that day.
“He’s got no permit to prospect here,” boomed Bradley.
“How do you know that?” asked the officer.
“Why do you reckon he hid?”
Taylor appeared puzzled as they drove on along the prospecting track. They soon reached the Golden nAUmad caravaners who were packing up their camp ready to depart. Bradley and Taylor parked nearby and greeted the retirees, the officer questioning their discoveries. John, Dennis, Rose, and Bea told the constable what they had found.
“We’ve been here five days … haven’t seen anyone since arriving … their camp appears to have been abandoned for weeks … wasp nest on the rear door … bungarra holes underneath the trailers … the red quad bike seemed to be hidden … there’s a smell coming from that mine shaft on the rise, something is dead down there!”
The Golden nAUmad crew were leaving early, because it all smelt too baleful.
Taylor and Bradley made their way to the identified mine shaft. Bradley harshly advised the constable to not approach the shaft too closely, as it could collapse. The two local men both exuded equal confidence; Bradley having earned his authority from decades of experience and capital success in the region; Constable Taylor’s assertiveness was formulated in a 28-week training course at the Western Australian Police Academy. Their contradictory personalities walked a parallel path to the Bell Chambers abandoned mine shaft.
Taylor got within a metre or so of the shaft’s two openings before recoiling from the smell. The constable recalls saying, “Something is dead down there,” lifting his collar over his nose. Bradley heard the officer say, “That smells like a cadaver!”
Bradley observed flies or black hornets coming out of the mine shaft, whereas the officer made no note of such.
They walked around the abandoned mine shaft searching the area for any further clues. Taylor spotted a kangaroo carcass in a hollow three metres or so to the east, and noted it as potentially the source of the smell. Bradley saw the same carcass, identifying it as skin and bone, and having no odour.
Their paths finally converged once they reached the campsite in their search that day, with collective agreement that the camp was indeed abandoned and appeared to have been so for a long period of time. The pair patrolled the surrounding area, Bradley showing Taylor the locations of several adjacent abandoned mine shafts, which they shined the officer’s Maglite torch within observing that the torch was useful to only ten metres or thereabouts, and many shafts were far deeper.
After their search, Constable Taylor dropped Bradley back to Sandstone then returned to Mount Magnet, relaying his observations to Constable Lane. With the gathered information and findings, Lane concluded it was appropriate to commence a missing persons report, and all information was forwarded to the regional Land Search and Rescue (LandSAR) centre at Geraldton Police Station.
A crack team was soon formulated. Incident Controller, Sergeant Nolan, would oversee the search from the Geraldton headquarters, and trained LandSAR officer Sergeant Hoskins would lead the team on the ground, based in Sandstone and on site at Bell Chambers as the Forward Commander. The State Emergency Services (SES), Tactical Response Group (TRG), and the Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES) were all put on standby. Sergeant Hoskins made his way to Bell Chambers that afternoon while Nolan reviewed notes and followed up on several calls.
Sergeant Nolan identified that the last person to have seen the couple alive was a Mr. Miller from a suburb south of Perth. Nolan called the man and Miller seemed surprised that the couple, his friends, had been reported missing. Miller regurgitated his rehearsed story that he last saw Ray and Jennie on the morning of the 21st March, having loaned the couple his quad bike to chase their dog who kept running from camp. He then asserted that he went prospecting alone for twenty hours non-stop, returning to camp in the early hours of the next morning. Ray and Jennie had apparently then parked his quad on his trailer for him ready to leave. Miller said that the couple did not stir from their tent, and so Miller left camp before sunrise on the 22nd March and returned home via Mount Magnet.
Sergeant Hoskins reached the Bell Chambers area later that afternoon, entering the southern track and soon reaching the abandoned campsite. Two four wheel drives, two trailers, a rooftop tent, a line of washed clothing strung between tree and trailer, camp chairs and table with a pair of reading glasses and two coffee cups on top, and foul odours emanating from rank coolers and an unpowered camp fridge. Hoskins stared at the camp table, at the two half-consumed cups of outback café mélange. There was no sign of struggle anywhere in camp. No overturned equipment, nothing thrown about. It looked like they had been sitting there together in one moment then simply gotten up from that table and . . .walked away.
The Forward Commander continued his survey of the entire Bell Chambers site, confirming that all was as reported by the three previous groups of observants. Reaching the northern prospecting track on the unlucky horseshoe, Sergeant Hoskins parked nearby the campsite previously occupied by the Golden nAUmad retirees. His field notes included reports of a foul odour emanating from a nearby mine shaft, further advised by Constable Tucker that there was a dead kangaroo nearby that would account for the smell. Sergeant Hoskins walked toward the abandoned mineshaft which was prominent and within a few hundred yards of the caravaners’ campsite, as stated in his notes. He came within a couple of metres of the mineshaft, observing the mounds of diggings nearby the two shaft openings, and concluded that it would be dangerous for anyone to approach any closer. Hoskins smelt the foul odour reported, which he attributed to a dead kangaroo. He decided that all shafts were to have a clearance zone taped off around each abandoned mine shaft in the area, for safety.
Leaving the site and driving back toward Sandstone, Sergeant Hoskins called the local Shire and ordered the Paynes Find-Sandstone shortcut to be closed to all traffic. There would be a search-plane in the air within hours, and they required no interference from false heat sources. The Forward Commander then called Sergeant Nolan, suggesting that they put together a media release with photos of the missing couple, to be aired as soon as possible in the hope that if anyone had sighted either of the pair they might come forward. Sergeant Nolan had requested photos from the missing couple’s family, passing them on to the Police Media Liaison team in Perth who whipped up a frenzy in the local news stations, choosing the photo that looked most like mugshots of Ray and Jennie — their worksite identification photographs. That evening, the first media releases of Ray and Jennie’s Outback Mystery were aired.
Late that night, in the closing hours of the 1st April 2015 — April Fools day — the AMSA search plane had returned to Perth, its night vision and heat detection data downloaded and forwarded to the LandSAR team. The results of all potential living bodies in an area slightly smaller than the island country of Singapore included one indomitable station owner, hundreds of livestock, thousands of kangaroos and emus, and a rogue wild dog pack glowing iridescent green on the mapping screen — whose location was of no use to anyone other than Dianne, who was now sound asleep inside her station homestead surrounded by tall eucalypts lulling her dreams, counting sheep and calves and eradicating their killers, a mere five miles south of a quiet outback murder scene.
7. 24 Hours
Ray and Jennie left Meridiem Ridge hours before dawn. Ella was in her first trial at the local kennel, dropped off the afternoon before. Their plane departed Perth airport in the early morning and flew two hours north across the changing landscape. The devoted couple, seated together in row seventeen, were wearing trucker-caps, safety sunglasses, and their allotted workwear of steel-capped boots, blue King Gee trousers, and high-visibility shirts as they grimaced at the breakfast service — an alfoil container of obscure colours and textures that were touted as eggs and bacon with a “hash brown”. The planeload of equally appointed workers finally passed over and landed just north of the gorgeous gorges of Western Australia’s Pilbara. It was the first day of work at Cloudbreak for Jennie, her training and tickets to become a heavy-haulage truck driver completed in the months prior. Ray ran this fortnightly gauntlet like clockwork, having completed the routine more times than he could count in the years prior. They caught the bus together from the small airport to site, where Ray and Jennie kissed, Ray tagging his site pass at the security gates and Jennie entering the ESO office for her compulsory site induction.
The entire day later, Ray returned to the gates, clocking off from work. Jennie’s induction had taken the same time, sitting in a small room with a dozen other fresh starters that day, watching slideshows of safety signage, site policies, environmental homage, and hours of filling out multiple choice questionnaires. She was frazzled, as was every other inductee in the room that day, including the instructor. Jennie’s stamp of completion was delivered in the ESO office, when she stood against a white wall while her photo was taken to print on her site pass, for identification. “Take your hat and glasses off, and keep still,” Jennie was instructed. She removed her cap, gave her hair and tired eyes a short rub then stood back looking forward at the camera. The flash went off, and her pass soon afterward printed.
Jennie was staring at her identification pass when Ray met her outside the site gates, a shocked look across her face. Ray grinned. “Give us a look, love.” Jennie snatched the pass away and shoved it in her pocket. Ray cackled as he wrestled his wife, both giggling, reaching into her pocket and pulling out the photographic evidence.
“It looks like a mugshot,” Jennie wailed.
Ray’s face arched back, laughing out loud toward the open sky. Looking back at the pass, Ray wiped happy tears from his eyes.
“Show me yours,” Jennie said, reaching into her husband’s pocket, holding his arm by the elbow as she cried laughing at Ray’s weathered face on his site pass.
“Easy, love, I’ve got feelings you know,” said Ray. “We could get some coffee cups made with our mugshots on them.”
She held the two passes together, snickering. “Oh no, no one else ever needs to see these incriminating photos.”
The couple walked off hand-in-hand toward the bus that would take them to their worksite accommodation, dreaming of the opportunities this new juncture in life would take them. Jennie, an artist. Ray, a farmer. Neither of those preferred vocations paid their bills in this corner of the globe; but given time and fortitude, with hard work and sacrifice, they would achieve their dreams.
Three years later, on April Fools day 2015, those workplace security photos would be broadcast to the world for other less wholesome purposes of identification.
“Tonight, a couple have been declared missing in the outback,” the news channels all declared as Ray and Jennie’s family and friends stared at their television sets numb in disbelief. “The couple’s last known whereabouts is a remote prospecting camp south of Sandstone in the Western Australian Goldfields. Police and volunteers are making their way . . .”
The next morning, search and rescue crews began the seemingly textbook task of locating the pair. A Robinson R22 helicopter was commissioned to travel to the remote region, refuelling at the local airport then taking off with a trained SES observer onboard to scour the terrain within a standard radius of their camp. PD Bucky, the MidWest and Gascoyne’s police recruit with the highest number of successful narcotics and violent offender’ arrests, a German Shepherd dog, also travelled to the campsite with his handler from Geraldton early that morning to track the couple’s movements before any other search crews would taint their scent. PD Bucky spent a good hour or more using his superior olfactory senses, sniffing the camp’s many odours then towing his handler onward and along the prospecting tracks, walking in circles but finding no path to follow. The Shepherd was then taken to the abandoned quad bike a quarter-mile north of the campsite, inhaling a deep draught of the air around it then shown the nearby mine shafts. PD Bucky, try as he might, could find no answer. After trotting along miles of rough ground, poking his bristled nose down dozens of shafts and openings, and snorting more red dust than he’d ever encountered in his life, Bucky finally sat down, admitting defeat, tongue hanging out the side of his elongated snout, staring at his handler with an expression that could only be interpreted as saying, “Yeah-nah, I’ve got nothin’. Maybe we should go to the Sandstone Pub; perhaps my training could be better utilised there.”
The search helicopter returned to the airstrip also without answer. Infra-red heat detection technology the night before, and the tried and trusted eagle-eyed detective work of trained operatives that morning — two textbook aerial searches — had found no trace of a single living human over hundreds of square kilometres of remote, otherwise uninhabited outback land.
The LandSAR team, led by Incident Controller Sergeant Nolan from Geraldton and Forward Commander Sergeant Hoskin locally in Sandstone, produced maps to section off the areas around the couple’s camp for ground-searches. A police trailer was towed into the southern track of Bell Chambers site for the LandSAR site headquarters, parking the remote office off the prospecting track a few hundred yards from the couple’s camp. Several small teams of SES volunteers and police officers were briefed on the maps and terrain, then scattered to survey their allocated sectors. All returned to the post hours later empty handed.
In the Geraldton Incident Control office, Sergeant Nolan was working on logistics, determining that if the missing couple could not be located in a short period of time with multiple aerial and ground searches, they may need to seek the assistance of their travel companion, to determine where else the pair may have ventured. Nolan called Mr Miller, asking if he would be willing to travel to Bell Chambers and show the search team where they had been prospecting together before he returned to Perth the fortnight prior. Miller sounded upset on the phone that his friends were still missing, and offered his immediate voluntary assistance. He would pack some camping gear and drive north, to arrive at the site by the following morning.
Sergeant Nolan then compiled a summary report of all data gathered to date, forwarding it to LandSAR’s primary consultant for Time Frame For Survival (TFFS) statistics, Dr. Luckin, a veteran of over thirty years study and active participation in search and rescue.
Ella, the missing couple’s much loved Great Dane, was picked up from her temporary dwelling at the Sandstone Caravan Park and brought to camp. It was hoped that she might lead the search team in the direction of the pair’s last prospecting movements. Ella’s limousine door was opened nearby the campsite, and she stepped out with dignity, her long legs reaching the ground with no drop in height of her body following. Ella stretched then stood for a long pause, lifting her head and smelling the air. She turned her gaze past the faces all watching for the dog’s next movements, fixing her stare on the vehicles and trailers of her companions. Ella momentarily turned to look at the limousine door, then returned her sight back, ambling over and curling up on her doona which was still laying on the ground beneath the trailers, as she had left it almost a week ago. She lay there with her enormous head resting against mottled paws, sorrowful eyes gazing past the many faces who were waiting for the Great Dane to do something other than . . .waiting.
Tactical Response Group (TRG) trackers arrived at Bell Chambers in the early afternoon. The team of trackers were quickly briefed and provided maps of all identified mine shafts in the surrounding area. The police and SES crews had been advised to keep a safe distance from all shaft openings, however the TRG were trained to approach the holes confidently — lying along the ground and keeping their centre of mass away from the shaft. If they have fallen into an abandoned shaft, they should be visible from above given that they would position themselves in a manner to be found. The TRG team promptly deployed, shining Maglite torches into any shafts less than ten metres deep, and dropping luminescent sticks into any greater. In their search, they identified further abandoned mine shafts not yet mapped, in total searching and clearing thirty-eight holes in the earth, including the most prominent abandoned mine shaft in the Bell Chambers prospecting tenement — located on the north-eastern corner of the unlucky horseshoe prospecting loop.
That particular shaft was a relatively easy one to clear. The pile of diggings atop the mine shaft allowed the TRG trackers ample ability to splay themselves along the ground with their weight centred well below a dangerous fulcrum. Peering over the edge, the TRG officer appointed to the shaft aimed his Maglite torch down the long vertical passage. Unable to see the base of the shaft, he reached into his equipment pack retrieving a luminescent stick. Cracking the stick and ensuring it was well lit before dropping it, the officer repositioned himself centre over the hole, his boots dug well into the ground behind him for stability, then let the stick drop, watching it bounce off the many ledges and fractured rocks lining the shaft walls before hitting the ground and illuminating the base of the shaft. The TRG officer estimated the shaft to be twelve metres deep. The base of the mine was clearly visible once illuminated, and no person could be seen positioned in a manner to be found.
It shouldn’t be this hard, the Forward Commander thought while ruminating on the search map now transposed onto a whiteboard attached to the side of the police trailer. Hundreds of people are declared “missing” in the Goldfields every season, most of whom are found in various states of undress within the first twenty-four hours of a well-executed search. And this was a very well executed search. At least one of the two should have been found by now, or at least some sign of them. Yet . . . Nothing.
Sergeant Hoskins used the trailer’s satellite phone to call Sergeant Nolan at the Geraldton Incident Control Centre. “They must have breached the borders of the search zone,” said Hoskins. “We’d have found at least something by now otherwise.”
“It’s getting late in the day,” Nolan lamented. “Let’s have one last shot at it. We’ll send in the Baron.”
Soon after the order was given, a twin-propeller Baron fixed-wing aircraft was deployed from Geraldton airport with a trained eagle-eyed SES observer onboard. The plane reached the Sandstone Goldfields region less than half an hour later, the pilot dropping altitude to five hundred feet and navigating to the perimeter of the identified search area. The plane flew several passes over and alongside all identified roads and outback tracks outside the search perimeter, and around a salt lake to the south that had filled with water after the recent heavy rain. They should be visible from above given that they would position themselves in a manner to be found.
The Baron aircraft returned barren.
Sergeant Hoskins and his teams of police, SES and TRG returned to Sandstone for the evening. Hoskins and Nolan compiled their reports for the day, calling one another to collaborate the information. Three separate aerial searches. Thirty-eight abandoned mine shafts cleared. Multiple ground searches. Two dogs. Nothing.
Sergeant Nolan’s email tinged, receiving a message from Dr. Luckin. “The TFFS report just arrived,” he informed Hoskins. “Not good news I’m afraid. Luckin has determined they are probably already deceased — by a matter of days, unfortunately.”
“How many days?”
“As many as five prior to the dog arriving in town, according to his report. At least a week now.”
Hoskins rubbed his forehead and sighed. “We’ve found nothing though. We can’t give up on them yet.”
“Their friend, Miller, will be there first thing tomorrow,” Nolan offered. “Let’s see if he can shed some light on it for us. I’ll rally DFES and get some more SES guys out there as well. I’ll call the families and let them know.”
Sergeant Hoskins hung up the call and stared at the maps and folders surrounding him. He opened a manila folder and lifted out Ray and Jennie’s identification photos, holding the two together at arms length in front of him. “We’ll find you,” he murmured. “Someone must know where you’ve gone.”
“Hopes are fading in the outback tonight, that a couple who were declared missing will be found, after police and volunteers searched hundreds of square kilometres in the past twenty-four hours without finding a single trace . . .” the news channels all declared that evening as Ray and Jennie’s family and friends stood shaking, transfixed in front of their television sets, anxiety-crazed in bewilderment.
8. Five News Perth
Dwayne made a grandiose entrance to the morning media briefing; his Personal Assistant, Emma, quickstepping behind him punching the day’s calendar schedule into a notebook as Dwayne rattled off his intended invites. “… and get Baz’s secretary on the phone straight away, I need to discuss the homeless situation with him. Pencil him in for eleven. There was a pile of goddamn food wrappers left outside my driveway last night, I nearly had to engage four-wheel-drive in the Range Rover just to get out of Mount Lawley this morning!”
“Baz…Baz…Baz?” Emma murmured attempting to recall the name.
“Baz Zempo, Emma! You know, the Mayor!” Emma still looked confused. “The nose, Emma. The nose!”
“Ohhh, yes, sorry Dwayne.”
Dwayne sat at the head of the table surrounded by Perth Channel 5’s brightest stars in journalism. “And keep my afternoon free, I’m taking the kids to Eagle Bay for the weekend.” Emma made a note then retreated out of the boardroom, closing the silvered-glass doors behind her. Dwayne swept the room with a penetrating gaze, met by several sets of rapacious eyes. He lifted his hands, palms upright like an orchestral conductor, “What have you got?”
Three journalists barked at once until the loudest voice drowned out the clamour. “Horror smash on the Mitchell Freeway this morning. Traffic banked up all the way to Beldon!”
“Horror smash?” Dwayne’s stare was piercing. “Horror! Smash! Haven’t we used our quota of ‘Horror’ this quarter already?” Dwayne lifted his iPhone to his ear and called his PA, “Emma, order a dozen thesauruses for the office. . . .it’s a book, Emma, just . . .google it, Emma. Thesaurus.” He returned presence to the room, “And where the hell is Beldon?”
“Near Joondalup, sir,” a small voice from the dark corner squeaked.
“Well why not say ‘Joondalup’ then?” boomed Dwayne.
“I was trying to make it more personable, Dwayne,” the loudest voice answered.
“Personable? Personable? What… who the hell even are you?” Dwayne turned to the opposite side of the table. “Is this person a graduate, or what?” The table erupted in canned laughter. “What else have you got? Any shark attacks? Please tell me there’s been a shark attack.”
