by John Marsden
Unlike everyone else I didn’t hesitate. There wasn’t time. I started wriggling inside. As I did I thought of something. Now I did hesitate. I said to Judy: ‘Won’t there be reprisals for you, when I’m not at rollcall?’
‘Leave that for us to worry about,’ she said.
I felt an immense wave of gratitude, realising how much they were doing for me.
‘Thank you,’ I said.
‘See you after the war.’
‘After the war. Yes.’
Inside the mattress felt strange. There was light coming through, and I could breathe, but I had to struggle not to panic. The stuffing was so uncomfortable; prickly and scratchy, bits of it sticking into me every time I moved. We had a couple of old horsehair mattresses stored in the shearers’ quarters, but you’d never dare offer them to shearers nowadays.
Without turning my head I sensed that Dr Muir had started the stitching up. It must feel strange to him too—I bet his time in Medical School hadn’t prepared him for a suture job like this.
Being in the mattress reminded me of something, and I tried to think what it was. Eventually I remembered. When I was a kid I’d snuggled down deep into the bed, with the blanket over my head, imagining I was in my own little world, all outside influences cut off—that was the feeling. I could have been in a space shuttle.
Less than five minutes later I heard heavy footsteps clumping in on the duckboards of the tent. I felt myself lifted. They struggled to get me up. It was lucky I’d lost weight in this war. I felt hands come in underneath me, to stop me falling through the fabric of the mattress. ‘Don’t move,’ someone whispered.
Even through the mattress I felt the coolness of the outside air. A few more metres and I was lifted again, then dropped onto a metal base. I heard the occasional shouted comment, but nothing else seemed to happen for quite a time. Then there was a series of thumps, as other stuff was dropped next to me. Almost immediately the truck started, and sat there rumbling, a big diesel engine. Doors opened and shut, there was a lurch, and we were off.
We didn’t get far before we stopped again. There were more shouts, and I could hear Dr Muir’s voice. Several times I heard the word ‘AIDS’. I was sweating so much I was making the stuffing of the mattress damp, and the air around me felt more and more stuffy and smelly. We seemed to be waiting an interminable time.
It was too long. Something must have gone wrong. I’ve never felt more helpless. I was totally in the hands of other people. I don’t like that; have never liked it.
The truck rocked as someone got up on it. Sweat broke out of me like never before. I just spontaneously sweated from every pore. The automatic sprinklers had come on. I was rigid with fear. Boots clumped past me and stopped. I could hear loud breathing, then something scraped, as though a heavy metal object was being moved. There was a bit of scuffling, then a boot kicked the corner of the mattress, hard. I felt a rush of vomit come into my mouth, just a first taste, but I pressed my lips tight and kept it in. A sharp stick, or a rifle more like, jabbed fiercely into the middle of the mattress, about a ruler’s length from me. My stomach knotted up like a huge bunch of fishing line in a gigantic tangle.
There was silence for—well, I honestly don’t know how long. Between thirty seconds and four minutes, that’s the best I can do. Time goes into a new dimension when you’re waiting to be killed.
The truck lurched underneath me. I gasped, then with no warning we were under way again.
I could tell when we left the actual camp, because we started climbing out of the quarry. I didn’t dare move, because I hadn’t heard the man on the back get off. I wasn’t sure if I had a soldier riding with me.
We travelled only ten or twelve minutes, then bumped over a poor bit of road for a while before coming to a halt, with a squeak of the brakes. The engine was switched off. Suddenly everything felt incredibly quiet. I heard the tailgate rasp open. A pair of boots clanged across the metal, and stuff was dragged past me. A few minutes later the boots returned. I heard Dr Muir’s voice, whispering: ‘They’re keeping their distance, Ellie. But I’ve got to get you off the truck on my own, so it could get pretty rough.’
‘OK,’ I whispered back, but I’m not sure if he heard me.
I soon found out what ‘pretty rough’ meant. Dr Muir dragged my mattress to the tailgate and then half-dropped me, half-slid me, to the ground. I landed on my hip, which hurt. There was a bit of padding under me, which protected my bum, but my hip had no protection.
