July

by Gabrielle Lord

  I got up and took a flying leap over the stone wall that separated the road and the station ramp from the basketball courts. It was a drop of about two metres, but I had to get away from the road! I hit the ground hard, tumbling and rolling before getting back up and running through the gate in the wire that enclosed the courts.

  The only other exit in the wire was diagonal from where I’d entered. I bolted towards it, hoping to escape down the street it opened onto. I dashed recklessly past a group of kids, sending their basketballs bouncing in all directions. I ignored their shouts as I focused on the gate, but I couldn’t ignore the black van that had driven into view! I skidded to a halt—it looked like Zombie was talking on a phone. Calling for reinforcements? I was going to have to go back towards the gate I’d just come through!

  As soon as I started running back to the first gate, I saw the van U-turn and speed back up the road, preparing to catch me at the other end again.

  I skidded, changing direction once more, but this time I was faced with another, even more serious problem—Sligo’s black Subaru was now covering the second exit! I was trapped!

  The tall wire mesh that enclosed the basketball courts had become a cage! It was hopeless!

  I stood there panting, not knowing what move to make next, when a pigeon fluttered up past my line of sight. I followed its path with my eyes, which led me to a large hole in a corner of the wire, way up high. I had no alternative and couldn’t waste any time, so I threw myself at the wire and climbed like a mad monkey until I’d reached the opening. I squeezed through and flung my body out the other side, half climbing, half falling to the ground.

  I landed a few metres from a bus stop where a bunch of kids, who looked like a team of basketballers, were noisily boarding a bus. To my right, I saw the van turn the corner, coming my way. It was getting dark, so I hoped they hadn’t spotted me behind the group.

  ‘Hurry up, boys,’ said a nearby voice. ‘Come along. Just get on board. We should have left fifteen minutes ago. Are you part of this excursion group?’

  I swung round to see that the teacher, a young guy with a scarf and a clipboard in his hand was talking to me!

  ‘Yes sir,’ I said, making a split-second decision to try the bus as cover. I didn’t think I had a hope on foot with the Subaru and the van in pursuit.

  I joined the kids as they boarded, my eyes scanning to see where my hunters were.

  ‘Hurry up!’ the man with the clipboard repeated.

  I didn’t need to be told again. I squeezed in, noticing that the kids must have been from different schools—they all had different school crests on their backpacks. There were a couple of kids keeping to themselves, too, so I guessed not everyone knew each other. Perfect.

  Squashed and sweaty in one of the seats, I saw the black van cruise right past the bus.

  I let out a huge sigh of relief. For the moment I was safe.

  From the talk around me, I gathered I was with a group of basketballers who were heading north for a sports camp. The guy beside me had earphones in, listening to music so loud that even I could hear it. I was glad he wasn’t interested in talking; it gave me some time to let my heart rate settle and concentrate on blocking out the memory that had resurfaced, of seeing my double at the courts, months ago.

  After a couple of hours, everyone had quietened down a bit. I started getting edgy again, worried someone would start taking more of an interest in me. I couldn’t afford having anyone look too closely at me.

  Just as we were about to pull into a roadside restaurant for dinner, I noticed a group of three guys whispering. They were trying hard not to look at me, but I knew I was the topic under discussion.

  I didn’t want to make too obvious an exit, so I waited for the bus to stop, then slipped out behind some of the taller guys who were pushing and shoving their way off. As soon as I could, I ducked around the back of the bus and ran into the night.

  After walking through the dark for a while, I saw red and blue lights flashing down from the highway. I crept behind some thick, prickly bushes and peered out.

  A police roadblock had slowed a line of cars down to a crawl. Every car was being stopped and searched.

  I put my hand into my pocket and touched the small angel pin Repro had given me. It had given me plenty of good luck so far; I hoped it would continue on my way to reach Millicent.

