THE GLEN HARTWELL MILKMAN

It was Saturday evening on the 19th of October 2024, and the Friedlander family: mother Tessa a thirty-something strawberry-blonde, father Wyatt a thirty-nine-year-old accountant, who looked more like an amateur wrestler, five-year-old Kylie a strawberry-blonde like her mum, and grandmother Katie, Tessa's mother, a honey blonde of fifty-something, were watching a live performance of a one-act play "Picasso Through Time", by a local writer, at the Glen Hartwell Playhouse Theatre in Blackland Street.

"What's hit hall about?" asked a puzzled Kylie.

"Darned if I know, honey?" whispered Katie.

"It's about Picasso, the worst painter in history, travelling through time to check out Goya, Rembrandt, Van Gogh and other great painters," explained Tessa: "To see what they did right, and what he is doing wrong."

"Oh!" said Kylie, still not understanding.

"Picasso..." began Katie, getting shushed by one of the fifteen or so other people in the theatre: "Oh shush yourself!" she said, stopping as an usherette shone a torch in her direction.

"Quiet ... please!" said the usherette, making it plain that it was an order, not a request.

"I'll tell you later," whispered Katie, drawing another shush from the bald-headed man two rows away.

Fortunately "Picasso Through Time" lasted just under an hour, so the Friedlanders were soon in the basement, climbing into their silver-grey 2002 Ford Cortina.

"So what're you reckon?" asked Wyatt: "About the play?"

"Crap," said Katie, climbing into the rear seats.

"Kwap," agreed Kylie, giggling as she climbed into the back of the car.

"Well, I don't think they'll ever film it," agreed Tessa.

"If they do, I know one family who won't be going to see it," said Wyatt. He checked that everyone was in the car and buckled up before starting the Cortina to join the rush to exit the Playhouse.

"Dat's for sure," agreed Kylie.

"Oh damn," said Tessa: "I've just remembered we're out of milk, I meant to stop at the mall earlier."

"They'll be closed by now," said Katie as the Cortina turned left into Blackland Street.

"How'll I heat my Bix tomorrow?" asked Kylie, meaning Wheat Bix.

"With sugar and cold water," teased Wyatt as they almost collided with the horse-drawn cart.

"Water han sugar?" asked Kylie, not realising her father was teasing.

"Hey, Pisshead!" called Wyatt as the horse-drawn cart missed them by millimetres.

"I'll go down early tomorrow to get some milk, honey," assured Tessa. Then to her husband: "Don't say Pisshead in front of Kylie!"

"Why not, you did," teased Katie: "And you might not have to go down early tomorrow, Tess, I think that was a milk cart that almost side swiped us."

"A what?" asked Kylie.

"A milk cart," explained Wyatt: "They used to deliver milk in glass bottles door to door."

"Gwarse bottles?" asked Kylie: "But milk comes in pwastic bottles or cardboard cartons."

"It does nowadays," agreed Wyatt, accelerating to try to catch up with the milkman: "But it used to come in six-hundred-millilitre bottles."

"Plant your foot, Touché Turtle," said Katie: "There's no way a horse-drawn cart should be able to outrun us."

"Who's Touché Turkey?" asked Kylie.

"Never mind," said Tessa, then to Wyatt: "And don't speed with Kylie and Mum in the car."

"So I can go like a demon when there's only you and me in the car?"

"No!"

"Well, I've gotta catch him. Katie's right, how can a horse-drawn cart outrun the Cortina?"

"It is over twenty years old."

"Yes, but I treat it like our little baby, Kylie-kins."

Kylie laughed at the nickname, but Tessa glared at her husband as he continued to accelerate the Ford in an effort to catch the milk cart.

For the next half an hour, the Friedlanders pursued the milk cart, first through Glen Hartwell, then into the sweet-smelling pine and eucalyptus forest beyond. But try as he might, Wyatt could not catch the horse-drawn cart, which they saw was a strangely phosphorescent pale blue colour. They could hear the rattling of milk bottles and could see through the Cortina's headlights that most of the bottles were full; but could not catch the fleeing cart.

"Try honking your horn to get his attention," suggested Katie.

"Yeah, twy honking dah horn," agreed Kylie: "Gotta have milk on my Bix."

Doing as instructed, Wyatt continued after the milk cart, without any sign that the milkman was aware of their pursuit.

"Is he deaf?" demanded Wyatt.