Then I started sliding along.
Poor Dr Muir. Not only did he have to drag me to the incinerator, but I guess he had to do it in a way that looked reasonably effortless. He couldn’t afford to have the guards think there was anything odd about the mattress.
I could smell the burning even through the fabric and the stuffing, and knew we were getting close. I just hoped Dr Muir wouldn’t have to chuck me in the flames.
He dumped the mattress and I think left it for a while. Then I felt a little breeze through the side and looking around realised that a thin sharp knife was cutting through the stitches. The doctor’s voice murmured: ‘Slide out, quick. The guards can’t see you.’
I obeyed at once, although it was hard to move. I was cramped from being still for so long, especially in my wounded leg. But I got out OK and lay on the asphalt. The incinerator was a few metres away. It was huge: a full-on industrial size. It smelt pretty bad, now that I was out in the open and able to get the full effect.
I kept lying there until Dr Muir appeared from the truck and threw two green plastic garbage bags full of stuff into the fire. Without looking at me he said: ‘Sneak around the back.’
I wriggled round where he said, and huddled into the warm back of the incinerator. It felt nice and safe and I almost forgot the danger. I remembered pretty fast when I heard a soldier’s voice suddenly very close to me, saying: ‘Hurry up.’
‘Yes, yes, won’t be long now’ Dr Muir sounded calm; his voice was steady.
I could hear someone, I assume the soldier, poke around with a stick or a metal rod. I could hear it scraping on the concrete base the incinerator stood on. It sounded horribly close. I shrank even smaller, crowded into the incinerator even more closely. The warm bricks were making me sweat.
‘Careful,’ Dr Muir said. His voice seemed less calm now, slightly higher in pitch. ‘The virus can survive for quite a while.’
It didn’t sound too convincing to me, and the soldier just grunted. He must have been only a couple of metres away, but the circular shape of the incinerator kept me from his view.
I heard the truck start and the horn sound. Someone was getting impatient. The soldier said a few words to Dr Muir, something I didn’t catch, but the doctor said, ‘Yes, fine’. I had a wild flicker of excitement, the first real thought of ‘Yes! Maybe I’ll get away with this.’
As though God wanted to punish me for that moment of relaxation, a second later the guard appeared around the side of the incinerator.
He got such a shock that he froze, staring at me, his eyes getting bigger and bigger. He carried a rifle, and he started fumbling with it, lifting it to his shoulder. I unfolded myself and stood and turned and tried to run. I was desperate to make my legs work. I was like a drunk trying to win an Olympic sprint. I remember I had my arms stretched out like I was reaching for something, a tape, that was nowhere to be seen. Deep within me I knew I couldn’t bear to be shot again. I couldn’t go through it a second time. I didn’t feel like I was moving but I must have been because when he finally got a shot off it whistled away to my left, missing by a ruler’s length I’d guess. I realised I was enough of the way around the side to be almost out of his sight again.
But it would only be for a moment. In front of me was the opening to the incinerator. It was bigger than I’d expected, twice the size of our fireplace at home, with flames licking out. It was a mess, with stuff scattered between it and the truck: all the things the doctor was shifting to be burnt. There was no sign of Dr
Muir. But I got a glimpse of the soldier coming around after me, lifting his rifle for a second shot. In desperation I picked up a burning length of wood that seemed to be part of a bed frame, and turning, flung it like a spear at the soldier. It got him on the right hand. With a shout he dropped the rifle and darted back, grabbing his hand where it had been burnt. I thought I’d better follow up while he was off-balance, so I swung to my left and grabbed at the nearest thing.
It was a dead body. I sort of realised as I reached at it that it was a human body, and I realised that it must be the man who’d died of AIDS. Aaron, I think Judy said his name was. I couldn’t believe this was happening, but I was in a situation where there were no second chances and no time to think. Aaron’s body was on a stretcher which was at an angle, the top part resting on an empty wooden crate, the bottom part resting on the ground. He was dressed in a white T-shirt and blue jeans and there was a scarf tied around his head, as though his mouth would fall open without it. I picked him up easily, by the front of his T-shirt and his belt. He weighed about forty kilos I’d guess. His body was quite stiff but as I lifted him his head fell back in a horrifying and sickening way, and there was a crack as though a bone might have broken. There wasn’t time to feel sick. I just heaved him straight at the soldier, hoping as I did that when Judy told me about Aaron’s sense of humour, she knew what she was talking about.