  The night was cold and dark, with a waning moon sinking in the sky. I tried not to think of this time last year, when Dad was dying, but I kept being haunted by those memories. I wished I’d been able to say to him: ‘I get it, Dad. I understand what you’re trying to tell me. I will continue the search to uncover the truth about the Ormond Singularity, and I promise to protect what’s left of our family.’ Maybe that would have given him some comfort as he died.

  I looked up at the immense sky, filled with brilliant stars in the blackness of deep space. I shifted my backpack on my shoulders, preparing to walk long into the night. I didn’t know exactly where I was—but I still had a long way to go before I made it to Redcliffe.

  168 days to go …

  Right now I was lying under the stars, praying it wouldn’t rain, and thinking about how my life had turned out so far. I’d been on the road for over three days, walking as far as my legs would carry me by day, and then sleeping in the bush, or wherever I could find a soft, quiet place, when it got dark.

  Going to school and coming home to my family seemed such a long, long time ago.

  Every now and then, more times than I liked, Winter came into my mind. I realised I would probably never figure her out, and while that drove me nuts, it was also kind of what I liked about her.

  167 days to go …

  At last, I’d arrived in Redcliffe. It was another quiet, rural town in the foothills of the mountains.

  I stopped and sat down on a bench next to a lonely town monument. I switched on the new mobile Boges had given me, and sent him a text message.

  made it

  Next, I entered my blog address, hoping I had enough coverage. It was taking some time to load.

  I swung round, spooked by a distant siren, and started walking again.

  Down the road was a sleepy country graveyard, with mossy headstones leaning at crooked angles and a small chapel among some trees.

  Eventually, my blog page loaded up, and I clicked on another private message from Winter.

  I dialled Boges as I stepped into the graveyard, stopping at a secluded spot behind the chapel, where a stone wall hid me from view. The phone rang out.

  If what Winter Frey said was true, and Sligo had some leads on where I was, it could mean only a matter of time before tracing me to Great-aunt Millicent, and to Redcliffe.

  Fear gripped me.

  He might have found her already.

  Anxious to move faster, I spotted a guy working at the end of the stone wall, ripping out blackberry bushes. He stopped what he was doing when he saw me, straightening up and pulling off his thick gloves.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said. ‘I’m looking for a property called “Manresa”. Do you know where it is?’

  The guy looked surprised, pushing hair off his sweaty forehead.

  ‘Manresa? What business do you have there?’

  ‘Visiting a relative,’ I said. ‘Why? Is there a problem?’

  He raised an eyebrow but didn’t answer my question; instead, he picked up a long stick and began drawing a rough map in the dirt at his feet.

  ‘You keep going along this road, until you pass a couple of big homesteads. You can’t miss them. Then you take a left turn here,’ he said, branching out with another line, ‘and keep go-ing another couple of kilometres. Manresa’s right at the end.’

  ‘Thanks, buddy,’ I said.

  He was still looking at me strangely. ‘You sure it was Manresa you were after?’ he said, before his phone rang and he waved me on.

  I set off as the evening drew in, keeping the rough map in my mind. Storm clouds were gathering over the mountai
ns and distant lightning split the air. Growls of thunder made me go faster. I was cold enough already. I didn’t want to get drenched as well.

  After following the gardener’s instructions, I came to a small, faded signpost, pointing down a dirt track, which spelled out the name ‘Manresa’. I wondered what sort of place it was, hidden away on the edges of a small country town like Redcliffe.

  I wrapped my hoodie tightly around me against the wind, and cautiously jogged down the track. I kept going over and over Winter’s message. I’d never noticed anything written on the Ormond Jewel, and neither had Boges, so I didn’t know what she could have been talking about.

  A couple of lights shone in the distance, urging me to rush on. I hoped my great-aunt was OK, and that Sligo’s stooges hadn’t beaten me to her. I also wondered if she’d heard the news about her brother’s death. I sure didn’t want to be the one to tell her.

  The wind suddenly stopped and the storm that had been threatening broke overhead, sending rain pelting down, hard and cold. Within seconds I was soaked, and the dusty surface of the road had turned into treacherous mud.

