Frogmouth (27 page)

He was shooting. She was running along the catwalk with the machete and the big gun like some sort of tiny child dressed in her father's clothing and, aiming carefully, shooting above and behind her to herd her away from Auden, Feiffer was to one side of the open doorway with O'Yee with his arm outstretched shooting round after round, placing the shots, punching holes in the roof He saw her shadow running. He saw her start to turn and, reloading, he fired round after round up at her—yards away—and turned her back and sent her running again. She was covered in blood. Above her, there were shadows, shapes as the last of the birds crashed into walls in panic or took flight and somersaulted, all their strength gone, and fell down over the catwalk and died on the hard stone floor. She was armed. She had the big Webley from Quarantine and the machete. Lim was dead. All he had to do was order, "Kill her!" and— He saw her reach the end of the catwalk and turn into shadows. He heard her start to come down another metal stairs in the darkness. All he had to do was— Feiffer yelled, "Bill, I can't see her! Keep down! Get Auden!"

"I'm all right!" On the stairs, Auden shouted, "I can see! I'm all right! It was the flash!" He was going back down the stairs with the shotgun at port. Auden, clattering down the metal risers, yelled, "I can see her! She's on the other stairs going down!" Auden, getting a quick bead on her as she ran and following her along the aiming rib of the shotgun like a clay pigeon falling down from its parabola, yelled to Feiffer, "Boss?"

It was O'Yee. At the doorway, before he could give an order, O'Yee shrieked, "Don't shoot!" He was by Lim's body with his fists clenched like a child. O'Yee shrieked, "It's a little kid! For Christ's sake don't kill her!"

"
Boss?
" She was going into the shadows. Auden, his finger on the trigger, not wanting to squeeze, starting to squeeze automatically, setting himself up for the order, demanded, "Boss! Harry? Yes or no?"

"No!" She was gone. She was gone into the shadows. Running toward them, his own gun still out, reloading as he went, Feiffer tried to count the shots. She had a six-shot Webley. She had fired one—two . . . She had fired one, maybe two rounds at Lim. Outside, as the car got to the factory he had heard one. Three shots. She had fired three. She had three left. Feiffer, running, crunching over bones and dead rats and birds, ordered Auden, "Go to Spencer!" He saw Spencer smash open another boarded window and send a shaft of light straight down. Feiffer yelled, "Get all the windows out! Get some goddamned light in here!" He thought he lost her. He had seen her only as a shadow. Getting to the bottom of the stairs, shoving broken bamboo cages and packing cases out of the way, there—in that instant—he saw her.

Feiffer said in a gasp, "
Oh my God!
"

There were dead birds and rats everywhere. There were holes in the walls where the birds had bitten through to the old gas pipes and killed everything that came out of there. O'Yee, every muscle in his body shaking as the light seemed to come down in suddenly lit dusty shafts one by one, said to no one, to someone, to Lim, "I thought it was something from a—" His hands were covered in blood. The blood was drying, caking. O'Yee, walking through the shafts of light, said over and over, "I came to help. I told you to wait outside. I did! I told you to wait outside!" There was some sort of dead bird on the floor in front of him, something with broken wings and talons and a twisted beak—some sort of hawk or sea eagle or kite, torn apart like something dead on the road, gutted and devoured by carrion. O'Yee, walking, going nowhere, said shaking his head, "
I came to help!
" He was dead. Lim was dead. O'Yee, shaking his head, trying to make it mean something, shrieked at the top of his voice, "
He's dead!
"

She was like something from hell. She had no face. Her face had been torn apart by the birds. Only the eyes were there. In the shafts of light the eyes were shining. She was tiny. In the outsized bloody coveralls, she was so small that the machete in her left hand dragged along the ground. She was a tiny child dressed up playing at soldiers with a wooden sword. He saw the gun in her hand. Her hand was a claw, with the blood, dark and unrecognizable. He almost— He almost went forward to take the gun from her because it was too heavy. Feiffer, lowering his own gun, taking a single step toward her, saw her. She was an
amok
. He had heard about them: he had heard stories from people who had served in Malaya. He had heard them say that there was no choice, that when it began, when the eyes glazed and everything locked and all there was was the killing, that the only thing to do was to shoot for the head and—

All he had to do was raise his gun and kill her.

All he had to do was—

He saw, in the shafts of light, the red haze about her the old Malaya hands had spoken of. He saw the gun, the machete. He saw her eyes. The eyes held him. She had no face. He saw only, as she seemed to turn and look at him, her long black hair pinned back.

