- we've been monitoring the hell out of the Russians. Ask Ben Trask about it some time.'
And Jake cut in, 'Well, at least I know something about all that: the way they dump their clapped-out subs, et cetera.''That's part of it,' Harvey agreed, 'but the rest of it is just as bad. Anyway, all that's away from the main subject, and in fact we were talking about - ?'
' - The big fire,' Jake reminded him. 'Until you went a bit off track.'Harvey nodded. 'Yeah, the Great Fire of Brisbane, 2007. It was around this time of year, and El Nino was up to its unusual tricks. The weather had been freakish everywhere, especially in the UK, England. For fifteen years the various water boards had been moaning about declining water tables. It could rain all it wanted during the winter, but given just three days of good old heartwarming sunshine in July and these jokers would start leaping up and down, and tearing their hair, and sticking in meters and standpipes, and demanding that people should save water by cutting down on their bathing and putting bricks in their water closet cisterns ... and so on, and so forth, ad infinitum. What a load of crap, zfyou could afford to take one! It was Nature all those years, warning us that the Big One was coming.'Well, in 2007 in England it came, and that year we didn't have a summer ...''It was washed out?' Jake felt obliged to ask. 'It was drowned out!' Harvey told him.'I seem to remember something about that,' Jake said. 'But I missed it. I was on the Continent.'
'But you must have read about it, seen it on TV?' 'I told you, I was doing my own thing. On the Continent.' 'Yeah,' Harvey agreed. 'About the only place in the world where the weather was moderately normal. You were lucky. But in England it rained, and rained, and rained! And as for declining water tables: forget it. There's been no shortage of water ever since. Anywhere below sea level turned into a swamp. The Thames Barrier failed, and high tides combined with a flooded river to drown the city six feet deep. Through July, August, and September - shit, there were gondolas in Oxford Street! Okay, so I'm exaggerating - maybe it wasn't quite as bad as all that, but it was bad enough. And I could go on and on. Except ...' He paused again.
'Except that was the UK,' Jake helped him out. 'And thepeople had plenty of warning, and there was little or no loss of life. Yes, I remember it now. But we were talking about Brisbane, not quite so close to home.''Not just Brisbane,' the other told him. 'In 2007 it was Australia as a whole. Now, you've got to remember that in Australia the climate works backwards to how we'd expect back home. It's way hotter in January than in July: the difference between summer and winter, right? Oh, really? Well, in 2007 everything went wrong. From February on the summer weather held, there was no winter and it didn't get any colder. Just like now, in fact exactly like now, they had the freakiest of freak weather.'Turning his head, Harvey gazed out through the limo's one-way windows at suburbs becoming city. 'I mean, just take a look out there.'Jake looked, lifted an enquiring eyebrow. 'Well?''Dry, brittle, parched. Those gardens that should be green are more like miniature deserts. The grass is withered to straw and the leaves are dead on the trees and bushes. Almost all the swimming pools are empty, and you won't see anyone watering any lawns. It should be a maximum of sixty, sixty-five degrees Fahrenheit out there, but it's well over eighty, and this is late afternoon. And naturally, it's an official drought. Perfect!''Perfect for what?' Now Jake was really puzzled ... not to mention tired of this circuitous route they were taking to the Great Fire.
'Earth Year!' said Harvey. 'The big conference that starts tomorrow right here in Brisbane, billed as the ultimate ecological summit meeting. Synchronicity at work again, or maybe not. Naturally they chose this place, because of the fire.'
'Well, you've lost me again,' Jake told him. 'And we still haven't got to the fire itself.'
The other shrugged apologetically. 'I'm sorry - it's this grasshopper mind of mine. Start me on a subject, it devours me. Okay, the fire: