Rain Stones 25th Anniversary Edition

by Jackie French

  ‘Yes, I did,’ said Jacob. ‘Just as much as you did. Just different.’

  Amy refused to give up. ‘You don’t see when you’re blind,’ she informed him. ‘So you shouldn’t say so.’

  No one spoke. Ben was embarrassed. Amy was just saying what they all felt, but she shouldn’t have said it. He looked at Jacob. Jacob didn’t seem upset. He seemed to be thinking. It was strange watching Jacob think. Most people hid what they were thinking, didn’t let it show on their faces. If Jacob was sad or angry or thoughtful, you could see it. He had never tried to hide his expression at all.

  This time Jacob looked hesitant, as though he wasn’t sure what he was saying, or how to say it. He seemed to be speaking to everyone, not just Amy.

  ‘Maybe there are different ways of seeing things,’ he said finally.

  Amy snorted. ‘Either you can see a thing or you can’t,’ she said.

  Ben spoke up. ‘Maybe he means it’s like watching an old black and white movie. There’s no colour but you sort of see it. You know what I mean?’

  ‘I don’t see colours when I watch black and white movies,’ stated Amy. ‘Anyway, I don’t watch black and white movies. They’re boring.’

  Jacob shook his head. ‘It’s not just imagination,’ he said. ‘You can see things without using your eyes.’

  ‘How?’ demanded Amy. The others were quiet, watching. They could see Jacob trying to find a way to express himself.

  ‘It’s hard to explain,’ he said, ‘but I know I do, because I can’t see any other way. But it’s hard to say how. Maybe I could show you.’

  ‘Show me what?’

  ‘How I can see things.’

  ‘What things? Things round here? I don’t need you to show them to me. I can see them myself. Better than you can.’

  ‘Round the bush then,’ insisted Jacob, ‘round where I live. Maybe I could show you things you wouldn’t see, not just by using your eyes.’

  Amy stood up. ‘You’re crazy!’ she said. ‘Things you can’t see with your eyes! I’ve had enough of this. Why would I want to see the bush anyway? Nothing ever happens in the bush. It’s boring. It’s all the same.’

  Jacob was silent. The others watched Amy walk over to the canteen and select a packet of chips. She wandered over to Roger and Ngyen, under the trees on the other side.

  Ben looked at Jacob. His face was white.

  ‘How about tomorrow then?’ Ben said suddenly.

  ‘What?’ Jacob turned to him.

  ‘How about showing us tomorrow? Round your place?’

  Jacob paused. ‘All right,’ he said finally.

  ‘You coming, Si?’

  Simon looked startled. ‘I suppose so,’ he said.

  ‘No, you’re not,’ said Mary. ‘Mum said you have to keep me company tomorrow, ’cause you’ve been over at Ben’s or Jamie’s every afternoon this week.’

  ‘You can come too then,’ said Simon. ‘If you don’t want to be by yourself you can come with us.’

  ‘Three of us then,’ said Ben. ‘How about after lunch?’

  ‘I’ll have to check with Mum,’ said Jacob. ‘It should be okay. How’ll you get out there?’

  ‘I’ll ask Dad,’ said Simon. He glanced over at Amy. ‘What about her?’ he asked.

  Ben shook his head. ‘What would we want her for, anyway?’

  It was hot. Cicadas roared in the swaying air. The sky arched over them, thin as a bubble. They could still smell the dust from Simon’s father’s car on the track. Behind them Jacob’s house was still and white in its patch of green garden. Sweat trickled down the back of Ben’s knees. They could have been watching a video now, eating iceblocks. He remembered Jacob’s words from yesterday. He was going to show them things you can’t see with your eyes. Crazy.

  ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Where are we going?’

  Jacob was leaning against the white fence around the garden. He lifted his stick. ‘That way,’ he said, pointing across the paddock to the trees on the other side.

  ‘How do you know?’ asked Ben, curious. ‘I mean, how do you know where you are?’

  Jacob paused. ‘I suppose I don’t think about it mostly. Like you. I know the house is there, behind me, because I just came out of it. I know we’re standing on the track because it feels different on my feet, not like grass or the path. I know there are sheep paddocks around because I can smell them, and I know the bush starts over there because I can hear it.’

  ‘The birds and things?’ asked Mary.

