Unless Malcolm had planned it that way.
“It is with gratitude and humility,” Malcolm was saying solemnly now to the other cane toads, “that I accept your invitation to take his place as your leader.”
Limpy felt like his warts were going to explode. He kicked and wriggled, flailing his arms, trying to tear himself off the tree so he could hop across the clearing in a huge furious semicircle and tell everyone what Malcolm had done.
But all Limpy managed to do was get one of his hands stuck to the tree as well.
Malcolm was still speaking. What Limpy heard next made him jolt with shock so violently that his hand ripped away from the tree.
“Limpy was much loved by us all,” said Malcolm, “and we will always remember him. He was a close personal friend of mine, even though he was a bit pushy at times.”
Was?
Limpy stared across the clearing.
Malcolm was standing next to another mound of earth.
Mum and Dad and Charm and Goliath were sobbing so hard now, Limpy could see their shoulders shaking even at that distance.
Stack me, thought Limpy, stunned. They think I'm dead too.
“In the absence of Limpy's body,” Malcolm was saying, “which after a thorough search of the area we've failed to locate and which we assume was taken by the human to be made into a handbag or something, Limpy's family would like to commemorate him with some of his things.”
Limpy watched in anguish as Mum and Dad and Charm and Goliath moved unsteadily forward one by one and gently placed familiar objects on his grave.
His collection of soft drink cans.
His newspaper and magazine scraps.
His sun-dried chicken bones.
All the precious things he'd collected that had been chucked from passing vehicles.
Limpy couldn't stand it. His poor dear family, racked with grief and misery. Suffering all that pain over his death when he wasn't even dead.
Yet.
Desperately, Limpy struggled to free himself from the sticky sap. He had to let them know he was still alive. Then he remembered the virus germs and stopped struggling.
It's better this way, he thought. If they think I'm dead, they won't come looking for me and put themselves at risk.
But it wasn't that much better. They were still in danger from the scientists, and Limpy couldn't even warn them.
“Now that,” said a voice, “is bad luck.”
Limpy looked around.
“You reckon you're unlucky,” said the voice. “Just because your folks think you're dead and you're not. That's not unlucky. This is unlucky.”
Limpy felt something tickling him and looked down and saw that the voice belonged to a flying beetle that had got stuck to the back of his hand.
“One cane toad in fifty million square kilometers with sticky sap on his fist,” said the beetle, “and I fly into it. Okay. That much bad luck you can't beat. I give up. Eat me.”
Limpy stared at the beetle. Suddenly he had an idea that made his warts light up.
“Tell you what,” said Limpy.“If you'll do something for me, I won't eat you.”
“Anything,” said the beetle. “As long as it doesn't involve selling cigarettes to children.”
Limpy pointed across the clearing at Goliath. “See that big cane toad?” he said. “Not the really big one with the smug expression, the fairly big one sobbing and trying to console himself with a mouthful of bog worms. I want you to give him a message.”
The beetle nodded.
“Tell him,” said Limpy, “that all cane toads are in great danger and that he must get everybody away from Malcolm and head east and find the national park as quickly as possible.”
“Right,” said the beetle. “Danger, away from Malcolm, east, national park. Shall I say who the message is from?”
“Tell him it's from Limpy,” said Limpy quietly. “Say I gave you the message just before I died.”
The beetle gave Limpy a strange look.
“Okeydoke,” said the beetle. “You're the one not eating me.”
Limpy carefully unstuck the beetle from his hand. The beetle hovered in front of Limpy's face for a moment, beaming with gratitude.
“Boy,” he said. “This is my lucky day.”
Limpy didn't take his eyes off the beetle as it flew across the clearing. For a brief moment he thought it was going to Malcolm by mistake, but it veered away and hovered in front of Goliath.
“Give him the message,” whispered Limpy. “Give him the message.”
He saw Goliath spot the beetle and look pleasantly surprised and lean forward close enough to hear what the beetle was about to say.
Limpy sighed with relief.
Then Goliath's tongue shot out and the beetle vanished into his mouth.
Limpy didn't take his eyes off the twenty-sixth beetle as it flew across the clearing.
The beetle reached Goliath and hovered in front of him.
Limpy whispered the words he'd whispered twenty-five times before.
“Give him the message.”
Before the beetle could speak, Goliath looked amazed at his own repeated good fortune and his tongue shot out for the twenty-sixth time.
“No,” groaned Limpy.
He gave up trying to get a message to his family.
For a while he slumped dejectedly, his back throbbing painfully against the sticky bark of the tree. Then he noticed something else happening across the clearing. Malcolm was unfolding a map and holding it up in front of the assembled cane toads.
Limpy stared. It looked like one of the scientist's maps. How had Malcolm got it?
“Attention, everyone!” said Malcolm. “We will be leaving for our new home at sunset.”
Limpy's mouth fell open. What was going on? Had Malcolm heard about the national park? Was he going to lead the cane toads there?
Glands twitching hopefully, Limpy squinted across the clearing, trying to see exactly where Malcolm was pointing on the map. It was no good. Goliath kept pulling big creepers down in front of the map and sucking leeches off them.
