Bruny

by Heather Rose

  ‘Clean,’ she said, ‘ought to also reflect the behaviour of our politicians. Never has such an insidious deceit been brewed in the darkness of both state and federal parliaments. What will be next? Will we sell the Blue Mountains, Uluru, the Opera House? Why stop there? What price Western Australia? Or, for that matter, our whole country?’

  WHAT PRICE OUR COUNTRY? was on the front of many newspapers the following day.

  It turned out that the rest of Australia was rather fond of Tasmania. New Zealand was too. An ex-head of the Australian armed services came out and said, speaking only as a private citizen, he believed that a Chinese presence, able to launch ballistic missiles from nuclear-powered ships and submarines off the coast of Tasmania, was clearly not something that had been thought through at the highest levels.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  On the Monday before the Tasmanian election, the federal government was still trying to spin the Tassie deal, declaring it a plan by Tasmanians for Tasmanians. Viper was spruiking the Tasmanian election as a referendum on Tassie’s future. A vote for JC, a vote for the Liberal government, was a vote for wealth and progress. Which was just a variation on jobs and growth, Amy O’Dwyer pointed out, and Tasmanians were too smart to buy that when the only jobs and growth were going to be in Chinese factories if the Liberals had anything to do with it.

  The PM began back-pedalling on the Tuesday, no doubt receiving polling numbers on the hour. He contradicted Viper, saying that despite the China Project being a Tasmanian-inspired initiative, indeed the vision of his esteemed colleague Senator Viper, and a project co-funded by the federal government for the good of the Tasmanian people, he had never really been sure that this was what the Australian people would want. And he had been proved right. ‘Which just goes to show,’ he said on ABC TV’s 7.30, ‘that all research is flawed.’

  ‘Are you saying, Prime Minister, that there was research done to ask Tasmanians if they were willing to settle on Bruny Island, in a new high-rise city with a population density of Sydney, while the Chinese took over Tasmania?’

  ‘I believe so,’ he told the ABC journalist. The research was not made public.

  He was a prime minister who had vacillated on so many issues that this became simply another of his flip-flops. He admitted that, in light of both local and international concern, his government may have to review the contract. A multi-billion-dollar land sale, even if it was for the good of all Australians, probably required deeper consideration. This didn’t win him any friends. All over social media Tasmanians were posting pictures of themselves saying: We are not land. The following day the PM suggested (not to disagree with his esteemed colleague Senator Barney Viper, or interfere in state politics) that perhaps when the Tasmanian people re-elected the Liberal government in Tasmania, a referendum could be held on the deal.

  Viper’s role as the mastermind of the China Project burned like wildfire through the media. Viper finally had his moment in the sun and, like Icarus, he fell. No matter that it may not have been entirely true. Aid-n-Abet maintained a very low profile. The prime minister needed a scapegoat and Viper was it. The PM and his government were up for re-election within twelve months. Better to lose Tasmania, and a senator in his last term, than to risk further damage.

  The bridge was to be opened on Friday, March 4th. The Tasmanian election was scheduled for Saturday, March 5th. Schools had been booked to bring their students to line the bridge. Local, national and international media were coming into Hobart for the opening. Celebrities and dignitaries from far and wide, and, of course, JC and Max and Amy O’Dwyer were all to be at the launch. So was I. But Cyclone Angus had other plans.

  Cyclone Angus had increased in size by entwining itself with another low-pressure system forming in the Tasman Sea. Now Angus was mammoth and meteorologists were predicting it would hit Tasmania’s east coast within twenty-four hours. On Friday morning, March 4th, Hobartians awoke to a cyclone warning for all southern waters. This was without precedent. There had never been a cyclone this far south. But the ocean temperature along the east coast of Tasmania had never before reached twenty-six degrees; at least, not since records had been kept. We had become cyclone territory.

  I had been beside JC all week through the media storm. I had watched Frank Pringle assure JC that things would settle down. It was just a matter of riding it out. Tasmanians needed some time to get their heads around it. Beyond that it would all be fine, and JC would be hailed as a visionary. Let the people get to the election, have their say in the privacy of the ballot box, then JC would know it had all been worth it.

