Mosquito Creek

by Robert Engwerda

  ‘Don’t even know how you get typhoid,’ Niall heard someone grumble.

  The men too were frowsy with sleep. Lamps squeaked against the iron bands of the wagons, throwing a feeble light as they set off. The entire party – some dozen men, half a dozen wagons and several carts and assorted livestock – huddled in a tight pack as they picked their way along the potholed, slippery track away from the diggings.

  Behind them the first diggers were slowly preparing for their day. As Niall looked back the goldfield was specked with camp fires being harried and poked to life. The sound of spoons scraping metal pans and pots could be heard along with a waking dog realising a feed might be had.

  It would be light in half an hour.

  Smales rode up front with his sergeant.

  ‘It’d be easier if you just had the horses,’ Smales ventured.

  Niall tugged on the reins to slow his mount to gentle walking pace. ‘Trouble is they can’t pull much,’ he said.

  ‘You reckon this bloke is going to go easy?’

  Niall thought. Five minutes out of the diggings and they were already picking their way through dense scrub. In daylight, he knew, he would’ve been able to spy scratchings and scrapings where diggers had turned over a few shovelfuls in speculative assessment of the earth.

  ‘I hope so,’ he answered.

  ‘If he doesn’t, we’ll sort him out, no worries.’

  ‘He’s an old bloke. So long as he behaves himself we’ll be the same with him.’

  ‘What’s he even worried about anyway?’

  ‘I suppose it wasn’t what he was expecting. We turn up there and tell him he has to shift for a while. Who would like it? And he’s got his own plans, I guess.’

  This countryside could easily take back what had been stolen from it, he thought. As soon as gold disappeared there’d be little reason to stay except for the occasional pastoralist here and there eking a living out of the bush. Sure as night the bush would creep in and take back what had once belonged to it.

  Be careful, she’d said to him.

  Niall could hear two of his troopers in conversation a little way behind him.

  ‘They say there’s ten or fifteen nearly dead already and by next week it could be fifty.’

  ‘You say?’

  ‘I do say. It could take over the whole diggings if we’re not careful. So what the sergeant’s doing now is right. It’s the right thing.’

  ‘Yairs, but why do this? Wouldn’t it be better to send them right away?’

  ‘Here’ll be far enough to stop other people catching it.’

  ‘And how do you know we won’t?’

  ‘You only catch it when you live like these people do.’

  ‘So we’re safe?’

  ‘For sure.’

  ‘Well, that’s something. Some people think you get it breathing the same air the sick ones do.’

  ‘If that was true we’d all be down with it by now.’

  ‘Good to know …’

  The trooper’s head fell like a doll’s as their talk drifted into black scrub around them.

  Now and then one of the wagons slid to the side of the track, pulling hard at the bullocks before it and inciting the trooper steering them into an explosion of oaths.

  Niall had been hardpressed thinking how the outbreak of typhoid had occurred. No one was even questioning it was typhoid and he felt guilty he’d set off that train of thought. But Stanfield had claimed it as his own now, as it was written into his report to government in the south. As far as Niall was concerned, and from the little he knew, he was surprised that disease had broken out here and at this time of the year. If it’d been summer, yes, that wouldn’t be a surprise. Cholera and typhoid erupted from time to time in the poorer areas of Melbourne and Sydney, even other places, where rubbish grew in stinking mounds in streets and where hanging carcasses in butchers’ shops ran blood into drains inviting the attention of blowflies and worse. But spring was unusual.

  Whatever it was, it was something they could do without. The carpenters were busy on their boat and the commissioner himself seemed preoccupied with that. Floodwaters had effectively cut off many of the supply routes feeding the diggings as well as disrupting those still doing the actual supplying. Few diggers were able to go about their work as they’d like. This sickness being spread over the diggings was a mist enveloping all the other worries. If they didn’t move rapidly to clear it diggers would start setting on each other in a way that could get badly out of hand.

