This was the flipside of the hard-core recovery work, and, while Caleb loved the adrenaline rush of getting in and getting dirty, there was a lot to be said for tackling the day-to-day nitty-gritty of station work so that when the going got tough, the equipment didn’t let them down.
And, meantime, everyone it seemed kept an eye on the weather forecast. They’d been blessed with a good spring season, with good rainfall, but with that had come high growth in the understory. And summer was proving uncharacteristically gentle so far. December had morphed into January with the occasional burst of heat, but thankfully with none of the heatwaves that rolled on with temperatures well over the old century for days and nights. It was when the temperatures soared and that hot north wind came down from the baking dry interior of Australia that put the wind up everyone, and had every nostril twitching. A fire in the Adelaide Hills in those circumstances was damn near unstoppable.
The forecast for the Ashton Show looked okay for now, but there was hot weather following, he could see on the forecast, a slow-moving high predicted to lob over the red desert centre of Australia and stay there, directing hot northerly winds straight down towards them.
Nobody was looking forward to that.
Caleb was in his spare room doing bench presses the day before the show when Ava surprised him by calling. “Are you free tonight? I want to show you something. I’ll be in the studio.” There was excitement in her voice that was contagious and Caleb found himself at her house inside twenty minutes.
As his feet crunched down the gravel path from the car, his eyes couldn’t help but be drawn to the spectacular view Ava had over the Uriarra Gorge, with its steep cliffs and treed valleys and ridgetops – terrain both beautiful and hard to protect in a bushfire situation – and he made a mental note to check Ava’s rooftop sprinkler system given the upcoming weather forecast.
He understood people wanted to live in the Adelaide Hills. Hell, he’d grown up hereabouts himself with his brother, with an entire range of hills and valleys for their back yard. Together they’d roamed far and wide, terrorizing the local wildlife, by sending mobs of grazing kangaroos scattering as they’d chased them out of grasslands, and climbing trees trying to reach the koalas nestled high in the branches, only to have them climb even further out of range. In turn they’d been terrorized when they’d stumbled upon the odd snake basking in the sunshine on the path in front of them.
While in winter they’d played alongside the rushing creeks and waterfalls of the valleys and gorges, chasing frogs and sending pieces of bark scudding down the rapid waters.
It had been the best kind of childhood and he knew better than anyone how special it was to live up this way. But he’d seen the fires too, that had ravaged the hills from time to time, that scorched the earth and left nothing in their wake, and were an ever present danger to life and property each and every summer, and one look at where Ava lived and a proper bushfire sprinkler system had been the first thing he’d suggested she get installed. That and a retreat room behind the studio where the studio backed into the earth wall of the slight rise behind, in case things got too rough and there was no way out. And, to her credit, she’d seen the sense in that and agreed. He’d put in the sprinklers and diesel pump and he’d lined the retreat room with concrete panelling to insulate it. Small things, but worthwhile, especially for a woman on her own.
He’d checked the diesel pump was working okay before the beginning of summer, and made sure she checked it weekly, but it was high time he checked it again.
There was music coming from the studio and Caleb recognised it as Ava’s favourite playlist. He didn’t know the names of any of the singers – his music tastes had stalled sometime around the Red Hot Chili Peppers – but that just added to the mystery and the exoticism that was Ava. God only knew how he’d ever got the courage to approach her.
She was working on a canvas when he rapped on the glass. She looked up and smiled and it was a good thing he wasn’t flammable because one hundred watts zapped its way straight to his groin. She met him half way across the room, taking his head in her hands, the kiss she gave him fast and furious and full of promise, and when she put his head away, her cognac eyes were damned near glowing.
“Come and see,” she said, taking his hand and leading him to the easel.
“It’s the first one, remember? When you were looking at the still life.”
He blinked. He remembered. But he also remembered it was the size of a page in a book. This was at least two feet high. “What happened to the other one? The small one?”
“That was just a sketch.” She laced her fingers in his. “Well? What do you think?”
What could he say? He’d thought the sketch was the real deal, but now he looked at the likeness of his back, his muscles rendered in myriad shades of charcoal and oil pastels that seemed to capture the very texture of his skin in the skilful use of light and shade. And there, on the back of his arm, the last three letters of his tattoo.
He frowned as he pointed it out. “I thought you said nobody would know it was me.”
“How could anyone recognise you from that?”
“My brother might.”
“Is he in the market for artworks and likely to be at the exhibition?”
“Well, no.” There was that. “But—”
“I’ve got a couple of ideas for others,” she said, discounting his protest without waiting to hear it.
“I thought you said you’d know it when
