Through the Tiger's Eye (7 page)

Now, looking at the two kids in the miners’ cubby, Lucy knew she couldn’t risk telling anyone about them. She didn’t know who they were, or why they were in that horrible jail, but she did not want them to go back there. If Mum found out they’d escaped from jail, Lucy just knew she wouldn’t approve. Grandma would feel sorry for the kids but she’d tell all her friends and then it would be all over Kurrawong by lunchtime. And maybe the Prime Minister would find out . . .

Lucy squatted down on the floor and put a candle between herself and the kids. It lit up their faces and made them look skinnier than ever. Ricardo sat down next to her. T-Tongue had given up hoping anyone was going to give him anything to eat and gone to sleep with his nose between his paws.

‘Who are you?’ Lucy asked the children.

The Tiger-cat jumped down as though it wanted to hear.

‘Rahel,’ answered the girl. Putting her arm around the boy, she said, ‘Toro’. Her voice was soft and accented, but every word was clear.

‘I’m Lucy and he’s Ricardo and he’s T-Tongue and she’s the Tiger-cat.’

‘I’m Ricardo and she’s Lucy and he’s T-Tongue and he’s the Tiger-cat.’

Lucy glared at Ricardo and turned back to the girl. ‘Where are your mum and dad?’ she asked. The girl’s eyes filled with tears and the boy looked away. Lucy wished she hadn’t asked.

‘Soldiers got them,’ said Ricardo with certainty.

‘How would you know?’ demanded Lucy.

‘Duh . . . the Tiger-cat told me!’

Lucy looked at the Tiger-cat but it didn’t say anything, just kept staring at her with those golden eyes. Then, all of a sudden,
that feeling came again
. Her body melted into the cold air of the room, her mind holding tight to the Tiger-cat’s mind-rope. Then the Tiger-cat was gone, and in its place . . .

An open door. A man steps out onto the verandah and lights a cigarette. It is the smiling soldier. More soldiers drag a dark-haired woman through the door, onto the verandah and down the stairs. She cries out in a strange language. Lucy understands two words: ‘Toro’ and ‘Rahel’. Another soldier appears in the doorway, carrying Toro, who is crying and struggling. The soldier hauls him across the verandah towards the stairs. A blue vase of flowers flies through the door, hitting the soldier and smashing to the floor. The man screams and drops Toro amongst the broken blue china and bright yellow flowers. Rahel launches herself into the open doorway, grabs Toro’s hand and tries to run down the stairs with him. But the smiling soldier, calmly smoking his cigarette, simply stretches out a lazy leg from where he stands beside the top stair and trips them. Both children tumble to the bottom. As Rahel and Toro lie helpless in the dust, Lucy can clearly see, on the top pocket of the smiling soldier’s brown shirt, a picture: the red-eyed face of a black bull with long yellow horns. Then Toro starts to cry.

Lucy shivered back into her body, chilled to the bone. The scent of the smiling soldier’s cigarette was strong in her nostrils. It was so real! She looked around the cubby, but the only smoke came from the candles spluttering on the table. It was her turn to sit with wide eyes and stare at the two children on the lounge in front of her, Toro’s sobs still ringing in her ears. The Tiger-cat jumped on her lap and Lucy stroked its fur while she tried to think of something to say. She didn’t have to.

‘What were you doing in that school?’ asked Ricardo.

‘It’s not a school, Retardo!’ Lucy yelled – and then felt ashamed when Toro shrank away from her and the Tiger-cat sat up, startled, sinking its claws into her legs.

‘Indeed it is not a school,’ Rahel said quietly. ‘After they arrested our parents, they sent us to the camp. It is a special prison for the children of the rebels. My mama and papa are rebels. The Bulls despise us . . .’

Her voice trailed off into silence and she hugged Toro closer.

‘The Bulls?’ asked Lucy, but she already knew the answer.

‘Soldiers. They have a picture of a bull on their uniforms.’

‘Are your mum and dad bank robbers?’ ventured Ricardo.

Rahel looked horrified. ‘No! They are rebels!’

Silence.

‘What are you doing in Australia?’ asked Lucy finally.

Rahel looked puzzled but Lucy didn’t give her time to answer. ‘C’mon! You can tell me. I’m not going to tell anyone. You’re boat people, aren’t you?’

