PART FIFTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
Shannon and Jo broke camp around eight o'clock Sunday morning to a bright, sunshiny day, with not a cloud in the sky. Rita left two hours before Shannon and Jo arose, almost at the break of dawn. She hiked briskly down to Halls Gap—taking the shortcuts she knew—to pick Kim up at the Cultural Center .
Shannon and Jo folded up the tent that they had used and put it on top of Jo's pack for the trip down to town. It seemed a little top-heavy, but Jo said she could manage it. Shannon put the blankets on top of her own pack. They told Rita the night before that they would bring the food that was in their day-packs to Daylesford when they came.
"I'll probably use it in my B&B ," Rita said, "since I usually have a lot of people stay there in the summer. Especially now, during the Christmas season."
"How in the world can you manage to leave the B&B in the middle of the tourist season and come to The Grampians ?" Shannon inquired.
"Oh, I lock it up and leave this big sign on the front door that says CLOSED FOR MAJOR REMODELING. REOPENING MONDAY, " Rita said. They all laughed. "It seems to work, because it's only one weekend a year, and nobody knows any different. For the rest of our meetings we use the back room of the B&B —always at night."
"You have other times when you meet, then? What do you do in these meetings? Are there always this many women who meet?" Shannon 's curiosity was getting the best of her.
"You'll have to ask our leader about things like that," Rita said, effectively closing the door on the subject.
Shannon and Jo walked along the dirt trail back to where it intersected with the bitumen road. They started sticking out their thumbs, hoping for a ride. They were just plain tired of walking. Finally, a family in an oversized SUV, with three young children in the second row of seats, picked them up. They gratefully climbed into the third row, which had two separate single seats. They placed their day-packs between their seats and listened while the man and his wife carried on about how excited they had been to come to The Grampians and all they'd seen so far. The kids kept up a steady argument about who got to play with what toy. Thankfully, it was a short ride.
They picked up their car behind the Tourist Office in Halls Gap , thanking Mabel for all her help the previous day, and were on their way by ten o'clock. Shannon thought if she pushed it a bit, they could be back in Clunes by one o'clock. But she needed some strong coffee, or she might fall asleep at the wheel. She had slept poorly on the hard ground last night. And Jo didn't know how to drive in Australia . So she scheduled a stop at McDonald's in Ararat. They both needed to use the restroom, anyway.
After they were seated with breakfast, Jo began thinking over the last couple of days, and she was struggling with finding answers to her questions.
"Shannon, do you realize when we were in Daylesford the other day at The Ice Cream Parlor , that Kim could have been sitting right next door at the B&B while we were eating ice cream? Why didn't your friends say something then ?"
Jo took another sip of her coffee in between bites of food. Why did we go all the way to The Grampians if Kim was right there in Daylesford? she thought.
Shannon replied, "I wish I had the answer to that, Jo. But there was probably a good reason why Tammi Sue and Joyce never said anything." She paused to eat another bite of pancakes. "But we'll find out when we get to Daylesford. Right now I just want to take a shower and wash my hair, and I think you probably want to get that paint washed off, don't you?"
She looked over at Jo, who had rolled her shirt sleeves up to the elbows and was rubbing her forearms with interest. The white paint was not showing any signs of wearing off.
"How come you never got painted?" she asked Shannon . A rhetorical question, but Shannon grinned broadly.
They lingered over their coffee while they ate pancakes and sausage. It felt so good to just sit at a table and take some time to relax.
When they arrived back at the B&B , Jo rolled her sleeves back down before they came in the back door. They parked next to the weeping willow tree in front, as they didn't see Fred's car at the back through the carport and didn't want to block him in. They left their bulging day-packs in the trunk.
Rose didn't see them come up on the veranda and go into the kitchen. She was in the washroom, busily pulling clothes out of the washing machine and putting them into her basket to take outside and hang on the clothesline. It was after two o'clock, and no one else was around.