The man was picking up his rifle. I don’t think the burning spear had hurt him much. Aaron landed on top of him. Perhaps it would have been funny, in a different situation. I’d kind of run out of laughter though. I had time to see the soldier’s expression of terror and disgust as he tried to roll out from under the body, and then I was running. I looked for Dr Muir, but saw no sign of him. We were both on our own now. I knew all too well that he’d risked his life for me, and that he might now be in deep diarrhoea, but there was nothing we could do for each other. Some day if we both survived I might be able to thank him.
In the meantime I just ran and ran, in a kind of stumbling, limping jog, until I was at least three k’s from the incinerator of horror. Then I kept walking, as fast as my poor tired stuffed-up legs would travel.
At least I had a definite mission now, a goal. If my mother was in Simmons’ Reef, I was going to find her. I couldn’t remember having a stronger sense of purpose at any stage since the beginning of the war.
Chapter Fifteen
I arrived at Simmons’ Reef at three o’clock in the afternoon, after six days and nights. It had been a wild trip. So much had changed while I was in hospital and the camp. The war was burning along, throttle all the way out, black smoke pouring from the exhaust. When I was hiding in a ditch by the side of the road, up to my hips in water, cold and hungry, hoping the passing convoy of trucks and tanks wouldn’t see me, it was hard to remind myself that all these soldiers racing around the country were good news for me in the long run.
I didn’t think much about acts of sabotage, or attacks on the enemy. Without the support of Homer and Lee I didn’t have the nerve to try much on my own. Plus I had no weapons. The truth is, I didn’t have the nerve for anything more than staying alive. Not that there were many opportunities for sabotage anyway.
Things got quieter approaching Simmons’ Reef. It seemed to be in a bit of a backwater; always had been as far as I knew. A freeway went right past it, but that had been so heavily bombed, you’d be lucky to get a bike along there now. The military traffic seemed to be detouring west, over the Wyndham River. I wished I had a radio, so I could call Colonel Finley. If the New Zealanders knew that there were convoys going along those back roads they could drop a few bombs on them, to slow the party down a bit.
But maybe the New Zealanders knew anyway. They sure were active. There wasn’t a day when a whole lot of Kiwi bombers weren’t thundering overhead, or when the lighter faster fighter planes weren’t racing past like whippets. Even better was the fact that I hardly saw any enemy planes, and the ones I did see were old and slow, lumbering along in complete contrast to the groovy new Kiwi planes. I guessed the military help from Japan was making a difference.
On my first full day of freedom, skirting around Cavendish, I saw an almighty explosion towards the eastern end of the city. The sky went red, from one horizon to the other, like it had been sprayed with blood. Then came the huge slow dark cloud, more like a toadstool than a mushroom. I wondered who’d blown up what, but I didn’t let it slow me down. I figured at worst it would be a good distraction, would mean fewer soldiers searching for me.
After all that Simmons’ Reef looked quiet and peaceful in the afternoon sun. I had no idea what day it was, even what week it was, but we were moving into autumn and the leaves were changing colour. I hadn’t scored a lot to eat in the six days. The first two days all I got was fruit stolen from orchards, but by the third day I was so desperate that I sneaked up on a row of motorbikes by the side of a road near Kerrie. I couldn’t work out where the riders were, but they were nowhere in sight. I wriggled up to the first bike, peeping around in every direction. I shoved my hand in the saddlebag. There were a few spanners and screwdrivers, and an empty paper bag. But there was also a long cool aluminium cylinder. I slid it halfway out and took off the top, closing it again quickly when I saw the bowl of rice inside. That was enough for me. I pulled the whole thing out and retreated fast through the grass, like a snake going backwards. I just hoped I wouldn’t meet a real snake in the long grass.
