The Swiss Family RobinZOM (5 page)

Bill
inserted the otoscope into Jack’s bleeding ear. He angled
it to peer inside.

“
Why’s there blood coming
out of his ear?” Liz said.

“
It’s his eardrum,” Bill
said. “It was perforated by the explosion.”

“
Will he ever be able to
hear again?” Liz said, voice shaking.

“
I don’t know. There’s a
lot of damage. There’s nothing I can do without full surgery
equipment. We’ll have to wait and see.”

“
I suppose Nip will have
to be his ears for a little while.”

Bill
’s face scrunched up. He sat back and put his hand over his
eyes.

“
I thought we’d lost him,
Liz,” he said. “I thought he was gone.”

“
Sh-sh-sh-sh-sh,” Liz
said, taking Bill in her arms. “He’s all right. He’s going to be
okay. If the worse comes to the worst he’ll have to rely on his
left ear more, that’s all.”

Bill
cleared his throat and breathed in a ragged
breath.

“
He was a little hero
today,” he said. “We wouldn’t be here now if it wasn’t for
him.”

There was a reflective pause.
Liz brushed a tear out of the corner of her eye.

“
We should let the boys
know he’s going to be all right,” she said. “They must be worried
sick.”

“
Yes,” Bill said, but he
didn’t move.

“
I’ll wash him,” Liz
said. “You go tell the boys. And prepare his bed. He’ll need to
rest.”

Bill wiped his eyes and sniffed
through his blocked up nose.

“
All right,” he said.
“And after we put him to bed we’ve got to discuss what we’re going
to do.”

Liz frowned.

“
With Jack?” she
said.

“
No,” Bill said. “About
the Lurcher invasion.”

Nine

“
There are only two ways
the Lurchers can cross to our part of the island,” Bill
said.

On a map, Bill
pointed to a narrow strip of land in the north
labelled Flamingo Marsh. The island was a crescent shape, with a
large river running from the north through to the south, dividing
the land into two parts. The east coast, where the Robinsons lived,
was three times larger than the west.

“
The only other way
across was the bamboo bridge,” Bill said, “but obviously, that’s no
longer an option.”

Bill crossed the bridge off the
map.

“
Which means,” he said,
“they will have to advance to the north and cross Flamingo Marsh
before turning south and coming at us.”

Liz, Fritz, Ernest and Francis
nodded in agreement.

“
The way I see it,” Bill
said, “we have two options. We meet them face-on and die, or we
employ our evacuation plan. Our only real option is to
leave.”

“
No!” Francis said. “I
like it here!”

“
The next island will be
even better,” Bill said. “You’ll see.”

“
I don’t want to see. I
want to stay here.”

“
Make no mistake, if we
stay, they will come down on us without mercy.”

“
How long do you think we
have?” Liz said.

“
Two days,” Bill said.
“Three, tops.”

“
How many of them were
there?”

“
Hundreds. Maybe
thousands. It’s hard to tell. And those are just the ones we saw.
There could have been more in the jungle, and more still in the
cruise ship. We’ve got our escape plan. We’ve got our boat. I
suggest we take it and get out of here. We’ll load up all our
supplies and be gone before they get anywhere near us.”

“
What if we stayed here
in the trees?” Liz said.

“
For how long?” Bill
said. “And what happens when we run out of food? Or we roll over in
our sleep and fall out of the tree? It’s not worth the risk when we
have a perfectly good boat out there waiting for us to
use.”

There
was a pause. Ernest had a thoughtful expression on his
face.

“
Why don’t we build
traps?” he said.

“
Good thinking, Ernest,”
Bill said. “We’ll hunt for some animals, dry the meat and take it
with us.”

Ernest
shook his head.

“
No,” he said. “I mean
hunting Lurchers. We know this island better than
anyone.”

“
We don’t want to trap
them,” Bill said. “We want to kill them.”

“
First we trap them, and
then we kill them.”

There was a pause.
Liz nodded.

“
It’s an idea,” she
said.

“
It’s suicide,” Bill
said. “We’ll never build enough traps to stop them all.”

“
We don’t need to stop
them all,” Liz said. “We just need to stop most of them. If a few
get through, we can take them down ourselves.”

“
How do we kill the ones
we do trap?”

“
We have a
gun.”

“
With four
bullets.”

“
We have bows and
arrows.”

“
Brilliant,” Bill said.
“So we’re going to re-enact the American Indian Wars?”

“
Technically we’re more
advanced than they are, so we’re the Europeans in this
situation.”

Bill
looked at Liz.

“
You’re being serious?”
he said.

“
I don’t want to run away
from everything we’ve
built here,” Liz
said. “I know we’ve got a lot left to build yet, but it’s our
home.”

“
I understand,” Bill
said, “really, I do. Believe me, I want to stay too. My only
concern is our safety. Leaving now guarantees that.”

“
What if we can’t find
another island?” Liz said. “What if the next island we come to has
even more Lurchers? What if we get stuck on the mainland, or swept
up in a storm? The monsoon season isn’t over yet.”

“
Look,” Bill said. “We
all knew this could happen. That’s why we came up with the escape
plan. Now you’re saying you don’t want to go?”

“
Everything we’ve built
here, everything we’ve done…”

“
We can do it all again,”
Bill said. “Do you honestly think you could ever rest easy here
again knowing those things are out there?”

“
I know I’ll never rest
easy out there on the mainland,” Liz said.

“
We’ll find another
island. There must be lots out there.”

“
And what if we get stuck
at sea?”

“We have provisions on board.
We can survive.”

“
I don’t want to
survive,” Liz said. “I want to live!”

“We must survive first, then
live.”

Liz
frowned
, shaking her head.

