by David Laing
Forest Secrets
David Laing
Published by JoJo Publishing
First published 2013
‘Yarra’s Edge’
2203/80 Lorimer Street
Docklands VIC 3008
Australia
Email: [email protected]
or visit www.jojopublishing.com
© David Laing
All rights reserved. No part of this printed or video publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electrical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher and copyright owner.
JoJo Publishing
Designer / typesetter: Chameleon Print Design
Illustrations © Steve Howells, water colour & line artist
Editor: Ormé Harris
ISBN: 978-0-9875879-7-8 (ePub)
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry
Author: Laing, David, author.
Title: Forest secrets : ghosts come in many guises / David W. Laing.
ISBN: 978-0-9875879-7-8 (ePub)
Target Audience: For children.
Dewey Number: A823.4
Digital edition distributed by
Port Campbell Press
www.portcampbellpress.com.au
Conversion by Winking Billy
About the Author
* * *
David Laing, a retired school principal, is now a full-time author. He has just completed the third book of his young adult, ‘Forest’ trilogy, Forest Secrets and is currently researching an adult novel, The Quinine Factor, which he hopes will be released in 2014.
At present, he is touring schools throughout Tasmania where he gives presentations to students. He is also a regular speaker these days at various adult groups such as Apex, Probus and Lions. At these presentations, David never fails to mention how he gets inspiration for his stories – from the people he has met and the life experiences he has had during his many travels throughout Australia.
David now resides in beautiful Needles, Tasmania with his wife, Wendy and his dog, Jesse.
Other books by this author:
Forest Spirit
Forest Shadows
A Tumble in Time
Author website: www.davidlaingauthor.com
Acknowledgements
* * *
My sincere thanks go out to my editor, Ormé who, as always, was on the ball with everything she undertook. Thanks also to Luke for your design and artistry. Thanks to Barry and Jo for another chance to help Make a Difference. Water colour and line artist, Steve Howells, has also shown his talents by way of the brilliantly humorous line drawings as shown in the book. Thanks also to Margaret Cowen for her poem, My Country, My Land, which so aptly captures the ethos of the story. My sincere thanks, also, to both Emeritus Professor Paul Hughes and author, Paul Eckert who were both extremely generous with their expert advice regarding our indigenous people.
For all the Aboriginal children and their families that I have met over the years. I’ll never forget your smiling faces.
I sense the spirits
when they walk the land;
the keepers
watching, waiting to return;
a flame that burns
deep in my heart,
never extinguished
mine to pass on.
For the love of this country,
the land of my birth.
A verse from the poem, ‘My Country, My Land,’ by Margaret Cowen, Word Weavers An Anthology of Poetry, S.W.W.T., Foot and Playsted, Tasmania, 2010, p27.
Prologue
* * *
The rhotosaurus tore some leaves from the high branches of the conifer tree and chewed. Always cautious, he turned his head from side to side, watching and listening. All he could hear were the usual sounds of the forest – the rustling leaves and bushes, the scurrying ground dwellers, the distant roar of another dinosaur. Then suddenly he stopped chewing. There was something else, a smell, one that he’d never come across before that was somehow threatening. He didn’t know why or how but he could feel it, sense its menace.
There was a noise, too. But that was a familiar sound. It was a snuffling coming from nearby – from the trees at the edge of the small clearing where he stood. Swivelling his long neck, he saw that it was the two muttaburrasauruses that he often saw prowl-ing around in the forest, feeding from the low-hanging branches of the trees. They were the bird-hipped dinosaurs that walked on two legs. And although plant eaters, they were considered by all the other dinosaurs, big and small, to be dangerous. They were fearless and always up for a fight. The rhotosaurus liked to keep his distance from them whenever he could. Although they were nowhere near his size, he knew he was no match for their deadly leg spikes that could rip his hide to shreds in seconds.
Standing perfectly still, he waited, hoping they’d go away.
But there was something else. Something he had felt a few moments earlier … that was far more dangerous than the muttaburrasauruses. Thousands of times more. And it was coming towards him.
It was an object as big as a small city and it was travelling at twenty times the speed of a bullet. It was an asteroid, due to blast through the earth’s hemisphere in seconds and which was destined to crash into the sea to create a wave, a monster wall of water 100 metres high.
Oblivious to the coming danger, and from habit more than anything else and hoping that the two dinosaurs below would leave him alone, he pushed his small head through the branches of the conifer for more leaves. But the strange feeling that something was wrong came over him again. He didn’t know what it was. He simply felt it, sensed it like before. It was something … different. With all thoughts of food gone from his mind, he swivelled his long neck to the left and right, listening and looking about him. The two killer dinosaurs had gone and the forest, like a corpse, had grown quiet and still. Wondering what was happening, and without thinking, he snatched some more leaves from the nearest branch and began to chew once more. But something was tickling the side of his face and neck; there was that smell again too, a faint, bitter smell. It was drifting in on the breeze which was getting stronger and, for some reason, becoming warmer … quickly.
