The Silent Frontier

by Peter Watt

  After a long walk following the tram tracks, Lachlan found that the heart of the city seemed to be behind him. Signs indicating that boarders were welcome were becoming more apparent. He stopped at one building displaying a sign welcoming good and sober Christian men to stay for a reasonable rate.

  Lachlan took a deep breath and walked up the wooden steps to the verandah of the two-storeyed, wooden house with its peeling paint and was met at the door by a ruddy-faced, middle-aged stout woman who eyed him with something between hostility and suspicion.

  ‘What do you want?’ she immediately asked, blocking the entrance to the house.

  ‘I, ah, saw your sign,’ Lachlan replied. ‘I was hoping that you might have a room to let for at least a week, as I fit such a description.’

  ‘Where you from?’ the woman asked.

  Lachlan could smell the pungent aroma of boiled cabbage wafting from somewhere inside the boarding house. ‘Melbourne,’ he lied.

  In their travels Duncan had taken Lachlan as far as the towns surrounding Melbourne but never into the city itself, as he had a strong dislike for cities. At least if he said he was from Melbourne the woman would not think that he was some kind of country bumpkin.

  ‘Melbourne,’ the woman echoed with a slight shake of her head. ‘No wonder yer came to Sydney. You pay a week up front, no women allowed on the premises, no strong liquor, no animals, no blaspheming, no gambling, no fighting, no stealing from the other residents and yer get an evening meal thrown in – at an extra cost fer meat.’

  Lachlan shrugged. ‘How much?’ he asked, and the woman gave him a price. Lachlan fished in his pocket for the right amount and counted out the coins into her podgy, outstretched hand.

  ‘Me name’s Melba Woodford,’ she said, eyeing the small pile of coins in her hand. ‘You can call me Mrs Woodford. What’s yours?’

  ‘Lachlan MacDonald.’

  ‘Well, Mr MacDonald, I will show you to yer room,’ the landlady said, turning her back and walking inside.

  Lachlan followed her up a set of dimly lit stairs to a row of rooms with closed doors. She stopped, turned a key in a lock and stepped aside to allow Lachlan to enter. It was a small but functional room with a single bed, chair and table. He could see a tall wardrobe with a cracked mirror and there was the scent of stale sweat and dust in the room. Rising damp was apparent in the stains on the faded wallpaper.

  ‘Yer put the candle out before you retire fer the night,’ Mrs Woodford said. ‘Don’t want no fires here. And yer buy any candles yer need, other than the one in yer room which yer can have fer free. Yer got any questions?’

  ‘Er, ah, where is the dining room?’ Lachlan asked, feeling the effects of hunger after his long and arduous day.

  ‘Downstairs. The evening meal is served promptly at six and if yer not there yer miss out. The outhouse is down the back stairs at the end of the garden – just in case yer got to go. Any more questions?’

  Lachlan shook his head and dropped his swag onto the saggy bed. This was only a temporary abode until he found something better, until he came to grips with how he would eventually become an explorer.

  ‘I’ll see yer at evening meal,’ the woman said gruffly, closing the door behind her.

  Standing in his room, Lachlan suddenly felt sad and lost. He sat down on the bed and stared out the tiny window at the smoke-stained brick wall facing his room. Sweat trickled down his chest under his shirt. He had faced opponents on the dusty paddocks outside the country towns he and Duncan had travelled through and fought more tough country boys than he could remember for prize money. He had taken the painful blows and never once shown fear, but now tears trickled down his face. What the hell had he expected? he cursed to himself. No family, no friends and there was no certainty of immediate work prospects. As for fulfilling his dreams, they seemed far removed from the reality of his circumstances. At least he had a reasonably good supply of money until something came up.

  Lachlan wiped away the tears. Only women cried, he told himself. It was time to take stock of what he did have and work towards achieving his ambitions. He would somehow make his dream come true. Sitting by the camp fire, old Duncan often used to say, ‘Laddie, when one door closes in life, another will open. Just be certain to go through it.’