  He might meet his informer again soon and hoped he’d learn more about Oriente. On the surface it seemed just an instance of someone skiving off, someone who might turn up again in days wondering what the fuss was about, or reappear on some other goldfield, or be found in a sly grog shop in the middle of a weeklong bender. But he had the feeling he wouldn’t. He had the feeling someone else’s hand was involved in his disappearance. And he could’ve easily let the whole matter go – ‘Just another digger’, as Smales had said – but he knew he wouldn’t. He knew he would stick with this one until the end.

  Before he knew it they were approaching Delaney’s hut.

  He spied it first as a light, a lamp rocking in the breeze by the door. Niall kept his eyes fixed on it while they drew nearer before the light was abruptly extinguished.

  The settler knew they were coming and a chill passed through Niall. He knew the feeling of having someone come after you.

  At the same time the sky was beginning to lighten in the east. Rain was starting to settle in again too and most of the men shrunk inside their coats.

  ‘Have to get everyone at the ready,’ Niall told Smales, waking him from his slumber. Their mounts had been pretty much finding their own way along the track. ‘Rifles ready just in case.’

  Be careful.

  ‘Right you are, boss,’ the trooper replied nervously, licking his dry lips.

  ‘Everyone on your toes!’ the sergeant called back down the line as they reached the perimeter of the settler’s property.

  A light flickered in a window before disappearing just as quickly.

  ‘See that?’ Smales cried.

  He’d well and truly woken now, nursing his rifle in his lap. Niall looked across to see where the barrel of Smales’s carbine was aimed and fell back a touch so any accidental firing would take out his horse’s neck and not him.

  ‘Everyone easy with your guns,’ Niall called again, but more quietly this time, always gauging hearing distance from their party to the hut. ‘Smales, Gill, Lightbody, Santini. You four come with me. The rest of you sit back till we see what’s going on. A few of you staying here sit up at the front with your rifles ready. Everyone off their horses.’ He looked down the line into every face. ‘You all got it?’

  Without a word the troopers all indicated they’d understood.

  ‘All right,’ he said softly to the four with him as they tied their mounts to the first fence on the property.

  They walked slowly, steadily, in part to keep their footing sure on the greasy track, in part ready to dive to ground should the settler open fire. There would be two forces at battle in Delaney’s mind, Niall knew. The first would be wanting to keep his property. The second would be his fear of being sent to gaol again.

  ‘Spread out a bit,’ Niall ordered. In concentrating on the hut his four offsiders had wandered in closer to him. ‘Too close.’

  The four looked at each other.

  Lightbody murmured in a quiet, matter-of-fact voice. ‘Smales is a nancy, can’t help himself. Has to be right on our tails.’ Santini and Gill screwed up their faces to stop themselves from cackling.

  ‘He’s a dog-sniffer!’ Santini added.

  ‘You won’t be laughing when you get your fucking head shot off!’ Smales choked.

  ‘That’ll do!’ Niall snapped.

  The hut was very close now and what he’d earlier thought was a lamp turned on and off was, he realised, a light being carried through the dwelling, only visible when it
moved past a window.

  ‘Just walk quietly and keep spreading out a bit. When we get to the stump there,’ he said, pointing to the broad remains of a eucalypt ahead, ‘you all stay behind and let me go to the door. Anything happens, don’t shoot till you can see I’m right clear of the hut. Watch your feet, everything’s slippery around here.’

  With these men he wasn’t confident of anything. In the last few yards up to the hut he was more conscious of guns pointing from behind him than anything that might be waiting at the door. He looked quickly back to see them down on one knee, carbines poised, two men either side of the track.

  He thumped on the door and instantly a lamp appeared at the window, Delaney briefly behind it before he hurried to the door.

  ‘What do yer want?’ he shouted so loudly the other troopers positioned with the wagons could hear him.

