The Worm King Page 30
‘It’s a big forest in the North Island of New Zealand, about halfway up on the eastern side.’ He didn’t think he could constructively pinpoint the Ureweras much more than that, so pressed on. ‘Anyway, we went in with a cousin of mine, Monty Weke. Monty looks after the dogs while I’m over here. It took us seven hours to walk in, up the Whirinaki track, and it rained the whole bloody time, didn’t it girl?’
‘Dunno, didn’t notice.’ She shrugged, and he laughed. That’d been the standing joke on the trip: Āmiria set a cracking pace walking in (“we do athletics twice a week at school, you know”) but on the second day, slowed considerably. That’s the problem with kids these days: no staying power.
‘We spent the night in an old deerstalkers bivvy Monty and I’ve used a couple of times. Next morning, there was a hell of a downpour and we got completely lost for about four hours, then spent the afternoon chasing this huge boar around a steep-sided gully all choked up with supplejack and bush lawyer. She was a nightmare to fight your way through. Wasn’t it girl?’
‘It was.’ No one in their right mind would forget the awful struggle up that sheer, never-ending gully of mud and thorns.
‘I got a shot at it just on dark, when it broke away from the dogs, but I only winged it and we found it’d made a real mess of the bitch we use as the main holder. Poor thing nearly drained right out there in the rain, and needed twenty stitches which Monty did with a needle and twine he always carries. Next morning, we took the other two dogs out and they found the trail not long after dawn and we got the pig cornered, then Monty finished him off. Would’ve gone more than 200lbs we reckoned. Monty gutted it and he carried it most of the way out too. Had these giant yellow tusks, sharp as razors. Eight inches long they were. He was an evil looking mongrel, I’ll tell ya. Bristly, jet-black hair all over him.’
John the Hat leant across and scratched Peanuts head. ‘Do you use dogs like this?’ He nodded at the cocker spaniel. Āmiria burst out laughing.
‘No. He’d get eaten alive. Wouldn’t last two minutes. Monty’s found the best dog is a cross between a bull stafford terrier and a greyhound. The terriers were originally bred a long time ago to chase rats, and the staffie is one of the bigger terriers, so Monty’s dogs are like massive ratters, but real fast and they can drag down something twice the weight of a man. If we had Monty’s dogs here now, there wouldn’t be no one we didn’t like get’in on that bus, that’s for sure!’
‘So that’s how you always get the pigs then, shoot them while the dogs are chasing them round and round?’ asked the Hat.
‘Oh, surely not!’ pleaded Alistair. If he was hoping for a humane ending he could be in for a disappointment.
‘No, we hardly ever use the gun, or you might hit the dogs. Monty never does. You’ve got to grab the boar by a back leg, then flip it over and stab it through the heart. You’ve got to hope the dogs keep a hold on its head: usually there’ll be a dog on each ear if they’re any good, and the boar will be squealing like banshee which is probably the worst part. You’ve gotta make sure you stab it on the right side—the pig’s left-hand side, I mean—because if you don’t get the heart, you’ll just make it really bloody angry.’
Alistair looked pale, and aghast. Nigel said he thought it sounded like a jolly difficult, violent sport, especially for a wee one to be playing.
The Hat disagreed. ‘I think it’d be a hoot. Less so for the pig, admittedly, but you never come home from a game of cricket with a hundredweight of prime bacon on your back, do you? So is that how you blokes over there have always hunted?’
Wiremu contemplated. ‘You’d have to say no. The first pigs arrived in New Zealand with Captain Cook, which was well late in the piece if you ask me. Still, we were always pretty good hunters cos we managed to tear through all the moa in a fairly short space of time.’
‘Do you hunt in Australia at all?’ asked Lord Brown.
‘Not so far. Although I hear the boars they get in Queensland can be even bigger than the kiwi ones, but they often have a type of worm in the flesh so aren’t much good for eating.’ He froze, then cast a glance over his shoulder as though he’d heard something. ‘I suppose they’ll be out roaming now. Big boars love the dark. That’s when they feed.’
Nigel and Alistair looked around too. Lord Brown chuckled. ‘Perhaps you got it from the Germans somehow?’ he suggested. ‘The Huns always liked their boar hunting. However my understanding is the Māori are widely recognized as the best boar hunters in the world these days.’
