by Peter Watt
‘Mebbe so, Inspector. Mebbe so,’ he replied good humouredly.
The rapport between the tough and experienced Indian fighter and the young, relatively inexperienced police officer, brought a tacit acceptance of Gordon from the others in the room. He sensed he was winning them over slowly to accepting his role as overall commander of the expedition to track and disperse the Kalkadoon.
‘Well, gentlemen, I believe there is little else to discuss at this point except to tell you that I intend to hold a meeting here in two weeks' time at the same hour. I would urge you all to be here so that I can go over my plans for the expedition we will mount to rid us of the Kalkadoon problem once and for all.’
The men muttered amongst themselves and nodded agreement to the meeting as they rose from their chairs. Gordon turned to Peter still sitting in his chair. ‘Trooper Duffy!’
‘Sah!’
‘We shall depart and return to the barracks now.’
‘Sah!’
Peter followed Gordon out of the hotel and into the heat of the afternoon. Gordon slipped off his kepi and wiped his brow. The sweat had not altogether been caused by the stifling heat in the hotel bar. The two troopers who had been lounging around the front of the hotel waiting for the boss to come out smartened their demeanour at his approach and saluted their officer.
They unhitched their horses and as Gordon swung into his saddle he said quietly, ‘Come over to my office after evening drill, Trooper Duffy.’
‘Sah!’
‘Good man! We have a lot to talk over,’ he added with a conspiratorial wink that thawed the stiff formality that had existed between them ever since Gordon had arrived at the barracks. Not that there yet had been time to sit down and discuss the old days as Gordon had been met by deputations of frightened settlers and concerned townspeople as soon as he had arrived from Townsville.
They wheeled away from the hotel and rode with stiffly erect backs down the main street. Their disciplined appearance was greeted with smiles and waves from those few people who were sheltering from the sun on the verandahs of the shops of the town.
Word had gone around that the son of Henry James had taken command of the troop and many of the old timers still remembered his father's considerable reputation as a disperser of the native tribes down south in the Kennedy district. If'n he was ′alf as good as h's old man then there was some ′ope of dispersin’ the pesky Kalkadoon, they generally agreed.
ELEVEN
Horace Brown watched the little steam lighter chugging towards the wharf. He leant on his cane with one hand and shaded his eyes as he peered across the muddy creek as the boat weaved between the wooden hulled coastal traders, making its way to the wharf. The day was mild and a clear blue sky promised good weather. This was fortunate, as on rough days passengers being transported from the steam ships anchored in Cleveland Bay often arrived in open whaleboats soaked and without their luggage.
Others also stood waiting on the wharf but hardly took notice of the lonely figure of the little Englishman who occasionally removed the spectacles from the end of his nose to wipe them on the sleeve of his jacket.
Horace was hardly noticeable to those about him because he could best be described as a nondescript man – a distinct advantage in his profession. For unobtrusive people made the best intelligence agents; they drew little attention to themselves or their occupation of gathering information and turning it into useable intelligence. But Horace – Remittance Man to those who made his acquaintance, and spy master to the passenger he waited to greet – had little time left working for Her Majesty's Foreign Office. A fact he was acutely aware of as the cancer ate at his body and sapped his life. How long? Six months at the most he guessed.
He hobbled painfully forward as the few people on the wharf pushed their way towards the boat that now steamed into the wharf. His rheumy eyes searched the passengers on the lighter for the distinctive figure of the tall, broad-shouldered man with the black eye patch and was rewarded with a glimpse of him standing like Ulysses watching for his Penelope amongst the mixture of Chinese and European passengers the lighter transferred from the ship out of Singapore. ‘Ah, dear boy!’ he sighed with tearful happiness to himself. ‘You have finally come home from your odyssey in the Orient.’