The table sighed. “No…nope…unfortunately not.”
Dwayne was furious. “Why can’t I get a goddamn shark attack when I need one!” he yelled.
Emma poked her head into the boardroom, “Sorry Dwayne, did I forget to order something?”
“No Emma, unfortunately we cannot order shark attacks. Yet.” Canned laughter re-swelled as Emma closed the doors once more. “What’s Ben Cousins been up to lately? Surely there’s a Bennie story? Footy season has kicked off already,” Dwayne turned to channel 5’s chief sportscaster, “Why haven’t you got me a Bennie story?”
“We ran one last month, Dwayne, remember? He did the biathlon bolt again after being caught on the Campbell Barracks.”
“Bloody hell!” Dwayne exploded. “We’re going into the Easter long weekend, and you lot can’t bring me anything other than a ‘horror’ smash in Belmont!”
“Beldon, sir,” the small voice trembled. Dwayne faced the dark corner sharply, his bottom lip jutted out.
Becky had waited for the right moment, this moment. Three years into her graduate program, Becky had studied the room well. She had spent the entire night researching and calling on old friends for information. This was her time to shine.
“The Outback Mystery, Dwayne,” Becky announced almost too casually.
Dwayne switched his gaze toward her. Becky was intelligent, charismatic, and ostentatious; Dwayne recalled hiring her for just that perfect resume. “Outback … Mystery?” he asked.
Becky knew she had the scoop. “You would have seen it on the headlines already, the couple who are missing in the outback.”
“The Beverley Hillbillies,” said the loud voice, waiting for a dose of canned laughter which never eventuated.
Becky ignored the attempt, knowing she would soon have that person’s job. “The police requested a media spotlight when they first went missing, just their faces out there for potential sightings . . .but it gets better. I spoke to my informant inside the search crew last night.” Becky nailed her rehearsed line, my informant, pride inflating inside as she recalled calling on an old schoolmate who joined the police force and found himself stationed in Geraldton.
Dwayne’s shoulders squared up toward Becky. “Go on.”
“I have it on good authority that the couple are already deceased and will be found within a day or two.” Becky dropped the hook and let it linger with a dramatic pause.
“Any children?” asked Dwayne.
“They’ve got children. Adult children. Not with them, though.”
“I’m confused then. What are you proposing?”
“Sir . . .Dwayne, I’m proposing to be there, on the ground, when they find them. We can get another team,” Becky waved a hand nonchalantly toward the loud and quiet voices, “to interview their families before and after the event.”
Dwayne rocked back in his chair. “Let me get this straight… the police are searching for a missing couple, who they believe are already deceased, and you want to be there when they find them, and have their families interviewed before these loved ones are found — in a midst of panic — then afterward, when they are grieving?”
“Yes.”
“This is brilliant journalism. Well done,” Dwayne displayed a hand toward Becky, turning to the rest of the room, “You could all take a leaf out of Becky’s book.”
Becky’s cheekbones flushed, yet remained composed to ensure victory. “All I need is a camera crew, a four wheel drive, a satellite dish, and your credit card.”
“How long will you be away for?”
“A day. The long weekend. Not sure. It’s the Outback, time works differently out there. Apparently. I’ll stay until they’re found.”
“And what will be the story angle? You can’t just announce that they’re dead from the outset.”
“Of course not,” Becky felt almost insulted. “The title is already set: The Outback Mystery. A middle-aged, happily married couple go missing in the Outback.”
“Well done, Becky. Well done.” The room began clapping. “Here, take my platinum amex.”
That afternoon, after an eight-hour drive, Becky and her camera crew found themselves in the tiny Goldfields town of Sandstone. The local population had quadrupled in size in just twenty-four hours, as fresh search crews arrived. Becky grimaced as she spotted other media vehicles also arriving. Yet, she was brazen with confidence; their crews of middle-aged men didn’t stand a chance against her.
Within an hour of arriving, Becky had secured the first of many Outback Mystery “exclusives” for 5 News, interviewing one of the LandSAR Forward Command officers, and an SES volunteer. The camera crew setup and filmed the interviews in the afternoon, then Becky presented the story Live on Five outside the Sandstone Pub, with rustic machinery in the outdoor museum behind her.
“It's a race against time tonight to find a missing couple who disappeared in the outback two weeks ago. There are growing fears for Jennie and Raymond Kehlet. And police are reaching the point where they might have to scale the search down. They've located an abandoned campsite and vehicles but there's no further trace.” said Becky, live to the camera before the story moved to visions of the search area from that afternoon, with her voice narrating over. “Seven hundred square kilometres of remote harsh terrain in the WA outback. This is the search site for rescue crews desperately trying to find Jennie and Raymond Kehlet.”
Vision moved to the afternoon interview with the LandSAR Command police officer. “Everyone involved is finding it very frustrating . . . the amount of assets we’ve put into this, you'd expect us to find something . . . and we haven't,” said the officer, visibly frustrated.
Becky’s narration continued as scenes of helicopter searches played out on screen, “The couple aged in their late forties are from Beverley. They were last seen two weeks ago by a friend at their campsite in Tabletop, just south of Sandstone, about 730 kilometres northeast of Perth. Police say the prospectors were new to the game, but they're extremely experienced campers. With them, they'd taken a metal detector, GPS, and water. Concerns were raised on Monday when their dog was found walking through town alone.”
The channel 5 news scoop switched to Becky’s earlier interview with an SES volunteer, who was dressed in orange overalls and an Akubra hat, framed by an outback vista. “It's nice when you actually go out and do a search and find something on the person. But when you don't get anything at all, it's just like really disheartening. . . . Yeah, we put our all into it to try and find them or any indication of where they've been. But yeah, it's pretty upsetting.”
The camera crew had taken some shots of the treacherous, abandoned mine shafts. Becky walked along an outback track as she spoke dramatically, “The biggest concern for rescue crews so far have been these abandoned mine shafts; they're worried the couple may have fallen down one and become stuck. Now, cliff rescue crews from both Perth and Kalbarri have so far checked through thirty-eight mine shafts, but they've found nothing.”
Live on Five cut back to the interview with police. The man in blue spoke more matter of fact, yet holding back on the known TFFS results, “We're unsure if there's probably a week’ timeframe where they could have gone missing. But we've been here for five days now. So we have very grave concerns for their welfare.”
Becky closed out her exclusive scoop. “Police are desperate to hear from anyone with information that could help. A decision on whether the search will be scaled back will be made tomorrow. In Sandstone, Becky Jones, Five News.”
Becky passed the microphone back to her camera crew and took a deep breath, hands on her hips, head back, elated. Her phone vibrated in her back pocket. Opening the message, a selfie of Dwayne on his Eagle Bay balcony stared back. He was grinning with a big thumbs-up. “Hope they find them tomorrow, so you can join us for Easter down here” the message read. Becky covered her mouth with her spare hand. My first exclusive . . .and an invite douth!
Becky had made it. Although, she knew it wasn’t over until this couple is to be found. “Hope so!” Becky replied to Dwayne.
Nearby, the Sandstone Pub was quickly filling up with every person in town, all potential sources of exclusive news content. This was Becky’s time to shine.
9. Fxxx!
A cloud of ochre dust filled the gap in the horizon where the Paynes Find-Sandstone Road had been carved into the violent scrub. Dianne, on her weekly run into Sandstone, slowed her work utility and sharpened her gaze ahead. “Bloody tourists,” Dianne muttered to herself noting that the oncoming vehicles showed no intent of slowing down. A moment later, the onslaught of the convoy breached the rise and came into view. Leading the pack was a four wheel drive troupe carrier towing a large enclosed trailer, the rig white and blue with POLICE stencilled along all sides to dispel any misunderstandings of who was in control. Dianne had barely a heartbeat of time in order to defend, pulling to the side of the road then placing her hand against the windscreen so that in the likely event that a stone found itself launched into her vehicle, it would not shatter the glass screen into her lap.
Even if the act was misinterpreted as a wave, Sergeant Hoskin paid Dianne no heed, his eyes fixed ahead and shoulders high in the saddle, making his way to Bell Chambers at high speed with a carload of boys and girls in blue. Behind him, a dozen more blue and white, orange and white, and red and white vehicles followed, all at a rate of knots unacquainted with the generally understood rules of outback courtesy.
Dianne sat with pursed lips and a vehement frown as she waited for the convoy to pass and the dust to settle before resuming her drive into town. Once the road was clear, she sat bolt upright with her arms straight out at ten-and-two on the steering wheel, mocking the police: “Oooh, look out, I’m a cop!” Dianne swayed back and forth, taking up all the road. She soon relaxed back into her seat, rubbing her forehead, “Fuck’n dickheads.” Dianne had barely regained composure when yet another aggravation appeared on the horizon. Rounding the last gravel corner then hitting the bitumen a few miles out from town, Dianne was forced to abruptly slow down due to a Sandstone Shire vehicle blocking her path, parked perpendicular across the road ahead.
Rodney from Sandstone Shire was placing bollards across the roadway, and was stunned to see a vehicle approach from the south. When Dianne reached him, rolling her window down, Rodney raised an eyebrow reflecting her sharp stare. “What are you doing, Dianne?” he asked.
“More the point, what the fuck are you doing, Rod?” Dianne spat.
“You’re not supposed to come out here.”
“‘Come out here’? I live out here. Who the fuck said I can’t ‘come out here’?”
“The cops have blocked it off.”
“No one’s come and seen me, mate, so I’m going to get my mail then I’m spinning around and coming back home.”
“We’ve got it barricaded…”
“Have a good go at trying to fucking stop me,” said Dianne as she sped off past the blockade, running over one of the bollards.
Rodney watched Dianne’s ute disappear toward town, the bollard following her trajectory for a short time before rolling to an exhausted stop. Rod smiled to himself and shook his head altogether in admiration. He would come back later and fix whatever Dianne ran down on her assured return.
Sandstone was an unusual hive of activity that day. Normally, when Dianne did her weekly run into town for the mail, passing by the only remaining buildings from the original gold rush era on Oraya Street — the Post and Telegraph Office, the Sandstone Heritage Museum, the National Hotel, and the Black Range Chapel — there would be a maximum of three vehicles on the main street, at least one of those towing a caravan and another a pastoralist on a similar mission. That day, however, it was bumper-to-bumper parking along the entire strip. Dianne turned the corner of Mingah Street and found a shady tree to park under, away from the bedlam. She slammed the ute door shut then sauntered back toward the post office. Passing the National Hotel, Dianne bumped into Darlene and Scruffy, the publicans, standing outside the pub equally wild-eyed in disbelief.
“The fuck is going on?” Dianne asked.
“It’s that missing couple out at Bell Chambers,” said Darlene. “The whole circus has come to town.”
“I know, I just passed all the clowns on the way in,” said Dianne.
Scruffy yipped a tiny smirk.
An older model dark-coloured four-wheel-drive with a trailer attached carrying a quad bike was parked front and centre to the pub. In the rear windows, several stickers displayed the owner’s resume: Medic, fire fighter, licensed snake wrangler. Dianne pointed a thumb toward the vehicle as she strolled by, “Who’s this hero?”
“Just one of many,” replied Darlene.
That hero, a Mr. Miller, was currently assisting police, meeting with an assistant forward command officer, Sergeant Green, at the local Sandstone Community Centre around the next corner.
Sergeant Green, a tall and imposing officer thus dwarfing this particular informant, yet gentle of persuasion, was kindly delivering bad news to Miller. “You’re familiar with these types of incidents,” said Green, sitting across a makeshift desk in a room made vacant for the LandSAR team. “I need to tell you that we have received a Time Frame For Survival report, and the results are not good.”
Miller doubled over, sobbing into his hands.
“We have found nothing . . .nothing, in multiple land and air searches.”
Miller threw his head back, eyes red with tears, bellowing, “Oh my god!”
Green gave Miller a moment to compose himself. “… We have limited prospects of finding your friends alive, but we need your help to find them regardless.”
Miller wiped his nose and tears and let out a deep breath. “I’ll do whatever I can to help, officer.”
“Have you got the same vehicles with you that you brought up on your prospecting trip?” asked Green.
“Yes, of course,” sniffed Miller.
Do you mind if we give them a cursory inspection?”
“No problem, orificer. No problem at all,” Miller quivered.
Sergeant Green ordered a pair of cadets to take Miller’s car and trailer to a shed at the rear of the community centre and search through it while Miller stood out on Hack Street and chain-smoked. The cadets returned soon after and indicated the vehicles were all clear.
Green stood hip to shoulder alongside Miller, consoling the squat, distraught figure. “You know where they were camped?” asked Green. Miller nodded. “Our team have an operations centre nearby. If you could make your way out there and show them around, we would greatly appreciate your assistance.”
As Miller started his car and pulled away from the kerb outside the Sandstone Pub, Dianne was making her way back from the post office toward Mingah Street. The pub was loaded with people, a raucous banter radiating from behind the doors. Dianne looked through the windows facing the street and saw an ensemble of old and new weathered faces from the region — prospectors, station hands, retirees, and all the broken and bent. Dianne pushed the door open and stepped inside. The room quietened, turning to face her. “The fuck is going on in town today?” Dianne shouted, lifting gripped fists to her hips.
Many voices answered, inaudible in their convergence. “Woah, one at a time,” Dianne instructed.
“Some of us have been booted from our speccin’ patches out that way,” said Frank, an old station hand that Dianne had contracted many times over the years, pointing a gnarled finger out the southern windows. “And all of us have come to town to help in the search, too.”
“Yet here you all are, in the pub instead, huh?” Dianne scolded.
“They don’t want our help,” Frank shrugged. “We all told those coppers we wanted to help, but they told us we can’t go out there. They blocked the road.” The pub banter rekindled as Frank ambled from the bar toward Dianne. “A couple of the Indigenous ladies from the Buttah Windee community even came to town after they heard there was a couple missing.” Frank shook his head as he relayed the news. “The coppers even told them to go home.”
“Fucking idiots,” Dianne spat. “Those girls know this land better than anyone.”
“Yep, nothin’ surer,” said Frank. “You heard from them coppers yet, Dianne?”
“No. Why the fuck would I hear from them?”
“You live right next door to where that couple were camped!”
Dianne rolled her eyes.
“You gonna try and give ‘em some advice?”
“If they want my advice, Frank, they know where to find me. Besides, if they don’t even want any of you or the local community’s help, the fuck would they care what I have to say?”
“Yerp,” Frank nodded. “Those coppers know better than any of us, huh?”
“Fuck’n idiots, the lot of ‘em.”
“True that, Dianne.” Frank turned back toward the bar. “Well, I’ll see ya in the Spring.”
Dianne had already left, soon running over several bollards on the entry to the Paynes Find-Sandstone road, making her way thirty kilometres south to her station homestead, a mere five kilometres past what was quickly becoming the most expensive LandSAR search in Western Australia’s history.
Miller had meanwhile made his way to the campsite, entering the southern prospecting track to Bell Chambers, climbing carefully over the rough rock track to the first of two small clearings in the otherwise violent scrub. Reaching the LandSAR command trailer, Miller parked up and exited his vehicle, sparking up a cigarette with shaking hands. Sergeant Hoskin was beside the police trailer directing a fresh batch of search crew, a DFES team, to reinspect the abandoned mine shafts. “The TRG identified thirty-eight shafts in the area. They’re all tagged with red flags. I need you to see if you can get a better look down them; it seems like the likely scenario that they’ve come to foul down one of them,” he said before turning to see Miller visibly upset beside his trailer.
“Sorry mate, we’re doing all we can to find them,” Hoskin courteously assured.
“I know,” Miller spluttered. “The copper in town told me they’re probably already dead.”
“We’re not giving up on them yet, mate,” said Hoskin. “Look, I know it’s difficult, but I need you to tell me everything you can about what they were up to before you left.”
Miller told Hoskins that Ray and Jennie had about four jerry cans of fuel, ramps and recovery tools, two blue barrels of water, two batteries for lights, two Engel fridges of food, and two tubs with dried food. He had left them with some prospecting gear: an ATX Garrett metal detector, a yellow hand held Garmin GPS, a green plastic gold pan, and a medium sized chain and belt.
“I left the detector on the campsite table, and the prospecting pan and the chain on a round table next to the tree.” Miller pointed toward the acacia tree that shaded Ray and Jennie’s camp, easily visible from their location a short distance away.
“A chain?” Hoskin frowned.
Miller explained, “For ‘chaining’ on the ground, when you’re speccing. You clip a chain to your belt and drag it behind you, so it leaves a trail on the ground to show where you’ve been, in case you get lost.” Miller lit another cigarette. “Have you found any of me gear at the camp?”
“Nothing like that, mate,” replied Hoskin. “No metal detectors or chains or anything have been found anywhere around here so far.”
Miller drooped his head and sobbed, his hand shaking as he inhaled on the cigarette between sniffles.
“When did you last see them?”
“The bloody dawg,” Miller snorted. “The dog kept chasing kangaroos. I told ‘em . . .I told ‘em I wasn’t up here to chase dawgs. I was up here to go speccing…”
“The dog ran off?”
Sweat glistened off Miller’s bald head in the sunlight, his heavily weathered face contorted like a twisted sand-shoe in anguish. “Yeah, a few times. Ray and I chased the dog the first day, and the second day. On the third day, I told ‘em, I ain’t up here to chase dawgs.”
“So, what happened?”
“Well, I leant ‘em me quad bike. Told ‘em to chase the dog ‘emselves. I was goin’ speccin.”
“And you didn’t see them after that? When was that?”
“In the morning, on the 21st. I leant ‘em me quad bike and told ‘em I was goin’ speccin, and to leave me quad bike on me trailer for me to leave early the next mornin’, to get back home for work.”
“You went prospecting on your own all day, then left the next morning, without seeing them between?”
Miller lit another cigarette and kicked the ground. “Yeah, that’s right. That’s what happened.”
“Did they catch the dog?”
“Well they must have. When I got back to camp the next mornin’, the dog was there and me quad was on the trailer like I told ‘em.”
Hoskin folded his arms across his chest. “So you three never went prospecting together?”
“Oh nah, nah, yeah we did,” said Miller. “Ray wanted to find the three million dollar patch.”
“The . . . ‘three million dollar patch’?”
“Yeah, Ray reckoned he found a patch for speccin’ that he called his ‘three million dollar patch’.”
“And where is this three million dollar patch?”
“Down that way,” Miller waved his cigarette toward the southeast. “I’ll show ya if ya want.”
“So, you went there?”
“Yeah, yeah, nah we tried to but we couldn’t get Ray’s new black Land Rover in there, and then the dog kept running off.”
Hoskin stared at the ground with a frown, trying to piece the story all together.
“Look mate, I don’t know nuff’n other than the dawg kept chasin’ roos, and I left ‘em with me speccing gear, and Ray was plannin’ on findin’ the three million dollar patch.”
“What about Jennie?” asked Hoskin.
“Jennie wouldn’t go far from camp. She didn’t wanna prospect anywhere they couldn’t see camp," said Miller.
“So, Ray was intending to prospect alone to the southeast while Jennie stayed at camp, but the dog kept running away chasing kangaroos?”
“Well, that’s all I remember, officer.”
“Then you left them and went prospecting on your own on the last day, and didn’t see them before you returned to Perth?”
“Nah, nah, yeah, that’s right.”
“And they and the dog were in camp when you left?”
“Well I guess so. The dog was there. I didn’t hear Ray or Jen. I just came in to camp and me quad was on me trailer. The gennie wasn’t runnin’ so the only lights was the solar lights. I just guessed they was asleep in their tent.”
