by Peter Ness
‘Sometimes we think we hear the dingoes crying at the moon, only it is not the dingoes. It’s George. And, on those nights that the moon is asleep she wanders over the hills in the distance. Her tears are the lights twinkling in the night sky. The Aborigines call them Min Min lights,’ Bill finished the story with a broad grin, satisfied. He reached across, adjusting the position of the bible on the dashboard, with his left hand.
‘So, how come we cannot see George?’ Jo asked.
‘Oh, but you do,’ Bill replied.
‘Huh? How come? What does he look like?’ Jo queried.
‘Well. He’s the moon in the distance, never getting close enough to see her.’
‘Oh! Mr. Thomas, what a fabulous story,’ Jo said excitedly and tugged at Amanda’s arm to force her to agree. Bill Thomas laughed loudly. Jo’s face suddenly grew serious ‘Mr. Thomas? Did you just make that story up?’ she asked, suspiciously.
‘Why would I do that?’ he replied with a straight-face.
‘Great story,’ I grunted at Brian, almost with a snore. ‘How can George be both the moon and a dingo?’
‘It’s impossible — like being in two places at the same time,’ Brian did the math, paused, and then responded with a half laugh.
‘Just make it up?’ continued Bill Thomas sounding piqued. ‘Who do you think I am, Mark Twain or Enid Blyton?’
I glanced across at Brian and then at Amanda, wishing she were in the back with me instead. We exchanged knowing glances. The vehicle hit a pothole and Brian was thrown into the air like a sack of potatoes.
‘Yeah, I wish I was in there and she were here too,’ he grinned, showing the large gap in his teeth. As if sensing our thoughts the pendant clamped hard down on my chest and churned out a sharp green burst of light. Brian’s jaw dropped. Bright flashes of white light lit up both the tray back and the inside of the vehicle. I blinked and rubbed my eyes in astonishment as Brian and Amanda traded places. ‘What the? So, it is magic!’ I heard Brian exclaim from inside the vehicle.
Jo jumped in fright, eyes opening widely. Glancing at Brian in the seat next to her now her mouth opened wide, and she snatched me a quick querying look. I shrugged. Hey don’t look at me, I never did it.
‘What just happened?’ Amanda asked, clutching at my arm tightly so as not to fall out the back of the vehicle.
Mr. Thomas looked over at Brian sitting next to Jo, and then in the rear vision mirror at Amanda sitting on the back. His mouth slowly dropped ajar.
‘I don’t recall Amanda being on the back?’ he said at last.
‘She’s been there all the time,’ Jo hastily lied with a straight face, and then flashed a concerned look back at me. Her lips moved but no words came out. ‘I just lied for you. You owe me big time.’ I lip read.
‘Oh, has she?’ Mr. Thomas replied. ‘Sorry, where was I? Yes. That’s it. In any case, these days most scientists think that Min Min lights are simply the lights of cars in the distance reflecting off the clouds, but others think it is due to the piezoelectric effect.’
‘Piezo lectrix fect?’ Jo asked scratching her head, perplexed.
‘What just happened Heni?’ Amanda quizzed, a worried look clouding her face. ‘I know I was sitting inside the vehicle next to Jo. And then suddenly, puff, I’m sitting back here next to you?’ She shuddered, nervously.
‘There’s no reason to panic. It’s just my magic pendant.’ I lifted it for her to see, with a grin. ‘It made you switch places with Brian. It must have read our minds.’
‘Huh?’ Amanda’s mouth dropped wide open. ‘You must be kidding?’
‘I don’t think so. That’s exactly what happened. Look. I’ll tell you all about it later,’ I added. ‘Don’t believe me. Ask Jo or Brian. They saw it as well. But don’t tell your father, he doesn’t know what happened. See?’ I nodded at the cabin.
‘Yes. That’s, where two sections of the earth’s crust deep below the earth’s surface rub together, the friction causes electric balls of gas to hover above fault zones. Geologists call it the piezoelectric effect — while other people think it is aliens from another world come to hunt us down and eat us,’ Mr. Thomas was saying.
Brian tossed me a broad grin and raised his eyebrows at Amanda. He couldn’t stop ginning like a Cheshier cat.
‘And—, what do you think Mr. Thomas? What do you think?’ Jo asked excitedly. She flashed me another look and smiled at Amanda.
