Read Online The War of Immensities by Barry Klemm - Free Book Online

there had to be psychological
problems with people who walked off piers.
    “I’m fine,
really,” she insisted, waving her one shoe at them to keep them at
bay. Then, finally, everyone calmed down and began to laugh about
it.
    “It’s silly. I
just... fell in.”
    “You’re all
wet. You’ll catch cold,” the old Maori was saying—only he dared
advance now.
    “I’ll be fine,”
she insisted, still holding her shoe as if the stiletto heel was a
sword.
    She looked at
the place where she had fallen. It was too silly to believe, but
she knew she had to believe it. She smiled at the old Maori, and
then raised her arm, pointing.
    “Tell me, which
direction is that?”
    “West. Sun sets
over here. That way is due west.”
    “Bit over
west,” corrected the young bloke who obviously regretted having
missing his chance to rescue her. “Maybe West Nor West.”
    “No. West,” the
old man said.
    She looked
West. That was where she had been going all right.
    “But what’s
over there?”
    “Te Atatu,” one
said.
    “Kumeu
Motorway,” said another.
    “Further than
that,” she asked, because she knew it was!
    “West coast,”
the young wouldbe hero said.
    “The sea,” the
old Maori added.
    “There must be
something else,” she demanded, because she knew there had to
be.
    “Nope. Tasman
Sea, all the way to Australia.”
    “Australia,”
she echoed, wrinkling her nose distastefully.
    It was time to
get out of there, and with a last thankful expression, she decided
to turn and walk, giving them their final thrill for the day. She
actually heard the collective intake of breath and stopped, turning
sideways, grinning, waggling a finger at them. They all smiled back
as well they might.
    She paused one
moment more, to complete the scene. In her hand, she still held her
shoe and she regarded it now, and then threw it out into the
water.
    “Why’d you do
that?” the old Maori asked.
    “Well, if
someone finds the other one, now they’ll have a pair,” she
grinned.

*

    Fairhaven
Hospital inhabited one of the finest old mansions along the
escarpment that overlooked the wide estuary of the Swan River and
the metropolis of Perth on the other side. It was used as a
convalescent home for those who could pay and was considered to
possess the best facilities available in Western Australia. Around
the building—classified A by the National Trust—was a tall iron
fence and at the front heavy gates, although these days they
operated automatically from both inside the building and a small
guard post where a hired security guard was always on duty.
    After all,
within the premises were more than thirty people who were well
worth the efforts of a kidnapper or terrorist. A former Prime
Minister, a world famous author, a distinguished British General
and an aged film star were to be numbered amongst the inmates, in a
hospital where the staff behaved more like butlers and maids than
the medical teams of most hospitals.
    No terrorist,
nor kidnapper, nor even assassin—as a potential murderer of one of
the patients might have been regarded—had ever attempted to
penetrate Fairhaven’s walls, but still the security remained
vigilant and efficient. Even if, for the period of about a week,
their most critical duty seemed to be the interception of a noted
lawyer trying to escape the grounds in his motorised wheelchair. He
tried it three or four times a day, and never once got past the
gate. But that did not deter him in the slightest.
    “But really, Mr
Solomon. Where do you think you’re going?”
    “Somewhere
else,” Joe Solomon said grimly as they wheeled him back inside.

*

    Slowly,
methodically, as was his way, he began to piece it all together. At
first it seemed that it had not happened at all—he remembered none
of it—but then, when he concentrated and worked it over in his
brain, it began to come back to him. Still it did not seem real,
and in fact the only way he could be sure that he had made the
journey at all was