“And you drove off without waking them?”
“I wouldn’t wanna wake no one in camp, orificer. That would be impolite. I saw me quad was on the trailer, and the ramps and tailgate was up. Ray’s quad was at the back of their trailer, too. So I made meself a cup of tea, checked the trailer was all tied down, then after me cup of tea I up and left.”
“And you left them your prospecting equipment? A metal detector, GPS, and chain?”
“Nah nah, yeah, that’s roight.”
“What time was this?”
“Oh, just before sun-up. About five in the mornin’.”
Hoskin’s lip contorted. “Wait… how long were you prospecting for?”
“Since the mornin’ before.”
Hoskin counted on his fingers and back again, 5-4-3-2-1-12-11-10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-12-11-10… “When did you start prospecting?”
“When they chased the dog, the mornin’ before.”
“So… you were prospecting for, what? Twenty hours?”
“Nah, nah, yeah about that.”
“On foot?”
Miller scraped his boot along the rocky ground, “YeAh.”
“Throughout the day, and all night?”
“Well, at night is the best time to go prospecting, officer. Especially in the full moon, cos you can see the gold glint in the moonlight.”
“Oh, right!” Hoskin raised his eyebrows. “So, you left them with your quad to chase their dog, went prospecting alone, then returned home the next morning.”
“That’s right.”
“And you left them with some prospecting gear, so that Ray could find a ‘three million dollar patch’?”
“Yep, that’s right.”
“Well, I guess you better show us where this three million dollar patch is.”
Miller lit another cigarette through sweat and tears. “Happy to oblige, orificer.” Miller dropped the ramps on his trailer and started his quad bike, reversing down then pulling it alongside the police trailer while Hoskin readied himself with a GPS device to track their journey.
Meanwhile, the DFES team had made their way around the Bell Chambers tenement, checking and tagging most of the thirty-eight abandoned mine shafts identified the day before by TRG. Using ropes and harness, the men were able to lever their bodies over the holes in the earth in order to peer straight down, directly to the base of the shafts. Using ultra-bright torches, they could clearly see the bottom floor of each shaft, where it would be assumed a person would either be crumpled in a heap or had positioned themselves in a manner to be found, if they had fallen down a mine. As each shaft was cleared, a second yellow marker was added to the TRG red flag, indicating it had been doubly cleared.
Senior DFES firefighter Andy Roberts and his wingman were standing atop the most prominent shaft in the Bell Chambers tenement, on the small rise alongside the prospector’s loop two kilometres north of Ray and Jennie’s campsite, having just completely cleared its contents of any person or persons. The mine shaft had two entrances, each easily searchable to the base from above. Roberts tied the yellow marker to its identification post and sighed, “Less than a dozen or so to go, and still nothing.”
As the search team walked further north toward more abandoned diggings, Miller and Hoskin had left the campsite on the southern track, with Miller taking the forward command officer toward what he had explained as Ray’s “three million dollar patch”, in the opposite direction — to the south east. Miller led the pair on his quad bike with Hoskin following in a police four-wheel-drive, plotting the route on a GPS device inside the cab. They drove across a dried creek bed, over rough and exposed slate rock, then to an area containing a scattering of further abandoned mine shafts. The shafts had already been cleared by TRG and DFES, two flags attached to each marker.
“This is Ray’s three million dollar patch,” Miller mumbled as he climbed down from his quad bike.
Hoskin climbed out the cab leaving the door open and engine running. This area was remote, even for Bell Chambers. There were no heavily used prospecting tracks, and the creek lines cut the land off from the main road. Hoskin had his fists on hips, scanning the site with revere, “I can see why it would have been hard to get his Land Rover in here.”
“Nah nah, yeah but ya can easily walk it from the camp,” Miller nodded back in the direction they had travelled in. “It’s only about three kays.”
“Is this where you came prospecting the day before you left?”
“Yeah yeah, nah I went the other way — west from camp, toward the main road,” Miller sparked up a cigarette, trembling.
“Can you show me where that was?” asked Hoskin.
“No problem, officer,” Miller sniffed.
The pair drove in single file further south to a fenceline which ran east-west along the boundary of Bell Chambers tenement and Dianne’s station. They turned west and drove to the fence line in that direction before arcing back toward the southern track and Ray and Jennie’s campsite. In all, Miller showed Hoskin around an area of approximately twenty square kilometres, all to the southeast and southwest of the camp, dissecting the Bell Chambers in half and away from the prospecting tracks and abandoned mine shafts to the north.
They returned to the LandSAR forward command post late in the afternoon. Hoskin handed over the GPS from their travels to a subordinate and instructed them to produce search maps from the data. Miller loaded his quad bike back on his trailer then lit another cigarette, his face writhen with grief.
Hoskin approached the trailer gently. “Listen, mate, we really appreciate you coming all this way to assist.”
“Anyfing, anyfing at all I can do to help I would,” said Miller.
“I forgot to ask you, what were they wearing?”
Miller scratched his twisted brow, “lemme see . . .Jennie was wearing high-vis gear from work … and Ray was … yeah, Ray was wearin’ a blue flanno.”
“Great, thanks,” Hoskins wrote in his notebook. “That was the morning before you left?”
“Nah nah, yeah, that’s roight. I didn’t come back to camp that day, or night. I was speccin’ all noight. When I came back in the mornin’, everyone was quiet. The dawg was there but I didn’t hear nuffin from Ray and Jen’s tent.”
“You assumed they were sleeping.”
“That’s roight. I didn’t wanna wake ‘em. So I made meself a cup of tea, checked everyfing was tied down, then left back to Perf via Magnet.”
“You drove home via Mt Magnet?”
“Yeah, that’s roight. I was havin’ car troubles, so I didn’t wanna risk the shortcut.”
“Which way you going home now?”
“Oh, I’ll drive home tomorrow mornin’, officer. It’ll be too dark to drive home tonight. I’ll go the shortcut.”
“Where are you camping tonight?”
“I’ll find a spot down the track a ways. Unless… if it’d be okay if I can just stay here tonight?”
Hoskin looked around the forward command post. “You might as well stay here tonight, that way you won’t be spotted if there’s any further aerial search. Then head back south tomorrow morning before the search begins.”
“Phanks, orificer, that’d be helpful.”
“Just don’t go anywhere near their campsite,” Hoskin pointed to Ray and Jennie’s vehicles, trailers and equipment, easily visible from their location.
“I won’t, orificer. I’ll just make meself some dinner and get some rest.”
“Yeah, it’s been a stressful day.”
As the afternoon sun began to dim, all the search crews loaded their blue and white, orange and white, and red and white vehicles up and left the Bell Chambers site toward Sandstone for the evening. Hoskin and his troupe carrier loaded with blue and white boys and girls were the last to leave. Miller was unrolling his tent, preparing for the night. Hoskins stood on the doorway and looked up, the moon had appeared over the horizon, bright and full. “Looks like a full moon,” he mentioned to Miller. “Don’t go chasing gold tonight, mate.”
“Ha, yeah yeah, nah mate, not tonight.”
Hoskins and his team left the tenement toward Sandstone with the daylight soon dimming. Thirty kilometres north, the shortcut was blockaded from any further entry. The Sandstone Pub was full to overflowing with patrons—the search crews, media teams and locals denied their offer of assistance. Five kilometres south of Miller, Dianne the indomitable station owner was sleeping soundly in her homestead bed. Miller’s contorted face reflected in his camp light. There now, at Bell Chambers, was the only man left standing for hundreds of square kilometres—the last person to see two fateful missing persons alive.
10. Freeze
Fight or Flight is the well documented, standard response to a threat. In the mile-wide grey area between those opposing reactions, denial that the threat is a reality causes the lesser discussed, more common response: Freeze. That reaction can last anywhere between a millisecond or an eon, and that moment is often the deciding balance between life and death.
Denial, somewhat cruelly in evolutionary terms, is also the first stage of the standard grief process.
By 2015, the Kehlet family had disbanded and found themselves strewn all over the Western Australian countryside, hundreds of kilometres distancing individual homes — the common modern Australian family structure. After Ray and Jennie’s missing persons report, updates from police were communicated via Geraldton to Ray’s middle brother Mal, who lived in the same Beverley shire as Ray, and were then relayed on the spiderweb of phone lines and airways connecting homes. In the colossal gaps between police updates, family members stood frozen in defence of the implausible, yet constantly shook back to reality by a barrage of television and online news.
“They’re fine, Ray and Jen know their way around the bush,” the common rebuttal to any sense of dread in that first day. “One of them must have had an accident, so they’ll be waiting it out in the shade until they’re found.”
On day two, the denial gauge wound right up: “They’re a resilient pair. They’re fine! Nothing to worry about!”
By day three, sheer panic had set in. Fight or flight. Somewhat cruelly, it was on that day that police consulted their textbooks to determine a new path forward, because despite having conducted perhaps the most elaborate missing persons search in WA history — including multiple aerial and ground searches, horseback mounted patrols, and thirty-eight abandoned mine shafts searched and cleared twice — they had found nothing, not even a trace of the missing pair.
That morning, a helicopter with an eagle-eyed SES specialist onboard had returned to the region to search the southern sector of Bell Chambers, based on the helpful assistance of the missing couples’ friend and colleague, Gray Miller, who had orientated the LandSAR command in that direction the day before. Again, the search returned without trace.
Meanwhile, the family were barraged with offers from the various media agencies to “keep the story alive” by engaging with their interviews. Having no option to assist otherwise, Ray’s eldest daughter Chars, who was living in the Goldfields town of Kalgoorlie, agreed to be the sacrificial lamb for the Kehlet family, and front cameras. A local freelance journalist quickly assembled camera gear and a list of questions, then interviewed Chars for distribution to the various networks.
While Chars was under that spotlight, the police had collaborated their expert knowledge of usual or plausible incidences in a rural or domestic Western Australian missing persons situation and concluded that foul play might indeed be involved. They rightfully dispatched teams to investigate, the first of which knocked on Mal’s Beverley door. Mal, perhaps the calmest person on the planet, nearly fell over backwards when he opened the door to see local police in full uniform. They’ve found them, his initial thought. Mal invited the officers inside, where his wife and children were waiting on further news in the loungeroom. Ray’s youngest daughter Mel and her partner Elizabeth were also there, having joined the home for respite and care during the horrendous turmoil.
The police officers informed Mal that they had a series of questions they needed to ask. The officers stood in the room while the family all sat and readied themselves for what they assumed would be long-overdue character references, and to confirm the couples’ abilities in the terrain they were last found in. The family was partially right, the officers did want information on the married couples’ character, yet not how they envisioned.
Any history of domestic violence … was their financial situation strained … history of drug and alcohol abuse … mental illness …
Shocked stares filled the room. Eyes darted between family members and a vacuum of drawn breaths chorused vehement negatives.
Elsewhere, teams of police gathered similar reports from Ray and Jennie’s family and friends. The combined reports were filtered back to the LandSAR command who were now scratching their combined brows for further ideas.
Nothing. No trace. Not even a scrap of clothing or equipment had been found in just under four days of extensive search within a standard radius of the last location the pair had been seen alive. The ground search had been extended south based on the advice of the couples’ travel companion, and that too had turned up negative. Meetings were held in esteemed offices, and the decision was made that the LandSAR search would be suspended until further information came to light. The LandSAR Forward Command were instructed to pack up the site, and the family were contacted to collect all the couples’ belongings.
The Bell Chambers camp was folded and packed — the rooftop tent tied down, the line of washed clothing previously strung between tree and trailer placed in the rear of the black Land Rover, the camp chairs and table stored under the tent, generator loaded and tied down, reading glasses were returned to the vehicle console, the two coffee cups added to the containers of cooking gear and rotten food, and those and the spoiled eskies loaded onto the rear tray of the old faithful yellow Land Cruiser and on the equipment trailer alongside the red quad bike — ready for collection.
No fingerprints were taken, no DNA samples collected, and no spoiled food disposed of from rank coolers. It was as if Ray and Jennie had simply gotten up one morning and walked away from that remote outback location, and now their refuse required evacuation.
While placing items inside the Land Cruiser, one of the officers decided to do a cursory glance through a backpack found behind the passenger seat. It was Jennie’s. Inside it, along with other personal items, was Jennie’s diary. The officer flicked through the pages noting that there were daily entries throughout, up to a final entry on March 18: Hopefully go to Hole, fingers crossed. Folded in that same page, the officer found a loose piece of paper that when opened contained a mudmap. The hand-drawn map included several latitude and longitude coordinates, a black marker line indicating the Paynes-Find-Sandstone road, and tracks marked to delineated ‘CAMP’ and ‘1ST HOLE’ locations. The officer collected the backpack and diary for evidence, taking it the LandSAR Forward Command post.
Later that evening, Chars’ news report (filmed that morning) finally aired.
“Raymond and Jennie's families are desperately clinging to hope. Today they have told me all they have left to do now is pray for a miracle,” said the reporter from a distant location, hundreds of miles from where Chars’ interview took place.
Chars, sitting inside her lounge room surrounded by family photos and memorabilia, addressed the local reporter stoically. “Very very difficult. Not knowing anything, not having any answers.”
“If anyone could survive that long the family say it would be these experienced campers,” said the remote reporter as scenes of the ground search played out on screen.
Ray and Jennie’s mugshots displayed momentarily, then the report cut back to Chars. “He's extremely resourceful and he's very resilient. Obviously he's grown up in the country and we've done a lot of things out bush and things like that. So he definitely knows his stuff and what to do when he's out there.”
Jennie’s family, her ex-husband Jim and their youngest daughter, just eighteen at the time, arrived in Sandstone the next morning. They were the first of Ray and Jennie’s family and friends to be shown this secret, remote, outback location that had only previously been displayed to the world via media reports and police liaison since the couple left home three weeks prior. Jim’s immediate thought would echo through everyone who encountered it afterward: there is no way they went missing in that spot.
Ella the Great Dane was elated to see Jennie’s daughter, dropping the caravan park manager like a hot rock when she smelt the familial odour of her pack, jogging to greet her sibling and jumping up against her at head-to-head height. Three weeks of perceived abandonment had finally ended. Ella was going home.
Sergeant Hoskins from forward command filled the pair in on what was known and what had been found thus far, or the lack thereof, finally handing over the keys for the two vehicles, and his business card, to Jim and his daughter. “When you get all the camping gear home and unpack it, if you notice anything unusual please give us a call,” he said, dropping the keys into bewildered palms and thereafter striding away.
Becky Jones from Channel 5 News was still in Sandstone, scratching around for relevance and melting like an ice cream left in the noonday sun. Search teams were rifling out of town at rates of knots, as Police, DFES and SES crews were called home — the search suspended. Spotting an unfamiliar pair checking equipment on camping trailers and vehicles she had seen at the search site, Becky pounced. Spurred by the information gathered, she called in further favours from her local Geraldton informant.
That night, Becky’s latest exclusive aired, as crews now returned to Sandstone yet again— the search now extended less than a day after the opposite call was made.
Tim opened the story, presenting from the ‘Live at Five’ Perth studio: “New clues tonight in the search for a missing couple last seen in the outback fifteen days ago. They pulled in reinforcements from across the state to join the hunt for the pair. Jennie and Raymond Kehlet disappeared near sandstone 730 kilometers northeast of Perth. Becky Jones is in Sandstone tonight near the search zone. Becky, what are Police telling you?”
Becky was stood on Mingah Street, reporting live from Sandstone: “Well, Tim, police say they have now uncovered new evidence which indicates the couple may have left the area that they've previously been searching. That search zone is currently 700 square kilometers and it surrounds the abandoned campsite of a couple including their two vehicles and their quad bike. Now SES volunteers and police have spent five days searching the very rough terrain but have so far uncovered nothing. And in an exclusive interview, Tim, Jennie Kehlet's former husband has told Five News he's worried foul play may be the reason for their disappearance.”
News video showed filmed scenes from the morning, of the camping equipment being checked, and Ella walking happily around on a lead ready to go home. Becky narrated:“Jennie Kehlet's daughter and ex-husband Jim came to Sandstone hoping for answers but now they're on their way back to Perth with her belongings and nothing but fear and concern.”
The camera focused on Jim. “The police and the volunteers have got no idea. They've said it's not like any case they've had before. They've just got no clue as to where they've gone.”
Search scenes filled the screen with Becky continuing narrating, “The 49 year old and her 47 year old husband Raymond were last seen two weeks ago at a campsite near Sandstone. They left almost everything behind — cars, a quad bike, a generator, phones, and their credit cards. Police say it's as if they simply vanished. The only items they took with them were a metal detector, a GPS and some water. Today, police and SES put the search on hold, exhausted after scouring almost 700 square kilometers of harsh terrain in the past five days. New Police crews and a chopper are now traveling to sandstone from across WA to relieve them. That's because new evidence shows the couple may have traveled further than previously thought.”
Becky presented again live from Mingah Street, “Although police are remaining tight lipped about what the new evidence is, Five News understand something was discovered inside the pair's personal belongings which indicates crews may have been searching in the wrong place.”
Tim and Becky appeared to face each other remotely in the news video collage, as the exclusive wrapped up. “So Becky, extra police will start arriving in Sandstone tomorrow, what happens next?”
“That's right, Tim, police, SES volunteers, and specialist experts are expected to travel from right across across Western Australia to come to Sandstone. The new search zone, which is a lot wider, is expected to kick off at daylight tomorrow morning. We've also been told another chopper has been deployed which has infrared camera technology on board, which will hopefully pick up the heat from their bodies wherever they may be. Now time is running out. Crews will have to work extra fast over the coming days. Otherwise, this may be yet another mystery for WA.”
Another chopper has been deployed? Urania Minerals’ CEO’s ice clinked against his whiskey glass as he jolted up in his leather lazyboy and reached for his mobile phone. “Darren? Yeah, Bruce here. Did you see the news? The search is extended. … Yeah. Do we know who the helicopter contractor is? … yeah? … Good, good. Get their number and send it to me right away. I’ve got a job for them.”
11. Chaos
Beverley to Cunderdin via the Carter-Doodenanning Road is eighty kilometres of quiet country road. It takes a little under an hour on a gentle Sunday ride; forty to forty-five minutes at a decent pace. It can be achieved in as little as twenty-two minutes though, if you really twist the throttle hard without care for life nor limb.
Ray and Dave had left Beverley early that morning in the Spring of the early 00s, soon after Dave arrived from Perth for their regular Sunday ride. It was a crisp day, bright sunshine and cool air – perfect conditions for liter bikes. Passing the Balkuling farmhouse just north of Beverley, the farm’s unsuspecting rooster, who was fluffing his wings ready to announce the morning call, had his tail feathers blown clean off as a silver Yamaha rocket flew past at warp speed. The rooster had barely enough time to reset its eyes back in the sockets when a blue Honda whipped up those feathers in a willy willy above its crest, then collecting its coq and returning to the coop dejected that its primary, genteel occupation had been thwarted.
Too many rotations of the sun had passed and paths in life had taken widened routes by then, yet those were the halcyon days of adulthood.
Ray (and Mal) had subsequently long-settled in to the metronomic rhythms of country life, with young families and respectful employment, blissfully unaware of the disparity and generalisations made between country and city folk. Dave had [un]fortunately learned those lessons only too well.
