“Can I come in?” he asked gently.
Beth stood stock still and did not answer. Taking her shoulders in both hands, he moved her to one side, and she meekly complied. His breath smelt strongly of whisky. He entered the house and closed the door. His wife turned to face him, but she remained close to the entrance.
“Surprised to see me Elizabeth?” asked Mark unnecessarily.
“How? How can you be alive?” stammered Beth.
Mark only smiled and said “Our little secret. Understand that nobody else can know.”
He sounded quite mad.
Beth’s mind desperately ran through the possible explanations for the impossible. She was still asleep and dreaming. She was deluded and hallucinating. She was seeing a ghost. What else? She remembered Rick’s dream. What had he said? That he saw his father at the funeral? She looked at Mark more closely; at what he was wearing. A cheap polyester track-suit. Not his style at all. What else did Rick say? A disguise, he’d said. His father was wearing a disguise.
As the reality of Mark’s existence sank in, Beth felt a wave of deadly fear rise from the pit of her stomach, causing her chest to tighten so that she was conscious of each heart beat. Her every intuition urged her to flee. Behind her, she felt for the door handle. Slowly, imperceptibly, she turned it until it clicked open. For a dreadful instant she was too frightened to move. But suddenly she found the courage to spring backwards, burst through the door, and make a mad dash away from the house.
Several moments passed before Mark comprehended what had happened. This wasn’t the way he’d imagined it at all. His wife was meant to be overcome with joy at his survival. Mark charged after her, fury mounting with every stride. Although she had a small head start, Mark was faster. By the time Beth reached the end of the garden he was upon her. As she tried to slip through the paddock rails he grabbed her, hurling her roughly face down onto the ground. In a second he was on top of her, kissing and biting the nape of her neck, trying to push her nightgown up around her waist.
She felt so soft and vulnerable beneath him that his anger started to subside. After all, she’d reacted only out of fear and surprise. Once she learned the truth, she’d come round. Beth lay quiet now, not daring to move. But Mark no longer held the element of surprise. This was no dream, no hallucination, no ghost. Her attacker was flesh and blood, and apparently intent on raping her, or worse. Gradually her fear was replaced with a steely resolve to defend herself.
Still Beth lay quiet. Mark turned her over to face him, and she acquiesced. The moon was not yet risen, but he could see the pale porch-light reflected in her eyes. It was too dark to read her expression. He spoke her name several times but she did not respond. Straddling her, Mark knelt up and slowly slipped the cotton straps of her gown off her shoulders. With one final tug, he exposed her breasts. Explanations could wait. The urge to possess her overcame him. His lips found her nipples, and one hand fumbled with his track pants, trying to lower them. This proved difficult. Beth seemed compliant enough now, so he took the opportunity to stand up, and strip to the waist.
As he lowered his body over her she seized her chance. With all her might she delivered a powerful kick to his groin. The blow was perfectly timed and placed. Caught unawares, Mark gave a yell and lost his balance. Beth shoved him aside and in an instant was away, diving through the rails of the fence and sprinting barefoot into the darkness.
Slowly Mark rose to his feet, cursing and pulling up his pants. Peering into the silent night, he could see nothing. Rage mixed with fear caused him to shiver slightly, despite the warm breeze. All his future plans depended on Beth. They were going to start a new life, together, far from here. He had no ‘plan B’. He turned to face the blackness, roaring out her name. In the shelter of a nearby gully, Beth heard and shuddered with alarm.
In spite of her precarious situation, Beth felt relatively safe in her hiding place, as if the bush meant to protect her. She was several hundred metres away from the house and the night was profoundly dark. Her knowledge of the land was excellent, while Mark’s was poor. The property was criss-crossed with thickly treed gullies, all leading down to a central watercourse. Her plan was to collect her thoughts for a little while, and then to try to make her way down the gully, cross the creek to the road beyond, reach a neighbour’s house, and then call the police. But for the moment she was content to crouch out of sight, recover her breath, and try to calm her racing heart. It continued to pound so loudly that she was convinced that Mark would hear it. From her hiding spot, Beth could see the woodpile, and the place where she’d held the dying Zenandra. Who would have thought that she too would be fighting for her life just days later? She mouthed a quiet prayer to the dead queen for courage.
Back at the house, Mark was becoming increasingly desperate. He needed a drink to help him think. As he walked across the lounge room to the bar, he noticed the miner’s lamp that he’d given his son for Christmas, lying on the floor behind the couch. It gave him an idea. Picking it up, he tested it. Good. It still worked. In the laundry, he found a length of light rope and shoved it into the pocket of his trousers. Then he went out the back door to the dog-run. A tired Beth had neglected to release the dogs, who’d been locked up all day and were anxious for some exercise. They greeted Mark excitedly, tails wagging and full of pent-up energy.
“Let’s find Mum,” whispered Mark as he opened the gate.
He put on the headlamp and walked with the dogs to where he’d last seen his wife, calling them through the fence into the paddock.
“Find Mum, find Mum,” he encouraged.
The little one began to yelp in anticipation.
