by Tony Black
Nathaniel leaned back and placed the pipe between his teeth; it clacked like throwing dice. “Or, for that matter,” he lunged forward, jutting out his jaw, “what dog or wolf, have you seen send a packhorse, a group of oxen, or any hunting dogs whimpering with fear? My own beasts have cowered at my back like little children at one whiff of a tiger. I have seen game in the bush run terrified, panting, their hearts ready to burst inside them, a full hour before any tiger has shown itself!
There was a fierce glint in Nathaniel’s eye and when I saw it I wanted to throw up my heels and run, but I could not.
I felt the rim of my panic rising as the room suddenly fell silent once more, and then a tall man with a white face stepped forward.
“They are no ordinary animal,” he said. His head was clear of any hair, but long dark wisps hung like branches below his ears and upon his face. “They are our terror.”
Father reclined his head and folded his arms across his belly. He seemed disbelieving, but his face said he would not mock at these fears.
Within the billet, as I watched Nathaniel and the crowd stooped before us, my thoughts ran as hot as a pyre. When the settlers spoke their stories gave me the same feeling I had in the Sakiai, listening to tales of Giltine – the bringer of death.
The current of the night’s talk carried us to a dark place. As the tall man stepped forward he brought a rush of air towards us. His waxy skin hid heavy tracks, as wide as grill markings, on the sides of his face.
“They do not hunt or kill like other animals,” he said softly, and the stiffness of his voice betrayed a threat of tears. “They attach to the throat of their prey, then they drink out their blood … like vampires.”
“They eat nothing else,” burst out Nathaniel, “nothing! They merely drink their blood … What kind of a fiend lives that way?”
I stood by Mother and Father at the fireside. I looked in their eyes but I saw no hint of their thoughts. My mother’s mouth was open like a coin pouch.
“They eat nothing else?” said Father.
“Sometimes, they will eat the heart,” said Nathaniel. “I have watched them. They are not afraid of us, they act as if we are not there. Once I emptied a pistol shot into the withers of a large male – he was going for my sheep hound, Bess. She were afraid of him and ran like the blazes at first, but then took charge of herself when I closed them in the pen. I could only get one shot off for fear of hitting Bess; there was an almighty tussle in that sheep pen but the bullet never slowed the tiger one bit. I could only watch as he put those grand jaws of his around poor Bess’s skull. My, what a gape it were, I swear he could have swallowed whole my best bull’s head. She fell dead that second, the beast had crushed her skull in its jaws.
“I ran to get my Winchester, I was going to plug him good and raw, but then he took the side of the pen in one great leap, like a kangaroo, it were, I swear. That pen was six feet high, and he jumped it like I cross a stile. Now none of this is bullyragging, that I assure to you. I watched that beast like you watch me now. I was glad to see him running, I still say today the next bullet from that handgun would have been best fired in my own head. I do believe the tiger could have taken the full round before he fell down and I was not the man to try it.”
I listened to the tales until my mother approached me. She placed her hands upon me, patting my clothes. “Good, you are dry. I think you should take your bunk now.”
“But, Mama …”
“No, Myko, it is time for you to rest now. Go to your bunk.”
As I lay awake my thoughts were a hot broth, bubbling inside of me. I saw again the mangy pelt which hung in the pawnbroker’s shop, the bounty on it already claimed. I knew now that every hand on the island was turned against the tiger.
“You do not like it here, do you?” said a soft voice at my side. I turned but I saw no one beyond the darkness.
“Who is that?” I said.
Someone struck a match and lit a candle, and across the bunk room I saw the barefoot girl. “I am Tilly,” she said.
As she walked over to face me I saw pale bluebells covered her flannel nightgown. Her small feet poked beneath, as freckled as her wide face.
“Oh, it’s you,” I said and looked away.
The girl sat down on the empty bunk beside me, “What is wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong … go away!”
“I can tell you do not like it here.”
I spoke flatly: “No. I do not like it here.”
“Do you miss your home?”
I turned over in the bunk and showed the girl my back.
“Are you frightened? Is it the talk of tigers?”
“No!” I snapped. I sat upright in the bunk. “I just don’t like how they talk about the tiger.”
The girl curled up her nose. “They hate the tigers.”
Her words lit a flame in me; I jumped from the bunk to stand before her. “Why? What has the tiger done that is so bad?”
She dropped her eyes and began to play with the sleeve of her nightgown. “I don’t know … they just hate it,” she said, “and that’s why they kill them, and tell tales at night around the fireside.”
I turned away and slumped back in my bunk, and the girl looked at me. “That’s just how it is here,” she said, “that’s how it’s always been.”
Chapter Five
In the months before our voyage from the Sakiai in Lithuania my brother Jurgis and I waited for the stork with the rest of the village. Father placed a cartwheel high upon our rooftop, hoping the stork would land on our home and build its nest. “If the stork rests here it will bring us luck and fortune,” he said, “would that not be good, my boys?”
The air was cold and still, but Father worked bare-chest as he hoisted high the wooden cartwheel and tied it into place on our rooftop. “This is a special day, my boys,” he said, “the stork is the holiest of birds … we must make our roof look the most tempting to land upon in the whole village.”