  I kept running until I reached the iron and stone pillar fencing that circled the large building. The structure was imposing in the evening light, half-hidden behind tall, leafless trees. Some sort of spire reached high into the sky, and a driveway curved up and around the entrance, making the place look like some kind of institution—an institution like Leechwood Lodge. Was my great-aunt insane?

  Another sign, now dripping with water, swung on the front gates. I rubbed some dirt from it and squinted in the poor light, trying to read it. I could hardly believe my eyes!

  ‘Manresa Convent,’ I read. ‘Enclosed order of the Sisters of Sancta Sophia.’

  Great-aunt Millicent lived in a convent?

  Would I even be allowed into an enclosed order? Didn’t that mean that the nuns had virtually no contact with the outside world?

  Then it struck me: this could be the one place in the country that hadn’t heard about me—Cal Ormond, Psycho Kid.

  A figure was heading down the driveway towards me. She was an elderly nun with a black umbrella. Her robes flapped in the wind, and raindrops shone on her black veil. Behind her, the convent loomed, dark and mysterious.

  ‘What are you doing here? Who are you?’ the nun demanded, her sharp eyes in her wrinkled face checking me out.

  I took a deep breath and a risk. ‘My name is Cal Ormond,’ I said.

  She held the umbrella out and I stepped under it with her.

  ‘You can talk to me while I close the gates for the night,’ she said, straining to make her voice heard above the rain. ‘But first, please tell me what you’re doing here.’

  ‘I’m trying to find my great-aunt, Millicent Ormond,’ I said. ‘This is the address I was given for her. I must talk with her. It’s concerning a very urgent family matter.’

  ‘Millicent, you say?’ she asked, before making a humming, thinking kind of sound as she bolted the gates I’d come through. ‘Do you mean Sister Mary Perpetua?’

  ‘Mary Perpetua? No, I don’t know who she is. My great-aunt’s name is Millicent Butler Ormond,’ I said. ‘She’s my dad’s aunt.’

  ‘Come in out of the rain, boy,’ said the nun, looking me up and down again and leading us with a tilt of the umbrella. She looked pretty old, but her eyes were bright and her step was brisk as we walked quickly towards an open door on the side of the stone building. ‘When we come into the convent,’ she explained, ‘we take another name. Your aunt took “Perpetua”. It means “eternal”.’

  Eternal. I thought of Sligo’s ‘leads’ and pictured Bruno or Zombrovski heading this way. I hoped it didn’t mean eternal rest.

  ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do with you,’ the nun said, as we hurried up the front steps, ‘but it would be most un-Christian of me to leave you out here in this weather.’

  I followed the nun to the heavy double doors, noticing a huge, gleaming brass bell hanging in the tower above the entrance steps. The steps were hemmed in by cactus plants, much taller than us, each one sprouting several long, stiff arms covered in wickedly sharp-looking thorns. They reminded me of giant sea urchins, with their massive, spiky arms spreading in all directions.

  Through the doors was a cavernous entry hall. It was a gloomy, cathedral-like area, dimly lit with three wavering candles burning in front of the statue of a saint—a guy in armour who was standing in an alcove set in the wall. Next to the alcove were dangling ropes and the narrow bell tower stairs. I shivered, not only because of the cold. Something about being there reminded me of what it was like in the Ormond mausoleum, with the bones of my ancestors.

  I stopped at the first of the three candles, my attention caught by the very real-looking sword that was attached to the armoured saint’s right hand, held in place only by some thin wire.

  ‘Cool sword,’ I said, admiring its blade, gleaming in the candlelight.

  ‘Saint Ignatius, bless him,’ muttered the nun. ‘A warrior saint. And yes, that sword—it is real. It was a gift from a benefactor—a military man. A general,’ she explained as she led me further inside, shaking water from the folds in her clothes as she walked. I followed her down a passageway and into a large kitchen area at the end.

  ‘Thanks for letting me in,’ I said, pulling off my drenched hoodie. We walked to a large table in the middle of the kitchen, where a large slow-combustion stove warmed us. The walls were covered in old-fashioned copper cooking utensils and the counters were stacked with piles of clean plates. The kitchen smelled of a thousand meals.