Steam was at last beginning to rise from the billy. The smell drifted over; fragrant, but with a sickly-sweet tang Wiremu couldn’t place. He asked the Hat what else was in the pot.
‘Six cans of no-frills strawberry jam, one liter of lime thickshake syrup and four cans of Watties jellied mushrooms. And your can of Tom Yum.’ No one spoke for several minutes, taking this in.
Eventually the Hat said, ‘Jeez, I bet those moa were tasty. Weren’t they like a turkey, only as big as a car?’
Wiremu thought this a stretch. ‘I don’t think they were that big.’
‘How’d you cook them? On a spit sort of thing, I suppose.’
‘No. In a hāngī. And not sure about turkey either. Monty reckons they would’ve tasted somewhere between venison and seagull. You dig a great big hole, put hot rocks from a fire on the bottom, wrap your meat in leaves, cover and cook real slow so it just falls of the bone.’
It would be tasty too. Mouthwatering in fact. Wiremu could almost see the enormous turkey-like thing laying there, seductively wrapped in puwha, watercress and cabbage tree leaves with maybe a sprinkling of kawakawa berry on top to give it some pepper. Then, next to the moa, he spies this strange-looking, smaller hunk of meat, that might’ve been pork, and then again it might not be. Something Lord Brown said earlier flashed into his head, about “things getting much worse.” Suddenly he didn’t feel like the moa anymore, and his appetite had gone right off. He wondered how Monty was getting on: he’ll be alright, and should’ve been safe from any of those big waves they had here. Where he lived in Turangi was about as far from the sea as you could get, and virtually surrounded by mountains. Wiremu thought they were mostly old volcanoes.
The Hat went to the fire and hooked the billy away with a solid hunk of branch left there for that purpose. He gave the brew a stir with a spoon, sniffed it, then jerked back like he’d been whiplashed. ‘Perfect!’ A stack of paper cups lay on the ground and he slid one out then dolloped in a spoonful of the lumpy, green soup. Yesterday Kevin found a carton of five hundred cups in Gunnedah when they’d stopped to look for diesel, so washing dishes wouldn’t be a problem for a while. It occurred to Wiremu that Kevin had been gone some time, and his torch battery must be nearly exhausted.
Zelda was first to take a cup. ‘Urrrghh!’ She shuddered and passed it to David. Wiremu and Āmiria took a half-cup each.
His daughter sipped it, leant in close and whispered confidentially, ‘Hey dad, that’s bloody horrible!’ He couldn’t help laughing.
‘Come on girl, we’ll see how Jerry’s going.’ After swallowing the last of the soup he passed the cup back to the Hat so it could be reused, then got to his feet. When they stepped away from the fire it became noticeably colder so he decided to grab a blanket from the bus. Back on board, Wiremu unzipped their bag and pulled out one of the two blankets they owned, not the heavy one in case it got damp. The two remaining hand grenades were tightly wrapped in rags and stored in a side compartment. They’d broken the zip-puller off that particular compartment so you could only get at them now by cutting through the canvas, or spending ages fiddling with the zipper. With the blanket over his shoulder, he began to start down the stairs then noticed the flour sack of garbage stacked up from earlier, which could be contributing to the smell, so he picked it up and tossed it though the front door. It landed with a thump right at his daughter’s feet. She looked up. There it was again: that utter terror. He really was a bad father, he finally knew that now. Must b
e. His daughter was scared stiff of him and he’d no idea why.
Wiremu jumped down and kicked the rubbish away then knelt before her. He held her arms tightly, ready to try anything to ease her fear. Absolutely anything. They think he’s strong, but he’s not; he has no idea what’s happening. And now there was only one thing left in the whole world that he knows is true. Just one.
So he told her to repeat after him:
‘I am Tūhoe!’
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Stratagem
The five men stood around the squat, rust-speckled pump. Forsyth had seen one exactly like it in India, so asked Nathan if that’s where it originated.
‘You know your bore-pumps Captain,’ he replied somewhat surprised. The machine in question protruded from the muck and consisted of a metal shaft the thickness of a fence post, with a rectangular box-like arrangement on top which in turn had another narrower handle-type pole jutting horizontally from one side. The whole contraption was centimeter or so shorter than the dwarf, who conveniently happened to be standing right next to it.
