‘So he never came back?’ I asked, after reading the final missive from Downes to his parents, and the curator shook her head.
‘Not that I know of, anyway.’
‘You’re right. It certainly is intriguing. What did they find out about Mr Rourke?’
‘I’m not certain. You’d have to ask Andy.’
‘Andy?’
‘Andy Harcourt. He’s the expert on this. Hang on …’ Crossing to her desk, she rummaged for a couple of minutes, then pulled out an address book and jotted some details on a scrap of paper. ‘Here …’
I read it, dumbstruck: Andrew Harcourt, Weatherly Station – and an address and phone number.
‘I’m sure he’d love to talk to you.’
‘He’s …’
‘His mother was William Downes’ niece, I believe.’
Soon after, I thanked her for her generosity and then headed north from Ballarat, as I’d been directed. Forty-five minutes later I pulled up beside a set of rusted gates, beneath an old, wrought-iron archway, from which the word Weatherly looks out across empty fields.
* * *
From the Journal of Lieutenant William Downes
25th December, 1921
Polar Exploration Vessel Raven
Approx. 48°12’S, 147°18’E
Christmas day today and a jolly affair on board. Cook knocked up a veritable feast, and in the wardroom we had a special lunch, dining well on ham, plus much fresh produce in the way of vegetables and salads. Additionally we had two whole chickens roasted for the occasion and a number of sweets. Most of us ate heartily, though the weather conditions have deteriorated somewhat and several of the men, including Alex and Greg Shannon-Stacey, were unable to face the festivities and confined themselves to their bunks.
Admittedly, I too am feeling slightly uneasy in the stomach, but didn’t allow this to interfere with my enjoyment of Christmas lunch. With a little luck I should find my sea legs in a day or so and with it my full appetite again.
The crew had their own celebration in the forecastle mess and from the foredeck it sounded like they were marking Christmas day with much merriment.
After lunch there was an exchange of small gifts, most of a humorous nature, though some serious. I received from Captain Smythe-Davis a pipe and from Alex a small pouch of tobacco, both of which will be most welcome during the long winter ahead, I imagine.
Our photographer, Randolph Lawson, presented Mr Rourke with a collection of rather lewd postcards which he claimed to have obtained in Paris during the war and which were passed around to the merriment of all. Several wits thought to enquire whether in fact Lawson had been the photographer responsible, a query he steadfastly refused to answer, either in confirmation or denial, which response provoked much laughter.
Another amusing moment was when Doctor Dalby presented to Doug King, who shares his cabin with Michael Burke, a sheepskin helmet with attached ear-flaps that he had liberated from the stores. Given Michael’s startlingly loud snoring, this was largely considered to be the most useful present given during the course of the festivities.
Before leaving Hobart, I had managed to purchase several large tins of sweet biscuits and I was pleased to present one to the expedition party in the wardroom and send one forward to the crew as shared gifts. Both were received with much pleasure from all aboard.
After lunch, Ivan retrieved from his kit a squeeze-box and, despite his English being rather limited, he performed for about an hour, playing all manner of songs from Russia and also a few well known favourites to which everyone sang along heartily.
All things considered, it was a most enjoyable day and excellent in relieving some of the tension aboard, which had continued to build since our departure.
From tomorrow we begin in earnest the business of preparing for the ice. Already outside the temperature is noticeably cooler even though, according to the Captain, we are still only a few hundred miles south of Hobart. We have continued to make between eight and ten knots, and after the noon sighting Captain McLaren estimated that we’d made a run of about a hundred and sixty-eight miles in our first twenty-four hours, which is an exceedingly good start to things.
The ship herself continues to handle the seas with only minimal rolling, though as we travel further into the 40 and 50 degree latitudes, I’m told the seas will only increase. One of the crew, an old salt by the name of Isaac with whom I share the middle watch, told me of a whaling trip he took below 55 degrees several years ago in which their ship was, at one point, almost completely overturned by the most enormous wave he’d ever seen; he claimed its peak was twice the height of their mainmast though I suspect his story, like most sailor’s tales, has lost nothing in the telling.
Last night I survived my first middle watch. Admittedly it was a fairly simple affair. Captain McLaren, who takes the evening watch immediately before mine, left instructions that I should wake him immediately if the wind changed in force or direction, but the winds and seas remained steady throughout and so for the most part I stood on the poop and chatted to Isaac, who was on the helm. As a general rule, my duties as officer on watch should also include navigation, however one of the benefits of a voyage to Antarctica is that getting there is relatively simple: you simply head south! Since leaving Hobart, we have held a steady 180° course and should continue to do so for another week or so. Naturally, as we approach the continent navigation will become trickier, as the magnetic variation increases and our compasses become less and less accurate.
Mr Rourke has asked me to organise the men into classes after muster tomorrow morning to start learning some of the skills we will need in the months ahead. One of the major hurdles that we face, especially when compared to the expeditions of men like Sir Ernest Shackleton or Douglas Mawson, is that the need to keep our goals private has made it impossible to approach any experienced Antarctic veterans in our recruiting. As such, the only men in our party with any degree of experience at working and surviving in the conditions we shall face are Ivan and Piotre, with their dog-sledding skills, and Per, who grew up in the Arctic and understands well the dangers that face men in extreme cold.
