Ghost Gum Valley

by Johanna Nicholls

  From the Colony’s newspapers she absorbed every detail of blood-thirsty murder trials, a notice of Rupert Grantham’s accusation of libel, bushrangers’ bail-ups of homesteads and lone travellers and the Government Gazette’s accounts of Governor Bourke’s battle to implement new statutes in the face of opposition from the Exclusives faction.

  There were columns of advertisements for everything from China tea to thoroughbred horses, dates of auctions of newly arrived cargo that Isabel now knew was often English stolen property. She looked wistfully at the list of shipping arrivals, hoping that if her contract worked out, it would one day list a ship bearing Aunt Elisabeth and Rose Alba.

  Alerted by the Sydney Herald’s account of the daring exploits of a bushranger active in the Bloodwood locality, Isabel hurried downstairs to the men’s saloon where Marmaduke sat in his shirtsleeves, drinking with Thomas and two rough, loud-mouthed Colonials. Marmaduke looked as much at ease as if he’d known them all his life.

  She was struck by the thought that though he placed heavy demands on Thomas’s time he did not draw the traditional line between master and servant.

  At the sight of her Marmaduke sprang up and steered her out into the corridor.

  ‘This saloon is strictly for blokes. Not one of your sleepy English villages where the farmers have known each other since 1066. Some of these old lags haven’t set eyes on a white woman in months. They’re tanked up with enough grog to float the Royal Navy. When they fancy a girl they don’t take “no” for an answer. Understand me?’

  ‘Perfectly.’ Isabel was inwardly shaken but thrust the newspaper at him.

  ‘I thought your father might be in danger.’

  Marmaduke frowned as he scanned the report. ‘Yeah. That sounds like Paddy Whickett, the bloke who’s sworn vengeance on all landowners who’ve brutalised their convicts. So that makes my father a likely candidate. I only hope I reach Garnet in time to get the deeds to Mingaletta signed.’

  Marmaduke ignored her shocked reaction. ‘I’ll join you upstairs in a minute. There are things you need to know about Garnet before we hit Bloodwood.’

  It was a full hour before he entered her bedchamber wearing a sheepish expression and nursing a bottle of wine. He was far from drunk but wine had made him friendly.

  ‘I just cleaned up at cards. A Royal Flush won me a prize bull. He’ll come in handy to service a mob of cows when I stock Mingaletta.’

  Isabel refused his offer of wine and took the lead. ‘So what’s the mystery? I know next to nothing about your family. If you expect me to give a convincing performance as your adoring bride, I need to know what kind of audience I’m playing to.’

  Marmaduke helped himself to a drink. ‘Righto, Garnet Gamble in a nutshell. He’s a born bully, seasoned womaniser, crooked businessman, feared tyrant hated by his assigned men. And, in terms of the law, he’s as devious as Machiavelli.’ He added wryly, ‘And that’s Garnet’s good side.’

  ‘Surely you’re biased. I’m not a child. I need to know how your father will react when he realises my family cheated him, sending him tainted goods?’

  Marmaduke didn’t bother to offer a polite denial. ‘Don’t worry. To Garnet you’re the genuine blue-blooded article, that’s all that matters to a man desperate for acceptance by the Quality. His CP – conditional pardon – means he can never return to the Mother England that chucked him out. But didn’t your family warn you about Garnet’s history?’

  ‘They told me nothing. Except it was my role to preserve the family honour. For Heaven’s sake, Marmaduke, I have the right to know. I told you the truth about my shame!’

  He took a swig of his wine. ‘The truth is Garnet Gamble is quite mad.’

  ‘Oh, is that all?’ she said relieved. ‘The British aristocracy’s rife with it. Uncle Godfrey’s friend is an earl whose poodles dine off gold plates at his banquet table.’

  ‘No. Garnet’s not one of your amusing eccentrics beloved by the English. He suffers periodic fits of violent insanity. If he wasn’t the second richest man in the Colony, free to buy protection, he’d be carted off to a lunatic asylum and they’d throw away the key.’