Feiffer said, "Oh my God . . ."

He saw the pin that held back her girl's hair.

She was fourteen years old.

He saw the pin she put in her hair to hold it back, to look pretty. He saw—

All he had to do—

She was not his. In the cocoon, he still lived. In the cocoon, he was still there with her. It was still that day. It was still the day they had all gone to Yat's. It was the day he had told her things about the birds and the animals and held her hand. It was still the day her mother had carried a camera around her neck and watched as he told her things about all the birds and animals and how they lived.

It was the day she had waited while her mother had said something to him.

"I wish—" She was sitting in the Wishing Chair with the lovely old dog asleep beside her. She was the only one waiting for the Wishing Chair. She was the only one there for the dog to come up to and fall asleep by and dream his dreams of bones and pats.

'Take my picture—"

She had waited there, waited there, waited there.

She saw his face change as her mother told him something and then walk away.

"Take my picture—"

She saw him look at her and she saw his face change.

She smiled at him and pointed to the dog, but it was no good because her mother had said something to him and he didn't like dogs or birds anymore.

He came to her and looked hard at her face.

"Take my picture . . ."

The look on his face made her cry.

Mother: Mata Idris, New China Apartments, North Point
. She had read it on her record at the hospital when nobody was looking.

Father: Unknown
.

"Take my picture—"

The look on his face made her cry.

'Take my picture . . ."

He had never said another word to her from that day, to either of them.

'Take my picture!"

She died and left a blank sheet of paper. In the hospital, at night, listening at the door, she heard people laughing about it. One of them had a friend in the police. It was the night Sister. She had cut the article out of the newspaper and given it to her.

"Take my—"

He thought he saw an Elephant
That practiced on a fife:
He looked again, and found it was
A letter from his wife.
"At length I realize," he said,
"The bitterness of life."

She saw him standing there in the light. She saw him looking at her. She saw the gun in his hand, by his side.

"Take my picture—"

"Take my picture!"

She was writing on the back of it.

The girl, her face torn apart, her hair held up by a pin, trying to cry, said in a child's voice that stilled him, that drained all the feeling from his face, "
I don't know what it means!
"

"HARRY!" He was behind her with the shotgun. Auden, the barrel of the weapon an inch from the back of her head, pointing down to execute something, said, "Harry!"

"
Leave her!
"

"Wai—" It was the name of the dog at Yat's.

Feiffer, trembling, said as he saw him come out of the shadows to one side of her with his gun drawn, "Christopher—"

"Wai—"

He saw her start to turn, to look around.

Feiffer said softly, "Christopher . . ." He saw Spencer appear from nowhere and take the Webley gently from her hand. He saw him break it open. It was empty. He saw Spencer lean forward, lean down to her and take the machete.

"Christopher . . ." He saw O'Yee weeping.

"Wai . . ." She was fourteen years old with her hair held back by a pin. She had been hurt. She touched at her face. "Wai . . ." She was telling secrets to the dog.

Feiffer said quietly, "Christopher, take her."

"Wai . . ."

O'Yee said softly, "He's dead."

"Take her." He saw Auden's gun come down.

He was weeping. He looked sad.

Auden said softly, "I'm glad. I'm glad I didn't have to—" He looked at Spencer and, seeing his face, looked away and down to the floor.

Mata Idris said, "I'm lost, Wai, I can't find my way home."

There was a silence.

He had children of his own. They were now all grown up. O'Yee said softly, "It's all right."

He had come to help.

"Wai—" Mata Idris, wiping at her face and touching at her hair to be pretty for her father the day he had taken her to Yat's to tell her all about animals and birds—the day she had got pretty to have her photograph taken—said, smiling, "Wai, I was the only one here. I got to pat you all by myself." He took her hand. He squeezed it.

She said so softly he almost didn't hear it as he smiled, she thought wonderfully, at her, "Wai, today is my eleventh birthday. I'm going out with my mother and father to have my photo taken in the Wishing Chair—"

A
t night after Quarantine had caught and killed all the dying birds on the floor of the factory, it came out.

It was a
Podargus strigoides
: a tawny frogmouth. It was scruffy, ragged. In the darkness, flying fast, it went after the boy on the boat.

It would not make it. The boy was too far out to sea. It mattered not at all.

It was the thing that flew above the harbor: it was life, optimism, promise.

It was a denial of death. It was hope.

Out there, too high to see, untiring, it flew.

It soared
.