  ‘You know what we’re here for,’ Niall answered. ‘It’s time to go. Let’s do it easy all round —’

  The settler called out before he’d finished speaking. ‘Yer can’t take somebody’s land!’

  ‘We’re not taking it. We’re borrowing it a while. Like I said, you’ll be paid for the time we keep your property.’

  ‘I don’t trust dogs like you lot!’

  ‘You can take my word for it. You’ll be looked after. This place’ll be looked after.’

  ‘We’re not goin’ anywhere! You try and get me out and yer’ll pay!’

  The sergeant knocked again. ‘Open up, Abraham! Let’s make it easy now.’

  But Delaney didn’t answer this time and Niall put his weight against the door to test it. Not making any impression on it, he figured it was bolted and latched from inside. He wondered where Sarah might be hiding.

  He called the troopers up.

  ‘Leave the others back for a minute.’ Niall guessed the settler wouldn’t be doing any shooting or would have done it by now when they were easier targets approaching the hut. ‘Try going around the back. See if you can find anywhere we can get in. You two … Smales and Lightbody.’

  They were back in a minute.

  ‘Nothing,’ Smales said. ‘All bolted and locked up. Windows too.’

  ‘All right. You two,’ he said, motioning to Lightbody and Santini, the biggest of them, ‘throw your weight onto the door and see if you can move it.’

  And they were happy to give it a go and show off their strength. From a few yards back they charged the door, once, twice and finally a third time, like bulls. On the last attempt Santini smashed his head against it.

  ‘Bloody thing,’ he winced. ‘Has to be three feet thick.’

  ‘Like your skull,’ Smales piped up.

  ‘That’s no good.’ Niall stepped back, as if to gain a better view of the hut. ‘And there’s only one thing for it now. We’ll take in the window. Smales, you go in first. Gill, you go in after him. First one in gets to the door and opens it for the rest of us.’

  He trod lightly to the window and peered in but couldn’t see anything. With Smales crouching beside him he quickly smashed out the window with the stock of his rifle.

  ‘Hurry up and watch the edges of the glass.’ He boosted Smales through, as shouting he couldn’t make sense of came from inside.

  A curse from Smales let him know the trooper hadn’t avoided all the broken glass. Gill pulled himself through more gingerly.

  There was more raucous shouting from inside as Niall heard one or both of the troopers making for the door, then more shouts and screams as someone tried unlatching it. He could hear Delaney and at least one of the women letting fly as seconds later the door crashed open, but it was Smales bolting from inside and out into relative safety.

  ‘Quick, inside!’ Niall shouted as the settler appeared swinging fists in greeting. Delaney landed one on Gill before Lightbody and Santini helped charge him to the ground, the settler swearing threats all the while.

  The three women put up some resistance too before being taken away from the hut.

  ‘God almighty!’ Smales bent over, feeling his face at the same time. Niall could see long scratches down one cheek, all deep enough to draw blood. ‘Bastards!’

  Delaney was still face down on the ground, spitting as the troopers bound his hands behind his back.

  ‘Settle down. You keep on you’ll get yourself in trouble,’ Niall told him.

  ‘Not half as much as will happen to you!’

  ‘This is the time to shut your gob, Delaney. Resisting arrest and assaulting a trooper can put you away.’

  The settler muttered to himself instead, still struggling as the troopers led him to one of the carts further up the track, pushing him up into it to join his wife. The daughters were placed in a wagon about twenty yards behind it.

  ‘You! Trooper!’ Delaney shouted at Niall. ‘Don’t think yer’ll get away with it! Think yer can just come in like this and take everythin’ away, yer wrong! I know yer now!’

  And he kept ranting then, boiling over so one of the troopers had to keep pushing him down to his seat in the cart.

  ‘How are we gonner keep him away from this place?’ Lightbody wondered.

  Niall watched the first cart leave, carrying the parents.

  ‘We’ll keep troopers stationed here. He knows he can’t come back. Besides, his animals and everything out of the hut will go with him. He won’t be able to lug all that back.’

