Terra Australis Templar (A Peter Wilks Archaeological Mystery)

by Gregory House

  Herbert Stimpson, this last Saturday, made the most remarkable discovery at the property of Limberlost by Neusa Vale. He was, as his duty, clearing part of the ridge slope for a new fence line, when in the company of William Jackson they found a long stone flagged platform cut into the side of the ridge. The said platform ran for about a hundred yards and, according to witness reports, was fronted by an array of hexagonal basalt pillars. Herbert immediately reported this to Mr Dun, the owner of Limberlost and they gathered up a work crew to return to the site of the excitement.

  Several hours’ hard labour had cleared most of the ruin from the tangle of scrub and trees and gave a more reliable idea of its dimensions and state. According to Mr Dun in conversation with the writer, the platform was out of character for the natural features in this area. As any of our readers will know who’ve talked with old Robert Dun at the Criterion, his family were amongst the district’s earliest settlers.

  Since last week the discovery has aroused quite a great deal of speculation in the town and district, with the council being called upon to seek a professional opinion on its origins. That proposition was put to a meeting in the Memorial Hall this last week and passed overwhelmingly. Our much respected local headmaster, Mr Robertson, has inspected the site and concurred that it has all the mannerisms of a man made ruin of great antiquity, though further investigation may divulge if it is of aboriginal construction, or an earlier civilisation such as the Egyptians, Phoenicians or maybe even a sign of the lost tribe of Israel as mentioned in the Old Testament. One local authority even claimed it was a relic of lost Spanish explorers like the supposed wreck that is said to lie buried on Fraser Island. Whatever it is, we await a proper report eagerly.

  Peter looked at the following brief note. It was from an H.H. Parkins, surveyor for the Lands Department in Brisbane.

  Dear Sir

  I have the greatest pleasure in replying to your query regarding the recently discovered site at Gentle Annie Ridge. I have consulted the maps and surveys of that region from the early 1880’s and can find no record of this anomaly in any reports. I have also spoken with my colleagues regarding the areas geological history and after reviewing the supplied photographs they are of the opinion that this is an interesting but natural basalt formation. According to them, several similar features have been reported along the Glasshouse Mountains and research indicates that it is only to be expected from strata formed under volcanic conditions, some millions of years ago. If you could let us know of anymore that turn up it would be of assistance to our endeavours.

  I remain your respectful servant

  H. H. Parkins

  Well those two were informative, the first a press article high on speculation and the second a politely dismissive reply in the best civil service style, condescending and wheedling at the same time. How could you claim to investigate something without at least going to look at it? The later sheets were a boundary division map from the local council, a survey dating from the 1960’s, an application for development by a company called Manticore Investments and one from an anthropologist stating that there were no known aboriginal finds associated with the specified site. Once more, Peter found no evidence that anyone had actually walked over the site in any professional manner since, well not since the local headmaster.

  It took ten minutes to get to the area indicated on the map. Peter was glad it was nominally winter here. He was getting a bit unfit with nothing but desk work. He stood on the side of the track and sort of tried to look down and across to the spot indicated by the shading on the sketch. That was a little difficult. According to the notes, this part of the ridge had been cleared in the 1920’s. If that was so it was a brief exposure. Since then the rainforest had surged back reclaiming the site.

  Peter took a few steps off the track and plunged into what looked to him virgin jungle. Trees clustered in a thick band beside the road and the few spaces between were filled with creepers, ferns and bushes. It was beginning to feel like he’d wandered into a scene of an ‘Indiana Jones’ film. All that was required to finish off the mood were a pack of natives wielding blowpipes and giant pythons draped over the branches.

  Something noisily bounded across the ridge and Peter froze at the sound. He’d been assured that nothing too deadly stalked the rainforest up here. Just watch out for venomous snakes, poisonous spiders, hungry dingoes, feral pigs, wild dogs, predatory goannas and of course the fearsome drop bears. As the snuffing and crashing moved thankfully away Peter came to an awful realisation. He was woefully unprepared for this excursion. He knew next to nothing about the local fauna or flora. He could, right this instant, be leaning next to the den of some fatally aggressive beastie, red in tooth and claw and he wouldn’t know it! What’s more, Adams could easily get away with the accidental loss of a seconded British lecturer. After all didn’t it take years to investigate the disappearance of those two yanks who’d got left behind on some scuba diving trip off the Barrier Reef? No one noticed they hadn’t shown up for several days and the resulting enquiry, when it finally occurred, spent lots of time suggesting they’d run an insurance scam and disappeared. Now he thought about it didn’t Hollywood do a film based on that ‘accident’? Now that the prospect of death, injury or disappearance was raised, Peter felt awfully vulnerable. He eased a few deep steady breathes to calm down then pushed on several more yards, and promptly tripped over as a creeper snagged his foot.

