by Des Hunt
‘You can’t do that,’ said Nick, quietly. ‘What we said was true.’
She turned and studied him. ‘That may be so, but it didn’t help that you’d been dishonest with me in the first place. If you hadn’t been, I might have been able to support you. As it is, I don’t know what to do.’
‘You could test the lupins for viruses,’ I said.
She shook her head. ‘I already thought about that. I went out there this morning to take a look. But yesterday’s rain has washed everything clean. There’s no sign of any egg spray. I collected some samples, but I doubt it’s even worth testing them.’
‘Does that mean the penguins will be all right?’ asked Nick.
‘No. They wouldn’t get infected from eating the lupins — it would be from inhaling the spray. That’s if there were birds in the area.’ She paused as a cup of coffee was placed in front of her. ‘And, of course, if the spray did contain a virus,’ she added quietly as the waitress walked away.
‘It did!’ I said firmly. ‘I just know it did.’
‘But why?’ she asked. ‘Why would someone who does nature photography want to kill wildlife?’
I didn’t have an answer to that.
‘I’ve got an idea,’ said Nick.
We looked at him.
‘She’s an animal-rights activist,’ he said. ‘She and Roost put the virus in the Peco sheds. They wanted it to spread to the penguins so it would get more publicity. And when it didn’t, they decided to make it happen anyway.’
Cathy looked doubtful. ‘Everything points to Shreeves bringing in the virus,’ she said. ‘Have you any evidence?’
‘We didn’t cut the wire to get into the compound,’ I said. ‘It was already cut.’ I then went on to describe our first meetings with Brio and Roost, and how they had encouraged us to first find the dead birds at Peco, and then report it.
‘That’s not really evidence,’ said Cathy. ‘But it makes sense.’
‘What are you going to do, then?’ asked Nick.
‘Well, I can’t tell Colin or I’ll get another bollocking. I suppose the only thing I can do is keep an eye on the penguins at Allans Beach.’
‘Can’t you inject them with something?’ asked Nick.
‘A vaccination,’ I suggested.
Cathy shook her head. ‘A vaccination wouldn’t work.
Vaccinations have to be given well before contact with the virus. Anyway there isn’t one for this strain of H6N3.’
‘Is there nothing else?’ I asked.
‘There are antiviral drugs, but I’m sure nobody knows how they might work on penguins.’ She thought for a while. ‘A serum would also work, but again, there isn’t one for H6N3. One would have to be made, and that would take weeks or even months. Sorry, but if the penguins are infected, then we’re just going to have to watch it take its course.’
After Cathy left, Nick and I went up to Murph’s to check the place over.
The first thing I noticed was the silence. On every other visit, I’d been greeted with the chatter and whistling of birds. That day there was nothing. Even the wild birds seemed to have abandoned the place.
The plastic wrap had been removed from the aviaries and replaced with a broad, white tape with the message Quarantine — keep out! repeated over and over.
We kept out. Not because we were worried about infection, but because there was no point in going near them — there was nothing left to see.
As I walked around the place that had always seemed so much alive, I thought of Murph and how he would feel when he came back to this emptiness. He would be shattered. The birds had been his family, and now they were gone. All he had left was Harriet. It made me all the more determined to make sure that she was there when he came out of hospital. Otherwise, I doubted that he would want to return.
That afternoon we had the first of our adventure tourism trips — the quad-bike safari.
Although I was looking forward to it, I was also concerned, because I’d been given the job of keeping Nick under control. Mum and Dad weren’t doing the safari. Instead they were off to a country fair, where Dad was hoping to pick up some junk that he could repair. That left me with Nick, and once again it had been made very clear to me that if anything went wrong I would be responsible. The brochure showed that we’d go over some farmland, down a riverbed, along a beach and then up some steep cliffs — plenty of situations for me to worry about.
I needn’t have. Nick proved to be the model tourist. He’d ridden quads before and, compared with the rest of us, was a bit of an expert. The main guide chose him to demonstrate how to move the body when cornering and climbing steep parts. Nick did it so well I was actually proud of him.
On the trip itself, he continued the leadership role, helping a German couple who found the bikes a bit of a handful. This was a side of him I hadn’t seen before. Maybe it had always been there, but I suspect that Harriet had a lot to do with it. While her living self wasn’t present, her image was dangling around his neck. More than once I saw his hand reach up to rub the pendant, and each time his face would soften in much the same way as it did when Harriet herself was on his shoulder.
On the way home, we called into the hospital to see Murph. We marched into the room where we’d visited him before, expecting to find him in the same bed, but he wasn’t there. My first thought was that he’d died. I think Dad and Nick thought the same thing. Mum was the only one to show any sense. While we stood around panicking, she went off to the office, returning a while later to tell us that Murph was now in his own room.
We soon found out why he’d been shifted. He was now connected to more machines. His breathing and heart rates were being monitored, along with his temperature and blood pressure. The reason was obvious — he was a whole lot sicker than before.