Hungry as I was, I still didn’t dare to open the container until I was at least three kilometres clear of the bikes. My mouth was watering so much I was dribbling. At last, burrowed under a bank of earth and bushes, I felt safe enough to open the cylinder properly.
It was a very neat arrangement: three bowls, each on top of the next, and each with different food. Below the rice was a bowl of vegetables, mainly some spinachy-looking stuff, and bok choy, and something like celery. It was in a beautiful sauce, oyster I think, with maybe a touch of garlic. Below that was a bowl of beef. The sight and smell of the meat had me drooling like a faulty garden sprinkler. I’m so carnivorous.
I ate half of each bowl, although it was so difficult to stop. My stomach felt full but I wanted to keep going. The flavours were intense and powerful after weeks of food that tasted like rat droppings.
By the time I got to Simmons’ Reef I’d eaten the rest of the three bowls, dumped the aluminium cylinder, and was well and truly ravenous again.
At least I forgot my hunger for a while as I looked at Simmons’ Reef. It was a pretty town, running along the side of a range of hills, with lots of yellowing English trees and a couple of old churches poking their spires up in the foreground. The only thing that spoiled it was the big blocks of flats at the eastern end, that Mrs Samuels had told me about. But to me those flats didn’t look too ugly. I’d come a long way to have this view, and right now it was quite attractive.
I started moving closer. It would be a long time before darkness set in, and I couldn’t wait. I had a deep intense longing to see my mother, and I also had a terrible niggling uncertainty about the way Mrs Samuels spoke. The fear she left me with had haunted me for nearly a week now. Had something gone wrong with my mother? Had she been beaten, or tortured? Had she been injured, crippled, brain-damaged? The only consolations for me were that the reality of what was in Simmons’ Reef could hardly be worse than my imaginings, and that whatever I found, whatever had happened, couldn’t affect my love for my mum.
I followed a gully down from a bridge and then walked up the sandy bed of the river. There wasn’t much water, so it was quite easy. I realised as I got closer to the town that I could follow the river right in there, like a road. Although I was getting excited, and impatient, I had to check myself and say, ‘Come on, slow down, take care, don’t get caught now, when you’re so close’.
So at each bend I snuck into the bushes and moved forward gingerly, holding the branches apart and peering at the view, making sure there were no nasty surprises. I made good progre
ss for a while. But just as I started getting confident I came to a grinding halt. A couple of fishermen were in the next stretch of water, casting their flies over a long deep pool.
I swore at them under my breath. This would happen. Teach me to get smug. I should know better, after all this time in the war. I waited for a while, hoping they’d move, but they looked quite happy, and then one of them caught a trout, so I figured they’d be there until dark at least. I withdrew along the river, still cursing, and climbed the bank.
I found myself in a park, in the outer reaches of the town. Nice park too, with a statue of a mother and daughter in the middle, and gardens radiating away like spokes of a wheel. Surprisingly the gardens still looked to be in good condition—someone had looked after them. The statue was kind of knocked around though. In the distance a few kids were using the playground stuff. Two of them were spinning on those whirligig things, and another was on the monkey bars.
I kept in the shadows of the trees and made my way along the banks of the river, close enough to see the heads of the fishermen below. I was planning to get back to the river but at the next bend it curved away from the direction I wanted. I could see the blocks of flats ahead, two or three kilometres, so I figured it’d be better to strike out directly for them.
It was the first time I’d been in the streets of a town since we’d hung out in Stratton. That seemed a long time ago. Simmons’ Reef wasn’t as big a town as Stratton, although it was a lot bigger than Wirrawee, but the main thing that struck me was how it was so undamaged. I guess there’d been no reason for the enemy to destroy it or New Zealand to bomb it. It certainly wasn’t a major military target. This was the way Wirrawee could still have looked if it wasn’t for the bad luck of being on the road from Cobbler’s Bay to the big city.
The only difference here between the old days and now was that the people in the streets were a different nationality. I had to remind myself to be alert. These old grandmothers watching the toddlers on the footpaths, the men talking in the front gardens among a haze of cigarette smoke, the children playing soccer in someone’s wide driveway were my enemies.
