‘Two safe,’ he said. ‘One more and we’re home free.’
She relaxed a little more, but she was still on edge. The cop’s gun was in his holster right by her side. She had an almost irresistible urge to grab it and toss it out of the window.
Mathew’s hand touched her shoulder, a feather touch of reassurance.
‘Camels are pretty hard to hide,’ he said. ‘And we’re right beside the only gun in town.’
She closed her eyes for a millisecond, infinitely grateful that he was here, that he was right. Australia’s rigid gun laws meant no one was going to shoot, and all they had to do was find Cleo.
And finally, blessedly, her phone rang again. It was Bernie—Bernardo the Breathtaking. Allie had the phone on speaker and she sensed his distress the moment she answered.
Cleo was in the yard of the local primary school. Bleeding from a graze on her flank. Edgy. Surrounded by excited kids.
‘Isn’t the school closed for holidays?’ Mathew demanded of the cop as the car did a U-turn and the cop switched on the siren.
‘It’s used for a school holiday programme,’ the cop snapped. ‘For kids whose parents work. There’ll be twenty kids there, from twelve years old down. A couple of student teachers run it. They’re kids themselves. They’ll have no hope of keeping the children safe.’
And the threat was back.
Fort Neptune was a sleepy holiday resort where the town’s only cop must spend most of his time fighting boredom. Now Mathew could practically see the adrenalin surge. He had his foot down hard, his lights were flashing, his siren blazing, and Mathew thought this was a great way to approach a scared animal. Not.
‘There’s no panic,’ Mathew told him. ‘It’s just a camel.’
‘It’s wild and wounded,’ the cop said with conviction—and relish? ‘I need to keep the kids safe at all cost.’
Then they were at the school, pulling up in a screech of tyres. The cop was out of the car with his gun drawn, but Matt was right there beside him.
It wasn’t pretty.
Mathew had watched Cleo yesterday. She’d been a teddy bear of a camel, with ponies and dogs jumping over and under her, but now she did indeed look wild. The school yard was rimmed with high wire fencing. There was one open gate. How unlucky was it that she’d found it? There was no way a frightened Cleo could find it now to get back out.
And she was surrounded. Kids were shouting and pressing close and then running away, daring each other to go closer, closer. A couple of teenage girls were flapping ineffectually amongst them.
Bernie was trying to approach Cleo, trying to shoo the kids back, putting himself between the camel and the kids, but Cleo seemed terrified beyond description.
Any minute now she could rush at the kids to try and find a way to escape. Any minute now they could indeed have a tragedy.
The cop was raising his arm—with gun attached.
‘You shoot in a schoolyard, you risk a ricochet that’ll kill a kid. Put it down!’ Mathew snapped, with all the authority he could muster, and the cop let the gun drop a little and looked doubtful instead of intent.
So far, so good.
But action was required. ‘Officer, do something,’ one of the older girls yelled. ‘If any of these kids get hurt …’
They well could if they kept panicking Cleo, Mathew thought.
Allie was flying across the schoolyard, calling Cleo to her, but Cleo was past responding. She was backing, rearing against the fence, lurching sideways and back again. Everything was a threat.
If the kids would only stop yelling …
Maybe it was time for a man—without a gun—to take a stand.
Once upon a time, as a kid with no home life to speak of, Mathew had joined his school’s army cadet programme. He hadn’t stayed long—drills and marching weren’t for him—but there’d been an ex-sergeant major who’d drilled them. The sergeant major could make raw recruits jump and quiver, and Mathew took a deep breath and conjured him now.
‘Attention!’
He yelled with all the force he could muster. Every single kid there seemed to jump and quiver. Even Cleo jumped and quivered. He’d had no choice, but it killed him that he’d frightened her more. She backed hard against the fence and her eyes rolled back in her head.
There was blood on her flank. What sort of wound?
But there was no time for focusing on Cleo. He needed to get these kids in order before anyone could get near her.
‘Everyone behind me,’ he ordered, still in his sergeant major voice. ‘And you …’ He pointed to a pudgy boy with a stone in his hand and his arm raised. ‘You throw that and I’ll hurl you straight into the police car and lock the door. That’s a promise. Put it down and get behind me. Every single one of you. Now!’
And, amazingly, they did. Twenty or so kids—plus the two teenage helpers—backed silently, shocked to silence.
Which left Cleo still hard against the fence, with Allie and Bernie to deal with her. But Bernie was obviously not an animal trainer. He was looking at the camel’s rolling eyes and he was backing, too.
Maybe he was right, Matt conceded. The camel was huge, lanky, way higher than Allie. Allie looked almost insignificant.
But Allie could deal, Matt thought. She must. Matt’s job was to keep his troops under control.
He should order them to return to their classroom, he thought, and they’d probably go—but there was one complicating factor. He could see from a glance at the teenage attendants what he was dealing with. They looked almost hysterical. Left like this, he knew the story that’d fly around town. He could see the headlines tomorrow—wild animal loose in schoolyard, threatening the safety of our children.
He needed to defuse it, now.
Besides, the cop was still waving his gun. Get rid of the kids and the way would be safe for a single bullet …
He glanced back at Allie. She knew what the stakes were. She knew what was likely to happen, but all her attention was on Cleo. She was whispering to the camel, standing still, blocking everything else out, simply talking to a creature she must know so well …
Okay, Allie on camel duty, Mathew on the rest. Defusing hysterics and rendering one gun harmless.
It was time to turn from sergeant major to schoolteacher.
‘Girls and boys, we need your assistance,’ Mathew said. ‘Can you help? Put up your hand if you will.’
A few hands went up. More kids looked nervously towards Cleo.
‘This camel is called Cleopatra,’ Mathew continued, ignoring everyone but the kids. ‘She’s a lovely, gentle girl camel who works in the circus you’ve all seen down by the beach. Today she’s been injured so she’s terrified. Look at her side. She’s bleeding. We need to get her to the vet. Mischka is trying to calm her down. Have any of you been to the circus yet? Mischka wears pink sequins and rides on Cleo’s back. She looks a bit different now, doesn’t she? Do you recognise her?’
A few more hands were raised. Wounds, vet, circus—he had their attention.
‘Mischka looks worried,’ Mathew said, almost conversationally. ‘That’s because she’s been out searching for Cleo for hours. Did you know Cleopatra has a special place in Mischka’s heart? Cleo’s mother was killed by a road train—do you know that a