Underground (16 page)

‘I gotta say,’ my companion observed, ‘I’m a little surprised that your government is standing for all this hoopla. I mean, it’s a bit subservient, don’t you think? A bit
too
willing?’

I agreed, some relic of national pride stirring inside me.

‘It’s one thing to be polite hosts,’ he added, ‘but I’m not sure this is really the right way to get respect for your country.’

Still, there was nothing to be done now except watch the show. And quite a show it turned out to be—to which the evening news here in Australia, and internationally too, later testified. Oh, the start was smooth enough—Bush swanning in to thunderous applause, with back pats and handshakes all round. A heart-warming speech from the PM (and a slightly less excited one from the Opposition Leader, who was getting no kudos out of this at all). Fine and dandy to that point, but then came the President’s own address, and the famous interruption by two Greens senators, leaping up with questions about Australian citizens stuck in Guantanamo Bay. Chaos! Howling outrage from the Speaker. The attempt to throw the senators out of the chamber. The scuffle in the upper seats when the senators refused to leave. The fuming brow on the Prime Minister. The smooth wink of George W., and his laughing reply of ‘I love free speech.’ And then, at the end, the running battle as the government members joined ranks to prevent the departing President being mobbed by Greens with petitions.

My American friend was in hysterics. ‘You’d never see
this
back home,’ he said through his tears.

Indeed. And no one outside the chamber would have seen it at all, if not for that American news crew with their contraband video camera. Oh, the scandal about that—from the Speaker, because his ban on cameras had been circumvented; from the government, because the Greens had embarrassed the entire nation; and most of all, from the Australian media, because
they
hadn’t been able to sneak a camera in, and had to steal the footage from American broadcasts.

My brother had been right in the thick of it, part of the human wall thrown up to block the Greens, and I’d been
delighted to see him jostled and angry. I had no expectation of actually speaking to him that day, however, seeing I wasn’t invited to any of the more intimate functions he’d be attending. But when we emerged from the gallery and made our way towards the exit, I was surprised to see Bernard wandering around in the public area of the foyer. He was in the company of another man—an American, I guessed, even from a distance.

‘My brother,’ I said to my companion, pointing.

‘I see.’ Then his eyes narrowed. ‘Hey, look who’s with him.’

‘Who?’

‘That’s Nate Harvey. He’s the Assistant Secretary for Homeland Security, back in the States. Making quite a name for himself.’

Ah. So Bernard was hanging out with his US counterpart, security specialists the both of them. Perfectly natural, of course. But the sight impressed me somehow. The two men were simply ambling about the floor, gazing at the departing crowd as they conversed, and yet it was a glimpse of my brother in a way I hadn’t seen him before. He was with a high-powered American official, and yet he looked very much the other man’s equal. Not the usual dull, insipid Bernard at all.

We met them in the middle of the foyer, and introductions were made. ‘Nate,’ said Bernard, hand on the Assistant Secretary’s shoulder in an avuncular fashion. ‘This is my brother Leo. My older brother. By fifteen minutes.’

Laughter all around. And this was weird, because I knew for a fact Bernard
hated
being my little brother. Still, Nate was pleased to meet a fellow American, and it turned out he and my friend had acquaintances in common, and gossip to trade. Which left Bernard and I to talk between ourselves for a moment.

‘Bit of a mix-up, back there in the House,’ I said.

Even that couldn’t wipe the smile from Bernard’s face. ‘The Greens made fools of themselves. You wait. The papers will crucify them.’

(And he was right, they did.)

I had another dig. ‘So meanwhile it’s your job to be tour guide for Nate here, is it? Got nothing better to do than babysit Americans?’

He laughed at me. ‘Nothing better at all.’

‘You two do seem very friendly.’

‘Oh, we go way back, Nate and I. He’s staying at my place.’

And it was the way he said it—I had a flash of comprehension. They really
were
old friends. No doubt it stemmed from all those tours Bernard had made to the US, but his relationship with this American bigwig was a cosy one. They liked each other. And finally I grasped why Bernard had been appointed to such a crucial position. Not only was he a loyal advocate of the war on terror. He was
connected
—with the Republicans, with the White House, with US security. And in the new world order, there was no connection more useful or more important.