The last to have been booted from the farmhouse-family nest back in the early 90s, Dave had won a stiff competition against over two hundred red-blooded adolescents to secure a prestigious position as an apprentice electrician at Northam’s Regional Hospital — a myriad of miles away from the last farm the family resided on, yet ethereally a different universe. A training hospital, and a mere hour from Perth city (or around twenty-two minutes if you twist the throttle hard), NRH served as a convenient placement for graduate city-folk who wanted to train their vocational skills whilst making fun of country-folk in their spare time.
By the second year, being twenty and apparently aesthetically pleasing, Dave was occasionally sent invitations to young allied-health professionals’ parties in Perth. Invitations were often sent to such exotic addresses as someone's mum's house, in Karrinyup. After politely accepting the invitation verbally, to “Karen-Yup”, the inviter would often make Dave repeat the location seventy-eleven times, stifling smirks, before correcting him, that the suburb is actually pronounced "Karen-Up". Dave was previously unaware of this common rule of the English language, the silent 'Y'.
He felt much shame.
For many moons, Dave was fondly regarded as a kind of P.T. Barnum circus attraction — a country boy that those city-folk could communicate with very basically, and was fun to ride so long as they returned it to the wild soon afterward then exfoliated heavily.
Fast forward a decade or so with lots of grey stuff in-between, and by the early 00s Dave was also a city folk, too. Apparently. By then, people from the country got 'that grin' every time they talked to him about anything to do with camping, hunting, or manual labour. You know the one, the *Imma only tellin’ ya this ta scare y'all* type, forehead forward, flash-eyed, crack-lipped, grin-delivered story about rootin’ shootin’ and/or electrocutin’, traditionally told around an open fire.
They were right of course; if his Yamaha broke down anywhere out bush, Dave would have had about seven hours max. before he'd perish. There was no way he could kill anything to eat anymore unless it really pissed him off, which automatically counted out all the herbivores — those beasts can apologise for any misdemeanour with those big, round eyes. Essentially, Dave'd pretty much be toast unless either Uber Eats could find his iPhone geolocation, or a rabbit decided to threaten him with an axe.
So, by the 00s, Dave lived in some sort of limbo world, not really belonging anywhere, like that bubble of useless gas between oil and water; a figuratively homeless inner-city lad who needed to go bush every now and then to recoup, but had lost the ability to hunt and forage.
He found it quite a nice space to be, really. He also believed it allowed him some authority to speak on behalf of both parties, to clarify the disparity of understanding and generalisations made between those country and city folk.
He considered that city people seemed to think country-folk were are all simple-minded, red necked, bumpkins. And that country people thought of city-folk as being all arrogant, pretentious, prima donnas.
And he had ultimately concluded: they were all correct.
“Mum!” yelled Dave as he pulled into the Cundie family house a quarter of an hour after ruffling that Balkuling coq’s feathers, turning the Yammie ignition off, parking the bike on its side stand and removing his helmet, “Quick, put the kettle on and pour a cup of tea!”
“What’s going on, love?”
“Ray will be here any minute, I want him to think he was well beaten.”
Clarabelle giggled and skipped inside to make the brew, bringing the cup outside to the front verandah a few minutes later. Ray arrived as the tea had started to cool, stopping his Honda out front then staring up past the brick paved steps where his smartarse younger brother raised the cup at him. “What took you so long?”
Ray removed his helmet, shaking his head all the way out before arching back on the Honda seat and cackling open-mouthed at the bright blue sky.
That laugh…
How did he manage to shake the entire world, to reset and balance it all, by simply laughing?
***
“He’s a psycho, Clare!”
Clarabelle sighed, “What did he do?”
“He tried to choke Ray!”
Ray and Keify exchanged a bemused glance across the dining table, Keify quickly returning his attention to the Sunday Times. Ray turned toward the kitchen where Jennie and Clarabelle were in a standoff, his windpipe still nagging from the encounter weeks prior.
Months later, on the shortest day of the year, Ray received a message from a contact long since deleted: Happy Birthday, Ram. The number looked familiar. Whodis? he replied. The number called. “It’s Dave.” Ray remained silent. An awkward moment passed. “Did you delete my number?” The silence lingered. “Come on, Ray, it’s been months. Jesus, I’ve had blood and guts brawls with mates and it’s all over by the next morning. Stop being a puss—” Ray hung up.
A decade passed, mutual weddings were held unattended, and a maelstrom of life events were described by others from afar. Ray is working FIFO? What the—he would hate it! … Ray and Jennie bought Whikser’s farm? No way!
Laterally, the nihilism of youth had been replaced by industrialism, with Dave channeling the propensity toward turmoil into revenue within the world of engineering, where the first equation that must be rote learned is: chaos equals cash. The control and containment of hazardous energy was a role serendipitous to Dave’s particular mindset. He had subsequently married the most beautiful girl in the world, Sally, and they had skipped the globe together, landing squarely in South Korea by the northern hemisphere’s winter of 2014, working in the shipbuilding fabrication yard of Okpo-Dong (the Dong) during the daylight hours, burning strips of meat on various hot objects whilst sousing themselves on rice wines (soju) in the evenings, then returning to their home in Perth for R&R every change in season; blissfully living the expat life in their early forties.
Spring had sprung on the Dong by late March of 2015, and a gentle rhythm had been established. Having spent a quality thirty-seven rotations of the sun together and romantically barbecuing meat under the moonlight, Sally had then bid adieu to travel back home to Perth, a week before Dave so that she could water the cat and feed the garden prior to a pre-planned holiday to a tropical Thai island with their very good friends, Tina and Gordon.
The very next night, Dave found himself in a night club full of Filipino waitresses, chockers with spicy ribs and soju after dinner out with workmates. Stumbling into the club, he was set upon by a swarm of clones. Knocking them all out of the way like Moses in a Filipino sea, he managed to get to the bar. "Whisky," Dave blurted through parched lips, pointing at the third shelf. "Green bottle." There was another expat in a dark corner, and the waitresses returned to his attentions, perhaps perceiving Dave a difficult client. One persistent waitress remained.
"You so handsome," she said.
"I know," said Dave, taking a sip of whisky. "I hear that a lot in these bars."
"You buy me a drink?" asked the waitress.
"I tell you what," said Dave, turning to face the waitress, "if you can tell me a good story, then I will just give you some money. How about that instead?"
The waitress looked confused at first, but her brow soon melted with determination. "I don't like being here, you know," she said. "I have a family back in the Phillipines. We love karaoke. One day, we were out at a karaoke bar and a scout came up to me. He said that I could work in Korea and earn a lot of money, singing. I believed him. I wanted to earn money, doing what I loved, and send it home to my family. Then, when I got here they took my passport and told me I had to be a waitress in this club instead."
Dave finished the rest of his whisky, and dropped the glass on the floor. "That's a good story," he said, reaching into his pocket and handing the waitress a sheet of paper worth some sort of monetary value. The waitress quickly walked off with it, disappearing into the dark void. Dave left the bar to walk home, having inadvertently given the waitress all his whisky cash.
On the way home, distraught with the knowledge that many of the Filipino waitresses were there against their will, having been sold a get-rich-quick scheme, and because he could not purchase any more whisky, Dave thought it would be a good time to call Sally back at their home in Perth.
"Hi Sweets," he said.
"What's happened?" Sally replied, concerned for the late call.
"No, nothing, I've just had a big night, that's all. Just wanted to share..." then Dave told Sally how he had been into a Filipino club, and how he had paid one of the waitresses for a story.
"WHAT?" Sally bellowed. "How much did you give her?"
"No idea," said Dave. "Whatever was in my pocket. It was a good story!"
It was Sally’s scathing monologue thereafter on that night that taught Dave that some stories should not be shared, or at least subjectively shared. He relayed this lesson learnt to his workmates the next morning, while they rode their pushbikes into the shipyard. “Indeed,” they nodded and laughed out loud, “What happens at the Dong must stay at the Dong.”
The next evening, April Fools Day 2015, Sally called Dave after work, who answered quite gingerly due to his ears still ringing from the night prior. “Your Dad just called. He said that Ray is missing.”
“What the hell?”
“Apparently Ray and Jennie were camped up near Sandstone, and they’ve been reported missing. There’s search crews headed there to find them. Your Dad needed to let you know because the media is all over it. It will be on the news tomorrow.”
“Sandstone?”
“Yeah, Sandstone. It’s a tow—”
“I know where Sandstone is. What the hell is Ray doing up there?”
“They went prospecting. Camping out in the bush.”
Ray missing. The thought was as logical as soju good for you.
“Are you still there?” Sally asked.
Dave’s carefree forehead had screwed into a tight ball. “Yeah, I’m still here. I just … Ray missing??”
“Keify doesn’t know too much else,” Sally continued, “I rang Mal before calling you. No one seems to know much at all. Their dog turned up in Sandstone. They’ve sent the SES up there to find them.”
Riding to the shipyard the next morning with a soju-induced hangover, Dave mentioned the call to his workmates. Is your bro prone to going missing? No. Not at all. Why would it be on the news then? Good question. Yet, sure enough, arriving to work and firing up the interwebs, then started the constant barrage of articles about Ray and Jennie’s Outback Mystery.
Sally called that morning: “A reporter from channel five just parked on our front lawn!”
“What the hell do they want?”
“She wanted a statement from you. They were on our porch poking a camera into our front door!”
"The fuck? How the hell did they get our address?”
“No idea, it’s supposed to be silent. She left a card.”
“Throw it in the bin.”
Messages were relayed on the global spiderweb of airways connecting Kehlet family homes, between Geraldton, Beverley, Kalgoorlie, Perth, Cunderdin, and the Dong. They’re fine, Ray and Jen know their way around the bush. … One of them must have had an accident, so they’ll be waiting it out in the shade until they’re found. … They’re a resilient pair. Nothing to worry about! For two days it seemed that at any moment someone would call with the appropriate update: Ray and Jennie were found camped out under a tree near a pool of water. They are safe and well.
That news never came, thus sheer panic had set in. Fight or flight. Dave then hopped on a plane home shortly after receiving the news that the search had been suspended. Alone with his thoughts and a bar-cart full of cognacs and whiskeys for twelve hours, with the airways to world news in flight mode, horror scenarios rolodexed his mind, so by the time he landed in Perth, the world outside matched the internals of Dave’s cranium—it had turned to chaos. Earth would never again present itself as it had only a few days prior: stable, reliable, and predictable. The plane door opened at Perth International like a butterfly’s cocoon, but what emerged resembled a tiger moth on meth.
Flight mode switched off. Taxi home, kiss wife. … Book flight to Kalgoorlie — need to see Chars. … Call Gordon, can’t go to Thailand, holiday cancelled. … Fly to Kal. … Chars, all 5’2” of her, is strongest person on planet. … New decision, must go to Sandstone. … Re-schedule early flight back to Perth. … Gordon calls, “We’re cancelling too, I’m coming with you to Sandstone.” … No time to argue. … Fly to Perth. … Call Gordon from airport, “If you’re coming, I’m leaving in two hours.” … Taxi home, kiss wife. … Throw anything and everything hiking or camping related in back of Landie. … Gordon and Tina arrive, “Let’s go.” …Kiss wives. … Drive.
The drive from Perth to Sandstone goes via the inland ‘Great Northern Highway’. It’s not one of the main tourist routes of Western Australia, although there is much history in the region. Gordon had previously not gone further inland than New Norcia, which no doubt entailed a nice morning of scones and tea with Tina before they walked hand-in-hand around the grounds of the historic Benedictine Monastery.
Gordon first arrived in Australia on a boat from the sky all the way from London, with his lovely wife and two devilishly awesome children, at the turn of the century, December ‘99. Once his family was settled, Gordon went about finding gainful employment. Dave and Gordon’s paths collided when they both took a job at a local manufacturing facility (which is a fancy way of saying bakery), starting on the same day, early 2000. The pair both left that baking facility a few months later, on the same day, realising that they could perhaps apply themselves to better opportunities elsewhere, and have been best mates since.
April 2015 would be a milestone birthday for Gordon, a very large one with a zero on the end, one of those half-century jobs. A celebratory holiday had been in the planning for months which included, first up, a week on a tropical island for the two couples—cocktails, beaches, diving, happy wives, happy lives. Instead, on day one of their itinerary, Gordon found himself being driven at high speeds along inner highways by a man whose mind was simply not in the same cab, with Tina along with Sally left high and dry back in Perth.
By the time the pair passed the final remnants of the sprawling city limits, Gordon was hunched over in the shotgun seat, wide-eyed, mouth-breathing. It was not a look of awe or enjoyment, more a man who suddenly realised the predicament he had found himself in.
“When exactly did the gold rush end, Dave?” Gordon asked in a rich cockney accent, attempting to bring the driver’s attention somehow back to reality.
“Dunno, Gordo. About a hundred years ago, I guess. In the early 1900s?”
“So not long after you lot got sent here for your crimes?” Gordon’s humour is incisive and refined, as his heritage would suggest, delivering astute wit and resulting laughter no matter what the circumstances.
They reached Wubin mid-afternoon. Dave called his brother Mal, to see if Mal was able to get the search coordinates from the LandSAR commander in Geraldton. “The Police advised that you are not go to Sandstone, they won’t allow you near the search site,” Mal advised.
Dave pulled the Landie over on the side of the road to process the response. “You’re kidding.”
“Nope, unfortunately not.”
“Well what the hell do we do now?”
“Dunno, Dave. They just won’t tell me anything.”
Dave looked across at Gordo for answers. “Well … we’re halfway there already. We might as well continue on regardless, to see what may be.” suggested Gordon. It was a brave spot to make the decision, as from that point north-east, the landscape changes dramatically—the fields and rolling hills of the wheatbelt flattening out to a hostile and tempered landscape, the roads flat and straight to the horizon without any services until Paynes Find, an hour and a half away.
Not long after turning inland from Wubin, when the pair were travelling along a long stretch of barren landscape, Gordon needed to break the adverse silence, scanning the passing hostile scrub from the passenger window, “You know what Dave, everyone always talks about the beauty of the Australian Outback, but I ain’t fekking seen it yet.”
They reached the 60km from Paynes Find road marker by sunset that afternoon. Not that they had a plan, but if they did, it would be to make it to Paynes Find, re-fuel, then head inland toward Sandstone and camp somewhere near the area Ray and Jennie went missing—which the police were not releasing. It was at this point that the fuel light came on in the Landie, making a foreboding alarm. Gordon’s face was one of disbelief that this day could possibly get worse, with the thought that they would not make Paynes Find, and instead would be hitching a ride to obtain fuel and return, and at the mercy of the Wolf Creek typecast characters of Australian outback cinema. Dave, too, held his breath for the entire next thirty minutes, until they limped into the Paynes Find Roadhouse. A beer was sorely needed by then, and so they stopped for a bit.
It turned out that the inland road between Paynes Find and Sandstone was closed-off due to the search. It was reaching dusk, and they now had a further three hour or more journey ahead, having to go via Mount Magnet. They decided it would be worth the risk to keep moving, despite the chance of hitting a kangaroo, so that time would be saved for the next day.
“I can’t stop in Mount Magnet, Gordo,” said Dave.
“Why not?”
“That’s where I was working before we met. The place was a dumpster fire.”
“It must be bad if it was worse than the bakery.”
During the hour and a half journey between Paynes Find and Mount Magnet, Dave regaled Gordon of his favourite local memory; when the proprietors of the Sandstone Pub had called in an emergency to their Mount Magnet camp, the nearest trade contractors. “The pub’s power was out, and the coolroom and ice-machines were on the blink. We knew that if we answered the call, there’d be a pallet of Bush Chook beers thrown in on the deal. We took the truck, because of the kangaroos,” said Dave as Gordon searched the roadsides ahead for wildlife. “It was all gravel between Mount Magnet and Sandstone back then, and the kangas were in plague proportions at night. But, they just bounced straight off the truck bullbar. The only thing we hit that caused any real damage was an emu. We still made it to Sandstone that night though, but that emu is no doubt still still lodged in the Mitzi frontend!”
Dave had the grin of a madman. Gordon knew that if they hit a kangaroo in the Landie, there would be no bounce, more just an earth-shattering crunch—and he didn’t want to even consider what an emu would do. Thankfully they reached Mount Magnet without harm, and decided that would do for the day. Nerves were frayed. They went to the pub, had a counter meal and a few beers, then set up camp at the local park with takeaways from the bar.
Poor Gordo. He would have had many pictures in his mind of where he might have been that night, a few days before. All would have included his lovely wife, a white sandy beach, music playing in the background, a drink with an umbrella in it. Instead he found himself drinking king brown beers from a paper bag, sleeping on the ground in a local park, and contemplating what madness his mate would get him into next.
12. Boys in Blue
Red rock, ochre dust, radiant green and yellow foliage, ash-silver dried wood, and a peppering of milky-white quartz make up the colour swatch for this pocket of the outback. Anything blue stands out like the proverbial canine’s testes—the boys and girls in blue in particular. A spattering of coppers in this region, where country towns might see one or two at most in any given season, appear like sapphires embedded in unfamiliar terrain from above. The SES volunteers, with their orange overalls and high-visibility stripes shimmer all too familiarly with the ground they search upon, when heat refractions bend the light around them. But today they were all gone, the search suspended, and only one boy in blue stood alone in the outback.
Neil had left his work in the Pilbara with urgency after hearing of Ray and Jennie’s missing persons report on the radio, on the Red FM morning news, three days prior. In those preceding days, he had travelled the entire length of the country and back again, in a desperate loop home from Paraburdoo to Beverley and return, to arrive at the last known location his friends had been seen alive—Bell Chambers. Neil knew that Ray wouldn’t think twice about doing the same if the tables were turned.
This morning, Monday the 6th of April 2015, as Neil drove the last hour of his more than two day journey, he passed police vehicles, police horse trailers, a mobile command centre and too many paddy wagons to count headed in the opposite direction—toward Perth. What the fuck is going on? his mind raced, unaware that the search had been called off, while desperately scouring the scrub north and south of Mt Magnet Rd until reaching Sandstone.
Arriving in town, Neil crept down Oraya Street past the Post and Telegraph Office and the Sandstone Heritage Museum, the main street eerily quiet now that the crews had all departed. He parked outside the National Hotel, knowing that it would be the best place in town for intel. Scruffy and Darlene, the Sandstone Publicans, were breathing a short sigh of relief and cleaning up after the onslaught of unfamiliar patrons they had encountered that last week. Scruffy knew Bell Chambers well, he and his father had over half a century combined developing the tenement, and now, as the town publican, had been delivering meals and supplies to crews daily during the phase 1 search. Scruffy gave Neil directions to Ray and Jennie’s camp, indicating the site and the shortcut would be open and empty now that police had unsecured the scene. Neil arrived at the southern prospecting track shortly thereafter, turning off the gravel causeway and carefully making his way to the camp site.
The site was easily distinguishable, as described by Scruffy; an open, wide and flat area beneath a lone acacia tree, with a large pile of campfire remnants nearby. Neil noted what a great spot it was for a long-term camp: A stone-throw off the gravel road, yet still secluded. Any doubts that maybe his able and experienced friends had gotten lost were immediately disposed after seeing the terrain, with the natural as well as manmade landmarks that he instantly identified all too easy to navigate from.
They’re not missing… Neil was resolute on that now. Murder suicide? Not a consideration, Ray and Jennie were laminated together. Became disorientated? Not possible. Fell down a mineshaft? Extremely doubtful. No, something else has happened here.
Neil spent the remaining afternoon light scouring the area around their camp, yet knowing it had been thoroughly covered in the previous days. As dusk approached, he decided to head back to Sandstone and work out a strategy to search tomorrow.