  ‘Sort of,’ said Jacob. ‘I can hear the trees too. A sort of furry sound. You don’t hear the wind like that on paddocks. The smells are different too, and the way the wind feels on your skin. Things like that.’

  Ben glanced at Simon. Simon shrugged. ‘That’s what you mean by seeing?’ he asked. If that was all there was to it they might as well go back inside.

  ‘Sort of,’ said Jacob.

  ‘But we can see all of those with our eyes,’ said Mary. ‘We don’t need to feel them or hear them or smell them.’

  ‘Maybe I can show you other things,’ said Jacob.

  The grass in the paddock was summer brown. It crackled under their feet. Beyond them the green trees brushed against the sky. The kids followed Jacob.

  ‘Where’s he taking us?’ whispered Simon. ‘That’s not the way to the gate! He’s missing it by miles.’

  Ben shrugged. ‘Dunno.’

  ‘This is crazy,’ said Simon.

  A kookaburra cackled up above them. Ben, Simon and Mary looked up. Jacob didn’t.

  ‘That means there’s strangers,’ he said. ‘Us.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Ben.

  ‘When they call like that. That’s an alarm call. They don’t call much during the day. Not unless it’s a warning. Just in the morning and at night.’

  ‘I’ve heard them lots of times,’ said Mary. ‘On picnics and things. Not just in the morning and evening.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Jacob. ‘That’s because they were calling the alarm every time they heard you. If you hadn’t been there they wouldn’t have yelled.’

  ‘Huh,’ said Mary.

  They had reached the end of the paddock now. A mob of sheep watched them curiously from beside the dam. The fence clanged against Jacob’s stick. He stopped, turned right, and began to walk along it. His stick kept contact with the fence.

  ‘So that’s how he knows where the gate is,’ whispered Simon.

  ‘It’s clever,’ said Mary, ‘but it’s not seeing.’ Mary looked hot. She brushed the flies off her face impatiently. ‘Even Superman would have been better than this,’ she muttered. ‘He’d better have something decent to show us.’

  ‘You wanted to come,’ said Simon. ‘Stop complaining.’

  Jacob held the gate open for them. They passed out of the paddock. The air was cooler now. The trees were between them and the sun; the heat no longer reflected off the hard ground. It almost seemed as though the leaves made the air move. It tickled their faces, and dried the sweat.

  Jacob closed the gate carefully. He sniffed. ‘The angophoras are flowering,’ he announced.

  ‘What’s the angophoras?’ asked Mary.

  Jacob lifted his face. They could see his nostrils widen slightly, as though he was trying to track the scent.

  ‘That’s one,’ he said finally, pointing. ‘Over there.’

  ‘That gum tree?’

  ‘It’s not a gum tree, it’s an angophora.’

  ‘What’s the difference?’

  ‘It just is,’ said Jacob.

  The kids walked over to it. Jacob was right. The ground below it was littered with yellow-white blossoms, a furry carpet around the trunk.

  ‘How did you know?’ demanded Ben.

  ‘He smelt it,’ said Mary.

  ‘Yeah, I know that,’ said Ben, ‘but how did you know it was this tree? The ango-whatsit? Not just a gum tree flowering?’

  ‘It smells different,’ said Jacob. ‘I can’t tell all the trees. B
ut this one smells like honey. And you can hear the bees. Listen . . . See?’

  They lifted their faces to the tree above them. Now they were quiet they could hear it too. Not a buzzing . . .

  ‘Like a plane taking off,’ said Simon.

  Ben laughed. ‘Maybe it is,’ he said. ‘Maybe they’re going to lift the whole tree up and take it back to their hive.’

  ‘Crazy,’ said Mary. ‘Come on. I’m scared of bees.’

  ‘They won’t sting you,’ said Jacob. ‘They’re too full. Let’s go. That’s not what I wanted to show you.’

  ‘Where are we going?’ asked Mary.

  ‘Down in the gully. Come on. Watch out for snakes.’

  ‘Why?’ demanded Mary, stopping. ‘Did you see one, I mean hear one?’

  ‘I’ve never heard a snake,’ said Jacob. ‘It’s just a snaky sort of day.’

  ‘How do you mean?’ asked Ben.

  Jacob thought. ‘It just smells like snake. A sort of dusty smell. You can feel it between your shoulder blades. Like there’s going to be a storm later. You know the feeling? Snakes come out in that sort of weather.’

