by Sarah Lark
He would have liked to do that right after capturing James McKenzie. He had since taken to attributing this triumph entirely to himself; after all, he was the one who had beaten James McKenzie and taken him prisoner. The other men thought the beating in the riverbed hardly necessary. In fact, if John Sideblossom had not knocked the thief from his mule and then beat him up, the hunters could have set off after his accomplice. As it was, the second man—though some of the people in the search party believed it to have been a woman—had escaped.
Nor had the other sheep and cattle barons approved of John dragging the captive along like a slave tied to his horse. They saw no reason why the already badly beaten man should have to walk when his mule was available. At some point, levelheaded men like Lord Barrington and Reginald Beasley had stepped forward and censured John Sideblossom for his behavior. Since James had committed the majority of his crimes in Canterbury, it was the almost unanimous opinion of the group that he should answer for his crimes there. Despite John Sideblossom’s protests, Barrington’s men had freed the livestock thief and made him give his word not to flee, then led him only lightly bound to Lyttelton, where he would be held until the trial. John insisted, however, on keeping his dog, Friday, which seemed to hurt James more than the bruises from the beating and the shackles on his hands and feet, with which John Sideblossom had bound him at night after locking him in a barn. In a hoarse voice, he asked the men to let the dog stay with him.
But John proved inflexible. “The dog can work for me,” he explained. “Somebody will be able to make it obey. A first-class sheepdog like that is worth a lot. I’ll keep him as a small repayment for the damages that bastard’s caused.”
So Friday stayed behind, howling heartbreakingly as the men led her master away from the farm.
“John won’t have much fun with it,” Gerald said. “These mutts get stuck on their masters.”
Gerald stood between the two factions on the subject of how James McKenzie should be handled. On the one hand, John was one of his oldest friends; on the other, he had to get along with the men from Canterbury. And like almost all the others, he felt, despite himself, a sort of respect for the ingenious thief. Naturally, he was angry about his losses, but the gambler in him knew that a person did not always take the most honorable path to making a living. And if that person made it for more than ten years without being caught even once, he deserved some respect.
James fell into a gloomy silence after losing Friday, which he did not break until the prison bars had been closed behind him in Lyttelton.
The men of Canterbury were disappointed; they would have liked to hear from the source how their captive had carried out the thefts, with whom he had worked, and who the mysterious accomplice who had escaped was. They did not have long to wait for the trial. It was set to take place in the Honorable Justice Stephen’s court the following month.
Lyttelton had come into possession of its own courtroom—it had been a long time since the trials were conducted in the pub or in the open air, as was common the first few years. The room did, however, prove too small to hold all the citizens of Canterbury who wanted to lay eyes on the infamous livestock thief at the trial. Even the sheep barons who had been affected and their families had to arrive early to find good seats. For that reason, Gerald, Gwyneira, and an excited Paul had taken quarters at the White Hart in Christchurch beforehand so that they could take the Bridle Path to Lyttelton.
“Don’t you mean we’ll be riding there?” asked a confused Gwyneira when Gerald laid out his plans to her. “After all, it’s the Bridle Path!”
Gerald laughed with pleasure. “You’ll be surprised at how the path has changed,” he said happily. “We’ll be taking the coach, relaxed and properly attired.”
On the day of the trial, he wore one of his best suits. And Paul, in his first ever three-piece, looked very grown up.
Gwyneira agonized over what was appropriate. If she were honest with herself, it had been years since she had thought so much about her clothing. But no matter how many times she told herself that it didn’t matter what a middle-aged woman wore to a trial as long as it was neat and didn’t draw too much attention, her heart raced at the mere thought of seeing James McKenzie again. What was worse, he would see her too, and he would recognize her, of course. But what would he feel when he saw her? Would his eyes light up again as before when she hadn’t known how to appreciate it? Or would he just feel pity, because she had aged, because her first wrinkles were marking her face, because fear and worry had taken their toll on it? Perhaps he would feel only apathy; she may be only a distant, faded memory now, extinguished by ten years of wild living. What if the mysterious “accomplice” really had been a woman? His wife?