"Where is everybody?" Shannon voiced, as they walked back to their bedroom. They looked over into the red room, noticing the door was open. There was no Carly, no Paige, and no luggage. The beds were stripped of their bedding.
"What's going on?" Jo said. "What have we missed?"
They went back outside, where Rose was busy hanging clothes on the line now. They came up behind her and stood there waiting for her to look up.
Rose turned to pull a pair of pants out of her basket. "Oh, my Lord," she said, startled. "You gave me a fright!"
"Where is everybody, Rose?" Shannon said.
"Let me finish hanging this load on the line, and I'll come inside and make us a ‘cuppa'. It's a long story."
Shannon and Jo went back inside and sat at the kitchen table. Rose came in after she finished hanging the clothes out and put the teapot on the stove and then set cups and tea bags on the table for the three of them.
"I'm so glad you girls are back," she said, sitting down across from them. "It wasn't right for you to just take off like that and not tell anybody where you were going or when you'd be back. We've all been worried sick over you! Where have you been?"
"We took a trip to The Grampians ¸ and we stayed overnight there with some real nice people. I had turned my cell phone off at one point and forgot to turn it back on. So if you tried to call me, I wouldn't have known it. I'm sorry," Shannon ended up. "I guess I better turn it back on now, huh?"
She reached for the phone in her pocket and turned it on, noting that it still had a strong charge. Of course I turned my cell phone off, she reflected. We didn't want anyone to know where we were! And I wasn't about to check for messages!
Rose and Fred had tea for lunch, so the teapot didn't take long to heat back up. Rose poured hot water over the tea bags and started talking.
"I didn't try to call, but Carly or Paige did. They said they couldn't reach you. They wanted you to know what they were going to do. And since you didn't get back before they left this morning, they went ahead without telling you. They said they'd try to call you later."
"Left for where?" Shannon and Jo asked at the same time.
"They've gone to Melbourne for a few days because there was nothing for them to do here. They had no idea when you'd be back, so since you weren't around, they got a ride with Suellen and Matt, who were going down to visit Matt's sister in Dandenong. And then they were going to take the bus from there to Melbourne . They didn't know how they were going to get to Melbourne otherwise, and Suellen and Matt were the first available ride. They said they were going to have some fun in Melbourne before and after Paige's mother's funeral before Paige had to go back home to the States." Rose said all of this almost in one breath, hoping she hadn't left out anything.
Still playing the grieving daughter, I see, Jo thought. "So they both went down to Melbourne ?" she asked. "That's where they are now?"
"Yes. They left at eight o'clock this morning. I'm sure they're there by now. The busses run every hour out of Dandenong because of the tourists—even on Sundays. It's a great tourist town."
"Is Carly coming back here after Paige leaves?" Shannon wondered.
"Oh, I don't think so. She left, too—they took all their luggage," Rose said.
"Where is Davie ? He's still here, isn't he?" Jo asked.
"Well, no. He left with Matt and Suellen, too. He got mad at Mr. Bannister yesterday and told him off and quit his job and was going back to live with his aunt in Melbourne for a while till he decided what he was going to do."
"He got mad at Mr. Bannister?" Shannon asked with astonishment.
"Why would he quit his job?" Jo followed.
"The way I understand it, he was upset because he didn't know where you were, Shannon , and Mr. Bannister told him to keep an eye on you and not let anything happen to you. But he couldn't do that, because you were always going off somewhere, leaving him behind. And he had done some lying to you, too, and said he wasn't raised to lie like Mr. Bannister wanted him to. He'd had a little too much to drink, I think, and told Mr. Bannister that if he wanted to keep track of you, he could bloody well come up here and do it himself. His very words. And then he quit."
She gave this long speech almost in one breath, also, and then added, "I have no idea why he was supposed to keep track of you, Shannon. Davie didn't say." Rose looked questioningly at her. "Do you know why?"
Shannon and Jo looked at each other. They knew that Jeff Bannister wanted to keep an eye on them. But why ? "Not really, Rose," Shannon said. "I'm in the dark, too."