‘Me? I think it’s just Min Min crying, because she cannot find her way back to her one true love in the dark,’ Bill Thomas said with a smirk.
‘Ha! Sounds stupid to me,’ I grunted. The engine roar and incessant shuddering of the vehicle vibrating over pot holes drowned me out. Amanda and I were launched into the air. Amanda laughed now, spinning the bike wheel, running a stick she had picked up across its spokes. Click, click, click, click, click. My arm hung limp now, over the side of the tray. I flicked the side of the panel with the palm of my hand.
‘Oh look. Min Min is coming to greet us,’ I said sarcastically, as we pulled up in front of a black cow standing in the middle of the road.
‘Oh! She is too!’ Amanda said excitedly.
Genie our small Aberdeen Angus milking cow turned her back on us, mooed loudly, lifting her tail to pee. Amanda and I both laughed. The horrid scent of warm ammonia drifted towards us. We screwed up our faces.
I banged the side of the vehicle panel several times. Genie refused to budge, so I jumped off the back of the Land Rover and jogged towards her.
‘Get out the way and let us through Genie, you big cow,’ I said sternly, raising my hand. She looked at me indignantly, standing her ground, snorting snot everywhere. Amanda climbed tentatively off the back of the vehicle now. Walking up and talking in a soothing tone she patted Genie gently, taking hold of the cow’s large brown collar. The cow bell jingled. Genie mooed, following Amanda. So did I, but without the moo.
In the distance, Mother stood by the washing line waving at us.
‘Hey! Heni! Take Genie down to the milking shed. You can milk her later. In the meantime, I’ll fix Mr. Thomas a cup of tea,’ she hollered.
I nodded, waving back and took Genie by the opposite side of the collar, walking her up the road, down towards the cow yard. Amanda and I chatted. Then I told her all about the pendant and its magical powers.
Mr. Thomas put the vehicle into gear. As it rolled forward he turned to Jo.
‘Did I tell you the one about the dead cow that walked ten miles?’ he asked.
‘No, but please do. I wanna hear it,’ Jo cried excitedly.
‘Well, I once had a cow named Macey—,’ he said, driving alongside us.
‘Is it funny?’ I asked, flicking a glance at Amanda.
‘No, just disgusting,’ she replied with a vomiting look. ‘The Henton brothers tied a dead road-kill kangaroo to their cousin’s car when he got married. The cousin drove all the way home with it trailing out blood and gizzards behind. They never smelt the putrid smell of guts, but the Henton’s only wash once a week so I guess they like the smell.’
‘How gross. Disgusting—,’ I added. ‘And—, it gets worse. They’re my cousins. Mrs. Henton, Aunt Denny, is Dad’s younger sister.’
‘Sorry. I never knew they were your cousins, and well yes, it is gross. But you haven’t heard my Dad’s take on the story yet. He takes blood, guts and gore to the next level! Plus, he alters the entire story. Sometimes it’s a cow, a horse, or even a camel. He can sure spin a yarn though,’ Amanda explained.
We led Genie into the cow yard, shut it, and walked back to open the wire gate for Mr. Thomas. Amanda clambered onto the back of the vehicle, grabbing the tail gate as it passed. After helping her climb over it onto the back, I jumped up onto the tow bar and held on with one arm. A sudden rush of wind swept through my hair. Then a large pocket of solid air, like a balloon-shaped bubble of wet water, splashed against the side my face bouncing off like an enormous rubber ball. I grimaced, rubbing at my moist face.
; ‘What on Earth was that?’ I thought.
#
As the half-meter sized invisible bubble-entity recovered from the impact, it rotated around. The hazy figure inside the entity peered back down at the boy. He just stood peering back with a dumbfounded expression, rubbing the moisture off the side of his face. The girl with the dark hair in the bubble-entity wondered what this boy was doing in that exact position at that exact point in time. That wasn’t in the equation. She decided that she needed to hang around and investigate things more.
‘Okay, let’s go then,’ the bubble-entity said to its occupant in a husky male voice.
Then, the bubble-entity flew off in the direction of the barn, over the cow shed, towards the Morten Bay Fig tree.
#
London: Mid-August 2012
‘Wats zat Andrea?’ Peter asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Andrea replied. ‘But that last paragraph is written in blue ink and in different hand writing. Look. It’s real neat. See here? Someone else wrote it.’
‘Maybe it was Mommy?’ Peter suggested.
