ABC Local Radio, Gibber’s Creek, 11 November 1975
Even in England the days when a king or queen could appoint or dismiss a parliament are long gone. But suddenly, in Australia, we find that it may be legally possible here. The voice of one man, the governor-general, has dismissed a government elected by the Australian people.
SAM
It had been a long two days. Sam had slept little on the flight back to Australia. The world shuddered slightly around him, not quite real. He should have stayed the night in Sydney.
But he wanted to get home, to share all he had seen with Jed, who was so good at saying, ‘Wow!’ even when she had no idea why the generating capacity of photovoltaic panels varied from one maker to the next, and why that was so important . . .
He found himself nodding off near Yass, dreaming she sat next to him. The ute veered onto the verge. He stopped at a truck stop for instant coffee and a toasted cheese and tomato sandwich, which anchored him to reality better than the weak coffee. He had just begun to drive again when the news came on the ute’s radio. Dismissal!
Surely his tired brain had misunderstood. It was . . . Sam struggled to find the word, kept coming back to the same one. Unreal. Not possible in the universe he had known.
Reality was solar panels, their shiny blackness harnessing the sun. It was the chocolate earth beneath your feet, Jed’s skin under his hands.
Yet the voice on the radio kept talking. Dismissal. Crowds gathering outside parliament, in the streets of every city . . .
Sam had known for years that much of the world’s thinking was outmoded. He had thought it would change, was changing. And he was helping it change. But now the most antique institution in the country, Australia’s tie to the British queen, had assumed control of the entire country, as surely as if Australia was a colony, just like it had been back with the First Fleet and poor mad George III.
Had the queen even known that this would happen? Had she sat at her toast and marmalade this morning and said, ‘Oh, by the way, Philip, darling, we are going to dismiss the government of Australia today’?
Sam shook his head to clear it. What the queen had said or known didn’t matter — unless, perhaps, she saw that what had been done in her name was wrong and ordered Whitlam reinstated. Somehow Sam couldn’t see that happening.
Nothing mattered now, except getting home. Sitting at the table with Jed and Scarlett, eating dinner, watching the moon rise . . . those were real. Important. Tomorrow, after he had slept, he could try to work out what insanity his country faced now.
His ute slid through the streets of Gibber’s Creek, almost empty now after the shops had closed, except for a few drinkers on the footpath near the pub, then onto the road for home. He was so intent he failed to notice the green Volkswagen speed past in the growing dimness till it braked sharply in his rear-vision mirror. He stopped also and reversed towards it.
Leafsong, at the wheel. Jed! Scrambling from the car, running to him . . .
‘Darling, what is it?’
Jed clung to him. ‘Scarlett’s gone. She was going to meet her mother. But I think she’s in trouble. She . . . left . . . we argued . . .’
Sam glanced at Leafsong. ‘What’s happening? Where are you going?’
‘I don’t know.’ Jed’s voice was muffled against his shoulder. ‘Leafsong just appeared and waved me into her car. She has to be taking me to Scarlett.’
Sam turned to Leafsong. ‘Where is she?’ he demanded.
Leafsong bit her lip.
‘Is she in trouble?’
Leafsong nodded.
‘Where? How?’
The girl shook her head, gestured, realised that no gesture was going to help explain this particular mess. She took a breath. A voice came out of her mouth, a frog’s faint croak. ‘Chosen of the Universe. Ra Zacharia . . . said . . . an offering . . . to the Elders.’
‘No! Why would she go there?’ cried Jed. ‘What about her mother?’
Leafsong stared, anguished, and shook her head.
‘It doesn’t matter why Scarlett went there. We need to get her.’ Sam debated the merits of Carol’s car and his ute. He trusted his car maintenance more. ‘Leafsong, squeeze in too. Jed, darling, it’ll be okay.’
‘No! You don’t understand! The aliens are supposed to be coming today! The aliens are the Elders.’
‘What!’
‘I was too upset to think about them today. All I could think of was Scarlett deciding to live with her mother. I had no idea she might go out there.’ She turned to Leafsong. ‘Did they kidnap her?’
Leafsong bit her lip and shook her head.
‘What does an offering mean?’ cried Jed desperately.
Leafsong looked like she might cry. She hunched her shoulders, indicating she didn’t know the answer.
Sam turned on the engine, then pushed the accelerator as he said, ‘It doesn’t matter now. We just need to get there. What happens when these precious aliens arrive?’
‘I don’t know! Peace and harmony, but that might mean anything.’
Sam nodded grimly. A community of dead acolytes could be seen as peaceful.
‘People have been leaving the community all year long. Maybe no one’s there except Ra Zacharia. Though Mark must be — he wouldn’t leave without telling Scarlett. But Carol says the place might be mostly empty.’
‘Except for a madman who thinks aliens will arrive today.’ It seemed no crazier than what had just happened in Canberra.
Jed nodded, her face twisted with terror and shame. ‘Sam, it’s all my fault. I . . . I tried to arrange Scarlett’s life for her. Sam, have I done that to you too?’
‘Done what?’ he asked, skirting around a wombat, worried, shocked, and yet still managing to enjoy Jed’s scent, the touch of her arm as they hurtled towards the sunset . . .
‘Bribed you into coming back to Gibber’s Creek? Used my money to make you do what I wanted?’
‘Nope.’
‘Sam —’
‘Darling, I need to concentrate on not running off the road. But trust me,’ he managed a tired grin, ‘you couldn’t manoeuvre me into doing anything I didn’t think was right, or that I didn’t want to do. Or if you tried, I’d tell you.’
‘Oh.’ He could feel Jed think about that, realising that what he said was true. He managed another grin. He was the son of two forceful people, neither of whom could persuade their son to be a respectable engineer, with a safe superannuation scheme, a secretary to make his coffee and a nice house in Mosman. He’d chosen instead to build a mud cottage in a commune, because he truly was their son, as sure of his own life as his sister was of hers.
‘I’m here because I want to be,’ he said. And he was. At Gibber’s Creek, in this ute, on this rescue mission for his littlest sister. With Jed, the heartstone of his life.