Icefall

by Hallowes, Guy

  Tanya sat for a few more minutes, sipping her tea. She got up, gave David another daughterly peck on the cheek, returned her tea cup to the kitchen, and left.

  In the intervening weeks David had spent much time talking with Chloe. In particular, he showed her his sources, all highly reputable.

  'Why isn't there more publicity? If this is about the survival of the world, why aren't people shouting from the rooftops? What you told us was a complete surprise. Are you sure it's not just a pile of bullshit peddled by some lunatic, fringe busybodies?'

  David laughed despite himself. Chloe had always been impatient with people peddling fancy theories. She was much happier doing practical things. 'No, I think the research is genuine. Those aware of the research must hope some sort of magic solution will save us all in the nick of time. Also governments seem to have no idea how to deal with the situation without causing panic.'

  'So what should we do first?'

  'This weekend, instead of playing golf, we'll start an exploratory tour of the countryside, mainly New South Wales, to see if we can unearth such a place. We could even play some golf out there, stay in decent places; it should be fun.'

  'You mean a series of dirty weekends for the next, however many weeks it takes to find this unlikely place.' She sidled up to him and put her arms around him.

  'Most certainly,' said David. 'I'm sure we'll find some very isolated places where the only possible spectators will be the occasional wallaby, who'll run like hell when you start to make your "I'm coming" noises.'

  She cuddled up a little closer, 'I was thinking more along the lines of nice comfortable beds. It's a very long time since we made love on a river bank.' She added wistfully, 'Patricia was conceived on a river bank.'

  'Well, hopefully there will be beds and river banks.'

  They didn't make it beyond the carpet in the lounge.

  David and Chloe spent the next six months exploring the countryside. They inspected a number of potential properties listed with real estate agents. One or two were almost possible, but either had an inadequate water supply or could not be completely isolated. However, they enjoyed the various places they stayed in from the luxurious in the Blue Mountains and Pokolbin to the more basic in Lithgow and further West; they often managed a game of golf, always playing for a decent bottle of wine. Chloe won more often than not.

  Despite the fun they had, Chloe was becoming more and more despondent. Some of the properties contained little cottages. In days gone by, they had obviously been someone's unfulfilled dream, with overgrown gardens and, once, two unmarked, child-sized graves. She thought the amount of work that would be needed was beyond their resources. She tried comparing those horrid little places to her beautiful North Shore home; there was no comparison.

  'I have been talking to my friends about our project,' she said to David one evening after a fruitless day's search. 'They've been wondering what has happened to us over the past months. When I tried to explain what we were doing they were all quite incredulous, and wondering if we have completely lost our marbles. Once they realise we are serious, they change the subject. Are you really sure the Ice Shelf will collapse?'

  'Yes, the latest scientific study has just been published and it reinforces everything I told you six months ago.'

  'These weekends have been marvellous, but we haven't seen anything that remotely suits,' observed Chloe quietly.

  'There is one tomorrow that sounds more promising.' said David defensively.

  Chloe shrugged.

  After three hours, sweat pouring off them in the uncomfortable heat, they were carefully finding their way along a poorly-defined track in the four wheel drive. To Chloe's irritation they had made several wrong turns, involving difficult and dangerous manoeuvres. Both Chloe and David were trying to help direct the driver.

  The agent threw up his hands, 'I don't think I can find this place, we need better directions.'

  David walked off to see if he could find the track. He came back, excited. 'Let me drive, there is something a little further along here.'

  They emerged into a glade a few hundred metres down the uneven track and there was the usual decrepit two bedroom cottage that Chloe was becoming used to. David and the agent had gone off to look at the stream that was running through the property, so Chloe thought she would give the cottage a once over despite its poor condition. The place was largely covered in brambles, but she scrambled up the rotting wooden steps and onto the small verandah. There to her horror was the largest black snake she had ever seen, coiled up in the doorway. It raised itself up threateningly; Chloe stood there, completely frozen.

  David had seen her walk to the cottage and was about to tell her to watch for snakes when he saw her reaction. He quietly moved up the steps and tossed a light stick onto the massive coils. The snake hissed and slid away down the verandah and into the nearby bush. Chloe collapsed into David's arms, shaking like a leaf.

  They sat down on the steps. 'It's okay, just a red-bellied black snake; they are generally quite shy and not aggressive.'

  Chloe just shook.

  David left her on the steps with the concerned agent and went inside the partly open cottage door. 'Oh my God!' he shouted. He came out as white as a sheet. 'Dead … there's a dead body in there. It looks as if it has been there for weeks, if not months.' David and the agent peered into the gloom. 'Don't touch anything. We need to call the police.'

  They tried the mobile phone but, inevitably because of the terrain, there was no signal.

  'Let's just get out of here,' said Chloe, still shaken. 'Do you think he died of snakebite?'

  'We don't know whether it's a male,' said David. 'I think it's improbable the snake had anything to do with it, but we'll find out.'

  David took over the driving and, at her request, dropped Chloe off at their hotel before reporting to the police.