Michael Duffy was far from a boy. In ten years' travelling the Orient he had used other names and nationalities to stay one step ahead of the men who would rather see his espionage activities permanently curtailed by his violent demise. Although in his mid-forties, his body was hard with muscle and his remaining blue eye blazed with energy even though his once thick, brown curling hair was now shot with grey. It was still in the style of his younger days, worn just above the collar of his immaculate white starched shirt. He also wore a fresh black eye patch over the eye socket where shrapnel from Confederate artillery had taken his eye in the Civil War between the States of America. His clean shaven face was tanned and smooth without any sign of ageing and his rugged good looks still turned the heads of ladies of all ages.
‘Mister O'Flynn, dear chap,’ Horace said as he gripped Michael's extended hand as he stepped ashore. ‘It is so good to see you well.’
Michael was taken aback by the gaunt man whose eyes bravely attempted to shine for him. He had last seen Horace in good health: a robust and portly man addicted to opium and young Chinese boys. But the man before him looked nothing like the person he had left to travel to the Far East. The transformation left Michael speechless for some seconds and he felt an unexpected wave of pity for the man who had ruled so much of his latter life with the ruthlessness of the obsessed. ‘Horace, you old bastard! How the devil are you?’ And he suddenly regretted asking such a tactless question as it was obvious to him the man was seriously ill.
‘Well enough, Michael. Well enough.’
Michael could have sworn that the tough and ruthless man who had survived the Crimean Campaign of ′54 and played a dangerous game of intrigue with his German adversaries in Asia and the Pacific was on the verge of tears. To break the awkward moment Michael placed his arm around the shoulders of the smaller man and steered him down the wharf towards the town.
‘From your dispatches I gathered things became somewhat risky from time to time, old boy. I hope not too risky,’ Horace said as he walked slowly beside the big Irishman. ‘I was often worried you might let your wild Irish passion get you into trouble.’
Michael snorted with amusement at the Englishman's concern. ‘You mean you were concerned you might lose me,’ he replied. ‘And have all that trouble recruiting someone else to do your dirty work.’
‘Not true, old boy’ Horace retorted with indignation. ‘I've grown rather fond of you over the years.’ Michael did not know whether to believe him. The man was both ruthless and sentimental.
Once off the wharf Michael was amazed at how much Townsville had grown since he had last seen it in ′75. It was still a town of tin and timber but there were also fine public buildings of stone and brick. The great red rock hill reared up from the town itself to dominate the view inland and the streets were lined with gas lights. They were a short walk from the newly built Excelsior Hotel into which Horace had booked him when Michael noticed that, although the town had grown, the unpleasant smells of the cesspits remained.
He carried only one bag. It was battered and had seen much service in its travels but he had never considered replacing the old carpet bag; it symbolised his life. For all that was necessary to his existence he carried in the bag: his razor, a brace of Colt revolvers, two changes of clothes and a faded photograph of an unsmiling little boy staring with serious eyes at the camera. The photograph had been given to him by his sister Kate Tracy. It had been sent to her from Sydney by their Aunt Bridget prior to the boy sailing for England. The photograph was Michael's most treasured possession. It was of his son – now known as Captain Patrick Duffy of Her Majesty's military expedition to the Sudan. A son who was unaware that his father was even alive.
In a short time th
ey arrived at the hotel. Michael signed in under the name O'Flynn. In the Colony of New South Wales he was still wanted for a murder that he had not committed. In his long years as a mercenary soldier he had killed many men who probably had not deserved death. But the only killing he had done purely in self-defence was called murder by the authorities of that southern Australian colony.
Michael's room had access to the front upper verandah where the view took in the muddy waters of the creek he had crossed to reach the wharf from his steamer. He could see the tall single spars of small wooden boats moored along the shore. A pleasant breeze played along the verandah and there was a sense of peace about the place. North Queensland was fast becoming home to him for many reasons. Here lived his sister Kate and her husband, his Yankee friend, Luke Tracy. Here resided the man who controlled his life and managed his pay. And here, too, he was not wanted for murder.
Horace had arranged for a bottle of cold champagne to be brought to them on the upper verandah and both men settled back in comfortable cane chairs facing out to the street. Horace raised his glass in a toast. ‘The Queen. God bless her!’
‘Saint Pat. And damn the British to hell!’ Michael responded.