As Father gritted his teeth, he forced the cold air from his nostrils and tied tight the jute rope to secure the cartwheel. Whilst he worked, his nails dug into the wet blackness of the wood that held our roof. “There, it is good enough for any stork,” he said. When he was finished he stood smiling and placed his foot on the cartwheel’s rim. “Not one would pass it by. We will have fine fortunes this year, my boys, mark my words, we will have the stork land right here and we will be blessed!”
There was great excitement awaiting the stork’s arrival. Mother tended the homefire and baked bread called duona. Some of the women from the village brought gifts of fruits, chocolates or pencils and they hung coloured eggs on the tree branches.
“The stork must be coming soon,” said one of the women, “look, those eggs are the stork’s … they are, they are, can’t you tell?”
Jurgis smiled and laughed out loud at the goings and some of the younger children began to lift their legs high in the air to walk with the gait of the stork. “They are sure there is luck coming,” said Jurgis, “the stork’s luck.”
I was not so sure. “But how can the stork bring luck?” I said.
My brother looked at me but said nothing; he was too taken up with the excitement that was everywhere.
“Jurgis, I don’t like this stork business,” I said.
My brother’s smile slipped away. “But why?”
“What if the stork is not caught? What then?”
As we looked to the sky, we saw no stork. For a long time we searched over every inch of the blue sky we could see, from the green pastures and the hilltops we searched ever upwards, but the stork did not come. And in time, everything was changed; the talk turned quickly to Giltine – the bringer of death.
“Without the stork, Giltine will surely walk among us,” an old farmer said.
Another spoke of his flocks: “Without the presence of the stork, there will be losses, for Giltine makes all beasts uneasy; they take on strange unnatural behaviours and in flocks they scatter,” he sa
id.
I looked at my brother, and I saw that he stared at our father with wide eyes. “What is happening, Myko?” he said.
“I do not know.” I was as confused as he was.
Our mother ran to us and held us to her, but she brought no comfort to us either; we heard only her sobs above the crowd’s chatterings.
“I should have seen the signs,” said a broad woman, a crone with night black hair, “I baked bread that broke clean into two parts in my oven, surely it was one of Giltine’s messages.”
“I had a crack appear in my ceiling,” said another, “likewise, it fell into two parts … was this not one of Giltine’s auguries?”
A loud whisper spread among the crowd and then the beekeeper stepped forward. Everyone fell silent, as the beekeeper began to speak. “I found a cross-shaped honeycomb in one of my hives,” he said.
Suddenly there was a noise like a giant gathering his breath. “But that is not all.” The crowd fell silent once more as the beekeeper took up the story. “I then returned home to find my deerhound, an animal I loved as one of my own family, had devoured her entire litter of pups.”
“It is Giltine,” the people cried out, “Giltine is among us.”
The villagers wailed and howled, men and women cried openly, and mothers clutched small children tight to their breasts as people fled in all directions.
In the days to come Giltine appeared again and again, in many new guises.
Chapter Six
The days passed at the great sheep station of Woolnorth with little flurry, save the harshness of the storm which descended upon us like a tidal wave.
It was a cruel time to be out of doors, even when the storm was spent. Grey skies, nearing on black, spread over the sedgeland covering the hills. The great white flocks scattered and huddled under leatherwoods, by lowland heaths, and along the hillsides’ rocky bournes. Their shrill bleats were heard skirling all along the edge of the meadows.
The pasture’s tree trunks wore a black-wet belt where the floodplains subsided, and the hopeless spray of raindrops from the ferns rose like mists upon the heavy air of the pulsing gales.
As I walked with my father in the morning’s air he collected small dark-knotted branches from the ground. “Have you greased those boots, Myko?” he said.
“Yes.”
“Like I showed you?”
“Yes, just like you showed me; look.” I halted where I stood to show my boots; they shone like pearls.
“Good,” said Father, “you have learnt that lesson well.”
I followed him through the pasture land and, though I measured my steps with care, nothing kept the punishing wetness from my feet. The unpredictable wind lifted up stray flaps of clothing and crawled upon my skin like icy mites. I shivered uncontrollably.
“I will show you how to set snares,” said Father, “you must use a strong stick on a straight treadle – like so.” He raised a small branch before his eye and tested its suppleness in his hands.
“You see, the grasp must be light.” My father was close enough for me to note the flecks of red inside his eyes. “Do you understand?”
I nodded to him, “Yes, I see.”
Father took great care with his instructions. He looked at me with caution, searching to be sure I had grasped his meaning.
“I understand, Father,” I said as I scowled at the sky, waiting for the sun’s warmth to show. I flapped my arms and patted at the sleeves of my heavy-flannel overshirt.
“Good, then set the snares there,” said Father, as he stopped his instructions and took himself to rest upon a five-bar gate. He pointed me down the track, which made a thin dog-leg towards the blur of green which marked the forest. As I set about tying the snares, he watched closely, squinting beneath the brim of his hat for some minutes, before he made to leave. “They are good,” he shouted to me over his shoulder as he went, “now go along the fence, tie more, and remember what I have taught you.”