Murray held the lantern and Doctor Azziz stood beside him. Inside the house were Nathan’s wife and Astrid plus the kiwi couple and their child from the front lawn of the Hyatt.
‘Can’t be much above freezing and I’m not sure if they’re made for the cold. It’s an Afridev,’ explained Nathan. ‘This Indian bloke sold a bunch of them around New South Wales ’bout ten years back, when they started bringing in the super-tight water restrictions. Reckoned we could keep a big garden watered with one even if there was no power, and we were getting the occasional power cut back then too.’ He stamped his foot on the soggy ground around the pump. ‘There’s a shallow aquifer under the property at eighteen meters. It’s not big enough for commercial irrigation and the water’s terrible to drink, as you know, so no one’s bothered about it before. Anyway, the bloke said it’d be great exercise too, which is one of the things that convinced the wife in the end. He was right about that! It’s damn hard work. In India they use them in schools and community centers and whatnot. Most of the time we just rely on the mains supply for watering and the pump never got used much. Funny thing is, I always looked on this as one the worst investments I ever made. Now it’s the only thing keeping us here.’
Nathan’s house was an old homestead subdivided from a larger farm and converted into a roadside tearoom. The main farm was 2 km to the west but their water supply got polluted early on, so the owners moved into Griffith several weeks ago. The cafe attached to the front of Nathans had a small adjoining kitchen, currently being used as sleeping quarters for Forsyth and Murray, while Winston, Azziz and the three other Kiwis slept in the lounge where it was slightly warmer.
‘The reason I got you out here—and I didn’t want to mention this in front of the shelias—is someone else’s been using it. The handle’s been left in a different position from where I always leave it.’
Forsyth unconsciously fingered the grip of his glock. The lanterns glow seemed far too weak. He had a small penlight in his pocket but was reluctant to draw it because batteries were worth their weight in gold these days. Nathan continued: ‘I thought about bringing out a stick or something, in case they had a go, but there’s not much I could do and it’d probably aggravate them more. There’s plenty of water anyway. It could be anyone. My guess is it’s this bloke who knocked on the door looking for food about five days back. I could only give him a tiny handful of rice and he wasn’t real happy. I took him out here and gave him a drink, so he does know where the pump is. He had a few swallows then the ratbag just swore at me and raced off that way, without even a thank you.’ Nathan pointed vaguely towards the west.
‘What is that way?’
‘Nothing at all, Captain. Not a thing. A few fences, dead grass and trees and the odd hill.’
‘What would he eat?’ asked Azziz.
‘Only thing I can think of is the Carmichael farm on the other side of the highway. It’s no more’in a kilometer away. They always kept a big paddock of sheep and might’ve missed a few when they were trying to round them up in the dark because the smell when the breeze was coming from their place the other day was fearful. If he’s eatin those, he’ll be crook as a dog, but that’s all I could think of.’
‘Yes, the rotten meat, she is not good,’ the doctor said knowledgeably.
‘Have you asked the city council, or whoever’s running the place, for some protection?’
‘No?’ replied Nathan, like the question came from la-la land. ‘What could they do?’
Forsyth had a gnawing feeling Councilor Montabelli was conning him. On arrival two days ago, Francesco immediately went into town to fetch his boss Montabelli, the doctor, and a twenty kilo bag of rice. Then Montabelli and Francesco drove off to fetch the Mayor, saying they’d be back in less than an hour, and here he’d waited: almost two days later and no sign of the swine. They must be stalling. His big mistake was in showing them the Order of Darkness prematurely. The councilors had wanted to take the legislation and show the Mayor, but he’d said no, so Montabelli offered to fetch Mr Mayor forthwith. Thus Forsyth had been outmaneuvered. However Montabelli’s short visit was revealing in one respect, by the disturbing question he asked regarding the authorities in Canberra: “Captain, do you think they are keeping it bad on purpose?”
Politics had never been his strong point. He should’ve simply put his foot down there and then, re-requisitioned the 4WD and buggered of. But they convinced him to wait. That was his main problem half the time: an easy touch.
