By Peter Corris
The ‘back beach’ on the east coast of Fraser Island is a wide strip of white sand that runs for 125 kilometres from Waddy Point in the north to Hook Point in the south. The best time to see it is after the tide has wiped out the thousands of 4WD tyre tracks that turn the beach into a kind of temporary two-lane highway. The worst time is in the middle of the day with the sun beating down and the Toyotas and Land Rovers roaring along, scaring the birds and leaving behind fumes and traces of oil and rubber.
I’d seen it at both times and at all times in between for the past four days. I’d put ‘fishing’ on the Application to Camp form I’d lodged with the Parks and Wildlife people in Hervey Bay. I had the permit and all the gear—rods and reels, lines, hooks, sinkers, knives, buckets, net in my Land Cruiser. I also had a portable generator that ran a fridge to make ice for the esky. The equipment had come with the vehicle and I hadn’t touched it, apart from the ice and the esky. My idea of catching fish is to go to Doyles and put a fork in a couple of grilled fillets. I was a fisher of men.
* * * *
Simon Bucholtz and his brother Alex, nineteen and eighteen respectively, had disappeared in July. They’d gone backpacking to Queensland, taking a break from their university studies after the first semester. They’d called their father from Maryborough to say they were pushing on to Bundaberg, and hadn’t been seen or heard of in the ten weeks since. The police had done all the usual things, including giving up the search. The boys’ father, Horst Bucholtz, had come to me— on the recommendation of a satisfied client— with his slender thread of new evidence, his straw to cling to, his piece of floating wreckage.
‘My friend saw them, Mr Hardy. Eight weeks ago. He was getting a plane on the beach on Fraser Island and he saw the boys just as he got on board. He flew to Brisbane and then to the States. He did not know the boys were missing until he got back yesterday. Even then Bucholtz was a big man, fifty plus and looking it around the eyes and in the way he carried himself. His wide shoulders had a defeated slump that looked unnatural with his trim physique and athletic grace. He sniffed, pulled the shoulders back and got himself under control. ‘Even then, he only mentioned seeing them as a casual afterthought. He was amazed at my reaction. He thought I had gone mad.’
‘I can imagine,’ I said. ‘He knew the boys well by sight?’
A sharp nod. ‘He knows them, yes.’
There’s not much you can do when a desperate parent gets into that positive mode, but you have to try. ‘Even so, eight weeks is a long time for them to be out of touch. I’m sorry, but you have to expect…’
He was all systems go now, imperious. He stopped me with a raised clenched fist. ‘Foul play. No. When I told him what had happened, Claude immediately phoned someone he knows on the island. This man was present when Claude spotted the boys. He says he has seen them in different parts of the island.’
‘Doing what?’
‘Fishing, camping, walking.’
‘When did he see them last?’
The shoulders slid forward. ‘He thinks a month ago, maybe six weeks.’
‘You should go to the police, Mr Bucholtz. They…’
‘No! I can’t understand why they would stay there. They must be in some kind of trouble. The police could make it worse, whatever it is. I want you to find them. Please, find them and find out what’s going on. Then I’ll decide what to do.’
It sounded screwy but interesting. I was upfront with Bucholtz. I told him that before I’d take him on I’d run a check on him, talk with the police and his friend Claude and his contact on the island. He agreed.
I did all that and found nothing to deter me. Bucholtz was a builder and prosperous. His wife had died two years before. Nothing remarkable about the boys—Simon doing Arts at Sydney, Alex doing Environmental Studies at the University of Western Sydney. Missing Persons in Brisbane faxed me a selection of their file which told me nothing useful. Claude Tolbeck, motor mechanic and fisherman, confirmed Bucholtz’s account.
I mugged up a bit on the island during the flight to Brisbane. It was basically built of sand carried north from the rivers of New South Wales and deposited by peculiarities of the currents and waves over thousands of years. It had rainforest and lots of other vegetation, magnificent beaches, crystal-clear springs and was free of rats, mice and all feral animals except the dingo. Timber-getters and mineral sands miners backed by Joh Bjelke-Petersen had been happy to chop and mine it into a moonscape but conservationists, led by John Sinclair of the Fraser Island Defenders Organisation (FIDO), had stopped them. It was now a number one tourist destination.