‘Boat people?’ Rahel echoed blankly.

‘Yeah, like we’re car people,’ said Ricardo helpfully. ‘We like cars best but some people like boats. Grandma likes buses, so I guess she’s a bus person. Then there’s bike people. Me, I’m a skateboard person and —’

‘Shut up, Ricardo. It’s not like that. I saw it on TV. Did you come on a boat and the Navy arrested you? I swear, I won’t tell anyone.’

Rahel just looked at Lucy as though she were a weirdo.

Then Lucy saw the flaw in her own logic.

‘No, that’s stupid, there are no Bulls in Kurrawong. I don’t understand any of this. I thought you were just a nightmare until the Tiger-cat sent me a picture of you this morning; and then we found the tunnel, and now . . .’

Her voice trailed off and Rahel finally got a chance to speak.

‘We have been dreaming of you too. We watched you washing the rug and your meeting with the Tiger-cat. We have been waiting for you. But you took so long to come to our country.’

‘Your country?’ Even as Lucy spoke a voice in her head was whispering,
It’s too hot at that jail and everyone speaks a different language.

Rahel looked at Lucy steadily and repeated, ‘You came to our country and we are grateful. You saved us from the Bulls’.

‘That’s OK,’ said Ricardo. ‘What country?’ He didn’t seem to have any problem with the idea of another country tucked away at the back of little old Kurrawong.

Toro whispered an answer: ‘Burchimo’, or that’s what it sounded like.

Rahel looked fierce.

‘No, Toro! Say its proper name!’

She sat up very straight, dark eyes flashing in the candlelight.

‘Toro is doing what the Bulls desire. They insist we call it East Burchimo or they beat us. But its name is Telares. The Bull soldiers came from Burchimo when I was seven and put people in jail. They killed many people and set fire to their houses. They stole many things. They say our country is part of Burchimo, but it is not. They never lived here before the invasion. Toro was only a baby when they came. He cannot recall anything before the Bulls came.’

‘But isn’t Toro Spanish for bull?’ Lucy asked.

Rahel frowned.

‘Mama named him Toro because he was born one month too soon. She said he was as impatient as a little bull. But if she had known the Bulls were going to invade, she would never have done it.’

Lucy’s head was spinning.
This girl is crazy! Or is she? What about the tiger? We don’t have tigers in Australia, except in the zoo . . . and cats aren’t supposed to beam video clips right into your brain. And what about those psycho trees? They’re all the wrong colour. Maybe it really is another country.

Rahel’s quiet voice broke in.

‘We have been in jail for six months. The Bulls came for us on Toro’s birthday on the sixth of June.’

‘That’s slack!’ said Ricardo.

‘How old are you now?’ Lucy asked Rahel, because that, at least, was an easy question.

‘Twelve.’

The same age as Lucy. Lucy suddenly felt like a big, dumb elephant next to Rahel, who looked about two years younger, she was so little and skinny.

‘How old is Toro?’

‘Six.’

Yipes! The same age as Ricardo! Toro didn’t have a puffed-up belly like those famine kids on TV, but he looked like a shadow next to Ricardo. And he barely spoke.

‘What do you get at your canteen . . . I mean what do they . . . What do you eat?’ asked Ricardo.

‘Rice.’

‘And?’

‘Vegetables . . . but not every day.’

‘You’re lucky! Mum and Grandma make me eat mine
all
the time. What do you have for breakfast?’

‘Rice.’

‘Rice Bubbles?’

‘No. Rice.’

‘Lunch?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Recess?’

‘Retardo! They don’t have recess! Don’t you get it? They’re not at school. They’re in jail. They don’t even have lunch!’

That shut him up big time. He poured another bowl of Cocoa Puffs while he struggled with the concept of rice for breakfast and dinner, with nothing in between. Then he realised what he had done and quickly offered more to Rahel and Toro, but Toro was holding his belly as if it hurt.

‘He is not accustomed to this food,’ said Rahel.

‘I’ll have it!’ Ricardo said helpfully, then, at Lucy’s face, ‘What?’

