In 1972, Yarram’s main street is lined with
rusting Holden sedans and faded signs for the
Woolies. The town clings to its postwar identity,
but beneath the surface, secrets fester. At
sixteen, Lorna McAllister is no stranger to
being told to stay out of trouble — she’s been
branded a rebel since she skipped school to join
the local footy team instead. But when she
stumbles on a weathered journal in her
grandfather’s shed, hidden beneath a pile of old
car parts, she finds a name that doesn’t belong
to him: Jack “The Ghost” Holloway, a bushranger
who vanished in 1894.
Lorna’s curiosity turns to obsession as she
traces the journal’s entries through Yarram’s
history, uncovering stories of a stolen gold
shipment and a betrayal that split the town in
two. Her best mate, Dave, is the only one who
believes her — until he disappears after helping
her dig up a grave marked only with a rusted
Holden hubcap. With the town’s elders refusing
to speak of the past, Lorna must choose between
silence and digging deeper, even if it means
tearing apart the very bonds of mateship that
hold Yarram together.
A local historian, Mr. Grimes, warns her that
some truths are buried for a reason. He tells
her that the last Holden in Yarram was driven
off a cliff by men who wanted to erase the past.
When Lorna finds the car’s remains at the edge
of the Nullarbor, she realises the journal’s
final entry was written from inside it — a plea
for help that went unanswered. She returns to
the site with a torch, flashlight in hand, and
finds not a body, but a box of gold coins and a
photograph of her grandfather as a young man,
standing beside Jack Holloway.
The town reacts with fury. Lorna’s discovery
shatters Yarram’s carefully constructed
nostalgia, revealing generations of complicity
in a crime that never left. In the end, the
Holden is buried again — this time with the
coins and the photograph. Lorna walks away,
knowing the truth will never be enough to heal
what was broken.
