Marion Lennox - Bushfire Bride

Something hit his legs-something alive. He looked down to see a half-grown collie pup whining in terror. Scratching at the door. Whining again…

Dear God.

The dog’s body language was unmistakable. She was inside.

For something that had threatened for so long, it was over with a speed that was frightening all by itself. One minute the population of Cowral was crouched in the shallows while the fire blasted its way right over their heads. The next the front had moved on. The air was still choked with smoke and debris but the roaring receded. The feeling that the very air required to breathe was being sucked away was replaced by the same choking, thick sensation that had been with them most of the day.

With the passing of the front the wind dropped. The fire had made its own wind. A vortex. That’s what the firefighters had said could happen and now Rachel believed them.

Toby was still cradled in her arms. Myra was beside them, their bodies a threesome of contact with the waves splashing over them in a rhythm that had been crazily undisturbed by the fire.

Rachel pushed back her blanket and peered cautiously out.

Around her everyone was doing the same-a field of grey, sodden ghosts arising from the ashes. Katy and her baby. The ancient Bridget, hauling back her blanket herself and peering out with an interest that belied her hundred years.

Casualties?

Sam was beside her, pushing himself out from underneath something that looked like a vast eiderdown. His wife was beside him. Sylvia Nieve still had a head full of hair-rollers and as she pushed back the eiderdown she gave them a cautious pat. Making sure of what was important.

‘Did everyone get to the beach?’ Rachel asked, and the cold feeling of dread in the pit of her heart felt like a lump of lead.

‘Elaine Baxter and Les Harding arrived just as it hit,’ Ian told her. ‘One of the men got bitten by one of Les’s cats. The cats are here in a cage-if someone hasn’t drowned them.’

‘But Hugo…?’ she asked.

‘He didn’t come back. He’ll have been well into the hills when it hit.’

‘Seeing his patient,’ Rachel said swiftly, as Toby turned a fearful face toward Sam. She had to stay calm. Hysterics would help no one. ‘There was a lady who’s ill up in the hills and your daddy has gone to look after her. And I need to go, too. Toby, can you stay with Myra while your daddy and I keep on working? I’ll see anyone here who needs help and then… Sam, how long do you think before we can get through to Sue-Ellen’s place?’

‘I’ll check with the fire chief,’ Sam told her.

‘As soon as it’s safe to move, let me know,’ Rachel told him. She gave Toby a hard hug, as much to reassure herself as to reassure Toby. ‘Hugo might… Hugo might need help.’

‘The chief’ll send a tanker.’

‘I’ll come, too.’

She worked solidly on the beach, coping with breathing difficulties and myriad minor injuries while she waited for the fire chief to declare it safe to travel through the town to Sue-Ellen’s farmlet beyond.

‘I can’t believe how lightly we’ve got off.’ The chief, a grizzled man in his fifties, pushed back his hard hat and wiped his forehead as he surveyed the clearing beach. ‘The storm sucked everything up in its path but we’ve done such a good clearing job around the town that we’ve only lost four houses. And they were holiday accommodation where no one followed orders to clear.’

Once the firestorm had passed, the townsfolk streamed back to their homes in time to put out spot fires and stop the fire from taking hold. Now the main front had reached the point where land became sea. Cowral was still surrounded by a ring of fire but increasingly the town looked safe.

But Hugo…

‘Can we go?’ Rachel finished wrapping a burned arm with a sterile dressing. A burning branch had been flung into the shallows at the height of the fire-it must have been blown for a quarter of a mile-but the child who’d been hit was already aching to get back to the excitement. Rachel clipped the dressing, gave the boy’s parents a rueful grin and turned back to the fire chief.

‘You don’t want to go with us, Doc,’ he told her. ‘I’ve got Gary Lewis on the truck already-he’s been out on the front and when he found out Sue-Ellen didn’t make it to the beach he nearly went berserk. There’s one of you emotionally involved.’

‘And you’re not?’

He met her look square on. And sighed.

‘Yeah,’ he admitted. ‘Of course I am.’

‘Then what are we arguing over?’ She was dressed in her firefighting gear. Toby was safe with Myra. There was no one else needing urgent treatment. And somewhere out there was Hugo.

She definitely needed to go.

But still the fire chief hesitated. ‘Doc…’

‘What?’

‘You’re not seeing this at its worst,’ he told her. ‘The river’s blocked the worst of the blast here. If we were right before the front…’

She gazed at his grim face and saw the message he was trying not to tell her. ‘You’re telling me there’s little chance Hugo’s survived?’

‘The boys are trying to clear the road now,’ he told her. ‘We’ll let you know.’

‘No.’ She straightened her shoulders in an unconscious brace position. ‘I’m a doctor. He… They may be hurt.’

His eyes met hers. Giving her the truth. ‘To be honest, Doc, the chances are that they’re a lot more than hurt.’

‘I know. But if not… I’m bringing medical supplies and I’m coming.’

Sue-Ellen Lesley lived five minutes’ drive out of town but it took two fire crews half an hour to reach it. Once outside the town boundaries there was thick bush-or what was left of thick bush. Now there was simply smouldering fire.

Eucalypts burned fast. The trees were already starting to smoulder rather than flame and the smell of burning eucalyptus oil was overpowering. Branches had dropped across the road. Trees were down. Every obstacle they reached had to be dealt with slowly-flames put out and the wood cooled enough to shift. Two fire crews worked in tandem, with a water tanker ferrying water as needed.

By the time they reached the tiny farmhouse where Sue-Ellen lived, Rachel was almost ready to scream.

‘You sure you’re not needed back in town?’ The fire chief’s face was grim as they rounded the last corner. Rachel had been working as hard as any of his team, joining the hard manual labour that had been needed to clear the road. She was working as one of his crew but there were personal issues here. He could see it. The set look on her face had him worried.

He was worried anyway. One of his boys was emotionally involved with Sue-Ellen and Gary was making himself sick with worry. And as well as Sue-Ellen… Well, this was Doc McInnes. Hell.

‘If I’m needed, they’ll contact me,’ Rachel told him shortly. ‘Elly knows where I am, and the radio network is still operational. But there’s nothing back in town but heat exhaustion and dehydration, and Elly and Don and David can cope with that.’

‘But-’

‘Don’t fight me on this,’ she told him. ‘We’re wasting time. Just get there.’

And then the farmhouse was in view. Or what was left of the farmhouse.

Nothing.

The tiny farm cottage looked almost as if it had been vaporised-sucked into thin air with only a smouldering slab remaining where the house had once stood. Even the chimney had collapsed in on itself and was now a low mound of crumbling, smoking brick.

Nothing could have survived this.

Hugo…

Rachel caught her breath. There was a car parked beside the wreck. Or what was left of a car.

A big old family sedan.

Hugo’s car.

Rachel was out of the truck before it stopped. Staring.