  ‘Do you often see them round here?’ asked Mary warily.

  Jacob shrugged. ‘Dad and Mum do. Come on. It’s this way.’

  The trees were moving above them now. Far on the horizon Ben could see mounds of grey gathering and rising. Jacob had been right. There might be a storm tonight. He hoped Jacob knew where he was going. It would be just their luck to be lost in the bush in a storm.

  A thorny lizard sunbaking on a rock gaped at them, then darted for safety. Jacob blinked at the noise, as though not certain where it had come from. His cane swished lightly across the fallen bark and leaves. They crackled like cornflakes under their feet. He seemed to be following a path, and his lips moved slightly. Ben realised he was counting. Counting what? Suddenly he knew. Jacob was counting his steps, just as he did at the swimming pool; so many steps to the canteen, so many to the path, so many to the road.

  Jacob stopped. He swung his cane round till it tapped a tree. He stretched his hand out. His fingertips touched it lightly, then swept over it, around its rough shaggy bark.

  ‘Here. Look,’ he ordered.

  ‘What at?’ demanded Mary.

  ‘It’s a possum tree. Look at it.’

  ‘It looks like any other sort of tree,’ said Simon.

  Jacob shook his head. ‘Look at the bark,’ he said. ‘See how it’s all rough and torn? That’s from their feet, running up and down. Smell too.’

  The children sniffed.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Simon.

  ‘Same here,’ said Mary.

  Ben sniffed too. Then again. He’d never thought to try to smell before. Smells came to you, you didn’t look for them — good smells like cakes cooking, pongs when his little sister was sick in the car. This was different.

  ‘I smell something,’ he admitted.

  Jacob turned to him eagerly. ‘Do you? What’s it like?’

  ‘Something sharp. Funny smelling. Like where the cat’s been, sort of.’

  Mary giggled.

  ‘Shut up,’ said Ben. ‘Just because you can’t smell anything.’

  Jacob was grinning. ‘It’s possum piss,’ he said. ‘Mum says that’s from the males. The females don’t smell like that. The males mark out their territories. You can smell it stronger at night.’

  ‘Urk,’ said Mary.

  ‘Everything smells stronger at night,’ said Jacob. ‘It’s like the heat takes the scent away.’

  Simon was frowning. He sniffed the bottom of the tree.

  ‘Hey, you’re right,’ he announced. ‘Can you see anything, Ben?’

  Ben looked up too. ‘Nope.’

  ‘There’s a hollow about halfway up, Mum says,’ Jacob told them. ‘They’re probably in there.’

  ‘Did your mum find the possums?’

  Jacob shook his head. ‘I heard them one night. They scream like hell sometimes. You’d think someone was being murdered. It was the smell that tipped me off. I brought Mum out here. She had a torch and spotted them. They’re ringtail possums. There’s some sugar gliders a couple of gullies over, but we wouldn’t see them till it gets dark.’

  ‘Have you seen them?’ asked Mary. In the last few minutes she had forgotten the useless eyes, Ben realised.

  ‘Last year. Just after we came here. Dad and I were out spotlighting with his big torch. There was this really high cry and this incredible noise, a thick sort of swooping, then a thud as it reached the next tree.’ He looked uncertain. ‘Dad might take us again, if you like, one night. You’d have to be really quiet though. Sometimes you have to wait hours till they come out.’

  ‘I’ve seen gliders on TV,’ said Mary. ‘There was this nature program or something.’

  ‘It’s not the same on TV,’ said Jacob. ‘All you can do is look at things and hear what someone’s recorded. It’s not the same as smelling them and hearing the bush all around and feeling the air on your skin and knowing you’re part of the whole thing, not just watching it.’ He put his stick out again. ‘Come on. We’ve got to get to the gully.’

  The trees were thicker now, old trees that had never been cut, where the ground hadn’t been compacted by the heavy tread of sheep or cattle and the small bush plants destroyed.

  Suddenly the soil changed. Instead of reddish it was dark brown, as though a line had been drawn across the ground.

  ‘Look at that,’ said Jacob.

  ‘How did you know it changed just here?’ demanded Ben.

  ‘You can smell it. See? The trees change here too, with the soil. And the tree ferns start just up here. You can smell the dead leaves rotting in the soil. You can feel the moisture on your skin.’

