He must have been very persuasive, Rachel thought, as she took a seat next to her brother on the bus. She felt perfectly calm, as if leaving her mother and Laura behind were the most normal thing in the world. She’d barely given them a thought – it was as though something, or someone, had banished any negative thoughts from her mind.
She looked at Adam. He smiled, every bit as relaxed as she was.
The bus pulled out of the station and emerged into the bright morning sun that flashed off the mirrored buildings of Perth’s financial district. The light in Australia was brighter than anything Rachel and Adam had ever seen before. Somehow the sky seemed higher and bluer, and the whiteness of the light made everything around them seem crisper, more sharply focused, and hyperreal.
Levi had dumped himself in the seats in front of the twins. He pushed his face between the seat backs and, grinning his white-toothed smile at them, said, “We’re on our way.”
“Where?” Adam asked.
“Kalgoorlie,” Levi answered.
Adam shrugged. The name sounded vaguely familiar, but then many of the Australian names sounded similar to his ears. It may have been somewhere he’d heard his mother and Laura talk about. “What’s in Kalgoorlie?”
“Gold.” A voice that sounded as if it had been baked dry in the sun croaked from across the aisle. Rachel and Adam turned to see a man leaning across to speak to them. He could have been sixty, maybe older … or younger. His age was difficult to guess because his face was deeply creased and weathered brown, and his glittering eyes were almost concealed beneath lids that looked as if they had spent a lifetime squinting against the sun.
“Gold?” Adam repeated.
“Expect you’ll be going to seek your fortune, eh?” the man said, putting down his newspaper. “Like thousands before you.”
Adam said nothing, and Rachel smiled.
“The Golden Mile, they call it. My great-granddad came out from Scotland a hundred years ago and started digging. He was a millionaire by the time he was thirty.”
“Wow,” Adam said.
“All gone now, mind. His son – my granddad – gambled most of it away, and my dad drank the rest. That’s Kalgoorlie for you. From nothing to a million and back again all in a hundred years. Boom and bust.”
“And are you in gold?” Adam asked.
“Kind of. I’m a jelly man.”
Rachel and Adam looked stumped, both imagining a job to do with making cakes or party food. The man didn’t look like a cake-maker, and he saw the confusion on their faces.
“Jelly – gelignite, high explosives. I used to blow holes in rocks.”
“What for?” Adam asked.
“To get the gold out, mate.” The man mimed an explosion with his stubby fingers and blew his lips out in a “Boom!” He had clearly enjoyed his work. “Of course, the Abos kicked up a great big stink, complaining that we were blowing up their special fairy-story places. Mind you, you can’t so much as fart on a rock without upsetting the Abos.”
Rachel and Adam winced instinctively at his use of the word “Abo”. It was derogatory, and they felt embarrassed for Levi, sitting in front of them. Adam coughed nervously, and, breaking eye contact with the “jelly man”, the twins stared straight ahead. A second later, though, the man grabbed Adam by the wrist.
“Listen,” he whispered, “I’ve been watching you two since you got on the bus. You look like good kids, so let me give you a word of advice.” Adam looked into the man’s deep-set eyes as the hand tightened on his wrist. “Stay away from the Abo kid. He’ll get you into trouble, believe me. A quarter of our prisons are full of Abos, and Abo kids are twenty times more likely to commit crimes. It’s a fact. I read it in the paper.”
Levi stood up and gave the man a look that could have split rock itself. Adam wrestled his arm free, and Rachel felt the hair on the back of her neck begin to prickle.
“Excuse me, sir,” she said, “but that must mean that seventy-five per cent of the prisons are full of people like you. You said your great-grandfather came here a hundred years ago and started digging and that your other ancestors had gambled and drunk whatever profit he made from exploiting the country. Hardly anything to be proud of, is it? Well, the Aboriginals have been here forty thousand years longer than you and your grandparents and, unlike you and your family, have done nothing but treat the land with respect. And I think that’s something you should respect.”
“Now, listen here…” the man said. “We’ve done more for this country in two hundred years than they’ve done in forty thousand.” He was about to say something else, but, seeing the look on Levi’s face, he decided not to continue. He grabbed his newspaper and fanned it out in front of his face, shielding himself from Levi’s gaze. His voice grumbled out from behind the paper. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
And as the Aboriginal boy continued to stare, the jelly man’s newspaper began to smoulder…
Kate Newman sat on top of the suitcase and bounced. She squashed down the clothes inside, then clicked the catch shut and twisted it: her family’s few possessions secure under lock and key.
Hauling the case from the bed, she stood it next to the other bag in the doorway of Rachel’s bedroom. She looked out of the window and down the rough path that led from the house. The sun had already dried up the rain of the day before, and in the distance she could see a cloud of dust being churned up by the wheels of an approaching vehicle.
She smiled, relieved. Laura had done well; she’d only been gone a few hours. She had presumably found the kids on the road to Perth, as Kate had thought she would. Kate pressed her face close to the warm windowpane and her heart suddenly jolted in her chest.
Laura’s Jeep was red, battered and old. The vehicle, now only a hundred metres or so away from the house, was black, shiny and very new.