They were both surprised that Davie had quit like that. They didn't think he had it in him. Shannon thought she may have misjudged the young man.
Jo asked. "So where does Jeff Bannister fit into all of this now?"
" Davie said he was supposed to come up here in a couple of days. So that would mean tomorrow, I guess. That's all I know, girls. I'm sorry."
"I'm sorry, too, Rose," Shannon said, "that we weren't here. But we just got tired of Davie saying he had to go with us, and we didn't want him to go. That's why we never told anybody where we were going. If Davie knew, he might have tried to get to The Grampians , too, and we didn't want him around. We just kind of wanted to take off by ourselves and see some country before I started taking photos. And I thought Carly and Paige would just want to rest a bit, because they've been on the go since they got here. So we didn't ask them to go. I'm sure you can understand that, can't you?"
I'm sorry, Rose, Shannon thought, that this is not the whole truth. But I don't have a choice in the matter.
"Oh, my, yes," Rose said. "I understand. But I just wish you had said something to me , so I wouldn't have worried about you both so much."
"Let's go get cleaned up, Jo," Shannon said. Then to Rose, "We need to go over to Daylesford for a little while to see someone else we met while we were at The Grampians. They invited us to come by this afternoon. We should be back by dinnertime. I'm sorry we have to duck out on you again."
"That's all right, you two. I'm just glad you're back—and safe. And if you don't make it back for dinner, that's all right, too. I'll tell Fred what happened when he gets home. He's taken Suellen's kids fishing down at the creek. You remember Jacky and Gerri, don't you?"
"You're a sweetheart, Rose," Jo said, rising up from the table and giving her a big hug. "I'm so lucky to have you as a friend."
Shannon and Jo went back to their bedroom, and Jo told Shannon to take a shower first, as she didn't want to get paint all over her , too. Shannon gave her a lingering kiss and said, "We'll continue this later." Jo started to tremble as she held Shannon in her arms after her kiss.
"Do we have to wait?" she asked sheepishly. "Couldn't we—?"
"Think of what we have to look forward to," Shannon said, gently pushing her away.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
They were almost to Daylesford when Shannon 's cell phone rang. It was Carly. "I need to pull over to talk with you, Carly. I'm on the road. Can you hold just a minute?"
She pulled off onto the next widening of the road and put the phone to her ear again. "What do you think you're doing, Carly? Did you get a cob up your ass or something, to just take off like that with someone you just met? And not even consult with me first?" There was a pause and then, "Don't you dare bring Jo into this conversation!" Another pause and then, "And I don't care if you think you've bonded!" Shannon was clearly angry.
Jo was only catching Shannon 's side of the conversation, so had no idea what Carly was saying.
"What? You're kidding!" Shannon shouted into the phone. "But why ?" There was a pause and then she continued. "Well, if that's what you want to do, I guess it's not for me to say no. I've known you for a lot of years, Carly, and I know how you are. It may not be long till Paige finds out, too. But if that's what you both—"
There was a long pause when Carly interrupted. "All right," Shannon said. "I'll call you when I get back to the States. Bye. Love you, too. Yes, I'll tell Jo."
"Tell me what?" Jo asked, as Shannon closed up her cell phone and pulled back onto the road.
"I guess you heard. Carly was calling from a hotel she and Paige checked into. You're never going to believe this, Jo, but Carly is flying back with Paige to Colorado Springs . She's not going back to San Jose just yet. Paige is loaning her some of the money she got from her brother to come over to Australia . Then they're going to rent a U-Haul and Paige is moving to San Jose where Carly lives! They're going to drive there. Carly is sure Paige can get a job at the bookstore where she works, as Paige has worked in a bookstore before. They'll probably be gone by the time I get back. Well, I hope they don't run into any snow driving clear to California in the wintertime."
Jo started laughing, and Shannon wondered what was so funny.
"Do you know what lesbians bring on a second date?" Jo asked.
"What?"
"A U-Haul," Jo said, and started laughing again. Shannon couldn't help but join in. It had been a long time since she'd heard that joke and had forgotten it.