Hidden in the gully, Beth’s blood ran cold as she heard the barking. The dogs would lead Mark straight to her. With no time to lose, she made her way in darkness down the gully, cutting her bare feet on the rough and broken ground and scratching her thinly clad body again and again on sticks and branches. Her progress was painfully slow, impeded by the treacherous combination of thick tea tree, bracken and the occasional Wombat hole.
For half an hour or more she battled on blindly through the bush. Then, exhausted and bleeding from cuts all over her legs, she paused, slumping down on a stump to rest. Looking back over her shoulder, she was horrified to see a beam of torch light. Mark. He was coming at a fast pace down the pastured hill adjoining the gully. With the advantage of light and the assistance of the dogs, he was bound to catch-up with her soon. The cover of the gully was of no use if the dogs betrayed her. Feeling around for some sort of weapon, she managed to tug a lump of wood out of the ground. Moving carefully, she finally emerged from her cover into the paddock on the other side, thinking she might have a better chance to defend herself out in the open.
By now Mark was just on the other side of the gully. She could see him clearly through the trees and realised that he was wearing a headlamp, probably Rick’s Christmas present. He held a coil of rope. When he caught her, he would have a free pair of hands. The dogs were following her by sight now. Mark stopped for a moment to train the beam of light directly on to her. She felt like a rabbit in a spotlight.
Beth backed away, praying for a miracle. Suddenly the lamp went out. She gave a quiet thank you for that faulty connection. Of course, she knew that the temperamental torch could click back on at any time, but at least it bought her some time. She continued to edge away, afraid to turn her back on her assailant. A large, fallen Wattle tree behind her caused her to trip and fall heavily, hitting her head. She noticed an odd, faint buzzing in her ears as she tried to stand and she prayed she had not suffered concussion. From nowhere, her little terrier jumped out of the night, licking her face with great excitement, closely followed by her collie, Dell. Without his light Mark had been unable to keep up with his canine guides. Beth’s reprieve was short-lived. Behind her, the enormous silver orb of a full moon rose slowly beyond the trees, illuminating the darkness.
Surrendering to her fear, Beth dropped the lump of wood and fled blindl
y across the paddock, followed by the excited dogs. To her relief Mark’s lamp was still not working. She reached a group of trees and hid behind them, crouching down, trying to keep the dogs quiet as her lungs tore the air for breath. Looking back from whence she came, she saw Mark’s dark figure emerge from the moon shadow cast by the gully. Once more she turned to run, hoping against hope that if she kept the dogs with her she might still elude him.
CHAPTER 34
Mark could now clearly see Beth as she turned to run, with the shadow of the dogs at her heels. Sensing victory, he leapt forward and attempted to jump the fallen Wattle tree that had tripped Beth moments earlier. It was difficult to judge distance in the gloom and he also stumbled and fell to the ground. The impact of the fall caused his headlamp to flicker back on. He now had a definite advantage.
As he stood up, he noticed a soft background murmur that seemed to be getting louder. It was now quite a distinct humming noise. Mark was almost to his feet when he saw insects flying towards the beam of his lamp. Imagining them to be moths, he swatted them away from his face with the short coil of rope he held. The peculiar buzzing noise grew louder again. Suddenly he felt an intense burning sensation on his hands and up and down his arms.
Shocked and confused, he lost his balance and crashed awkwardly back to the ground. Trying to remain calm, he shone the beam of his torch onto his arms, in an attempt to identify the cause of his pain. Wasps. A second nest was concealed on the edge of the gully. It had entirely escaped Beth’s notice. Dozens of European wasps crawled over his body and exposed limbs. A shriek of pure horror escaped his lips. Desperately he tried to ignore the pain and climb to his feet, but they were swarming so thickly now, attracted by the lamp and flying directly at his face.
Wasp stings hurt. Painfulness, rather than toxicity, is the most immediately useful way for stinging insects to defend themselves and their nests. If Mark had, despite the pain, doggedly moved away from the nest, he might have escaped. But this scenario ignores the psychological effect, the almost uncontrollable terror that accompanies such a mass attack. Mark’s fear was so acute that he lost the ability to reason. He tried to defend himself against them. A hopeless task.
Mark shared the characteristic attitude of most people towards insects; ignorance about them, fear and dislike of them, and a desire to kill them on sight. He also vastly underestimated the extent of the danger he was in. Mark was unaware of a certain fascinating evolution in European wasp behaviour since their arrival in Austalia’s mild climate. Some nests were known to overwinter, not declining and dying in the autumn, but instead continuing to grow. Unfortunately he had chanced upon such a super nest. Unchecked by the advance of the previous winter, it had continued to develop, constantly producing fertile queens and drones throughout the colder months. Demonstrating amazing adaptability, not all the young queens sought fresh territories. Many remained within the nest, cooperatively reproducing and contributing to a vast population of wasps. This one perennial nest alone contained a staggering one hundred and twenty thousand workers, more than two hundred functional queens, and measured over a metre in circumference. Mark’s violent swatting merely served to further enrage the insects, and the bright torch light, for which he was so ignorantly grateful, only served to attract them to his vulnerable head. As the sheer volume of wasps and agonising stings grew, he threw himself forward onto the ground in a vain attempt to shield his face. Desperately he tried to protect his mouth and eyes.