This irreverent response to the toast had become a longstanding private joke between them. They threw back a good mouthful of the cold, fizzy wine and settled into the chairs to stare vacantly into the blue sky beyond the railing, both men deep within memories that the shared ritual stirred in them.
‘I should have shot you that night in Cooktown back in ′74 when we first got to know each other,’ Michael growled softly, and Horace chuckled at the recollection of confronting the dangerous, wily Irish-American who was in a rum-induced sleep.
‘If you had you would never have got to see the exotic Orient. Or settled scores with Mort,’ he replied. ‘Or picked up that rather lucrative reward from Cochin China from the princess's eternally grateful family.’
‘Maybe,’ Michael pondered. ‘Or maybe I would have had a life as a painter of beautiful landscapes instead of living constantly with the fear of someone putting a bullet in me.’
‘You have done a lot for Her Majesty's Empire in the last ten years, Michael. That must count for something in your life.’
‘I had little choice, Horace,’ Michael retorted. ‘You and your contacts in the colonies made sure of that. But that's all finished now. I'm home and no more of the past.’
Horace fidgeted with the cane and tapped the end with his fingers. He cleared his throat as he leant forward in his chair. ‘Not quite, dear boy. Von Fellmann is back and I believe he is behind a second expedition to claim New Guinea for the Kaiser's empire.’
Michael stared at the timbered floor of the verandah. ‘I came home to find what's left of my life, Horace. I came home to leave the ghosts of my past in other countries. I've had enough.’
‘What would you do here, Michael? You have no real savings so you cannot retire to the life of a painter. Work for your sister? Work in a store, keeping ledgers of accounts? Do you think you could live like that after all you have done and seen? Do you think my contacts could protect you from that knock on the door in the middle of the night and some policeman with a warrant for your extradition to New South Wales to answer a charge of murder?’
‘You mean would protect me against arrest, not could.’
Horace did not answer. He knew Michael was right. Once his usefulness to the profession was finished so, too, was any need to keep him out of the clutches of the law. ‘Not my choice, dear boy. If it was within my power I would not be asking you to do this one last thing,’ he apologised sadly. ‘But after this I give you my word that the Crown will find a way of showing gratitude and repaying you for services rendered faithfully to the Queen. God knows you deserve some kind of reward for all that you have done.’
‘Why not recruit someone else for the job?’ Michael asked.
‘Because a situation is unfolding in Sydney where your knowledge and talents will be best employed.’
‘Sydney! Jesus, Mary and Joseph!’ Michael exploded. ‘That's the last place I want to go. If the traps are going to catch me then Sydney is the most likely place on earth. Why doesn't the bloody British government just annex the damned place themselves?’
Horace leant back in his chair and pursed his lips with an expression of annoyance. ‘Because we have stupid men who refuse to listen to wiser men,’ he replied. ‘We have men in London, like Lord Derby at the Colonial Office, who advise Gladstone that the resolutions of the Intercolonial Convention held in Sydney a couple of years ago are the ravings of naive colonial premiers about the possible threats to future defence in the Pacific to Australia. Gladstone does not believe that Bismarck intends to annex New Guinea. He has even gone one step further to reassure the Germans that he has no intentions of acting on the resolutions for British annexations proposed by the Sydney conference. That is why.’
Michael was well aware of the Englishman's concern towards German imperial interests in the Pacific. Although his colleagues in the Foreign Office still looked towards France as the natural threat to English interests, Horace had been a lone voice nagging them about the rapid expansion of the German military machine in Europe. He could see years ahead to when Germany would have established trading posts in its annexed territories – which could easily be used to support future military operations against strategic British interests. To Horace the drive for imperial annexations was a dual drive for military supremacy in the international chess game of strategic moves. The political leaders in Australia held the same views.
Horace had dedicated his very life to thwarting the Germans in the Pacific. Michael Duffy's fluency in the German language had been an extremely valuable asset in Horace's undeclared war against German covert operations. The man who opposed Horace was Bismarck's intelligence chief in the Pacific, Baron Manfred von Fellmann.
