Icefall

by Hallowes, Guy

  'Ah, the bitch is allowed to speak,' said Harold, smirking. 'I thought I was dealing with the first team, but I see the reserves are still included.'

  Tanya was surprised by his apparent confidence. She expected his case to collapse immediately. Maybe Nicholson had uncovered her subterfuge and had instructed Harold to continue. She tried not to betray her anxiety.

  Mark stood up, took Harold quietly by the arm, and went outside, returning ten minutes later with a shaken Harold. 'Tanya, I apologise, my remarks were unnecessary.'

  'Right, where were we?' said Mark.

  'Our belief is The Settlement is virtually broke,' blurted out one of the other claimants, to Harold's amazement.

  'If we go broke, how does that help you? You may end up with nothing,' said Tanya.

  'Other people have left without all this fuss. We can do the same for you,' said Mark

  'What's the deal?' asked Harold thoughtfully.

  Tanya admired his gall. She was hopeful that shortly he would have to capitulate, unless Nicholson had called again, reversing previous instructions.

  'You own three houses between you. You can rent them out to prospective settlers and perhaps sell them to those settlers in time. We can help and won't charge anything,' said Tanya. Nobody had ever been charged for such a service, but Tanya didn't think Harold was aware of that.

  'We don't want any more buggering around. We just want out,' said Harold.

  Mark pushed three envelopes to the claimants, 'These are cash offers for your individual properties, payable on settlement, which could be any time in the next week or so provided you withdraw all your legal actions.'

  In the few minutes prior to Harold appearing, Tanya had insisted, forcefully, that they make ridiculous offers for the properties. 'I am certain Harold will capitulate and accept a very low offer. Then we can deal with the others. Hopefully, they will agree to stay or, if they still wish to leave, will agree to rent their properties out.'

  There were looks of horror on the three faces opposite on opening the envelopes. Harold's face went puce, but he was restrained from saying anything by his colleague, who said, 'Give us an hour.'

  'What did you say to Harold when you went outside?' David asked.

  'That I would knock the living shit out of him if he made one more rude remark to my wife. Apart from immediately stopping all negotiations and continuing with our suit for misrepresentation, I also reminded him he still had a court case coming up with a possible jail sentence. I suppose he has behaved like this all along?'

  David said anxiously, 'We're pushing them to the edge again. Is this wise?'

  'Just watch, I promise if this doesn't work I'll bale out altogether. I mean that.' Tanya glared at them both.

  Mark and David were shocked. They both knew The Settlement would be much worse off without her.

  The triumvirate returned within an hour. Harold said, in a more conciliatory way, 'These offers are very low, far less than the houses' cost to build. Is there any way they can be improved?'

  'We are now short of funds. Due to the publicity generated by your actions, several promising new settlers have decided not to sign up. If we are to purchase those properties we may have to hang on to them for months before we are able to sell them … We can deal with each one of you separately,' Tanya said. She watched Harold speculatively, knowing what his instructions were.

  Harold drew a sharp breath. He could see he was being manoeuvred into a corner. Tanya was now clearly in the ascendancy. Whatever happens here, bitch, I will get you one day, he thought.

  'Any individual agreements would have to remain confidential,' added Mark. 'Before anything happens, you will all have to withdraw your court cases.'

  They negotiated three separate deals. Harold accepted a cash offer, only slightly higher than the first and the Bowers withdrew all the evidence they had submitted to the police. The other two claimants accepted the arrangement to rent their properties with a view to selling them when possible. Both were angry and felt they had been let down by Harold.

  'You never know,' said Tanya, to one, 'you might get a good price in a few months' time, when we get back on track.'

  All the court cases between the parties were withdrawn. Tanya breathed a sigh of relief once the arrangements were finalised. She did not mention her conversation with Nicholson.

  The newspaper was told that all legal action involving The Settlement had been dealt with out of court. The newspaper agreed to publish a series of articles relating to The Settlement on the understanding there would be no further legal action against them.

  The editor hesitated when Tanya produced four articles written by her. 'We write our own,' he said.

  'These have all the facts stated correctly,' insisted Tanya. 'Change them if you have to, but please send me the amended articles prior to publication. It also might be helpful if some of you came up to the Blue Mountains to see what we are all about. '

  Over the next few weeks, a number of positive articles appeared in the Sydney press after two journalists spent time with David in the Blue Mountains.

  David, Mark, and Tanya had time for a full review of the crisis, during one of the younger Bowers' weekend visits.

  A contrite Tanya said, 'I went about things the wrong way and put our future at risk. It won't happen again. But I am certain whatever we did would have made no difference. In the end, it was the Government withdrawing support from Harold that forced him to capitulate.'

  Both David and Mark were uncomfortable about Tanya's secret source of information. They wondered if they had been told the full story.

  'Mark, we should have involved you in the detail sooner than we did,' said David, trying to move the discussion on. He was embarrassed by what he now saw as his betrayal of Tanya. 'The remarks Harold made to Tanya were unforgivable.'

