Mosquito Creek

by Robert Engwerda

  As he wrote at his desk he felt curiously like his father, only he was assembling words where his father laboured at his replica of the Victory. Scattered about his father’s tabletop were a confusion of strips and stubs of teak, copper pins, tiny nails and tacks together with a small iron hammer to nail them in, squares of stiff canvas to be later cut for sails, rounded, tapered lengths of black-painted teak for masts, heavy thread for rigging and, in a small box no higher than an inch, scores of miniature brass cannon ready to be fixed to the ship’s gun decks. But his father’s fingers were less than nimble and his father’s sons knew better than to be in his vicinity when he was at work on his ship.

  On the voyage to Australia he entertained dreams of arriving at something that would make his father sit up and take notice, so his father could wryly note to his friends that the lad had amounted to something after all. Sundays after his return to England, when guests and distinguished visitors arrived, his father might take a pipe in his chair and speak expansively of his son’s achievements in that distant colony as he listened with a glass of something warm and fortifying in his hands. His father might nod to him as a signal that he should take over the conversation himself. He would then hear his own voice settle around the room while he was encircled by admirers. Terence would be listening intently, absorbing every word.

  But when he looked up from his letter there was nothing like that to be seen. It was as empty and cold and desolate here as a shepherd’s hut on a bleak moor. He wished his brother were with him now. He and Terence would have been as formidable as any of Nelson’s fine crew.

  He had known for some time that Phillip Oriente would one day appear with the relic and he would have liked to have his brother standing beside him as he fought for its return. Sometimes, however, one had to battle with what little one had and he would steel himself for that now. This morning he had to meet with Alfred Row and settle on his final plans. By tonight his business would be done and he would be free of the worry that had tormented him since landing in Australia. There would only be his rescue of the miners then, his ship navigating the river as easily as any boat ever had.

  20

  Niall Kennedy rode from the diggings once morning was clear of the horizon, keeping a watchful eye out for who or what might be around him, and picking the clearest route to the escarpment and the passage south.

  Diggers were still trying to go about their business as best they could though rain and cold were constant companions. The flooding was worse. Niall could see that in the way they worked. A man here was hunched over a pan flicking bits and pieces of stone away, worrying wet sand with his fingers. Beside him his partner was mechanically shovelling sloppy ground into a wheelbarrow. Near them other teams were doing the same, everyone shrugging dirt into barrows as if they were slinging years of wet gravel out of their bones.

  His horse found firm enough footing and Niall lifted his head occasionally to see which direction he should follow. There was a rise in the diggings here too, a gentle undulation that would in another two hundred yards take him into a ragged tree line of thinned-out woodland and trampled bracken before he struck the track south-west.

  There were few tents on this margin of the diggings. Where they could, miners preferred staying closer to creeks and the river. Those camped where he now passed were ill-equipped battlers. The canvas of their tents was paper thin and powdered with mould and crusty mildew. The whole construction of their more permanent shelters was unsteady with poles skew-whiff, on the verge of toppling. Niall imagined their owners to be the same: wild-eyed boys recovering from a spree, hopelessly mired in grog and only temporarily sober enough to make a shambles of their attempts at mining. He’d seen a beggar here recently, his hat extended for any offering, the bloke parked on his backside with a patchy, swollen eye as though he’d been repeatedly bitten by some infuriated wasp.

  Before he knew it he was in the damper air of the bush.

  The noise of the goldfields receded as he rode. Here there was only the sound of snapping leaves and twigs under his horse’s hooves, the whole landscape wet and poor. How anything so rich as gold could be found in so unpromising a terrain was beyond him. Or perhaps that was the hope of it all, in everything, that the real promise lay just beyond what could be seen with the untutored eye.

  And he didn’t really know what to expect where he was going. There was only a vague sense of heading to the escarpment he momentarily lost through thicker bush ahead of him. Above that somewhere would be the homestead.

  As if to mirror his apprehension, light drizzle blew in again.

  He felt the pull on his mount’s flanks, the scrambling of its hooves as it negotiated a steeper gradient through denser bush. A wallaby crashing through undergrowth startled him momentarily before he spurred the horse on. The sound of something came scuttling through leaf litter, some animal he couldn’t see.

  The horse watched its footing. Most of this landscape seemed undisturbed, with only occasional signs of a log cut up and carted away. Wombat holes lay burrowed randomly into moist earth. There was a strange quality about it too, Niall noticed. As he climbed there were mossy patches and ferns reaching for light, foliage that should have belonged in gullies alongside creeks.

  All the while he puzzled over what the informer had told him about the commissioner. The digger was a peculiar sort of bloke with more to him than the drink, he suspected. If he was to sort out anything though, he had to have more behind him than just a suspicion or two. Hearsay counted as nothing. But why then had this cove turned up out of nowhere two days running to tell him this story about Stanfield if there wasn’t some truth behind it? And in what way could Stanfield have been involved with him? There was talk around the place of some in authority taking money in exchange for turning a blind eye to certain goings-on, and he knew it for a fact himself: the illegal sale of drink, diggers mining without a licence, horses that mysteriously disappeared from the police yards despite the yards being watched. Whatever it was, if the digger was right there wasn’t much time left to work it out and prevent whatever it was that was supposed to happen tonight from happening. And what could occur at a circus where there were likely to be hundreds of people and everyone in full view?