  Isabel felt faint. ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘You will soon enough. Garnet’s not the only entrepreneur in the Colony whose condition is tolerated. No doubt you’ve heard of John Macarthur? One of our most powerful “pure merinos”, the man many said was responsible for Governor Bligh being removed from office. Y’know, William Bligh of the Bounty Mutiny fame? Macarthur’s imbalance was common knowledge for years but it didn’t prevent his election to the Legislative Council. Until finally Governor Bourke was pressured to remove him on the grounds that Macarthur had been “pronounced a lunatic and there was little hope of his restoration”.’

  Isabel was so stunned she felt her tongue cleave to the roof of her mouth.

  ‘But I understood your father is a brilliant entrepreneur.’

  Marmaduke shrugged. ‘He is – between times. Why should that surprise you? Poor old George III was totally lucid between his bouts of insanity and much loved by the people, but that didn’t prevent his son becoming Regent when His Maj was locked from sight.’

  Isabel managed to ask, ‘Exactly how ill is your poor father?’

  ‘I don’t claim Garnet’s that far gone yet but there’s no known cure and the quacks can’t predict just how crazy he’ll end up. It’s said that Macarthur’s insanity is the legacy of Cape fever he picked up in the port of Cape Town years ago. Maybe Garnet also copped a dose of that when he was transported. Who knows? He won’t talk about his months on the Fortune, a hell ship from the sound of it.’ With a note of bitter irony, Marmaduke added, ‘So now you know why I vowed never to marry. No woman will ever give birth to a child of mine. Garnet’s dynasty will die with me.’

  ‘But you’re bad, not mad,’ she said without thinking. ‘Forgive me. That was cruel.’

  ‘But accurate. Madness is a matter of degree. I have some of the same symptoms – a violent temper and periodic melancholia. I’m told Garnet appeared to be perfectly sane as a young man when he married Mother, but it’s a progressive disease. I don’t intend to live long enough to be locked away. Before I reach that stage...’ He pointed his finger like a pistol at his temple and mimed pulling the trigger. ‘Sorry to be blunt. I’ll tell you what you need to know for your survival.’

  Isabel asked quickly, ‘Survival from your father or from you?’

  ‘You’re in no danger at my hands, Isabel. At least not for the brief term of our contract. So let’s enjoy life while we can, eh?’

  He attempted a short laugh but she saw how his hands twitched with nerves.

  ‘I should also warn you about Bloodwood Hall. Terrible things have happened there, leaving their imprint on every stone. Some claim the place is haunted. I don’t. But for me it harbours nothing but bad memories. We must stay under Garnet’s roof until the deeds to Mingaletta are handed over. Not an hour longer. I hate the damned house so much if it were mine I’d burn it to the ground.’ On a swift change of mood he added lightly, ‘That’s enough true confessions for one night. I reckon I could use another drink. Care to join me?’

  This time Isabel readily agreed. When he filled her glass she lightly touched his hand.

  ‘Marmaduke, I can’t pretend to like you. But I want you to know one thing. You’re in no danger of betrayal at my hands. I am your ally for as long as it takes.’

  Marmaduke looked at her long and hard before he said at last, ‘Thank you, soldier.’

  It was late afternoon the following day when Thomas drew the horses to a halt and spoke to Isabel out of the corner of his mouth.

  ‘The Garnet and Rose is Bloodwood’s only safe inn. It’s owned by Mr Gamble Senior. Rival shanties would cut your throat for a ha’penny.’

  ‘Thanks for the reference, Thomas,’ Marmaduke said dryly, ‘but there’s no need to scare my bride out of her wits.’

  Bloodwood Village sat on a rise overlooking Scavenge
rs Creek. Ram-shackle wooden buildings had mushroomed up out of the bush along a single street that dissected the hamlet like the crooked spine of a hunchback. To Isabel, this was civilisation after hours of charging through dense eucalypt forests devoid of any sign of human habitation.

  Marmaduke wagged a warning finger. ‘Do me a favour. Don’t wander off!’

  Before Isabel had time to snap back a reply he stalked off in the direction of the Garnet and Rose. It was clear her father-in-law left his stamp on everything he touched.

  Marmaduke returned holding the reins of two horses, one with a lady’s sidesaddle, the other with two saddlebags.

  ‘I want to show you Mingaletta before we confront Garnet. Thomas can stay here and bring the carriage tomorrow. Of course, if you’re not up to riding a horse?’

  Isabel had little experience with horses but there was no way she was going to appear a helpless female. ‘Why wait? I could go on all night.’