Gwyneira turned over her memories in her mind, some of them becoming girlish daydreams when she recalled her weeks with James. Could he ever forget the day on the lake? The enchanted hours in the stone circle? But then again, they had parted on bad terms. He would never forgive her for having Paul. One more thing Paul had destroyed.
In the end, Gwyneira decided on a simple navy-blue dress and a tippet, buttoned in the front, though the tortoiseshell buttons were a little precocious. Kiri put her hair up in an austere coiffure, which she offset with a bold little hat that matched the dress. Gwyneira felt as though she had spent hours in front of the mirror, pulling at this or that strand, making adjustments to her hat, and fixing the dress’s sleeves so that the tortoiseshell buttons were visible. When they were finally seated in the coach, she was pale with expectation, fear, and a sort of anticipation. If it continued like this, she would have to pinch her cheeks to give herself a little color before entering the courtroom. But even more than being worried about her pallid complexion, Gwyneira hoped not to turn beet red when she saw James McKenzie again for the first time. She shivered and convinced herself that it was just the cool autumn day. She could not keep her fingers still. She tensely crumpled the curtains at the coach’s window.
“What’s the matter, Mother?” Paul finally asked, and Gwyneira cringed. Paul had a fine-tuned sense for human weakness. He could not, under any circumstances, get the impression there had ever been something between her and James McKenzie.
“Are you nervous for Mr. McKenzie?” he asked, already drilling her. “Grandfather says you knew him. He knew him too. He was the foreman on Kiward Station. Isn’t it crazy, Mother, that he then ran away and made a living stealing sheep?”
“Yes, very crazy,” Gwyneira replied. “I would never…none of us would ever have thought him capable of such a thing.”
“And now he might be hanged!” Paul remarked with pleasure. “Will we go if he’s hanged, Grandfather?”
Gerald snorted. “They won’t hang the scoundrel. He got lucky with his judge. Stephen’s not a farmer. It doesn’t bother him that McKenzie brought some people to the edge of ruin.”
Gwyneira almost smiled. As far as she knew, James McKenzie’s thefts had been no more than pinpricks for those affected.
“But he’ll spend a few years behind bars. And who knows, maybe he’ll tell us a bit about the men behind the scenes today. It doesn’t look like he did it all on his own.” Gerald did not believe the story about there being a woman accompanying James McKenzie. He agreed that it had been a young accomplice but had only caught a glimpse of him.
“Who he was selling to would be of interest. In that respect, we would have had a better chance if they tried the fellow in Dunedin. Sideblossom was right about that. Speak of the devil! Have a look. I knew he wouldn’t miss the man’s trial.”
John Sideblossom’s black stallion galloped past the Wardens’ coach, and he greeted them politely. Gwyneira sighed. She would have loved to avoid having to see the sheep baron of Otago again.
John Sideblossom had not held it against Gerald that he took sides with the men of Canterbury and went so far as to reserve seats for him and his family in the courtroom. He greeted Gerald heartily, Paul a bit dismissively, and Gwyneira with icy coldnes
s.
“Has that charming daughter of yours reappeared?” he asked mockingly as she sat down—as far from him as possible among the four reserved seats.
Gwyneira did not answer. Paul rushed to answer in her place, assuring his idol that no one had ever heard from Fleur again.
“In Haldon they’re saying she must have landed in some den of sin,” Paul announced, for which Gerald rebuked him sternly. Gwyneira did not react. Over the past few weeks, she had begun responding to Paul less and less. The boy had long since outgrown her influence—if she had ever had any to begin with. These days he listened only to Gerald; he hardly even attended Helen’s school lessons anymore. Gerald always talked about hiring a tutor for the boy, but Paul was of the opinion that he had attained sufficient education for a farmer and livestock breeder. When it came to the work on the farm, he soaked up the shepherds’ and shearers’ knowledge like a sponge. He was without a doubt the heir that Gerald had wished for—if hardly the partner of George Greenwood’s dreams. The young Maori Reti, who was handling George’s affairs while he was in England, complained to Gwyneira. In his opinion, Gerald was raising a second Howard O’Keefe in terms of ignorance—only one with less experience and more power.
“The boy already won’t listen to anyone,” Reti bemoaned. “The farmhands don’t like him, and the Maori downright hate him. But Mr. Warden lets him do whatever he likes. Who’s ever heard of a twelve-year-old boy overseeing a shearing shed?”
Gwyneira had already heard it all from the shearers themselves, who felt they had been treated unfairly. In his drive to make himself important and to win the traditional competition between the shearing sheds, Paul had written down considerably more shears than had actually taken place. That was good news for the shearers, who were paid by the number of sheep sheared. But later, the amount of fleece did not match up. Gerald raged and laid the blame on the shearers. The other shearers complained because the competition had been rigged and the prizes handed out to the wrong people. It was altogether a terrible mess, and in the end, Gwyneira had had to pay everyone a considerably higher wage just to ensure that the shearing gang would return the following year.
Gwyneira had had more than enough of Paul’s insolent behavior. She would have liked nothing better than to send him to boarding school in England, or at least Dunedin. But Gerald would hear none of it, and so Gwyneira did what she had always done since Paul was born: she ignored him.
Now, in the courtroom, at least he held still, thank God. He listened in on the conversation between Gerald and John and noted the frosty greetings the other sheep barons gave the visitor from Otago. The room filled up quickly and Gwyneira motioned to Reti, who was one of the last to push his way into the room. There was some difficulty—a few pakeha did not want to make way for the Maori—but the mention of George Greenwood’s name opened any door for Reti.
Finally, ten o’clock struck, and punctual to the minute, the Right Honorable Lord Justice Stephen entered his court and opened the proceedings. For most of the audience, it did not get interesting until the accused was led in. When James McKenzie appeared, the room erupted in a mixture of curses and cheers. James himself reacted to neither the one nor the other, instead keeping his head low; he seemed relieved when the judge demanded order from the crowd.
Gwyneira peeked out from behind the tall farmworker who sat in front of her—a bad choice since both Gerald and Paul had a better view. But she had wanted to sit as far from John Sideblossom as possible. She would be able to look James McKenzie over as soon as he took his place next to the unenthusiastic attorney he had been appointed. As soon as he sat down, he finally looked up.
Gwyneira had been asking herself for days what she would feel when she was once again in close proximity to James. Would she even recognize him? Would she see in him that which had once…once what? Had impressed her? Enthralled her? Whatever it had been, it lay twelve years in the past. Maybe her excitement was misplaced. Perhaps he would just be a stranger to her now, someone whom she would not even have recognized on the street.
But her very first look at the tall man on the defendant's bench told her otherwise. James McKenzie had hardly changed. At least not in Gwyneira’s eyes. Based on the drawings that had appeared in the papers reporting on his capture, she had expected to see a wild, bearded fellow, but the man before her was clean shaven and wore simple but clean clothes. He was still just as slim and sensual, but the musculature beneath his somewhat tattered white shirt revealed his strength. His face was suntanned—except for the places his beard had covered. His lips seemed thin—a sign that he was worried. Gwyneira had often seen that look on his face. And his eyes…nothing, absolutely nothing had changed about their adventurous, lively expression. However, there was no mocking laughter in them now, just tension and something like fear. The lines in his face were still there, only more deeply imprinted, just as James’s whole demeanor had grown harder, more mature, and more serious. Gwyneira would have recognized him at first glance. Oh yes, she would have been able to pick him out from all the men on the South Island, if not the whole world.
“James McKenzie!”
“Your Honor?”
Gwyneira would also have known his voice anywhere. That dark, warm voice that could be so tender but also stern and full of authority when calling out commands to his men or the sheepdogs.
“Mr. McKenzie, you stand accused of having carried out large-scale livestock theft in the Canterbury Plains as well as in the area around Otago. How do you plead?”
McKenzie shrugged. “There’s a lot of stealing in that area. I don’t know what that has to do with me.”
The judge inhaled sharply. “The court has the testimony of several honorable men that you were encountered with a flock of stolen sheep above Lake Wanaka. Do you at least admit to that?”
James McKenzie repeated his shrug. “There are plenty of McKenzies. There are plenty of sheep.”
Gwyneira almost laughed but then began to worry instead. This was surely the best way to bring His Honor the Lord Justice Stephen to a boil. It was useless to deny the accusation. James’s face still showed signs of his fight with John Sideblossom. Sideblossom must have had a bad time of it too—Gwyneira derived a certain satisfaction from the fact that John’s eye was still markedly blacker than James’s.
“Can anyone in the court testify to the fact that this man is the livestock thief James McKenzie and not by chance someone else of the same name?” the judge asked with a sigh.
John Sideblossom stood up. “I can testify to that. And we have proof that should remove any doubt.” He turned to the room’s entrance, where he had placed an assistant. “Release the dog!”
“Friday!” A little black shadow flew like the wind through the courtroom directly to James McKenzie. He seemed to instantly forget the role he had planned to play before the court. He bent over, took up the dog in his arms, and petted her. “Friday!”
The judge rolled his eyes. “That could have been done less dramatically, but so be it. Please enter into the record that when this man was confronted with the sheepdog that herded the stolen flocks of sheep, he recognized the animal as his. Mr. McKenzie, you do not now mean to tell me this dog too has a double out there.”
James smiled his old smile. “No,” he said. “This dog is one of a kind.” Friday panted and licked James’s hands. “Your Honor, we…we can cut this trial short. I will say anything and confess everything as long as you assure me that I can keep Friday. In prison too. Just look at this dog; it clearly has hardly eaten since it was taken from me. This dog is to this…she is of no use to Mr. Sideblossom; she won’t listen to anyone…”
“Mr. McKenzie, your dog is not the one on trial here,” the judge said sternly. “But since you want to confess now: the thefts on Lionel Station, on Kiward Station, Beasley Farms, Barrington Station…all of these can be ascribed to you?”
McKenzie reacted with his now familiar shrug. “There’re a lot of thefts. Like I said. I might have taken a she
ep now and again…a dog like this needs exercise, you know.” He gestured to Friday, which set off thundering laughter in the courtroom. “But a thousand sheep…”
The judge sighed again. “All right, fine. Have it your way. Let’s call in the witnesses. First we have Randolph Nielson, foreman of Beasley Farms.”
Nielson’s appearance was the first in a chain of workers and breeders who without exception testified that hundreds of animals had been stolen from the aforementioned farms. Many had been found in McKenzie’s flock. It was all very tiring, and James could have shortened the proceedings, but he proved obstinate and denied any knowledge of the stolen animals.
While the witnesses rattled off numbers and dates and McKenzie’s fingers wandered over Friday’s soft fur, stroking and comforting her, he let his gaze drift around the room. There were things leading up to the proceedings that concerned him more than the fear of the noose. The trial was taking place in Lyttelton—Canterbury Plains, relatively near Kiward Station. So would she be there? Would Gwyneira come? James had spent the nights leading up to the trial recollecting every moment, every incident involving Gwyneira, no matter how small—from their first encounter in the stables to their parting, when she had given him Friday. Not a day had gone by since she had cheated on him that James had not thought of it. What had happened back then? Whom had she chosen over him? And why had she looked so desperate and sad when he had pushed her to speak? Shouldn’t she have been happy? After all, the business with this other fellow had turned out just as well as with him.
James saw Reginald Beasley in the first row, with the Barringtons beside him—he had suspected the young lord, but Fleurette’s response to his cautious questions had assured him that he was only in limited contact with the Wardens. Would he have been so disinterested in Gwyneira if he were the father of her son? It appeared that he cared deeply for the children who sat between him and his unlikely wife on the bench. George Greenwood was not present. But according to what Fleur had said, he was hardly a candidate for Paul’s father. Although it was true that he was in regular contact with all the regional farms, he had taken Helen’s son, Ruben, for his protégé instead.