  Fortified by his memories of the old Scot’s words, Lachlan rose from the edge of his bed and went in search of the dining room. Downstairs he found a large room where seven men were sitting around a wooden table eating a meal in front of them consisting of boiled cabbage, potatoes and mutton. They were eating in a hearty manner, using slabs of bread to mop up the juices on the plate, and hardly gave Lachlan a second glance. From their suntanned faces and working man’s garb Lachlan guessed the men were labourers of some kind.

  One young man around Lachlan’s age beckoned for him to take an empty seat beside him. Lachlan smiled his thanks and sat down as Mrs Woodford placed a generously piled plate of meat and vegetables in front of him.

  ‘What’s yer name?’ the young man asked between mouthfuls of food.

  ‘Lachlan MacDonald,’ Lachlan replied, picking up a knife and fork.

  ‘The name’s Jimmy Graves,’ the other man said, introducing himself without shaking hands. ‘Yer working around here?’

  ‘Just got in,’ Lachlan replied. ‘Haven’t had a chance to look for work.’

  ‘What were you doing before you got in?’ Jimmy asked.

  ‘I was working as a traveller,’ Lachlan replied.

  ‘You look like you could do a hard day’s work,’ Jimmy said, pausing in his eating to study the newcomer. ‘Our crew has a vacancy since the Dutchman fell off a ladder and broke his back. You up to working on buildings?’

  Lachlan was pleased to find both a good meal in front of him and an immediate offer of work. Maybe a door was opening.

  ‘I can give you an honest day’s work for a fair wage,’ he replied.

  ‘Hey, Harry,’ Jimmy said across the table to an older, wizened-looking man ploughing through his meal. ‘We got a replacement for the Dutchman. Lachlan here says he can start with us.’

  The man barely glanced at Jimmy but nodded his head. ‘He starts tomorrow – and he better not be bloody late,’ he growled.

  Jimmy turned to Lachlan, thrusting out a calloused hand. ‘I’ll make sure you get to work on time,’ he said.

  The following day Lachlan joined Jimmy to set out for work. Mrs Woodford had prepared each of the working men in her boarding house a sandwich for their lunch and Jimmy packed Lachlan’s sandwich with his.

  The building site was only one block from the boarding house and Lachlan was surprised to learn that they would only be working an eight-hour day. It was hot and the work a lot harder than Lachlan had expected. Sweat poured down his body as he hefted loads of bricks to the bricklayers, mixed cement with a shovel and unloaded more bricks from the horse-drawn carts arriving with their loads. The men were contracted to build a store house of great size and hauling the bricks on a hod up the many levels of planks was backbreaking work. The men worked mostly in silence and the midday lunch break was especially welcomed by Lachlan, who collapsed next to Jimmy.

  ‘Here’s yer sandwich,’ Jimmy said, handing Lachlan a couple of dusty pieces of thick bread encasing slabs of cold mutton and pickles. ‘Yer get a mug of tea with yer sandwich.’ A battered enamel mug containing sweet black tea was handed to Lachlan.

  ‘Yer get used to it,’ Jimmy said, noticing how stiff and sore his new friend appeared. ‘The money ain’t much – but it’s sumthin at least.’

  ‘Just glad we only do this eight hours a day,’ Lachlan sighed after a sip of his tea. ‘It was a lot easier selling wares to country ladies.’

  Yeah, well, unless there were lots of young ladies out in the country then you wouldn’t find me swapping jobs,’ Jimmy said. ‘At least in Sydney yer get to meet plenty.’

  Lachlan was interested in Jimmy’s comment. He was a young man and had never had the opportunity to really get acquai
nted with the opposite sex. His itinerant life on the road with Duncan excluded a steady romance, although he had often caught the eye of a pretty young lady from time to time and town to town. Like all young men of his age, his thoughts were often plagued with curiosity as to the physical charms of the heavily dressed but shapely bodies of the pretty young ladies he had looked at shyly.

  ‘Where do you meet young ladies in Sydney?’ Lachlan casually asked.

  ‘Lot of places here you can meet the fairer sex,’ Jimmy said, finishing the last of his tea. ‘Yer got the Domain, Hyde Park, Randwick race track that was opened this year, but that’s not as good as the Domain, or if yer have some money, you can go up to Lane Cove on a picnic and meet a lot of single girls.’

