At the door he looked out and saw them sitting wrapped up in blankets on the old picnic table. Their footprints trailed behind them in the dew of the grass. Crazy to be sitting outside, but maybe they wanted some privacy. He closed the door.
Still feeling uneasy, he walked down the passageway peering in each of the rooms, chastising himself as he went. He stared in the room where the girls’ belonging were. Things thrown on the bed. Pills in their blister packaging. The empty box the pills came from on the floor. What was she taking pills for? He picked up the box and read the description—some kind of antidepressant with a black box warning about the increased risk of suicidal thoughts with taking this medication. Crazy—they were meant to help. He noticed the Perdu@ logo and that the ‘at’ sign was without an address. Maybe the @ stood for something else. Perdu was a different name but he’d seen it before: Pain Perdu, another name for French toast.
He turned quickly. No one there. Something wasn’t right. He told his imagination to back off.
The pills—after so many years. He sensed it, something pushing its way through his thoughts. Whispers.
You’re still there aren’t you?
<°)))><
Isabella was rugged up in the blanket and stared at the steam coming out of the cup. She heard the back door close.
“Think we forgot to shut the door, Bella,” Lucas said.
Isabella nodded. “Oops, sorry. Last thing on my mind.” An eagle soaring high above caught her attention. “Look at that, Lucas. How graceful.” As if in tune with Isabella’s thoughts, the great bird turned to show its immense wingspan and commenced gliding. No effort at all.
“This place is certainly well concealed. Only eagles can see us. Your gramps really thought through the situation we were going to be in. Pity I’ve yet to work it out. Why are people after you, Isabella?”
“I’m not sure.” She continued to watch the eagle, which had now been joined by another. “He draws those things. Birds. He must be okay.”
“Do you have doubts, Bella?”
“Yes and no. What did the notes that Gramps left say? Where is Gramps, anyway?”
“Sounds like the authorities finally caught up with him. Took them a long time. He’ll be fine.”
“The notes . . .”
“Not a lot of information, Bella. Just that your mum’s thoughts on the drug she was involved with. You best read them sometime. Quite spiritual, and some that anyone of not the same persuasion may think a bit crazy. I imagine they’re things the company didn’t want to get out in the public arena. They might assume you’re some kind of threat.”
“Keep them in a safe place.” Lucas handed the notes to Isabella.
“I’ve a secret pocket in my coat. That’s where they’ll live until I can read them.”
“It must be a big pocket.”
“It is. So they want to kill me because of something I know or something I don’t know?” she said, “What am I meant to do, Lucas?”
“I think all we can do is give ourselves up to the authorities. But we need to get rid of the technology. The notes said your Grandpa doesn’t want the authorities to get hold of it because eventually it will be used for the wrong things . . . wrong motives.”
“Then who should we call?”
“Not sure. Where’s your phone?”
“On the bed.”
James was standing next to the pot-belly when they came in the room.
“Sorry ’bout leaving the door open.”
“That’s okay.” James nodded.
Isabella wasn’t sure if it was really okay because this man looked stressed. “Are you okay?”
“Yep, just not used to having company.”
Isabella could empathise. There have been many days where she preferred her own company, and of late that was all she had wanted. But things certainly had changed. “Hopefully, we won’t be here much longer. We’ve decided to contact the authorities and bring an end to this cat-and-mouse game.”
She watched James’s eyebrows rise. But no words came.
33 – The beat of drums
JAMES TOLD THEM HIS SHACK WAS BASED ON SUSTAINABILITY. Solar panels on the roof generated power when the sun was shining, and on overcast days the power came from battery packs. At one stage he planned to be completely self-sufficient, as he thought the end was coming. He didn’t think he would be called up to be with the Lord, so he planned accordingly.
Isabella stood at the passageway entrance and listened. “Maybe you need to revisit some of your books, James. I believe you can position yourself to be called up. Mum and Dad used to tell me about these things. Mum believed the rapture and the second coming to be the same event whereas Dad believed they were separate events. On second thoughts, maybe you should read the good book, the Bible. That’s where the truth is.”
James tucked in his bottom lip, raised his eyebrows and looked at Lucas.
Lucas shrugged as he watched Isabella head down the passage way. He opened up both palms. “Can’t help you, James. I’ve no idea.”
Isabella returned and walked into the lounge room holding her phone. “Not too much of a charge left but enough for a call. The only problem is there’s no signal.”
“You can charge up the phone if you have a charger. I don’t have a phone so I can’t help you out. We are in a valley. You could walk up the hill and see if that improves the signal.”
“How do you survive without a phone?”
“Easy. Prefer it that way. When the smartphone was born I decided I wanted to have a cancer-free skull and protect the cells that lived in there.” James tapped his skull. “I know maybe that’s a bit over the top. But I don’t need a phone. You could say I walk to the beat of a different drum.”
“Relevant, as drums were used as a communication device once.” Lucas said.
Isabella looked at Lucas and shook her head. She walked over to the window and looked up at the hill. “Come on, Lucas, let’s go climb a mountain.”
“Do we have mountains in this country?” Lucas asked.
“Funny. Good to see some humour creeping in. Didn’t they beat the drums from the mountain tops?”
“Yep. We could do that too.” Lucas smiled.
James walked over to a cupboard near the pot-belly. He opened and pulled out some coats that had seen better days. “You better put these on. You’ll need to keep warm as it’s a narrow track you will be walking on. The shrubbery keeps the sun out and the frost stays until midday.
Ah-ah-ah-aaaah
“A crow?” Isabella asked.
“The answer to that is complex.”
She thought that was a simple question.