“I will lead you to a place,” Malcolm was saying, “where cane toads can live in peace and safety forever.”
Yes, thought Limpy, warts tingling with relief.
He watched the assembled rellies discuss this among themselves. Most of them still looked numb from the shock of the four-wheel drive and the sadness of the funerals. Even so, they seemed pretty keen on the idea. All except Goliath, but he probably just had indigestion.
A voice rang out. “What direction are we going, Mighty Malcolm?”
Limpy smiled sadly. It was Dad.
“East,” murmured Limpy to himself.
“West,” said Malcolm.
“Eh?” said Limpy.
“Far over the horizon where the sun sets,” continued Malcolm, beaming at the rellies. “I call it Sunset Estates. You'll love it. A real slice of cane toad paradise. And because you're all family, I'll be making your new homesites available at low, low discount prices, easy weekly repayments, flying insects accepted.”
Limpy's throat sac was rigid with shock.
He struggled to digest what he'd just heard.
Malcolm was taking everyone in the wrong direction. To the west. Where, Limpy had heard from very thirsty galahs, the heat was crippling and swamps were nonexistent. And then, worst of all, the big wart-bag was charging everyone to live there. They'd have to spend the rest of their days risking their lives on the highway to get the flying insects to pay him. Scientists with needles full of deadly germs wouldn't even have to leave the road to get to them.
Limpy struggled to unstick himself from the sticky sap tree. It was the only thing stopping him from rushing across the clearing and confronting Malcolm and begging everyone not to go.
And, thought Limpy desolately as he stopped struggling, infecting them all.
He was still stuck to the tree hours later when Malcolm led a meandering column of rellies out of the swamp in
the direction of the setting sun.
Limpy looked sadly across the clearing at Mum and Dad as they hopped after Malcolm, their tearful warty faces turned back toward home.
Charm was further ahead, next to Malcolm, but she was looking back tearfully too.
Suddenly Mum let out a cry. She broke away from the others and frantically retraced her steps and flung herself across one of the mounds of earth.
It was, Limpy realized, his grave.
“I don't want to go,” sobbed Mum. “I don't want to leave my son. I don't want to leave my home.”
Dad came over and gently pulled her to her feet.
“Come on,” he said. “There's nothing for us here now except terrible memories.”
He started leading her away. She broke free again and darted back to the grave and, Limpy saw, grabbed his favorite soft drink can.
“They're not all terrible memories,” said Mum.
This time, hugging the can, she let Dad lead her back to the others.
Malcolm stood at the head of the column, watching impatiently. “Can we go now?” he said.
Charm glared angrily up at him. “Hey,” she said. “We're leaving the home we love. Don't rush us.”
Limpy watched Malcolm turn away from Charm and the others and roll his eyes. Then, telling the others to keep up, he led them off toward the setting sun.
Limpy felt a spasm of pain.
Not in his back, in his guts.
“Goodbye,” he whispered to them all.
For a second Limpy thought Goliath was waving, but then he remembered they didn't even know he was there. Goliath must just have been trying to snatch a few stink beetles for the trip.
“Take care,” whispered Limpy as his family disappeared into the dying light.
He didn't cry this time.
Not now that he knew what he had to do.
Limpy discovered it wasn't easy, peeing up his own back. Especially since the sun had gone down and he was having to aim in the dark. He got the hang of it eventually, though, and after a while the sticky sap started to dissolve.
He staggered away from the tree and went and lay in the swamp for a while to wash off the rest of the sap and soothe his aching warts.
Then he visited Ancient Eric.
As Limpy approached the moonlit mound of earth, he heard a hissing sound.
For a scary moment Limpy thought Malcolm had come back to get something he'd forgotten. His map or his exercise equipment. Then Limpy saw it was just a couple of snakes with dried herbs on them, chortling at poor Ancient Eric.
“Not so hungry now, eh, flat-face?” chuckled one of the snakes.
“Come on, you miserable old windbag,” hissed the other. “Eat us.”
Limpy's glands prickled with anger. He was very tempted to give them a squirt. Then he remembered what Dad had told him: Don't waste your poison pus unless you're actually being attacked. Or unless you're prime minister and your press secretary tries to trim your warts off.
Limpy cleared his throat.
The snakes twitched in alarm, glowered resentfully at Limpy, and slithered away.
Limpy looked down at Ancient Eric.
It was one of the saddest sights he'd ever seen. A once-proud leader, flattened. And worse, with skin so smooth he looked like a human dinner plate with a grumpy mouth and surprised eyes.
Oh well, thought Limpy. At least the poor thing can't catch anything from me.
“Mr. Eric,” said Limpy. “Things are pretty crook at the moment. I know there's nothing you can do, so I'm going to have a crack at saving everyone myself. I may not have much time left, but if I can find that national park to the east, perhaps I can rescue the others from Malcolm and get them safely there.”
Loud hissing and chortling came from the nearby shadows.
“Fat chance,” said the snakes. “He's kidding himself. What an idiot.”
Limpy ignored them. He leaned forward and gripped Ancient Eric by the edges.