‘No. That’s not her writing silly. This is really neat, the same as before. Mom writes in more of a broad scrawl.’
‘Eh? Wot?’ Peter interrupted.
‘Um. I think it’s probably that Red Injun girl, Small Elk, again in an invisible balloon-sized bubble-entity—,’ Andrea mused. ‘She must be looking for her brother Little Hawk.’
‘Is she a ghost, or an alien, or a pixie?’ Peter wondered. ‘Tinkerbell?’
‘I’m not sure. It doesn’t say, but it sounds intriguing doesn’t it?’
‘Intricking? Wots that mean?’ Peter scratched his leg. ‘Is this banana mine?’
‘Intriguing—,’ Andrea stared in the air thoughtfully. ‘It means “so interesting that you wanna find out more.” No, that’s mine. You already ate yours. I’ll go you halves though. Sorry. Where were we?’
#
A few minutes later, Cassiopeia Farm: 1973
Just before the vehicle came to a halt, I jumped off. Amanda climbed down behind me, grabbing at my outstretched hand. Brian moved to the back of the vehicle and opened the tail gate, helping Mr. Thomas get the bikes off the back. They carried the boxes of groceries into the house. Jo went inside and dropped our school bags in the bedroom, complaining about the weight of my bag.
Amanda came up behind me, poked me and whispered in my ear, leaving me blushing. The shadow of her father flashed past. The girl in the bubble-entity jealously watched from a safe distance.
‘Amanda. Let’s go,’ Bill called, slamming the front door of the vehicle shut.
My reflection bounced back at me off Amanda’s smiling eyes. She grabbed at my hand, pulling it gently.
‘I have to go,’ she said, jumping into the front seat of the vehicle. ‘You can tell me more, later.’ She meant about the pendent. ‘If it can do that then, you never know what else it can do as well,’ she added, raising her eyebrows at me.
‘What? No cup of tea?’ I asked, mouth open, closing her door gently. ‘We were just beginning to have fun—.’
‘See you tomorrow, Hen,’ Amanda winked, rubbing my arm warmly. As they drove off, she looked back, blew a kiss and waved. I held my hand in the air in a half wave, a grin from ear to ear.
Thud! A sharp whack burnt a large pink welt on my bare right arm. It was Jo.
‘So, she likes you,’ Jo said with a broad grin. ‘Brian says you were playing footsies under the table at school!’
‘I don’t think so. We were not!’ I replied.
‘Well. That’s what the Henton boys said in the bus,’ Jo added. ‘And, what was that back there with the pendant?’ Brian walked quietly up from behind.
‘Yes Heni. We both saw it, for real. Zap! And then I exchanged places with Amanda. How cool was that? The pendant is magic: it really was ridgy-didge this time. It just read my mind, flashed, did its thing and switched Amanda and I — when I thought about it. If it can do that, I wonder what else it can do?’ Brian smiled broadly, and then laughed. ‘And, it looks like you finally got yourself a girlfriend.’ He slapped me hard on the back. Smack! ‘And—, if she isn’t half sweet on you too!’ Brian then elbowed me so hard that I nearly fell over. ‘Have you kissed her yet?’
‘Oh! Yuk! Shut up, Brian,’ I said, my face flushing pink. ‘Boyfriends and girlfriends don’t kiss anymore. That’s just an old-wives tale, like an urban legend. We’ve gotta milk the cow now. Race you both to the cow shed.’
Brian and I took off. The entity rotated, hovering. It followed us, interest piqued.
‘Hey you two! Wait for me! I wanna come too.’ Jo’s arms were flailing in the air as she ran, trying desperately to keep up. Her tongue was fleeter than her legs. ‘Hey! Heni—, Brian. What’s an urban legend? Is it a game? If so, hey — I wanna play too?’
#
Cliff Horris looked down at the list he just received from Martin Dunbar: Number 16 Za-fortunat-one, Number 4 Silver-bucker, and Number 9, Terrorize-me. They were sure-fire winners. If any of the horses came through he would be rich. What did it cost anyway? It didn’t cost him a dime. It was cheap at half the price. He popped a beer can open. The froth went all over the battered and soiled flowery red carpet, so he rubbed it in with the side of his shoe as he recollected the conversation.
#
‘So, who’s that hunk Sue Melon hanging out with these days,’ Martin asked in an off-handed way. ‘Is it still Jack Henton?’
