Diamond Eyes Read Online Free Page A

them. Spotted, he vanished; his hairy, bare-footed legs briefly visible to
    Dr Zhou where a hole in the wall had been ‘patched’ by a scrawny brown hedge.
    The hedge followed a cobbled driveway uphill to a modern security checkpoint, where a large sign welcomed visitors to the Serenity Centre and promised a sensual extravaganza at an upcoming festival. However, a red witch’s hat blocked the driveway, along with a makeshift sign apologising for renovations still in progress and asking all visitors to park outside and then follow a painted line of yellow happy faces to reception.
    ‘You’d think they’d at least rope off a decent car park,’ Van Danik complained. ‘Although I suppose that says a lot about the frequency of their need for visitor parking. Hang on, Zan. It’s time again to embrace your rally driver within.’
    Dr Zhou gulped and gripped his seatbelt just as the sidecar bumped off the road onto the sandy grass verge and footpath.
    ‘This place is a mole on a porn star,’ Van Danik muttered as he avoided a light pole to park behind the bus shelter. He braked under the umbrella of a mature weeping fig, cut the engine and pocketed the key. ‘Why leave a blemish like this standing when there’s an expensive facelift going on down there along the waterfront?’
    ‘Everyone’s entitled to a sound roof and a decent view,’ Zhou defended. ‘Handicapped or not.’
    ‘They’re retards; the view is wasted.’
    ‘Intellectually
handicapped,’ Zhou argued, and glanced uphill to the security checkpoint in time to catch another glimpse of the strange little man as he scuttled past the boom gate towards a cluster of old limestone buildings. ‘The term “retard” is offensive.’
    Feeling physically crippled himself after an hour in the black-and-gold sidecar, Zhou scrambled out awkwardly, teetering on his spindly legs as he disgorged his head and black, shoulder-length hair from the helmet.
    ‘You should be grateful Colonel Kitching was able to arrange so many survey participants in one place,’ he told Van Danik. ‘You’re the one who said you were sick of working with criminals and trained killers.’
    ‘Those trainee astronauts at Cape Kennedy were okay.’
    ‘So were the Queen’s Guards, but it’ll be a relief to work with volunteers who can’t think of a hundred ways to kill me with my own pencil.’ Zhou glanced around and noticed that they’d travelled high enough to see over the tops of the tallest mangrove trees to a flotilla of sailing boats that stretched north and south as far as the eye could see in the main channel of the bay. ‘I agree the view is manna, though.’
    ‘And the fishing must be orcan. Did you notice the size of the lures those guys were using?’
    ‘Orcan’s not a word. And whales are hardly likely around here, are they? They’ll be after barramundi, or maybe shark.’
    ‘What’s your problem today, Zan? Life too colourful already, or the poetry of allusion just eludes you?’
    ‘Too busy clinging to my life, among other things.’ Zhou leaned to inspect the luggage rack behind the sidecar. ‘Is my bag still back there?’
    Van Danik took off his helmet and rolled his eyes as his gangly passenger grunted and strained at the rear luggage fasteners. ‘You know, if you can’t lighten up with a view like that, Zan, there’s no hope for you. I believe the violence of chaos — subatomic or not — naturally becomes me, as a physicist, but you’re a physician, and the absence of a calm bedside manner is a little unsettling. Now step back before you hurtyourself.’ He shouldered Zhou aside and pointed to the hedge of brown-flowering shrubs that lined both sides of the driveway. ‘Maybe you should stand over there with the other weeds.’
    Zhou frowned but his expression softened with one glance at the hedge. ‘Actually, those aren’t weeds. They’re
Boronia megastigma,
and quite exquisite specimens too.’ He leaned closer, sniffing. ‘Not everyone can