THE SEEKER

A Trouble Seeker spirit is causing chaos around Glen Hartwell

I've looked under chairs
I've looked under tables
I've tried to find the key
To fifty million fables

They call me The Seeker
I've been searching low and high
I won't get to get what I'm after
Till the day I die

I asked Bobby Dylan
I asked The Beatles
I asked Timothy Leary
But he couldn't help me either

They call me The Seeker
I've been searching low and high
I won't get to get what I'm after
Till the day I die

People tend to hate me
'Cause I never smile
As I ransack their homes
They want to shake my hand

Focusing on nowhere
Investigating miles
I'm a seeker
I'm a really desperate man

I won't get to get what I'm after
Till the day I die

I learned how to raise my voice in anger
Yeah, but look at my face, ain't this a smile?
I'm happy when life's good
And when it's bad I cry
I've got values but I don't know how or why

I'm looking for me
You're looking for you
We're looking in at other
And we don't know what to do

They call me The Seeker
I've been searching low and high
I won't get to get what I'm after
Till the day I die

I won't get to get what I'm after
Till the day I die
© Copyright Pete Townsend

Angela 'Angie' Neumann was on her way home from shopping on the 9th of June 2025, in Boothy Street, Glen Hartwell, in the Victorian countryside. Her chestnut coloured shopping Jeep was laden, and she was struggling even to get it to move along the concrete footpath.

"Oh boy, I can't wait to get home, put this lot away, then have a nice long Radox bath."

She was slowly pushing her heavily laden Jeep down the street when she came to Lorenzo's Cafe and Wine Bar at number 96. As she passed, she saw a couple having a passionate kiss while waiting for their order.

"Oh, that is so sweet, young love," thought Angie. Watching the dark-haired man and the beautiful blonde.

Needing a rest anyway, she stopped and watched, smiling at them.

Until the man turned around, and she saw that it was her husband, Archie!

Archie stared right through her, as though not recognising the raven-haired woman as his wife.

That rotten bastard doesn't even recognise me, thought Angie, livid.

Reaching into her shopping Jeep, she lifted out a heavy bottle of Penfolds Bin 51 Riesling, intending to storm into Lorenzo's to smash it upon her cheating husband's head. Then commonsense kicked in:

No, too many witnesses! she thought. I'll wait until the rat fink comes home, then I'll whack him good! He won't know what hit him! Of course, it's a waste of a good bottle of wine ... but then he's a waste of a husband.

It never occurred to the ravenette that Archie wouldn't come home, thinking, I bet that floozy can't even cook, let alone clean house properly.


Over in Calhoun Street, Eunice, George, and Archie Neumann were building up a sweat, digging holes in the verges and planting wattles, and sweet-smelling lemon-scented gum trees.

"I hope the people in Glen Hartwell appreciate what we're doing for them," said Eunice Grayson, a tall Amazonian, forty-eight-year-old, brunette who wore her hair in a long ponytail.

"I doubt it," said her fiancé and foreman, George DuBois, a tall, strongly built man of fifty-two, with balding brown hair.

"They just keep complaining that the trees are obstacles," said Archie, a thirty-two-year-old redheaded man who was thin but very strong. "And to prove their point, they accidentally, on purpose, keep backing their cars into them and uprooting our hard work.

"Yeah, bastards!" said Eunice, "most of them have never done an honest day's work in their lives."

"Accountants, and other poncy slackers," said George.

"Exactly," agreed Archie.


Over at the Mitchell Street Police Station in Glen Hartwell, the five cops were sitting around the huge blackwood desk that took up much of the front room of the station. While Deidre Morton, owner of the Yellow House in Merridale, was serving them with afternoon tea or coffee, with homemade fairy cakes with cream and raspberry jam.

"Umm, these fairy cakes are so light, I almost expect them to float away," said Suzette Cummings, an eighteen-year-old trainee with long, raven hair.

"Thank you, dear," said Deidre, a short, chubby, sixty-something brunette who was a cordon bleu-trained chef.

"But when you can cook like this," asked Paul Bell, a tall, thin, dark-haired man approaching sixty-seven, "why do you run a boarding house, instead of owning a restaurant in Melbourne?"

"I did open a Melbourne-based restaurant in my early twenties, then I inherited what you all called the Yellow House. And decided to run it as a boarding house, and delight my extended family with my treats."

"Well, you certainly delight us with your wonderful treats," said Sheila Bennett. At thirty-six, Sheila was Chief Constable of the local police and was a Goth chick with black-and-orange striped hair. She was also Deidre Morton's favourite among her extended family members.

"Thank you, dear," said Deidre, smiling broadly.

"Yes, I shudder remembering the rubbish I used to eat before moving into the Yellow House," said Terri Scott. A beautiful ash blonde, Terri was the Senior Sergeant of the local police and Sheila's boss. She was also engaged to Colin.

"Likewise, Mrs. M.," said Colin Klein, a tall redheaded Englishman of forty-nine, who was a constable in the Glen Hartwell Police Department. "Mrs. Miggins in Lenoak is a pretty good cook ... but nowhere near your standard."

"Thank you, all of you," said Deidre, beaming in pleasure.


Still standing outside Lorenzo's Cafe and Wine Bar in Boothy Street, Angie Neumann thought, I'll kill the cheating Lothario when he gets home!

She started pushing her chestnut shopping Jeep, with difficulty, heading down the street toward their home, not far away at number 178.

Arriving at the front steps of her yellow brick house, Angie unlocked the front door, then grabbed two shopping bags of groceries to take inside, rather than trying to struggle the heavily laden Jeep up the steps. By this means, she gradually emptied the Jeep enough to be able to pull it up the steps to the concrete patio, then lift it into the cream-carpeted corridor.

Didn't even notice me, the bastard! thought Angie, as she piled the groceries back into the Jeep. So that she could wheel them down to the kitchen at the rear of the double-fronted house.

She managed to put away all of the groceries in the lime coloured cupboards in the lilac coloured kitchen, without calming down.


"I'll be relieved when we finish for the day," said Archie Neumann over at Calhoun Street. "This tree planting is hard work, especially with no one appreciating it."

"Not more bloody trees!" shouted a motorist driving past.

"I see what you mean," said Amazonian Eunice Grayson, dropping the finger to the motorist.

"So who feels like a refreshing VB?" asked George DuBois, the foreman, taking three cans of Victoria Bitter out of his work bag.

"Oh, yes, please, honey," said Eunice, taking one of the cans from her fiancé.

"Me too, honey," teased Archie, making Eunice almost drown, laughing while she was swallowing cold beer.

After George patted her on the back to stop her coughing, Eunice said, "Don't say things like that while I'm drinking."

"Sorry," apologised Archie, unable to resist laughing.

"And stop laughing, while I'm trying to drink without drowning," pleaded Eunice, unable to stop laughing herself.


Over at 178 Boothy Street, Angie Neumann had opened up the expensive bottle of Penfolds Bin 51 Riesling, which she had brought for their tenth wedding anniversary in a week's time. Holding it up to her mouth, she took a long swig, thinking, "I only need the bottle to whack him with! It'd be a shame to waste good Riesling!

As she waited, despite only being a moderate drinker as a rule, Angie kept swigging the fine wine, getting drunker and drunker, madder and madder, less and less reasonable.


"Knock off time," said George DuBois, to the relief of Eunice and Archie.

"Thank God!" said Eunice, reaching round to rub at her aching back.

"I'll be relieved to get home," said Archie, starting off, "to have a nice Radox bath with Angie."

"You lucky so-and-so," said Eunice, getting a chance to laugh at him this time.

"No need to walk," said George, pointing to his dark blue Ford Ranger, "we'll give you a lift."

"Thanks, mate," said Archie, following them across to the Ranger. "It's not that far, but with my back ...."

"Don't worry," said Eunice, "we know what you're going through."

"So, what are the chances of us sharing a Radox bath when we get home?" asked George.

"You never know, honey, you never know," teased Eunice.

"I'm gonna risk taking that to mean yes," said George, making them all laugh.


At 178 Boothy Street, Angie Neumann had finished the bottle of Penfolds Bin 51 Riesling and was well and truly plastered. She staggered down the yellow-walled corridor and just made it to the old phone stool, although they both had mobile phones, so the phone stool near the front door had not been used in the time that they had lived there.

The ravenette had almost fallen asleep, holding the empty wine bottle, when she heard the Ford Ranger pull up outside. Staggering to her feet, she peeked out the mail flap in the front door, then seeing Archie getting out of the Ford, she opened the front door and stepped outside, staggering toward the three concrete steps leading down to street level.

She held onto the steel railing with her left hand, so she didn't fall down the steps, while concealing the empty wine bottle in her right hand behind her back.

"See you tomorrow," called George DuBois, as Archie opened the gate and approached his awaiting wife.

Reaching the bottom of the concrete steps, Archie turned back to wave goodbye ... then Angie smashed the empty wine bottle over his head, before fainting and falling down the steps on top of him.

Screaming, Eunice jumped out of the already moving Ford Ranger, leapt over the yellow brick fence and ran across to where the Neumanns lay in a heap.

Braking quickly, George also leapt out and raced across to help out.


Over at Mitchell Street, Deidre Morton had left, and they were just finishing up their afternoon tea. Suzette Cummings and Sheila Bennett both grabbed the last cream-filled fairy cake.

Looking at the ravenette menacingly, the Goth chick said, "Either halvsies, or I'll be forced to snap your wrist."

"Halvsies," agreed the ravenette quickly.

"Good girl," teased Sheila, breaking the last fairy cake in half and taking one half.

At that moment, Terri Scott's mobile phone rang. Terri talked for a few moments, then disconnected and said:

"That was Tils at the hospital. Angie Neumann got plastered and brained Archie with an empty wine bottle. They're both in the hospital."

"But Angie and Archie are both only light drinkers," said Colin as he, Terri, and Sheila got up to go outside.

"Well, it seems she downed a whole bottle of Penfolds Bin 51 Riesling before he got home from work," said Terri as they headed toward her police-blue Lexus.

"Ooh, that's pricy stuff," said Sheila as she got in behind the steering wheel. "It shows you don't have to drink cheap plonk to get plastered."


Half an hour later, the three cops were in a cream-walled two-bed room at the Glen Hartwell Hospital. While Archie was sleeping in one bed, having had his head stitched up, Angie was being treated in the next bed. Beside the two beds sat Eunice Grayson and George DuBois, both looking worried about their two friends.

"We haven't sedated her yet," said Tilly Lombstrom, a tall, attractive fifty-something brunette, a top surgeon at the hospital, "so that you can interview her."

"Although she is well and truly stonkered," said a gorgeous platinum blonde nurse, Topaz Moseley. "So, whether you get much out of her is another matter."

"Angela?" asked Terri.

"My brain hurts!" said Angie, unable to grasp her head, since her hands had been tied with leather straps to the sides of the bed.

"Wait till tomorrow, when you get the hangover," said Sheila.

"Shoosh," said Terri. Leaning over the bed, she asked, "Angie, why did you try to kill Archie?"

"Saw him smooching a blonde in Lorenzo's Cafe and Wine Bar."

"That's 96 Boothy Street," said Sheila.

"But it's only a week till your tenth wedding anniversary," pointed out Colin.

"Saw him smooching a blonde in Lorenzo's Cafe and Wine Bar," insisted Angie.

"When did you see him smooching her?"

"About four o'clock this afternoon."

"That's impossible!" said Eunice.

"He was working with us at that time," added George. "Planting saplings on the verges in Calhoun Street."

"From when?" asked Colin.

"About 10:00 AM, till we knocked off at 4:30," said Eunice.

"Then we drove him straight home."

"Angie, did you hear that?" asked Terri. "Archie was planting saplings in Calhoun Street at four o'clock."

"Saw him smooching a blonde in Lorenzo's Cafe and Wine Bar!" insisted the ravenette.

"Take some pictures of Archie with your phone, Sheils," suggested Colin, "and we'll take them around to ask Lorenzo."

"Good thinking, babe," said Terri.

As the three cops turned to leave, George said, "I'll go with you."

"Okey doke," said Terri, and the four of them headed out into the corridor.


Twenty minutes later, they were showing Lorenzo the pictures of Archie.

"Yeah, I know him well," said Lorenzo. "He often comes in here with one beautiful woman or another."

Looking shocked, Terri asked, "But was he in here today?"

"Sure was, from about three o'clock till nearly five. Eating, drinking, but mainly smooching a gorgeous blonde lady."

"But he was at work at that time!" protested George.

"If that's his work," said Lorenzo, "how much does he get paid? I might switch jobs!"

George and the three cops exchanged puzzled looks, then returned to Terri's police-blue Lexus GX.

"How could he have been in two places at once?" demanded George, as they started back toward the hospital. "He was definitely at Calhoun Street planting saplings with Eunice and me all day."

"We believe you," assured Colin.

"But why would Angie or Lorenzo lie to us either?" asked Terri.

"Angie was all chuffed about their upcoming tenth wedding anniversary," said Sheila. "She was planning to buy a special bottle of wine to celebrate ... Oh, I guess she did!"

"Then she drank it all herself, before sconing poor Archie with the empty bottle ... after she saw, whatever she saw," finished Colin.

"Which can't have been Archie snogging some blonde in Lorenzo's, because he was working all day with us!" insisted George DuBois.

"We believe you already!" said Terri.

"This is getting almost as weird as our last case," said Colin. [See my story, 'Memories'.]

"Except everybody remembers who I am," said Sheila. "You all forgot me in our last goofy case!"

"Who are you, weird Goth woman, and what are you doing driving my car?" teased Terri.

"The worst bit about everything going strange was that I thought I'd never see Venice again," said Sheila.

"You've been to Venice?" asked George.

"She means her Venus Flytrap, Venice," explained Colin.

"She didn't exist in our last adventure ... and Tommy Turner was teetotal."

"What! Where were you, in the Twilight Zone?"

"That's what I thought at the time."


Six thirty the next morning, over at Barny Bertram's News Agency on the corner of Matthew Flinders Road and Robinson's Drive, Glen Hartwell, Barny was just opening for business. A tall(ish), balding man, Barny had always loved magazines, didn't see the point in reading books, so being a newsagent was his dream job.

I'm living the dream! thought Barny as a long-time friend and steady customer, Stanley Bradshaw, a tall, dark-haired man of sixty, who looked more like forty-five, entered the news agency.

Stanley, was also a notorious and very successful ladies' man.

"Stan, had any good women lately?" teased Barny.

Usually, Stanley would grin and say, "No, I prefer bad women, they're more fun." But today, although he was grinning like the Fool on the Hill, he remained silent as he walked through the newsagent's toward where his lifelong friend was waiting to serve him.


Over at 22 Providence Street, in their green and cream-walled kitchen, Stanley and Shirley Bradshaw were sitting at the dining table, eating English muffins with whipped cream and strawberry jam. A short, dumpy brunette, Shirley suspected that Stanley only stayed with her due to her culinary skills, which were close to Deidre Morton's, so she tolerated his sexual peccadilloes, thinking that she was lucky to have a husband, let alone one so many other women fancied.

"Will you be home late again, honey?" asked Shirley, trying not to nag. Stanley hated it when she nagged him.

"Probably," said Stanley, thinking of the luscious Clara, whom he would be seeing after work. Then, looking at his watch, "Oops, I'm running late."

He gave Shirley a perfunctory kiss on the cheek, grabbed his briefcase, and then headed out into Providence Street.

His work was in Robinson's Drive, which was just as well, since he always liked to stop in to his lifelong mate Barny Bertram's News Agency to buy the Glen Hartwell Recorder, and a tube of Mentos before heading in to work.


Over at Barny Bertram's News Agency on the corner of Matthew Flinders Road and Robinson's Drive, Stanley Bradshaw was still grinning like an idiot as he approached Barny Bertram.

"Same as usual, mate, Mentos and the Reporter?" asked Barny, grinning broadly at his lifelong friend, holding the paper and sweets out to him.

Stanley took the two items, but instead of paying for them, he punched Barny in the face, knocking him down. Then, reversing direction, still grinning like an idiot, Stanley walked out into Robinson's drive. Seeing a metal bin a few metres away, he walked across, dropped the Mentos and the paper into the bin, then walked off, still grinning broadly.


Over at the Yellow House on Rochester Road, in Merridale, they were sitting down to breakfast.

"What have you got for us this morning?" asked Tommy Turner, a short, podgy, blond retiree.

"A choice of flapjacks with cream and jam," said Deidre Morton, "or breakfast potato cakes ... Or as the Americans call them, hash browns."

"Yum-yum!" said Natasha Lipzing, a tall, grey-haired lady of seventy-one.

"I've always preferred American hash browns over Australian-style potato cakes," said Freddy Kingston, a tall, portly retiree.

"You Philistine," said Leo Laxman, a tall, black Jamaican, employed as a nurse at the Glen Hartwell and Daley Community Hospital. "You're in Australia, you should be eating Australian foodstuffs."

"Yeah, support the Aussie product," insisted Sheila Bennett.

"Go, Aussie, go!" shouted Tommy, as though he were at a Test Cricket match.

"Can I have ...?" began Sheila, just before Terri's mobile phone started to blare. "Oh no! Can I have three large flapjacks covered in cream and jam, rolled up, and put in a bag, so I can take them with me?"

"Of course you can, Sheila," said Deidre, patting the Goth chick affectionately upon the cheek, before preparing the three pancakes for her.

Disconnecting her phone, Terri said, "Actually, Mrs. M., could you pack three flapjacks each for Colin and me, too?"

"Of course, dear."

"So, what's up now?" asked Colin.

"You remember Barny Bertram's News Agency at Matthew Flinders Road and Robinson's Drive?"

"Of course," said Sheila. "That's where we stopped, Johnny No Face." [See my story, 'Johnny No Face'.]

"Well, Barny's just been assaulted and robbed by Stanley Bradshaw."

"What?" cried Sheila, jumping to her feet, almost falling over in her haste. "But Barny and Stanley have been mates since ... Hell, since before you or I were even born."

"That's what I thought," admitted Terri, gladly accepting a plastic bag with her flapjacks from Deidre Morton. "But Barny swears it was Stanley Bradshaw who attacked him!"

"Well, I'll be gobsmacked!" said Colin, accepting his bag of flapjacks from Deidre Morton.


Twenty minutes later, the three cops were standing inside the news agency, talking to Barny Bertram, who had a massive shiner on his left eye.

"You're certain that it was Stanley who did this to you?" asked Terri Scott.

"I've known him all of my life, I'm not gonna mistake anyone else for him."

At that moment, the bell over the front door tinged, then Stanley Bradshaw walked into the news agency.

"My usual order, mate," said Stanley, stopping to stare at Barny's black eye. "Oh, my God, what happened to you?"

"I'll show you what happened to me!" said Barny.

Leaning across the counter, he punched Stanley hard enough so that the sixty-year-old staggered backwards, colliding with a display of greeting cards, before falling to the floor of the news agency, taking the cards and their wooden stand down with him.

"Curiouser and curiouser!" said Sheila, as they went across to lift the wooden stand off the unconscious man.

"Wow, you really hit him!" said Terri, checking Stanley's neck for a pulse. "Have you ever considered boxing as a profession?"

"Now what do we do?" asked Sheila.

"Assuming Stanley doesn't need to be hospitalised, we arrest them both," said Colin. "Then take them to Mitchell Street, and try to work out what the Hell is going on!"

I agree," said Terri.

She handcuffed the unconscious Stanley, while Sheila lifted the counter flap, went into the selling section and cuffed Barny.

"But I'm the victim here!" protested Barny.

"Not if Stanley dies!" pointed out Colin.


An hour later, Stanley Bradshaw was at the Glen Hartwell Hospital, although still technically under arrest. Colin and Terri were waiting by his bedside for him to come around, while at the Mitchell Street Police Station, Sheila, Suzette, and Paul Bell were struggling to get any sense out of Barny Bertram.

"I keep telling you, Stanley came into my shop forty minutes or so before you arrived, flattened me, taking his paper and Mentos without paying."

"Then why did he ask for his usual order when he came back?" demanded Paul. "Aren't the paper and a pack of Mentos his usual order?"

"Well ... yes," admitted Barny.

"Why would he want two papers, even if he decided to have two packets of Mentos?" asked Suzette.

"And why was he so unprepared for you to whack him when he came back, if he'd already slugged you earlier?" asked Sheila.

"He went over like a lamp pole hit by a tank," said Paul Bell.

"Taking half of your shop down with him," said Suzette.

"He only took down the greeting cards," insisted Barny. "And if he didn't slug me earlier, how do you explain this?"

He pointed to his shiner.

Lost for words, the three cops exchanged puzzled looks.

"Well!" demanded Barny Bertram.


Over at the Glen Hartwell Hospital, they soon revived Stanley Bradshaw, who had a bigger shiner than Barny, plus a broken nose.

"Could I have my mobile?" asked a sad and sorry Stanley.

"You want to ring your wife?" asked Colin, getting his phone.

"Yes, but first I need to ring my girlfriend, Clara, to tell her I can't come over to her place tonight."

Terri and Colin exchanged a look, then Terri said, "Okay, uncuff him while he makes the two calls."

Colin did as instructed, then after the two calls, Terri said, "Barny claims you came into his store very early, took your usual order, punched him in the face, then left without paying."

"Firstly, why would I risk being arrested over the cost of a newspaper and some Mentos? Secondly, if I had done what he claims, why would I have returned when three cops were standing in the store? And why wasn't I expecting him to whack me, if I had already assaulted him?"

Terri and Colin exchanged puzzled looks before going on to interrogate him further.

Forty minutes later, they were still interviewing Stanley, with two women sitting by his bedside: His wife, Shirley, and his mistress, Clara, a tall thirty-something, busty blonde.

"Will he be able to come home tonight?" asked Clara.

Glaring at the blonde, Shirley said, "That's for me to ask." Then to Terri and Colin, "Will he be able to come home tonight?"

"That's for Tilly to decide," said Terri. "Considering he got the worst of the two beatings, if he agrees not to charge Barny Bertram, we're happy to let him go?"

"What if Barny charges me for something I didn't do?" demanded Stanley.

"We'll make it a condition of releasing him that he doesn't," offered Colin.

"Okay," said Stanley, "I don't have a clue what really happened, but Barny and I have been friends for decades, so I don't want him charged."

"Okey doke!" said Terri. She instructed Colin to uncuff Stanley, then rang through to Mitchell Street."


Over at Mitchell Street Police Station, they were as confused and frustrated as Colin, Terri, and Stanley Bradshaw.

"Look ..." said Sheila, stopping as the station phone rang.

She went across to the huge blackwood desk and spoke for a few moments. Hanging up, she said, "That was Terri, she says that as long as he agrees not to press charges against Stanley, we should let Barny go, and write it up as one of those 'What the Fuck!' cases."

"You mean the Z-Files," teased Suzette.

"Exactly."

"But he hit me first!" insisted Barny.

"We only have your word for that," pointed out Sheila. "Whereas, Terri, Colin, and I all saw you assault poor Stanley."

"Oh ... all right," agreed Barny, clearly unhappy. "But tell Stanley he is barred for life from my news agency."

"I'm sure he will be devastated!" teased Paul, going across to uncuff Barny.


An hour later, Barny's message had been passed on to Stanley Bradshaw, and Colin and Terri had returned to the police station.

"What a couple of days," said Terri, sitting at the blackwood desk. "First, we have Archie Neumann snogging a blonde at Lorenzo's Cafe and Wine Bar in Boothy Street, while at the same time helping Eunice and George to plant saplings over at Calhoun Street."

"A fact now testified to by our Wiccan Witch friend, Magnolia McCready. Who was looking outside her front window when Archie and the others planted a lemon-scented gum tree outside her house?" said Sheila Bennett.

"Then we have Stanley Bradshaw assaulting Barny Bertram, while his wife, Shirley, swears he was still at home having breakfast with her at the time," finished Terri.

"And Shirley is not the type to perjure herself," said Sheila. "Not even for her husband."

"So, do we assume that this is one of those goofy cases we keep getting?" teased Suzette Cummings.

"Not at all," said Colin. "By Glen Hartwell standards, this is just another day in the life ...."

"We have sort of out-Twilight-Zoned the Twilight Zone over the last couple of years!" said Sheila.

"Maybe they should make a spooky TV show called, 'The Glen Hartwell Region'?" suggested Suzette, doing the doo-dah-doo-dah-doo-dah sound effects.

"Hey, I like it," said Sheila.


At 9:20 the next morning, forty or so people were awaiting the arrival of the nine o'clock train from Melbourne at the Glen Hartwell Railway Station in Theobald Street. As usual, the train was running way, way late. The smarter people were sitting in the outside waiting room, which provided them with at least a modicum of protection from the winter cold. The more frustrated travellers were standing in the cold on the only platform, looking down the tracks in the Melbourne direction.

"Doesn't this bloody train every run on time?" asked Paul White, a tall, thin businessman, dressed like a typical English gentleman in pin striped suit and shirt, bowler hat, and umbrella, which he was waving about in frustration as though engaged in a sword fight.

"You know damn well it never does," insisted a pink-haired spinster, Wendy.

"That's true," muttered Paul.

"No, it's not," insisted the new station master, a lanky redheaded youth straight out of high school, the old station master having died of a heart attack recently, "it was two minutes early recently."

"Nonsense!" insisted the old lady, Wendy. "That's just an urban myth!"

"I was here when it happened," insisted the redheaded youth, Francis 'Frankie' Whittaker.

"Ah, you're just an urban myth then," insisted Wendy.

"That doesn't even make any sense," said the teen in a nasally voice.

"I don't care," insisted the old lady, refusing to back down once she had her dander up.

"Give up, Frankie," said Paul, "the old goat has never backed down in her entire life."

"Even when she's talking rubbish?"

"Especially when she's talking rubbish."

"Old goat? How dare you? You're talking rubbish," insisted Wendy. "Both of you are talking rubbish."

Rather wisely, both Paul and Frankie wandered toward the other end of the platform.

"Yeah, you'd better run away!" shouted Wendy, as though she had just driven off an invading horde.

"Just ignore the old goat," advised Paul, as the two men strolled down the station.

"I'll give you old goat!" the pink-rinsed old lady shouted after them.

Before she could decide whether to start after them or not, they heard the sound of a train whistle, vaguely, from way off in the distance.

"It's about time, you hopeless station master!" called Wendy, as though it was somehow the redheaded youth's fault that the train never ran on time.

"I told them by ESP that you were getting impatient," teased Frankie.

"Well, it's just as well ..." started Wendy, stopping as she realised what he had said. "Why aren't you at school instead of running trains this late?"

"I graduated last year, and I'm taking a gap year before starting Uni in 2026."

"Well ... that's no excuse!"

Fortunately, the train had come into sight by that time, although it was still a kilometre away.

"About time!" shouted the spinster.

Although Paul secretly agreed with her, he wasn't about to say so, and possibly start her off again.

As the train stopped, the driver jumped off and raced toward the men's room. Merely seconds later he ran out of the toilets and jumped back aboard the train.

"That was quick," said Frankie Whittaker.

"Come on, girls," said Sharona Pickles, a tall, shapely redhead of thirty-something, as the train finally pulled into the station. Taking the hands of her two daughters, Dilys and Bridget, both redheads like herself, she led them onto the ancient red carriage.

"Dis is an old twain, Mummy," said six-year-old Dilys, careful to hold her mother's hand while stepping over the gap from the platform to the train. She had always feared falling down that gap, which she fancied might go all the way down to Hell.

"Yes, but old things are often more reliable than new things," said Sharona, lifting Dilys over the gap, knowing of her fear.

"You mean like Uncle Steve?" asked Bridget, referring to Sharona's drunken wretch of an uncle.

"Well ... I did say often. Not always," said Sharon, as they sat down upon the lush, padded seats, which had green and red floral covers on them.

"The seats have table cloths on them," said Bridget.

"They're seat covers," explained her mother. "That way, any mess can be taken away and washed out of the covers, without the seats getting dirty."

"Dats a good idea," said Bridget as the train started to move.

"How long 'fore we get to da zoo?" asked Dilys.

"It's about a ninety-minute train ride to BeauLarkin. Then we'll meet up with Nana Murphy, and we'll have snacks at her house, in Paisley Street, before getting to the zoo around noon."

"Will she have raspberry lemonade?" asked Dilys, pronouncing the P in raspberry.

"I'm sure she will," said Sharona, tickling Dilys and making her giggle, "she knows little Dill Pickles loves raspberry soft drink."

"I wike orange softy," insisted Bridget.

"I'm sure Nana Greta will have plenty of orange soft drink too. She always takes care of her two favourite granddaughters.

"We're her only gwandaughters," said Bridget. "Da others are boys."

"Well, that's why you're her favourites," insisted Sharona.

"Hi, see," said Bridget, deciding she had to think about that.

The train had barely started when a tall, moustached man, Billy, reading the Glen Hartwell Reporter, suddenly stopped reading, looked out the window, then said to the Pickles family:

"I think this train is heading in the wrong direction."


Less than a minute after the train started, the driver, a tall, dark-haired, fifty-something man, Freddy Silver, ran out of the men's room, looked around, then asked:

"Where the Hell is my train?"

"Heading the wrong way ... towards Willamby," said Frankie.

"Without a driver?" demanded Freddy.

"No, it had a driver."

"Who?"

"You. You jumped aboard and started it up ... but in the wrong direction."

"How could I have jumped aboard and taken the train out, in either direction, when I'm still here?"

"I was wondering that myself," admitted Frankie.

"Ah, screw this," said Freddy taking out his mobile phone. "I've gotta warn them at Willamby, that they're getting a train today after all."

"Wow, won't they be surprised?" said Frankie.

"Yeah, especially if the bloody thing doesn't stop when it gets to the end of the line."

"Hey, that's a great song, man."

"What is?" asked Freddy as he started dialling.

"Getting to the End of the Line, by the Travelling Wilburys."

"I am officially not talking to you anymore," said Freddy.


Upon the train, Sharon, Bridget and Dilys all stuck their heads out of the windows to look.

"He's white, Mummy," said Dilys, "we are going in da wong direction."

"Goin' ta 'Lamby," said Bridget.

"Willamby," corrected Sharona, wondering, What happens if we don't stop when we reach the buffers at the end of the line?

"Are day 'specting us at 'Lamby?" asked Dilys.

"The station master has probably rang through to Willamby," said Billy, hoping it was true.

"What hiff we don't stop at 'Lamby?" asked Bridget.

"I was wondering that myself," admitted Sharona. Grabbing the two startled girls, she sat down, hugging them to her in case this was the last chance she would ever get to hug them.


Over at the Mitchell Street Police Station, Terri and the other cops were still trying to make sense of the two attacks the day before, when Terri's phone rang. She listened for a moment, then disconnected and said:

"We have a runaway train on our hands. The Melbourne train has continued to Willamby, instead of heading back to Melbourne."

"Why would Freddy Silver do that?" asked Colin as they stood up and started outside.

"He didn't, he's the one who rang from Theobald Street."

Going with them, Suzette asked, "How long will it take to get to Willamby?"

"In the Lexus, at least ninety minutes," said Terri.

"By which time the train will have either crashed or stopped safely," pointed out Colin.

"You really should get a sports car," suggested Sheila as she started the car.

"A sports car could never handle the roads between here and Willamby."

"How about getting a monster truck?" suggested Suzette, her green eyes shining from excitement.

"You mean one of those things that you need an escalator to get in and out of?" asked Terri. "And which costs you three thousand dollars every time you need to replace a blown tyre?"

"Yep, those are the ones," agreed the raven-haired teen. "I love watching monster trucks."

"Me too," said Sheila, "imagine me behind the wheel of one of those beauties."

"No thanks," said Colin, "I have nightmares less scary than that."

"How dare you, constable?" demanded the Goth policewoman.


Aboard the runaway train, Bridget and Dilys were crying into their mother's chest, while Sharona was silently praying, holding her two terrified treasures as securely as she could.

At the other end of the train, Paul White and half a dozen others were standing in open doorways, trying to build up the courage to jump out.

"Well, what are you waiting for, Captain Courage?" nagged pink-rinsed Wendy. "Anything would be better than dying in a crash."

"Anything would be better than listening to your foul whining any longer!" said Paul, just before jumping.

Unfortunately, his jacket coat snagged on the door handled, and he got sucked under the wheels of the train, screaming just once before being cut in half.

"Oh, my God, he got cut in half!" cried a fifty-something blonde.

"Because he hesitated too long, the stupid bastard," nagged Wendy.

To prove her point, the old lady waited for a grassy patch to appear outside and leapt well clear of the train. Unfortunately, she landed upon her head and snapped her neck, dying instantly.

"Well, I think the old nag made it," said the blonde.

Taking courage from that, she started out the door, tripped in her high heels, and fell face first under the train, having her neck crushed as she was decapitated.

"Did she make it?" asked a forty-something fat man with long mousy blond hair.

"She must have done," said his younger brother. "Let's go, bro."

"On the count of three," said the older brother. "One ... two ... three ...."

The two brothers leapt out together. The older brother, shattered both legs and would be in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. The younger brother landed on his back, breaking his spine and both kidneys, and would be in a wheelchair and on dialysis for the next forty years before dying in his late sixties.

"Well, they seemed to land all right," said a stockily built forty-something brunette. Having not heard their screaming as the wind blew it away toward Melbourne.

After a second's hesitation, she stepped out of the train and fell under it, having both legs amputated just below the crotch.

"Should we risk it, Ritchie?" a teenage blonde asked her boyfriend.

"Course, better than being aboard when the train crashes into the bumpers," said Ritchie.

He leapt out and crashed into a metal brace once used to hook mail off and onto the train. Dying instantly as his face and brain were reduced to paste.

Distressed, wanting to die too now, the blonde closed her eyes, stepped off the racing train and landed softly in a muddy bog, ruining her clothing, but being the only one to leap from the train not to be physically hurt.


"How are we going, Sheils?" demanded Terri, obviously hoping for some kind of a miracle.

"Still seventy-five minutes away," said the Goth chick, shouting from stress, even though Terri was sitting just behind her.

"Just a thought," said Colin. "In the unlikely event that we get there before the train crashes into and straight through the buffer stop ... what are we supposed to do to stop it?"

"Shit, I hadn't thought of that!" cried Terri.\


Aboard the runaway train, they had all started crying when they whooshed through Willamby train station, despite the rail signal being red.

"Mummy loves you both!" said Sharona to her crying daughters, just before they smashed through the bumper stop past the station.

The train kept going for a moment, as though able to travel on the soft, muddy ground, then flipped over sideways again and again, finally crashing to a halt against a row of white and grey snow gums. Some of the gums shattered and flew away. The others buffered and finally stopped the train upside down.


By the time that Terri and the others reached the crash site, the air ambulance had arrived, with Glen Hartwell's six land ambulances roaring through the forest just behind Terri's police-blue Lexus.

"Lord, above!" said Terri, crossing herself.

When they arrived, Tilly Lombstrom, Jesus Costello, Elvis Green, and a dozen or more nurses were hunting through the inverted train, looking for survivors.

"Any found alive?" asked Colin.

"None so far," said Jesus Costello, a tall, strongly built man, administrator and head surgeon at the Glen Hartwell and Daley Community Hospital.

"What are the chances of survivors?" asked a glassy-eyed Suzette Cummings.

"Remote, frankly," said Elvis Green, nicknamed due to his devotion to the late King of Rock and Roll.

Just then, they stopped as they heard crying from one of the carriages.

"Where did that come from?" demanded Tilly.

"Down the back of the train, I think," said Topaz Moseley.

She led the charge down to the rear of the train, closely followed by the others.

With difficulty, they boarded the last carriage and found the corpse of Sharona Pickles, still nursing Bridget and Dilys. Acting as a human buffer, the redhead had managed to save the lives of her two daughters, although they would be in the hospital for much of the remainder of 2025.

"She gave her life to save her daughters," said Suzette, awestruck.

"What a woman," agreed Topaz as she helped to apply splints to Bridget's broken legs and Dilys's broken right arm before taking Dilys, while Suzette lifted Bridget, to get the two girls to the air ambulance as quickly as possible.

By the time that they had checked the entire train, Dilys and Bridget Pickles were the only two survivors found. Although the mangled jumpers were found later, along with the unhurt teenage girl who had landed in the muddy bog.

"So what now?" asked a dour-sounding Suzette Cummings as they set out for the long drive back to Glen Hartwell.

"Now, we check out our Witchy friend, Magnolia nee Mavis McCready, in the hope that she can shed some light on the latest goofy goings on," said Terri.

"Just don't call her Mavis," advised Sheila, "she hates that name."

"Why? Mavis Dracula is a cool chick," said Suzette.

"For once, the mad Goth chick is right," advised Colin.


1/21 Calhoun Street was the right-hand side of a divided white weatherboard house in Glen Hartwell. Inside lived Magnolia McCready, a tall, busty, fifty-something redhead with electric-blue eyes. Opening the door, Mavis said:

"Terri, Colin ... and who is this lovely lady?"

"Oh no, she's forgotten me again," teased Sheila. [See my story, 'Memories.']

"Not you, you great Goth idjit, you're not lovely. I meant this beautiful raven-haired lady."

Blushing deeply, the teenager said, "I'm Suzette Cummings, a trainee."

"Well, come inside everyone, I can feel some lettuce coming my way."

"We brought a cauliflower to pay you with this time," said Sheila.

"I shall ignore such comments," said the Wiccan as they headed into her turquoise coloured living room.

Ten minutes later, they were sipping cups of green tea, with homemade lemon tarts. With Magnolia's huge, white, fluffy Tom cat, Timmikins, wandering around, trying to glom some lemon tart.

"So what's the prob. this time?" asked Magnolia, reluctantly giving part of a tart to Timmikins, who wolfed it down, before rubbing up around Suzette's legs.

"Here you go, puss-puss," said the teen, giving the cat most of a tart.

Struggling to eat a tart and talk at the same time, Terri told the Wiccan everything that had happened in their latest goofy case.

"Sounds like you're dealing with a Seeker, or Trouble Seeker, as they're also called. A middle European imp or pixie. Usually, they only cause minor mischief, like the woman smashing a claret bottle over her hubby's head, or the two men punching each other out. Crashing a train, killing fifty or so people, is a new one for Seekers."

"So, how do we deal with it?" asked Colin.

"Well, I could always send it to the bottom of the Challenger Deep, within the Mariana Trench, like I did with the Memory Thief recently," said Magnolia, thinking aloud. "But, with magical pixie powers, it might be able to survive somehow and get back to the surface."

"How about just banishing it back to middle Europe?" suggested Sheila.

"What inflict it upon others?" asked a shocked Suzette.

"Why not? We banished a Banshee back to Ireland, and some Valkyries to the Northern Hemisphere," said the Goth chick. "Our only loyalty is to Glen Hartwell and Victoria. Hell, I'd gladly have it sent to Brisbane, as long as it was out of our hair."

"Sheils!" said Suzette. "I have rellies in Brisbane."

"Well, there's a dark secret she kept from us," teased the Goth policewoman.

"All right, so I'll call it here, then send it back to middle Europe," said the Wiccan. "After all, with the monsters and evil dictators that they have there, I suppose they'll barely notice another one."

"I still don't ..." began Suzette, startled as Timmikins jumped up onto her lap to beg the last of her lemon tart. "Oh, here you go, handsome," said the teen, giving him the tart and patting the cat.

"It'll take until about ten o'clock to prepare my potions, so meet me back here after supper," said Magnolia.

They got up to leave, with Suzette almost tripping as Timmikins sauntered between the teen's legs, rubbing up to her.

"He's taken a fancy to you," said Magnolia smiling.


On the dot of 10:00, they were all gathered around Magnolia's living room again as the redhead sorted out her potions and herbs.

"Sit back in your chair and get comfy," Sheila advised Suzette, "the old witch can take forever to get a result ... if she even does."

"Old witch!" demanded Magnolia. "And when have I ever failed to get a successful result? Oh, and Sheils, keep that mega mouth shut while I am chanting."

"Burn, baby, burn!" said Suzette, shaking her fingers at Sheila.

"You do realise I outrank you?"

"Burn, baby, burn, marm!" said Suzette, shaking her fingers at Sheila again.

"That's better ... I think?"

"What part of 'Sheils, keep that mega mouth shut' did you not understand?" demanded Magnolia McCready before beginning the ritual.

"Burn, baby, burn, marm!" whispered Suzette.

As the Goth chick had predicted, after more than an hour of chanting and mixing herbs and potions, nothing had happened.

"Looks like it's gonna be Pamela Anderson's chest," whispered Sheila.

"What?" whispered Suzette.

"A big bust."

"Quiet, Mega Mouth!" shouted Magnolia, before returning to her ritual.

It was nearly twenty minutes later when there was a poof and powdery smoke filled the room. And when it cleared the Seeker appeared before them, looking around himself in astonishment.

Although, not as astonished as the four cops. The Seeker kept fluctuating back and forth between male and female, two hundred centimetres tall, all the way down to one hundred centimetres, black, white, red, olive, from pre-teenaged to as old as Methuselah, as though flashing back and forth between every visage it had borrowed down the centuries, never having had any true form of its own.

"Why did you bring me here?" demanded the Seeker, its voice also fluctuating from male to female, and from pre-teen to ancient.

"To stop you murdering people in Glen Hartwell," said Magnolia. "It was bad enough you getting Angie Neumann to clock her poor husband with a wine bottle. and tricking Barny Bertram and Stanley Bradshaw into giving each other a black eye ... but killing fifty people on that train was the limit!"

"Rubbish, I only killed forty-three people!"

"I did think of sending you to the bottom of the Challenger Deep, within the Mariana Trench, to drown you," said the Wiccan.

"With my powers, I could easily survive that," said the Seeker, sounding uncertain.

"Or, I could just banish you back to middle Europe if, you give me your solemn word never to return to Australia."

"But middle Europe is so boring compared to Australia."

"Banish him to Brisbane," whispered Sheila.

"Sheils!" protested Suzette.

"Quiet, you two," said Magnolia. Then to the Seeker, "Well? Your choice?"

"Very well, I give you my word to never return to Australia."

"Excellent," said the Wiccan, beginning the banishing ritual, which took another half an hour.

Finally, in a puff of smoke, the Seeker vanished.

Holding out her right hand, Magnolia said, "Two hundred buckeroonies, please."

"Sorry, we only brought cabbage," teased the Goth policewoman.

"Quiet, Mega Mouth," said Magnolia, as Terri counted out the cash.

As they were leaving, Terri said, "Actually, Sheils, I think I like your new nickname, Mega-Mouth."

"Whatever you say, Tezza," teased back Sheila.

"Touché, Ms. Turtle," said Terri, making them all laugh.

THE END
© Copyright 2025 Philip Roberts
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia