Lasseter's Cave

PROLOGUE EIGHTEEN MONTHS AGO Terry Jenkins had mixed feelings. His time in Australia was nearing an end. He was driving to Perth in Western Australia to catch a flight back to his home in England. Terry missed his family and looked forward to seeing them again. Contact with his parents and his brother back home in Somerset over the previous year was limited to periodic, brief, long-distance telephone calls, and the occasional postcard sent from various locations in Australia. He was also going to miss Australia. Twelve months was not a long time to become familiar with a strange, foreign country, particularly one as vast as Australia, but it was long enough for Terry to fall in love with Australia and its citizens. Terry had been working in Australia on a visa for almost twelve months, and admired everything about the country some people in England still referred to as the antipodes. Given his enthusiasm for everything Australian, its people, its weather, and its lifestyle, he believed he could live the rest of his life in Australia, and had already decided one of his first priorities when he returned home would be to investigate the possibility of emigrating. His parents would not like the idea, but he was determined, and the prospect of a future filled with sunshine, pristine beaches, and the prettiest girls he had seen anywhere was far more appealing than the dour, cold, grubby backstreets of Bridgewater in the Southwest English county of Somerset. Terry’s desire to live in Australia was decided soon after he first became aware of Harold Lasseter’s bold expedition into the remote and unforgiving Australian outback. Lasseter was looking for a magnificent reef of gold he was convinced actually existed, and swore he had seen with his own eyes. Terry wanted to visit the place the hapless adventurer allegedly rested before subsequently perishing after setting out on his ill-fated trek to reach the Olgas, one-hundred-and-forty kilometres to the east. He still had a few days before his scheduled arrival in Perth, and could easily have flown to the Western Australian capital from Yulara where he had been working, but his desire to visit Lasseter’s last known place of refuge was too strong. The Lewis Harold Bell Lasseter legend captivated Terry from the first time he learned of it while watching a late-night television documentary. Lasseter’s story epitomised the adventurous, carefree, “have a go” attitude that seemed to be ingrained in the Australian psyche, Terry thought. He had a car, not a particularly good car in relation to its aesthetics, but the imperfections in the form of mild body rust, more than a few panel dents, and one door a different color from the other three, were of little concern. Since he purchased the car in Perth, soon after he first arrived in Australia, it had given him no trouble, and had taken him across the great Nullabor Plain, into South Australia, and later to many other parts of the country. Crossing the rough, dusty, corrugated Great Inland Road, while a somewhat daunting prospect prior to actually attempting it, ultimately presented no real challenge other than the time it took to traverse, and the somewhat uncomfortable ride it presented. Terry stood on top of a moderately steep rise, shook off his backpack, and considered the landscape around him. Directly in front, at the base of the incline, was a large, dry waterhole. He imagined how fantastic it would look if it were filled with water, and how different things might have been had it been filled with water back when Lasseter sheltered in the cave not far away. He slowly turned and gazed at the surrounding countryside. He was looking forward to this experience, and now that he was actually here, it was even better than he could have imagined. There were many who would disagree with Terry’s assessment; this was a remote, isolated, desolate place where most folk would never dare, or even want, to venture; there were no McDonalds, KFC’s or Krispy Kreme Doughnut stores out here. For Terry Jenkins however, the attraction was the lack of commercialisation. Just as the sand and rolling surf of the coast, and the beautiful bodies flocking to the sunbaked beaches were a magnet for Aussies and tourists alike, this place was quintessentially Australian. This was the Outback. As he slowly turned, taking in the vista stretching for hundreds, and in some directions thousands of kilometres around him, he found himself facing back the way he had just come. He froze. A man stood at the bottom of the incline smiling up at him. The stranger was holding a g*n, and it was pointed up the slope, directly at him. Terry stared at the man. They locked eyes across the short expanse of ground separating them. There was something about the way the stranger smiled; more sinister than welcoming, he thought. A strong feeling of dread washed over the young Englishman. “Hi,” Terry said, tentatively. The man did not respond. “I didn’t expect to find anyone else out here,” Terry continued. His eyes were drawn to the rifle, and the threat it represented. As he watched, the man raised the barrel of the rifle. “Wha… what do you want?” Jenkins asked, the first icy fingers of fear beginning to flutter in his belly. “You shouldn’t be here,” the man said calmly. “I… I was just about to leave,” Jenkins said. He took one cautious step towards the base of the incline. The man fired. The bullet crossed the short distance between the two men in a millisecond. It hit Jenkins in the throat. Blood, bone and tissue sprayed haphazardly from the back of his neck. The impact threw him backwards and he crashed to the ground, his body raising a small cloud of dust that quickly settled around his prostrate form.