"I never thought Carly would hook up with anyone after I told her to go back to San Jose years ago. She doesn't have the right temperament for a lasting relationship."
"Maybe it'll be different this time," Jo responded.
* * * * * *
Shannon pulled up and parked in front of The Lakes B&B . It was Sunday, and in the States a small town like this might be relatively quiet because of the Sabbath. But here the streets were teeming with visitors and tourists who were crowding into The Ice Cream Parlor and lining up outside to get in. It was a sweltering day, and ice cream seemed just the thing to cool a person off. A block-long, grassy, tree-shaded park with picnic tables scattered about was right across the street, and because of limited seating inside the shop, people went over there to enjoy their treats.
Shannon had worn a short-sleeved shirt and left her hat back at the Willowbranch. She'd also forgotten her camera at the B&B , not realizing it until they were halfway to Daylesford. But she hadn't taken any pictures lately—either at The Grampians or anywhere else—and she didn't think she would take any pictures now. So she never bothered to turn around and go back for her camera. Photography had completely vanished from her mind, as she was caught up in the dramatic events of the present.
She knocked on the door of the B&B . Rita opened it almost immediately and ushered them inside. They handed her the day-packs with the tent and blankets and food. Before they left Clunes, they had taken out their personal belongings. Rita took their packs and put them behind the counter in the lobby.
"Come on back to our meeting room," Rita said, leading the way to a door behind the front desk. "Kimboola is waiting for you."
Kimboola? Shannon thought.
Rita opened the door into a room approximately twenty-five feet square. There were a dozen padded folding chairs set up on one side of the room. The walls were decorated with Aborigine wall hangings and finger paintings. Directly in front of them about three feet in from the far wall was a large oval table, the tabletop carved from dark red gum and polished to a high sheen. It would seat a dozen people easily, as the chairs around it testified. Kim was sitting at one end. She got up and walked over to them.
She had washed her dark brown hair, and it was pulled back into a pony tail and then inserted through the opening in the rear of a baseball cap. The logo on the front of the cap read The Lakes B&B . She had also donned clean clothes after she washed up, but they were basically the same kind of clothes she had on when they left The Fortress —dark plaid shirt and jeans, with heavy-duty hiking boots. The scar on her face was visibly prominent.
"It didn't take you long to get here," she said, stepping between them and putting her arm around Shannon and then around Jo. "I'm glad. Come over here and sit on the couch. It's more comfortable. Rita, could you bring us some of your good, strong coffee?" Rita closed the door behind her as she left.
They noticed for the first time a large divan with a coffee table in front of it in the corner behind them. Two pole lamps were on either end of the divan. There were no windows in the room, so the lights were turned on. The divan was covered in plain brown corduroy that one might find on couches in almost any furniture store. There was nothing of the mystical in the color or texture of the fabric. In fact, aside from the Aborigine decorations on the wall, there was nothing in the room that would lend itself to anything more than a regular meeting place for any kind of meeting! A hardwood floor covered with a couple of large, colorful, braided area rugs dampened the echoes of the room. Then they noticed a closed door on the right-hand wall.
"That's my room," Kim said, gesturing toward the door when she saw Shannon and Jo looking in that direction. I sleep in there when I'm here. No one goes in there but me. Not even Rita." She indicated for them both to sit on the couch and then sat between them.
Shannon looked at Kim with sadness. "Rita called you Kimboola."
"Yes. That's what my name was changed to when I was initiated as a shaman. I was training to become a shaman for years before I ever met you, Shannon. I never told you. But I was always destined to be a shaman. I would go to Hawaii twice a year for a month at a time, and that is where most of my learning took place."
"Why did you come to Australia ?" Jo asked.
"I worked at the Denver Zoo for about four years, and there was always a hungering deep inside of me when I would look at the kangaroos and emus we had there. Ancient peoples throughout the world are all descended basically from the same roots—the Hawaiians, the Aborigines, the Maori, the Polynesian people. I am not descended from one of these ancient peoples. But there was something in me that identified with them. I guess I knew sooner or later that I would come to Australia . I knew Hawaii was not where I should be.