Live at Five’s Becky Jones was finishing her nightly news exclusive as Neil returned to the Sandstone Pub that evening, “… police, SES volunteers, and specialist experts are expected to travel from right across Western Australia to come to Sandstone. The new search zone, which is a lot wider, is expected to kick off at daylight tomorrow morning. We've also been told another chopper has been deployed …”. As the cameras switched off, she dropped her microphone to her side and gasped in the hot air. Becky’s resolve was turning as precarious as a chocolate egg left unclaimed on Mingah Street after Easter Sunday, having been in Sandstone for close to a week without the promised narrative that this couple would be found within a matter of hours.
Becky’s phone rang, it was Channel Five’s executive producer, Dwayne. “Great work, Becky. You’re hitting home runs out there.”
Becky rubbed her temple and screwed her eyes tight. “How was your weekend in Eagle Bay, Dwayne,” she feigned.
“Great, great, lots of time by the beach, wineries, gastronomical delights—the usual,” he said. “I’ll be joining you in Sandstone tomorrow. We’ve held a press meeting today, and all the major networks are jumping on this mystery.”
“Oh great,” Becky exclaimed. “Are we trading places?”
Dwayne scoffed loudly, “Oh no, Becky. You’ve created gold out there! The Outback Mystery is the highest rating news we’ve had all year. I’m coming to help push the story along.”
Becky stifled a tear, composed herself, then inflected, “That’s. Such. Great. News. Dwayne. How long do you think I’ll be needed out here?”
“Well… until they’re found, Becky. Like your pitch suggested.”
“That’s … awesome,” Becky pinched her nose and hung up the call, staring at her feet upon the ochre ground, a tear landing on top of her white shoe spattering in ochre dust.
The following morning, Neil was waiting outside Sandstone Shire for their doors to open. When Beth the shire president arrived, Neil explained that he was a close friend and left his contact details in the event they heard some news. Neil had spent the evening studying maps of the region, familiarising himself with all the recognisable landmarks and waterholes around the Bell Chambers area, advising Beth of his intended itinerary. Beth explained that the LandSAR search would be resuming that day, and the Police Search coordinator would be returning by the afternoon.
Meanwhile, LandSAR had commissioned the Robinson R22 helicopter to perform a fresh search of the Bell Chambers area, focusing on the northern sector with reference to the mudmap found in Jennie’s diary. The helicopter was refuelling at the local airstrip when a secretive vehicle arrived. It was Urania Minerals, having negotiated overnight with the helicopter contractor to strap a VTEM survey unit to the chopper, to undertake an electromagnetic survey of the Bell Chambers tenement while the aerial missing persons’ search was simultaneously carried out, for a pallet of Bush Chooks or otherwise unknown agreement.
One bird, two stones, and all that…
Neil had started his own ground search to the south of Bell Chambers that morning, before the helicopter and eagle-eyed SES observer started their search of the region. So, Neil kept his distance, returning to Sandstone.
Channel 5’s news crew were parked in the shade opposite the Heritage Museum, kicking rocks and swatting flies, when Neil arrived in town. Frustration was eating his mind out from the inside, so, although Neil hated the thought of being in front of a camera, he wanted the world to know how piss poorly he believed the investigation and search had gone thus far. Neil parked behind the media crew and approached the cameraman. The cameraman asked Neil why he was in Sandstone, to which he responded, “To find out what the hell was going on because there was no way that Ray and Jenn were lost.”
Becky’s eyes lit up. Another exclusive source. She took notes while Neil and the cameraman chatted: Neil, the couple’s friend, wants to tell police that family and friends who knew Ray and Jennie best, haven’t for a second entertained the idea that they were lost or had done each other any harm. Becky soon interjected the conversation, suggesting that the cameraman might want to roll camera while she interviewed further.
With the camera rolling on Oraya Street, Becky squared her shoulders and faced Neil. “A friend of Ray and Jennie Kehlet has arrived in Sandstone today to desperately search for the couple. So Neil, what do you think has happened to your friends?”
“I have been out to their camp site, and there is no way that Ray and Jenn are missing,” Neil said. “I believe foul play is the only plausible conclusion.”
After finishing the interview, it was back to kicking the dirt around waiting for the police to arrive. When they finally showed up mid-afternoon, Neil’s mood hadn’t improved. He made it clear to police that he was there to assist in the search, and that he wasn’t a fan of any of their theories so far, and that they needed to be looking for involvement of a third party. The police retorted by not allowing Neil to search officially. Neil treated the police with all due respect, returning to the Bell Chambers region and covering 150km that afternoon east of Bell Chambers. During his search, Neil would often stop and get out of his four-wheel-drive to walk to the top of the many breakaways in the region, for a better view.
Ray and Neil shared a similar stature and temperament—same height, same weight, same ideals. Standing there, in the landscape his little mate (as they each referred to one another) was last known to have been, he would have been identified very quickly and easily from the air above. Neil wore the same clothes, walked Ray’s gait, talked his talk. In a momentarily cruel chirality of nature, from his work boots up to his blue flannelette shirt, Neil was precisely what the LandSAR team had been searching for for those past many days, based on the description given them by the last person to see Ray alive. And he stood out in that landscape with high contrast.
Ray by day, Jennie at night, both should have been spotted in high definition visibility, yet despite now four aerial searches and a week of ground searches, the only displaced individuals to be found were the police themselves—sapphires embedded in unfamiliar terrain from above, and good for perhaps only a bowerbird nest’s decoration at ground level.
Becky’s latest exclusive aired that evening on Live at Five. “Family and friends who knew Ray and Jennie best are certain of foul play … in other news, another prospector has been reported missing in Laverton, only six hours east of Sandstone. Back to you in the studio, Tim.”
Meanwhile, the Sandstone Pub was filling up again, as scores of police, SES, DFES and every media channel from Perth arrived back in town for the phase 2 search. Scruffy and Darlene were ready for this fresh onslaught; a semi-trailer loaded with stores would arrive from Laverton on the morrow.
13. Nine Zero
Sergeant Nolan’s phone rang soon after the nightly news concluded. It had been a stressful day, organising the largest LandSAR search of his career, the second-largest being the previous phase of the search for the same pair of missing prospectors which had concluded less than forty-eight hours prior. Regardless, he was on duty. Nolan was always on duty.
The caller was distraught, sniffling and breathing heavily into their phone. “It’s Miller,” the caller announced before snorting back tears. “Why would anyone want to hurt these people?” he sobbed.
Nolan reassured Mr Miller, the last person to see his missing friends alive, that they had found no evidence to indicate foul play. The search was entering a second phase based on intel received that the couple may have been planning to prospect north of their camp, in the opposite direction Miller had shown the LandSAR Forward Command.
Miller was audibly distressed, thanking the Sergeant for taking his call.
Nolan recalled the police notes identifying Miller as an Emergency Services Officer, Medic, a trained vertical rescuer, and SES volunteer. The man had even been awarded a bravery medal. First responders always find these situations the toughest, when it’s their friends involved.
Five hundred kilometres east of Nolan’s Geraldton headquarters, Sandstone’s population had concurrently reached triple-digits for the first time that century. Phase 2 had swollen the town’s capacity with scores of new search teams arriving as well as familiar faces returning from phase 1. The Pub was heaving, with everyone eating their evening meals and emptying the ice-coolers as fast as they could be replenished. All the media channels had also jumped on the Outback Mystery, each sending a reporter and camera crew to the small Goldfields town.
Channel Five’s Becky Jones was still, however, first on ground, and best on ground. She considered herself now an honorary local after having been in the town since the very beginning of the search. Becky recognised the DFES crew who had returned that afternoon, and focused her attention on them, welcoming Senior Firefighter Andy Roberts and his team back to town.
Roberts proudly described the cutting edge electronic camera the DFES crew had brought with them this time round. “It's designed to get in and around tight corners, and has a massive extendable boom to penetrate deep into those shafts,” he winked.
“Oh. My. God. That is amazing,” Becky fawned. “Will you show it to me tomorrow?”
“I’d love to show it to you,” said Andy, page 3 of the 2013 annual Firefighters Calendar.
Sandstone Pub heaved into the night, the banter abating late in the evening as the town settled in for rest ahead of the morning’s new search. As daylight called, the population descended on the community’s sports centre — a vacant building adjacent a faux-lawned tennis court-cum-bowling green and a red-dirt golf course — for the morning meeting. Dave, Ray’s youngest brother, and his mate Gordo arrived in town from their overnight camp in Mount Magnet soon after the meeting concluded, easily finding the cluster of police given the few options in town. Driving down Rowe Street toward the sports centre, the friends let out a collective gasp at the scene ahead. The carpark appeared as if a movie-set, with half a dozen reporters all filming under spotlights and umbrellaed reflectors, then pouncing on police and search crews once they exited the sports centre. The reporters were mostly ignored, with the search teams entering vehicles and speeding away south of town toward Bell Chambers. Sergeant Green was the designated media liaison, standing at the court gates which served as the barrier to media, and fielding a barrage of questions.
Gordo and Dave stayed in their vehicle until the pandemonium abated, only approaching Green once there seemed opportunity to do so without being engaged by media. Green sighed as Dave approached, waving him off, “that’s enough of questions and answers time,” he said.
“I’m Ray’s brother,” said Dave.
Green’s demeanour quickly changed. “Sorry mate”, he said. Green had assessed the two city blokes out of place in the local landscape, “I thought you were reporters. What are you here for?”
“To help,” Dave replied, “in any way possible.”
Green reiterated the message that the pair had received the previous day on the journey north, that they could not go anywhere near the search area. Green suggested that they hang around town, and when the police returned in the afternoon he would meet them for a chat.
Sandstone was soon deserted once again, with everyone with purpose thirty kilometres south, at Bell Chambers. Gordo and Dave decided to set up camp at the caravan park, rolling out their tents and chairs under the trees at the front edge of the park entrance then strolling the short distance into the Sandstone Pub. Darlene was cleaning up the bar area while Scruffy, with Neil’s offered assistance, unloaded a fresh supply of food and beverage pallets in the storeroom out back. Darlene was visibly tired, catering for hundreds of lunches and dinner ahead for all the search crews. A few locals sat in one corner of the bar, having been moved on from their prospecting sites due to the search, and they were not happy about it. One media crew sat in the opposite corner, settling in for a long days waiting for police to return in the evening.
“What can I do for you boys?” Darlene asked Dave and Gordo as they sat at the bar. The pair explained that they had just arrived, and weren’t exactly sure what to do. “How long are you in town for?” Dave said that they weren’t sure yet, maybe a few days. Darlene’s eyes started to roll back, thinking I haven’t got time for this. “What are you here for? Something to do with the search?”
“Yeah, Ray is my brother,” Dave answered.
Darlene stopped wiping a glass mid stroke, “Sorry”, she said, “I thought you guys were reporters or something!”
Mistaken for reporters twice in one morning. How embarrassing. Little did they know that Dave had at that point not slept for a week solid, so the spiky haircut and unshaven face, mistaken for city fashion, was simply a hint of the homelessness following him. Darlene filled in the pair on what had been happening since the search began, how they had been needing trucks of supplies almost daily, then gave Gordo and Dave ideas of places to visit locally, such as the old heritage trails and sites. They thanked her, then asked Darlene not to mention Dave was family to anyone, as they didn’t want to be bombarded by the reporters in town. “I promise,” said Darlene, “You know, now that I look at you, you do look a lot like the pictures of your brother.” Dave glanced across at the media team sat in a quiet corner, hoping to God that they hadn’t noticed, too.
Scruffy and Neil completed their unloading of supplies, then collected the cooler boxes filled with lunches for the search crews, preparing to head south to Bell Chambers just before midday.
Earlier that morning, the new LandSAR command centre had been erected on the same site previously housed by the Golden nAUmad caravaners, on the northern prospecting loop of Bell Chambers. By then the site was again a blank canvas thanks to the days and weather passing, yet now a thriving hotspot, with marquees, medical tent, satellite dishes, and the filtering in and out of search teams. Channel Five had entered with impudence, Becky brazenly assured she would collect what was offered the evening before.
The DFES crew were milling around the command centre awaiting instruction. Becky and her cameraman approached Firefighter Andy Roberts, suggesting then was a good opportunity for him to display their new equipment. The DFES crew happily obliged Channel Five, allowing them to film the camera being tested on a nearby abandoned mine shaft. Meanwhile the DFES team were instructed to re-search any mine shafts, to a deeper level, if they were deemed safe to do so, given that the “massive boom” barely penetrated the surface of most of the century-old shafts in the area. Becky’s eyes lit up. She grabbed Roberts’ elbow and begged him to let them film his descending down a mine shaft. Roberts turned to the command centre, where Forward Commander Hoskin smiled and nodded approval. Roberts quickly scanned the horizon, noting the closest prominent shaft on the hill a short stroll east, which he recalled clearing just days earlier. It was an obvious and safe choice for the media stunt.
Channel Five and the DFES team assembled their respective equipment, Five’s cameraman testing angles and light into the shaft from above, while the Firefighters parked their four wheel drive perpendicular to the mine for an anchor point, tying off the ropes to the recovery hitch and checking belay devices. Roberts draped a canvas sheet over the edge of the shaft entrance to prevent friction damage to the ropes and equipment, climbed into his harness, donned his helmet with a torch attached, clicked the carabiners into place, and hopped over the edge of the shaft while the cameras rolled.
The short descent was a walk in the park for Roberts. He had abseiled into and down some of the wildest and remote cliffs and caves in the state during his years as a firefighter. The burning sun soon dissolved as he descended below head height. Looking down the shaft from that point, with his head-torch peering through the darkness, Roberts noted black flies swarming at the base. He let out some more rope, bouncing off the rock edges to lower himself further. Roberts soon smelt a foul stench, yet could not see where or what it emanated from. He turned upward, the camera aiming down the shaft in his direction, past his spotter who was laying over the canvas sheet watching his every move. Roberts decided to rappel further. He reached around two-thirds of the total depth of the shaft when he noticed that the bottom of the mine opened deep and wide into a cavernous bulb. Laying there, behind and underneath rubble, a human body glinted in the torch light.
Roberts held the top of his helmet, aiming the light toward the body to dispel any doubt. He turned back to his spotter, “Nine-zero.”
“Nine-zero?” the spotter echoed in disbelief.
“Yeah, nine-zero. Highly decomposed.”
Becky stared at the spotter, then back at the cameraman, “What? What has he found?”
“Nine-zeroes?” the cameraman shrugged. "That’s a billion isn’t it?”
“Oh my god, we’re rich!” Becky clapped her hands together.
The DFES spotter didn’t take his eyes off Roberts until he was safely back on the surface. The firefighters instructed the Channel Five crew not to go anywhere until they had debriefed with LandSAR command.
Neil and Scruffy were at the mobile command centre, delivering lunches, as the re-enactment was filmed. Scruffy mentioned to Neil that the shaft they were filming had a god-awful smell emanating from it a couple of weeks before, but it had been cleared twice during the previous search. The pair left back to town as the DFES team reported their finding to the Forward Command.
“Badly decomposed,” said Roberts. “Mostly skeletal from what I could see.”
Hoskins advised that the media crew were to be kept on site until they could ascertain for sure if the finding was related. Roberts was instructed to re-enter the shaft with a GoPro and get images and video to send to Perth forensics, which he promptly achieved ensuring he did not disturb the floor of the mine shaft. While dangling precariously from the rope, GoPro in hand, Roberts noted that the body appeared to have been dragged—the feet were shoulder-width apart, and facing into the cavern out of sight of the shaft—and was laying face up, unlike the many bodies he had retrieved from cliff and cave accidents over the years, which were inevitably crumpled in a heap, or having instinctively moved to a place easily seen from above.
The images were sent to Perth for forensic evaluation, who deemed that the body appeared far too decomposed to be related to the missing couple. Months if not years deceased, the advice read. A recovery team would be sent overnight. Channel Five were given the green light to use the footage how they saw fit. Becky determined that this would be her greatest exclusive to date, and all she needed now was a personal angle. They needed Neil.
Neil had returned to town with Scruffy, then rested in the afternoon shade on the main street. Channel Five’s four wheel drive screeched to a halt when they found him, piling out the vehicle doors in a chorus of slamming catches. “Neil, hey buddy, how you doing?” Becky grinned as she stalked toward him. “Something was found during the search today. Major development; it’s going to be big news. We want to interview you real quick, because we think it will help.”
Neil reluctantly agreed, soon thereafter re-enacting a search scene in the local scrub. Becky asked Neil how he was holding up, and had he conceded that it was certainly now a recovery and not a search and rescue. Becky directed Neil to walk through the scrub holding a compass, asking him to yell out Ray and Jennie’s names. Neil was nine hours from home, on his own in a desperate search for two of his closest friends, so he soldiered on through the humiliating anger, wanting to do anything possible to help.
The afternoon news headlines soon broadcast. Gordo and Dave were inside the caravan park tv room, flicking between news channels to gather any possible information available, when Channel Five’s aired: “Exclusive details tonight on a twist in the search for a couple missing in the outback.” Dave’s phone rang, it was Mal relaying the advice received from police that a body was found that appeared to be years old—unrelated. All possible updates would now need to wait until police returned to town, so it was beer o’clock.
The Sandstone Pub was refilling for another evening, the front bar and outside courtyard and rooms all slowly growing in patronage with search crews returning. They were all laughing and sharing stories or thoughts on what the fate of the missing couple might be, unaware of the elephants in the room. Familiar faces were a welcome reprieve, when Neil and Dave spotted each other across the bar. The two had been to school together a whole century ago. They caught up over a couple of beers and Neil filled Dave in on the detail he knew. Neil told Dave how he had been to the campsite area that day with Scruffy, then arranged for Gordo and Dave to do the same tomorrow, hitching a ride with Scruffy on the lunch run the following day.
When the media crews all made their way to the bar, Gordo and Dave found a nice spot outside near the cocky cages, the smoking area between there and the front bar creating a screen from reporters. Sergeant Green soon found them, and affirmed that a body had been found that morning, however it was not possibly related to Ray and Jennie, as it appeared to have been there far too long based on the decomposition.
Neil sat in the front bar when Channel Five’s live news coverage played on the screens above the serving area, still unaware of the day’s discovery. Becky was presenting on the street outside, with a minor delay between her live presentation and what showed on the screen. She had her crispest white shirt on, positively pearlescent in the afternoon light, holding her microphone high and ready as the studio introduced the segment.
Dramatic music and camera swirls announced Tim in Perth’s Live at Five, “We have exclusive details tonight on a twist in the search for a couple missing in the outback. Specialist crews sent into search mine shafts have found human remains! But they're not linked to Jennie and Raymond Kehlet's disappearance.”
The news exclusive displayed footage from the media stunt that morning, with Senior Firefighter Andy Roberts preparing to descend into a random mine shaft. Becky’s voice narrated the scene, “Securely strapped in, an elite team of firefighters from Perth brace themselves to explore the depths of a 100 year old abandoned mineshaft in Sandstone.” Then the dialogue switched to Becky reporting live across the road and visible from the Sandstone Pub, “The crews were sent to look for missing Beverley prospectors, Jennie and Raymond Kehlet. But what they found was another mystery altogether.”
A roar erupted from the front bar as the news broadcast video of Roberts midway down the abandoned mine shaft, announcing, “Nine-zero”, his spotter echoing, “Nine-zero?”, then Roberts affirmation, “Nine-zero, highly decomposed.”
Becky narrated, “Human remains but not that of the missing husband or wife. The body of someone else lost in the desert, so badly decomposed Police say it could have been there for months or even years. A forensic team is heading here from Perth to investigate.”