In the normal course of events he’d walk into Griffith, retrieve the vehicle from either Francesco or Montabelli and continue on his merry way back to Duntroon. Against this, was the fact that they’re right out on the fringe of town here and he’d be leaving these folk with little more than sharp cutlery when suspect individuals were clearly lurking. Even now, he wasn’t overly happy about standing around in the open carrying just two handguns and a few knives. Then again, just how many was he supposed to protect? And why this lot? They weren’t as perturbed about their situation as he might’ve imagined, and the dwarf seemed absolutely confident Francesco would return.
The doctor’s prognosis on the city council had also been surprisingly positive. Apparently they’d locked down two sizeable warehouses of food and several smaller ones destined for supermarket chains on the coast. The council had a particularly large stash of rice in a warehouse fifteen kilometers to the other side of town. Forsyth had asked if there’d been any opposition and Azziz thought a “businessman’s militia” initially sprung up but this hadn’t lasted long and was stamped out, or absorbed. Or disappeared or something. The doctor believed the council had appropriated most of the available fuel reserves. With fuel, they were able to keep the remaining food distributed and wait it out. The majority of the council’s time was taken up ensuring all households had some form of emergency lighting, even if it were only a rechargeable battery to use for a couple of hours a day in order to eat and do the essentials, or a spot of lantern fuel. Just enough to get sorted because as Dr Azziz said, if people just sit there in the dark all the time they won’t be able to find food or drink and eventually, they curl up like the leaves out there and die. No attempt as yet had been made to restore power onto the grid, although this was supposed to be the next step.
Forsyth’s subsequent inquiries uncovered that Azziz wasn’t strictly speaking a doctor at all, but a final year medical student who lived in Sydney with the dwarf. After a week at Griffith hospital they’d upgraded him to full doctor status, which sounded a slightly shaky qualification, still, who was he to talk, waving around Order of Darkness papers. Azziz brought with him three liters of lantern kerosene from the hospital and a half dozen fully-charged rechargeable 12-volt batteries, plus the rice. The 20kg bag was expected to last ten people a week, or eight, nine days tops. That equated to 1 cup of uncooked rice per person per day, which cooks up to 2.5 cups of cooked rice per person per day. Virtual
starvation rations.
Azziz had been blunt. ‘Everybody very lethargic. Only reason scurvy isn’t starting more, is the cans of fruit the council is handing out.’ Forsyth couldn’t recall getting any fruit with their rice and asked why, but the doctor hadn’t known. ‘Maybe they run out already.’ He’d rattled off a comprehensive list of symptoms to watch out for, if you happen to be living on a rice-only diet, which means almost zero fat. Apart from being hungry all the time and getting extremely skinny, there’ll also be irritability, muscle cramps and twitches, restlessness, insomnia and profuse sweating. Azziz said he tried to institute exercises at the hospital, so people weren’t just sitting in the dark wasting away, but they’d refused to have a bar of it and what could he do? ‘You cannot just beat the people, to make them do the push-up and the dumbbell!’ The dwarf had disagreed, saying you could, and Forsyth’s experience with the army was that you definitely could too.
The good doctor thought a belief was arising amongst those at the hospital that the earth will now die, and even if the light did return, all the plants will be dead and all that’ll be left is red dirt. Like Mars. Nothing will ever recover. The Captain was sceptical. He couldn’t help thinking a lot of Australia had already been more or less like that anyway, so would it really make much difference?
The dwarf was having a lash on the pump: after much panting and wheezing the twenty-liter bucket parked under the nozzle stood full to the brim. Forsyth decided to give it another twelve hours at Nathans before walking into town. In the meantime, they’d try and cover the windows in the house, but there were plenty, and the big ones at the front of the cafe will be especially tricky so it’d take a while. Maybe they should start after the next meal, when everyone had more energy.
‘Let’s get back inside.’
It was Astrid’s idea to begin dining in the cafe. It contained four cozy tables which were pushed together to make one longer one. Prior to this, they’d eaten on the floor of the lounge-cum-dining room and although it was warmer back there, there was more space in the cafe. They dined heartily on a three-quarter cup of plain cooked rice each, with a coin-sized dab of tomato sauce on top and as many glasses of cold, metallic water as you could force down. Forsyth managed four before feeling vaguely full and queasy and had to stop. His stomach still rumbled.