  Marmaduke helped her mount the bay mare, positioned her on the lady’s side-saddle, checked her stirrups then mounted the stallion carrying their saddlebags and took the lead crossing the bridge across Scavengers Creek.

  A few miles on they passed a grand house set a half mile back from the road.

  ‘That’s our nearest neigbour, Penkivil Park,’ Marmaduke said laconically. ‘Owner’s a military officer. We often got invited there in Mother’s day. Now the Gambles are persona non grata.’

  Over the next half hour as the light faded they followed a narrow zig-zag track crowded by overhanging branches. Isabel cried out in excitement at the sight of a huge lizard she recognised from a drawing. She gasped when it opened its mouth in a ferocious leer.

  ‘Look, isn’t that a goanna?’

  Marmaduke barely gave it a glance. ‘Yeah, good tucker. When I was a kid the tribes who passed through Mingaletta roasted goannas under hot coals in pits. It’s called lazybed cooking. The blacks took a shine to me. I shared their bush tucker, unknown to Garnet.’

  ‘Why? Didn’t he like them?’

  ‘Who? The goannas or the blacks?’ Marmaduke gave a snort. ‘Neither. Garnet ran the blacks off his land. Mother couldn’t prevent that but she threatened to leave him if he fired a shot at them. As for goannas, Garnet was hell-bent on raising me to be a gentleman and in his book gents don’t eat bush tucker. But I’m grateful for what the blacks taught me. If I’m ever lost in the bush I’d never starve.’

  He glanced at her over his shoulder. ‘I’d take you camping on a bivouac, teach you how to cook snake and ’roo and eat live witchety grubs but I reckon an English girl wouldn’t have the stomach for it.’

  ‘Anything you can do, I can do,’ Isabel snapped.

  ‘I just might take you up on that!’

  Recognising the innuendo in his voice, Isabel turned her head to conceal her blush.

  They passed a drystone wall that reminded Isabel of the traditional borders of the fields beyond de Rolland Park. Here the land had clearly fallen into misuse.

  Isabel was startled by the bizarre sight at the heart of it. Standing in splendid isolation against the sky was a cone-shaped tower built of variegated stones.

  ‘Good Heavens, that looks like the sort of folly you’d find in one of Capability Browne’s landscaped gardens.’

  ‘It’s a copy. That chimney over there is the ruins of an Indian bungalow built by my grandfather. He was a retired British Army colonel whose heart remained with the Raj in India. When Mother married she moved to Garnet’s adjoining property but her heart remained on Mingaletta. The colonel survived years of warfare only to be defeated by a bank. He neglected to tell Mother her dowry, Mingaletta, was mortgaged to the hilt. When he went bankrupt he took the coward’s way out. Shot himself through the heart. Father bought Mingaletta from the bank. That’s how the deeds to Mother’s land were swallowed up by Bloodwood Hall under Garnet’s name .’

  ‘What a tragic story. But if Heaven exists, and I believe it does, your mother will be happy to see Mingaletta back in your hands at last.’

  Marmaduke’s face darkened. ‘Mother was never happy. She was married to Garnet.’

  Isabel felt the force of his suppressed rage as she rode behind him towards a miniature garden fenced off by the kind of wrought-iron lace Isabel had seen on Sydney terrace houses. It was then Isabel saw it. The tombstone carved with a plump cherub. She followed in Marmaduke’s footsteps to read the weathered stone inscription.

  HERE LIES THE BELOVED WIFE OF GARNET GAMBLE

  MIRANDA

  BORN FORT WILLIAM, CALCUTTA

  DIED AGE 36 AT BLOODWOOD HALL 1825

  IN THE ARMS OF HER HUSBAND

  ALSO

  THEIR INFANT

  MAY ANGELS GUARD THEIR RESTING PLACE

  ‘In the arms of her husband – that’s a joke!’ Marmaduke said coldly. ‘Mother only stayed with Garnet because the damned law grants custody of a child to its father. If I’d been born dead she would have been free to leave him.’

  Isabel had no words to lance the pain she realised, with shock, had festered inside him for years.

  Embarrassed by his outburst, Marmaduke’s mood changed like quicksilver. ‘Come, soldier,’ he said lightly. ‘We’ll take a short cut through the Gamble family cemetery – not afraid of ghosts, are you?’