  'It's too late to do anything today, but we will need you both to accompany us tomorrow morning,' they were told. 'Please arrive by six.'

  David, the agent, three policemen, and a pathologist, in two four wheel drive vehicles, arrived at the cottage by nine thirty.

  'Just be careful of the snake,' warned David, but there was no sign of it.

  'Male, aged about fifty,' said the pathologist. 'One bullet wound to the head. I would say he has been there about six months. There is no sign of any firearm. His feet and hands are bound.'

  'Looks like murder then,' said the inspector.

  David and the agent made statements back at the station then David and Chloe returned to Sydney.

  Chloe was unusually silent during the drive home.

  'Although that place is no good, the agent now has a really good idea of what we want. He says there is a place about a day and a half's hike into the mountains just beyond where we were today. I thought we could try to go there next weekend. We have all the hiking and camping gear,' volunteered David insensitively.

  Chloe bit her tongue. She was tempted to shriek at him that a snake and a dead body was enough for one week, but she kept her cool. 'I think you had better count me out,' she said. 'Anyway I'm not sure I'm fit enough for a three day hike. There's a decent competition on at the club this weekend, maybe I'll try to find a place in that. Mark may be able to go with you.'

  David looked at her closed face and said no more.

  Mark was unable to go due to a big deal at work, but Tanya had said, 'I'll go with you. It's a while since I had a good bushwalk. So it'll be you, me, and the agent or owner?'

  David had kept Tanya up-to-date with some of the places he and Chloe had seen; it seemed the likelihood of finding anything suitable was diminishing with every passing week. The party had a four hour journey down a very rough, partly overgrown track in the agent's four wheel drive and then walked for a good six hours. The agent was worried about Tanya and kept asking if she was alright. At the end of six hours, Tanya was marching confidently ahead leading the way, with the bedraggled agent, streaming sweat, barely keeping u
p at the rear.

  David and Tanya became more and more excited as they walked. They were following, sometimes with difficulty, an old track alongside a clear, fast-running stream. Both David and Tanya were familiar with the generally silent Australian bush, the sunlight flickering through the leaves of the tall trees. They knew that most snakes would sense them and move away quickly. There was the occasional thump-thump of a surprised wallaby or kangaroo fleeing, and from time to time there were flocks of birds—cockatoos, lorikeets and more, attracted by the water. Towards dusk they entered a narrow gorge where they camped the night.

  David and Tanya slept next to the fire while the agent pitched a small tent a few feet away.

  'It depends on what we find once we are out of the gorge,' said Tanya. 'If there is a large, cleared area, this almost looks possible. The problem is going to be the cost of building a road, but access could easily be blocked here.' She pointed upwards to the almost sheer sides of the gorge on both sides. I bet they've been trying to unload this place for years. It would be too out of the way for most people.'

  David had collected wood and made a fire and Tanya helped him cook the dinner. 'Have you heard anything from the police?' David asked the agent.

  'Absolutely nothing.'

  The next day, after a difficult five hour hike along the stream, they found themselves in a valley with an extensive flat, almost treeless area extending as far as the base of the mountains on both sides of the stream and reaching upriver into the mountain as far as the eye could see. The agent sat under a lone tree while David and Tanya walked to the end of the flat.

  'It must be at least a thousand hectares, just the cleared area!' David was unable to keep the excitement from his voice. 'Maybe a glacier or other freak of nature dug this valley out millions of years ago. It has not actually been cleared, or we would see stumps. It looks as if no trees have ever grown here, only on the mountainside. We need to get soil samples and some idea of the carrying capacity.'

  'I will get a proper survey done and perhaps you could get an estimate of the cost of building a road. I'll check all the deeds,' responded Tanya, trying to keep it all businesslike. But she was also more and more excited by the whole idea of David's settlement.

  They took a look at the small cottage, unobtrusive on a hillock strategically overlooking much of the site. David beat the outside with a large stick before they went inside. 'Snakes,' he explained.

  'Chloe told me.'

  The cottage was old, dusty, and full of spider webs and much of the timber used in the construction was rotten. There was no sign of recent occupancy; not a saucepan, bed, or chair.

  'This is prime position,' said David. 'The cottage will have to go of course; we can build something more suitable.'

  Tanya looked at him and said pointedly, 'We mustn't get too far ahead of ourselves, the place looks great, but we have to do our homework. Property, road, and then we can worry about houses.'

  Tanya and David spent half an hour standing on the dusty deck of the cottage trying to get a feel of the place, 'It's almost as if it was made for the settlement you have in mind,' observed Tanya, letting down her guard for a moment. 'It's already isolated, surrounded by pristine virgin forest, with those steep rock walls on all sides. It's also very beautiful, with that tinge of blue from the eucalypts. And there's no noise at all, except for the breeze in the grass and the bird calls. And being quite high up in the mountains, although not as high as Katoomba, means it won't get ridiculously hot in the height of summer.'

  A jet plane silently flew over, still very high, reminding them that Sydney with its four and a half million people, was not that far away. David remained silent, if he had dreamt of the ideal place this would be it. A few kangaroos came out to graze in the late afternoon, then a dingo came past, scampering off when it saw the humans.