  JC had the sense not to buy it. The polls on Thursday had him at seven per cent. Even lower than the Labor premier whose resignation had made room for Max to become leader.

  ‘What we need is for someone to blow up the bridge,’ JC said to me. ‘Where’s a bomber when you need one?’

  The beautiful thing about living an international life, moving from war zone to conflict zone, from rebel stronghold to terrorist headquarters, from corrupt government to outposts of hope, is that you meet some very talented people. Talented recruiters, talented ballistics experts, talented divers.

  On Thursday, when the cyclone was circling in on our TV screens and the bridge opening was delayed until the storm had passed, I told JC I was going to Bruny.

  ‘It won’t hit Tasmania,’ said JC.

  ‘It’s never going to reach land,’ said Max. ‘Let alone Hobart.’ ‘It’s not looking good,’ said Stephanie. ‘You really sure you want to go to Bruny?’

  ‘I’ll go first thing tomorrow. I need to make sure the house is all battened down,’ I said.

  ‘Why is it named after Grandad, Aunty Ace?’ Grace asked.

  ‘Cyclone Angus? Because Grandad has a sense of humour,’ I told her.

  You coming back to the island? Dan texted me.

  Yes, I replied.

  Pick you up at Tinderbox at 7 am, he texted. Not safe after that.

  At Tinderbox the sky had the look of a week-old cork bruise. The sea was getting wilder. The wind was increasing. All the bunting for the launch was strewn across the paddocks. Up on the hill, the BFG camp was deserted but for a few cars parked beside the farmhouse. The marquee and tents were all gone. There was no-one in sight. The worksite had been evacuated, too, all those prefab buildings full of office equipment and bridge paraphernalia were empty. Even the security guards had been sent home, the temporary structure of their offices deemed unsafe for the forecast wind.

  Dan had brought a large power boat across. ‘Not trusting the Zodiac today,’ he said.

  ‘Don’t suspension bridges wobble?’ I asked as we left the shore.

  ‘They engineered that out,’ he said over the wind. ‘But, yes, in a wind they used to start twisting. This one’s designed to move up and down about five metres, but the caissons go down to bedrock. No wind is going to knock that thing over. Now hang on. It’s going to be a little hairy mid-channel. Must be nearing thirty knots.’

  I surveyed the bridge as we passed along its length towards Dennes Point. I looked at the scale of the thing and thought about metrics. All the engineering specs I’d memorised over the last few months.

  Total length of bridge including approaches from abutment to abutment: 2052 metres.

  Length of suspension span including main span and side spans: 1474 metres.

  Length of main span portion of suspended structure (distance between towers): 960 metres.

  Length of one side span: 257 metres.

  Width of bridge: 27 metres.

  Width of roadway between kerbs: 19 metres.

  Width of footpath: 3 metres.

  Total weight of each anchorage: 54,400 tonnes.

  Total weight of bridge, anchorages and approaches: 811,500 tonnes.

  At 9 am the ferry service was shut down at Kettering. By then, the wind was over forty knots. Out on my balcony I took a few pictures to accompany my report. Once it was encrypted and despatched I took my second phone and rem
oved the sim card and fried them both in the microwave. I then took the melted remains to the old outdoor toilet and let it all fall into the long drop.

  I had thought long and hard about what life could look like beyond the election. I had thought long and hard about Tasmania and Tasmanians and the bridge, JC, Max and my family. I had thought about my dad. I had thought a lot about my dad. I had thought about Dan Macmillan.

  I made a call to Stephanie, who had picked up Mother from the hospital and taken her home to their place with Phillip. Phillip had brought several bottles of Hendrick’s with him, and everything was just fine. Stephanie said all southern coastal properties less than three metres above sea level were being evacuated. Which turned out to be a lot of homes around Hobart. Stephanie had opened their house for anyone needing to relocate from lower Sandy Bay.

  ‘It’s a little crazy. We have three families here already and another two on the way. The kids are going silly with this wind, but it feels good to be helpful,’ said Stephanie.

  ‘The election has been postponed,’ she added. ‘They’re predicting power blackouts across southern Tasmania.’

