The Dog with Seven Names Read online

  ‘Too boggy at this time of year,’ Bluey agreed.

  ‘They must be desperate if they’re giving it a go.’

  From my hiding place, I heard an aeroplane circle the town. It was Jimmy’s Electra.

  ‘Send trucks to the airstrip,’ Doc shouted. ‘I’ll follow on the motorbike.’

  I hid under the hospital as Fred revved one of the trucks. A soldier ran to another. I watched their dust trails rise into the air as they sped away.

  The bombing news spread quickly. Soldiers brought mattresses and netting. Beds were dragged across the floor above me. The soldiers left, then came back with waterbags. Nurse Molly’s shoes click-clacked over the floorboards as she moved patients to the far end of the verandah. I heard trucks rumbling down the road and ran to the front gate, ready to greet them.

  A frightening smell stopped me.

  People were lying head to toe in the back of each truck. They were crying in pain.

  ‘Quick,’ Matron yelled.

  I slunk under the oleander bush as Molly ran to help Fred carry injured people into the yard. Doc moved between them. I watched him check each person then call instructions to Matron. Broken, bleeding patients filled the hospital. Some were tiny babies.

  Soon there were no spare beds. Jock and Bluey gave up their mattresses and sat stiffly on chairs. Fred spread clean sheets on the verandah floor. The patients who weren’t screaming stared into space. Their expressions made me shiver. I hid behind the bush and shuddered.

  Part of me wanted to run. Keep the ocean to one side, my instincts hissed, run to Elsie. But I was too frightened to move. I cowered in the shadows with my head between my paws, trying to block out the awful cries.

  There were so many hurt people. As Fred carried them past, I smelt their terror. My golden eyes saw strange flames dancing over water and I blinked until the firestorm went away. From my hiding place, I watched the nurses treat one patient, then run to another. Doc was in the midst of the madness, striding between the verandah and the operating room.

  Doc was acting brave, but I could smell his fear. I heard him taking big breaths of air and saw his hands opening and closing as he hurried past. I trembled, trying to understand.

  Jimmy’s Electra circled the hospital again, dipping its wings before landing. Fred drove away and brought back more hurt strangers. The Electra left, then returned with other patients. Another pilot staggered into the hospital. His name was Jack. He’d flown from Broome with more evacuees.

  ‘Did you see the bombing?’ Bluey asked.

  Jack flinched. ‘There were nine Zeroes, in three units of three. The enemy strafed all of the flying boats that were refuelling in Roebuck Bay and more at the airfield. I was lucky, I’d just taken off. One of the fighter planes saw me. He fired but missed by a few inches. I couldn’t shoot back. I’m weak with dengue fever and could barely steer the plane.’

  ‘How did you get away?’

  ‘I flew low, hugging the mangroves. The enemy pilot turned, ready to have another go, then he suddenly broke away. I didn’t wait to see where he was going. As soon as I gained altitude I headed south for Hedland.’ Jack put his head into his hands. ‘Those boats were crowded with families. The pilots must have seen the women and children jumping into the ocean, but they kept firing.’

  As Jack slumped to the floor, I scampered back to crouch behind the prickly bougainvillea.

  All day planes circled overhead. The one Fred called Lodestar brought more frightened people. Some said they’d travelled underneath the plane in a baggage compartment. They shook as they talked about their journey. At last the aeroplanes stopped. The smell of death and dying didn’t.

  The sky was darkening when Fred whistled for me and whispered, ‘You’re needed, Flynn.’

  Something about Fred’s voice frightened me. I didn’t want to leave my hiding place, but he coaxed me out with a piece of mutton.

  ‘Here, Flynn, have another piece,’ he said. ‘I’ll bet you haven’t eaten today.’

  I gobbled the food. Then Fred led me to the verandah. A boy was there. His wails raised my hackles. Even Dave’s pain, trapped under the blood wood branch, did not sound like this.

  Doc was trying to give the child an injection, but whenever anyone came near, the boy thrashed his legs and screamed louder. Fred’s hands shook as he held my collar. When he led me closer, I saw a face with blackened skin and a nose and mouth that looked all wrong. I stopped. The verandah was sticky beneath my paws.

  ‘There now, Hendrik,’ Matron soothed, ‘you’re safe here.’

  The boy kept calling a strange word, ‘Moeder, Moeder, Moeder.’