  ‘So, what’s at the Domain?’ Lachlan asked.

  ‘The flash lads and lasses up there are more my crowd. Yer don’t get them with the stuck-up airs of the toffs yer find around the Lane Cove lasses,’ Jimmy said. ‘I get to meet some of the lads from the Rocks at the Domain. They are a tough crowd but if yer get in with them they ain’t so bad. The coppers leave them alone. What did yer do for fun when yer were working out in the country?’

  ‘Did a bit of boxing for money,’ Lachlan said. ‘Or read books when I could.’

  ‘How good a fighter are you?’ Jimmy asked.

  ‘I seemed to win more than I lost,’ Lachlan shrugged.

  ‘Yer look like yer got a fighter’s build and if yer were any good then you can make some good money around the inns here, fighting bare-knuckle for a good-sized purse.’

  ‘I don’t know if I’m that good,’ Lachlan answered honestly.

  ‘So, when did yer win most of yer fights?’ Jimmy asked.

  ‘All my last fights,’ Lachlan answered, remembering the pain-racked, bruising bouts of the last year behind the hotels in the little towns he and Duncan had visited.

  ‘That means yer got a handle on what to do with yer fists,’ Jimmy said. ‘I reckon it is worth having a crack around here before Christmas. Hey, Harry,’ Jimmy called. ‘Who’s that big bastard fighting fer the Shamrock Inn?’

  ‘The Irishman, Kevin O’Keefe. Why?’ Harry answered.

  ‘I reckon we should put Lachlan here up against him. Win a few shillings on the outcome.’

  Jimmy’s statement attracted attention from the rest of the crew but the mumbled conversation that ensued was cut short by the call back to work. Lachlan heaved himself stiffly to his feet to face another few gruelling hours under the hot summer sun. If nothing else, he had a job and if today was anything to go by it would toughen his body unlike anything else he had known.

  That night, Lachlan ate a stew prepared by Mrs Woodford, washed himself down in the backyard from a tub of water and climbed the stairs to his room to collapse on his saggy bed. Before he knew it, he fell into a dreamless sleep to be awoken in the early hours of the following day to do what he had done the day before. This ritual went on for a week before his body slowly became inured to the physically hard work. Then the weekend finally came around – and Sunday meant a day away from the dusty, hot construction site to go with Jimmy to the Domain and meet some of Sydney’s lasses.

  The smartly dressed young man sitting in the sombre offices of a Victorian bank waited patiently as the bank manager, sporting a bald head and great bushy sideburns, pored over the table of accounts on the polished timber desk between them.

  ‘Mr MacDonald, you have quite a considerable sum of money deposited with us for someone so young,’ he said, glancing up at John MacDonald. ‘I would strongly advise that you put your money to work.’

  John took a deep breath and fiddled with the hat that lay in his lap. ‘I intend to do that, Mr Craven, and that is why I asked to see you personally.’

  The manager, a man in his late forties, sat back in his comfortable swivel chair. ‘You are somewhat of a mystery man around Melbourne,’ Craven said, eyeing John with just a hint of suspicion. ‘May I ask how you suddenly came by such a large amount of money?’

  ‘I came by it honestly,’ John replied. ‘It was bestowed to me in a family legacy. My father was a miner who did well out of the Ballarat fields some years ago but he has since passed on, as has my mother, and now you are the custodian of my moderate wealth.’

  ‘Please forgive me, Mr MacDonald, I was not casting aspersions on how you came about your windfall,’ Craven hurried to say, lest he insult one of his recent best depositors. ‘I can assure you that our services will always be available to you when it comes time to invest your money.’

  ‘I feel confident that you will, Mr Craven,’ John replied. ‘I do have some ideas, but first I wish to purchase some real estate for a residence. I do not envisage spending a lot on a place to live at this stage.’

  ‘A wise idea,’ Craven replied with the faintest of smiles, relieved to know that this young man before him was not going to whittle away what he had in the bank in a foolish search for pleasure as was the habit of most young men his age.