  Pushing himself up out of the tangle of snaring flora, he found his first relic. It was possibly a stone pillar. Usually it would have been submerged in the riot of jungle, but for the fact that his tumble put him within nose length of one corner and a flailing hand had torn away some of the shielding greenery. Well he was here so why not? Five minutes cautious unpeeling revealed more of the remnant and gave him his first hint of the Limberlost Terrace, though he had to pause for a minute or more as he nervously shepherded a large multicoloured spider away from its favoured lair.

  After that what did he have? An eight sided hexagonal shaped pillar. It had broken off around three foot up. The sides were reasonably flat and the edges only slightly rounded. He pulled out a tape measure and his camera from the haversack and took several shots of his discovery and the surrounding area. As he was snapping away a couple of incongruities became apparent. The first was this place hadn’t been investigated since its initial discovery. Peter didn’t know very much about the regenerative reclaiming abilities of the Queensland rainforest but would happily bet this regrowth was over twenty years old, if not more.

  This place was as close to jungle as he‘d yet seen. How anyone could say with confidence that there had been no sign of aboriginal remains without clearing and digging test pits or a trench beggared belief. Getting back to his find, how was he going to determine whether it was man made or natural? He lacked just about every tool or resource required, not even a shovel and even more ominous no excavation crew to share the labour and act as witnesses. Adams had made a very lavish promise of complete support but all that meant was the university would avidly be watching for any mistakes. If he found anything how was he going to prove it? For that matter, if this was an evaluation for a development, how was he going to guarantee that his finds wouldn’t just ‘disappear’ from any report or just plain disappear?

  Peter took a good long look around as he tucked away his camera. His experience of site archaeology was more European and Levantine based, open fields, rescue work on construction sites and digging in forests or rocky slopes. Tropical rainforests were a bit out of his range, though he could clearly see this was going to take a team of a dozen plus a good supply of chainsaws and brush cutters and someone who had a better understanding of the wildlife. Feeling very frustrated and overwhelmed he struggled back to the dirt track.

  Damn that conniving bastard, Adams!

  Finding a nearby farm house hadn’t been that difficult nor had arranging a tow truck from Gympie. Just a few pleasant hours wait while having a chat with the local farme
r, Jack Kyle. He had retired up here a few years ago after running a machinery business near Tewantin and didn’t really know anything about the mystery ruins nearby. Jack reckoned it was a nice area, friendly neighbours, great climate, amazing view towards the Noosa River and beautiful soil for his orchard though, Jack did have one strange tale. A year ago he was heading along the ridge track to check some fencing and he came across a really strange sight. As Jack put it;

  “Three car loads of hippie types, probably from Maleny, had stopped and set up some kind of funny frame covered in mirrors and bits of polished stone and stood around it ringing bells and singing. I reckoned it was a bit odd even for around here. Then it got stranger. I politely asked them what the hell they thought they were on and to go back to ‘Weirdsville’ or wherever. Their head honcho, some bird dressed up in flowing robes and flashing silver jewellery, left off the chanting stuff and claimed they were finding the intersection point of some sort of lines, and soon would discover the great temple. After that, discussion became a bit heated and somewhere between the hint I‘d set the dogs on them and call the coppers they’d rattled off. As far as I know no one had been here since then.”

  Jack hadn’t mentioned the development application so neither did Peter, just that he was here working on a report for Skaze University

  It was only later in his hotel room in Gympie that Peter began to realise how many anomalies were beginning to crop up. He’d done a search on Gympie and Limberlost on the net, and a lot of really weird stuff was cropping up, just as Freddie had warned.