  ‘You’re lucky I saw you when I did. If I hadn’t been shutting the gates, you’d still be out there in the rain, I’m afraid.’ She put out her right hand to shake mine. ‘I’m Sister Jerome. I fetch the shopping and answer the front door for the other sisters, among other things, of course. I drive the minibus, too. Where are you from, child?’

  ‘Here and there. I sort of—camp out.’

  ‘You’ve been sleeping rough? In this cold weather? Where’s your mother? You look like you could do with a good bath, and I’d better find something for you to wear. You’ll catch your death in those wet clothes!’

  She draped my wet hoodie over the back of the chair closest to the stove.

  ‘Thank you, Sister, but I have some extra clothes here,’ I said, digging around in my backpack to find something else to put on. ‘Could you please tell my great-aunt that I’m here and I would like to talk with her? It’s extremely important.’

  Sister Jerome had a worried look on her face.

  ‘Has anybody else been here?’ I asked. ‘Wanting to speak with Millicent? Sorry, Sister Mary Perpetua?’

  ‘Certainly not. How come?’

  ‘I need to talk to her. To tell her something,’ I continued, ‘and ask her something about an important family matter.’

  ‘A family matter? We nuns don’t have families. We’re about the last of the old, enclosed orders. We still live by the old-fashioned rules. We leave that entire muddle behind us. As the great Saint Teresa said, “Not being able to have contact with your families is often a great blessing”.’ She gave me a stern look. ‘You know what families can be like.’

  She had a point, but I could never imagine turning my back on my family for good.

  ‘This is really important. Because there could be—a problem,’ I added, not wanting to alarm her.

  ‘What problem?’

  How could I tell her that any number of bloodthirsty criminals could be on their way here right now, trying to chase me down, without a care for anyone standing in their way? She’d never believe me.

  ‘Never mind,’ I said. ‘I’m just really looking forward to seeing her.’

  Sister Jerome showed me the outdoor bathroom and I washed up a bit in a big laundry near the kitchen. I paused to look at my reflection in a speckled mirror. My long, lank, dirty blond hair looked darker than ever.

  Five minutes later I was sitting in the kitchen
of the Manresa Convent in a dry grey sweater from my backpack, while Sister Jerome cut me a jam sandwich and made hot chocolate. I liked the way she locked the kitchen door behind me as I returned. I was in a holy, stone fortress, surrounded by a spiky cactus moat, a group of nuns, and strong locks. This had to be the ultimate safe house.

  ‘Now you wait there and eat up,’ she said, pointing to the sandwich, ‘while I go and find out what’s to be done with you.’

  I tucked into it, greedily. From somewhere I could hear the sound of chanting and I guessed it was the nuns.

  By the time I’d finished eating and was half-way through my drink, Sister Jerome was back. She frowned solemnly.

  ‘I’m afraid you are going to be disappointed. I didn’t want to mention it earlier, but I fear you have come all this way for nothing.’

  ‘For nothing? Please don’t stop me from speaking to my great-aunt!’ I pleaded. ‘This is way too important!’

  ‘Nobody’s going to stop you, Cal,’ she said with a gentle hand on my shoulder. ‘There’s something you should know.’

  My heart sank. I waited for her to tell me that Millicent was dead.

  ‘Sister Mary Perpetua—your great-aunt—she doesn’t speak any more. In fact, she hasn’t spoken for an exceptionally long time. I think it was about twenty years ago that she stopped.’

  ‘What?’ I asked, putting the mug of hot chocolate down. ‘Why?’ I was torn between being relieved she was alive, and confused as to why she had stopped speaking.

  ‘Nobody knows exactly. When you get up at five o’clock, pray nine times a day, work in the kitchen or the garden, read for half an hour and then go to bed after tea, there isn’t much to say, really. In fact, talking with you like this is the first lengthy conversation I’ve had for a number of weeks. Since querying a greengrocer’s bill.’