"Must be," agreed Katie: "Or too stupid to recognise potential customers when he hears them."

"Are those old-fashioned six-hundred-millilitre bottles?" asked Tessa.

"Looks like it," agreed Katie: "But as long as the milk is fresh, who cares."

"Yeah, who cares, long as I get milk for my Bix," insisted Kylie.

"Hey, you deaf bastard!" Wyatt shouted out the car window.

"Language in front of Kylie!"

"Yeah, langwitch in front of me," agreed the little girl.

"Slow down, you deaf idiot," shouted Wyatt, ignoring his wife and daughter.

"I think we're on a wild goose chase," said Katie.

"Har dare wild gooses out here?" asked Kylie.

"It's just a saying, honey," explained Tessa, as the milk cart suddenly stopped a hundred metres or so ahead of them.

"At last, pig-brain heard me," said Wyatt. He stopped the car then started to step out: "Where the Hell are we?"

"Does dat man have a pig for a bwain?" asked Kylie.

"Yes!" said Wyatt before the two women could say otherwise. He stepped out of the Cortina, then looked down puzzled: "Has it been raining lately?"

"Not that I can recall," answered Tessa, as she stepped out of the car; knowing she could not trust her man for such an important purchase. The last time he had come back with six litres of skim milk, even though Kylie would only drink full cream milk. When Tessa had pointed that out, he had said: 'She's gotta learn she can't always get her own way!' Then he had gone back out to buy the little girl her full cream milk.

When Tessa stepped out onto the pine needles that blanketed the forest floor, they were soft underfoot, and the strawberry-blonde struggled against the grip of the muddy ground that tried to suck her down.

"It is wet underfoot," said Tessa as she started toward where the milkman had climbed down from his cart. He stood grinning idiotically at the approaching couple.

"Good evening, we'd like a few litres of milk," said Wyatt.

"Full cream," added his wife.

However, the tall, thin grey-haired milkman stood silently, grinning at them.

Is he retarded or something? wondered Tessa, really struggling now against the pull of the sodden ground.

"Feels like we've wandered into quicksand," said Wyatt, like his wife, struggling not to be pulled down into the mire.

"Yes," said Tessa, unable to move forward at all anymore as she started to sink more rapidly into the ground: "Wyattttt!"

"Don't panic, struggling only makes you sink faster," said Wyatt, noticing that his wife had now sunk to her knees in the mud.

"Don't tell me not to panic!" shrieked Tessa as she sank deeper into the murky mess.

"What's going on?" called Katie from behind them.

"Stay in the car!" shouted Wyatt. Yet when he looked back he saw that the Cortina had sunk to the axles into the mud. Turning back to the milkman, he shouted: "For God's sake help us!"

"Help us! Help us!" shrieked Tessa.

The milkman stood grinning widely as he watched the couple sink to their thighs, then to the navel, with Tessa still sinking faster than her husband.

"Help us pleeease!" called Tessa one last time, before sinking past her nose into the mud.

"Tessa!" cried Wyatt, trying desperately to stride across to his dying wife ... without success: "You bastard, why won't you help us!" he called to the milkman.

Who only grinned evilly back at him. Until Wyatt had also sunk completely below the mud.

"Mummy! Daddy!" shrieked young Kylie trying to get out of the car.

"No, honey, stay in the car," called Katie, grabbing the youngster. Then, as the car sank down to the windows, she realised: It's too late for me, but Kylie can still escape!

Quickly unwinding a window, allowing the mud to start seeping into the car, Katie hefted Kylie out through the window, saying: "Run like Hell back to the Glen, and don't stop running or you'll sink into the mud too."

Standing on the miry mud, the little girl hesitated for a second, then turned and ran back the way they had come into the forest.

For the first time since stopping, the milkman stopped smiling. Then as the Cortina sank beneath the surface of the mud, he grinned a half grin, thinking: Three out of four ain't bad!


Over at the Yellow House in Rochester Road in Merridale, they were setting down to one of Deidre Morton's magnificent repasts.

"Looks scrummy, Mrs. M.," said Sheila Bennett. A Goth chick with orange-and-black-striped hair, at thirty-six Sheila was the second-top cop in the BeauLarkin to Willamby area of the Victorian countryside.

"Delish," agreed Tommy Turner. A blond retiree, Tommy was short and obese; a reformed alcoholic due to Deidre hiding his stash and doling it out one drink per meal.