Even so, despite never having travelled to the south, Mr Rourke has developed a formidable knowledge of the traps and pitfalls that have faced other expeditions, as well as how they were overcome. In his cabin he has an extensive library including the writings of Shackleton, Amundsen, Mawson, Wilkes and Dumont D’Urville, which he has encouraged us all to read. Doctor Dalby has spent his time since agreeing to join the expedition learning as much as he can about the cold and the dangers that it brings with it, and so we are not completely without expertise.
There is a lot to cover, though, and I have put together a busy schedule, which will serve not only to prepare us well for the Antarctic, but also to while away the hours aboard and stave off boredom.
Tomorrow Doctor Dalby will lecture the whole company, expeditioners and crew alike, on the dangers of frostbite and scurvy, and teach us what we need to look out for in each other. The following day, Ivan and Piotre will take the men through basic dog-handling skills, though we are naturally limited in what we can accomplish on the moving deck of the ship.
In days to come, we will also need to be briefed on the building of the hut, loading and driving a sledge, recovery in the event of a crevasse-fall, and all manner of other skills. Once we’ve covered the essentials of survival, then I intend to have the scientific staff – Alex Holdsworthy, Greg Shannon-Stacey, Doug King and Mike Burke – present lectures on their own fields and choose from among the group at least two assistants each so that, God forbid, in the event of a calamity befalling one of them, we will not be completely bereft of expertise in their chosen area. Likewise, I have asked Doctor Dalby to commence first-aid lessons for all hands.
It will be a busy time for everyone but, by spending our days aboard engaged in this kind of practical undertaking, we will ensure that the remainder of our sojourn to the south is incident free.
> * * *
EIGHT
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF LIEUTENANT WILLIAM DOWNES (PART TWO). THE FURIOUS FIFTIES. THE DEATH OF IVAN PETROKOFF.
I loathe reading that last entry. Of all the pages that Downes wrote in his journal, the one for Christmas Day, 1921, filled as it is with such hopeful plans, never ceases to evoke in me a sense of terrible pathos, for it is possibly the final time that William Downes writes in what I have come to think of as his ‘real’ voice, because two days after Christmas, everything aboard the Raven changed irrevocably.
How and why this occurred you will discover for yourselves, soon enough. In the meantime, we shall return to where you last saw me – standing below the ironwork sign at the bottom of the gravel driveway to Downes’ family home.
The longest drought in fifty years has not been kind to farmers right across the country, and the same was true when I visited Ballarat. As I climbed from my car to take a quick photograph of the gates and to crane my neck for any indication of a homestead in the distance, I could taste dust in the air. Extending away from me in every direction, the bare fields were parched dry and the merciless wind had for years been scouring the topsoil – stripping the earth and leaving only meadows of emptiness in its wake. Here and there the odd tree littered the skyline, but for the most part these were sorry specimens, straggly and under-nourished.
Standing there, I was startled and slightly cowed by the silence – the whistle of a light breeze through the letters of the sign was the only noise. I tried, but failed, to imagine what this place must have looked like in 1919 when William Downes, freshly returned from the battlefields of Europe and still in his uniform, might have climbed down from a passing lorry, or the back of a horse cart, thanked the driver and then slung his kitbag over his shoulder and stepped though these same gates into the fields of home.
I was lost in these idle imaginings when the faint sound of a motorbike engine revving carried across the empty fields from somewhere off to my left. Then I spotted a plume of dust rising from the other side of a low crest, about a kilometre distant, and coming in my direction. Reaching the top the rider stopped, a dark silhouette against that enormous horizon, noticed me and my car standing at the gates, and waved. I returned the greeting and, pointing the bike down the slope, the rider gunned the engine and came bouncing towards me.
Stopping just inside the gates, the engine spluttered into silence, and the rider removed her helmet. I was slightly surprised to find myself looking at a young woman, perhaps twenty-five years old, with long, ash-blond hair.
‘Hi. You lost?’ she asked, leaning against the gate and propping one foot through its lowest rail.
‘No,’ I replied. ‘At least, I don’t think so. I’m trying to track down the relatives of a returned World-War-One serviceman by the name of William Downes.’
The mention of the Lieutenant’s name drew a surprised response. Her eyebrows flickered briefly upwards and she tilted her head slightly, studying me more closely.
‘What for?’
I told my story again, the same one I’d used on the curator of the Ballarat Museum, about researching a book about returned war heroes.
‘I saw the letters in town,’ I concluded, ‘and the lady there suggested I come out here and speak to Andrew Harcourt.’
The woman appeared to think for a moment or two longer, before abruptly standing and unlatching the gate.
‘That’s Dad. You’d better come on up to the house.’
‘If it’s not a problem.’
‘Shouldn’t be. I’m Emily, by the way.’ She stuck out her hand and I took it, introducing myself at the same time.
‘Just follow me.’
