Beyond the creek, on the landward side, was a reasonably sized town, a cluster of larger buildings lining the main road. She’d driven past them earlier, noticing a pub, a grocery store and a hairdressing salon.
The helicopter swung away, and now all Kate could see were the slopes of hills, many of them covered with banana plantations, while beyond them rainforest-clad mountains rose up to meet the sky.
‘It’s cattle country once we’re over the mountains.’
She turned to Hamish and nodded acceptance of his statement, soon seeing for herself the open stretches of tree-studded plains. Rex seemed to be following what appeared to be a river, with more closely packed trees marking its meandering course. Then more hills appeared, rugged, rocky sentinels rising sheer from the plains, the setting sun catching their cliffs and turning them ruby red and scarlet.
So this was what people talked about when they used phrases like ‘red centre’ to describe Australia. Kate pressed her face to the window to get a better view.
‘You’ll be seeing it firsthand before long,’ Hamish reminded her, and, right on cue, the helicopter began to descend. It took another twenty minutes but eventually Rex found somewhere he could safely set down. He turned off the engine and, with the rotor blades slowing, he climbed back into the cabin and began to unstrap the equipment they would need.
‘I’ll send you down first, Doc, then the gear, then you, Sister Winship.’
‘Kate, please,’ Kate protested, but Rex just shook his head.
‘Rex is an old-fashioned gentleman. He calls all the women by their proper titles,’ Hamish told her. ‘Tried to call me Dr McGregor for the first few months I was here, but I kept thinking he must be talking to my father and didn’t answer, so he finally gave it up.’
Hamish was checking the equipment bags as he spoke. Once satisfied that each contained what it should, he’d lower it out of the helicopter. Rex set up a belay rope, using one of the helicopter’s skids as the anchor point, and Kate was reassured by the professionalism of both men.
‘You’ve got the radio but once I leave the top of the gorge you won’t be able to contact me until I’m back overhead in the morning. Use the hand-held GPS to find the patient. When it’s light, if you can see a space—maybe near the waterhole—that’s clear enough for me to do a stretcher lift, you can radio me the position.’ Rex was looking anxiously at Hamish, obviously unhappy that he had to abandon the two of them. ‘I’ll fly over to Wetherby Downs for the night, refuel and be in the air again at first light. Back here soon after six.’
‘We’ll be OK,’ Hamish assured him, handing an abseiling harness to Kate, then fastening himself into a similar one. He followed this up with a helmet, complete with headlamp. ‘Kate, you’re sure you’re happy about this? You could stay with Rex. It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve broken RRS rules in an emergency.’
‘Not on my first day,’ Kate joked, hiding a tremor of trepidation. The gorge wasn’t all that deep, and dropping down the cliff-face would be simple, but the sun had already left the bottom of the cleft and the shadowy gloom beneath them seemed … unwelcoming somehow.
She watched Hamish disappear, and when he gave the signal helped Rex haul the reinforced rope back up. They hooked the two backpacks, one with medical gear and the other with the stretcher and stabilising equipment, onto the rope, then added another which, Rex explained, held emergency rations.
‘There’s a little gas stove so you’ll be able to have a hot cuppa later tonight,’ he said. ‘No fires, though, it’s a national park.’
Kate nodded, though she was certain park rangers would forgive a small fire should it be needed for warmth or survival.
She watched as Rex lowered the rope. Hamish would undo the gear, then send the rope back up, and it would be her turn.
Strong arms caught and steadied her as she found her feet, then Hamish unclipped her harness and signalled to Rex he could haul it back up. But the pilot was obviously anxious for he repeated all his warnings and instructions about contact before Hamish finally signed off.
He reached down and swung one of the backpacks onto his shoulders, then lifted the other one.
‘That’s mine,’ Kate told him. ‘If you want to be gallant, take the smaller bag.’
He grumbled to himself, but held the medical equipment pack up for her so she could slip her arms into the straps.
‘We’ve a way to walk,’ he warned, and Kate grinned at him.
‘My legs may not be as long as yours, but they’ll get me anywhere we need to go, so lead on.’
He muttered something that sounded like ‘damned independent women,’ then turned his attention to the GPS, marking their current position as Landmark One, then keying in the position of the injured man.
‘It’s about eight hundred yards in that direction,’ he said, showing Kate the route map that had come up on the small screen.
They set off, picking their way through the wide-leafed palms that gave the gorge its name, clambering over the rocks littering the banks of the narrow creek that had cut through the sandstone over millions of years to form the deep but narrow valley. The creek was dry now, at the end of winter, but, come the wet season in late October, and it would roar to life, marks on the cliffs showing how high it could rise.
Darkness was falling swiftly, but they’d left the creek-bank and were walking on more stable ground, the light from their torches picking out any traps for their feet.
‘It shouldn’t be far now,’ Hamish told her. ‘I’ll try a “coo-ee.”’
The thought of a Scot using the Australian bush call made Kate smile, but Hamish’s ‘coo-ee’ was loud and strong, echoing back to them off the cliffs. Then they heard it, faint but clear, definitely a reply.
‘Well, at least he’s conscious,’ Hamish said, reaching back to take Kate’s hand to guide her in the right direction—hurrying now they knew they were close to their patient.
The man was lying propped against the base of the cliffs, an overhang above him forming a shallow, open cave. A very young man, haggard with pain, trying hard to hold back tears he no doubt felt were unmanly.
‘Digger said he’d let someone know, but I thought he was just saying it to make himself feel better about leaving me,’ the lad whispered, his voice choking and breaking on the words.
‘Well, he did the job and here we are,’ Hamish told him. ‘One doctor and one nurse, all present and correct. I’m Hamish and this is Kate, who’d barely set foot in Crocodile Creek when we whisked her off on this adventure.’
‘Crocodile Creek? You’re from Crocodile Creek?’
He sounded panicky and Kate knelt beside him and took his hand, feeling heat beneath his dry skin.
‘We’re the Remote Rescue Service,’ she said gently. ‘And now you know us, who are you and what have you done to yourself?’
She brushed her free hand against his cheek, confirming her first impression of a fever, then rested it on his chest, unobtrusively counting his respiratory