"Fabuloso," agreed Terri Scott, a tall, beautiful ash blonde. The top cop of the area, Terri was Sheila's boss and Colin's fiancé.

"Superb," agreed Colin Klein. At forty-nine Colin had worked as a London crime reporter for thirty years, but now worked for the Glen Hartwell Police Force.

"Yes, wonderful," said Natasha Lipzing. At seventy-one, Natasha had lived at the Yellow House for thirty-six years.

"Certainly better than the rubbish I got at my last place," said Leo Laxman. Leo was a Jamaican-born nurse who had been employed at the Glen Hartwell and Daley Community Hospital for about a year now.

"Absolutely," agreed Freddy Kingston, a tall, heavy-set retiree.

"Yes," agreed Deidre Morton, a short dumpy, sixty-something brunette: "They should have called it the Slop House with the so-called cooking of that woman."

After tea, they settled down into the lounge room to watch the finals of, 'The World's Stupidest Stuntman Down Under'.

"Just three more weeks to go," said Tommy, sounding sad.

On the screen, a huge-chested, huge-arsed blonde was tentatively walking a small motorbike. She screamed as the bike fell from her grip and just jumped backwards in time.

"Ouch," said Natasha as the blonde fell onto her backside.

"Relax, she's got enough padding back there," said Sheila: "I still can't believe she made the competition instead of me. What's she got that I don't?"

"Huge tits, a huge bum, and blonde hair," said Tommy.

"From the mouths of babes and idiots," said Colin, making everyone except Tommy laugh.

Long before the show finished, Natasha, Deidre, Leo, and Freddy all went off to bed. Colin and Terri soon followed. Only Sheila and Tommy watched the whole two hours, laughing like mental cases every time some potentially horrific accident occurred.

Finally, Sheila and Tommy went off to bed.

Only for Sheila to be awakened around 3:30 AM by Deidre Morton hammering on the bedroom wall.

"Mrs. M., have you gone bonkers?" called Sheila, seeing the time.

"No, you're wanted in Glen Hartwell," called Deidre, going across to wake up Colin and Terri also: "Wakey, wakey, sleepy heads."

She's definitely gone bonkers! thought Sheila as she hurriedly dressed in her police uniform.


Forty-five minutes later, Terri, Colin, and Sheila were standing in a hospital ward at the Glen Hartwell and Daley Community Hospital, listening to the Nurse-in-Charge, Annie Colfax, a short forty-year-old ash blonde, as she told them the tale Kylie Friedlander had told them after staggering into Glen Hartwell half an hour earlier.

"She was lucky Suzette Cummings was still at the Mitchell Street Police Station and could bring her to us," said Annie.


Bulam-Bulam was a grey-haired elder of the Gooladoo tribe, outside the township of Harpertown in the Victorian countryside. Although he lived in a lean-to in his tribal village, he owned and worked a small grocery shop in town. An early riser, he was already at work at 6:00 AM when Terri's police-blue Lexus pulled up outside his shop in Chappell Street.

"How're they hanging, me old cobber?" said Sheila, walking across to hug the old man. He was a friend of theirs and also helped out as a police tracker when needed.

"Will she ever learn to speak English?" asked the Aboriginal.

"Not as well as you speak it," assured Colin Klein.

"So what can I do you for?" asked Bulam-Bulam.

Terri quickly filled him in on what Kylie Friedlander had claimed, then said: "We need you to backtrack us to where she claims it happened."

"She made it to the Mitchell Street Station, and told Suzette, who took her to the hospital," explained Sheila.

"Then, let's start from Mitchell Street," said Bulam-Bulam, leading the way outside.

They quickly located the girl's tracks and were soon driving into the bush, with Bulam-Bulam sitting astride the bonnet of the car. After forty minutes or so they also located a set of car tracks in the pine and eucalyptus forest outside Glen Hartwell.

"Could be from the Friedlanders's Cortina," guessed Terri.

Another forty minutes later, climbing down from the front of the Lexus, Bulam-Bulam said: "This is where the prints end."

They got out and stared at the prints.

"They just seem to start out of the forest," said Colin: "But there's no sign of where they originally came from."

"Like she just started in the middle of the forest," said Sheila: "Same with the tyre prints."

"Or she jumped from a car that has since sunk from sight," said Bulam-Bulam. He pointed to the first few prints: "Notice how they're deeper than the later prints ... As though she jumped down there."