Intriguing.

But soon enough Bernard and Nate were called away to more august company, and my American friend and I were left to wade our way out of Parliament House, and then down through the barricades again in search of a taxi.

‘So what did Nate think of the Greens?’ I asked. ‘Pretty disgraceful, from an American point of view, I’d think.’

‘He thought it was a good thing, actually.’

‘Really? How?’

‘Well, it makes the whole process look robust, doesn’t it? We might be monstering your government about the war and taking over your streets, but there’s still free speech, right? Like the President said.’

‘It’s hardly free speech if you get dragged out of the chamber for your trouble. Or when your capital city has been turned into a fortress around you.’

He laughed. ‘It’s true, Nate was just saying how Canberra is a security dream. The easiest place in the world to lock down. Small population. Centralised design. Miles from anywhere, off in the bush. Only three highways in and out. It might have been designed for a day like this.’

‘I don’t think that’s quite what Walter Burley Griffin had in mind.’

We were coming down to the lake, and ahead of us the Captain Cook fountain was spearing into the air.

My companion turned thoughtful. ‘No. But he’s a perceptive man, that Nate. You watch him. He’s not destined to just be Assistant Secretary forever. I hear he’s running for State Governor soon. And after that, who knows?’

Prophetic words, as it happened.

Sadly, the day itself turned out to be a waste of my time, because my American friend decided not to invest with me after all. Still, it was something to see the President in person, if only from up in the gallery. Moreover, events would reveal that I hadn’t merely
seen
a US president that day—I’d actually shaken hands with one. And by the time Nathaniel Harvey had risen to the highest office in America, who would be holding the highest office in Australia other than his bosom buddy, my own little baby brother.

A hangover was kicking in as we made for the Queensland–New South Wales border. Not a
proper
hangover, I hadn’t drunk nearly enough at the cricket for that. This was more a slow and unpleasant sobering up. The creeping return—after all the fuss at the Gabba, and the frantic rush out of there—to the cold realities of life on the run. Another false identity, and another secret journey to who knew where.

We were riding through the night in a battered old Humvee. It was the property of the Australian Army, and it wasn’t like any of the luxury Hummers I’ve ridden in over the years. This was no hotel room on wheels—this was the basic military model, as stark and simple as you can get. And hard on the backbone. But then we were soldiers now, not soft civilians, Aisha, Harry and I—all of us dressed up in fatigues, and each bearing the distinguished rank of corporal.

Our cover story was that we were a team of communications experts, setting out to tour satellite facilities in regional areas. To that end, we not only had new IDs in our pockets, we also had military transit passes that were good to take us through any roadblock we might encounter in the next thousand kilometres. We would never have got out of Brisbane without them. The explosion at the cricket had sent the whole city into lock down. But there we were, already clear of the outer suburbs and heading south-west on the Cunningham Highway.

I was in the back, with Aisha. She’d scrubbed off the ludicrous make-up of her previous disguise, and dumped the jewellery, but with her styled hair and pale skin and narrow face, she made an unlikely soldier. Not that I was any better—a fat fifty-nine year old with not an ounce of muscle on me. Harry, up front, at least looked the part. But only the fourth member of our group, the driver, was genuine—a shaven-headed, gravel-voiced warhorse of a staff sergeant whose first name, Daphne, gave a rare clue that she was, in fact, a woman.

‘A bomb,’ Harry was still muttering, shaking his head and turning around repeatedly to glare at Aisha. ‘A fucking bomb.’

It wasn’t the bomb itself that bothered him—it was that Aisha had known about it. Harry was regarding her with a whole new air of puzzlement and worry now. So was I. Ever since the detonation, she’d had a look of creamy satisfaction on her face, a sort of distant smile that seemed, to me at least (sex-starved old fart that I am), almost post-coital. It was downright sinister. And a timely reminder about who she really was—a terrorist, sworn to violence, mad, and kind of beautiful, but above all else, highly dangerous. And important. Both to the authorities who wanted her dead, and to people like Harry who were trying to keep her alive.