Neil’s video segment then played, re-enacting a desperate search for his friends in the violent scrub, “Joining the hunt, Beverley local Neil headed out with a group of locals to search for his missing friends himself.”
Every stare in that bar was in Neil’s direction. He held his beer tight, face red with anger. Why wouldn’t they have told me it was a body found?
“At least I have gone and tried to do something and made me feel a bit better just to get out there and have a look,” Neil’s interview continued.
Video switched back to a side-by-side montage of Tim in Perth and Becky in Sandstone. “The search is now in its second phase and being expanded. The base for the operation is Sandstone. Becky, are police still hopeful of finding the pair?”
“Tim, it's been a very long and tiring day for search crews who have spent hours scouring through bushland spotting from planes and looking down mine shafts, and at the crack of dawn tomorrow morning they'll be up and at it again, hopeful they'll find Jennie and Raymond Kehlet. But, in good news, the 53 year old prospector who was missing in Laverton has been found alive and well. He was actually found at the caravan park here in Sandstone.” Becky stood for a long pause after the cameras switched off, basking in the glory of her greatest exclusive to date and the raucous laughter and cheers from the bar across the street.
Meanwhile, thousands of viewers across Australia stared wide eyed at one another as the news faded to black, Could this be their long lost missing loved one, finally found?
14. The Siberian
The outback can be a fickle temptress, when all seems to be settled into a steady pace—dry heat, violent scrub, red dusted bowls—then in a sudden she will burst into a never ending carpet of wildflowers overnight, transforming the landscape after a small tipping point of atmospheric change is breached.
A singular rotation of the earth had occurred since Channel Five’s media stunt notified the world of a random person’s corpse unearthed, found down an abandoned mine shaft within arguably one of the most remote corners of the globe. The arrival of fresh police recruits to Sandstone over that evening and following day was a sight to behold. The Sandstone pub courtyard had burst into blue, the cockatoos all going Berko inside their cages after all the orange cacophony of the SES had scattered, replaced by premature blooms of police uniforms all descending on such a small town at once.
Officer AB, known to his colleagues in the TRG as The Siberian, lay in his bivvy bag writing notes from the day past, his amber eyes reflecting by camp light appeared radiant like the surface of the sun. He gripped his tactical pen in his left hand, his dominant hand, writing upside down against the all-weather diary that he packed on all assignments.
0400 - Departure … 0937 - Arrive Sandstone … 1000 - Forward command post ... The black-coated, heavy steel pen bounced in the light, its embedded glass breaker-cum-DNA sampler glinting at the tip, and shadows from a quote engraved along the shaft (文武両道) danced to The Siberian’s diary notation.
The TRG’s arrival had been whispered the night before. Tables of search volunteers were sharing accounts of that previous day, and riotously describing the hilarious coincidence that police had allowed news crews to film their guys abseiling down a shaft that was deemed all clear, so that they weren’t interrupting the main search, yet somehow—by miracle—another long-lost missing person had been found. Beers spilt and spittle showered the air in mirth. It was an utterly golden moment for the media crews, too, who could now smell newspapers selling faster than cold beers in the front bar.
In a dark corner of the beer garden, Gordo and Dave were meanwhile formulating a better plan for the coming day, now that they knew the lay of the town, and had, in their minds, worked out the rules of play after several beers. They had approached Scruffy to ask if he would take them on the lunch run, out to Ray and Jennie's camping area, as Neil had suggested, which Scruffy was happy to oblige. They also decided to crash the morning meeting at the amenities building, to see what insider information they could gather on the search so far. It all felt rather clandestine, so more beers were suggested. It was Gordo’s shout.
Gordo stood at the bar between elbows of oranges and blues, holding his card and smiled high to get the barmaid’s attention, ordered the beers, when he then overheard a mention of the TRG coming to town. The barmaid delivered the cold bottles back to Gordo, whose face had now turned to revulsion. He strode back to the beer garden with a wide-eyed stare. “The TRG are coming to town, Dave,” he exclaimed, “do you know what this means?”
“Ahhh, no Gordo, I do not?” the mumbled reply.
Gordo spat out the words, “They found another body today, Dave! Your bro and his wife are missing… There’s a bloody psychopath out here somewhere! They’re sending the TRG to find him!”
It was a logical conclusion delivered whilst inebriated - a potent mix. Over the course of the night, more and more police started arriving from Perth, the town turning from a sea of orange to blue, as SES were de-mobilised and replaced. The pair noted how prompt and dense the response appeared.
“You’re fek’n right, Gordo,” Dave lisped. “That’s what those psychos do! They always hang around where they’ve committed the crimes. It’s probably someone inside this pub!” In a town as small as Sandstone, this game of Cluedo had a small board.
It was Dave’s shout. Entering the front bar, which had thinned by the movement of the changing guard, he noted that the majority of patrons were now media crews and locals. Bellied by sufficient intoxication to render a dull form of wit, Dave decided to test the theory of his resemblance to his brother, the man whose face was displayed alongside his wife’s on every channel in the state, by facing and nodding at each reporter in the room while he waited to be served. He then elbowed Dwayne at the bar, spilt a beer on Clyde from Seven Sunrise, and trod on Becky’s white shoe on his exit from the room. The cream of WA’s investigative journalists all responded with nothing other than pursed lips and groans, before returning to the locals in the hope of finding an angle for their next exclusive report.
“Well, it’s definitely not one of the reporters, none of them are smart enough,” said Dave as he placed their fresh beers on the table. “Who do you reckon it is, Gordo?”
Gordo didn’t need a moment to consider his answer, it was already set. “It’s Scruffy.”
Dave took a swig of beer. “How did you come to that conclusion, Gordo?”
“Look at this place,” Gordo waved his upturned hand in a dramatic arc. “An outback pub devoid of regular income, now profiting possibly more than ever.”
“Bloody hell, you’re right! A serial killer would put this place on the map.” Dave took a large gulp of beer. “Any of the locals could be in on it, really. Have you seen the shady characters in the corner of the front bar?”
“Scruffy’s mates, Dave? Yeah. Yeah, I seen ‘em… why’d you have to get us killed, Dave? Why? We could be drinking Pina Coladas on the beach right now, Dave, but no… tonight we’re getting murdered instead.”
They both spat their beers out laughing. They drank another twenty beers to ensure they would die happy, then waddled off to the camp site, to their tents in the wide-open caravan park, ready for a certain murdering.
0400 the next morning, as The Siberian and his entourage left their Perth barracks toward the outback, Gordo and Dave lay prone upright listening to every single footstep, falling leaf, wind direction change, and the farts echoing from nearby camps ready to jump out, torch in hand, to stare into the eyes of the assumed Sandstone psychopathic murderer on the loose.
Gordo poked his head through his tent door after sunrise, one eye open and scanning the horizon, the other puckered closed in the shape, texture, colour, and no doubt smell of a cat's bum. Dave was boiling the billy, grinning at him like a madman. He crawled out and slumped into the camp chair. It was going to be a long day. “I need to go to the toilet,” said Gordo, “but I’m gonna leave it ‘til later, so I’ve got something to look forward to.”
The town of Sandstone soon descended on the amenities building for the morning search meeting. Media crews all milled outside the gates as police, SES and DFES teams entered. Gordo and Dave used the reporters’ incessant barrage as a shield, slipping by the gates and finding a spot up the back of the hall to listen in. The orange teams all soon left with instructions and maps for the day, while new recruits of police remained in their seats. Dave winked at Gordo, this will be when we find out what’s really going on.
“The TRG will arrive this morning, to assist with the recovery of human remains found in the mine shaft. Meanwhile, I want each of you assigned to a search team, to bag and tag anything found today. I know the conditions are rough, there’s not enough beds in town, but you will be supplied with all meals, plus one drink in the evening. Standard award rates plus overtime can be claimed for all hours. Let’s go.” A loud groan could be heard from the rear of the hall.
Three TRG officers arrived at the Sandstone Pub at 0937. The Siberian exited the driver’s door and stretched, his ginger hair ruffling in the breeze. His companions checked the trio in, then returned to their landcruiser and departed town toward the forward command post, thirty kilometres south. They arrived at 1000, as scheduled. Sergeant Hoskin, the Forward Commander, greeted the team and described the finding: Twelve metre deep shaft, bulb-shaped at the base, human remains are highly decomposed. Forensics officers would arrive soon, however the TRG were to provide support due to the danger and difficulty of extraction.
The TRG team began setting up their equipment alongside the mine shaft situated within a short walk and easily visible from the forward command. Hoskins noted the sheer size of Officer AB compared to the other TRG officers, even though they too were supremely built men. AB looked like he could run through brick walls. Which, coincidentally, was how Officer AB earned his nickname.
The Siberian was renowned in the TRG as the man sent in to dispatch the most violent and dangerous offenders. After the long, drawn out process of gathering intelligence, facilitating the plan, then finally standing at the threshold of the perpetrator’s door, soon to be smashed open using the enforcer (battering ram), The Siberian’s amber eyes would narrow to slits, his ginger hackles raise, defining dark brows scowling to the ready—many of the state’s hardest of criminals had simply frozen in terror over Officer AB’s years in the force, unable to move while a puddle of piss filled their pants, as The Siberian charged in to subdue them, effortlessly pinning them to the floor under his unassailable southpaw.
In the urban jungle, The Siberian was the apex predator. Although, truth be told, Officer AB was a man simply driven by his circumstances. The qualities that earned his reputation in adulthood were honed in adolescence, in the gyms of eastern martial arts training centres, after having been ridiculed in childhood. AB found his passion in the literature of the ancient Feudal East, when warriors were scholars and priests practiced the art of the sword. With years of combat sports under his belt by the time he came of age, AB had made the choice to use his supreme advantages in a profession to serve his base motivations: the eradication of bullies. So now, as a TRG officer in the prime of his life, The Siberian’s only worthy natural enemy was the sun itself.
The Siberian wrapped a shemagh scarf around his neck and face, then carried a crate of vertical rescue equipment to the abandoned mine. The TRG team assembled a Larkin frame over the shaft, so that they could lower and ascend men and equipment from directly over the opening, without disruption to the collar or walls. They each tested the gear, abseiling to the base of the shaft and return. Officer AB noted the position of the human remains, the skull and shoulders prominent to the shaft, and the body laying flat and face-up, away and into the cavernous base, far out of sight from the opening above. He returned to the surface, tidying equipment and surveying the ground while waiting for forensics officers to arrive.
Three cigarette butts were spotted on the ground, approximately three metres from the shaft opening, in a tight cluster. Officer AB also spotted the remnants of a small fire on a ledge on the opposite side of the shaft. He pondered the likelihood that the butts and ash, particularly the ash from the fire, could have lasted in the condition found given the recent weather reported. The officer poked around in the fire remnants, however nothing other than ash remained. Detectives from the forward command approached, so AB pointed the findings out to them, questioning why the evidence had not been gathered.
“This isn’t a crime scene, Bamm-Bamm,” the detectives sarcastically retorted.
Officer AB’s amber eyes narrowed, focusing on the three cigarette butts, the small fire, and recalled the scene at the base of the shaft. Not a crime scene? he wondered, ginger hackles raised as he stared back at the detective.
Scruffy was concurrently loading lunches into coolers back at the Sandstone Pub, ready for delivery to the search crews. He had enlisted the help of his friend John, a tall and hardened local prospector. Gordo and Dave were waiting to join them out on the side street, Gordo pelting Dave with blocks of ice from the eskies for having gotten him into the predicament of joining his two prime outback-serial-killer-suspects in their own vehicle, to drive out into the unknown. Dave took a photo of the numberplate and sent it to their wives, which did not seem to appease Gordo who instead landed an ice block perfectly aimed at Dave’s temple.
Scruffy drove the foursome fast and loose down the Sandstone-Paynes Find gravel shortcut, first stopping in a cloud of red dust nearby a group of SES volunteers who were searching along the roadside. They dropped the lunch supplies then quickly gunned it to the next stop, at the Bell Chambers forward command, a kilometre inland from the shortcut, on the northern prospector’s loop. Hoskins, John and Scruffy were in deep discussion, standing at the back of the ute while Dave and Gordo took in the scene. The TRG team were lowering themselves into a shaft at the top of the rise to the east. Media crews were nearby, filming a group of SES volunteers searching in the bush. They piled back into Scruffy's ute and turned back toward the shortcut. Scruffy said that the police had told him to not take them anywhere near where their current search and extraction was taking place, but he could show Gordo and Dave where Ray and Jennie were camped. Scruffy showed them the fence lines that ran along the south, the border to Dianne’s station, and described the same to the east of where they had camped. Then they drove off the main road again to the camp site.
It wasn't far off the road, just over a kilometre of rough but easily manageable bush track, which crossed over a dry creek bed. All that remained of Ray and Jennie’s camp was a compacted black ash pit from their fire, and the shade-providing acacia tree they had set up under. Recent heavy rain ensured that any tracks, or other sights or smells, were no longer Ray and Jennie’s. Dave walked around the site in a trance, flashbacks from childhood filling his mind. Rusted tin signs with bullet holes from sighting the rifles. A granite ridgeline with much to fossick around and under. Trees and boulders to climb. Tracks, ridges, creek lines, all congregating to where they had camped. The 'Tabletop' sight marker easily seen from anywhere in the area. The camp area looked to have been well chosen since it was a natural junction and therefore a safe bet that even if someone did become disorientated, they wouldn't have to walk far to find their way back to camp.
It seemed insulting to imply that either Ray or Jennie would have ever got lost there.
Dave came across a small pile of rocks, piled up on the edge of the creek bed—elongated flat rocks of similar sizes intertwined in a squared lattice stack, like a geological Jenga tower. He didn't disturb it. Perhaps Ray and Jennie would return to play their game.
They returned to Sandstone, bumping into Neil at the bar. Neil had run out of options to help, and wanted to get home to his family before having to head back to work, so would leave early the next morning. “There’s no way Ray would have got lost out there,” said Dave. Neil shook his head and looked down.
The TRG crew soon entered the bar, collecting their food supplies and rapidly departing. They would be there for another day, as they could not complete the extraction due to potential danger of the shaft collapsing.
“There’s no way Ray would have got lost out there.”
The police arrived in town, dismissing the advances of Dave to speak to them. The police suggested that Gordo and Dave head home, as they hadn't found anything more, and the search would likely be called off again. They promised the police that the pair would head home in the morning.
“There’s no way Ray would have got lost out there.”
Everything seemed abnormally cold, dark, and quiet in the pub that evening. None of the search crew stayed longer than to have dinner and their one allotted drink before leaving. There was little to no banter. Dave bought John a beer to thank him for the day—John couldn't even look Dave in the eye when he passed it to him, he simply took the beer and walked away to another table, head down. Darlene and Scruffy kept themselves busy behind the bar. Within an hour or so, the only people left at the pub were a few locals, Gordo and Dave, and the media circus.
Gordo and Dave decided to stay on an extra day and night; it just didn't seem like they could, or should, leave that next morning. Something wasn't quite right; there was a piece missing from this geological, geographical, Jenga puzzle.
There was no way Ray would have ever got lost out there.
… 1000 - Forward command post ... 1015 - extraction team at site … 12 metre shaft … body within cavernous base … splayed and upfacing … remnants of fire at shaft opening … three cigarette butts found nearby … “not a crime scene” … Officer AB completed his diary entry and closed his all-weather book, clicking the end of the Gerber tactical pen shut. He momentarily glanced at the quote engraved along the shaft, dancing in the camp light, 文武両道 (bunbu ryodō), The Siberian’s most treasured lesson from the ancient martial scribes: Pen and sword in accord.
The Siberian would now sip green tea whilst reading Miyamoto Musashi’s The Book of Five Rings, which he knew would take precisely two hours and thirty-seven minutes cover to cover, whereafter he will cover his face loosely with his shemagh scarf and sleep soundly with one eye open.
15. Under the Pump
Clyde closed his eyes and sighed. The Sandstone Pub front bar was deserted early in the night, thank god. Finally, some space and peace for the veteran reporter. He could now unfurl his copy of The Australian with room to move. Clyde rolled his head in slow circles, stretching his neck, then adorned a pair of frameless spectacles, opening the newspaper to the Commentary section. There was a new Tony Abbott editorial that he had been simply dying to digest all day, while being otherwise inconvenienced by reporting Channel Seven’s coverage of the Outback Mystery—a middle-aged couple missing in the outback.
Darlene walked by. “Excuse me, bartender, what wines perchance do you stock?” asked Clyde.
“We’ve got red wine, and white wine,” replied Darlene.
Clyde appeared to have been slapped in the face by a wet fish. “What, ah … what regions, mahm?”
Darlene glanced at the drinks fridge, a dozen or so bottles lay on the bottom shelf untouched for months. “I don’t know. I can get them out and you can have a look if you want? White or red?”
Clyde took a moment to compose himself, the shock was too much for him to bear. His loose, white jowls flapped, “Can … can I have a look at your ‘white’ wines please, madam?”
Darlene lifted three bottles from the fridge and blew the dust off the labels before lining them up on the bar, plonked on top of Clyde’s newspaper. Clyde hurriedly removed his paper before turning the bottles over. “Hunter Valley aged sémillon. Mount Pleasant,” he read from one label aloud. Darlene turned and faced Clyde, laying her tea towel over her shoulder and placing hands on the bar. “That’s where I grew up,” she said with a reminiscent tone. Clyde stared blankly at her for a moment, until realising awkward silences were the norm in the outback. He dismissed Darlene with a, “Joyous,” before tapping the bottle chosen.
Darlene thrust herself away, returning with a glass, cracking the lid and pouring the glass full. Clyde’s red nose twitched as he hesitantly breathed in the aromas of the wine, then took a small sip, rolling the hay-coloured liquid inside his pasty cheeks. “Surprisingly pleasant,” he mumbled.
Clyde opened his Vivino account on his iPhone to write a short review.
Elizabeth Sémillon 2011. Picked early yet aged well. Lively bouquet with hints of green apple and citrus, finishing with a nose of biscuits and honey. Refreshing and lovely, a rare find in the outback.
Placing the phone down on the bar and turning to retrieve his paper, Clyde noted a dishevelled man staring at him from across the room. The man began shaking his head at him. Clyde fluttered his oversized newspaper and returned to the editorial, keeping his peripheral vision on this mysterious character. Once the man had left the room, Clyde sighed with relief. “Heathens,” he muttered.
Dave collected his round and returned to Gordo in the dark corner of the outside beer garden near the cocky cages. There were just two tables occupied in the beer garden that night; Gordo and Dave on one, and a round table of every other news reporter left standing. Theirs was a cross-channel cacophonic cock-fest. Such were their superior powers of journalistic research, it still did not occur to them that Dave was a family member, despite the odds of who was now left in town. Their discussion continued loud and unabated.
“Extraordinary development, what,” said Darryl from PerthNow.
“A relative goOoldmine!” exclaimed Duncan of ABC fame.
Dwayne from Live at Five had been lounging backward in his chair until that moment, man-spreading the rest in alpha display. He leaned forward and clunked his beer on the table, taking control of the conversation. His words came slow and dramatic: “Nooow that the . . . search hasss deeeviated due to such exxxttrrraneous circummmstances . . . whaaat do you feeeel should be the . . . nnarrrrative of thisss storrry…”
The narrative of this story.
“Don’t do it, Dave,” warned Gordo sitting at the nearby table, having noted Dave’s hand clenched upside down around the neck of an empty bottle.