"She said the ground was like quicksand," said Terri. She tentatively touched one foot past Kylie's tracks, then when the foot did not sink down, she hesitantly walked out past the footprints: "It seems solid enough to me."

Bulam-Bulam and the others followed Terri out onto the so-called quicksand. Unlike the night before, none of them got stuck or sunk into the mud.

Sheila stomped one foot hard on the forest floor, then asked: "How could it have been like quicksand last night, and this morning be so solid?"

"It can't have," said Colin, looking as puzzled as the others felt.

"So what're we do now?" asked Sheila.

Terri shrugged: "If it had been boggy like Kylie claimed, we might have got Building and Works to dig it up. But it's as hard as marble, so I don't know how far they'd get with it."

"Maybe you should check around for the pale blue milk cart," said Bulam-Bulam with a sudden epiphany.

"Genius, as always mate," said Sheila, giving him another hug.


The Quayle family were riding out into the forest soon after lunchtime: Heidi Quayle the oldest at twenty-two, a tall leggy ash blonde, teasingly called Barbie by her brothers, Timothy Quayle, a year younger, with short curly red hair, was nicknamed Tintin, and the baby of the group, Edward, eighteen, with short black hair, was nicknamed Eddy, after Eddy Munster.

"So why are we riding out into the forest outside G.H. when we could be working around the station?" asked Tintin.

"I told you, we're hunting brumbies," said his beautiful sister.

"Who says there are wild horses out here?" asked Eddy.

"Gale and Mavis Honeycomb."

"The Honeycomb twins are virtually retards," said Tintin, making Eddy snicker and Barbie glare at him.

"Gale and Mavis are friends of mine!" said Barbie.

"That explains everything, Barbie," said Eddy, drawing a smirk from his brother, and a glare from his sister.

"Don't call me that..." said Barbie, stopping as they heard the rattle of bottles approaching: "What the heck is that?"

"Maybe brumbies have started drinking beer," teased Tintin.

"I hope so," said Eddy: "I could do with a coldie myself."

"You're only eighteen."

"That's the legal age in Oz."

"Just because Dad and Pops are alcoholics, doesn't mean you have to be."

"Dad and Pops aren't alcoholics," said Tintin: "They just like a drink or twenty."

Eddy laughed out loud while Barbie glared again.

"That's not funny!"

So busy were the Quayles arguing, that they had almost forgotten the rattling of bottles ... until the pale blue milk cart suddenly appeared out of the forest in front of them.

"What the Hell is that?" asked Tintin.

"I think it's what Pops calls a milk cart," explained Barbie: "Apparently, they used to deliver milk door to door in the mornings."

"Well, I've never seen them," said Eddy.

"We're talking the 1980s and earlier. Probably Mum and Dad can't remember seeing them."

As the milk cart approached she added: "Actually a nice bottle of milk would be better for all of us than beer."

"That's your opinion," said Tintin, making Eddy snicker.

"Hey, mate, three bottles of full cream," said Barbie as the milk cart drew level with them.

The milkman was dressed like an old-fashioned ragman in a dirty duffel coat and grey-brown cap. He grinned broadly at the three young people but kept going, driving his cart straight past them.

"Hey, Deafy," called Eddy: "What's his problem?"

"Other than being a retard, like the Honeycomb sisters?" teased Tintin.

"Gale and Mavis aren't retards!" protested Barbie, as the three siblings turned their horses and started after the milkman: "Come on, we'll soon catch Old Man Steptoe."

"Old Man Who?" asked Tintin.

"He's from an old TV show Pops told me about," said the leggy blonde.

"Babe, you're spending way too much time with pops," teased Eddy, drawing another glare from his sister, and laughter from his brother.

"Hold up Old Man Steptoe!" called out Tintin.

"Don't call him that," said Barbie as they started after the cart, which had began to travel surprisingly quickly: "He's not gonna stop for us if you insult him."

"No worries," said Eddy: "We'll soon catch the old codger ... that's a term I learnt from Pops!"

Deciding not to waste her breath on her brother, Barbie led the charge after the fast-disappearing milk cart.

Despite Eddy's confidence, the faster their horses galloped, the further the milk cart pulled ahead of them.

How can a single horse, pulling a heavy cart, travel so quickly? wondered Barbie as the three siblings continued to gallop after the milkman.

"Hey, Dopey, we want a drink!" called Tintin.

Originally, like Eddy, he had not been keen on milk, but the further the milk cart pulled ahead of them, the more determined he was to have a drink of milk.