  I could feel the boy’s life force weakening.

  ‘We’re losing him …’

  ‘Hold up Flynn,’ Matron urged. ‘It’s worth a try.’

  Fred scooped me into his arms and held me beside the bed.

  ‘Look,’ he told the boy. ‘This is our hospital dog. Her name is Flynn. Do you have a dog at home, Hendrik? Can you see her golden eyes? Aren’t they interesting?’

  For a moment the boy stared into my eyes. And I saw terrible things. Boats on fire. Broken aeroplanes. A woman was screaming as she held a baby above burning waves. Then she began sinking. I wanted to look away, but the boy needed me. He stared into my eyes, gasping, until slowly his thrashing eased.

  ‘That’s it, Flynn,’ Matron encouraged. ‘Work your magic …’

  I felt Hendrik’s pain as Fred spoke. He was gabbling, saying anything to distract the boy, telling him how Doc had found me and how I’d helped Beth. I could see Hendrik cling to Fred’s voice, like the boy on the jetty had hung onto the lifebuoy. As Hendrik listened I stared into his eyes. Imagining hide-and-seek games on sunny days. Imagining Elsie and Christmas treats. Imagining hope.

  ‘Engel,’ the boy whispered.

  He stopped struggling and Doc pushed an injection into his arm. Hendrik’s breathing eased and his eyes closed.

  ‘Well done,’ Matron cried.

  I turned away. Dogs don’t like making eye contact. Staring is something pack leaders do – it’s safer to look aside unless you need to threaten. But Elsie had been right about my golden eyes. I’d seen horror in Hendrik’s eyes, flames and thunder which I didn’t understand, but my instincts told me the visions were real.

  Fred carried me outside. ‘Good dog,’ he said.

  I stumbled away from the blood and the pain, down the steps to curl against a verandah post. From there I watched Matron blink tears as she cut clothes from Hendrik’s burnt skin. She smoothed ointment over his wounds, then covered his skin with wet cloth and wrapped him in bandages. When Matron noticed me staring, she murmured, ‘You saved him, Flynn. Good dog.’

  For two days Doc, Matron and the nurses barely slept. A sour smell settled over the hospital. There were bodies in beds, on the verandah, on the floor. Some even lay in the yard. Doc spent all night in the operating room. His face was pale and exhausted. All the while I stayed with Hendrik. One side of his face and body was burnt, but his other side wasn’t. Hendrik’s wounds smelt dead, but his life spark flickered. As people hurried back and forth, I lay under his bed on the verandah. Each time the boy whimpered, I woofed, letting Hendrik know he wasn’t alone. It seemed to help. Matron told Molly that she didn’t think he’d live, but Hendrik was strong. I knew he would.

  Hendrik often woke up screaming and the only thing that settled him was Fred holding me beside the bed.

  ‘Engel,’ he whispered. ‘Niet gaan.’

  While Fred talked I looked into Hendrik’s eyes and imagined happy things for him. But when the woman and baby appeared, I had to look away.

  Fred couldn’t hold me up for long, because the hospital was too busy. But a few moments watching me was usually enough to help the boy sleep.

  Whenever he heard planes Hendrik shuddered. And there were a lot of planes.

  ‘Engel,’ he called, curling his weak fingers over my fur.

  I licked Hendrik’s good arm until he stopped
trembling. As I listened to the boy moan, I wondered about his family.

  ‘Moeder,’ he cried. ‘Moeder …’

  Was the woman in the sea his mother? And if that woman in Hendrik’s eyes was his mother, then where was she now?

  On day three, I heard Doc tell Matron that he believed Hendrik would live. My instincts agreed.

  More evacuees arrived.

  ‘Broome Hospital can’t cope,’ Everett said.

  ‘Nor can we,’ Fred replied.

  Every room was full. Matron complained that even the morgue was full. I’d never seen what was in the morgue room, but the smell reminded me of the way Dave smelt at the homestead, only worse.

  Patients that were well enough to travel were sent south on whatever plane was able to take them. The ones who were too sick to travel rested where they could. I heard patients cry for the women and children who’d been trapped inside their flying boats, and they cried for those who’d drowned trying to swim to shore. Fred said our patients were the lucky ones. They didn’t seem lucky to me.