  The bank manager rose from his chair to indicate that the interview was over and thrust out his hand to John. John accepted the gesture and was struck by how limp and clammy the older man’s grip was. They parted, John walking past the tellers to the busy street outside the bank and slipping on his hat. To passers-by his appearance was that of a successful young man of probable good breeding – and that was what John wanted people to think.

  Losing his family that terrible day of the massacre had all happened in confusing circumstances; the killing of his father and brother by the red-coat guns and bayonets, Lachlan’s disappearance, and the forced separation of himself and Phoebe the day after the fall of the stockade. Confirmed orphans, Phoebe had been adopted by a good Christian family. But where they had taken her John had never known.

  As for himself, he had been put in an orphanage in Van Diemen’s Land and eventually apprenticed to a printer in Hobart. It was there that he had slaved to improve his grasp of reading and writing as he worked diligently to master the trade of printing.

  The young man who walked the broad streets of Melbourne had come a long way from the miner’s son working with his family in the dust of the goldfields at Ballarat. But he returned to his hotel with a dream. One day, the wealth that he intended to increase many times over would assist him in finding his lost brother and sister. As young as he had been at the time, he had sworn an oath to his dying brother that he would keep them all together. Now the ancient, clannish blood ran hot in his Scottish veins and John knew he would not rest until his promise had been fulfilled.

  THREE

  Sunday came bright and sunny and after a wash, Lachlan donned his best clean clothes. He stood outside the boarding house with Jimmy who was dressed in his best shirt and trousers, finished off with a red scarf wrapped around his neck. Jimmy had slicked his hair with copious quantities of grease – although a stubble of whiskers remained on his chin.

  ‘We are going to Hyde Park,’ Jimmy declared.

  ‘I thought you said that the Domain was the place to be,’ Lachlan countered.

  ‘Ah, but the regimental band will be playing at the Park and it will be your chance to see your opponent for the big fight,’ Jimmy declared. ‘I knows he goes there with one of his lasses of a Sunday to strut about like a flash man in front of his push.’

  Lachlan shrugged. At least he would be away from the dust and heat of the building site and could relax and take in what the sprawling town had to offer. Listening to a band from a British regiment stationed in Sydney would be a pleasant diversion.

  However, Lachlan was pleasantly surprised to see that there was an abundance of young ladies parading with friends and family through the park. Ladies wearing dresses which cascaded to the ground and wide-brimmed hats and carrying parasols could be seen on the arms of stiff-backed young officers in the bright uniforms of Her Majesty’s regiments. Other young men wandered amongst the strolling crowds, their seemingly inherent disdain for the socially more advantaged ensuring they kept their dista
nce from the higher classes. Lachlan felt just a little self-conscious of his working-class clothes, especially after receiving a nudge from Jimmy. ‘Yer seem to be getting a couple of looks,’ he said from the corner of his mouth. ‘Must notice that yer a country yokel. Ah! Over there,’ Jimmy suddenly exclaimed. ‘It’s O’Keefe himself.’

  Lachlan glanced in the direction Jimmy had indicated and noticed a tall, well-built young man, not much older than himself, strolling with an adoring young lady on each arm through a small grove of shrubs. He was well dressed and had the air of a man confident in his abilities to command those around him.

  Lachlan groaned inwardly. If this was the man that Jimmy had announced to all that he was to fight, then he was not feeling so confident. O’Keefe stood a head taller and was many pounds heavier than himself.

  As if reading Lachlan’s mind, Jimmy commented, ‘He might look like a big bugger but he hasn’t had a good fight in months. He has been seeing Kate Duffy from the Erin Hotel lately and I hear he is a bit sweet on her. It has taken the edge off his fighting skills.’

  Lachlan was surprised to hear that the man he appraised over the twenty paces between them was courting a young woman, when the two lasses hanging off his every word and gesture looked much more than passing friends. Duncan’s strict Presbyterian morality had rubbed very much off on Lachlan, and he immediately disapproved. ‘He’s got a longer reach than me,’ Lachlan said quietly.