"Don't worry, we'll soon catch him," cried Barbie, although the faster they galloped, the further the milk cart pulled away.

For more than an hour they galloped after the pale blue milk cart until Eddy thought: Why didn't we just head home to get some milk ... or a beer?

The three siblings were all ready to abandon the chase, when the milk cart suddenly stopped. The milkman turned the cart in a circle until it faced the Quayles, as though he had finally heard them.

It's about time, Deafy! thought Tintin as they continued galloping across the pine needle and gum-leaf-covered forest toward the cart.

"Three bottles ..." began Barbie, squealing as her horse stopped dead, throwing her over its head onto the muddy ground.

"Barbie!" called Eddy, slowing his horse to a stop to dismount to help his sister. Gee, the ground is muddy, he thought, knowing there had been no rain in the area for over a week.

With difficulty, Eddy strode across to his sister, struggling against the pull of the mud, which seemed determined to pull him right down.

"Here you go, Heids," said Eddy, as he tried to pull her straight to her feet.

What the...? Eddy wondered as the simple task of lifting his sister seemed to have taken on Herculean proportions. How can she be so heavy? he thought as he struggled to lift Barbie to her feet.

Barbie was fighting the grip of the mud, without much success: "Don't let me go, Eds.," she cried, afraid they had mysteriously ridden into quicksand.

Not noticing the fate of his siblings, Tintin managed to reach the milk cart and ordered: "Three litres of full cream milk."

"Only sell it by the pint," said the milkman, still grinning idiotically.

"What's a pint?"

The milkman picked up three pint-bottles and handed them to Tintin, who popped the lid off one, took a long swig, then spat it out gasping in shock:

"This milk is well sour!"

"Not surprised, hasn't been a milk delivery in this area since 1982."

"You're sellin' forty-year-old milk?"

"Don't blame me; you're the one who chased me for miles."

"What the Hell is a mile?"

Behind them, Barbie was still struggling to stand, with the help of Eddy.

"Pull, Eddy, pull!" shrieked Barbie, having failed to climb to her feet, let alone get away from the tugging mud.

"Don't worry, I'll soon have you back on Copper Tone," said Eddy; but as he looked around he saw that both Copper Tone and his own horse were gone, having managed somehow to escape the pull of the mud.

"Help meeeeeee!" cried Barbie as she had sunk almost to the neck.

Eddy tried to step forward to help her, but found that he had now also sunk to the knees:

"Help us, Tintin!"

Forgetting his argument with the milkman, Tintin looked round just as a screaming Barbie vanished from sight beneath the mud, and Eddy had also sunk to the mid-thighs.

"Hold on!" cried Tintin.

He tried to turn his horse, however, Lord Mountbatten had sunk to his knees and was whinnying in terror as it struggled to escape the pull of the mud.

Leaping from his horse, Tintin tried to race across to where Eddy was still attempting to pull Barbie up from under the mud, despite having almost sunk to the crotch himself. However, Tintin was soon stuck in the unrelenting suction of the mud and started screaming for help as he quickly sank to the knees, then to the mid-thigh.

"Help me!" cried Tintin.

Then seeing that Eddy had sunk to the navel, he realised that there was no help for any of them.

The milkman stood grinning idiotically as the three young people, plus the horse, Lord Mountbatten, sank out of sight beneath the mud. Then climbing back aboard his milk cart he drove straight back the way he had come ... across the almost black mud ...

Which was now hard as concrete!


Over at the Quayle Cattle Station, Mum, Dad, and Pops Quayle were busy checking their twelve hundred head of cattle, when Quicksilver and Copper Tone, Barbie, and Eddy's horses came half galloping, half staggering up from the forest.

"Where the Hell are the kids?" asked Arthur, Pops, as if he expected the horses to answer him.

Copper Ton neighed in distress and Lois, Mum, went across to look at him.

"Both horses are caked to the fetlocks in dark mud," she said.

"That doesn't explain what happened to the kids," said David, Dad, as he walked across: "All right, you stupid nags, what ya done with Lord Mountbatten and the kids?"

"Yer gettin' as senile as Pops if you 'spect a horse ta answer ya," said Mum.


Fifty minutes later, Terri Scott, Sheila Bennett, Colin Klein, and Bulam-Bulam stood around the Quayle Station talking to Pops, Dad, and Mum.

"Fetlocks caked in black mud," said Mum, pointing.