  'What did people do here?' asked David over the camp fire that night.

  'No idea,' responded the agent, 'This is the first time I've been here. I understand people lived here for a few months at a time, but it's just too hard and isolated. You are the first people to have shown any interest in the place in ten years. We apparently had a religious group before that wanting isolation, but it was even too much for them.'

  The agent had pitched his tent, retiring to his bed early in anticipation of the long hike home the next day. He thought he had probably wasted three days. He couldn't understand why anyone would want to live in such a god-forsaken place.

  David and Tanya talked until late; both were excited.

  'At first glance it's ideal for the settlement you have talked about.' Tanya kept her voice down, not wanting the agent to overhear. 'But we have to be very careful. I will have a look at the legal stuff next week. The road is going to be expensive and we need to find a house builder. If we can find someone who buys into the idea we may get good rates. We should come back in a week or so with surveyors, and take some soil and grass samples.'

  'You are not going to ask them to walk in here are you?'

  Tanya laughed quietly. 'Stuff the walking! Once we have lined all the people up, we can hire a helicopter and be in and out of here within a few hours. I now have the coordinates.' She waved her GPS device. 'Buggerlugs over there will be none the wiser.' She jerked her thumb in the direction of the agent's tent. 'If we had come in here by helicopter this time the owner would have thought all his Christmases had arrived at once. We need to continue to keep their expectations low.' She hesitated for a moment, 'If you don't mind, if we decide to proceed, I would like to be in charge of negotiating the purchase price. I have a strategy I think will work. You can handle the building and road costs.'

  David was thankful for her insights. He liked Tanya, but despite some suggestive glances from the agent, he saw her only as his daughter-in-law. There was absolutely no hint of any kind of sexual attraction between them. With Tanya's help, they might be able to pull off something which even the previous weekend was looking to be a rather forlorn dream.

  A dawn breakfast cooked by David saw them packed and ready by seven. Between them, Tanya and David kept up a steady pace back to their vehicle, with the agent struggling behind. Arriving well after dark, David drove to the estate agent's office to collect his car.

  Glancing back at the sleeping agent, Tanya said quietly, 'I had a chat to our friend. He thinks we're not interested, so I will leave him for two or three weeks while we do all our homework and then I will deal with him.'

  Chapter Six

  Chloe

  Chloe was utterly despondent. She could see herself spending years living in some hellhole, working herself into an early grave, looking after chickens and sheep, and fighting off large black snakes. She didn't like or know anything about chickens and sheep and was terrified of snakes. She was unconvinced about the science and all her friends and acquaintances dismissed it out of hand. 'Load of bullshit,' was the general consensus.

  Patricia supported David's view. 'Joe and I have looked at all the references. They are all well respected. We think he is right.'

  'What are you going to do?'

  'We will see what Dad comes up with, but if it is half sensible, we will probably join him.'

  'Even if that involves selling up? Joe giving up his very good job and moving to a perilous future in some remote, undeveloped bush retreat? What about the kids' education?'

  Patricia laughed, 'Joe is not sold on his job and I can educate the kids at least as well as any school. Anyway, there is no purpose in them being educated just to die of starvation or something worse. Joe is very interested in technology and has been researching all he can about solar power. He thinks he can install solar in the settlement's houses. We've even heard about farmers in Australia and North America running their tractors on solar. He has signed up for a course to become an accredited solar power technician.'

  Mark was too busy to think about ice shelves collapsing. When Chloe cornered him, he said, 'I just don't know, I thought it was all bull, but Tanya seems to
be more and more convinced Dad is right, despite her misgivings. A couple of people in the office think the science is sound; others think its all crap. So I'm reluctantly accepting what's been dredged up might just be right. I wish to hell it wasn't and that we could all just get on with what we are doing. It's interesting none of the so-called climate change investment opportunities have seen the light of day.'

  He and Tanya had many, often heated, discussions. 'What happens if Dad's conclusions turn out to be a whole load of rubbish?' Mark said to Tanya one day. 'We will have put all our funds into a fucking great white elephant in the Blue Mountains. Not to mention we will have spent some of the best years of our lives slaving away up there when we could be travelling the world, or just enjoying ourselves here in Sydney.'

  'If you don't accept the science, maybe you should do your own research. You say that the brightest in your office tell you the science is sound. If that is so, what the hell are they doing about it?'

  'They may intellectually believe in the science, but as the saying goes, "follow the money". Not one of them has made a move in the direction we are going. I am quite sure if the bank was asked to invest, the proposal would be laughed out the door. '

  'So, what are they going to do when the Ice Shelf collapses, drown or starve? Those appear to be the two options if nothing has been planned.'

  'Much of the funding for the settlement will need to come from us. I'm having real difficulty in believing all our efforts over something like the next fifteen years will go into building this settlement, and it may all be unnecessary.'

  'What sort of legacy will we leave our children when we have them? They will probably be in their early to mid-teens when it collapses. If we do nothing, we might have indulged ourselves but they will just die.'