"But then I met Shannon," she continued, turning to look at Shannon , "and my destiny was tweaked a bit as I fell in love with her. We came to Australia for a vacation—I thought . I had every intention of returning to the States. But events had already been set in motion before we ever left the States. And in the end, my destiny won out." Kim took Shannon 's hand in her own.
She quit talking for a moment, as Rita came in carrying a tray with hot cups of coffee and some sweet rolls. She set the tray down on the coffee table and left again. They picked up their coffee cups and helped themselves to the snack. It seemed to be just what they needed. After a few minutes, Kim swallowed the last of her coffee, set the cup down and proceeded to talk some more. She took hold of Shannon 's hand again.
Jo could see this might be a long, drawn-out story, so she settled back in the couch and listened to Kim.
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
Jo was interested in what Kim was saying. But she was still trying to wrap her mind around Shannon and Kim being lovers, because now Shannon and she were lovers. How can you love two people intensely at the same time?—which Shannon seemed to be doing. Maybe this will become clear soon.
Kim wouldn't have had to talk about this part of their lives at all, but she felt Jo deserved an explanation of what had happened. Plus she had to set up the scenario before she could put her plan in motion. She continued.
"We went on a four-wheel-drive tour the first day we were at The Grampians . It was just the beginning of winter, and the rains were starting to come. There were showers almost every afternoon. Out tour guide said ours was the last tour he was doing at The Grampians that winter—literally, as I'll explain in a bit—and the park would be shutting down for 4WD tours till the next summer when tourist season started again.
"We missed out on the last two stops in the tour because the rain had started falling heavily up in the higher country. We came back down to Halls Gap, and it wasn't raining down there at all. Shannon wondered if we could stop and see the Aboriginal Cultural Center . She had read in a travel folder about it, and they had authentic Aboriginal dances there in the evenings. We had looked at Aboriginal and Australian history when we went to the State Library in Melbourne , so I was interested in that, too. Of course, Shannon had no idea that I was training to be a shaman." Kim squeezed Shannon 's hand.
"The tour guide—I believe his name was Dan, or Don, or something like that—said yes, he could take us there since he had an hour or so before he had to get back to Hamilton where his tour company was based. He moved away that winter up to Queensland to go into the tour guide business with his business with his brother. I've never seen him since that day.
"We pulled up to the Cultural Center, went inside, and thought it was nothing out of the ordinary—just some attraction for tourists who weren't really interested in Aboriginal things. There was a souvenir shop, a history of the region and The Grampians , with some artifacts of sandstone—from which most of The Grampians is formed—and pictures of the early settlers in Australia around that area. But the lady there told us the Aboriginal Cultural Center itself was around in the back. She said, 'Just follow the path and you'll come to it.'
"So we walked down this path about for about 500 feet, and there were Aborigines already dancing around in an enclosed circle that was in back of the Cultural Center . We sat down on the logs that were provided for visitors to watch the dancing. There were half a dozen other tourists there. I was quite taken with the rhythm of the Aborigines with their painted bodies gyrating around in the circle—dancing, using their clapping sticks.
"They stopped right in the middle of their dancing, it seemed to me, and one of them came and grabbed my hand and took me to the center of the circle, where they sat me down on a large stump and began dancing around me. One of them reached out and closed my eyes. Do you remember that, Shannon ?"
"Yes," Shannon answered, "all too well. They put some dabs of white paint on your face, and each time one of them passed by you, he would lean down close to your face, but I didn't hear them say anything."
"You have a good memory," Kim said. "But what you don't know is that I didn't hear anything out loud , either. But I heard it in my head— in English . It was not in the Aboriginal language, which was the only language these people spoke. I knew they were speaking to me, but it was all in my mind. " She stopped—reflecting.
"They were all telling me the same thing: ' Stay here. You belong here. You are part of us. You are one with us. Stay here.' But they were thinking it, and all I heard were their words in my head. ' Stay here .' That's when I knew I couldn't go back to the States."