Bulam-Bulam and the three cops examined the horses then, Terrie said:

"How do you fancy another ride on the bonnet, while we backtrack to find the kids?"

"Always up for a ride into the bush," said the Elder: "Beats sitting in the shop waiting for customers ... and pays better."

"Told you he was a smart bloke," said Sheila as they set off slowly.


It was mid-afternoon by the time they returned to the area where the Friedlander family had disappeared the night before.

"Doesn't this look familiar?" asked Colin as they climbed from the blue Land-Rover which they had borrowed from Donald Esk.

He pointed to the tracks of Kylie Friedlander's shoes in the mud, and the tracks of the Friedlanders's Cortina.

"Sure does," white man," teased Bulam-Bulam.


The four teenagers were riding their bikes through the forest outside Glen Hartwell, not long after tea time.

"Smell that sweet pine-scented air," said Daryl 'Tiny' Lombardo. So nicknamed due to being nearly two metres tall at only sixteen.

"You smell it," said Nicola 'Nikki' Hollander; a fifteen-year-old freckle-faced redhead: "I'd rather be at home where it's warm."

"With our parents watching?" demanded Ferdinand 'Ferdie' Thomas, a thin seventeen-year-old with short raven hair: "We couldn't get up to anything at home."

"You're not getting up to anything out here," insisted Tonja 'Scarlet' Hollander, sixteen, a redhead like her sister.

"We'll soon warm you girls up, if you're cold," offered Tiny.

"I repeat, you're not getting up to anything out here!"

"Virginity is not a command from the Bible," insisted Ferdie: "The eleventh commandment: Thou shalt not put out!"

While the boys cackled, the two girls glared at them.

"Don't blaspheme," insisted Scarlet: "I'm thinking of becoming a Nun."

Looking shocked, Tiny said: "Dad says a Nun is just a woman wasted."

"Your dad is a retard!" said Nikki.

"True," agreed Ferdie: "But that doesn't alter the fact that girls have three holes in their bodies for a purpose."

"Yeah, to eat, crap, and piss," said Scarlet.

This time the boys looked chagrined, while the two girls laughed.

"Very funny, Miss..." began Ferdie, stopping as they heard the rattling of glass bottles in the forest ahead of them.

"What can that be?" wondered Nikki.

"Probably just a bottle-o carting away empties," said Tiny.

"Out here in the forest?" asked Scarlet.

"With luck it's BWS making rural deliveries at last," suggested a hopeful Ferdie: "Then we might be able to buy some drinks."

"So you can get us drunk and have your wicked way with us?" asked Nikki.

When the two boys blushed and didn't answer, Scarlet said: "Go ahead and try it ... we'll drink you both under the metaphoric table."

"Some chance," said Ferdie, half fearing the girls could indeed outdrink them.

They were still arguing when the blue milk cart started to approach them:

"What the Hell is that?" asked Nikki.

"Damned if I know," admitted Tiny.

"It's an old milk-o," said Scarlet, the brains of the outfit: "They used to deliver six-hundred-mill milk bottles door to door."

"I could use a milk," said Nikki.

"And I'm guessing we boys have to pay for it?" asked Tiny.

"If you want to stay in good with us girls."

"'Nuff said," said Tiny, turning his bike toward the approaching milk cart: "Oiy, four of your best milks."

As though not hearing the teenager, the milk cart continued toward, then past the four teens.

"Hey, Retardo, are you deaf as well?" asked Ferdie, as the four teens turned their bikes to start after the milkman.

"Don't worry, he can't outrun our dirt bikes out here," said Tiny as they set off.

However, for more than twenty minutes the milk cart managed to stay just out of reach of the four pursuing teens. Despite occasional angry retorts from Tiny and Ferdie.

That nag looks nearly a hundred, thought Ferdie, referring to the horse pulling the cart: How can it go so fast with a cart in tow?

Yet the milk cart did manage to stay a regular twenty metres or so ahead of the four charging teens ... Until the cart suddenly stopped with a loud rattling of bottles.

About time! thought Tiny, panting as they finally started to draw near to the pale blue cart.

After the twenty-minute race, the four teens were too exhausted to speak at first, gasping for breath. Finally Ferdie said: "We'd like four litres of full cream."

"Only sell by the pint," said the milkman.

Seeing the others looking puzzled, Scarlet explained: "That means six hundred millilitres."

"Then four pints of full cream," corrected Ferdie.

Grinning like the fool on the hill, the milkman handed over four bottles of milk.