  Lee Wah cooked and cooked, but there wasn’t enough food. Soldiers brought soup and carted water to top up Lee Wah’s waterbags. All day he kept refilling a huge pot of tea. As I lay under Hendrik’s bed I heard patients whispering about the Japs, how they’d attacked Wyndham and Broome on the same day. They said our soldiers weren’t ready for them, and they worried where the enemy would strike next.

  Each time a newspaper arrived, people crowded around Fred. Like Doc, he knew how to untangle the marks on the crackly paper. When Fred read about Western Australia ‘tasting the violence of war on its own soil’, I sniffed the red dirt then licked my muzzle, wondering about that taste as he continued.

  ‘Three of our towns in the north have been attacked by the Japanese,’ Fred said, ‘and the newspaper says we must be prepared for further raids.’

  He looked up and took a deep breath.

  ‘Go on,’ Jock said, and I smelt the old man’s fear and excitement. ‘Keep reading.’

  ‘These attacks should make us more determined to put every ounce of our energy into the war effort.’

  ‘Hear, hear,’ Bluey called. I heard his old heart thumping faster as Fred closed one newspaper and opened another.

  Hendrik was too sick to listen to Fred read. The only time he spoke to another human was when Matron came to change his bandages.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she told Hendrik, as she peeled cloth from his skin. ‘This will hurt.’

  ‘Moeder,’ he cried. ‘Kom en vind me.’

  No one answered and Hendrik reached for my fur with his good hand.

  ‘Engel,’ he whimpered. ‘Waar is Moeder?’

  I stayed as still as I could and let Hendrik feel my warmth. I would have done anything to help him find his mother.

  Fred drove patients to and from the airport when he wasn’t helping Matron. That’s where Fred collected the newspapers.

  One afternoon, Fred was reading the newspaper stories aloud to the patients and said that, ‘Allied planes went up to meet Broome’s six raiders, one of which was brought down … Broome, it is further revealed, suffered some casualties.

  ‘Some,’ Fred snorted, looking around. ‘That’s the understatement of the year!’

  The newspaper stories were often about things I didn’t understand. While Fred and the patients discussed them, I scratched my belly or snapped at sandflies, but when Fred spoke about Mr Litser, an eyewitness (whatever that was) saying the Japanese aeroplanes were like wasps, my ears pricked up.

  ‘Mr Litser reckons, They just darted back and forth like a lot of wasps,’ Fred said in a pretend-voice that made the patients smile, ‘… I didn’t realise it was an enemy raid until I saw smoke and flame spurt from the flying boats on the water.’

  My Elsie had once bumped into a wasp nest. The flying creatures attacked her even while I barked and jumped at them. I remembered the nasty droning sound of the wasps and how Elsie’s arm had swelled up. Those wasps were frightening, but they were smaller than my nose. How could Japanese planes be that tiny? None of the patients stopped Fred to ask, so I had to keep wondering.

  ‘It says that Mr Litser didn’t hear an air-raid warning,’ Fred continued, scanning the crinkly paper. ‘His camp overlooks the harbour but was at least half a mile from the raid. He says that he saw the whole thing and it didn’t seem to last more than about ten minutes.’ Fred looked up at the patients. He wasn’t using a funny voice now. ‘He heard one big explosion when a flying boat got into the air, but it was shot down.’

  One patient began crying. I wondered whether I should creep over and nuzzle the woman’s foot, or would that upset her more?

  ‘I saw that plane explode,’ she sobbed.

  Fred closed the newspaper. ‘I’m sorry, love,’ he said. ‘I didn’t think …’

  ‘No, please keep reading.’ The woman wiped her eyes. ‘We need to know.’

  A strange mood settled over the verandah. As Fred continued in a much softer voice, I sniffed the air, trying to understand the jumbling emotions. It was too confusing.

  ‘All right, it goes on to say that: Of the twenty-six years Mr Litser has lived at Broome, sixteen were spent in active pearling operations, in which he still has interests. Some of the Japanese, he said, know every yard of the north-west coast and far better than any white man. Bloody Japs,’ Fred growled. ‘Pardon the language, ladies, but some people reckon they’ve been making maps under our noses for years.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ Everett muttered, as he hurried past on his way to the radio hut.

  Everett’s anger reminded me of Doc’s words about the Japanese man who didn’t want Australia to be invaded. I sensed a connection, but couldn’t quite grasp it. Then I heard Matron’s shoes. My ears flattened. It was her keep out of my way footsteps. I woofed softly but Fred didn’t hear.