“
W
hy don’t we set fire to it all?” she said. “Set fire to the
whole island, reduce it to ash.”

“
And then what do we
do?”
Bill said. “What do we survive on?
You’re being irrational. The fire would destroy everything. We’d
have no home, no food, nothing. Then we’d have to find another
island anyway.”

“
And what about Jack?”
Liz said. “He can’t go on a long voyage the way he is! What if we
take him out to sea now and he needs medicine?”

“
We’ll take plenty with
us.”

“
And if we run
out?”

“
We won’t run out. Look,
I think we’ve debated enough. Let’s put it to a vote. Who votes we
get on a boat and leave right now?”

Bill
raised his hand. After a moment, Ernest followed. And then,
not looking at Francis or his mother, Fritz put up his
hand.

“
Fritz!” Francis
said.

“
Dad’s right,” Fritz
said. “We have to do what’s best for us all.”

“
Who votes we stand and
fight?” Bill said.

Liz and
F
rancis raised their hands.

“
Three to two,” Bill
said. “Motion carried to evacuate the island.”

“
Wait,” Francis said.
“What about Jack?”

“
He’s asleep, resting,”
Bill said.

“
Shouldn’t he get a vote
too?”

“
We’re voting for Jack’s
welfare too.”

“
Voting for what?” a
voice behind them said.

Jack hobbled out of the
shadows and into the warm glow of the candle
light. He was in his bedclothes. He rubbed his
eyes.

“
Jack!” Francis
said.

He leapt up and
wrapped
his arms around his brother’s
waist. Jack smiled and rested his hand on his little brother’s
shoulder.

“
Here’s our little hero,”
Fritz said with warmth.

Jack
took a step forward, and then braced himself on the wall.
Everyone was up on their feet in an instant to help him.

“
I’m all right,” Jack
said. “But I can’t seem to walk straight.”

“
It’s your ear,” Bill
said. “It helps keep you balanced. Yours is damaged, so you can’t
balance very well right now. You’ll get used to it.”

Fritz got up so Jack could have
his chair. Jack sat down. Ernest ruffled his hair.

“
This means I’ll be able
to make even more noise and I won’t be able to hear it,” Jack
said.

They all smiled, but the
smiles didn
’t touch their
eyes.

“
Are you hungry?” Liz
said.

Jack
didn
’t respond, and just looked at the
map.

“
Jack,” Liz
said.

The family shared a look
of concern.
Liz moved to Jack’s other
side.

“
Jack,” she
said.

He turned to look at her.

“
Are you hungry?” Liz
said.

“
Famished,” Jack
said.

Liz
’s mouth turned down as she moved to the oven. The
Robinsons all looked at Jack, saddened by his injury. Liz took a
deep breath, wiped her eyes and composed herself. She opened the
oven’s front door and brought out a plate using a tea towel. She
sat the plate before Jack on the dining table.

“
Be careful,” she said.
“The plate’s hot.”

Jack
picked up his knife and fork and tucked into his meal.
Francis ran to the desk in the corner of the room and returned with
something behind his back.

“
I made something for
you,” Francis said to Jack.

He brought his hand
out.
He held a piece of cardboard in the
shape of a shield. On it was written:

MEDAL OF HONOUR

TO: JACK ROBINSON

FOR OUTSTANDING BRAVERY

FROM: THE ROBINSON FAMILY

“
Mum helped me with the
spelling,” Francis said, “but I did all the colouring.”

“
That’s amazing,
Francis,” Jack said. “Thank you.”

Francis unhooked the
safety pin and pinned it to Jack
’s
T-shirt. Jack beamed.

“
We were just talking
about what we’re going to do next,” Liz said. “Either leave, or
stay and fight.”

“
Leave?” Jack said. “Why
would we leave?”

“
Some of us think it’s
the safer option,” Liz said.

Jack shook his head.

“
No,” he said. “We’ve got
to at least try. We’ve fought every day we’ve been here – against
the jackals, against the weather, against everything. Lurchers are
just another obstacle. In five months we haven’t had one Lurcher.
Then we have a storm and a boatload turns up. We’ll just have to
deal with it.”

There was a pause of
reflective silence.
Fritz
frowned.

“
Let’s put it to a vote,”
Liz said. “Those who want to evacuate?”

Bill and
E
rnest raised their hands.

“
Fritz?” Bill said.
“We’re voting here.”

“
I know,” Fritz
said.

“
Are you sure you don’t
want to put your hand up?”

“
Those who wish to stay
and make a stand?” Liz said.

Liz, Fritz, Francis and Jack
raised their hands.

“
There it is, then,” Liz
said. “Two to four. We stay and fight.”

Ten

Clumps of dirt flew
through the air and landed on a large mound. The late morning
sunlight glinted off the scratched
lip of
a shovel as another chunk of dirt flew through the air. Bill paused
and wiped a hand over his brow, his fingers came away wet and
dirty.

“
Let’s take a break,” he
said.

Bill threw
his shovel out of the hole he was in, reached
up, and pulled himself out. Ernest, on the other end of the hole,
followed. A stone flew from another hole, almost striking Bill in
the face. Bill peered into the hole.

“
Hey!” he said. “I said
let’s take a break!”

Liz and Fritz
stopped
, and leaned their shovels against
the dirt wall of their hole. Fritz climbed out, and then helped his
mother up. The men had their shirts off, looking like miners having
spent the day down the pit. Liz toiled under a thin T-shirt that
was soaked with sweat. The holes were ten feet long, four feet wide
and seven feet deep. Before them, spread out in a chessboard-like
pattern were a series of identical rectangular holes. The Robinsons
drank from bottles made from hard fruit skins and bamboo canes.
They sat on the edges of their pits, looking out at the
jungle.