Facing the Flame

by Jackie French

  He could not sit. Sitting meant death, for him and for the boy. He could not stand. He had to stand, he had to lift the boy and carry him to safety before the whole of this place was one vast flaring flame . . .

  And then he saw it emerging from the smoke. The wheelchair, powered by the best that Thompson’s Industries could provide; the girl, her hair as red as flame.

  He grabbed the edge of the chair, the wonderful strong stable chair, managed to get to his feet, leaning on it, took one deep breath then another, bent and lifted George’s hands far enough up for Scarlett to grab them.

  She pulled. The boy’s body rose limply over the edge of the chair, then flopped across her lap.

  He needed to say, ‘We need air.’ Had no breath to say it, and anyway, Scarlett knew that as well as he did . . .

  ‘Wheelchair express,’ said Scarlett grimly. ‘I told the others to wait in case Ms Sampson-Lee found Lu. Hold on to the chair.’

  He did. Staggered, leaning on the chair, its motor labouring.

  ‘Come on!’ Scarlett muttered to it.

  The air around them was as dark as night, darker even than before. The sky pulsed, yellow, red, as bright as the flames where he had last seen his brother. The air itself was burning.

  Scarlett bent to press a breath into George’s mouth and then another. They had to get him to clearer air, but the wheelchair wasn’t made to carry three . . .

  A sudden calm spread through him like melted butter, and a strength too. It was as if his brother walked with him again; he had Andy’s power now as well as his own, and Scarlett’s too. Scarlett who had not given up as a helpless three-year-old, nor a ten-year-old, dreamed not just to be able to use her hands but to do medicine, Scarlett who would not give up now . . .

  He stood. Managed a step by himself and then another. The wheelchair spurted forwards, freed of his weight.

  He looked down as George’s eyelids fluttered, though they didn’t open.

  He was still alive.

  ‘Dr McAlpine! Scarlett!’

  He turned and Vera Sampson-Lee ran towards them, wet, grim faced, red eyed. He probably looked worse. ‘Let me help.’

  He staggered back, let her help bear George’s weight. The chair moved even faster. The boy coughed, then coughed again more strongly.

  ‘Sshh,’ said Scarlett, her voice frog hoarse. ‘It’s all right now.’

  ‘. . . couldn’t get out when the bell rang,’ the boy whispered.

  Joseph managed to reach the chair again, bent down. ‘You did just what you should have.’

  ‘Live well,’ he wanted to say. ‘Live each day my brother gave you richly. You owe him that. Never waste a minute . . .’ But he could not say that. Nor had Andy given his life in exchange for anything, not even a life well lived.

  He had simply given.

  Andy, he thought. He hung back as Scarlett and Vera Sampson-Lee carried the boy up to the waiting car. My brother is dead.

  Chapter 45

  LU

  She missed the ford somehow. The water grew deeper, and deeper yet, the current pushing her, making it impossible to walk.

  She reached up and grasped a hank of Mountain Lion’s mane. ‘I’m going to have to ride you,’ she said soothingly, then kept talking, nonsense words to calm him, calm herself, using all her remaining strength to haul herself up and onto the horse’s slippery wet back.

  She flopped forwards and rubbed his ears, hoping he would accept a wet rider clinging to his neck with wet legs dangling against his rib cage.

  Mountain Lion stopped. He stood still mid-stream, muscles tense and trembling. She didn’t dare urge him on in case he leaped forwards and dislodged her. She murmured more meaningless phrases. At last she felt him settle and relax. He began to walk, splashing his way through the water.

  She sensed the growing shallowness near the river bank as Mountain Lion moved faster. She swung her leg back over and slid down, felt sand, paused to feel the current and trod carefully, leaning against Mountain Lion’s shoulder, out of the river.

  Suddenly there was dry sand under her sodden boots, unstable. She felt Mountain Lion begin to shiver again. She comforted him before he shied, trying to think, to feel the direction of greatest heat again.

  Should they take the path through River View? That was the quickest way up to the road. Or was that way too dangerous, with River View burning?

  She had hated the place, but did not want it gone. River View had saved her too.