Lucy shook her head in disgust but she felt stupid herself, for not remembering what they’d said on that TV show – that kids who had been hungry have to get used to food again, gradually. She would have to find out more; but right now, time was ticking away and they had to get back to the house, load up all the stuff they needed and get back here before Grandma arrived.

‘We have to get more stuff for you. We’ve got blankets and pillows at home and more food. You can stay here until —’ Lucy didn’t quite know how to finish that sentence, so she was glad when Rahel interrupted.

‘I must locate my aunt!’

‘What? Where is she?’ said Lucy.

‘She fled to the rebel base in the mountains just before we got taken. I must find her. She will know what to do. She is the only one who can help Mama and Papa. She said she would care for us if anything bad happened. I have committed all her maps to memory. I know how to get there.’

‘But Toro can’t walk. And what about the Bulls? If they see you, they’ll just put you back in jail,’ said Lucy.

‘Toro will recover. It is just that we have not eaten. We
must
find her. If we take food we will be able to hide from the Bulls. We will walk at night and follow her directions.’

Lucy didn’t know what to say. Who in their right mind would go out the jungle jail end of the tunnel again?

‘At least stay here for a while,’ she urged. ‘Eat good food for a few weeks and get a bit fatter . . . I mean stronger. We’ll bring you food every day, and medicine for Toro. You’ll need other things too.’

‘I’ve got a water pistol,’ said Ricardo, ‘and a Ninja sword’.

The Tiger-cat jumped off Lucy’s knee and padded to the lounge. It climbed boldly onto Rahel’s lap and began to purr. She looked horrified.

‘Pat him,’ said Ricardo.

‘She won’t hurt you,’ said Lucy.

Rahel looked at them and then gingerly stroked the cat’s fur. The Tiger-cat purred even more and pushed its head against Rahel’s hand as if to say, ‘More, please!’

‘Scratch between his ears. He likes that,’ advised Ricardo, to Lucy’s intense irritation.

‘How would you know?’

‘He told me!’

Purrs reverberated around the cubby. Rahel looked up at the kids and smiled for the first time. It made her look completely different, like a normal kid, not a freaked-out, hungry one.

‘Let’s go, Ricardo, we’ve got to get the rest of the stuff before Grandma gets here.’

‘See ya,’ said Ricardo and took off through the door with the torch, leaving Lucy to stumble along behind until he felt sorry for her and stopped. Once again, the Tiger-cat was waiting, its golden eyes appraising them from its throne of broken wood and rubble, when they reached the pit.

11
The Old Lady ’s Stuff

Ricardo grabbed the humungous bunch of keys and tried the little silver one. Lucky first go. Clunk, creak; the door opened, and Ricardo staggered back and collapsed on the floor under what
had
been a tower of old lady’s clothes. He pulled the pink fluffy nightie from his head and clawed his way to freedom through a lemon dressing-gown and six pairs of massive white undies.

If he hadn’t glimpsed the padlocked dragon chest through the pink nightie, he might have given up, but it was irresistible. He clambered up. What was inside? Surely one of the keys would open it? Lucy shouldered past him, tripping on the undies.

‘What are you doing? They don’t need granny clothes. They need bedclothes!’

She began jamming blankets and sheets into her biggest backpack.

The room was a cross between a treasure trove and a junk shop, full of old magazines, lacy tablecloths, a crystal vase, an old black-and-white TV that didn’t work.

‘Stop trying to open that chest, Ricardo. Mum told you to leave it alone and you’re supposed to be helping me! We have to finish before Grandma comes.’

Ricardo shuffled outside, lugging a bedspread. Lucy threw pillows after him and tried to think what else they needed. She spied a wicker basket by the wall. Perfect. A picnic set. Plates, cutlery . . . everything! Ricardo found a metal bowl with a flower painted on the bottom, big enough to sit in.

‘A bath!’ said Lucy.

Toxic! He dropped it. Then Lucy found the corner with the camping gear. Airbeds, fold-up chairs, a billy, an esky to keep stuff cold. A heavy tent. A gas bottle and camping stove. Whoever owned the granny clothes must have been an explorer. Rahel and Toro could cook bacon and eggs, and heat water for a bath. They had everything they needed to stay down there forever.

‘Ricardo, give up, will you?’ She wrestled the keys from him and tried them on the chest herself.