Conversation was difficult, as he could speak only a few words at a time before needing a rest. Even those words were hard to make out because of the rasping from his lungs. It was only when Nick reported on Harriet that he showed any real interest. He wanted to know everything about her, and Nick was happy to oblige.
After that he seemed to doze off, so we quietly said our goodbyes.
‘Hold it,’ he whispered, trying to raise an arm. ‘Bob, can we have a word?’
Dad nodded and moved closer to the bed.
‘Come on boys,’ said Mum. ‘We’ll let these two have their man-to-man talk in peace.’ She tried to say it jokingly, but it was easy to see that she was concerned about Murph and why he might want to talk to Dad alone.
We went into the corridor, walking slowly towards the exit. Dad joined us before we got back to the car. He looked pretty upset by whatever had been said. Mum raised her eyebrows in a question. He shook his head grimly. ‘He wants me to arrange a solicitor to visit,’ he said. ‘So that he can make out his will.’
Mum took hold of Dad’s arm. ‘Oh, Bob’ was all she said. After that, we drove home in silence.
CHAPTER 20
We got a big shock when we arrived home. A BIRT vehicle was outside our house and three security guards were patrolling the front lawn.
‘What’s the problem?’ asked Dad as we climbed out of the car.
‘This house is under temporary quarantine,’ replied one of the guards.
‘Why?’ asked Mum.
‘We have reason to believe there may be a diseased animal inside.’
My heart sank. It had to be Harriet.
‘There isn’t,’ said Dad.
‘There is,’ replied the guard. ‘There is a parrot. We can see it through the window.’
‘She’s not diseased,’ said Nick, showing the first signs of distress.
‘That’s not for you or us to say. The house is quarantined until the Incident Controller arrives.’
Dad gave an angry snort. ‘Well, we’re going in anyway.’ He moved towards the door. Straight away the other guards moved to block his way.
‘No one goes inside,’ said the leader. ‘Not until the Incident C
ontroller gives the OK.’
Dad stiffened. ‘Are you saying I can’t go into my own house?’
‘Yes. Not until a decision is made about the infected bird.’
‘She’s not infected!’ screamed Nick.
The leader sighed. ‘That’s a decision that the Incident Controller must make.’
‘And who’s that?’ Dad demanded.
‘Mr Colin Saxton,’ replied the leader.
My heart sank even further.
‘And when will he be here?’
‘Right now,’ said one of the other guards, pointing to a vehicle coming along the road.
Saxton parked so that his car blocked our driveway, as if it was likely we would try to escape. He marched up to the leader. ‘Any problems?’ he asked.
‘Yes!’ answered Dad. ‘I’m not allowed into my own house. That’s a problem.’
Saxton turned to him. ‘One that we will soon rectify, Mr Masters. Once we have established the status of the bird inside.’ He waved an arm at Nick and me. ‘I have to interview these two boys again. We can do it here or we can go back to our temporary office in Portobello.’
Dad breathed deeply for a while, before saying, ‘Do it here.’
‘Good!’ said Saxton with a slimy smile. ‘We’ll use that barbecue table over there.’
When we were seated, he placed a tape recorder on the table. Then he gave his name, ours, along with the location, date and time. I have to admit that by then I was very scared. He’d promised big trouble, and now it looked like it was happening.
‘At our last interview, I asked if there was anything else you should tell me. Why did you not tell me about that parakeet?’
‘She’s got nothing to do with this,’ said Nick. ‘That’s why.’
Saxton pointed towards the house. ‘That bird was at Mr Murphy’s house along with all the other infected birds.’
‘No, she wasn’t!’ shouted Nick.
Saxton took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. ‘Son, we have feathers from his house that prove a native parakeet had been there recently. Two days later, health officials saw a native parakeet in this house. It’s circumstantial I know, but I’m sure that tests will show it is the same bird.’
‘She’s not sick,’ said Nick. ‘She hasn’t got bird flu.’
‘Perhaps not, but she may be a carrier. The virus can be in some birds and not cause them to be sick. But that doesn’t stop the virus being spread to others.’
I broke in. ‘What are you going to do with her?’
‘We will take her away and swab her. If she is—’
‘Why can’t you do it here?’ interrupted Nick.
‘Because,’ said Saxton as if talking to a child, ‘it takes days to get the results. If she is infected, we don’t want her giving it to other birds. The Peco epidemic is over. The last thing we need is another outbreak.’
‘We’ll make sure she doesn’t go near other birds,’ I said.
Saxton looked from one of us to the other.
‘Please!’ pleaded Nick. ‘We promise.’
The man gave a sneering laugh. ‘You! Making promises! And why should I expect any promises from you two to be kept? You’ve lied right from the very start, and I doubt that you’re going to change now. Even assuming that you might, it is illegal for you to keep that bird without a permit. No — I have no choice. We take her away.’
‘What if she is a carrier?’ I asked. ‘What happens then?’
‘She gets treated the same as all the other birds that we found at Mr Murphy’s place. She gets euthanized.’
‘You mean killed!’ said Nick.
‘That’s what would have happened straight away if she’d remained in Mr Murphy’s house. This way she gets a chance. We will test her first.’