  Should they try to walk along the river? But rivers had trees along them, logs and debris that would burn. She had never seen this river, but just in case, the centre of town would be safer. There might even be a park there. Most towns had a park. Mountain Lion would be safest in a park, as long as she stayed with him to keep him calm and stop kids from trying to pat or ride him or feed him sandwiches. If Flinty couldn’t send a float for Mountain Lion, she’d call Joe. No, she’d call him anyway because this must be on TV and he’d be worried . . .

  And bereft, she realised suddenly. His wife dead, his daughter blind, refusing to come home. She almost laughed at realising so much in the middle of terror and tragedy. She had to call Joe . . .

  The wind screamed past her, heat and hell and a current of air that was not so much heat as just plain hot. That was the way to go then, up the side of River View, not using the path through the centre. But they’d have to hurry, before the whole place went up.

  She put her hand back on Mountain Lion’s neck. His legs had felt all right, if a bit tender: she’d need to make sure they were wrapped in wet cloths later and kept cool, but there were no burns that she could feel. His breathing seemed as harsh as hers. If his lungs had been harmed by this, she could never forgive herself, but just now they had to get away.

  A horse was faster than a girl, especially a blind one. But this horse was also terrified, skittish and could probably see as little as Ms Sampson-Lee had been able to.

  But together they would make it.

  ‘Coming up,’ she said to him against the yell of the wind. She hauled herself back onto his broad, wet back, damp clothes and all, and waited to see if he shied with pain from a burn on his back, if debris had landed there. He skittered to one side and then stood steady.

  And suddenly the magic was back. They were one, not two, girl and horse. He began to walk, carrying her, and she guided him, using his sight and her sense of smell, both of them feeling the air on their skin, feeling the breath of fire, listening for crackles, the lurch of falling wood. She was grateful for her uncomfortable wet jeans, wished she put her shirt back on. A bra was not enough to stop the sparks that landed on her skin.

  ‘Sorry, old boy,’ she whispered. ‘All you have is hair.’ He tossed his head as if he agreed with her, but stayed calm. In the short time that it had taken them to ford the river, he seemed to have quickly accustomed himself to a wet body, dangling legs, a different centre of gravity and nothing to control him other than a lead rope. They were a team, needing each other, and he knew it as well as she.

  She heard his feet strike a concrete path and let him break into a jog, trying to work out how the sixty-three human strides to the fork up to the road translated into horse strides, but it didn’t matter. Mountain Lion made the correct turn anyway. The slight slope levelled off as his hooves met the bitumen in front of River View and the evacuation point.

  ‘Help!’ she gasped, though she already knew from the silence beneath the roar of the wind and fire as they had come up the path that there was no one still at River View: they had already evacuated, or perhaps they had been burned . . .

  A man’s voice answered, ‘Over here.’ An unfamiliar voice. A miracle. Then, ‘Do you need a hand?’

  No, she thought, slightly hysterically, I need my optic nerves.

  ‘Who’s there?’ she demanded.

  ‘Name’s Alex.’

  ‘I’m Hannah,’ said another voice. ‘Are you hurt?’

  Once again she fought the urge to giggle. ‘Not r
ecently. What about the others?’

  ‘The bus has left with the kids. Did you see a girl in a wheelchair?’ the man’s voice — Alex — asked urgently.

  She shook her head, unwilling to let on that she couldn’t see anything at all.

  ‘They went in the other direction,’ said the young woman, Hannah.

  ‘I’m going after her,’ said Alex.

  ‘Scarlett said to stay here . . .’

  ‘I need to find her.’

  Lu bent low over Mountain Lion’s neck, resting her weary body. ‘Listen,’ she managed, despite the hoarseness of her throat, the roar of the raging wind. She could hear voices, the faint rattle of wheels on the paths. Mountain Lion started to shift his hooves and switch his tail as he swivelled to face the next new situation.

  The young man yelled, ‘Scarlett!’ She heard footsteps pound off in the direction of the approaching voices. Mountain Lion skittered sideways. She stroked his neck, trying to soothe him and keep her balance on his slippery, sweaty back.

  More footsteps, this time moving quietly towards her. ‘Your name is Lu?’ It was the young woman, Hannah.