  The hill was small, but it was slower walking now. Jacob went carefully, swinging his stick in front of him, one foot forward, check, one foot forward, check, through the thicker bushes and trees around them.

  Ben came to a decision. He touched Jacob on the arm. ‘Say, do you want to put your hand on my arm? Like you did with Billo?’

  Jacob nodded. ‘It’d be faster. Thanks.’

  Ben took his hand awkwardly. Jacob shook his head. ‘No, you hold your arm next to you. Like that. Then I can just put my hand on it. That’s right. Okay, we go up the hill then it’s sort of to the right as we go down.’

  It was strange to be walking arm in arm with someone else. He hadn’t done it since he was small. It was hard at first, keeping pace, but Ben soon got into the rhythm of it. It was certainly faster. Jacob held his cane up high, with just one hand slightly in front of him, to ward off branches. They reached the top quickly.

  ‘Holy shit!’ said Simon.

  ‘If Mum heard you say that you’d be in for it,’ remarked Mary. ‘Wow! It’s something, isn’t it?’

  The country changed. Instead of trees below them and up the next hill, there was a sea of tree fern tops, filling the whole of the gully, so thick it seemed you could walk on the tops.

  ‘Do we go down there?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jacob. ‘Ooops.’

  ‘Sorry,’ said Ben. ‘I wasn’t looking.’ He twisted the creeper out of Jacob’s face.

  ‘That’s okay. Hey, listen to that! That’s a golden whistler.’

  Down into the gully, slipping on the moist ground, under the roof of tree fern. The world was dim. The leaves above them blocked out all sound — no wind, no rustle, only the crackling under their feet of age-old fronds. The tall trunks stood rough and rigid around them. The air smelt dusty, as though from a thousand years of rotting ferns.

  It was hard even to remember the sky from here; only the flashes of blue and white through the ferns. Suddenly it didn’t matter what Jacob had brought them to see. It was enough to be here.

  ‘Tell me when you see an old log,’ said Jacob.

  ‘That’s it over there,’ exclaimed Mary. It was a fallen tree fern, half rotted in the soil. Ben led Jacob up to it, skirting the rocks that peered through the
fronds where he might trip. Jacob touched it lightly with his cane.

  ‘Okay now,’ he said. His fingers left Ben’s arm. He felt with his cane again, along the rotted trunk then over it, tapping the tree ferns as he went. He seemed to be counting again.

  Suddenly he stopped. He beckoned the others over. ‘This is it,’ he said.

  ‘What is it?’ demanded Mary. ‘I don’t see anything.’

  They looked around. ‘Are we supposed to smell something again?’ asked Simon.

  Jacob grinned. ‘You can use your eyes too, if you want to. How about looking up?’

  They craned their necks. The tree fern curved outward. A platform had been built on the bend, with a conical nest behind it.

  ‘Hey, it’s enormous! What is it?’

  ‘Lyrebird’s nest.’

  ‘Wow! Do they fly all the way up there?’

  ‘Lyrebirds don’t fly much. See the slope behind us? The female scrambles up there then sort of glides down to the nest. Then when she wants to get down she just jumps off the balcony.’

  ‘What about the male?’

  ‘They don’t bother with the nest. They do most of the singing. Not now though. Not till it gets cooler, or a mist comes down or something.’

  Ben tried to remember what a mist was like. Not just the look of it — there was a taste to a mist, when you thought about it, a prickle of water on your face.

  Mary was indignant over the male lyrebirds. ‘They’re just lazy! I suppose they’ve got the time to sing,’ said Mary. ‘Hey, there’s something on my leg. Oh yuck, it’s a leech! Get it off.’

  ‘Hold still!’ ordered Ben.

  ‘Don’t pull it off,’ said Jacob. ‘It’ll bleed. You need some salt or a match or something.’

  ‘We don’t have any.’

  ‘Leeches suck your blood,’ announced Simon. ‘Like vampires.’

  Mary brushed at the leech frantically. It came off against her hand. She threw it away.

  ‘Look, my leg’s bleeding. It’s disgusting.’

  The others checked their legs. There were two on Simon, none on Ben. Simon pulled them off hurriedly. Small trickles of blood washed down his leg.

  ‘Come on,’ said Simon. ‘Let’s get out of here. Out of vampire country.’

  He and Mary started up the hill. Ben turned to Jacob. ‘You want me to check your legs?’