***
The Kehlet family would mostly spend their ‘downtime’ entertaining themselves with card or board games while growing up in the ‘70s and ‘80s, in country West Australia. Yahtzee, Euchre, Cluedo, and the like. Jenga was never on that list; although Dave had played many games of Jenga over the years, betting for beers with ladyboys in bars while travelling through SouthEast Asia. It is a puzzle game, where you set up and knock down a stack of blocks over and over again. Making a mistake and knocking over the stack is an expected failure while playing. The game ends when the tower falls. Ladyboys are mostly, secretly, structural engineers in Dave’s experience; Those bishes can balance a fifty-four-block stack on a match head, if it means they don’t have to pay for the next round, he thought to himself while lying wide awake throughout that entire night, rolodexing the scenes from Ray and Jennie’s camp the day before.
What was the geological Jenga stack at Ray and Jen’s campsite all about? There was no other trace left of them having been there; their camp was packed up and taken home, and no sign of them had been found within a wide radius of where they were last seen. There was absolutely no possible way they were simply ‘missing’. Dave had been saying that on a constant repeat the previous evening: “There is no way my brother is missing out there”, to anyone who could be bothered listening to him say it thirty-seven times in a row.
When daylight called that next morning, ten days since the missing persons report had been relayed to the family—ten days since anyone in the family had slept—Dave could smell colours, taste sounds, and hear the words “professional dry clean” that were written on the tent’s care tag hanging from the roof above him as if they had been shouted. John walked past on his way to town, “Wakey wakey, hands off snakey,” he yelled into the tent door. Dave rolled out of the tent, crawling to the camp chairs and climbed aboard. Gordo’s tent was wide open and empty.
Gordo and Dave were supposed to leave that morning, but something didn’t feel resolved. The cold shoulders received last night, from the Sandstone police and search crews, required answers. Although, they knew they would not get any information until that evening, when they all returned from the cop-blocked search area. All they could do in the interim was to keep occupied for another long day.
Neil had said his goodbyes the night before, departing via the Paynes Find-Sandstone Rd shortcut at 3AM in the morning, giving police all the respect deserved by ignoring the closed road—he was confident he wouldn’t be contaminating an already clueless crime scene—although torn about driving away knowing that Jennie could possibly be so close, yet powerless to assist finding her.
By the time Neil reached the outskirts of Wubin, Gordo was walking back from the caravan park ablution blocks, with a pace on. It seemed he’d used up a few precious minutes early on, not having saved the treasured toilet time for later as he did the day before. Dave’s head bobbled in his chair, white spittle spilling out the corner of his lip, watching Gordo stride toward their camp, Either there was no bog-roll in the toilet block, or he’s found something important, Dave thought.
“Dave, I’ve found something for us to do,” said Gordo with a skip to his step. “There’s a map in the laundry block that shows an old homestead to the north of town for us to visit. There’s a campground there, too.”
It was an ideal solution, as they had already visited all three other potential tourist activities to the west and east.
“What, you’re not enjoying sitting around the esky, staring at the heat refractions in the air, Gordo?”
“You know what Dave, everyone always talks about the beauty of the Australian Outback...but, like I said on the drive up here, I ain’t fekking seen it yet.” Gordo pulled up his chair and slapped Dave on the shoulder. “You know what else Dave, I was sure we’d find Ray at the old brewery yesterday arvo.” The ‘brewery’ is a cave, carved by hand by an old Irishman during the gold rush of the early 1900s, which acted as a cool room to store his ales. On top of the cave is remnants of the still. From that point you can see to the horizon in every direction; a harsh, dry, unforgiving landscape dotted with thousands of old mine shafts throughout, they too dug out by hand. “If you went missing up here, no doubt that’s where you’d have found your way to.”
Dave laughed so hard he nearly peed his pants. Not that it would have mattered if he did, there were worse stains on them already. “I promise when your brother goes missing, I’ll come with you to help look for him, Gordo.”
“I’ll hold you to that, because there’s a good chance that’ll happen one day,” Gordo grinned. “Plus, it’ll be in London, so many, many more pubs to search.”
They barbecued a delicious plate full of burned meat and potatoes peppered with flies for breakfast, then packed up camp and headed off out of town in the Landie, toward Lake Mason Homestead, on the Sandstone-Wiluna Rd. A rooster tail of dry cervicitis blood followed them.
Polar opposite to their position that morning, in the same distance south from Sandstone, Dr. Lee, a police Senior Constable with a PhD, was being kitted out in vertical rescue recovery gear by the TRG. It had been determined that the risks of rock falls and/or collapse were too high to send more than one person at a time to the base of the twelve metre deep abandoned mine shaft, where human remains had been found two days prior. Only one set of ropes could be rigged to the Larkin frame. Sending a second officer into the base of the shaft would compromise a rapid extraction in the event of an emergency. The entry to the shaft had aged, rotten wooden logs acting as a collar, preventing the high mound of tailings at the surface from collapsing inwards. Pieces of the wooden collar were missing, and some of the pieces had visible signs of white-ant activity.
Lee’s vocational passion was in the study of insects, but not white ants on wood. Lee had earned his PhD while tenured at the Body Farms of USA, where, amongst other Taphonomy, Forensic Entomologists study what insects do to human bodies, and their lifecycles, over the course of the body decomposition. So, Lee raised his hand enthusiastically, volunteering to retrieve the human remains, as well as collecting samples of whatever might be crawling around and into it, that day.
The Siberian lowered Lee into the shaft while the legs of the Larkin frame were footed by three other TRG and forensics officers. Lee focused his helmet torch at the base of the shaft as he descended, noting the dry, arid heat and dust soon gave way to the musty interior and quiet darkness. By the time he reached the bottom of the twelve-metre deep shaft, the smell of decay punctuated all other senses. He took a moment to compose himself while The Siberian lowered his equipment in a carry-bag. The body lay as described, head and shoulders toward the entrance, torso away and within the voluminous cavern, legs and feet splayed to the extremity.
Lee surveyed the scene. The shaft was barely over a metre square at the entry, however it opened out into a broad stope at the base, elongated and approximately six metres long by three metres wide. Lee could easily walk around the entire cavern without needing to stoop, its highest point around two and a half metres tall. The walls of the stope and the shaft were comprised of highly fractured rock. Lee gasped in awe at the hardened individuals from that time long past who toiled to such extremes in the incessant search for elusive gold.
Loose rocks and dust fell from the shaft as his equipment bag was lowered, the ropes flicking against the walls. At the base of the mineshaft, directly below the opening, Lee noted a conical pile of debris sloping outwards in all directions, comprising a mixture of the same loose materials, gravel and dirt, as well as pieces of rusty metal and wood. A red plastic petrol can with an opening cut out at the top, with a heavy layer of fine dust was laying on its side in the southern corner of the stope, opposite to the body. The human remains were located on the edge of the cone of debris, lying on its back on the northern side of the pile. A rusty metal can half-filled with rocks and soil was positioned over the body’s right shoulder. The right arm was covered under loose rock material. A large piece of timber was positioned over its right leg, but not in contact with the body. The timber was in two pieces, over a metre long in total and half a foot in diameter. It appeared to be the same type of timber as found at the collar of the shaft.
Lee gathered his equipment—cameras and notebooks—and documented the entirity of the shaft, stope, and human remains. He noted that the body was complete and all parts in anatomical position, clothed in a pair of dark blue coloured work pants, but was not wearing a top or a shirt. The pants had an employer’s decal. Its legs were splayed out at approximately shoulder width, the feet shod in brown All Terrain brand working boots. A clear PUMP water bottle rested between the legs, which appeared to have little to no dust or blood-staining on it. A pair of black gloves were politely placed, one in each trouser pocket.
The body was no longer bloated, having flattened and the exposed parts had become black in colour. Flesh and skin had completely decomposed on the skull, neck, shoulder, and right arm and hand, leaving only dry, broken skeleton. The majority of the torso’s bodily fluids had drained into the surrounding soil, creating a decomposition halo. Insects and mites were writhing throughout the material. The stench of decay was putrid. Lee considered his studies at the Body Farms and concluded that the remains were in Stage 4 of decomposition. He retrieved sample jars from the kit bag and collected hundreds of insect samples, including beetles, larvae, wasp-egg laden pupae, and his favourite predatory beast, the hairy maggots.
It was time to wrap and exhume the body. Lee lifted the skull and jaw mantle away, as there was no longer connection to the body, and wrapped it separately. So too for the right arm, lifting it away from the torso and bubble-wrapping the bones. He wrapped the remainder of the remains, easily lifting and rolling the body which now had relatively no weight. Finally, he searched the ground for small bones that had become dislodged by the insect predation, collecting all the remnants to be found and sealing them in collection jars. The totality of pieces were transferred to lifting frames at the shaft and raised to the surface by the TRG crew then placed in the purpose-built cooled pod of the forensics vehicle. Lee then collected the metal can, red plastic petrol can, and the clear PUMP water bottle that the body lay under.
Lee returned to the surface late in the afternoon after he was satisfied that all possible items were accounted for and collected. The Forward Commander approached, “What are your thoughts, Lee?”
Lee was cleaning his hands with Aqium sanitiser. “The remains appeared to be in Stage 4 of decomposition.”
Hoskins stared at him blankly.
“That would mean around two to three weeks on the surface,” informed Lee.
Hoskins blank stare remained.
“I can’t say for sure, there are no studies for bodies inside mine shafts. But, he has definitely not been down there as long as we determined from the images sent to forensics two days ago,” confirmed Lee.
“He?”
“The skeletal indications suggest a male body.”
“Any defining features?”
“None visible at this stage of decay.”
Hoskins raised an eyebrow.
“The trousers had a work decal on them, though,” Lee offered.
“What was it?”
“Cloudbreak.”
16.
I fell over again this morning. It seems to be happening more frequently this year, since the ruling. That’s the thing about impasses, some structures are most stable when they are moving—like bicycles, solipsism and grief—thus prone to toppling over and breaking when the brakes are applied.
Keep your head up and keep pedalling, that’s what I would hear Ray shout a moment before eating the red dirt. He’d pull me up by the arm, cackling away with that crazed laugh he had, his back arched with head up and mouth open wide to the sky. It was a hard landing each time, never on the lawn or soft sand, no—in the gravel, so you really felt it. The laughter and blood had a balance of its own, shaking the world into a reset.
Try again, he’d say, wiping the tears of laughter from his eyes.
Keify, Dad, was managing a farming property at the time, outback, and in the fading sun of the summer of 1979 I entered my first day of school. The school bus picked us up on a gravel road that bordered the farm, which was about a mile or so from our house. My two brothers and I rode to the bus stop that morning—my next oldest brother Mal on his bike, and Ray dinking me on the back of his—then the bus dropped us back off in the same spot that afternoon, Ray, Mal and I piling out the side door before it continued on north in an ochre dust cloud. We dragged the bikes out from the tin shelter and strapped our school bags on the bars. Ray helped me aboard his bike before we set off. Mal took off ahead of us, I think he enjoyed those moments of peace and solitude on the ride home.
“How was your first day, mate?” asked Ray as he stood up on the pedals pushing us off.
“Bloody hell, Ray,” I said. “Miss Gray didn’t even give me a book like you said she would!”
“You’ll be right, mate,” Ray assured me. “Plenty of time for that. What about your classmate, how was she?”
There were just two of us starting our first year of school that year. “Who, Emma? She’s nowhere too, Ray,” I shouted, swinging my head around wildly, making the bike sway. “She can’t even count to ten without help. And, she gets to E on the alphabet then completely loses her shit!”
Ray arched his back, his face twisting as his gob opened wide to the sky, cackling away in that crazed laugh. Ray had been running his own headmaster like studies on a chalkboard set up at home for years prior, with myself and Mal as his students. “She’ll be right, mate,” he said. “She’ll catch you up in no time.”
[And indeed she did. By winter, Emma had risen to the top of the class; and in a classroom of two, second place is dunce.]
We got home, letting the bikes lean against the garden fence, entering the yard through the gate, then ran up to the back door (which in the country is really the front door) throwing it open and bursting inside. The floorboards all creaked and moaned under us as we trampled in, breaking the country silence. I threw my school case across the floor, letting it skid along before coming to a rest in the corner of the room.
Clarabelle was busy in the kitchen. “How was your first day, luv?” asked Mum.
“Bloody hell, Clarabelle,” I shouted, arms flailing in exasperation. “Miss Gray didn’t even give me a book like Ray said she would!”
After a few weeks of this routine, Ray took it upon himself to give me a crash course in the fundamentals of bicycle dynamics, to get his little brother off his back. This he did one afternoon on the ride home, by sitting me on his bike and pushing me off with little warning, while running behind yelling, “Keep your head up and keep pedaling!”, added with that signature cackle of crazed laughter. Thereafter we were a convoy of three, although I do recall he still carried my school bag for me.
That was one of my first life lessons, one of my earliest memories, from more than forty years ago in a different world across oceans of time, which is now seared into the cerebellar ever since that day my brother Ray taught me to ride a bike: the stability of motion.
Bicycles, solipsism, and grief—such things fall over when the brakes are applied.
My relationship with Ray turned sour about eighteen years ago due to a disagreement with the way Ray was handling taking a new direction in his life. It resulted in Raymond the Ram and I butting heads, after about eighteen beers, eighteen years ago, and that night he made the decision to never speak to me again.
I didn’t learn that Big Brother lesson until it was too late: Love will make you do anything for the person you fall for—in Ray's case it was to walk away from his family and slam the door. I only understood Ray and those decisions he made after meeting my wife, but by then it was too late.
While over Ray’s last few years some sort of peace had been made, the fact remained that our relationship was not the same as it had been, nor how it should have been, and now will never be. Ray was murdered in March 2015. Murdered. To this day, the events leading to his death remain unexplained, and the person responsible walks free.
The Outback Mystery they called it. “Insufficient burden of proof,” they say.
I have had to focus on that Big Brother lesson on the stability of motion from many years ago, in order to just remain upright: The best way to prevent yourself from falling over is to keep moving. But I have fallen over many times despite the motions of time, once more again today, and I have no doubt I will again. I miss my brother. God, I miss my big brother. The cheeky larrikin with that crazed laugh forever ingrained in my mind, like fingernails on that chalkboard from forty years ago. My only solace is that when I look around at the life I have made now, the roots are evident from those earliest of days’ way back when. I now recognise that although we may have grown in different directions, each of us was always a part of the other, and will always be.
I like to think that this was Ray’s final Big Brother lesson, to be able to look back at our beginnings and be truly grateful. So this is making up for time lost, attempting to make him proud, by utilising those advantages that he first gave me.
Never stop. Eat the blood-stained dirt if you have to. Feel it.
He’d have pulled me up by the arm today, cackling away, his back arched with head up and mouth open wide to the sky, shaking the world into a reset.
Try again, I’d hear him say, wiping the bloody tears of laughter from his eyes.
17. Jenga
April 10, 2015.
The heavily corrugated gravel road travelling north between Sandstone and Wiluna threw the silver Landie and its inhabitants around like a Boston cocktail shaker for half an hour before it finally approached the discrete turnoff to Lake Mason Homestead. To either side of the road, sparse barbed shrubs filled the pancake-flat land with hostility, the same as the surrounding gazillion hectares. The sign directing them off the main road toward the homestead finally rattled into view, turning east toward a goat track of ill repair.
Reaching Lake Mason and the Homestead a mile or so inland, Gordo and Dave identified a dried scratch of smoother rocks and lighter sand that was surrounded by a sharper red rock base. Clearly therefore this was the “lake”. Perhaps water had been there for a day or two in the last year, it was hard to tell. There was certainly none there at present despite the recent rain. The homestead was an abandoned pastoral cottage, with sheds and workers accommodation to the north of a cleared patch of red dirt. The cleared area no doubt the campground.
Driving around the site, Gordo scanned the surrounds. “Why the bloody hell would anyone want to live out here?” he asked.
Meanwhile, Dave was staring mouth-opened at the scene, taken back to his childhood—it was as if it were a carbon copy of the first property that he remembered living as a child. The house was an old timber framed semi-transportable building with wide verandah; the laundry and toilet outside in a separate building; an old hills hoist buckled from years of use; and a low wire fence around the once-lawned area, to keep the livestock at bay. Dave pulled the Landie up near the fence and got out, abandoning the vehicle as he would his old farm bike, opened the gate and walked toward the house. Gordo was hanging back, beside the Landie. “What are you doing?” he asked, wide eyed.
“I’m going in,” replied Dave.
“But...But! Oh bloody hell...” mumbled Gordo as he followed toward the verandah.
The house wasn’t locked, of course. Nobody bothers to lock their house in the country. It was deserted anyway, no one had lived there for years. Walking inside, Dave stepped back in time. The floorboards all creaked and moaned as they entered, breaking silence like they would when the Kehlet boys got home from school all those years ago. When the sunlight filled the room, Dave could see it all again.
There was Keify sitting reading the paper at the table. Clarabelle was busy cooking something in the kitchen, probably a mutton dish. Mal was in the lounge room watching ABC on the old black and white TV. Ray will no doubt be in his room, building some new project he had on the go. Dave threw his school case across the floor, letting it skid along the timbers, to come to a rest in the corner. He wandered through the house until it was empty again, then headed back out the back door, which was really the front door as all country homes knew. “Close the bloody door! You don’t live in a tent, do ya?”, an echo yelled from inside. Dave went to the outside laundry and gave their Collie, Kelly, a pat.
Outside, the only sound, apart from the hum of flies, was from the creaking rhythm of the windmill, pumping water for the camp tank. Gordo and Dave walked across the camping ground, the dried earth beneath their feet crunching under their gait leaving fresh prints in the dust. There were no campers there that day, the pair wondered if there ever had been. A short walk later, past remnants of a white-bricked fireplace from another homestead now demolished, they came to the workers’ cottage—a repurposed transportable war building with odd tin shelters bolted to the outside for added storage. Gordo and Dave looked at each other, spooked. There was a real sense of trepidation in the air. Perhaps they had watched one too many movies. Dave pushed open the door and walked inside.
There had been someone in the cottage very recently, as there was a freshly washed woman’s shirt and underwear draped over a chair in the very centre of the main living room, and the whole building was cleaned like it had just been bleached and mopped. But there were no tracks leading into, nor around, the property.
They moved on, quickly exiting toward the shearing shed. Dave felt drawn into the shearing shed. It was just how he remembered from childhood. The smell of the wool and oil leached into the wood, the structure bent and twisted, and sharp steel sheeting sticking out in all places it shouldn't. He walked carefully through the building, climbing over and through fallen timbers, then out the back entry. A lean-to had been built over what would have been the holding pen. It seemed the only structurally sound part of the building left.
Inside the pen, right in the centre, there were two dead kangaroos lying on the ground, cradling each other. One was a large buck, the other a medium grey doe. The buck looked to have been dead for some time, perhaps a fortnight or more, whereas the doe appeared to have died more recently. There was no visible reason for death—they hadn’t been shot, or other prominent injury to suggest how—they were simply lying on the ground together, embraced. Dead.
Gordo and Dave’s eyes met, then stared back at the kangaroos. Neither dared speak. It was time to go. The pair jogged back and jumped in the Landie, then gunned it, sailing above the corrugations back toward Sandstone.
It is just not possible that Ray could be missing out here. We grew up in this landscape, Dave thought to himself as they rattled along the Wiluna-Sandstone gravel highway. While he had been well and truly reborn a city boy, Ray never left. Ray never wanted to. It was insulting to suggest he even could be missing. Is this a game? A puzzle? Was that why they left that Jenga stack near their camp, and the kangaroos at Mason Homestead? I’m going insane, aren’t I?