"Why didn't you tell me, Kim?" Shannon said with anguish. "Why did you just let me go, saying you had to answer a 'higher calling?' Which is about as nebulous as it gets! Why didn't you tell me?" Tears were starting to course down her cheeks.
Kim looked at her with hurt in her dark brown eyes. "I knew I was going to lose you, Shannon , because my destiny was already set. I knew you were hurting when I said I wasn't going back with you. I couldn't bear to say anything else and hurt you even more. There were no other words I could have said which would have helped you understand."
"All these years, Kim, and one little card from you about your initiation, and then silence," Shannon cried. "How did you think I felt then? How could you know that if you had said for me to come back to Australia , or that you were coming home, that I would have been happier than you could ever imagine! But you told me to be happy for you ! When my own heart was breaking. Even when I discovered later on what the eagle totem meant for you, Kim, and knew I would never be a part of your life, I never got over you! Do you know that? I never got over you!" She sobbed with the emphasis of her words.
"I'm sorry, Shannon . What happened between us should never have happened. I was going in a different direction, and you weren't included. But I did love you, Shannon. I still do."
She said that with finality and then turned loose of Shannon 's hand and stood up from the couch.
Jo cleared her throat after recovering from the emotional scene just played out next to her. She was sure the relating of these things between Kim and Shannon was not the reason Kim wanted them to come to Daylesford as soon as they could after they got back from The Grampians . No matter how much it helped Jo to understand.
"What did you want to talk with us about?" Jo managed to say, the words coming with difficulty.
"I knew I was supposed to be in Australia ," Kim continued, "and supposed to be a shaman. But after I was initiated as a shaman, the men of the Aboriginal tribe became angry with the ancient one who had brought me to them. They didn't like a woman being a shaman, especially a white woman. I had problems with a number of them. It got so bad that I couldn't do my job, and I had to break away from them. That tribe was split apart because of what happened, and there are still some men of that original tribe who remember that turbulent time. I try to steer clear of them. They carry grudges a long time.
"After the tribe broke up, I began talking to other women. They felt like I did—that there was a future for them in the mystical world of positive feminine energy. So I began training them with the knowledge that I had, and we met on a regular basis. I initiated the first woman shaman in our group three years later—at The Fortress . That was Rita. Then other women began coming, and we are over forty women strong now, not all of them shamans yet, of course. They have their own meetings in different towns with a woman shaman—that I've trained—to guide them, just like I lead meetings here at this B&B . Every year we bring more women in and initiate new shamans. That's what we were doing at The Fortress when you two arrived there.
"We feel there is a common energy bond between us that could revolutionize the world, bringing it together in peace, something that men have never been able to do. We just need time to gather enough women to spread out over the continent, and then to other continents and countries where women are waiting to be included in this revolution. Everything is heading in that direction."
"I think I can understand what you're saying, Kim," Jo said. "I felt that energy when we were being taken to The Fortress by the women you sent to lead us. But that's a monumental undertaking! It would take thousands and thousands of women for that kind of revolution to take place. Forty women is not even a drop in the bucket."
"I know I won't live long enough to see that happen," Kim said, "but I need to continue with what I'm doing, to keep our feminine energy reaching out to cover the world, and helping other women to do the same."
She paused for a moment to let her words sink in and then sat back down on the couch.
"How do Shannon and I fit in here?" Jo said, unwilling to hear the answer. She could feel a sinking feeling starting in the pit of her stomach, afraid of what Kim was going to say. Would Kim want Shannon to stay her with her now? All the signs were there.
Kim looked at Shannon, who had now retreated to her own private place in her mind and shut the door. She seemed to not be hearing anything that was being said and was sitting on the couch with a blank stare on her face that had dried of its tears while Kim had been talking.
Kim turned to Jo. "Before I go on, Jo, I really need to talk with Shannon alone," she said. "Please—" She reached over and put her arms around Shannon and drew her close.