He didn’t know that it was the forerunner to a superheat-ed killer cyclone already raging on the other side of the planet. And he didn’t know that the asteroid’s tail, a long, yellow, burning streak, had just exploded above the earth, scattering great chunks of scorching metal and burning debris to all corners of the land.
The giant lizard’s nostrils twitched and his body shuddered. He lifted his head above the tops of the trees trying to figure out what was happening. That’s when he saw the mountain beyond the forest. Black smoke and swirling ash were pouring from its peak. He could see that the mountain was about to explode. And for the first time he felt the ground begin to shudder.
He threw back his head and roared. Nearby birds and other dinosaurs scattered. They knew the great lizard well and they knew that today he was uneasy … about something. They didn’t know what that something was. They also didn’t know that the volcano beyond the forest would soon be throwing its rocks and choking ash into the sky; that soon its rivers would emerge as slow streams of red, scalding spew that would slither through their forest and over their land, killing everything in their paths.
Backing away from his tree into an open area nearby, the rhotosaurus looked up and stared. He was mystified. Rocks, glowing red, and sparks were falling from the sky. But not from the volcano. It hadn’t exploded yet. He did see, however, that every one of the fiery rocks was starting fires and that the trees and bushes surrounding him were beginning to burn.
The rhotosaurus hesitated. His hide was starting to singe and the thickening smoke was stinging his eyes. What to do now? Where to go? The other dinosaurs were wondering the same. They were drifting one by one and in groups into the clearing where they gathered alongside the rhotosaurus. Mingling and rubbing shoulders with each other as though seeking safety from the growing heat and the stiffening breeze, they stared as if mesmerised as the forest continued to erupt around them. The flying pterosaurs were the last to arrive, howling and screeching in the sky, dipping and weaving towards the gathering horde of beasts. That’s when he decided.
Lifting his head to the sky once more, he roared and then, head jutting, neck stretched, looking neither to the left nor right, the giant lizard, with the others following, ran.
Chapter 1
* * *
My cousin, Snook, didn’t look too good. He was sitting directly across from me next to his best mate, Skinny Watson. Our year 10 teacher, Mr Winterbottom – we all called him Stormy for short – was pacing the floor telling us about the destruction of the dinosaurs and how an asteroid had wiped them out. I was only half listening. I was watching Snook; something was bothering him. His usual lopsided, cheeky grin had disappeared, his face was a sickly grey skeleton colour, his eyes were wide and kinda goofy-looking and his mouth was hanging slack like a busted balloon.
Stormy had noticed Snook’s unusual behaviour; Snook was strangely quiet, for a start, not yacking to Skinny or fiddling with something or other. No, he was the model student. Except for his sickly look, that is. Not having to yell at Snook was probably worrying Stormy as well. There’d been no Settle down Kelly! or Behave Kelly! coming from his mouth at all.
A short, nervy man, our teacher liked lessons that went smoothly. He didn’t appreciate interruptions or anything that was different, like Snook was now. Looking a bit anxious, Stormy strode over to the whiteboard, picked up a marking pen and, as if trying to use up his frustrations, began to scribble notes madly, and then, as though he had eyes in the back of his head, he said, ‘Sit up, Snook Kelly and stop slouching.’ At last, I thought, he’s told Snook off for something. He’ll be happy now.
It was a mystery to me though, and everyone else, how Stormy could do that – see out of the back of his head. I’d often thought about it, but up until now I hadn’t come up with an answer. At any rate, as always, Stormy was right. Snook was slouching. In fact, at that very moment, he was sliding off his seat and disappearing under the desk. Stormy must have heard the slither for at that moment he turned away from the whiteboard and said, ‘What’s wrong with you, Kelly? What are you up to now? In a different world, are we?’
As one, the rest of the year 10s turned to see what was going on. They must have wondered when Snook’s mouth, peeking above the desktop, began to open and close like a bullfrog. His eyes too, were roaming about his face like a mad man. I thought I’d better say something. ‘He’s not well, Mr Winterbottom,’ I called out. ‘Perhaps he should go to the sickroom.’ It was pretty obvious Snook wasn’t well. He was in a different world. The blank, vacant stare and the croaking frog noises coming from his throat told me that.
‘Is that right, Kelly? Do you feel sick?’
No real answer, just a slight shake of the head. Shaking his head too, Stormy continued with the lesson. ‘As I was saying,’ he went on, ‘the theory is that the dinosaurs became extinct about 65 million years ago.’ He looked at his watch. ‘We’ll look at the effects of that in the next lesson where I’ll explain about huge waves, freak winds, wild fires and exploding volcanoes.’ Placing the whiteboard marker on his desk, he looked up. ‘You may go. Have a good weekend.’ He glanced over at Snook who was pushing himself free of the desk. ‘And you, Snook Kelly, had better go straight home.’
Gee, I thought, Stormy does care. A little bit anyway. I looked at the clock on the wall out front. It was half past two. He was even letting us out early because of the long weekend.
I caught up with Snook in the hallway, just outside the class-room. He was looking a bit better, but I could see he was still not back to normal. His grin hadn’t come back. I had to ask him. ‘What was wrong with you in there? It was like you’d seen a ghost.’
‘Maybe I did,’ he said, hoisting his school bag over his shoulder and then walking out into the school yard towards the bus line. ‘It sure felt like it.’
Chapter 2
* * *
Zombie eyes … unseeing, creepy, bulging eyes – no longer drooping or goofy looking but definitely eerie, scary. That’s what Snook had now. I first saw the new look when I caught up with him at the bus line, and it was Stormy’s fault … or so I thought. All that talk about an asteroid and dinosaurs had really upset Snook and for some reason, seeing him like this had made me feel uncomfortable too … as if an inner voice was trying to tell me something.
I climbed onto the bus and then sat in one of the front seats behind Thommo, the driver. ‘G’day, Jars,’ Thommo grinned. ‘Did you bring that good-for-nothing cousin with you?’ Smiling back, I nodded and pointed to Snook, who was just getting on the bus.
‘Here he comes, Thommo. He’s just getting on board now.’
‘The Man,’ Thommo said like he always did when Snook got on the bus. ‘How are you …?’ He didn’t finish. Head down, mouth slack, and dragging one foot after the other up the steps, Snook looked every bit the zombie. Thommo stammered a quick hello, and then turned quickly away, gripping the steering wheel with both hands as he waited for the other students to board.
‘Hi, Snook.’ It was Gloria Huntingdale, Snook’s girlfriend. She was sitting at the front of the bus across the aisle from me. I watched as she patted the seat next to her, expecting him to sit there as usual. Her eyebrows shot up when all he did was walk straight past without a word, not even a nod. Screwing up her face, she leaned across the aisle towards me and asked, ‘What’s going on? He totally ignored me.’
I didn’t know what to say so I raised my eyebrows too, and shrugged. Then we peered around the edge of our seats as Snook walked slowly up the aisle, looking neither left nor right. Eventually getting to the back of the bus, he shoved in next to some of the other kids in the long seat below the window. At that moment I felt really sorry for him. He looked like a lost soul, not talking, just staring straight ahead as if in a dream. The other kids were staring too … at him.
I wondered how I could help. Letting him wander around like some sort of android wasn’t an option. Life could turn into an absolute nightmare for him. It was already starting; I could hear the giggles and whispers now, from all corners of the bus, and it’d get worse. His mates would be pulling faces behind his back soon, and then there’d be the staring, the finger pointing and the name-calling. The teachers would talk about him as well … in the staff room, and maybe even after school when they were doing whatever teachers do. And then the principal would find out. He’d contact Snook’s parents and so it would go on. No, I couldn’t let all that happen to my cousin. Not likely.
Chapter 3
* * *
I stepped down from the bus onto the footpath to wait for Snook. Shadow, my German shepherd, was waiting for us as usual. He was the friendliest dog in the world; I thought so, anyway. He used to belong to a ranger friend called Reg Carter, but when Reg had to move interstate, he gave him to me and Shadow and I have been best mates ever since.
Grinning widely, Shadow jumped up and plonked his paws on my shoulders trying to lick my face. ‘G’day boy,’ I said, and then added, ‘I see you’re in a better mood than Mr Freaky back there. My cousin’s had a face like the Cookie Monster ever since we left school. I think something’s gone and got under his skin.’
‘I heard that,’ Snook said jumping down from the bus carrying his school bag with one hand and brushing his long, fair hair back from his eyes with the other. ‘So you think I’ve got a face like a Cookie Monster, do you? You’d have never said that when you first came to live with us. We couldn’t get you to say boo to a grassho
pper then, but you’re real cheeky now, ain’t cha? You’ve changed.’
I told him that I didn’t mean to be cheeky, that I was just trying to be normal, only trying to fit into my new life. But Snook was right. I don’t know about the cheeky part, but I had changed; I sort of knew that. I suppose that’s what happens when you grow up, or maybe it was the change of environment. I’d been used to the quiet life on the Northern Territory cattle station where I used to muck around with the ringers and station hands as well as the Aboriginal folk who sometimes worked there. It was different here in Tasmania though, where there were towns and cities and schools and lots of people. I guess that’s what I was trying to get used to.
Forgetting my philosophising for the moment and after apologising a second time for calling him names and explaining that the monster thing was just something to say – an offhand remark, I also said that I was worried about him. But when I asked him what was really the matter and why was he acting so dorky, he didn’t answer. He just shrugged and made for home.
Figuring that I’d broach the subject of Snook’s health again later, I hurried to catch up with him. Stealing a sideways glance at him, I couldn’t help frowning. He was a right mess, even worse than I had thought before. Shoulders slumped, still dragging his feet and not saying a word; I’d never seen him like this before. And Shadow, probably wondering why we were both so quiet, trotted along behind.
I tried to piece the day together. Tried to make sense of Snook’s sudden change from being real bouncy to downright sad. The change had definitely happened during Stormy’s lesson. I’d worked that out. The first mention of the asteroid had done it. Before that he’d been normal, the Snook everybody knew, the one who liked to joke and goof around, the one that teachers hated and students reckoned was pretty cool.