Kate quickly pulled the curtains across the bedroom window and threw herself back against the wall. She was breathing heavily and her heart was pounding. She waited, listening as the tyres rumbled across the yard and the vehicle came to a halt outside. She heard the ratchet of the handbrake and the slam of a door.
She waited.
There was a loud rap on the front door.
Kate swallowed hard; they never had visitors here and neither did they want them, especially now … while she was alone. There was a second knock and Kate realized that the door was unlocked. Whoever was outside would be able to let themselves in. There was nowhere to run; she would have to go down and face them.
The door opened slowly just as Kate reached it, and she shaded her eyes from the strong sunlight to see a man standing on the porch. He looked crisp and smart, as if the heat of the day had not touched him. He wore pressed chinos, a black polo shirt and sunglasses.
“Hi,” the man said. His accent was American and he sounded friendly enough.
“G’day,” Kate replied, trying to sound Australian and disguise her trembling voice.
“Sorry to bother you, ma’am. I’m from the Beekeepers’ Consultative Committee for the Government of Western Australia.”
The name sounded preposterous. Kate might have laughed had she not been so terrified.
“We’re doing some research into a thing called Colony Collapse Disorder or CCD. Ever heard of it?”
Kate thought that she might have and nodded. “Isn’t it a disease that’s killing off bees in America?” she asked. “You’re American, aren’t you?”
“I am, but it’s not just in America, ma’am. It’s here as well. The hives are down by fifty per cent in WA. And we don’t even know whether it’s a disease or if it’s caused by some other phenomenon: pesticides, phone signals or something else altogether. So we’re just doing a survey of all the beekeepers in the area, to work out the health of our hives.”
Kate nodded again.
“So are those hives active?” the man asked, pointing across to the paddock.
Kate was surprised. She was hardly aware of the two old hives buried among the long
grass. “I don’t think so,” she said. “They were here when we moved in.”
The man made a note on a clipboard.
“And how many people live here?” His voice sounded different. More businesslike.
“Oh … I live here … by myself,” Kate stuttered, trying to sound light and cheery, and failing.
“But you said ‘when we moved in’.” He looked at Kate for confirmation.
“Oh yes, there’s a lady who lives here too,” Kate said as if suddenly remembering. “A friend.”
The man raised an eyebrow, and made another note. “So,” he continued, “not alone, then?”
“No. Not exactly.” She was beginning to wonder what on earth this had to do with bees.
The man studied his clipboard for a moment and whistled between his teeth before looking up at Kate. “It’s just that you seem a bit confused about who does live here. It’s you, your lady friend … no kids?”
“No,” Kate lied.
“No … twins?” The man glanced across at the BMX bikes leaning against the fence.
“No,” Kate said again, her face reddening.
“OK, that’s fine, then. Thanks for your time.”
“No problem,” Kate said, ready to close the door.
“Yeah, thanks,” the man said again. He looked down at his clipboard once more. “Just to be sure – the names Dan and Molly Crocker mean nothing to you?”
Kate shook her head, fighting to control the tremble moving through her body.
“It’s just that I have them listed as living here.” The man stepped forward and showed her the names printed on a sheet.
Kate shook her head again.
“If you’re sure,” the man said. “Or perhaps the names Rachel and Adam Newman might jog your memory?” He smiled, his voice deadpan.
Kate tried to slam the door, but it wouldn’t shut.
Looking down, she saw the American’s shiny boot was wedging it open. She pushed her full weight against it, but with her legs trembling like jelly she was no match for the man as he forced his way in…
The isolation had been one of the main reasons why Kate and Laura had chosen this area when they had first been looking for somewhere to settle.
Somewhere to hide.
There were never any passers-by, but if there had been, they would almost certainly have been startled by the gunshot that rang out from the house that morning, echoing across the flat, wet earth and sending a cloud of parakeets rising up from the nearby trees.
“Do I swing from the trees? Do you see me eating bananas? Do I look like a monkey?!”
A polite laugh fluttered across the audience. Indeed, most of them had never seen anyone who looked less like a monkey than the man who stood before them on a rickety stage, beneath a banner that read:
CHURCH OF THE TRIPLE WHEEL
Pastor Ezekiel Crane looked down over the few hundred or so of his flock, gathered together in a clapboard chapel on the outskirts of a small Midwest American town. His face was very pink on the shiny forehead, and his cheekbones looked as if they had been pumped up from inside. His full lips were a darker pink still and his square chin was divided by a deep dimple. His hair was blond and thick, and his teeth were Hollywood perfect.
Less charitable observers might have said that Ezekiel Crane’s appearance was the result of dozens of cosmetic surgical procedures, each paid for with the funds that his followers donated at every meeting. Some said that he wore a wig and false teeth. Others spread more outlandish stories, suggesting that he never slept, was given daily blood transfusions and ate live chickens for breakfast.
There was no shortage of rumours…
Crane surveyed his audience, trying to catch the eye of as many individuals as possible, eager as always to make contacts and converts. This was a typical audience for him: hard-working nuclear families – mom, dad and two kids – the pillars of Middle America. Crane had been surprised by this at first. He had expected more followers from the fringes of society, the hippies and New Agers, but his message seemed to resonate with the most conformist of people. Those who appeared to be the most certain about life had turned out to be the most uncertain of all. Crane was pleased. His disciples were not only respectable, but also well-behaved and loyal.