  ‘So you’re speaking to JC again?’ I asked. I had never imagined Stephanie angry, but her rage about the bridge and the deal had taken on the kind of hostility that might well have summoned Cyclone Angus. She hadn’t spoken to JC since the day the news had broken.

  ‘You know, Ace,’ she said, ‘JC has lived his life just as he’s wanted. I have stood by him. But I’m not blind. And I’m not stupid. I happen to value family above everything else. But Tasmania is my family too. That’s where he went wrong. What on earth did he think he was doing?

  ‘I blame Viper,’ she said. ‘And I know JC. He wouldn’t have come around to this easily. Whatever Viper knows made him pliable. I don’t need to know. I suspect you do, because you have a way of knowing. He’s going to lose the election. He’s going to lose everything he’s worked so hard for. Everything we’ve worked so hard for. He’s going to be remembered as a traitor. And I’m the traitor’s wife.’

  ‘Oh, Stephanie,’ I said.

  ‘You can go home to New York and nobody will know about this. But I have to live with it,’ she said.

  ‘Maybe you and the girls might like to go live at my place for a few months?’ I said. ‘You’re welcome to stay as long as you like, actually.’

  ‘You’re not going back to New York?’ she asked.

  ‘I think I’m going to stay here. For a while at least. Until the dust settles.’ I hadn’t been sure until I said it, but now I was. Somehow, I knew I wasn’t going anywhere.

  ‘Let’s get through this storm,’ she said. ‘I mean, both storms. I still can’t believe it’s called Angus.’

  ‘God works in mysterious ways,’ I said.

  Dan had tried to insist I spend the night at his place, but I wanted to be alone. If anything went wrong with the plans Edward and I had made, I wanted to be the first to know. And in truth, I still thought it was all going to be okay. Cyclones lose power over land. To come into the Derwent River, the storm needed to cross several peninsulas and waterways. By then, it would be wind and rain. I was high on a hill. I had gum trees around the house that might fall but there was nothing to be done about that now.

  No house in this part of Tasmania was built to protect it from easterly weather. West is the prevailing direction for any storm. Tasmania didn’t get cyclones. Sydney didn’t get cyclones, until it did. The chance of Angus doing any really damage was low to nil. That’s what everyone said.

  But Cyclone Angus wasn’t playing by the rules.

  At dusk that day, Cyclone Angus crossed the hills and peninsulas and hit Hobart. One of its first victims was the mobile tower on Mount Wellington. Every phone in a hundred-mile radius lost coverage. That included Bruny Island. By then, the power had been out for hours.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Someone was banging at my back door. I shone the torch in the eerie darkness and there was Dan.

  ‘What the hell are you doing out in this?’ I asked.

  ‘Checking you’re okay,’ he said, his face wet, his oilskin dripping.

  ‘Maiden in distress?’ I asked.

  ‘Not quite a maiden.’ He grinned. ‘But if you could act like one, it might be fun.’

  This whole conversation was carried on at a shout over the banshee wind.

  ‘Come down to mine,’ he said. ‘I’ve got the car.’ His house was more protected. Lower down the hill.

  And then a terrific rush of wind made us both jump, followed by a tree branch crashing through the kitchen window. The whole house shook and groaned, the wind screamed. I dropped the torch. I had an image of Dorothy hurtling out of Kansas, airborne in her flying house.

  ‘Too late,’ he said. He had already grabbed my arm and was pulling me into the hall.

  ‘Bedroom,’ he said.

  ‘I thought you’d never ask,’ I replied, but he didn’t hear.

  Dan began dragging the wardrobe across the window and the chest of drawers in front of it to anchor the wardrobe more securely.

  ‘Grab the bedding,’ he said. ‘We have to get under there. These old sleigh beds, they’re made to go the distance.’

  We pulled pillows, the doona and blankets into the space below the bed.

  ‘I’ll be back,’ I called over the wind.