  Mark felt slightly inadequate for not coming in earlier to support Tanya. He admired Tanya's acceptance of the blame for the fiasco and wondered if he would have had the courage to do the same. Part of him felt he had now gained something in his undeclared competition with Tanya for ascendancy. Another part felt even more inadequate. If their roles were reversed, he thought Tanya would have supported him to the bitter end and not tried to gain the advantage.

  The rest of the board were horrified. 'Why didn't you involve us sooner?' asked Patricia. 'We are all part of this too, working our backsides off. And what about all the settlers who have put their faith in us?'

  'I agree. My fault,' said David.

  'I am concerned about Harold,' Tanya told the meeting. 'He certainly bears a grudge.'

  Chloe was furious, but decided to say nothing. She was glad of her flat in Manly and her charities.

  David tried to calm things down. 'The newspaper articles have generated a number of new enquiries for settlement. However, we need to accelerate the process. The best settlers have always been people with personal introductions from the family. I will talk to each of you individually about this over the next few days.'

  Mark's reputation in the village was substantially enhanced by his actions in saving the community, via the additional funding. Most people thought Tanya had overreached and should have asked for help sooner. She said and did nothing to change that view.

  Tanya was now reasonably certain Mark had been salting some of his earnings away privately, but did not raise the issue. Who gives a fuck what he was doing, she thought, trying to justify her inaction. We've now got the money, where it belongs, back in Settlement bank accounts and Mark is more committed than ever to the project. In her heart of hearts she knew she should tackle him on the issue, but never did.

  Weeks later, Tanya told David the details about George's information and the telephone calls with Nicholson. 'I was pretty certain Harold would pull the plug, but there was still some risk. But I also wanted Mark's full commitment and the extra money. He feels he played a leading role in rescuing us from bankruptcy and so has taken a bit more ownership in this place. I have not said a wor
d to him about what I did and never will … There is one other thing. My information about Nicholson is completely kosher. The fellow was and is a bastard. But all that stuff I told him about newspaper articles was pure fabrication. I certainly wrote the articles, but the phone number was one I set up.'

  David looked horrified, 'What would have happened if he'd checked?'

  'Because of his position he was never going to take the risk of doing that. If he had and been found out, the consequences would have been disastrous. It was far easier to do what he did and so he lives on, somewhat to my regret. Anyway, that was the reason I couldn't tell you more at the time.'

  David knew he would never have been able to bring himself to take such a risk.

  Once the crisis had settled down, David turned his mind to the dam. He spent months working out how he should cope with floods in the future. As well as rebuilding the main dam, he decided to build two smaller dams further down the valley, one almost opposite the village. The dams were re-stocked with trout. It became a favourite picnic spot in the hot weather, once a lawn had been established.

  'The pipe carrying the stream will have to be much bigger than I first thought,' David told Mark. 'It will need a grid on the front so children won't play in there and I will grow trees and bushes in front to hide the unsightly view.'

  Two short years after the birth of Chas, Tanya gave birth to another boy. 'We'll call him Didier,' said Tanya, without consulting anyone. As before, she was back in the office a week after the birth. This time nobody questioned her. Her children thrived under the expert tutelage of their nanny, and looked forward with much excitement to the almost weekly trips back to The Settlement.

  'Didier?' David questioned Mark.

  Mark shrugged, and said, 'Tanya,' by way of explanation.

  Chapter Nine

  The Settlement 2016

  2016

  David, accompanied by Spike, his Kelpie cross, would often stand on a hillock conveniently overlooking The Settlement. Today, he had asked Joe and Fred to accompany him. 'It helps in the ongoing planning to have it all visible in front of me,' he explained. The main dam had been completely rebuilt and the two smaller earth dams were in the process of construction.

  Holding an area plan and facing northwest, David pointed out the forty houses clustered on the eastern side of the creek, settled on a gentle slope up the hill. There was room to build approximately sixty more dwellings. The stock, vegetable gardens, and crops were on the west side of the stream. They all knew there was enough of a slope between the village and the stream that even with the most extreme weather event the houses would never be threatened by flood. Chloe's horse paddock was just up the hill from the houses.

  'The central parking area is working. Keeping vehicles away from The Settlement is the right thing. It keeps the dust down and the wide, grassed pathways between the houses are attractive, almost medieval in appearance. Plus, cars will be useless once we are isolated,' said Joe.

  'Should we not spread the houses out a bit?' offered Fred.

  'Theoretically it might be safer if there was a fire, but we need to make this place productive, so on balance limiting the housing area makes sense. If we have to defend ourselves in the future, the smaller the area, the better,' said David.

  'We won't be able to buy petrol or diesel for years after the collapse. So we have set aside funds to buy a million litres of each. Where should we site the tanks?' asked David.

  'As far away from the village as possible and we need to have easy access for cars, helicopters, and tankers,' said Joe.

  'Would we ever think of starting another village in the bushland area we enclosed?' asked Joe.

  'No,' was David's firm response. 'Looking after one village is difficult enough and what we have still has plenty of room to grow.'

