12 August 1975
Ms Jed Kelly
Dribble, Australia
Darling Jed,
I’m writing to you from London’s greatest heatwave ever, 32°C!!! The city has gone mad. I just saw a banker type take off his shirt on Fleet Street, and in Hyde Park businessmen are rolling up their trousers to paddle. How would they survive in 45°C Canberra?!
The whole world seems mad just now, with Carlos hunting Yehudi Menuhin — the world’s greatest violinist targeted by a terrorist! And the Birmingham Bomb trial and the stable boys are on strike. As my history teacher used to say of everything from the French Revolution to World War I: ‘Things were grim, girls.’
Can I tell you a secret? I long for brown hills. I want blue sky so high you want to jump into it, and wine I can afford to drink, even if it’s in a box.
I saw Sunday Too Far Away and I cried because I was homesick, and because Australia is suddenly making brilliant movies and I’ve missed it all, and maybe, just maybe, I am missing the most exciting time and place to be young. Or maybe I just want Vegemite toast and a Violet Crumble and roast pumpkin leaving little black bits in the gravy.
Even more secret: I went to Australia House last week to look at the newspapers for jobs in Australia. I’m not coming back till I have a decent job . . . which means I’ve decided, haven’t I?
It probably won’t be for months yet, but if you want to visit me here, it had better be soon.
Love, hugs and a few homesick tears,
J xx
PS I thought of Drinkwater when I watched Sunday Too Far Away and suddenly it didn’t seem Deadsville at all. All that golden light. And those gorgeous shearers’ muscles.
PPS Did you hear that Anthea is shacked up with a builder’s labourer in a squat in Glebe?! What a coalition for the Green Bans: Nobel Prize-winning Patrick White and Jack Mundey, who is rather a dish, and Anthea and her Bruce, or whatever he is called. Anthea being Anthea she didn’t tell me his name in the letter, just what union he’s in!
RA ZACHARIA
‘I’m sorry,’ said Mark 40 quietly. ‘But the pain has been too bad. I’ve handed in my resignation at River View.’
The world cracked. Ra Zacharia took a calming breath and rightened it. ‘My dear girl, I am sure a few days of meditating here . . .’
‘I’m going back to Sydney. My mother’s made an appointment for me with a rheumatologist.’
This time the anger was too sharp to dissipate. He forced his smile to keep sailing. ‘In less than three months all ills — including yours — will be vanquished. But only if —’ He stopped. If the girl realised that he knew she was not truly one of the Chosen, that he only needed her to get that small boy here, at the right time, she would be even more determined to leave. ‘Do not stop meditating,’ he said at last. ‘Even in Sydney, every day, remember you are one of the Chosen. And as you realise that doctors cannot help you, as you feel the strength of the Elders build as they come closer,’ he took her hand, held it warmly, ‘then come back to us. The boy needs us. You are his only hope!’
‘Perhaps,’ said Mark 40 softly. Ra Zacharia watched her limp down the stairs, and into her small white Hillman Imp.
So. He had to face it. Six members of the community left, and none of the six a perfect Sacrifice, except himself. And he was too valuable for the future of humanity to create a pathway for the Elders, to bring them to earth, to Gibber’s Creek.
But he still had Mark 23. And Mark 23 still had the trust of the wheelchair girl, meeting her every Saturday, he reported, just as he’d been instructed. But would she be enough? Ra Zacharia gazed through light that seemed too bright, as if the edge of every object might shatter if he touched it. Somehow, he must get the boy too.