  ‘Yes.’ It hurt to talk.

  ‘Can you slide off? Do you mind if I check you for burns?’

  ‘Sure — but I’ll stay up here for the moment. It takes a lot of energy to get back on. And can you check Mountain Lion too? Please.’

  ‘That’s the name of the horse?’

  No, thought Lu, I have a mountain lion in my pocket. ‘Yes,’ she said patiently, then added again, ‘Please.’

  Hands, touching her skin. Cold dabs of some kind of cream that smelled medicinal. Mountain Lion edged sideways, away from the stranger and her smells, but Lu kept rubbing his ears and murmuring to him until he steadied again. He tossed his head as unfamiliar hands touched him.

  Eventually Hannah said, ‘You seem okay, just a few slightly red patches. But you’ve inhaled too much smoke.’ Her voice sounded slightly helpless. ‘We’ve only got a ute and a Volkswagen. I don’t think the horse will fit in the ute . . .’

  Lu almost grinned at the ridiculousness. She put her hand on Mountain Lion’s neck. He was breathing heavily but steadily. Her own throat felt like a tiger had scratched it; she hoped his wasn’t as bad.

  ‘Is there a park in town?’

  ‘We passed one just down from the hall.’

  ‘How far away is the hall?’ Lu tried to keep her voice patient.

  ‘About half a kilometre. You keep going down this road and you come to it. You’re not planning to ride there?’

  ‘Is there a fountain in the park?’

  ‘Yes. One of those big old-fashioned ones.’

  ‘Good.’ Either Mountain Lion could stand in it, or she could use her shirt to cool him down. Except she was only wearing a bra and her shirt was somewhere back in the burning paddock . . .

  ‘I don’t suppose you have a shirt I could borrow, do you?’ The sounds of the wheelchair and voices were closer now. She could feel Mountain Lion starting to tense up again as he registered even stranger elements looming up out of the smoky dimness. She leaned forwards, still rubbing and stroking him as he sidled sideways, stamping his hooves and blowing loudly through his nostrils.

  ‘Not that would fit you. Alex?’ Hannah called.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Take off your shirt.’

  ‘Why?’ His voice sounded too preoccupied to really bother with a query. ‘Okay,’ he amended. ‘We have to hurry. The whole place is going up.’

  Footsteps leaving, footsteps coming. Cloth put into her hand. Lu felt it carefully, moving slowly so as not to spook the horse. She found sleeves and buttons, managed to gently thread her arms into the sleeves, but got the buttons wrong.

  Never mind. She was decent.

  ‘Tell them we’ve gone to the park.’

  ‘Tell who?’ Hannah asked helplessly.

  ‘This is Gibber’s Creek,’ said Lu. ‘Almost anyone will do. Tell them to tell Matron to ring Joe. Say that Lu is safe and loves him, and Flinty McAlpine’s horse needs a refuge.’

  ‘Tell Matron to phone Joe to say Lu is safe and loves him and Flinty McAlpine’s horse needs a refuge,’ repeated Hannah. ‘Are you sure you can . . .?’

  ‘We can make it to the park. Can’t we, boy?’ said Lu.

  She clicked her tongue lightly and nudged him with her heels. Mountain Lion began to walk, breathing hard but no longer panting.

  It was a long walk for a girl and horse who had been through a fire, but they’d be all right. Just as it was going to be a long journey to learn braille and all the other skills she’d need to become a trainer. But she’d make that too. She turned to where she thought the woman who’d spoken to her was standing, and smiled. ‘We’ll be fine,’ said Lu.

  Chapter 46

  JED

  She had swallowed half the river. Lost her way. Had screamed and swallowed even more water. Had learned to bear the pain and to shut up.

  But you couldn’t get very lost in a river. A river only went in two directions, and the current in one. So when she hit the sandbank and found she was on the far side of the river from the Dribble firebreak, all she had to do was swim back across . . .

  The contraction grasped her, would not let go. She lay beached and curled in agony on the sand, then realised . . .

  The fire had not jumped the river here, as it had further down, and the wind was carrying it further away. She could stay here, safe on the sand, no flames to burn her, burn her baby . . .