“Sorry about this,” said Limpy. “I know I'm not meant to touch you, you being so important. But you need a final resting place where you won't be pestered. I think you'll find it's more dignified under my bed.”
Limpy heaved Ancient Eric onto his shoulders. Ignoring the pain from his back, he hopped slowly round the edge of the swamp till he reached a familiar front path.
It didn't feel good, being in the place with everyone gone. Okay, not quite everyone. The flat sun-dried rellies were still there, aunts stacked in one corner of Limpy's room, uncles in another, cousins at the foot of his bed.
Limpy put Ancient Eric reverently into a pizza box and slid him under the bed. Then Limpy said goodbye to the flat rellies. It took a while because he wanted to do it individually and some of them were stuck together.
Finally he finished and went outside.
Limpy paused, gazing at the dear swamp he loved so much. In the moonlight, the still water and lovely weeds were full of shadows.
And memories.
They flooded through him.
Dad teaching him not to eat giant mangrove slugs while they were kissing because if you swallowed two at a time they got stuck in your throat.
Goliath gobbling stinkweed until he had wind so bad he could speed through the water without using his arms or legs.
Mum telling Limpy and Charm that the swamp would always be their home, as long as Goliath didn't pollute the water too much.
Limpy shook his head sadly and sent the memories back into the darkness.
Would he ever see his dear home again? Would he ever know such love and happiness again?
Probably not, thought Limpy.
But there wasn't time to hang around feeling sorry for himself.
He had a train to catch.
Limpy crouched in the grass next to the train tracks and smeared sticky sap onto his knees and tummy and forehead.
“That won't make much difference,” said a nearby centipede.
Limpy didn't answer.
He thought the centipede was probably right, but when you were going to fling yourself at a train moving faster than a stampeding goanna, you needed all the help you could get.
A loud whistle shrieked in the distance.
The centipede put quite a few hands over its ears.
Limpy tensed.
As the light on the front of the train hurtled toward him out of the darkness, he tried to think of positive things.
How the train would almost certainly slow down as it went over the highway crossing.
How his back wasn't hurting so much now, more sort of itching. And that might just have been from when he'd stretched the skin trying to pull himself away from the sticky sap tree.
Then the mud under Limpy's feet started to tremble and the metal tracks hummed and suddenly the train was thundering through the crossing and past Limpy.
Not slowing down at all.
“Jump!” screamed the centipede.
Limpy jumped.
For a while he thought he was dead. Arms and legs ripped off and head bouncing into the centipede's front yard.
When he realized he was still in one piece, he knew that at the very least he must be completely flat, with his face peering out of his own bottom and his brains leaking out of his ears.
So he was pretty surprised when he discovered he wasn't.
Stack me, thought Limpy. I'm still toad-shaped.
Gradually he realized the deafening noise wasn't broken bones rattling around inside him, it was the wheels of the train clattering along the tracks just below his head.
He was clinging, he saw in the moonlight flickering through the train above him, to a rusty metal beam at the bottom of one of the carriages.
But not for long.
As he and the train hurtled forward, the rush of air was tearing him off the beam. Even though he was clinging on as hard as he could with both arms and his good leg, he could feel himself sliding painfully across the rust.
The sticky sap was useless. The wind had a
lready turned it into a dry, flaky film on his chest. It was crumbling faster than the rust.
I've got to get off this beam, thought Limpy desperately.
He looked around. Above him and a bit behind him was a gap between the floorboards of the carriage.
It wasn't a big gap.
It was more of an Uncle Nick–sized gap.
But it was all there was.
Limpy let go of the beam, flinging his arms upward.
The wind slammed him backward.
As he became airborne, he rammed his hands through the gap and grabbed the edge of a floorboard. Slowly, painfully, he dragged himself up into the carriage. He could feel the wind tearing at his legs and lower body. As he wriggled through the gap, the rough wood scraped flakes of sap off his skin. Then it scraped off flakes of skin.
Finally he was inside, lying trembling and exhausted on the floor of the carriage.
Safe.
Limpy gave a weary sigh of relief.
And saw, above him, about a hundred pairs of eyes, white and unblinking in the darkness.
Limpy froze. Even his trembling bits stopped moving.
Too late. The eyes were all looking at him.
“Hmmm,” said a voice. “We seem to have a traveling companion.”
I'm done for, thought Limpy. It's a packed tourist train. There's nothing humans on holiday like more than practicing their golf or tennis on a cane toad.
He waited for the swish of a club or a racquet, or a trail bike if the human was into motorcross.
It didn't come.
The only thing that struck Limpy was a thought.
Wait a minute! he said to himself. I understood the voice, so these can't be humans.
At that moment the train swung round a curve and moonlight spilled into the carriage.
Limpy looked around nervously.
Staring down at him were a large number of sheep.
“G'day,” said Limpy, desperately trying to remember if he'd ever heard stories of sheep savaging cane toads.
He didn't think he had. Not unless some of the four-wheel drives on the highway with dark tinted windows had sheep driving them.
“Evening,” said the nearest sheep. “Going far?”
“To the national park,” said Limpy. “If I can find it. I know it's in this direction.”