Ferdie ripped off the silver bottle top, started to take a drink, then stopped as he was overcome by the rancid aroma of the near solid milk.

"This milk is off!" he said, saving the others from tasting the awful muck.

"Haven't made a delivery in decades," said the milkman.

"Then why'd you pass it to us?" demanded Tiny.

"You asked for four bottles."

"Don't be a smartarse," said Ferdie: "And don't expect us to pay."

Dropping the milk bottle, he tried peddling his bike again, only to find the wheels had started to sink into the muddy ground.

"Hey, what gives?" asked Tiny.

Bigger and stronger than Ferdie, Tiny still was not strong enough to make the wheels of his bike turn.

"We're sinking!" said Scarlet, the first of the four teens to realise why they were unable to pedal their bikes.

"Abandon your bikes," suggested Nikki, noticing that the bikes had sunk twenty centimetres into the mud and were stuck fast.

"No way," said Ferdie: "This bike cost near three hundred bucks; I ain't leaving it!"

"Then, see you in your next lifetime," said Scarlet.

She jumped off her bike and started running away from the mud. However, she did not get far before sinking past her ankles.

"Hey, what gives?" asked Nikki, also sunk to the ankles: "This was solid ground when we rode onto it."

"Not anymore," said Ferdie.

He finally, reluctantly abandoned his bike and started after the two girls. He reached Scarlet before his feet had sunk to the funny bones and he was stuck fast.

"It's like trying to walk through treacle," said Scarlet still struggling to move out of the mud, even as she continued to sink, first to the calves, then the knees.

"It's not so bad," boasted Tiny.

He managed to run a couple of metres past Scarlet, before also becoming stuck in the quicksand-like mud.

Seeing the milkman grinning at their plight, Tiny demanded: "Hey, you old fool, what's so funny?"

"You're the ones foolish enough to get stuck in the mud!"

Ignoring the grinning milk-o, the four teens continued to struggle against the overwhelming pull of the mud, until they had all sunk to the knees.

"God help us!" shrieked Nikki.

"God helps those who help themselves," mocked the milkman, still grinning like an idiot.

"Fuck you, old man!" shouted Scarlet, as she sunk halfway down her thigh.

Soon both girls had sunk to the crotch and were crying and screaming.

Tiny and Ferdie continued to curse and rant at the grinning milk-o as they steadily sank toward oblivion.

"Soon it'll all be over," taunted the old man, as the girls sank to their waists.

"Help us!" cried Scarlet.

"What, and spoil the fun?"

Continuing to shriek, plead and curse at the old man, the four teens kept sinking; past the waist to the chest. Then to their neck.

"Please!" cried Nikki one last time until the mud covered her mouth and she was unable to speak.

Soon the mud covered her nose and Nikki began to drown in the sludge, even before her head finally sank from sight.

Soon all of the teens had sunk to the mouth, then noses, and finally disappeared from sight beneath the devouring mud.

Behind them, three of the bicycles had also sunk from sight. However, the fourth bike still had its handlebars above ground when the last teenager vanished, and the mud instantly solidified again.

"Another fine catch," said the milkman, as though he were a fisherman.

Mounting his cart, the old man turned and slowly rode away from the death site.


Over at the Yellow House, so named due to Deidre Morton's obsession with the colour yellow, they were in the lounge room, after tea time, watching 'The World's Stupidest Stuntman Down Under'. Or at least Sheila Bennett and Tommy Turner were watching it. Leo Laxman and Natasha Lipzing had gone to their rooms to read, while Deidre, Terri, and Colin were doing their best to ignore the moronic program and Sheila and Tommy's riotous laughter each time one of the contestant-cum-victims had a near fatal accident.

Seeing it was nearly 10:00, Terri said: "Well, I think it's time for us to go to bed."

"Agreed," Deidre: "Anything is better than watching this rubbish."

"How dare you," said Sheila: "'The World's Stupidest Stuntman Down Under' is a contest between moron and machine."

"It's the ultimate battle between pointless life and pointless death," added Tommy.

"Nonetheless... " began Colin, stopping as Terri's mobile rang.

"Terri," she said into the phone.

A minute or two later she disconnected and said: "That was Moni Hollander. Scarlet and Nikki haven't returned from a ride through the forest. She contacted the parents of Tiny Lombardo, and Ferdie Thomas, and they're missing too."

"So, it's off to work we go," quoted Colin.

