Trust Me!

by Paul Collins

  Since communications had been cut off by a series of tropical cyclones, there wasn't a lot for me to do. I couldn't talk to my main office, because all the lines were down. We were a long way from anywhere. The only ship that had put in to our little harbour had come in three months ago and it was still there, ropes rotting and hull heavy with barnacles. The sailors said that the currents outside the lagoon had changed. No ship could live in the sea now. Only one had tried. Pieces of it washed up a week later, though we never found the remains of the crew.

  I could have read, I suppose, there were a lot of books in the library, but in the heat the weight of a book on a reclining body soon became heavy, cutting off the breath, and sitting up meant sweat dripping off the forehead and marking the pages, which in turn reflected the terrible heat onto the face. It was too hot to do anything. Gradually I had fallen into a pattern. I rose, washed in water which even the night had not cooled, walked to the club before dawn and sat there all day, enduring the heat as best I could. We dined at eight. It had been supportable, just. But now there was no ice.

  I was curious about Jones’ fate and decided to investigate. It had happened to Jones. Had it happened to anyone else? Or was it some inherent vice, some flaw, in Jones, a quarrelsome person, while we still had enough energy to quarrel?

  Our little settlement of twelve houses faced the harbour. There was only one street, which led to the sea in one direction and to the main road in the other. Several people had set off for the next town before the heat closed down. We had heard nothing from them since. The N'gah said that the Time of Ending was come, and that no one could escape unless they shunned the touch of daylight. That is what they were doing. Every native family retreated to the sea-caves at the first blink of sunlight and sealed themselves in. If they were caught away from the caves, they dug themselves a hidey-hole. I recall Jones dragging some poor native out of the ground during the day and laughing as the native cringed and wept, and as soon as Jones let him go he scrambled back into his burrow like a rabbit. Jones called the natives ‘bunnies’ after that.

  He really had been an unpleasant man. I was not going to miss him.

  The sun did not beat down on my panama and reflect off my white suit. That would have been better; bright light implies shade. This was a sullen moist heat that poured like honey, or rather like toffee, melting over a person, moulding itself to him lovingly so that every part, every eyelash and toenail, was hot. We were like flies trapped in resin, immovable, fastened, pinned by the heat. I got as far as the first of the wooden planter's houses before I had to sit down.

  Protocol dictated that any visitor was to be offered a glass of water before any questions were asked. Atkins gave me a drink and sat down beside me.

  ‘Jones has died,’ I told him.

  ‘Good thing too,’ he grunted. He had never liked Jones.

  ‘Strange death,’ I said. The water was lubricating my throat but not cooling me and emerged instantly as sweat. ‘He seems to have … well, melted.’

  ‘That might explain that,’ he said, pointing.

  I looked. A large flat puddle was soaking into the ground at the bottom of the steps. On it lay a pile of clothes.

  ‘Who was that?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, they're Bill Thompson's clothes,’ he replied. His wallet was still in the pocket.

  ‘He can't have been there long,’ I said. ‘He hasn't soaked in.’

  ‘It was there when I came out this morning. So the N'gah are right. This is the end of the world.’

  ‘Probably,’ I said.

  He didn't say anything more. After a while I got up and continued down the street to Michaelson's house. He'd gone, of course. Last ship to get out. He'd said that the weather patterns had altered so much that fishing wasn't profitable and had taken off, wife and children and all, muttering about omens. Wild-eyed, he'd been. Strange man. I rested on his porch for a while. It was hard to breathe in the heat.

  I must have fallen asleep. When I awoke the sun was going down. I was parched and stifled and staggered to the next house, where Johnson gave me water and I croaked myself back into language.

  Night brought no relief. A jasmine vine was shedding flowers on me, black and curled in the heat, a sweet rotten smell which turned me sick.

  ‘Cheer up,’ he said. ‘It might rain tomorrow.’

  ‘And if it does, it will just get hotter,’ I responded. It was a ritual exchange. We had been saying it for months. It made me feel slightly better. I told him about Jones and Bill Thompson. He shook his head.