  Matron stepped onto the verandah and frowned at Fred. He dropped the newspaper and hurried back to work. Then Matron walked to Hendrik’s bed, repeating some of the strange words she’d learnt.

  ‘Het spijt me,’ Matron said. ‘I’m sorry, Hendrik. I need to change your bandages.’

  I smelt the boy’s panic. Although Matron was gentle with Hendrik, he screamed every time she treated his wounds. The young nurse, Molly, tried to calm him, but she gagged at the terrible smell and had to move aside. Matron glared at Molly’s trembling hands. I licked Molly’s leg from under the bed. Hendrik’s rotting skin made my nose quiver too. Molly took a deep breath and tried again.

  Matron spooned medicine into Hendrik’s mouth and his screams settled into quiet sobbing. Once he was asleep I slunk down the stairs. Hendrik’s sorrow felt heavy, and I needed to feel the earth under my paws.

  I padded towards Lee Wah’s kitchen. The stink of vegetables bubbling on the stove wasn’t nice, but it helped clear away the sharp hospital smells. Lee Wah slipped me some damper. I circled the yard a few times, then went back to Hendrik. He heard the tap tap of my claws on the verandah.

  ‘Engel,’ he whimpered, and I licked his healthy arm.

  When Matron finished her rounds, she took a moment to perch on the steps with a cup of tea. From my hiding place I heard her sigh as she eased off her shoes. Matron’s feet smelt strong, but I didn’t mind. I crept closer and nuzzled her toes. Matron laughed.

  ‘That’s where you got to, is it?’

  I woofed. I’d been listening to a rat scratching inside the wall. Matron kept setting traps in the wrong places and I wanted to catch it for her.

  ‘I don’t suppose you’ve eaten much during the past three days,’ Matron said, slipping me half her biscuit.

  I swallowed the treat then laid my head across Matron’s foot. She seemed pleased with the contact. Matron stroked my ears and told me I’d been a good dog. I loved it when she said that. We listened to the night birds call until Matron finished her tea. Then she bustled back to the patients.

  I stayed by Hendrik for days. Sometimes his hand squeezed me so hard that it hurt. Remember R
ivette, I thought, remember Rivette. Other times when Hendrik sobbed, the tears on his hand dripped onto my nose. I tried to stay still. It wasn’t easy.

  As soon as Hendrik was well enough to turn his head, he peered over the side of the bed at me. Once his lopsided face even smiled, but then the images returned. The things in Hendrik’s eyes scared me. There was smoke, fire and always the woman in the water calling his name.

  ‘Moeder,’ Hendrik cried. ‘Moeder.’

  Whenever Hendrik turned his worried eyes to me, I nuzzled the small parts of him that weren’t burnt. Hendrik must have once had a dog because he knew just where to tickle me. As his wounds crusted over, he stared into my eyes and I tried to be that dog for him. When Matron changed his dressings I stood steady, letting him grip my fur as hard as he needed. And I remembered Rivette …

  ‘Dankjewel Engel,’ he whispered.

  I was under Hendrik’s bed when Fred told a new patient about Gus Winckel. I’d already heard Gus’s story, but I pricked my ears to listen. The evacuees loved talking about that brave airman.

  ‘Well,’ Fred began. ‘Gus is a Dutch Air Force officer. Just a young fellow, but brave as they come. He was on the Broome airstrip, cleaning a machine gun when the Zeroes attacked. They say Gus grabbed a belt of ammo, raced out and stood on the tarmac shooting at the enemy planes. There was nowhere to mount the machine gun, so Gus rested the gun barrel on his forearm and fired from the hip.’ Fred whistled and I sat up. ‘The barrel would have been scorching hot,’ Fred continued, ‘but Gus didn’t stop shooting until he winged one of those Jap planes.’

  ‘What happened?’ Jock asked. ‘Did it crash?’

  ‘The plane was trailing a cloud of black smoke and Gus thinks he saw flames.’

  ‘That’s one less Zero that will come back.’

  ‘It is,’ Fred agreed. ‘Broome Hospital treated Gus for third degree burns, and you know better than me how painful that is.’ The patients nodded as Fred added, ‘I hear that people in Broome have taken to calling Gus “Wild Bill”.’