‘Jack? No. The sun shines out of Denny’s cute little ass. You should listen to him go on,’ Cliff said, opening a beer. They both laughed. ‘Do you want one?’ Martin declined with a shake of the head. ‘You know what — I saw Sue Melon in the bar with that Bill Thomas guy the other day. He drooled all over her, tossing money on the bar like tomorrow never comes,’ Cliff added.
‘Really? No way. You gotta be kidding me. Go on,’ Martin prompted. ‘And, there — I thought Bill may be close to bankrupt. He keeps winging about money all the time.’
‘He probably sold one of Sandra’s thoroughbred mares to help pay down his mortgage—,’ Cliff said.
‘Say, tell me Cliff, why’s that Kirin fellow — the geologist — always holed up at the Hani’s? Are Blue Sky Mining re-developing the old Lead-Zinc mine? And, who owns that these days, anyway?’
‘Don’t tell me you don’t know? The women of course! They got hold of the lease years ago; the time when the government was trying to introduce laws to allow mining in National Parks,’ Cliff said, scratching the burning sensation at the back of his neck. ‘The leases cover the Gullabilly National Park as well as their farms.’
‘That must be expensive. They have to fork money out each year just to keep the tenement?’ Martin said, eying off a painting of a shipwreck on Cliff’s lounge room wall, hanging above the fireplace. ‘What do you know — a Turner,’ Martin mused softly to himself, his hand resting gently on the golden framework. ‘Must be worth a for—.’ He flashed a sneaky glance across at Cliff, who was shaking his beer can over his upended throat. ‘— A hundred bucks at most. My wife Marj really loves crappy paintings like this. Look at the line work. The guy can’t even paint. You said you wanted to get rid of some of these. Tell you what Cliff. I’ll give you a hundred bucks and take it off your hands. No that’s daylight robbery. If you chuck in that old Ming vase though, I might consider it. Marj can use it to plant some strawberries in—,’ he lied wondering if Cliff would take the bait. Not to worry. He would.
‘Okay. You’re on—,’ was Cliff’s quick reply, keen to jump on a bargain. They shook hands. ‘It was destined for the rubbish anyway,’ Cliff mused, frowning anxiously, and shuffling nervously in case Martin heard and changed his mind.
Cliff had finally ridden himself of that stupid 1805 J.M.W. Turner oil on canvas painting that his old man had refused to chuck out. Until he died his father kept saying that the lousy painting, aptly titled Shipwreck, was worth a fortune in gold. Surprise, surprise, it was — a whole one hundred bucks.
<
br /> ‘I’m sure that Marj would love that painting of water lilies. It would save you a trip to the dump? Look, I’ll give you twenty bucks for it,’ Martin added, glancing at it through the open door. ‘The guy should have taken up another profession — like golf, or even tennis, perhaps.’
Cliff laughed, agreeing that it was poorly crafted, not much better than a sketchy impression, but the vivid colors of the water lilies brought back fond memories of his childhood. He wasn’t ready to part with it just yet. It was painted by a French bloke called Claude Monet in 1907 or 1908. Martin Dunbar seemed genuinely disappointed, rubbed his ear and shrugged his shoulders in defeat. His eyes looked at the base of the wall and then down at his feet as Cliff quietly declined. In response, Cliff smiled, a little embarrassed for having the audacity to rip Martin off and offend him.
‘Too bad. I guess, another day perhaps,’ Martin watched the $$ signs bounce out of Cliff’s eyes as they slid from the painting back across to him. ‘Sorry, you were filling me in on the Lead-Zinc mine—?’ Martin’s right eyebrow rose just a little. ‘Yes. I have him exactly where I want him now,’ he thought. A faint smile of satisfaction flittered across his masked face, then instantly vanished as his cold steely eyes looked away.
‘Every few years, one of those big yellow Schramm drill rigs rolls down the road kicking up loads of dust, followed by one of those large black Mann water trucks which roar up the road, ripping up a few fences. The drillers toss down the odd drill hole, mainly water bores, in a tight grid pattern, usually between Jack Henton’s fence line and Ashton’s house,’ Cliff said. ‘Saw one of them drillers once — covered in oil, grime, grease and dust. He reckoned that the geologist said they are sitting on a bit of a hydrothermal deposit of gold, with copper and even silver — not lead and zinc — whatever that means.’
