‘What happened to Ayesha’s mother?’ Beck shouted over the noise of the engine. He clutched at the open-topped jeep’s roll bar as it lurched out of a particularly deep rut on the jungle road. The boys sat in the back, leaning forward so they could speak to Nakula as he drove.
‘Did something get her?’ Peter asked.
‘I think she starved to death, as Ayesha would have done,’ Nakula said with blunt sadness. He didn’t look round, preferring to concentrate on the potholed road ahead.
They had stayed another three hours at the sanctuary, playing with Ayesha and meeting some of the other keepers and orang-utans. Each keeper had his own favourite and the boys got acquainted with them all.
Beck had never realized how individual the animals were. Each one was just as much a character as a human. They had their likes and dislikes, their own sense of humour, their own moods and tempers. It didn’t matter that none of them could talk. They had ways of letting you know what they were thinking. And when, sadly, it was time for Nakula to keep his promise and drive the boys back to Medan, Beck was sure the orang-utans were sorry to see them go – Ayesha in particular.
Peter handed her over as if she was his own baby sister. She clung to her keeper’s chest and watched them leave with sad coos and chirrups, and then buried her face in the man’s shirt.
‘Starved?’ Beck asked, surprised by what Nakula had said. He knew all too well that the jungle held many deadly surprises, but starvation shouldn’t be one of them. Especially not for an animal in its natural environment.
Nakula slowed to negotiate a pothole before he answered. Beck looked around. They had been driving for one hour of the three-hour journey and occasionally he recognized a landmark from their trip out that morning. The most recognizable one of all was Mount Lasa. When the road headed straight towards it, you could see the volcano looming large ahead, but mostly the trees hid it from view.
Beck worked out from the direction they’d taken that morning that they would now be heading north, straight towards the volcano, before skirting its base and carrying on eastwards back to town.
‘She would have had a few favourite trees as her territory,’ Nakula told him. ‘If the loggers took them, then she was homeless. No other female would let her into their territory, so . . .’ He shrugged. ‘In the cities, the homeless can line the streets and beg. Here, no streets. They starve quickly.’
‘How bad is it?’ Peter called. ‘The logging? You said the timber was in demand in the west.’
‘Oh, yes, very much. Hardwood in particular. It is sold through Malaysia and Singapore and sent on to Europe, to the United States, to Japan . . . It has many uses – furniture, picture frames, ornaments. It brings a lot of money, which is why it always springs up again, despite what the authorities may do to stop it.’
‘There’s no sustainable way of doing it?’
‘Oh, of course there is. There are schemes, but sustainable wood costs more. Two thirds of the logging in Indonesia is still the illegal kind. It destroys hundreds of square miles, it wipes out ecosystems . . . and there is a human cost too. If the jungle dies, then the environment dies around it. The ground erodes and water flows in different ways. The paddy fields do not flood, the crops cannot be harvested. So communities can starve too. The only people who benefit are the ones doing the illegal logging. It takes a lot of money to buy an easy conscience, but they have a lot of money—’
The jeep swerved suddenly. Beck was flung against the side of the car and had to grab hold of the bar.
‘Whoa!’ Peter had been jolted so hard his glasses were askew. He pushed them back onto his nose. ‘Did we hit something?’
‘I don’t think so,’ Nakula said grimly. He slowly brought the jeep to a halt. They sat with the engine ticking over, apparently waiting for something. Then the keeper jumped down from the vehicle and took a few paces along the road. It looked like he was picking his way with great care. He seemed to be testing the ground with the soles of his feet.
‘What—?’ Peter asked, and suddenly the whole car shook. Nakula staggered and almost fell. The trees on either side shuddered as if a mighty wave was passing through them. The usual jungle background noise of cheeps and chirps erupted into screams of protest from a million birds.
‘What’s happening?’ Peter shouted over the racket.
‘Feels like an earthquake,’ Beck yelled back.
‘A tremor,’ Nakula corrected him. ‘A big one but not serious. This close to the volcano it is not unusual. Still, it would be best to get out of here.’ He pulled himself into the driver’s seat and revved the engine hard. The jeep shot forward. ‘Medan is well away from the volcanic area.’
Beck remembered what the tour guide had said about Indonesia and the Ring of Fire, and wondered if anywhere in the country was well away from volcanic activity. But he saw what Nakula meant. Right now they were practically on the flanks of a big volcano. Anywhere else would probably be safer at the moment.
BOOM!
The explosion felt like red-hot needles stabbing into their eardrums without warning. Beck and Peter both cried out and clapped their hands to their ears. The jeep swerved again but Nakula fought to control the steering wheel. He glanced back at the boys and Beck saw his lips move. He couldn’t make out the words over the ringing in his ears.
The ringing slowly died away and Nakula’s voice faded in, like someone turning up the volume control.
‘. . . more than just tremors. It may be an eruption.’
The jeep shot through a cleared patch of jungle, and just for a moment Beck had a glimpse of Lasa, towering over the trees. A thick column of solid black smoke belched up from the summit. It was already twice the height of the volcano. Then the trees hid it from view again.
‘Shouldn’t there be warnings?’ Peter asked.
‘Sometimes. Not always. It goes off every few years – always small explosions; nothing to worry about if you are a safe distance away. It is the volcanoes that sleep for centuries that cause real destruction.’
Nakula was driving much faster now, trying to find the happy compromise between getting as far away as possible and keeping control of the jeep. A puncture could trap them here. Peter opened his mouth to say something else, but Beck just put a finger to his lips and shook his head. Nakula needed to concentrate on the driving. There was nothing either of them could do to help except sit back and let him focus.
More bangs, more hidden rumblings. Beck wasn’t sure if he was pleased or sorry that the volcano was hidden from sight. If an inescapable wave of molten lava was flowing his way right now, did he want to know?
But Nakula glanced round at them and smiled. A little. ‘I think we are leaving it behind,’ he said. There hadn’t been any more tremors now for a couple of minutes, and the bangs were getting quieter.
‘Look out!’ Peter shouted suddenly. Nakula turned back, but too late.
There was high ground to the left side of the road, low on the right. Glowing red lava had poured down from the left and carved a trench across the road. It was about two metres across and they could feel the heat beating at their faces through the open window. The sides of the trench were scorched black.
Nakula was going too fast to stop. He did the only thing he could, which was turn the wheel hard. The vehicle swerved off the road and plunged down a sharp bank into the trees.