  ‘There's only a few of us left,’ said Johnson. ‘Just you, me, the Thompsons, no, only Tommy Thompson now, Dr Palmer, Atkins, Tolley and his family. I haven't seen them for a few days. Mac and his crew down at the harbour, too. We'd better check up on them. Coming?’

  It took a huge effort to get to my feet, but I did it. We carried one of the few electric torches left in the settlement. The wet does something to batteries and they corrode practically before one's eyes. Perhaps that's what was happening to us. We were corroding. Past our use-by date. Certainly past our best-before date, all of us.

  We passed the mountain of sawn logs, which had been the stock of a failed trading venture. Can't remember the man's name. He bought in chainsaws and cut down acres of tropical forest before he found that it wasn't economically viable to transport the wood all the way to Brisbane to mill. He'd gone broke. The wood was still there, rotting. Everything was rotting. Huge blooms of tree fungus patched the surfaces, exploding into fine spores if one brushed against them.

  Johnson stopped as a taipan slipped across the path. Once he would have killed it. But ammunition was scarce now. It was a big one. It took two minutes to slide past.

  The darkness came down on us like a lid. With it came the hum of mosquitoes. We were soaked in repellents but they didn't seem to work any more. I brushed them from my hands and face. It was hardly worth doing, really. They would just come back for more.

  There were no lights in the small houses on the shore. Once they would have been garish with coloured bulbs, orchids, loud music, sailors and N'gah girls drinking rum at the Island Home. As we came closer we saw that one girl, at least, was still there.

  ‘Pattie,’ said Johnson. ‘What are you doing here?’ She was sitting on the edge of the steps going down to the sea. A N'gah girl indeed, a slender and beautiful one, if her face had not been so scarred. Things had got out of hand one night in the Island Home, and a drunken sailor had slashed her with a broken bottle. We had sent her to hospital in Brisbane. They had saved her sight, but she would not stay for any further treatment. She was cradling a little light, some oil and a wick in half a coconut shell.

  ‘I came to say goodbye,’ she said.

  As she stood up I saw she had abandoned her western clothes and was naked, as the N'gah unmarried women are.

  ‘You were kind to me,’ she said to me. ‘Thank you.’

  She leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek. Then she kissed Johnson. Then she started to walk away.

  ‘What's happening, Pattie?’ I asked.

  She half-turned, her little light flaring with the movement.

  ‘The end,’ she said simply. ‘Just the end.’

  We saw her little lantern bob along up the hill to the forest, where the N'gah would be hunting that night.

  Tolley's house contained nothing but puddles; a big one for Tolley, a smaller one for his son, a medium-sized one for his wife.

  There was a torch burning at the jetty. Mac and his crew were frantically dragging at their anchor. Two men were in little boats, ready to conduct the ship out to the mouth of the harbour and instant death.

  ‘Mac!’ I almost shouted. ‘What are you doing?’

  His bearded face, dripping sweat, came into view. Both hands grasped the rail.

  ‘It's the end,’ he yelled. ‘We're seamen! I'm getting out!’

  ‘But the currents will wreck you!’ yelled Johnson.

  ‘Better Davy Jones than
melting like a candle,’ he shouted. ‘That's no death for a sailor! See you in Fiddler's Green!’

  With a vast effort the becalmed ship began to move. She must have carried half her own weight in barnacles. The sea was oily with heat, moving reluctantly away from the bow, closing in like treacle as she passed.

  But she gained the harbour mouth after about two hours, and we heard the waves break and the snap of her back as the whirlpool took her.

  As we walked back, we almost trod in Atkins. And as we passed Tommy Thompson's house, we heard the shot. He had decided not to wait.

  ‘Always was hasty,’ said Johnson. I agreed. We were now the only remaining foreigners.

  ‘Well,’ said Johnson, ‘nice to have known you, West.’

  We shook hands. ‘How about a last drink?’ he asked.

  I thought this a good idea.