Wasp venoms produce prolonged pain and swelling caused by damage to the blood vessels under the skin. Additionally, they attack muscle. Peptides such as serotonin and histamine work on the nerves, acting as major pain-producing agents. Their venom is also full of allergens and neurotoxins. Not only are these compounds responsible for the tortured burning sensation of the skin, but also for the fatal systemic reactions that can follow. The body responds to the envenomation not just at the sting location, but at other areas remote from the sting site. Cutaneous reactions affect the skin, causing ugly swellings, hives and rashes on the face, neck and the palms of the hands. Vascular reactions involve the circulatory system, with massive leakage from veins and arteries and a consequential drop in blood pressure. This leads to dizziness and fainting. Respiratory reactions cause swellings and an enormous build-up of fluids in the lungs. This is followed by difficulty in breathing, sneezing, constrictions in the throat and chest, and frothing at the mouth. These reactions are quite terrifying to the individual, who perceives that they are about to suffocate. As the symptoms intensify, the victim also experiences cramps, diarrhoea, nausea, vomiting and finally loss of consciousness.
Mark was in serious trouble. His entire body felt like it was being pierced by razor-sharp, red-hot skewers, and the more he writhed around, the more he exposed himself to the excruciating assault. Within minutes his body began to convulse in an unbearable agony and, forgetting to protect his face, he let out scream upon anguished scream. Instantly the wasps advanced. Climbing into his mouth, they stung his sensitive tongue again and again, before clambering further down his throat and attacking his tonsils. Others crawled beneath his eyelids.
Mark’s tormented screaming lessened, and his body went limp as the tremendous physical shock set in. Breathing now became very difficult, as his throat swelled to a massive size, blocking his airways. His face turned blue and, mercifully, he lapsed into unconsciousness. The sheer volume of venom in his system was now of itself fatal. Mark had endured over two thousand stings, and still more wasps continued to pour from the nest. His body spasmed one more time and his heart failed. Mark was dead.
As Beth turned to run, she heard Mark’s first ear-shattering shriek. Despite her panic, the sound seemed to root her irresistibly to the ground. The bloodcurdling screams continued unabated, and for a little while Beth was too terrified to turn and face in the direction of the noise. The dogs went strangely quiet and lay whimpering at her feet.
In was many minutes before Beth plucked up the courage to even turn around. The first thing she noticed was the glow of the torchlight from behind the fallen Wattle log. For a fleeting moment, she thought that maybe the frightful screaming was a bizarre ploy to trap her. But she soon dismissed this notion. Such hideous cries could surely only be made by someone in genuine agony. Whatever could be happening to Mark? Dell licked her hand. The dogs began to tremble as the tortured shrieks continued. Beth curled up on the ground with them, covering her ears in an attempt to block out the nightmarish sounds. After what seemed like an eternity, the screams disintegrated into a sort of anguished, choking gurgle that was almost more disturbing. Abruptly the sound ceased.
For several minutes Beth remained on the ground in the foetal position, afraid to move. Eventually she unfolded herself and dared a glance back at the fallen tree. The faint glow of torchlight illuminated an odd golden mist, hovering halo-like around the Wattle log. After several more minutes Beth stood up. The dogs stayed cowered on the ground at her feet, reluctant to move. Clouds scudded sullenly across the sky, revealing the round, bright moon and a slice of stars. Taking a deep breath, Beth stretched her aching limbs and tiptoed from her hiding place in the trees. Cautiously, she inched her way towards the lamplight. As she drew closer, a familiar, low, buzzing drone grew ever louder, and she was hit by a sickening comprehension.
Now she stood directly before the fallen trunk. Mark’s life-less form lay on the other side. Swarming all over his body were thousands of European wasps. They were particularly thick around his head, attracted to the light from the headlamp that had, unfortunately for Mark, flicked on when he stumbled over the tree. The unfiltered beam from the torch acted as a magnet for the insects, who had already been disturbed by Beth and the dogs minutes before. They crawled over his massively swollen face and up his nose, pheromone-driven to sting even after their victim was dead. Mark’s eyes bulged grotesquely. His mouth, wide open as if still gasping for air, was filled with a crawling mass of angry wasps. Beth stood in awe, as more and more insec
ts emerged from the colony entrance underneath the fallen wattle. Soon Mark’s body all but disappeared beneath a seething swarm of wasps, many inches deep.
Beth did not grieve. She’d already grieved. Mark had somehow cheated death but not for long. Her exhausted emotions struggled to rise to the occasion. Horror, sorrow, astonishment; they vied wearily for preeminence. However in the end, simple relief won out. The glorious, full, summer moon now sailed high in a sky free of clouds, illuminating the bushland with its friendly light. Gazing upwards Beth felt a deep sense of comfort and protection. Whispering her grateful thanks to the sacred night, and guided by the gentle moon, she began her long trek home.
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Wasp Season Page 24
