“Yes, but that’s not the one I’m thinking of,” said Mr. Pelford. “Come on, someone else, please. Someone with a brain in their head.”
“The Great Wall of China,” offered Richard L’Estrange.
“The Niagara Falls,” said Emily Piper.
“Big Ben,” shouted the Mickleson twins, Amy and Aimee.
“For heaven’s sake, children,” said the teacher, throwing his hands in the air. “It’s the Harbour Bridge, of course. An extraordinary feat of engineering, at the top of which, I might add, one Geena Llewellyn agreed to become the second Mrs. David Pelford on a rainy July afternoon some seven years ago.”
The children looked a little skeptical that Mr. Pelford could possibly have persuaded one person to marry him, let alone two.
“And as a special treat,” he continued, “I’ve arranged for us all to climb the bridge this afternoon, like the tourists do. Yes, even you, Stephen Hebden. I don’t want to hear a word about your chronic vertigo.”
Happy to do something different, the children made their way outside to the waiting bus, and on the short journey that followed, Barnaby looked down from the ceiling as the other children read comics, examined the contents of their handkerchiefs, or listened to their iPods, and wished that he could take the empty seat among them that was rightfully his.
When they reached the bridge, they were met by a young student named Darren—“Call me Daz”—who had messy blond hair, a sunburned face, and the whitest teeth Barnaby had ever seen on a human being.
“Good morning, bridge climbers!” he shouted, looking as if he had never been quite as happy as he was at that very moment. “Is everyone ready to see Sydney from above?”
There were a few grunts from the children, which Daz seemed to take as assent, because he clapped his hands together and roared, “Well, all right, then!” in a hysterical tone. In fact, some of Barnaby’s classmates were starting to grow very enthusiastic now as the great expanse of the bridge appeared before them. Most of them had driven back and forth across it in their parents’ cars hundreds of times, but they had never really looked at it before. And for some, for those observant few, it was a thing of beauty.
“Of course we can’t climb in our civvies,” said Daz, leading them into a special chamber where a row of gray-and-blue jumpsuits were laid out for them, along with caps, fleeces, rain jackets, special climbing shoes, and a bundle of curious-looking cables. “We’ve got to look the part.”
They got dressed, each one enjoying the feeling of being bundled up in such fantastic new gear, and the girls gathered their hair up in specially provided scrunchies, so it wouldn’t blow in their faces. “It can get pretty windy up there,” said Daz, laughing happily, as if the prospect of being blown over the side into the harbor waters was a terrific joke. “And we don’t want anyone falling in, do we? Never again, that’s my motto! Now, anyone been drinking?”
The children looked at each other in confusion, and Marcus Foot raised his hand tentatively. “I had a black-currant cordial in the bus,” he said nervously. “But I’ve already been to the bathroom, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“I’ve been four times,” said Stephen Hebden, who was looking for any excuse to avoid the climb.
“Not soft drinks,” said Daz, laughing. “Grog! We can’t have anyone climbing the bridge if they’ve been on the sauce. I need everyone to take a Breathalyzer test.”
“For heaven’s sake,” said Mr. Pelford, momentarily worried that he himself might not pass it. “They’re only eight years old.”
“Regulations, mate,” said Daz, getting each child to blow into a tube and examining the reading. “More than my job’s worth to let anyone go up without blowing in here first.”
Ten minutes later, when all had proved sober, a collection of cords and wires were attached to their suits in complicated ways and they were led out to the iron steps. The moment he got outside, Barnaby started to float upward, only slightly held down by the weight of the suit and the equipment he was carrying, but Daz was too quick for him, grabbing him by the ankle and pulling him back to the ground.
“Where do you think you’re going, mate?” he asked, staring at the boy in surprise.
“It’s not my fault,” explained Barnaby. “I float.”
“Well, that’s crackin’!” roared Daz, who was one of those rare people who embraced difference rather than feared it. He held on to Barnaby as he arranged all the children in single file, then locked the harnesses of their suits to the pole that ran along the inside of the bridge itself.
“You know, we’re not supposed to take kids as young as you climbing,” Daz told them when they were just about to start. “But today is a very special day.”
“Why’s that?” asked George Jones, a boy who was known for his flatulence—a reputation that, a moment later, he justified.
“It just is, mate,” said Daz, winking at him. “Think of me as the magician on the bridge. All will be revealed in time.”
They began to ascend and, connected to the bridge, Barnaby found himself able to walk without anyone holding him down.
“You’re just like the rest of us now,” said Philip Wensleydale, grinning at him.
“Yes,” replied Barnaby, frowning so much that a little vertical crease appeared in the gap between his eyebrows. “Yes, I suppose I am.”
Only, to his great surprise, Barnaby didn’t enjoy feeling like the rest of them. It was as if he was pretending to be someone he wasn’t.
They made their way up, and one girl, Jeannie Jenkins, tried to start a sing-along with a rousing rendition of “Advance Australia Fair,” but no one joined in and she gave up after the first verse. Donald Sutcliffe and his mortal enemy James Caruthers, stuck one in front of the other, began a conversation about their dogs, both of whom were Cavalier King Charles spaniels; they quickly forgot all the terrible things they had done to each other over the years and forged a new friendship. Katie Lynch, a studious girl, recited poetry in her head. Cornelius Hastings, known to everyone as “Corny,” looked over the side and pointed at every building he saw, gasping in astonishment and saying “I should have brought my camera” over and over, until Lisa Farragher, directly behind him, threatened him with violence. Dylan Cotter counted the steps. Jean Kavanagh played with her hair. Anne Griffin wondered whether the man who lived next door to her might have murdered his recently deceased wife and decided that when she returned to ground level, she would begin an investigation.
In short, everyone kept busy as they made their way up the side of the Harbour Bridge.
After about an hour, they reached the top and turned round to look down at the city spread out before them. It was an extraordinary sight. In the distance, a hot-air balloon was coming in to land on one of the green areas beyond the city, and Barnaby could just make out two figures inside the basket, jumping up and down in delight. Beneath them, the lanes of traffic were whizzing across from one side of Sydney to the other, the noise of the engines drowning out the sound of Stephen Hebden’s screams and George Jones’s farting. To their right, they could see almost as far as Cockatoo Island, and when Barnaby turned to his left, he was looking down on the white tiles of the Opera House and the ferries shuttling the Sydneysiders from Circular Quay to the bays and coves beyond.