Dave’s phone rang as they arrived back in town. “Hi Dave”, said an unfamiliar voice. It was one of the reporters. That sneaky chick from channel five who’s been sucking up to all the locals at the bar every night for snippets of information, no doubt. “Whereabouts are you currently?”
“Why?” replied Dave.
“I was wondering if you might be in Sandstone by any chance?” asked Becky. Someone had finally let the cat out of the bag. Dave hung up, and he and Gordo bailed out of town for the afternoon, driving to a lookout area to the east, spending the afternoon wandering around aimlessly in the bush.
Dianne visited Sandstone that afternoon, driving the thirty-five kilometre gravel gauntlet from her outback station, past the fields of police and search crews at Bell Chambers, to pick up her weekly mail. She had just left the post office and was headed back to her car parked on Mingah Street when the search crews all arrived in a convoy of importance along the main street, nearby the shire offices. Dianne spotted the troop-carrier and trailer that had passed her a week or so prior. She approached a gathering of blue uniforms. “Who’s the cop who tows the big trailer around?” barked Dianne into the throng.
Forward Commander, Sergeant Hoskin, puffed his chest out, “That would be me.”
“Well, out in the bush, mate, it’s common fucking courtesy to slow down with a trailer, and pull over because it’s gonna be my fucking windscreen that gets smashed,” Dianne politely informed the officer. Hoskin frowned at Dianne. Dianne returned his gaze, “Do you need me to keep going?”
Gordo and Dave parked up at the caravan park just as Dianne had won the afternoon uncomfortable silence competition before returning to her vehicle and running over a fresh set of bollards on the Sandstone-Paynes Find road, on her way home. The pair walked to the pub, noting the police all milling around the shire building around the corner. They entered the front bar, ordering and skulling a quick Bush Chook each. It was time to catch up with the cops, to see if there was any news from the search. Gordo stayed in the pub, and Dave walked over to the shire offices, where the police were busy packing things up for the day.
Sergeant Green did a double-take as Dave approached, he had expected Dave and Gordo would have been on their way back to Perth that morning. Green was finishing off some paperwork with the TRG and another group in blue overalls, who were packing up their van ready to go. The rear doors all slammed shut on the van, Green wished the crew a safe journey, before turning to Dave.
“The extraction at the mine shaft where the body was found was successfully completed today. That van is taking everything back to Perth for forensics,” said Green, nodding toward the departing vehicle. “I thought you were going home today?”
“We will tomorrow,” Dave promised.
“Good,” said Green. “I think it’s a good idea if you do. You should spend some time with your family now, there is nothing you can do here.” He paused for a moment, looking down at his boots, then went on, “The body that we extracted was a male, and not as decomposed as we expected.”
“What do you mean?” Dave frowned.
“There is nothing more I can tell you right now, the body is being taken back for forensic investigation.”
“Wha...what do you mean?”
“There is really nothing more I can tell you now, mate. I’m sorry, but I have a lot of work to sort out right now. I suggest you get yourself some rest tonight and head home tomorrow, okay?”
Green reached to shake Dave’s hand, but was met with a vacant stare. Green turned and walked to the shire office, leaving him in thought. Dave turned and waddled back toward the pub. As he approached the door, Ray’s eldest daughter, Chars, called.
“What the hell is going on, Uncle Dave?”
“I really don’t know Chars...why, what have you heard?”
“The Geraldton Police just called, and they said something about the body in the mine shaft.”
“Yeah, they just said something to me too.”
“Well, they said something about the clothing, that it was mining gear. They even said the word Cloudbreak.”
Ray worked at Cloudbreak...the body was a male...not as decomposed as expected... Everything fell out from under him. The game ends when the tower falls. And the geological, geographical Jenga tower just fell.
“Ohhh... I’m so sorry, love...” Dave whimpered.
“What?”
“I’m so sorry,” was all he could say.
A silence of a few seconds that felt like years passed before Chars finally said, “I’ve got to go,” then hung up.
Dave pushed the Sandstone Pub door open with the top of his head and waddled into the front bar. Gordo was sitting at the counter. He turned, then did a double-take at Dave’s bleached-white face. “What happened?” said Gordo. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”
18. Finale
April 10, 2015
Gordo watched silently as the ghostly figure entered the bar and slumped onto the stool beside him. He listened as three long, drawn breaths passed before waking him. “What happened?” asked Gordo.
“It’s Ray.”
“What’s ‘Ray’?”
“The man in the hole.”
“Wha. . . how do you know? … Did they tell you?”
He tipped a bush chook back, reigniting the circulatory system, then dropped the empty can on the floor. “They said enough.”
Gordo looked around the room. Search teams and media crews had begun entering the bar for the evening. “Come on, let’s get out of here. We’ll sit out the back.” Gordo lifted the sack of despair off the stool by the elbow, directing him through the doorway to the hall then through the rear courtyard toward the beer garden.
Sergeants Hoskins and Green bumped into the pair as they traversed the courtyard. Dave sprang back to life, standing to the blue uniforms. “That guy they were camping with, have you guys got him under surveillance?”
The officers exchanged bemused stares. “Why would we do that?”
Dave’s eye twitched, “You’re kidding, right?”
Green and Hoskins squared their shoulders, “No. Why would we need to do that?”
Dave looked at Gordo and raised an eyebrow, then turned back to the officers. “Well. . . three people entered, and one is left, so…”
The officers turned to Gordo, “Just make sure you go home tomorrow.”
Gordo directed Dave to the outside beer garden, nearby the cocky cages, the smoking area a screen to all the people inside. Dave stood at the cage watching the cockatoos all screeching and landing on the wire daring him to pat their feathers. He scratched the white cockatoo for a moment until the black one asserted its dominance, shoving the cocky out of the way and spreading its wings and tail wide, displaying a red patch of feathers beneath. Dave moved his hand towards the cage, Gordo grabbed his arm. “That one bites,” warned Gordo. Dave pushed his whole finger inside the cage and stroked its belly where the red feathers dissolve to black.
Sergeant Green had changed into his ‘civvies’, searching for the pair and sitting alongside Gordo while Dave’s finger bled onto the lawn. Green opened his mouth to say something placated, so Dave cut him off: “I’ll get you a beer,” he said, striding inside. Gordo and Green sat in awkward silence for a minute.
“It takes a week for DNA results,” said Green.
“He’s not stupid you know,” said Gordo.
Green stood, “It takes a week to obtain DNA results,” he said, then left.
Gordo leaned back and sighed heavily, sweeping the search and media crews with a pensive gaze as they entered the space. “The gold rush never ended,” he muttered to himself.
Spring, 2013
The airport bus arrived at the Cloudbreak ESO office gates, the fly-in crew exiting and swiping their passes into site. Ray and Jennie kissed at the gates, Ray entering work and Jennie carrying a parcel inside the office. “G’day Gray,” she said, smiling at the short, bald, weathered old man behind the counter. “I bought you something.” Jennie passed the large yet thin cardboard box across the counter. Miller appeared startled. “It’s a book,” said Jennie. “You said you were into prospecting, so I found this old book on geology at home. I thought you might like to borrow it and have a read.” Miller opened the carton, inside was a hardcover, cloth-bound relic, Geology and Mineral Resources of the Western Goldfields the title in gold leaf on the printed front board. Jennie smiled as he ran his finger across the letters, “It’s a first edition. Written over a century ago. Early 1900s. It is fascinating.” Miller exchanged a smile with Jen then turned his attention back to the book, opening the cover gently, its hinges creaking. “It’s even still got the separate portfolio of maps—very rare,” she proudly stated.
Miller kept his gaze downward on the book. “You’d trust me with this?” he croaked.
“Of course,” Jennie inflected. “I’ll grab it back off you when you’ve finished with it.”
Miller looked up, meeting Jennie’s smile. His eyes were red and moist.
“Are you okay, Gray?”
“Oh. . .yeah, nah, yeah, I’ve just got some of this red dust in my eyes, ya know?”
Jennie laughed, the corners of her eyes raised with sincerity. “Well, look after it,” she said, then left the office and entered the gates back to work.
Summer, 2013
On their final swing before Christmas, Ray and Jennie exited the Cloudbreak gates ready to board the airport bus and return home from the Pilbara. Miller waved from behind the office window, urging Jennie inside. “I’ve got your book for you to take home,” he said as Jennie entered.
“Oh, thanks Gray,” she said. “Did you like it?”
“Fascinating,” he smiled. “Do you study geology?”
Jennie’s eyes twinkled, “Oh… no, not formally. I love gemstones and crystals though. I just bought a new book, Gemstones of Western Australia. There’s so much of it around this area.”
“Nothing valuable like that around here though,” he said.
“Well… it depends on what you deem ‘valuable’,” winked Jennie. “Those ancient stones hold a lot of power. I love opals, too, though.”
Miller passed the book encased in its cardboard safe across the counter back to Jennie. “What about gold?”
“What girl doesn’t love gold,” she laughed, her hand accidentally brushing Miller’s as she collected the parcel. Jennie held the book against her chest as she left the office, turning to Miller at the doorway, “See you next year,” she waved.
Miller watched as Jennie exited and walked to the bus. “See you next year,” he muttered.
Autumn, 2015
Ray, Jennie, and Miller all filled their tanks with fuel at the Paynes Find Roadhouse early in the morning, March 19 2015, staring in disbelief at the numbers on the bowser as they rolled furiously higher and higher. The convoy of three four-wheel-drives towing three trailers and two quad bikes entered the gravel shortcut toward Sandstone shortly thereafter. Miller led, Jennie following at a safe distance behind, and Ray at the tail of the billowing orange cloud swept up by the procession. Ella pressed her enormous jowls against the window in the rear of Ray’s cabin, wanting to sniff the desert air. Ray reached around and patted her flank, “No open windows, Ella, there’s too much dust. We won’t take too long.”
They reached the turnoff to the Bell Chambers’ southern prospecting track a few hours later, Miller stopping on the side of the road to ensure the other two vehicles didn’t inadvertently miss the GPS location. Once everyone was accounted for, the trio crept along the track carefully eastward, reaching their chosen camp spot a kilometre or so inland.
Red and blackened rock, ochre dust, radiant green and yellow foliage, ash-silver dried wood, mulga and acacia bushland, and a peppering of milky-white quartz would be their planned home for the next ten days. Ella bounded out of the Land Rover, jumping up against Jennie at head-height when she stretched out of the old faithful yellow Land Cruiser’s driving seat, wetting her entire cheek with one small lick. “Oh, it’s so beautiful here,” said Jennie as she took in the surrounds.
They setup camp with urgency, digging the wheels of the trailers into the solid ground to prevent movement and square the work spaces, backed the quad bikes off the ramps, opened tent awnings, and unfolded tables and chairs. Ella’s doona was fluffed and laid out under the shelter of Ray and Jennie’s trailer rooftop tent. The billy was boiled, and cups of tea made. Ray and Miller then went about sorting their equipment, ready to find gold.
Jennie walked to the edge of the dry-creek bed with a collection of golden-brown jasper stones from the Pilbara, rough and unpolished, each in the shape of a flint arrow head, and stacked the stones in a lattice structure with a shaft down the centre. “These are tiger eye,” said Jennie, “This will give us courage, endurance, and strength to achieve our goals,” she announced.
Ray was coiling rope together in a figure eight, “Okay, love,” he rolled his eyes with a grin toward Miller, the corners of his eyes high with tenderness.
Miller gripped his mattock tight.
“Our cups of tea are getting cold,” said Ray.
“I’m too nervous,” said Jennie, rubbing her hands together.
“Me too,” Ray grinned. “Let’s just get the show on the road, huh,” he gestured toward Miller.
The quads were packed with all their necessary equipment, and they had a whole afternoon ahead. “Alright then,” said Miller, “Let’s get going.”
Ray and Jennie checked on Ella who had already curled herself up on the doona, her snout resting against mottled paws. “Ella, ‘stay’,” said Ray. Ella returned a sideward glance without lifting her head—as if she didn’t already know the drill.
The trio climbed aboard the quad bikes, started the engines, and left the camp together, on an equal path of parallel purpose.
Winter, 2022
No other sound is to be heard other than the leaves rustling and occasional branch creaking in the breeze. A blanket of stars fills the sky each night; the Milky Way unspoiled by any light pollution in this remote land. Seven years of cycling seasons have passed, the rains and subsequent droughts have reset everything in the outback—moments that take many seasons to erase—and the earth has now returned to a blank canvas.
There's a misconception that survival in this country is dependent on certain essential amenities: water, shelter, fire. Those may be true, however the list of sacred essentials for surviving our country are not found in trees and streams. The real essentials for long term Australian outback survival are: identity, community, and purpose.
This land is shared with very few: National treasures such as one local indomitable woman who patrols an area the size of some nations of the globe, and knows every track and crossing as if they were the lines on the palm of her hand; those old prospecting men and women, those hardened individuals, relics of the former era who moved whole landscapes with their bare hands; the traditional owners, the Indigenous people who know this land better than anyone, whose ancestors not only survived but also thrived in perhaps the most inhospitable environment on Earth; and the nomads and wanderers, passing through on their perpetual searches for peace. These communities who share a common principle, that respect must be earned, not simply given to uniform, title or position.
Wildflowers have burst into life then fallen to dust many times, yet the dry heat and violent scrub remains a constant, as does the metronome of amber sunrises and sunsets who shine golden light upon this rugged, unspoiled landscape.
A pair of wedgetail eagles surveys this land daily, soaring in the thermal currents miles aboveground, peering down upon the vast beauty of the Western Australian Outback from their lofty heights. Somewhere in this oasis, precious gemstones of milk-white opaque opal lay within the ochre earth, waiting to be found.
Thank you for reading Ray and Jennie’s Outback Mystery. This is not the end, however; as many of us know only too well, this was, and is, merely the beginning.
A timeline of key events is included below.
I hope that you will agree that the outback “mystery”, is that there was never any real mystery. Yet, the puzzle remains unsolved and the perpetrator walks free.
Please join the public group on the Book of Faces, where you can share, add comment, and participate in the discussion:
The Man in the HOLE - public group
With your help, justice for Ray and Jennie will prevail.
Timeline of key events:
2014 - 2015 - Kehlets and [Miller] plan and train to abseil down mine shafts (refer emails and messages between the trio, in coroner's findings sect. ‘The Plan’)
Sometime 2014 - 2015 - Kehlets and [Miller] draw mudmap, including reference to '1ST HOLE' (written by [Miller])
Sometime 2014 - 2015 - Kehlets tell a friend ([Maximus Whikser]) of their plans to abseil down shafts.
March 18 - Jennie Kehlet's final diary entry - "Hopefully go to Hole, fingers crossed"
March 19 - Kehlets, Ella the dog, and [Miller] arrive at Bell Chambers Camp
March 22 - [Miller] leaves the site, heads back to Perth. A local prospecting couple see a man who looks a lot like [Miller] on Paynes Find-Sandstone Road at ~5AM. Two prospectors happen across the campsite ~10AM - don’t see anyone there except Ella the dog.
Sometime between March 20ish & whenever - fire extinguisher found on Atley Station by [Dianne]. (And tyre marks to south of Bell Chambers)
March 25 - Two more prospectors happen across the camp site - don’t see anyone there except Ella the dog.
March 27 - Prospectors camp on the northern track of Bell Chambers, nearby Ray's HOLE, and note foul odour.
March 28 - Ella is found at a caravan park in Sandstone. 25mm of rain soaks the region in coming day/s.
March 31 - Family is contacted by Sandstone Shire.
March 31 - Family call satellite phone, [Miller] answers (satellite phone was supposed to be left with Ray and Jennie).
March 31 - Family report the Kehlets missing.
March 31 - Sandstone Shire head to the site.
April 1 - police from Mt Magnet head to the site. A constable smells an odour from a mine shaft, but attributes it to a dead kangaroo. - overnight AMSA infra-red plane search.
April 2 - Land SAR begins (AKA Phase 1 of the search). Aerial and ground searches find no trace of the Kehlets.
April 2 - TRG look down that mine shaft and declare it ‘clear’.’
April 3 - Kalbarri SES look down that mine shaft and declare it ‘clear’.’
April 3 - [Miller] assists police and is allowed to camp near the Kehlet’s setup, ALONE, with all Kehlet’s camp still set up (all roads otherwise blocked to the region, so the last man to see two missing people alive left unattended at the camp). [Miller] directs the search toward the south. [Miller] leaves the following morning.
April 4 - the mudmap is found
April 5 - Phase 1 search concludes. Camping gear taken home by Jennie’s family. Minimal forensics undertaken at this stage. Campsite was already dismantled.
April 6 - Phase 2 search confirmed.
April 7 - Helicopter aerial search conducted, with no trace found. [Urania Minerals] utilise the helicopter search to obtain VTEM survey of Bell Chambers.
April 8 - A body is found by accident while [channel 5] news crews film a media stunt. The remains are deemed too highly decomposed to be either Ray or Jennie.
April 9 - TRG (assisting with extraction) note cigarette butts and remnants of a small fire nearby hole. Not collected, it seems because it was not, somehow, deemed a crime scene…
April 10 - The body is extracted. Police comment that the remains were “not as decomposed as thought” and note that the work pants had ‘Cloudbreak’ mine site decal.
April 12 - Phase 2 search ends.
April 17 - the body is formally identified as Ray. Some family members find out via the news reports.
April-May - Blood spatter analysis escalates the investigation to potential homicide (despite autopsy report not having already done so…).
May 6 - phase 3 of search begins.
May 7 - Cigarette butts are seized from near the mine shaft (1 month after their identification).
May 8 - Ray’s funeral.
May 11 - Police ask for some of Jennie’s DNA. Her family give them a hair brush. Cars and other things are looked at by police. Not sure if they had forensics involved at this stage.
May 15 - phase three of search ends.
July 22 - fire extinguisher found on property by [Dianne] back in March prompts a new search.
July 23 - Phase 4 LandSAR search begins. (Based on report by Snr Sgt WHITEHEAD)
August 1 - [Miller] does only ever media interview
August/September - Ray & Jen’s quad bike and equipment taken for forensics testing
November 3 - [Miller] arrested and taken for questioning - his equipment seized for forensics
November 4 - [Miller] released without charge
Nov/Dec 2015 - Phase 5 search of area around [Miller]'s GPS ‘ping’ (from evidence retrieved after his equipment was taken) on Paynes Find road conducted,
March 2017 - police call for public information
October 2017 - Govt offers a $250k reward for information
July 2018 - DPP says they won’t press charges on [Miller] after police submit report.
October 2019 - Coronial inquest announced
January/February 2020 - coronial inquest
May 2021 - inquest findings handed down: Ray declared murdered, Jennie deemed deceased beyond reasonable doubt.
June 2022 - DPP not pressing charges - insufficient “burden of proof”.
NOT The End.
Thank you for doing this it is a powerful read. I think you have done your brother the greatest honour under the most horrendous circumstances and somewhere, somehow he and Jennie are watching on with immense pride.
I look forward with great interest to the next part of the story.
The truth has a way of wriggling and niggling and gnawing and chafing and growing heavier and louder and more uncomfortable the longer it is kept in the dark.
The truth will set you free x
I don't know what to say....
Devastating to read...I'm familiar with this area have been out there prospecting in the same area
Hand on my heart , my heart is breaking for you and your family
Just wished I could help you 😔