  No! Her first baby had died because she was in the open, unprotected and unaided. She had to get to a phone. Call triple zero and get the ambulance. Ambulance officers could deliver a baby if they couldn’t get her to the hospital in time.

  How far apart were the contractions? Only one since she had been lying here, but that might be two minutes, or a day. It might be hours before her baby was born . . .

  . . . and every contraction left her weaker. If she was going to swim, then stagger to the house, she had to go now. And hope, desperately, that Merv was not waiting for her there.

  She crawled back into the river, swam sidestroke, because that way she could somehow half float and it was easier to breathe. She began to count her strokes, hoping no contraction would hit till she reached shore. Well, if it did and she sank and began to choke, she’d find the strength somehow to swim again.

  One stroke, two . . . six . . . fifteen . . .

  And on the thirty-first stroke, her hand hit sand again. She curled her fingers into it, floating, just as the contraction hit. Pant, she thought. Pant. And then, What idiot thinks ‘pant’ when they’re out of breath already?

  Now to stand. She managed it. Bare feet on sand. Bare legs and heat. But this blackness was long burned, all heat gone from it except what the air had brought today. She began to count her footsteps towards the house. One . . . eight . . . forty-three . . . fifty-nine . . .

  A noise. Maxi, barking frantically. Did that mean Merv was there? If she could just let Maxi out, the Doberperson would protect her . . .

  Seventy-two steps. She grasped the door handle, glanced around for Merv, then flung herself inside. She locked the door as Maxi danced around her. Now to lock the front door too . . . unless Merv was already in here, and she was locking herself in with him. Damn Nancy and Matilda who had taught her country people do not lock doors in case someone needs the phone.

  Phone. She had to phone. Then lock the door. No, leave it open for the ambulance officers. And Merv was not here, or Maxi would be at his throat, not whining at her heels, knowing something was wrong . . .

  ‘You haven’t even had puppies,’ Jed muttered to her, using the wall for support. ‘You are no use at all.’ Except she was, large and comforting and protective. And she was home, the place of love and happiness Matilda had given her, Nancy had furnished for her, she and Sam and Scarlett had created all around. Love mattered, even now.

  She lifted the receiver, then pressed the button, over and over. No dial tone
!

  ‘Hello? Hello?’ she tried anyway. The receiver lay in her hand, silent.

  Maxi whined again.

  Jed leaned against the wall. Okay. No ambulance. No car. Even if the road was not blocked both ways by fire, no car was likely to pass here today, unless coming here or to Overflow.

  Women in poor countries gave birth in fields by themselves, didn’t they? What did she need? She forced herself to focus. Scissors. String. Both in the kitchen. She staggered there, found Maxi at the fridge, found laughter, even then. ‘No, I am not going to feed you . . .’

  Boiling water. She was not even going to try that. Never, ever was going to face flame again, not even on the stove. Somewhere to lie down, where anyone who looked in would find her. Living room, not bedroom . . .

  She managed to make it there. Kneeled by the sofa, her head cushioned, screamed, and screamed again, shouted for Sam, for Scarlett, screamed and simply screamed.

  And then lay down, panting, and found Maxi at her side. Dumb dog. No, good dog, even if her fur felt like a furnace. For she was not alone, not with Maxi, not in this house. She was Jed McAlpine-Kelly and she was loved and her baby would be loved too.

  ‘Good dog, Maxi,’ she gasped and shut her eyes, until the next pain hit.

  Chapter 47

  MERV

  The world was black. A different black. His head hurt. His body too. Merv opened his eyes. The world was fringed with soot, but the air was clearer here than it had been before.

  He was lying on a wooden floor, with wooden seats, no, pews, around him. Vaguely he could remember Janet stumbling along the dirt track, the wind, the flames. A branch must have fallen on him . . .

  Then how was he here? And where was here? Had someone rescued him, taken him to safety? That must be it. He just hoped whoever they were hadn’t seen Janet too.

  He tried to sit up. His legs wouldn’t move. Neither would his hands. For a moment he thought they’d been injured, like his head, then realised his hands were tied behind his back. His ankles were bound together too.