‘And if she’s not a carrier?’ I asked.
‘She will live.’
‘Will we get her back?’
He shook his head. ‘That won’t be up to me. But I think it unlikely. You’d have to get a permit from the Department of Conservation before she could ever come back here.’
There was nothing to say after that. A while later Saxton and the leading security guard were kitted out in biosecurity suits ready to attack Harriet.
‘Is that necessary?’ asked Mum, showing alarm.
‘Probably not,’ said Saxton. ‘But they’re required by our rules, and I never bend the rules.’
Shortly afterwards they entered the house carrying a metal box.
Harriet did not go quietly. After screeching noisily for a while, her objections became more specific. ‘Help! Help! Murder! Murder!’
Then, as they carried her out of the house in the box, she started swearing, giving them the full range of words she’d picked up over the years.
They bundled her into the BIRT vehicle and took off. There were no goodbyes from them, and they never gave us the chance to say goodbye to Harriet. All we could do was watch in sadness as the vehicle disappeared along the road to Dunedin.
CHAPTER 21
That night, Nick and I lay in our beds talking until way after midnight. On other nights if we’d talked late, Harriet would have soon snorted her disapproval. But of course there was no Harriet, and we now found that we missed her grumpiness. The bedroom just didn’t seem the same without her.
Most of our talk was grumbling about Saxton, who was top of our list of most-hated persons. Brio easily took the second position. She would be promoted to number one if we could prove for sure that she’d brought the disease into the country. In our minds we felt that if we could prove that, we might have a chance of saving Harriet, or at least giving some meaning to her death.
Although we talked well into the night, we came up with nothing. Even after Nick fell asleep I lay awake trying to make sense of it all, with no more success than before. The only conclusion I came to was that Brio was evil; trying to understand what happened inside her head would be near-impossible, and could even be dangerous.
The next day was a rest day in our adventure tourism mission. I spent the morning finishing off the Harriet carving for Murph. If I didn’t give it to him soon, it could be too late. Carving Harriet’s image was also good therapy, and did a lot to help me cope with her loss.
Mum was at the Albatross Centre and Dad was at the TAB in the pub, leaving Nick and me to make our own lunch.
‘I’ve got an idea,’ said Nick as he munched a tomato and cheese sandwich.
‘Wow — that’s wonderful,’ I said. ‘Did you think it up all by yourself?’
Ignoring my sarcasm, he continued. ‘You remember those piles of rubbish bags at Allans Beach?’
I nodded.
‘Well I think some of that rubbish would have been left by Brio and Roost.’
‘So?’
‘Before they went to Oz, they probably cleaned out all of the stuff they didn’t need any more. There might be evidence in that rubbish.’
‘And your idea is that we should search through them?’ I asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Yuk!’
‘Yeah, I know,’ said Nick, smiling. ‘But maybe we’ll find eggshells or something like that.’
‘They were already stinking two days ago,’ I complained. ‘They’ll be even worse now.’
‘We can wear gas masks,’ argued Nick. ‘Your dad’s got some in the shed.’
He did, too. They were old World War Two models that he’d just finished restoring back to working order. Not that he intended them to be used. His idea was to sell them as war relics.
I thought about Nick’s idea. It was a good one. It might provide the proof we were after. The gas masks were a good idea too: if Brio and Roost had left rubbish which included infected eggs, then some breathing protection might be desirable. The only hitch I could see in his plan was that by now the council would probably have cleaned up the illegal rubbish dump.
The car park was packed with vehicles from the city. Over the holiday period, day-trippers flocked to the beaches on the p
eninsula for a day in the sun. It was great for the people, but not so good for the wildlife which found they no longer had the beach mostly to themselves.
There were more rubbish bags than before. The ten or so bags of Boxing Day had grown into thirty or more. It was going to be a big job, and not one that I wanted to do in public, which was a problem, as there always seemed to be somebody in the car park.
In the end, we found a secluded spot where we could sort through the rubbish without being disturbed. When the car park was free, we would grab a couple of bags each and haul them away. After they were searched, we would swap them for another batch.
It was quite an experience. The sort of stuff we put in the rubbish at home was mostly packaging material that couldn’t be recycled. I soon found out that other people’s rubbish was quite different. The most disgusting stuff was raw meat or fish. Possibly it was already off when it was thrown out, but now it was giving off an absolutely disgusting smell which wasn’t entirely blocked by the gas masks. Disposable nappies were another revolting thing we could have done without — them and bags of dog poo.
A lot of this stuff was full of maggots. Very large blowfly maggots that when released seemed to find their way into our gloves, our clothes and even our hair. It was just as well our faces were covered by gas masks, or I’m sure they’d have climbed up our noses or into our mouths.
Despite these distractions, we slowly worked our way through the bags. We found lots of eggshells, and in every case we searched that bag more thoroughly. Unfortunately we didn’t find anything that could be linked to Brio or Roost.
We’d just emptied another batch of four bags onto the ground when a male voice boomed out. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’
I looked up to see a man holding a rifle. He was quite young, and was dressed more like a farm worker than a holiday-maker.