"Aw, but 'The World's Stupidest Stuntman Down Under' isn't quite over," protested Sheila, as she reluctantly climbed from the yellow, floral sofa: "Record the rest of it, so I can watch it later."

"Will do," assured Tommy.

"It'd be just my luck to have that chesty blonde bimbo get killed, and me miss seeing it," complained Sheila as they headed outside.


An hour or so later they had reached Bulam-Bulam's village with Donald Esk's Land-Rover with search lights on the cabin roof. After filling the Elder in, they set out to look for the four missing teenagers.

"Wow, this is much more fun to drive than the Lexus," said Sheila. Although the Goth chick regretted not being able to operate the floodlights.

"Take it easy," said Colin, almost being thrown off his feet, standing in the back of the Rover which had just taken off with a jerk.

They drove slowly through the forest for hours, until finding themselves at the spot where the four teens had been swallowed by the devouring mud.

"Well, they're not...." began Colin, being interrupted by Bulam-Bulam:

"What's that?" asked the old man.

Jumping down from the bonnet of the Rover, he raced across to where the handlebars of one of the four bicycles stuck out of the now solid dirt.

The others climbed from the vehicle and raced across to examine what Bulam-Bulam had found.

"Handlebars!" said Colin: "We may have found the missing teens."

"Looks like it's time to bring in Building and Works with dozers to dig this seemingly solid ground up," admitted Terri.

It was dawn before the bulldozers arrived at the death site, and took nearly an hour to dig up the corpses of the four teenagers.

"I'm no doctor," said Colin: "But I suspect drowning in mud might be the cause of death."

An hour later four ambulances were parked nearby and the local medics, Jesus Costello (pronounced Hee-Zeus) and Tilly Lombstrom were examining the corpses.

"We'll need to do full autopsies at the hospital," said Jesus, a tall, heavyset man in his early fifties.

"But drowning in mud does seem the most likely explanation," said Tilly, a tall shapely brunette in her mid-fifties, Jesus's second-in-command.

"Although, how the Hell you drown in rock solid dirt...?" said the coroner, Jerry "Elvis" Green, so named because of his long black sideburns.

"What'll we do now?" asked George, the foreman of the Department of Building and Works.

"Keep bulldozing," said Terri, wondering if it was even a word.

They had just reached the remains of Barbie Quayle, when a police-blue Range-Rover pulled up. Out stepped Darlene Forbes, a tall, thin eighty-two-year-old woman, with bobbed grey hair, and her husband, Mel: an eight-nine-year-old tall stockily-built grey-haired man, with a Sergeant Carter-style brutal crew cut.

"So he's back," said Mel, helped across to them by Darlene.

"Who?" asked Terri.

"The Glen Hartwell Milkman. Reportedly back in the 1980s the silly sod drove his milk cart into the Glen Hartwell Swimming Pool, and milkman and horse alike drowned."

"Glen Hartwell has a swimming pool?" asked a puzzled Sheila Bennett.

"Yes, you're standing in it," said Darlene.

Sheila looked down in amazement: "No wonder no one knows about it: swimming pools are usually filled with chlorinated water, this one is full of dirt, pine needles and gum leaves."

"No, you great Goth idiot," said Mel: "They filled it in. After the milkman and horse died, his blue cart started haunting G.H., luring people to the swimming pool to their deaths, so the pool was filled in."

"And for forty years or so that seemed to work," said Darlene.

"But for some reason the milkman started up again," said Colin Klein.

"Yes," agreed Mel: "Somehow he seems to have worked out how to send people down through the hard dirt."

"Kylie Friedlander said the dirt turned into slushy mud when her family were devoured by it," explained Jesus Costello.

Over the rest of the day they kept bulldozing and came up with over sixty bodies, and more than half a dozen cars. Most of the bodies would need DNA testing to determine their identity.

"G.H. has always had regular missing persons cases," said Mel: "We may be about to solve a lot of them at once now."

When they finally emptied the pool, the sixty-three bodies were carted away and the local priest, Father Montague, filled the Olympic-sized swimming pool with Holy Water.

"Hopefully that will keep it safe," said Terri, sounding uncertain.

"Fingers crossed," said Mel Forbes, sounding doubtful.

"So, is it safe to swim in again?" asked Sheila.

"If you don't mind swimming in a pool that recently had sixty-odd mouldering corpses in it," said Colin Klein.

"Maybe not," agreed Sheila.

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