Jo got up from the couch. "I'll be over across the street in the park. Call me when you're ready for me to come back." She turned and left.
As she walked across the street, she hardly noticed the car which came close to grazing her or the shout that followed the horn blast from the person behind the wheel. She felt like her world was crashing down around her.
CHAPTER SIXTY
Jo slowly walked over to the park, sat down on the grass, and leaned back against a huge, beautiful, white eucalyptus. She sat with her knees bent, folded her arms across them and laid her head down on her arms. It was incomprehensible how Shannon had led her on, when all this time she was not over Kim. She still loved Kim! And that was why she came to Australia —to find Kim! Jo felt like a fool, and maybe she had been living a fantasy of how she thought a relationship with Shannon would be. But the bubble had burst as she realized she could never be with Shannon like she wanted to be. Shannon didn't love her.
But it was not her imagination when she remembered the intimate sex they had together. Why would Shannon do such a thing? Was she the type of person who just played around with someone's emotions and never gave it a second thought when it was over— after the person had fallen desperately in love with her?
I can't believe she would do that, Jo thought. I don't know what to do now. I can't go on like this. Maybe I should just go home and leave Shannon to her precious Kim. That's what they both seemed to want.
She didn't know how long she had been sitting under the tree, feeling sorry for herself and trying to sort out her emotions, when Rita walked up and sat down beside her.
"Don't be upset, Jo," she said. " Shannon is not staying here with Kim as you think she is. It's you she loves. Kim is not Kim anymore. She is Kimboola now, and her life is laid out in front of her. And though she still loves Shannon, her destiny does not include Shannon ."
"How did you know I was thinking about Shannon ?" Jo asked, looking over at her.
"You forget I am a shaman. I knew your thoughts as you were thinking them."
"Do you know everyone's thoughts like that?"
"Only when it's necessary to know."
"How do you know Shannon loves me? It sure didn't sound like it."
"She will tell you herself, if you give her a chance. Let's go back now."
They got up and started walking slowly across the grass and met Kim and Shannon coming toward them. They were each holding two waffle cones filled with three scoops of ice cream topped with the decorative red and green sugar sprinkles they had come to expect at Christmastime.
"Here, Jo, this is for you," Shannon said, smiling. "Your favorite strawberry/cheesecake flavor. I got myself some, too."
"And this, Rita, is for you," Kim said, handing her a cone of her favorite blueberry ice cream. "I like just plain ordinary chocolate."
"How did you—" Jo began, looking over at the crowd of people lined up in front of The Ice Cream Parlor.
"We snuck in the back door, as if we were very important people. Tammie Sue and Joyce served us up right away," Kim said, laughing. "Come; let's sit down over here at this table. We can talk here while we eat our ice cream."
Kim and Rita sat on one side of the picnic table. Shannon and Jo sat on the other side. Shannon put her hand on Jo's thigh, and Jo covered it with her own, giving it a little squeeze.
"So what did you want to talk to us about?" Jo asked. "That is, not that you haven't already talked to us. But that's not all you wanted to say."
"No, it isn't." Kim paused and then went on. "How do you two see me right now—in appearance, that is?" she asked, very seriously.
Jo responded first. "Well, you look like a person who's lived here a long time by just the way you dress and the ruggedness of your look. You've been out in the sun a lot, because you have a good tan, which is normal for Australians, I guess. The scar on your face looks like you might have had a run-in with some sort of wild animal. Other than that, you look like just any other person. Especially in Daylesford, you look like any other woman . Don't you think so, Shannon?"
"Yes," Shannon agreed. "Except for the baseball cap. The Lakes B&B is a sure giveaway, unless you sell baseball caps there."
Kim jerked the cap off her head. "Actually, Rita does sell them. But other than that, I could pass for any person, right? I mean, there isn't anything about me right now that would suggest I'm a shaman—as far as you two can tell?"
"Absolutely not," Jo said, and Shannon agreed.
"That's the appearance I have been portraying outwardly for many years. Only those within our community know who I really am, and I must keep it that way.