After I’d spoken briefly on the phone to Tim Driberg, Tolbeck’s contact on the island, and learned that I’d need a 4WD to get around, I gave Bucholtz an estimate of the money he was looking at. It was pretty high—fares to and from, vehicle hire and insurance on top of my daily rate. He couldn’t write a cheque fast enough.
* * * *
I’d flown to Hervey Bay, hired the Land Cruiser and taken it on the ferry to the island. I’d heard about Fraser Island for years of course, but wasn’t quite prepared for the strangeness of it. There is something weird about all those trees sprouting out of pure sand and the lakes that just sit there, not being fed by streams or springs. Once I got used to driving on the sand I began almost to enjoy the place. As much as circumstances and my city habits permitted.
Tim Driberg had lived on Fraser for thirty years, had been a logger and a sandminer, and claimed to know every inch of it. He moved around by land and sea between the couple of small freeholds he owned, fishing, winching out bogged 4WDs and taking photographs for sale to travel magazines. He was about sixty and looked it although he was still lean and muscular. A long white scar on his right leg that almost glowed against the tanned skin came, he said, ‘from goin’ six fuckin’ rounds with a chainsaw’. His faded blue eyes crinkled in the lean, leathery face when I asked him about the boys. We were on the balcony adjacent to the bar of the Cathedral Beach Resort and drinking Crown Lager. I was on my second, Driberg was one ahead of me.
‘Handsome lads, very handsome. But shy. I turned a camera on them once and they ran like rabbits.’
‘Where was this?’
‘I forget. As I told Claude, I spotted them here, there and everywhere.’
I got out a map and pinned him down, confirming what he’d told me on the phone. Dilli Village, Eurong, Happy Valley, Cathedral Beach, Waddy Point on the east coast; Lake Boomajin, Central Station, Lake McKenzie and Lake Allam inland; near the Kingfisher Resort and at Massey Point on the west coast.
‘I’d say they were headed for the ferry back to Hervey Bay last time I saw them.’
‘But you didn’t see them board the ferry?’
‘No.’
By this time I’d already checked at some of these locations, showing photos of the boys to campers and fishermen and getting no response. Driberg seemed happy to have me pay for his drinks.
‘You don’t have a lot of information, Mr Driberg.’
He lit a cigarette and blew smoke out over the rail towards the fringe of dense bush that ringed the resort. ‘I’m an old Fraser Island hand. We keep ourselves to ourselves. I leave it to the fuckin’ greenies to worry about the outside world. Rwanda and all that shit. What did the outside world ever do for us?’
After driving the Land Cruiser over the sand and through the creeks, I’d been dry and had drunk the beers quickly by my standards. They’d run through me and I went to the toilet. When I got back Driberg had gone. The barman signalled me.
‘Tim got a packet of smokes. Said you’d pay for them.’
‘Why not?’ I put the money on the bar. ‘Where’ll I find him if I need to talk to him again?’
‘He’s got a place a bit north of here. I don’t mean the Sandy Cape joint. Just past the first creek and in a bit. He’s a character. Another beer?’
‘Yeah, thanks. What d’you mean, a character?’
The barman, a young tawny coloured man, expertly knocked the cap off the bottle and produced a fresh glass. ‘Hates the tourism. Yearns for the old days—chainsaws and draglines. A real redneck.’
After several nights of camping out I was happy to take a cabin in the resort that night. I had a decent meal and some wine and went to sleep listening to the sound of the surf pounding on the beach. The next two days I spent driving around the island checking on Driberg’s sightings of the Bucholtz boys. I got no confirmations and everything pointed to a need to see Mr Driberg again. I drove north, fording the streams high on the beach in the approved fashion (the vehicle hirers threatened penalties for driving through salt water), and located Driberg’s shack in the scrub behind the dunes. It was empty and bore signs of having been vacated hastily. The tyre tracks of his old Land Rover were distinctive and they headed north towards Sandy Cape. Going there would mean another couple of nights on the air-bed in the one-man tent with mosquitoes and Bundy rum for company and a tinned-food dinner in my belly, but what the hell? It was the one part of the island I hadn’t yet visited and one of the few places where Driberg hadn’t claimed to have seen the boys. That might mean something.