Michael sighed and poured himself another champagne. ‘If you know the bloody Germans are going to annex New Guinea why do you need me in Sydney?’ he growled. ‘It's obvious those fools in London aren't particularly interested in what happens out here.’
‘They would be if I could prove von Fellmann is organising an expedition with the intention of seizing the northern half of New Guinea and the surrounding islands,’ Horace replied quietly. ‘But I have no proof. All that I know is that he has suddenly returned to Sydney as a representative for a German trading company and claims that he is setting up an expedition to go to the islands to indulge in trading with the natives.’
‘That's possible, you know,’ Michael interjected lamely. ‘It's been over ten years since he last tried to get his hands on New Guinea. And he might be like me, a man who wants to find some peace in his last years of life. Trading in the islands can be very lucrative, you know.’
Horace laughed softly and shook his head. ‘I doubt that the Baron ever required a contingent of German marines to protect him. Not the hero of the Franco–Prussian war.’
‘How do you know he has marines with him?’ Michael asked suspiciously. Was it a ploy by Horace to justify sending him south?
‘We have both been military men, Michael. It is easy to recognise fellow soldiers – even if they do pose as German merchants.’
Michael could not argue with Horace's point. If the Prussian was in Sydney with a contingent of marines he was obviously on a covert mission of some kind.
‘You realise, of course,’ Michael said, ‘that von Fellmann probably still holds somewhat of a grudge from my mission to blow up the Osprey.’
‘I know all that. But I think you will find a way to renew your acquaintance with certain key people around the Baron.’
Michael flushed with a realisation. ‘You mean Penelope, don't you?’
Horace nodded. ‘Not only the Baroness, but also her lover of many years.’
‘And who would that be?’ Michael asked with an edge of jealousy.
Although he knew that Penelope was a woman of unlimited passion f
or the pleasures of the flesh and had taken many lovers, memories of her golden hair cascading on silk sheets, her milky white skin bathed in a sheen of perspiration, her body arching with her desire when he entered her came to him with bittersweet recollection. In all his travels and in all his years no woman – except possibly Fiona – had ever matched the beautiful wife of the Prussian aristocrat in the act of unbridled coupling. And he had known many women's bodies in his turbulent life.
‘Fiona White. Your son's mother,’ Horace said softly.
His revelation caused the champagne flute destined for Michael's lips to remain hanging in mid-air. ‘Fiona!’ The name came as a soft hiss from his lips. Fiona was Penelope's lover! He had no reason to doubt the Englishman's intelligence. Horace was rarely wrong.
‘An interesting situation,’ Horace said quietly, ‘if I must say so myself. And you, the link between both women.’
‘Penelope is in Sydney with Manfred?’ Michael asked.
‘Yes, she is staying at their house they keep on the harbour. I have reason to believe she spends a lot of time with Fiona while Manfred gets on with organising his mission. And from what I already know, we have little time to send you south before he completes his plans to sail from Sydney. But you will have enough time to visit your sister before you leave,’ Horace added kindly. ‘I know you have a lot to catch up on concerning your son and family in Sydney, so I will leave you with the bottle and be on my way. I will see you here tomorrow at ten in the morning.’
He rose stiffly from his chair and stretched his back. The pain was through his whole body now and he badly needed the opium to help him forget the future and the painful reality of the present. ‘This will be the last time for us both,’ he said softly. ‘I promise you that with my very life. You know, Michael,’ Horace said in parting as he leant heavily on his cane, ‘if you ever get to grow old and write your memoirs, they would make interesting reading. Especially with regards to your acquaintance with the ladies in your life.’ He sighed a deep sigh and continued in a sad voice, ‘But men like you and I do not have the same privileges of old generals retired to the comfort of their libraries to reminisce about the battles they fought. The battles we have fought over the years can never be told. We carry our memoirs in our heads, memories of good men and women who have died so that others might live in a secure peace. And I suppose it will always be so for us, and for those who follow us in future times – and future undeclared wars – for the information that keeps us one step ahead of our “friends”. Until tomorrow, dear boy.’