  One group reckoned a nearby hill was really a pyramid and that was the tamest of the speculations. The rest floated off in the deeper end of metaphysical pool. All that aside, someone wanted that site investigated for something, and considering what he knew of Adam’s, this task wouldn’t have been given to him if the vice chancellor didn’t already have a particular conclusion in mind, if it hadn’t already been written.

  So what the flip was he going to do? How the flipping hell was he going to do the report?

  Then his mobile chimed out the tones of Big Ben.

  Chapter 5 Old Mates

  As the low sonorous tones of Big Ben rang out in the hotel room, Peter began the frantic search for his mobile. It had to be here somewhere. He distinctly remembered trying to use it on Gentle Annie. The tolling of the bell continued until he wrenched it free from his coat pocket and fumbled the answer button. The tolling stopped, to be replaced by a tinny sounding voice as the recalcitrant phone vibrated out of his grasp and bounced under the bed.

  “G’day, Pete…hey Pete are ya there mate?”

  Peter hooked the hiding mobile out with a foot and dove across the room to intercept its sliding passage along the floor.

  “Arrgh bloody phones. Thumpp thummpp, SWWWWCCRREEEELLL. Anybody down there? PETER, IS THAT YOU, CAN YA HEAR ME?” The voice echoed down the ether and overrode all the electronic interference in blaring pulses. To Peter it sounded kind of familiar, though he wasn’t sure why.

  “Hello, Wilks here.”

  “Peter? PETER, ME OLD MATE. HOW ARE YA? IS IT COLD IN POMMIELAND? ARE YOU AWAKE NOW… What? Don’t worry of course he’ll still be awake. The pubs are still open there. LOOK PETE, WHAT TIME IS IT?”

  At the last screamed greeting, he pulled the mobile away from his ear and stared at it in disbelief. Well flip, flipper and flipping hell! It sounded just like Sid from Central University down Canberra way. He hadn’t heard from him in years, well several actually.

  “Ahh hello. Sid, is that you? It’s 4 o’clock in the afternoon actually. Ahh, why?” It was a tentative response. It had been years and last time they hadn’t actually parted on terribly good terms. In fact, if he recalled aright, the last word’s he’d heard from his Aussie friend Sid, had been a growled threat to rip his ‘fuckin’ arm off’ and beat him to death with the soggy end. The discussion had then continued with a selection of comments on his parentage and a very descriptive rendition of his sexual partners, who, according to Sid, baa’d their ecstasy.

  “Told you HE’D STILL BE UP. Don’t’ worry.” This was a very strange conversation. From the hiss, crackle and echoes, Sid must be relaying the replies back to someone else.

  “PETE, HOW’S THE WARM BEER OF HOME?”

  “It’s still better than that Aussie piss you swill!” Yeah that’d be Sid, firmly addicted to icy cold Fosters. Yuckk, a worse brew than XXXX was hard to imagine, but that iconic lager was definitely it, both tasteless and bland. What was wrong with these Aussies? Did they have no taste at all for fine ales?

  “Well MATE I’LL leave that debate till I see ya again. I’ve GOT TO BE QUICK THIS CALL TO POMMIEland is costing me a fortune.”

  “What? No, no it’s all right. I’m not there.”

  “Ahh SHIT, I WAS COUNTING ON you to BE NEar a decent library. THIS STUFF’S UP your end of the FIELD. YAH GOT AN email address?’

  “Yes, Sid but what‘s going on?” The explanation was lost in the spelling out of his address. It must have been relayed to the other person present because Sid kept repeating the segments in a low bellow. After the fourth attempt, it sounded close enough to actually work.

  “LISTEN MATE I’VE got a few shots. I NEED your advice on… CAN YOU get to a computer right NOW?”

  “Ahh well I suppose so.” Peter walked over to the table and logged into his email account on the laptop. Something was slowly downloading. It must have been pretty graphics heavy because it was taking forever. Then finally it finished and he opened the message to find:

  A lot of black framed rectangles with a small red dot in the left hand corner. It may have come through but not with any images. He reported this failure back to Sid on the mobile

  “WHAT, BUT I got the addrESS DIDN’T I? WELL try IT again!”

  Several more attempts all met with failure. “Look Sid can you tell me about what you want me to do? The pictures just aren’t coming through.”