  He’d have to be there no matter what. He knew that.

  Within fifteen minutes he reached the craggy face of the escarpment.

  It was a jolt, rising from the earth as it did, a jagged stretch of cliff possibly eighty feet at its highest. Apart from starved tufts of grass and tree roots dangling barrenly from rock, nothing of any consequence grew on the wall. Slabs of jutting rock were painted white by bird droppings, rough nests of twigs built in natural and weather-eaten niches. Everywhere else the rock was ochre, an imposing stone wall of massive blocks except where water had cascaded from above in waterfall streaks of black.

  It was a marvel, he thought, the way it had pushed itself out of the ground to form this huge barrier. As he paused at its base and then let the horse pick its way between boulders and rubble that had worked free, he briefly forgot it was a track he was following to the top. There was more protection from the elements here. Further above, wind and rain hurried over the edge of the escarpment to fall behind him over the bush.

  As he worked his way higher through a natural sagging of the escarpment two wagons coming from the other direction forced him to dismount and make way. The two drivers tipped their hats to him as they inched past.

  And as he watched them go, letting his horse crop a minute longer at some grass by the track, his eye caught something barely visible between the trees. Tying his mount to a sapling he trod carefully to the rocky wall.

  A flourish of rock curled out from the wall. Beneath it openings gaped, some tall enough to stand up in and floored with smooth stone.

  He found more overhangs as he wandered.

  And what he came upon in one made him hold his breath.

  It was another overhang, shaped like the roof of someone’s mouth; a swollen to
p lip of rock curled out from the wall and underneath spread an area the size of a small room. The roof sloped away to a back wall where he stooped to see figures and animals painted on rock. There were reds and oranges and blacks, stick men wearing halos of white dancing across the wall amid a celebration of lizards, wallabies and fish. On one section of the wall, thick white lines had been traced around the body of one figure – a chief or leader? he wondered. Hands small and large splayed in outline at the bottom of the cave where red had been spat over them. He placed his own against one and found an almost perfect match. Animal bones, fragile as chalk, crunched under his boots as he peered at some artist’s handiwork. Above the paintings of the animals he saw more recent work – a white rifle, with perfect stock and long barrel.

  The cave unsettled him in a way he didn’t understand. This belonged to another time, something different from the blacks he had seen moping about the diggings where religious men, pastors and lay preachers alike tried making Christians of them, in much the same way they tried salvaging the souls of drunks. But here there was humanity and life, an idea of family and the everyday passing of the seasons, painted in every loving ochred line.

  Outside he felt exposed to the weather and raised his eyes to take his bearings but the sight of a rocky outcrop swinging above left him giddy.

  He found his way back to the horse and slung himself into the saddle, jabbing his heels into the horse’s sides to get it moving, the animal labouring with the steep climb and the slip of its hooves on stone rubble.

  Reaching the top of the track he dismounted again, gazing down on the glistening canopy of trees, rain lashing his face. It was exhilarating all the same. To be up here was to be clear of the diggings and everything that went with it. In the distance towards the river he could just make out faint curls of smoke blowing away above the treetops. Further beyond the river would be spilling its way through the country and he wondered about the fate of those who might be stranded on the other side and the sick brought out to Delaney’s farm. But it looked like the rain would end soon. In the far west a strip of clear blue seemed to run the entire length of the distant sky.

  He spun around once, twice, letting out a deep breath as if to exhale the last of the diggings, before surveying the trees in front of him to pick a likely path to the squatter’s abandoned place. He set himself for what might lay ahead.

  There were two lesser paths branching away from the main track at the top of the escarpment. One was indistinct as though it wasn’t sure it wanted to venture into the trees, the other more recently trampled and marked with horse droppings, so he didn’t have long to ponder. A post half-buried beside the track a little way up indicated a marker of sorts before he spied another about fifty yards further. Daubs of white paint stuck on the tops of fence posts must have meant something to someone.

  He’d let the horse take a breather for a while, he decided. And the walk would give him time to consider what he’d say to her when he reached the homestead, and how he might tackle her father. From what Cole told him yesterday afternoon, and from what the digger had said, he knew he’d have to be prepared for anything. He again cast his mind back all those years but he couldn’t recollect any Delaney, much less place his face. Perhaps Delaney had been and gone by the time he arrived. But still, that comment about knowing him …

  ‘Come on, old feller,’ he said to the horse, stroking its neck. ‘Let’s get going.’

  Niall stared ahead and focussed on the sounds of the bush around him as the rain eased off before it ceased altogether. The first patch of cleared land broke through trees around the next bend in the track. A handful of despondent-looking cattle wandered among stumps, barely raising their heads as he passed by. The track grew wider and slippery with deep ruts as he led the horse so he was forced to move along one side of it where the animal could tread flattened grass.