  I scuttled back to the kitchen where rain was sluicing the floor. I crawled under the branch and looked about with the torch beam. There it was. I pulled my backpack from the remains of what had recently been the kitchen bench. My roof, I thought. The branches and leaves on the newly arrived tree branch shivered and quivered in the torchlight. The wind was making the most hideous howling sound, as if a thousand grieving spirits had been loosened from the dark caves of the underworld. Glass was shattered across the floor. Back in the bedroom, I tossed the bag in under the bed and crawled in after it.

  ‘Supplies,’ I said to Dan.

  ‘You’re a nut,’ he said. ‘What was so important?’

  I pulled a gyro lantern out of the backpack. I turned off the torch and wound the lantern awkwardly in the confined space. It gave a gentle glow to our cocoon of blankets and pillows. The dark space beneath the wooden slats became a cave. His proximity was a little disturbing. His eyes were dark blue in the lamplight, his teeth very white. My hand searched the backpack and found the zip. I brought out the bottle. I handed it to him. Suddenly I felt giggly. I’m in shock, I thought.

  It was the whisky we’d been given after the death of the Chinese worker.

  ‘I thought if we died it would be a shame to waste it,’ I said.

  ‘What else have you got in there?’ he asked. I smelled the damp, good smell of him.

  ‘A book,’ I said. ‘I just figured if it was my last night, I’d rather spend it doing the things I like.’

  ‘So what book?’

  I showed him.

  ‘One Hundred Great Ghost Stories,’ he read. ‘Food?’

  ‘Biscuits and cheese. Chocolate. Couple of apples. Packet of mixed nuts.’

  ‘Right now, you are the most attractive woman on earth,’ he said.

  Once the lamp burned down, it seemed pointless to rewind it. We checked our phones. Both on low battery now. We lay side by side in the pitch-black, the blankets beneath us not doing much to soften the floor. He took one of my hands and held it. The storm raged on, a symphony of catastrophic proportions. The whisky was warm in me. I closed my eyes.

  ‘I don’t want to be crushed to death,’ I said.

  The skin of his hand was a little rough. I curled my hand into it, and he stroked his thumb near my thumb.

  ‘This house was built in 1939. It isn’t built to withstand a cyclone,’ I said. ‘It’s too close to the trees. We shouldn’t even be having a cyclone. Or a super storm, or whatever this is. It’s not right. It’s not even possible. Everyone knows that. What’s happening to the world?’

  He pulled me closer. I reached my fingers up through the b
ed slats and felt the mattress.

  ‘I don’t want to suffocate either. I don’t want to be crushed to death. What if the legs give way? Are you sure the legs won’t give way?’

  ‘Pretty sure they won’t,’ he said.

  ‘It’ll be like a sandwich press. I don’t want to die that way.’ Dan offered me another slug of whisky and took one himself. Somehow this seemed the most sensible thing to do. I had never lived through a severe weather event. But I had seen the aftermath of hurricanes and tsunamis. ‘Severe weather event’ seemed an improbable term for whatever was happening outside. I had worked with people who had lost everything. Their homes, their businesses, their churches and schools, their children and elderly: all washed away in storms or blown towards death by wind or water on an unprecedented scale. Except now there was no unprecedented. There was whatever happened next.

  I thought of how the media would measure it against other storms. It would be explained by changing currents, warmer temperatures. An act of God. When we couldn’t explain it any other way, it was always an act of God. Even insurance companies called it that, trying to explain the inexplicable. A medieval God perhaps. An ancient vengeful God of Chaos. Something freed by an archaeological dig, ripping through this part of the world at forty degrees latitude and unleashing an ancient might.

  Lightning cracked, sending shards of light across the floor and about the bed. Then it blinked out and the thunder broke once more. I had seen those illustrations on weather charts of warming water and the effect this had on cold air and precipitation, and how it lifted then travelled and gained velocity. The rain was pounding on the roof. Thunder sounded again. Very close. So close we felt it reverberate in our bodies.

  ‘Fuck,’ Dan said, squeezing me closer. ‘Whatever is going on out there, it’s going to pass. It has to. It has to drop out eventually.’

  ‘What if this is it?’ I said. ‘Hypothetically.’

  ‘I don’t think it is,’ he said. ‘Hypothetically.’