Waiting until I was through, she closed the gate behind me then fired up her bike again and took off up the road. I followed, windows up against the cloud of dust her back wheel flung into the air. After about ten minutes, she stopped again, opened another gate and signalled me through onto a neatly maintained gravel driveway that curved gradually up a slope, stopping outside a stately farmhouse, all weatherboard and surrounded by a wide, bull-nosed verandah.
‘Welcome to Weatherly,’ Emily told me as I climbed from my car. ‘Dad’s out checking some cattle at the moment, but if you’re happy to wait a few minutes, I’ll go and get him. He’ll be pleased to talk to you.’
I told her I’d be quite happy to wait.
‘Make yourself comfortable on the verandah. I’ll be fifteen minutes or so.’
In fact, it was closer to half an hour before she returned, but this was not a problem. I spent the time sitting on a comfortable cane chair, looking out across the fields and making a few notes in my writing journal. I found it hard to shake the feeling that the ghost of William Downes – the one who’d come back from the war, not the one who’d vanished aboard the Raven – was somehow sitting there beside me.
Then Emily roared back up the drive, riding ahead of a battered old Toyota Landcruiser, driven by a middle-aged farmer wearing the standard chequered flannel shirt and dusty Akubra hat.
‘G’day.’ The moment he took off his hat and smiled it was immediately apparent that he was Emily’s father. ‘I’m Andy Harcourt.’
I shook his hand and he gestured me to sit back down.
‘Em tells me you’re interested in William Downes?’
‘I’m working on a book about returned soldiers and they told me at the Ballarat Museum that you were the person to speak to about him. Were you related?’
‘He was my mother’s uncle. Not that she ever met him, because he vanished soon after World War One. He’s become a bit of a family legend. How’d you come across his name?’
‘Just while looking around in the museum.’
Now, I will admit that lying to Andy about my motivations was a terrible thing to do, and I felt truly awful at the time, but at that point I wasn’t yet convinced that I had any cause, or right, to reveal what I knew.
‘Ah. So you’re interested in his war record, then?’
‘I can get his army records from the War Museum in Canberra. I’m more interested in what happened once he returned to Australia.’
‘It’s a strange tale that one. My mum always says that he came to a bad end through no fault of his own.’
I noted his use of present tense.
‘She’s alive? Your mother?’
‘Sure is. Eighty years old and as fit as a mallee-bull. Lived here with us at Weatherly until just a couple of years ago, but then she and Dad moved into the city. She’d probably be able to tell you a bit more about William than I can. Her old man was his brother.’
‘What sort of bad end?’
‘Well, nobody’s quite sure. He came back here to Weatherly for a few years after the war, we know that much, then he took some kind of job down in Tasmania, all very hush-hush and from there he just vanished. At least, that’s the way Mum tells it. Hang on a tick …’
Kicking his boots off, Andy disappeared inside. While I waited for him to return, I leaned on the verandah rail. The house paddock that William referred to in his journal is still there, running from the other side of the driveway down to the road, about three or four hundred metres distant, but the drought has reduced it to a grim incline of dusty stubble. I was still standing there, squinting my eyes in the early afternoon light, when Andy returned, setting a cardboard shoebox down on the table before joining me at the rail.
‘It’s pretty dry, nowdays,’ he said, and I nodded.
‘It must be tough for you.’
‘We do what we can.’ He shrugged, then abruptly turned back to the box on the table and removed its lid. ‘Here. Take a look through this stuff. This is everything my grandfather managed to find on William after he disappeared.’
It wasn’t much. A few odd snippets from Hobart newspapers, a couple of letters from the Hobart police and harbourmaster’s office, a letter from the Smythe-Davis family in Sydney, expressing their own concern over their uncle, George, who had similarly vanished.
‘What did your grandfather think happened to his brother?’ I asked Andy.
‘He was always convinced there was some kind of cover-up, a government conspiracy, that sort of thing. Reckoned William got involved with some Antarctic trip that must have gone pear-shaped – something like Scott, or that other bloke, what’s-his-name?’
‘Sounds a little far-fetched,’ I suggested, then asked, ‘What do you think?’
Andy shrugged. ‘I dunno. It was a long time ago, now, and in all honesty I’ve got bigger things to worry about. Talk to Mum if you’re in town. I’ll give you her details.’
He jotted them on a piece of card, which I accepted with thanks, then took my leave of him and his daughter and departed.
Driving back to Melbourne was, I think now, when I finally had my epiphany. As I drove, turning over the events of the day in my mind, a sudden and not altogether welcome realisation came to me that this wasn’t just about Downes and his crewmates, but also about me. I’d read his journal and sat on his porch and talked with his family and now, whether I liked it or not, my fate and his were intertwined, irrevocably.
Some way outside the city I pulled over to the side of the road and just sat, engine idling, turning over in my fingers the card with the phone number of William Downes’ niece upon it and knowing, for the first time, that whatever I did afterwards, it was time to lay the ghost of William Downes to rest, for once and for all.
* * *
From the Journal of Lieutenant William Downes
28th December, 1921
Polar Exploration Vessel Raven
Approx. 51°26’S, 147°26’E
Finally some calmer seas! I will be honest and admit that there have been times during the last three days when I doubted that I, or any of us for that matter, would live long enough to write even a final entry in this journal.
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