"Remember I told you that the Aborigines of the tribe I was in didn't want me there? They hated me so much that they passed the word around that there was a white woman shaman among the Aborigines. That was simply unheard of."
Shannon remembered the Aborigine who blocked Jo's path near St. Paul 's Cathedral in Melbourne and had talked to Jo. He may have been one of those disgruntled men. She also remembered the words that came to her mind that day. Run! Run away!
She said, "There were two Aborigines we saw in Melbourne , and I got this strong message in my mind that I should run away from them." She looked at Kim for an answer.
"I didn't want anyone to hurt you, and didn't know if those men were some who still held a grudge, so I sent you that message," Kim said.
"Through telepathy," Jo said.
"Yes. Rita told you, didn't she? Of course, there have been curiosity seekers, which I've managed to elude. And from time to time, others have come looking for me for various reasons, and I've given them the slip, too.
"But this Jeff Bannister has become a thorn in my side. He's been persistent, and though I've narrowly escaped him twice in the past year, he keeps coming after me. I've got to put a stop to this once and for all. All Jeff Bannister is after is money. And a feather in his cap which he thinks will catapult him into center stage where he can name his price for any idea he comes up with—no matter how outrageous it might be.
"But there's more at stake this time. Mr. Bannister thinks he has an ally in the search for me, one by the name of Shannon Brooks."
"What do you mean—an ally?" Shannon looked horrified at the thought. "I can't stand the man!"
"Just a manner of speaking, sweetheart. When he enlisted you to do some photography for him, paying you an outlandish amount of money—plus all your expenses—it seemed his scheme was going to work. You are a relatively unknown photographer. Didn't you think it was a bit unusual that your photographic skills would drop that kind of money into your hands just like that?" she said, snapping her fingers. "He knew if anyone could find me, it would be you , Shannon. He figured you'd lead him right to me."
Shannon responded, "Oh...my...God!" Pieces of the puzzle were starting to fit together.
"But how did he know I knew you in the past?" Shannon said.
"I haven't figured out how he arrived at that conclusion, but there are ways. There are many things that are a matter of public record. It took a lot of effort to put two and two together and come up with you together with me . But when I found out what he had in mind, I had to do something."
"How did you know what he had in mind? And what does he have in mind?" Jo asked. "And what did you do?"
"One question at a time, my friend," Kim told her. "We have our sources of information, which find their way back to me. We've been keeping an eye on Jeff Bannister for a long time. So that's how I knew what he had in mind this time. And when I knew what was going to happen, I projected my thoughts onto Shannon, so that she had this overwhelming urge to come back to Australia . That was the beginning, even before Jeff Bannister's representative approached her. Otherwise she might not have come, even though the money was tempting."
"No. I don't think I would have come," Shannon said, remembering how she wrestled with it for a long time. What convinced her was the overpowering feeling that she had to come back.
"You projected your thoughts?" Jo asked.
"Yes. Our thoughts ride the energy waves that surround the earth, because our thoughts are also energy. Shannon was in the right receptive mood, as she had never forgotten me. She thought that maybe what she was feeling was that she had to come back to Australia to unite with me, though she couldn't have put that into words because she didn't understand the power behind the thoughts.
"I've talked with her now," Kim continued, looking across at Shannon , "and she knows what really happened and is okay with it. She can tell you about it later, Jo."
Jo looked strangely and questioningly at Shannon . Her hand, which was still covering Shannon 's hand on her thigh, squeezed tightly.
"And there are other ways we have to finding out things that would hurt our community. Do you know that some of us are shape-shifters?" Kim asked, raising her eyebrows. No one responded.
"Do you remember that wedge-tailed eagle that you saw in The Grampians at the beginning of your trail-walking? Then when you came to The Fortress wall you saw it again, soaring up to the top of the cliff?"
"Was that you? " Jo asked, incredibly. "Oh, my God!"
Kim stopped talking for a bit and ate some of her ice cream, remembering her training to become a shaman.
* * * * * *