  The remains of Dr Palmer lay on the dining room floor – I could tell it was him by the stethoscope and the collecting tubes. Kai had gone – run away, I hoped. So Johnson and I sat down and mixed ourselves a large rum punch. It went down well, so we had another, and then another.

  He slid away half an hour ago. I really don't fancy being left alone. I am rather glad that, just now, as I write, I can see my toes beginning to dissolve …

  Did you ever fall asleep on the train and miss your stop? Or fall asleep and go right through to the end of the line? Well, maybe you did, but I bet you never stayed asleep while they took the train out from the last station and left it on a side track overnight. After you hear this story, I bet you'll make sure you never do.

  It happened last year. I'd stayed late at school for the boys’ under-seventeen basketball final against St Joseph's. Yeah, we won, 84 to 76. And I scored eight of our points! After the game, I caught the 8:17 train from North Wollongong back to Gerringong. At Kiama, we did the changeover from the electrified line to the two diesel carriages going all the way to Bomaderry.

  So, anyway, I fell asleep listening to the Red Hot Chili Peppers on my headphones and slept right past Gerringong. When I woke up, the lights were off and the carriage was empty. The only light was the moonlight pouring in through the windows. I must have slumped over sideways in my sleep, because I was lying stretched out across a double seat.

  You'd think they'd have someone go through and check the carriages at the end of the line, wouldn't you? I reckon someone didn't do their job.

  Man, it was weird! I looked out the window and there was no station platform, no buildings, nothing. Just railway tracks, and another couple of unlit carriages further down the line. And tall, dark trees all around, tossing in the wind, silver and glittery under the moon.

  See, what happens is, they leave the trains parked at Bomaderry, ready for the big commuter rush to Sydney in the morning. When I worked that out, I knew this carriage was stuck here for the night.

  I could've rung home on my mobile, except it was out of battery. I knew that already because I'd tried to ring and tell my brother Matt we'd won the final. I tried again now, but no use.

  It was five minutes before midnight by my watch, so I must've slept on long after the train stopped. But I still had hours and hours to wait.

  No way was I planning to wait in the train! There's something seriously creepy about a dark deserted train carriage. Maybe it was the tossing of the trees outside, but the shadows kept moving and twitching over the seats and across the floor. Even the scrawls of graffiti seemed alive. You could half imagine the seats still filled with people. I grabbed my backpack and headed for the nearest exit.

  Then I discovered that the doors wouldn't open. I yanked on the handles, but I couldn't drag them apart. Locked!

  And even worse – when I pushed on the red alarm button, that didn't work either. The carriage's electrical systems had been totally shut down. I was trapped.

  Stay calm, stay cool! I told myself. The standing section of the carriage by the doors was even creepier than the main section, so I went and sat down again. A different seat, two rows in front of where I'd fallen asleep.

  I was wondering what to do next when I heard this noise. A scraping and scratching noise, with a muffled sort of thump every now and then.

  The first thing I realised was that I'd been hearing it for a while, only it had blended in with the sounds of the trees in the wind.

  The second thing I realised was that it was coming from right under my seat!

  Skrikk-skrikk-skrikk-thrubb!-skrikk-skrikk-thrubb!

  I jumped up, backed away into the aisle and bent down for a look. Under the seat was a battered brown suitcase. It fitted as snug and tight as if it had been made for this very space.

  Then I remembered the guy who must have left it. He was already in his seat when we changed trains, so I guess he was travelling from Kiama. A strange-looking guy, half-dignified and half-disreputable, like a business executive who'd gone on the whiskey. He smelled of whiskey, too. He sat there with his collar pulled open and his tie hanging loose.

  He wasn't there long, because three security guards came into the carriage even before the train left the station. And not only security guards, but a plainclothes detective, who flashed a badge and spoke to the man in a low voice. I heard the name ‘Dr Crowl’ and enough of the tone to know they were taking him off for questioning.

  Dr Crowl went without a fight, only mumbling and rolling his eyes. Maybe he was too far gone to remember his suitcase, or maybe he was still smart enough to leave it deliberately.