I saw men fencing around the paddocks. As I went, they hammered heavy palings and twisted great reels of wire between them. There seemed to be many men at this task, stretching like a line of ants from the low foothills to the rocky rise beyond the paddocks.
The wind made my eyes tear-blown as I entered Spink’s Paddock to set the necker snares, as Father had shown me. The sun was warming and a yellow sheet descended on the paddock. I crouched low among the smells of damp grass and the sounds of the rippling stream, which was darkly stained by the mud-flows, and then I heard my name searing the air.
“Myko. Myko. Myko.”
I raised myself and turned to face the open paddock. I saw nothing, but heard the cry go up again.
“Myko …”
This time, as I searched with my eyes, I found the source of the noise. The voice came from the track, which led from the billet. Running hard on the wet trail was Tilly. She was barefoot and I could see the mud splashes following her steps.
“I am here,” I called.
Tilly ran to me and as she neared I saw her long trousers, rolled past her knees, were soaked through.
“Myko … Myko, you must come, quick,” she said.
“Why?”
“You must! Come now.”
She grabbed at my arm and tried to draw me into her stride. “Quick, Myko.”
“But, why? What is it?”
“A hunt, there’s a hunt.”
I threw down the branches – the snares could wait.
As we ran, I tried to draw out some of Tilly’s panic. “What are they hunting … a tiger?”
Tilly’s breath was heavy, but her words came clearly. “A pack of stray dogs has been seen on the station.”
I had not seen any pack. “Dogs. From where?”
“They chased rabbits down from the gullies and now they’re in the myrtle forest … there are some on the company’s lands, threatening the flocks.”
We ran quickly, my heart was pounding, and then suddenly we were stopped still as the air rang through with rifle shots.
I turned to Tilly. “They’re shooting.”
“Yes. They’re nearby.”
A pocket of powder rose from the roof of a copse of trees.
“There, look.” As I called out a large setter dog came loping from the bush into the open paddock, spreading the flocks where it ran. It shone red and bright as a newborn calf.
The setter’s long and loping strides drew fast upon the flock. I could tell the dog had just discovered a new and strange game; it had no hope of bringing down its quarry.
Another rifle shot rang out from the copse and the setter was dropped. Cheers filled the air as a group of men watched the dog writhing on the wet grass. I watched as it took its last few breaths, and then lay stilled.
The men lifted their hats above their heads and grinned wildly as they descended upon the paddock to retrieve their carcass.
Tilly and I ran towards the loud cheering crowd, where great excitement spread among the men. I watched them peer above the paddocks looking for more dogs, but they had been scattered.
We pressed our way to the crowd’s front where the setter lay. The white prongs of the dog’s ribcage showed above the dark red of its coat and the darker red of the bullet wound. It was a young dog, its eyes were black and shining in its peaceful face. It was not yet fully grown – its short coat lacked the coarseness of most pack dogs.
Where I stood, staring, I felt Tilly fidget at my side. She crouched low on the ground, beside the setter, and stroked the softness of its crown.
“Look,” said Tilly, she eased open the setter’s mouth.
I gazed at the dog’s teeth and saw they were milk white and clean; they had never tasted mutton.
“Well, there he is,” said the gunman; his eyes were wide-set and little lines cross-hatched their edges. “Was a strong looking beast.”
The gunman saw us staring at the setter’s teeth and tried to draw me to his sport. “I reckon he could have snatched out a sheep’s throat with one bite of t
hem teeth, what do you say, boy?”
I looked up to him, he was smiling. His dark sun-punished skin was stretched taut to his face, his rifle butt perched upon his hip, like a figure from the cover of a penny novella.
“It’s a bitch,” I said, “she is very young.”
The gunman’s complexion quickly changed. His face turned hard and twisted as a walnut and then he showed his anger. I was pushed aside as he grabbed the setter by its scruff.
He held up the carcass and looked beneath its belly. “Of course it’s a bitch … them’s the hunters,” he said.
The rest of the men laughed in little muffled bursts.
There were slaps placed upon the gunman’s back and then the fencers moved off to return to their duties.
As they went, the gunman swung the setter above his shoulder like a hay bale, then threw it upon the dirt track which skirted the paddock.
“Damn dog,” he said, spitting where it lay, as he made to join the others.
I felt an emptiness inside as I looked down upon the setter. Its eyes were bloodied and ruptured, its tongue swelled as wide as a water pouch within its mouth. I knew the Tasmanian devils would set upon the dog to feed. By the next day there would be scarce a bone left to see of the young animal.
“Boy, get back to them snares,” called the gunman at me, his voice thumping like a piston, “that bitch’ll be just one of many!”
The gunman turned from me and as I saw the back of his flat shoulders I felt the muscles of my jaw tighten. My head buzzed like insects over a billabong. I reached down to the ground and took up a heavy rock. I set my aim on his head, and drew back my arm.
“Myko!” called Tilly, “no …” She darted in front of me, wrestling the rock from my grasp and rolling it onto the ground below. I fought with Tilly to reach for the rock, but she held me back, her quick fingers covering my eyes. “Myko, you can’t.”