Ben nudged the stick carefully forwards. The nose of the microlight pointed downwards. The racetrack below became visible through the front window and started to draw closer. He watched the airspeed indicator, watching the needle creep up. When it had gone up to about 50 knots, Kelly spoke again.
‘OK, now level it off. Pull the stick back gently.’
Ben brought the nose slowly up again. The view of the racecourse disappeared and the windscreen was lined up with the horizon as before.
They were once again flying level.
Ben felt inordinately pleased with himself. He gave Kelly a wide grin.
‘Now we’ll try a turn. You can turn using the stick, but if you don’t use the pedals as well you’ll get too much yaw. Have a go at turning her right. Keep your right foot on the rudder pedal, but not too much.’
‘How will I know when it’s too much?’
Kelly tapped the horizon. ‘Keep this as close to the middle as possible. Oh, and don’t turn too sharply because we’ll lose lift and airspeed.’
Ben looked around at the controls. ‘Will we need the throttle? Where is it, by the way?’
‘Forget about the throttle,’ said Kelly firmly. ‘Just turn using the stick and pedals.’
Ben pushed the stick away from him and pushed his foot gently on the pedal.
The microlight turned. This was easy.
Suddenly Ben’s stomach seemed to leave his body, making for the top of the craft. He let go of the controls.
The plane was dropping out of the sky.
The map flew off Kelly’s lap and over her shoulder, like a trapped seagull. She snatched it back and, with her other hand, grabbed the stick. ‘You idiot!’ she yelled. ‘What did you do?!’
Just as suddenly, the plane flew smoothly again. But the altimeter said they had fallen a hundred feet.
Ben was white. He was gripping the seat so hard his fingers hurt. ‘I didn’t do anything. It just went by itself.’
The respite was short-lived. The plane started to jump up and down, like a boat on choppy water. Kelly tried to control it with the stick and the pedals. She pointed the nose upwards and the engine roared as she tried to regain the height they had lost.
But at least it seemed to be under control again. Ben’s stomach was calming down. He even felt able to make a joke.
‘When do we get to loop the loop—?’
His words ended in a strangled sound. The plane dropped again, like an elevator plummeting with a snapped cable. Ben’s buttocks lifted off the seat. If he hadn’t had the seat belt on he’d have gone clean through the roof. He was paralysed with fear, only just able to hold on.
Kelly was struggling with the controls. The engine above them seemed to be screaming. Ben caught a glimpse of the instruments. They were doing crazy things, the needles swinging from side to side.
Then the bright blue sky around the cockpit went dark, and Ben realized he could smell smoke.
Something was burning.
Was the microlight on fire? He looked behind and above. Where was the smell coming from?
The windscreen cleared again, the smoke disappeared and they soared away into blue sky. Kelly watched the dials with fierce concentration, making adjustments. Ben gripped the seat, dreading it happening again.
But the craft was flying calmly now. And he could no longer smell smoke.
Kelly relaxed and unclosed her fingers from around the stick. She was breathing hard, like she had been running.
Ben let go of the seat again. ‘I didn’t do that, did I?’
Kelly shook her head. ‘You couldn’t do something like that even if you were flying in boxing gloves. There must be something outside that did it.’
Ben craned around in his seat to see where the smoke had come from. A black plume rose from the park below. Bright orange flames flickered through the tinder-dry trees, consuming them one after the other as though they were no more substantial than twigs. Ben had never seen anything like it.
Kelly was peering out of the other side. ‘We caught the thermals from that fire. It must be giving off heat like a furnace.’
The park adjoined a street of houses and the fire was eating through the trees like lightning. Soon it would run out of trees, and the next thing in its path was the row of houses.
‘Oh my gosh,’ said Kelly. ‘That looks really out of control. Call nine-one-one.’
Ben slid his phone out of his pocket. He knew she meant the emergency services — 999 in the UK. ‘Actually,’ he said, ‘here it’s treble-zero.’
Wanasri Kongprapoon had only finished her fire-fighter training the previous week. She had signed in for her first shift and was just stashing her kit in her new locker when the call came in. The trees in the municipal park near the cemetery were on fire. Now she was in the cab of Engine 33, craning her neck out of the window to look at the pall of smoke on the hill.
In the cab with her were her new team-mates, whom she had met for the first time that morning: Petra Wardell, the driver and team leader, and fire-fighters Andy Delmonte and Darren Beogh.
The crew hadn’t exactly looked thrilled when they were introduced to their new colleague. Wanasri’s family were from Thailand, and although she was tall, her build was slight. Andy, Darren and Petra were all big Australians with broad shoulders. Andy was in his forties and heavy-set. Wanasri could see what was going through their minds as they were introduced. What use will someone so small be as a firefighter?
Now they might have to trust her with their lives, and she had to trust in them. Today, Wanasri had a lot to prove.
The smoke was drifting towards them. All the crew coughed as it caught at the back of their throats. There was no smell like it. Wanasri recognized the resiny tang of burning eucalyptus. It sent a surge of adrenaline pumping through her veins. She felt ready for anything, like a soldier psyched up for combat.
Ahead was a big wooden fence. The tall trees behind it were blazing, sending orange flames shooting ten metres into the sky.
The engine stopped beside a big house clad in white weatherboard. This would be their front line — the territory they had to protect. If they couldn’t put out the burning trees, the fire would spread to the house and it would go up like kindling …
Wanasri jumped smartly out of the cab, putting her yellow helmet on. She fastened the catch under her chin and pulled the visor down as the heat hit her like a furnace. Andy and Darren had already begun unwinding the hose lines and Petra grabbed one, ran in and started to play the water into the flames.
Wanasri picked up a line too. The metal nozzle was heavy in her hands. The water started to course down inside it, making it move like a live snake. She looked towards the fire as she had done hundreds of times in training — and froze. This was a real fire, not a practice. Somebody’s home was under threat.
Darren dragged a hose past her and shouted, ‘What are you doing? Get stuck in!’
That kick-started something in Wanasri’s brain. There was a gap in the line, waiting for her. She ran in.
Her firefighting career had well and truly started.
She had never frozen like that in training. She didn’t know what had come over her, but she resolved that it would never happen again.
The water poured out of the hoses in white arcs. When it hit the burning columns of vegetation it turned into steam. The eucalyptus trees were rich in oils and burned particularly well. The heat rose, creating thermal currents, sucking flaming fragments into the air. They landed on other trees and set them alight. As fast as one tree was put out, another was catching.
Wanasri’s team was driving the fire away from the house. Meanwhile another team attacked it from the other side of the fence, and a third crew was drenching the walls and roof of the house in case a burning branch came its way.