  The forty dwellings on the property housed about one hundred and sixty people. The Settlement had become self-sufficient and David anticipated that the speed of development meant they would be at capacity by 2020. The finances were now in good shape, despite rebuilding the dam and Harold's lawsuit and they had cash in the bank, most of which would be spent by the time the place was fully settled. In any event, David thought the banks would disappear once the Ice Shelf collapsed.

  Each member of the Bower family had had their own house for some years now. David had insisted that none of the Bower houses were in any way remarkable and they blended in perfectly with the rest of the development. Jonathan had a small two bedroom cottage and David had personally funded a cottage for the absent Evan. Both of them were treated as a Settlement asset and were used often enough not to fall foul of the abandonment rule.

  Tanya and David were very cautious with the funds belonging to The Settlement and ensured there was no hint of money being used for private Bower matters. None of the Bowers received any income for their work in the community.

  Patricia had started the school with just a handful of pupils. There were now some eighty children in all classes from kindergarten to university entrance. David had recently encouraged the highly-respected headmaster of a high school in Sydney to settle. His wife, also a teacher, and their family would accompany him.

  'We all feel you have done a wonderful job setting up the school ...'

  Patricia smiled, 'Dad, I always thought someone like this would join us. I will gladly hand the school over to him. To be quite honest with you, it now needs a long term professional to take over. I can still help if required, but I think there is something else I can do for the community.'

  'Oh!' David was pleased. He was expecting some resistance since Patricia had put her heart and soul into the school.

  'I would like to engage the youth in developing life skills such as bush craft, animal husbandry, growing crops, and so on. Useful knowledge for their future after the Ice Shelf collapses.'

  'It all seems very serious,' said David.

  'It must be fun to ensure participation. Mum is doing great things with the horses, all the kids love that. I would like to organise other activities. For example, Joe could get the technically minded to understand how the solar power systems work. He thinks he can build a computer and involve the kids. We could have a young farmers' group who can help the people already running arable areas and the dairy. We could encourage more sport.'

  'And you want to do all that?'

  'Mostly I see myself as a catalyst. Once something is set up I will let them get on with things and they can come for advice as needed.'

  'Perfect! When do we start?'

  'Joe is ready to go once he gets the tick of approval from you. We may need a small amount of funding for computer parts and fuel for visiting neighbouring farms.'

  'Go for it. School first, with these activities as an added dimension. This will only improve the attractiveness of the place.'

  David found he had to deal with many issues he had not envisaged when vetting prospective settlers.

  Don Weatherspoon, a recent settler, came to him one day. 'This is obviously a Christian community ...'

  'We have many Christians in the community, plus the Jewish grocer whose brother is joining us within a few months, and a Muslim family whose house is presently being constructed. He is a very skilled carpenter, or rather a craftsman,' responded David.

  Don looked discomfited for a moment, 'Your family are Christians?'

  David hesitated, 'Although my wife and I were brought up in the Christian tradition, none of my family are practising Christians. Why?'

  'We need a church for our services.'

  'You can certainly build a church, but it will have to come from your own funds and be approved in the normal way for building projects.'

  'We don't have any money. I thought a Christian community would provide the funds.'

  'Would the church be available to all the Christian denominations in the community?'

  Don looked uncomfortable. 'We had envisaged an Anglican church actually,' he said rather lamely.

  'But we also have
Catholics and Presbyterians,' said David.

  'Well, they can look after their own communities, we will look after ours.'

  'You knew before you agreed to settle that there will only be about three hundred people here. There are already many diverse beliefs here and I expect that to widen. We don't have room for every religion and their denominations to have their own place of worship and we certainly can't fund such a programme.'

  'You should restrict new settlers to people with Christian beliefs.'

  'Don, do you mean Anglican Christian beliefs?' said David kindly.

  Don fidgeted, avoiding the question, 'I prefer to be called Donald.'

  'Donald, there are practical reasons for having a wide cross-section of people here.'

  'I don't like the Government's current immigration policy; that was one of the reasons for coming here.'

  'Would you prefer the White Australia or Apartheid style of society?' asked David quietly.

  'Well I wouldn't put it quite as strongly.'

  'There is no possibility of having such a society here. Do you know why?'

  Donald went on doggedly, 'They will not have our values … '

  'Please let me tell you one of the most basic reasons. The Ice Shelf will collapse in ten or fifteen years, after which this community will be isolated.'

  Donald nodded uneasily.

  'We have no idea how long the isolation will last, but whatever happens it will take many years for the society to develop and become integrated again. Probably two or more generations,' said David to emphasise the point.

  'Yes,' said Donald impatiently.

  'Donald, have you any knowledge of cattle or dog breeding?'

  Donald looked angrily at David, 'No, I am a builder and lay preacher, but what on earth has that got to do with building a church?'

  'If we restrict our small community to one racial group, which is what you are suggesting, the society will become inbred, have a very restricted skill base, and become much more susceptible to disease. We will be weakened and possibly not survive. Talk to the doctor or vet if you don't believe me.'