This is the road to Mount Yearby. Between the trees before them, I
stand the day like war is held. I remind them about what happened in
Long Tan. Weather can be an enemy like any other. In Long Tan.
Rains stop the Vietcong attack here, dry lightning might hold us back.
Only the old olive trees understand. There is a small fire outside of Jamestown.
Philby yells, I'll put some pants on, and suddenly we're following our
bush fire plan, which is basically flight or fight alongside the trees. But
that day passes and another I let my soldiers recover, take a day's leave,
head on into the city. It's a quiet drive, just me and
the Toyota nor An expressway to the outskirts. Outside a baby bunting store,
I loiter. I'm waiting for a mother to be I'm going to kidnap her,
take her to Mount Brian with me and Bossy do some recreating for TV.
Suddenly I see one she won't go in. She's maybe seventeen, staring
longingly at a baby's bedroom scene. I think evily I approached her. I
say, you don't know me, but I was once like you. You
see, I'd like to buy this cot help her younger sister, who is
less well off. She looked at me suspiciously, like she's not going to
But I'm just a regular old lady. We went into the shop, not
the cot she had one, but the sheet set we got, and a
lot of other supplies. Then I said I'd give her a ride. She
said, but you don't even know my name, and I said, that's
all right, that's fine, that's okay. I didn't want her to say
her name, but she said it all the same, and once I heard
it, I couldn't remain in my murderous state. Mary, the same name
exactly as the nagerie mother to be who was ravaged on Mount Bryan last century.
Hitman did his job, Hallett's hit Man and his dog, but I
could not, and neither could Boss, not even in my imagination, but
in real life it really happened. But we're not like them. We're not
like those men. Philby tells me again, we are not barbarians, and
I want to believe him. So are you're done with your poem? Can
that be the end? But my generals have been conspiring in my absence.
I tell him, the trees you mean, I understand why you prefer them,
General number five. I suspect that one, the one you were kicking.
What about that one? He's pointing at them out in the street.
General number two, he hasn't on anything yet, according to you, According
to me, is that jealousy, philby or envy. Don't worry, dearie,
he tells me patronizingly, I'm already married. General number two is a
beauty. It's true. Whatever species, even birds appear. Suddenly there's a
wooden sea underneath by the golf club gate for golfers and others to wait in
General number two's dappled shade. I sit the same listening to General number two's
update. It was his contacts, he claimed that dropped the limb that broke
the step that did the deputy mayor of barra In. He fell and broke
his neck. His wife had an angina attack, he says. He hopes.
I'm counting that. I tell him I can do the math. It's
only General number five now, whose mission remains undone. I say, how
do you propose your lonely olive tree near the Tarawi on the run will achieve
what these others have done? He says, you'll see mysteriously. In fact,
you'll be the first one. Sleep easy. Philby says to me,
it's not your problem. Besides, the whole of essay is in lockdown six
days, so stay with plenty of t P. There's no traveling rurily.
You've got what you wanted, almost exactly. Now call your generals off,
he pleads, it's time to let this be. I agree. I can
see Philby's relief, but deceit by its nature can't be seen, and it
can't be planned for naturally. Five generals stand before me, unworried by COVID
nineteen more troubling for humanity, says General number three. South Australians can't walk
in the street. You can't walk, bossy. He's okay. We're making
sacrifices, suffice to say, we will pick up this another day. General
number five says, too late. I'm afraid the orders went out yesterday.
We started early because of all the COVID delays. I saw the mushroom cloud
rising over the shoulder of General number three. Her mouth open. It's begun.
That is the end of TERRAWI says General number five. Bang, and
there goes white Yakowi. Next is Jamestown. We're waiting when Philby comes running.
They're bombing us. He says, who I asked him? The Chinese?
Nah? I say, it's me. It's all part of my plan
to get rid of the colonizers. Philby cries, is that why our farm
is on fire? The olive trees, the flames go higher than a Kuwaiti
oil fire. The CFS trucks drive straight by on the Barrier Highway on their
way to Rawi. We can see them from the top of Mount Brian,
where we're sitting in the toyota Bossy Philby and me in the clothes we are
wearing. All the rest is a distant pre plague dream. We are leaving.
Phobia is saying, avoid the containment that has others dying. A flit
before Hallette is another cruise ship. He's packed the camping gear when I wasn't
looking. We are out of here, He's saying, today, one last
try, but lockdown. I cry. Philby says, fuck it, and
Philby is calm and pass the fire burning down our farm. The windmills are
still turning on the vast wind farms. Can you hear that hum? Philby
asked me, I can't but try and imagine. It turns people crazy.
Oligarchs own them and want more money. We need to fight them, but
first we flee, Yes, says Philby. He's remembering yes the Chinese,
and we do get away, and that is how this story continues today.