  “I’VE GOT A DIG OUT HERE, on the northern COAST and I need a FEW PIECES IDENTIFIED REAL Soon. AAH SHIT, its A PITY YOU’RE IN POMMIE land.”

  “Ahh Sid, as I said before, I’m not in Britain. I’m in Queensland

  “WHAT? I DIDN’T GET that. Did you say you’re in KWAZILAND?”

  “No Sid, I said Queensland, QUEENSLAND! You know Barrier Reef, Brisbane, the chaps that wallop New South Wales at football. I’m in Gympie right now.”

  The offline debate seemed to get a bit heated as a third voice chipped in. “WHAT, I mean what? He says he’s in Gympie… mutter, mutter… Yeah, inland from the Sunshine Coast. Yeah, well I got an idea…mutter…Don’t be stupid, of course it’ll work out…mutter…ya got a better one?”

  “LOOK, PETER, since you’re out here, I’ve got an OFFER YOU CAN’T REFUSE. I NEED YOUR HELP ON A DIG. We’ll pay YA a thousand a week plus YOUR AIRFARE and RETURN TICKET OUT HERE plus all the lobsters and BARRAMUNDI YA CAN EAT.”

  “What…SCREEEEOOOWLL…mutter…Sid?? Shaddup, I KNOW WHAT I’M DOING. It‘ll be worth it, can ya book him a ticket with that thing?”

  “I’m not sure I can Sid. I’ve got a report to deal with here.” Not strictly the truth, but he was a bit wary of hooking up with Sid, especially since the debacle last time.

  “Look Pete, I’M IN A BIT A OF A BIND. I really need some EXPERT assessment. Our contract could GO TWO thou a WEEK IF you’ll hop on a plane tonight!” Peter took a very slow look around his motel room. His entire break was going to be spent here and each day he’d have to slug it through that jungle and at the end Adams would shaft him no matter what kind of report he put in. Two thousand a week was still a lot more than he was getting, doing this stupid assessment. Anyway, if Sid was doing a dig, he must have pulled his act together.

  “How long will it take and do you have beaches there?” He’d done it, reacted to his screaming clawing urges. So much for being a professional.

  “WHAT? OH about two maybe THREE weeks should do IT, and MATE WE’VE got hundreds of miles of THE BEST BEACHE
S IN THE WORLD. Great FISHIN. THE SITES, ONLY A stroll away from a great beach miles…SCRREEEEEEELLLLL…BLOODY BEAUTIFUL…YOWWWWLLLLLLL…CROWDS, white SAND!” It sounded so good even over the garbled squeals. Sid should have been a publicity spruker for a tourism agency.

  Ahh stuff Skaze. He didn’t need this rubbish. What he needed was a break, away from their slimy machinations. Two or three weeks would be perfect. Enough time to work out a counter ploy.

  “Book me the flight, I’m coming over.” Peter could hear both cheers and screams over the phone. Well maybe he owed Sid one anyway. Then he remembered one vital question. “Hey Sid, where am I going anyway?”

  “MATE YOU’RE HEADIN’ for the KIMBERLEYS, GOD’S OWN COUNTRY!”

  Peter got the details of his flight and hung up, punching the air in bouncing joy.

  “SHIT YEEEEEEEAAAAAAHHH! SUN, SAND AND BIKINIS!!!

  Chapter 6 Kimberley where?

  Lampie slumped against the white wall of the terminal under the shade of the verandah, with an old hat pulled down over her eyes so as to seem asleep. It was quite warm, with the odd shimmer of refracted heat off the tarmac setting willy willies dancing and skipping with swirls of red dust. It would have been cooler inside the small blue and white building, but it was packed with tourists, swapping improbable tales of fish they’d caught and the monsters that had escaped at the last moment. She’d quirked a smile at a few of the more outrageous stories, as the tellers endeavoured to out exaggerate their feats to the company. To round out the gathering of tourists, a couple of non fishing types took up the corner seating, comparing the scenic splendour they’d seen from the cruising yacht they’d spent a week on. That overheard conversation gave her smile a quirky edge. She’d seen the faces of easterners and Perthies as they’d moored in the rock basin of Crocodile Creek and explored the deep azure blue water, flanked by the bands of orange and white-grey rock strata. An hour there took you on a journey of sight and senses that was difficult to shake off.