* * * *
Driving on the back beach is tricky. You have to judge the tides right or you can find yourself being pushed so high up the beach you’re likely to get bogged in the soft sand. At a couple of points you have no option but to go inland to avoid rocky outcrops that bar the beach. You keep the revs up or you’re likely to find yourself axle-deep in sand. Time and tides were on my side and by the time I rounded Sandy Cape there was only one set of tyre tracks to follow.
According to the barman at Cathedral Beach, Driberg laid claim to a bit of land near the block on which the Sandy Cape lighthouse stood. His claim was disputed, but he’d built a shack there out of materials he’d brought ashore himself from his boat. The light was failing as I drove along the firm, straight beach with the lighthouse dead ahead, the only man-made thing in sight. I wasn’t confident of locating Driberg in the twilight and didn’t fancy setting up camp in the dark, so I turned off into a dry creek bed and made my arrangements—tarpaulin stretched across from the roof rack on the Land Cruiser to a couple of trees, tent, primus stove, driftwood fire, baked beans, tinned pineapple, beer, coffee and Bundaberg rum.
* * * *
I was deeply asleep when I felt something nudging my ear. Dopily, I thought it was a mosquito and slapped at it. My hand hit something cold and hard, metallic. I woke up. A torch beam dazzled me and I threw up my hands to shield my eyes. Something thumped me in the chest and I collapsed back onto the air-bed, zipped up in the sleeping bag.
‘I thought you’d come after me,’ Driberg said. ‘And a city slicker like you’s got no fuckin’ chance out here against an old bushwhacker like me.’
I struggled to sit up and free my hands. ‘I’m not against you. I just wanted to talk to you.’
‘Like hell you did.’
First he hit me with the beam, then with the metallic object. The beam dazzled me and the blow put out all the lights.
* * * *
My throat was dry, my head hurt and my hands were lashed together behind my back. My ankles were tied and I was lying on my back on sand. An insect was nibbling at my ear.
‘Hey!’ I yelled. ‘Hey!’
I swore and tried to summon some saliva up for my dry gullet that felt as if it had been sandpapered. I managed to struggle up into a sitting position although my cramped limbs didn’t want to move. I realised that my eyes were gummed shut and I wanted desperately to rub at them. I forced them open, feeling the mucus crack. With sight other senses returned; I could hear birds calling and feel a warm wind. I could smell the bush and smoke and something else. I squinted, trying to focus on the shapes around me. I was in a clearing about half the size of a football field with thick bush all around. But I still couldn’t make out the shapes.
I blinked hard several times and tried again. Some of the shapes were like cages or pens, others were smaller. They were laid out geometrically with a well-trodden path between them. I could see plastic water containers and drums.
I got my throat moistened and yelled again, louder. The first times must have just been croaks because now there was a reaction. I heard noises from the pens—grunting, barking, squeaking and the insistent howl of frustrated cats.
‘Music to my ears.’
Driberg was standing beside me, barefooted and wearing only a pair of shorts. Casually, he kicked me in the shoulder and I fell back. I tried to look up at him but the sun was just above his head and I had to look away. ‘Fuck you. What d’you think you’re doing?’
‘I know what I’m doing, mate. Happy to tell you. I’m running Noah’s fuckin’ ark here. I’ve got four pair of real wild pigs, a half dozen foxes, a couple of German shepherd bitches the dingos’ll go crazy over, lots of rabbits and cats and I don’t know how many rats. All doing nicely.’
The message in the pamphlet I’d read came back to me—’free from feral animals’. Driberg’s weatherbeaten face cracked into a smile when he saw that I understood.
‘You’ve got it, mate. I made a good living here, logging and sandmining. Me and some other good blokes. Doin’ no harm at all. Then the fuckin’ greenies and tourists took over. Well, they’re in for a surprise. When I let this lot loose their paradise is fuckin’ gone forever.’