  He had been to the homestead once before, not long after he’d come to the diggings, and he remembered now that the settler’s name was Millicent. The previous commissioner had asked him to investigate if anything untoward had happened to him before they learnt he had gone to Sydney for reasons of family illness, though others said it was to do with business. But all these places crudely hewn out of the bush were alike, every track similar. It was only the house here that set it apart. That and the fruit trees and other old-country plants the settler had grown and cared for.

  Despite Niall’s asking around no one had been able to tell him when Millicent might be returning, so the empty house remained locked, what little that might be useful on the diggings spirited away from the property by persons unknown. Commissioner Stanfield himself was adamant that in due course the fellow would return for what was his, because an investment had been made.

  And soon enough the gums around the track opened completely to reveal an expanse of cleared scrub and bush, worked more closely and tidily this time so that even stumps were grubbed out. There was a fashioned order about the property, signs of permanence the bush hadn’t been able to reclaim quickly. A fence had been set hard against the line of trees and on alternate fence posts sat pieces of bleached wood or stone. Riding closer and looking again Niall realised that they were human skulls. He instinctively flinched, turning his eyes away, reminded again of Van Diemen’s Land.

  He halted and glanced around to see if there was anyone, but the space about seemed deserted. Then around a slight bend the house appeared as he remembered it; more beautiful and substantial than anything else he had seen in these parts.

  He shook the horse back into motion, refusing to look again at the fence line. Sarah’s father would be hereabouts so he had to be wary.

  But as he brought his horse closer there wasn’t a soul about.

  He tied the horse to a rail alongside the dwelling and ventured closer on foot, keeping an eye out for Delaney.

  A row of five apple trees with first buds appearing bordered one side of the impressive building. Vines still waiting for their first leaves curled tightly around wooden trellising nailed to the top of the verandah that bordered the entire house. In summer, he could see, the vines would form a fringe around the woodwork shading the interior of the house from angled sun. A few, tallish gums had been left to grow on the western side of the property and these too would afford shade. Elsewhere to the back of the house there were sheds and huts, which he guessed once supported chickens and goats, implements and building materials; the mechanics of farming.

  He involuntarily looked back at the skulls. They seemed to be watching him as he inched forward; black, empty sockets mournfully tracing the progress of his boots on the ground, keeping a close watch on what he and the horse might be doing. They were like dead wild dogs strung up on a fence to frighten off marauding animals, he thought. But what was there to fear here now, unless they were a sign to him?

  He looked again to reassure himself there was no one watching from the house, before calling, ‘Hello!’

  His voice died on the wind as it sang out so he called again.

  He peered into the wooden house but something kept him from advancing up the steps of the porch and thumping on the front door itself. This place had glass too, clear windows reflecting like mirrors. He could see himself faintly in one that wasn’t squarely in its frame, the glass angled like a jaunty mirror at a summer fair. He caught sight of his hair blown about by the wind, and then his heart began beating quickly as he glimpsed something moving beyond his line of vision – someone was watching him from inside the house.

  Niall stepped back a pace or two. Everything about this place, flat and squat, had a presence of its own. He knew she was there behind one of the windows. Instantly he felt he was being considered, that she was making up her mind. He wondered if the rest of the family might be in there too, crouching and waiting.

  He thought to call hello again but stopped himself. Instead he said as loudly as he knew would be heard, ‘I just need to talk to you for a minute. I promise I won’t take much of your time.’ />
  He hesitated then, feeling cold invade his skin as he remained still. What if Abraham Delaney was waiting for him somewhere? What if she had changed her mind and decided she didn’t want anything to do with him? What if it was the old man who presented himself outside?

  Again, something moved in the house.

  A brown kelpie began barking from where it was tethered to one of the apple trees.

  And then someone emerged quietly from the house, almost wafting from behind the door like air. Sarah.

  ‘You’re soon back,’ she said, nervously casting her eyes about as he walked lightly over the creaking boards of the verandah to join her.

  He stared back and then behind her as if to check no one had trailed along in her wake, that she wasn’t a decoy for another purpose.

  Sensing this, she explained, ‘Mother’s inside unpacking with Louise.’ She paused. ‘They won’t come outside.’

  ‘Your father?’

  ‘He’s getting ready to move the stock. He won’t be back just yet.’

  ‘It’s not taking long, then.’

  ‘No. And this place is a surprise.’ She turned to regard the house behind her. She used her hands expressively, mirroring her conversation, suddenly in a hurry to tell him. ‘It’s big inside and everything so well made. I don’t know what timber the floors are but they’re beautiful under your feet. In a day or two we’ll have most things unpacked and in some sort of order. How long did you say no one has lived here?’

  ‘I’m not sure. Anything from five or six months. No one knows exactly.’

  ‘No broken windows or anything. The chimney works. You’d think someone would have tried to camp here.’

  ‘People don’t mind breaking into ordinary huts and stealing there. They think twice about richer properties. The punishment …’ he said.

  ‘I thought a crime was a crime.’

  ‘It never has been. Not here either.’ But he’d forgotten about the note, he realised. ‘I came to bring you this, Miss Delaney,’ he said, fumbling the commissioner’s note from his pocket.