And they had money. Money they were falling over themselves to donate to Crane’s movement.
“Evolutionists would have us believe that we are descended from the great apes,” Crane continued. “And their theory has always been a convincing one … until now.” He turned to an easel by his side and flipped over a sheet of paper. On the other side were pictures of a chimpanzee, an orang-utan, a gorilla and a human. Next to the pictures were numbers.
“Now, if we were related to these guys, you would expect some genetic similarities … and there are some. But it’s not the similarities that are important; it’s the differences. If we were descended from the apes, then we would have the same number of chromosomes, right?”
He tapped the board with a pointer.
“Well, if we look at the figures here, we can see that the apes all have forty-eight chromosomes, that’s twenty-four pairs. Now, if you look here” – Crane pointed at the idealized human figure silhouetted on the sheet – “humans have only forty-six chromosomes, twenty-three pairs. Which means that we have a pair of chromosomes missing.” He stared out at the crowd, shaking his head. “Now, I’m no scientist, but chromosomes don’t just disappear, do they? So where have they gone?”
There were murmurs from the crowd. Crane took a couple of steps forward, speaking more intimately, fixing the faithful with his eyes.
“What I believe, my friends … what I know … is that we are a completely different species. One that has existed from the beginning of time. Apelike maybe, but different. And what changed us from our primitive form into what we are now is a genetic input from elsewhere. A genetic input that fused our chromosomes and made us men!” Crane brought his hand down on the lectern in front of him for emphasis. He heard a collective intake of breath from his audience. It always happened at this point in his speech, as if this were the moment when he was going to unlock the secret of mankind for them.
This was the point at which he knew he had them in the palm of his hand.
“Now, if you turn to page fifteen in your books, we’ll read together the words of Ezekiel, the great prophet I am named after. Then we’ll see the truth together.”
The audience shuffled and opened their copies of The Triple Wheel. Ezekiel Crane had edited parts of the Bible and other sacred writings that appeared to reinforce his theory and dotted them throughout his book, which, along with the accompanying CDs and DVDs, were selling in increasingly large numbers. Some of those in the audience had read it already, of course, but they were happy to listen again and have their faith in Pastor Crane renewed and strengthened.
Crane began to lead them in the reading:
“Now it came about in the thirtieth year,
On the fifth day of the fourth month
While I was by the River Chebar amongst the exiles,
The heavens were opened and I saw a vision…
“As I looked, behold, a whirlwind
Was coming from the North, a great cloud
With fire flashing forth continually
And a bright light around it, and
Something like glowing metal in the midst of the fire.
Within it there were figures resembling four living beings
And this was their appearance: they had human form.”
“Great sermon, Pastor Crane,” Brother Jedediah said. He passed Ezekiel Crane a cold Dr Pepper and smoothed a hand over his thinning scalp, as if trying to make himself smart for his boss.
Crane put his white shoes up on the dressing-room table and cracked open the can with a hiss. “Thank you, Brother Jedediah. I thought we’d never get rid of them.”
Crane had given a two-hour sermon with readings and songs. He had then spent another hour blessing children,
and signing books and CDs while the collection buckets were passed around. He had encouraged his followers to go home and listen to the CDs whenever they could – in the car, in bed, at any time, night or day – so they could learn and spread “the good news”.
“Don’t know where you get your energy from,” Brother Jedediah said.
“From above,” the pastor said. He smiled and tipped his Dr Pepper at the little man in a “cheers” gesture.
It was true that Crane did not look particularly tired. His creaseless face betrayed no fatigue and only the dark circles of sweat under the arms of his suit gave away the fact that he had been working hard. Crane swigged down the last of the cold drink and crushed the can in his hand.
“I got a good feeling, Jed,” he said, smacking his lips. “I can feel it in my bones. I’ve got them buzzing, and now them worker bees are all coming round to my way of thinking.”
“Hallelujah to that,” Brother Jedediah said. He placed a hand on his sweaty black satin shirt over his heart. “Hallelujah and amen.”
The sun made the landscape shimmer, and Rachel imagined she could see patches of water on the rough track ahead. The Great Central Road stretched in front of them into infinity. Rachel had thought it would be a major highway, but in reality, it was little more than a rough track used by only a few thousand intrepid vehicles a year.
Over dinner at a small motel the night before, Levi had revealed where their journey would take them. Rachel and Adam were excited. It was the most famous landmark in the country, but they had never been there. In fact, during their two years in Australia, they had rarely gone further than their local beach.
“Do you think we have enough food for the journey?” Adam asked, concerned as always about his stomach.
“There’s plenty of food out there,” Levi said, gesturing at the landscape around them. “If you know what you’re looking for…”
They spent the first hour in silence, taking in their surroundings. With every step, the horizon seemed to get further away and both Rachel and Adam began to worry about exactly how far they were going to have to walk.
Triskellion 3: The Gathering Page 2