  ‘What about the other two?

  ‘The daughters? I’ll go speak with them now.’

  Niall walked off to where the women waited in the wagon and stood beside them, not quite sure how to begin. Some of the men were already beginning to empty the hut, shaking their heads about something and laughing, shoving smaller items of furniture into the back of the wagon where the women sat.

  ‘You broke a window and some other things inside,’ Sarah said.

  She was barely looking at him.

  ‘It wasn’t by choice. If you’d let us in there would have been none of this.’

  ‘You’ll have to repair it.’

  ‘It’ll be fixed. I’m as good as my word.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she replied curtly.

  The second sister, Louise, younger than Sarah, sat silently with her head bowed, occasionally glancing along the track where her parents had already disappeared out of sight.

  ‘Is she … ?’ Niall began.

  ‘No, she can hear. She’s quiet, that’s all.’

  ‘We’ll take up your things. You can see we’re already doing it,’ he said unnecessarily.

  ‘Some things were already packed. I got up early this morning. Try to keep everything together if you can.’

  ‘I’ll get some of the more reliable ones to do it.’

  Sarah carried her own bag closely by her. ‘I can’t say I’m happy how all this has come about. But you’re the law, so what choice do we have?’

  ‘Not much.’

  ‘And where are you taking us?’

  Niall watched the troopers walk briskly to and from the hut with armfuls of belongings, laughing about something.

  ‘You know the escarpment south of the diggings?’ Niall said. ‘There’s a place up there at the top. Not right where the road comes through, but further away, west of it looking from the diggings.’

  ‘What’s there?’

  ‘A house. A proper house, not a hut. A bloke settled there maybe five years ago, but had to head to Sydney not long ago on some family business, taking most of his things with him. We thought he’d be back by now but he isn’t and no one seems to know where he is.’

  ‘Someone on his own?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘And is he coming back?’

  ‘The commissioner says so. He hasn’t let anyone move into that place, not diggers anyway.’

  ‘Especially not diggers with typhoid.’

  Niall looked at her. ‘How do you know about that?’

  ‘News travels quickly around here. Especially bad news. And now you’d have us taken from our property and
it turned into a place for the sick and dying.’

  ‘Just till we can get on top of what’s happening.’

  ‘While our place is contaminated with disease. And you’ll expect us then to go back to it later?’

  ‘From what I know, there won’t be any lasting damage.’

  She stared at him. ‘I hope you’re right then.’

  ‘You’ll be all right.’

  ‘And this other house?’

  ‘It’s big. Lots of space. Big hearth. Plants growing around the outside of it, vines.’

  ‘Father’s worried about his animals.’

  ‘The stock will come up after you, tomorrow. There are yards there too. Fruit trees I should have said, too. Nothing on them this time of year, of course.’

  ‘So you’ve thought of everything?’

  He drew a breath.

  ‘You can’t think of everything. If there was more time maybe it would have been better.’

  She sat there quietly nursing her bag and waiting for the bullock team to be slapped into action. She glanced at Niall, the briefest hint of a smile appearing and then disappearing. For the moment she seemed oblivious to rain beginning to drift across the bush.

  ‘Maybe what happens, happens for the best?’ she said.

  He’d been letting his gaze travel over the countryside around them, across the huts and sheds, pass over Delaney’s fences and yards, settle on the smoothly hewn wooden block that was their front step. Now he let it settle on her.

  ‘I hope so,’ he said.

  She looked at him as if she were about to say something but couldn’t, or wouldn’t. After a few seconds he had to avert his eyes.

  Soon Gill marshalled the other troopers and led the wagons swaying and jolting away along the rutted track.

  At least that part was over, Niall told himself. Now it was just loading the other wagons and carts with the settler’s belongings. But the way the daughter had stared at him unsettled him.

  He waited near the front of the hut for the other troopers to return, squatting and absently watching a line of red ants march a filament of bone away.