  I stared at it. I could see that it was closed with a padlock, but I couldn't yet see how it was dotted with tiny airholes.

  That was when I had my stupid moment … you know, the moment when the idiot walks right into the serial killer's cellar or the vampire's lair. The noises from that suitcase were already making the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. But if I didn't investigate, I knew I'd stay scared for as long as I was trapped on the train. Better find out now than have my imagination run wild.

  As if my wildest imaginings could ever have come close to what was really in the suitcase!

  I grabbed it by the handle and pulled it out between the seats. It bumped and bulged as the thing inside went berserk.

  I let go and backed away into the aisle.

  Now I could see the airholes, and the rip that was opening up between them!

  The rip grew wider and wider, halfway across the front of the case. Then a hand emerged. Someone's left hand, a human hand.

  It was the size of an adult male hand, with powerful fingers and thick knuckles. The skin, though, was as smooth as a baby's and the fingers were sort of pale and floppy.

  It was impossible. The suitcase was no bigger than a school case; there was no way you could fit an adult or even a child inside.

  I was paralysed. Like they say, you want to move, but your muscles won't obey. I was waiting to see a wrist, an arm, I don't know what.

  There was a furious scrabbling and the suitcase shook this way and that. The hand waggled and flapped like somebody waving. The scrabbling sounded like claws …

  It was claws. Suddenly another rip appeared and a little claw stuck out.

  In the next moment, the new rip met up with the old rip, the suitcase burst apart and the thing sprang out.

  My mind couldn't take it in. Couldn't, wouldn't, believe it. Snout … tail … claws … and hand!

  Of course, I'd seen that picture on the news, you know the one? – the mouse with a human ear growing out of its back? A scientific experiment with gene-splicing or something. But this … this wasn't a mouse but a monster rat, some exotic breed as big as a small dog. And what was growing out of its back was a human hand!

  It turned towards me. Its eyes were red like tiny beads of blood, its teeth were needle-sharp. It looked completely crazed, with drool and saliva dripping from its mouth. I guess you'd have to go mad if you were an animal with a hand growing out of your back.

  I was still watching, still goggling, when it leaped up at my face.

  Swin
ging an arm I deflected it away. Ugh! My hand touched the rat-thing's hand. Clammy and flabby! Its fingers seemed to cling to mine for a moment, before I shook it off.

  I yelled and half-fell, hauled myself upright again. The rat-thing had landed in the aisle. It pointed its snout towards me and looked ready for another spring.

  I backed away, fast as I could, between the seats. The rat-thing pattered forward, stopped, pattered forward again, stopped again. It wasn't the bite of its teeth that scared me, so much as the touch of that unnatural hand.

  Back and back I went. I couldn't take my eyes off it, until it darted suddenly under the seats.

  Now I didn't know where it was. I turned and ran, ten paces to the end of the carriage. There was no way through to a further carriage, only the blank door to the driver's compartment at the front of the train. If I could get into the driver's compartment and close the door behind me …

  But of course the door was locked. No surprise there. I thumped the window with my elbow and the jolt tore right through me, making me gasp. I was trapped.

  I spun around and listened. Was that the sound of scrabbling claws or the sound of branches knocking together in the wind? The wind outside was blowing harder than ever. I could feel the whole carriage rocking slightly under my feet.

  I stood backed up against the driver's door. My backpack was still on the seat where I'd left it, but I wasn't going back to collect it, that was for sure.

  Skrikk-skrikk! Skrikk-skrikk!

  The more I listened, the more I heard noises from both sides of the aisle. It was like the rat-thing had multiplied into a hundred rat-things.

  Crouching down I peered under the seats and caught a flash of something pale. The hand! It had to be! It shot out of the shadows, disappeared again. It was closing in on me.

  I never stopped to wonder why it was after me. What did it want to do? I never thought that maybe it had some other reason for heading this way.

  Then it appeared in the aisle again. Not where I was looking at all. It had come nearly level with the last row of seats.

  I backed into a corner next to the exit door.