‘Woman,’ he warned, ‘when the high command get hold of you, they’re gonna
grill
your arse. You know a lot more than you’re telling.’

Aisha merely considered him with languid contempt.

I said to her, ‘Just for interest’s sake, are there any more bombs we should know about? I’d prefer to avoid them, if possible.’

‘There will always be bombs. Until we win.’

‘Win what exactly?’

‘A united world of Islam.’

‘And then what? Are you going to put on that veil thing and become a good Muslim wife to some man and never show your face in public?’

A smouldering glance. ‘A united world of
new
Islam.’

‘There you go again,’ said Harry. ‘And I’d love to know where you’re getting it from. None of your terrorist buddies are talking about a
new
Islam. They seem pretty damn stuck on the
old
Islam. And they like things like the veil.’

‘Western propaganda.’

‘Who are your mullahs, then? Where do they come from? The Middle East? Indonesia?’

‘My teachers weren’t Arabs. Or Indonesians. They were white Australians.’

‘Like who?’

But Aisha was done with the conversation.

‘Well, screw you too,’ Harry said, and gave up.

We rode in silence for a mile or so. Then Aisha spoke, softly. ‘There are no more bombs that I know of. At least, not where we’re going.’

I followed her eyes to watch the highway rolling underneath the headlights, the night darkness all around. Where
were
we going? South, that was all we’d been told. Somewhere south, where the leaders of the Oz Underground were waiting for us, whoever they were. Then I found myself staring about at the interior of the Humvee, dully lit from the dashboard. I was sitting, in effect, in the very heart of the beast—the bosom of
an army that was now my enemy—and yet I was safe. And the implications of that were only just starting to hit me.

‘How on earth did the OU pull this off?’ I asked Harry. ‘How can the Australian Army be part of the resistance?’

He turned to look back at me. ‘Not all of the army, just some of it.’

Our driver stirred. ‘Those of us with any fucking balls, anyway.’

I said, ‘But the military should love this government. Army, air force, navy—they’ve never been bigger or more powerful or better funded.’

The woman gave a snort. ‘Size ain’t everything, darlin’.’

Harry smiled. ‘Daphne here is regular army.’

‘Thirty years coming up next month. When I joined we had maybe sixty thousand personnel in the whole Defence Force. Small, but bloody professional.’

‘Now look what we have,’ said Harry. ‘Over three hundred thousand personnel, but most of those conscripted, and next to useless. They’re spread thin, too, with all these wars we’re fighting, not to mention home security. The truth is the ADF is being run ragged, and morale is at rock bottom.’

The sergeant gave me a glance in the rear-view mirror. ‘I’ve got mates overseas, and what I hear isn’t good. It’s the same old shit. Wars we can’t win. Peacekeeping where everyone hates our guts. The troops mostly strung out on drugs or booze. Whole companies refusing orders. Officers beaten up or shot in the back or just told to fuck off. Discipline’s a joke.’

Harry was nodding. ‘Then there’s the ideological aspect. The Australian military used to be completely apolitical. These days, though, if you aren’t a vocal supporter of government policy, then you don’t go up the chain of promotion.’

‘Thirty fucking years served,’ repeated Daphne, ‘with distinction. I was in the first two Gulf wars. Then some secret
service queer in a suit sits me down and says I have to take a loyalty test. Or else. Stick it up your arse, I said.’

‘She’s not alone,’ Harry added. ‘The military have been in on the Underground pretty much from the start. The navy was first. That whole asylum seekers scare, the boat people, back in the Howard days—the navy really didn’t like what they were made to do. They’re
sailors
, and sailors have rules. You don’t ignore people in a sinking boat. You don’t fire warning shots at them. You don’t have debates about whether to save swimmers in the water. You sure as hell don’t wait until you get approval from Canberra before you send in a rescue party. Those guys all know that one day
they
might be the ones in the drink . . . And they’ll expect someone to help, not tell them they’re breaching an immigration zone.’

‘That’s nothing,’ Daphne declared. ‘The things I saw in Iraq, second time around, no one in Australia would believe. It was like every fucking thief and liar in the world descended on that poor bloody country and ate the place alive.’