  Isabel bit her lip at the sudden flood of childhood memories of the Other that had broken through the borders of reality the day she had seen the ghost of Henri de Rolland leap to his death.

  She shivered at the sight of graves that perhaps were linked to the ghosts said to haunt Bloodwood Hall. Would she attract them, too? And would she even know they were ghosts?

  Despite her anxiety she was moved by the knowledge that Miranda Gamble had not been buried here, but on her own land, Mingaletta.

  The little graveyard was shielded by a windbreak of fir trees. Marmaduke halted the horses but remained in the saddle. He gestured to a mausoleum built in the style of a small Greek temple complete with pediment and Doric columns.

  ‘Garnet controls every aspect of life and death. He’s obsessed with building things bigger and flashier than anyone else. He designed this ready for his final journey, dictated his own inscription to the stonemason. All that remains to be added is the date of his death. Even Father can’t control that!’

  The mausoleum made Isabel distinctly uneasy. Nightfall had appeared like a sleight of hand. The Australian bush was eerie enough by day but terrifying by night. There was no long English twilight to soften the transition. She froze. Was it a trick of the full moon? Or was there a light shining through the door of Garnet Gamble’s tomb?

  Isabel’s throat was so tight she could barely ask the question. ‘What’s that light?’

  ‘Let’s hope it’s Father’s ghost!’ Marmaduke said lightly.

  As they approached on foot, Isabel instinctively drew closer to him. Her breath came fast as if she had been running. The atmosphere felt thick with acrid emotion. She peered around Marmaduke’s shoulder, shielded from sight but able to see through the aperture. Light flickered from an oil lamp that threw ghastly shadows around the burial chamber. Isabel felt the hair bristling up on the back of her neck.

  Kneeling beside a stone sarcophagus was an old woman dressed in an orange sari. Her rasping chant sounded too malevolent to be a prayer. Unaware of them watching her she took the lamp and hurried off down a path where the night concealed her from sight.

  ‘That’s Queenie, my old nanny. She blames Garnet for Mother’s death. She comes here to pray for his death.’

  Isabel was shocked into silence. I don’t doubt evil things did happen here. I can sense the aura of hatred in this place.

  ‘I’ll introduce you to Queenie tomorrow. No need to be afraid of her. She was Mother’s faithful servant since they were children in India. She’s as tiny as an elf, but she protected mother like a warrior. Queenie’s the one person strong enough to call Garnet’s bluff. I’d trust her with my life.’

  Isabel was exhausted. The p
revious night and the past weeks had produced a chain of revelations so complex she felt too weary to make sense of them.

  ‘Journey’s end. Home, sweet home,’ Marmaduke announced with undisguised sarcasm. In the distance the outline of Bloodwood Hall loomed up through a slit in the dank mist that sealed off the valley. She knew it wasn’t the chill night air or the shadows cast by the full moon that caused her to shiver. It was an instinctive sense of foreboding.

  When they passed through a pair of iron gates the sound of their closing left Isabel in an acute panic, as if a dungeon door had clanged shut to imprison her.

  Bloodwood Hall seemed to rear out of the darkness.

  The Gothic stone mansion was blanched by moonlight. For a moment she lost all sense of time and place. Was she sleepwalking in a nightmare? Was she really here in this godforsaken Colony?

  Marmaduke sprang to her side. ‘What’s wrong? You’re deathly pale.’

  Her words tumbled out beyond her control. ‘My God! Don’t you know? This isn’t your family home – it’s ours! It’s a replica of de Rolland Park!’

  Overcome by a sickening wave of nausea Isabel reeled backwards. Marmaduke caught her in his arms.

  Isabel stirred and her eyes focused on a flash of silver. Marmaduke’s flask touched her lips and the brandy gave her a pleasurable burning sensation, proof she was still alive. She lay on the lawn swathed in Marmaduke’s greatcoat, his arm firmly around her shoulders.

  ‘You’ve had quite a shock, déjà vu gone crazy. This place is so bloody Gothic and English I always thought it was just a hodge-podge of Garnet’s ideas of Gothic Revival. How was I to know he had recreated your ancestral home? Now his obsession makes sense. I take it this is a dead-ringer?’ At Isabel’s frown he translated, ‘Identical.’