It was dangerous to ask but I had to know. ‘The boys?’
‘Nosey little bastards. Spied on me and found out about this place.’ He drew a finger quickly across his throat.
‘Why did you admit to seeing them?’
He spat down at me, missing my face by a couple of centimetres. ‘Yeah, I fucked up there. Panicked a bit. I wasn’t sure who else’d seen them or where so I tried to keep it vague. You pressed too hard, mate. Should’ve taken the hint.’
‘Where’re the boys?’
‘Six feet fuckin’ under, where you’re goin’ to be. This sand’s easy to dig.’
‘You won’t pull it off, Driberg. People know about me. I’ve got a vehicle…’
His laugh was harsh and almost out of control. “That’s where you’re wrong. You don’t know the island. In the old days, before the four-wheel-drives, cars and trucks were always getting stuck in the sand. Know what happened to ‘em? The sand swallowed ‘em. Must be hundreds out there off the back beach.’
‘The lighthouse keeper. He must know…’
‘Automated a year ago. That’s when I started this up. I really love those pigs, you know? They’re going to breed like crazy and rip shit out of this place. You’ve pushed me ahead of schedule a bit but I’m flexible. I guess now’s the time. It’ll take a bit of organising but I’m ready for it. Have to drop them all off in the right places. Say a week and it’ll be done. I’ll shoot through and who’ll fuckin’ know?’
Thinking was beyond me. All I could do was react out of anger and helplessness. ‘You redneck lunatic,’ I rasped. ‘You should be locked up.’
His fierce grin turned sour and ugly. ‘Just for that, cunt,’ he hissed, ‘I’m goin’ to feed you to the fuckin’ pigs.’
He moved to step over me. What he’d said pumped adrenalin and fear into me. I pulled my knees back, pivoted on my bum and lashed out with both feet at his leg. I caught him right on the scar and he screamed as I felt something give in his knee. He went down hard with the leg buckled under him. He lay on the sand, winded and gasping. I scrambled to my feet and did the only thing I could do—I launched myself forward and fell on him with all my weight. I heard ribs crack and he moaned as the breath rushed out of him again.
The animals in their pens and hutches were setting up a cacophony and I realised that I was adding to the noise by swearing in a continuous stream as I struggled up and off Driberg. I scrambled away from him and couldn’t get to my feet again—my legs wouldn’t obey my brain. I needed to get my hands and legs free but the straps were hard and tight. Driberg was stirring. Off to my right was a pen with corrugated iron nailed all around it. I wriggled and crawled over to it, praying that Driberg was a bush carpenter. He was. The sheets of iron didn’t quite meet at the corner of the pen and there was a raw edge I could reach if I could only stand up. I could see Driberg slowly coming to life and fear got me on my feet again. I backed up to the iron, located the edge with my fingers and began to saw at the straps. Driberg was only a few metres away. He gasped, spat, saw what I was doing. There was a steel stake leaning against a tree at the edge of the clearing and he began to crawl towards it, blood dripping from his battered face. Then he was up and hobbling. I sawed at the strap and felt it fray and then break. Driberg had his hand on the stake. I bent down and my clumsy, cramped fingers seemed to take an age to undo the strap around my ankles. I got it free just as Driberg shuffled within reach and swung the stake. I ducked and he missed. He fell, dropping the stake. I pounced on him; his contorted face swam up towards me and I delivered the best head butt of my life. I got him solidly on the nose and I heard and felt the bone break and the cartilage collapse and I was glad.
* * * *
I had sadness, anger and fear to exorcise. I found a .303 rifle and ammunition in Driberg’s shack and I shot every one of the animals big enough to take a bullet. The rabbits and rats were securely held and I left them for the authorities to deal with. I took Driberg back to Cathedral Beach and made the phone calls to Hervey Bay and Sydney and gave all the explanations. I wasn’t there when they dug up the bodies of Horst Bucholtz’s kids nor when they held a kind of commemorative service for them on the creamy white beach south of Sandy Cape. Bucholtz sent me a photograph of the event and I’ve kept it. Great beach.