Corroboree

by Graham Masterton

  Eyre said, ‘Come on, now, Christopher, we’ve done nothing criminal.’

  ‘Oh, haven’t we just? If you’d had the sense that night to call the police; or at least let Arthur run off, then we would have been quite all right. But here we are, almost as guilty of absconding from Botany Bay as he is.’

  ‘Arthur will have to hide,’ Eyre decided.

  ‘Hide? But where?’

  ‘There must be somewhere at the racecourse.’

  ‘There’s a hut there, which they use to keep the scythes and the shovels in; but he won’t be able to stay there for longer than two or three nights. There’s a race meeting on Wednesday afternoon.’

  ‘That may be as long as we need,’ said Eyre.

  Christopher frowned. ‘I’m not sure that I follow you.’

  ‘It’s very simple,’ said Eyre. ‘In three days, we shall be able to assemble everything we need for my expedition. Food, water, horses; we shan’t need to take anything particularly fancy. Joolonga is arriving in Adelaide tomorrow, and the other Aborigines are already here.’

  ‘I hope you’re not suggesting what I think you’re suggesting,’ said Christopher, in a pale voice.

  ‘It seems to me the very best way of killing two birds with one stone,’ said Eyre. ‘I need two companions to come with me on this expedition. I was already thinking of you, Christopher, if I could persuade you; and of Robert Pope. But I am prepared to substitute Arthur here for Robert. After all, Arthur seems to have been something of an expert when it comes to surviving under harsh conditions. We could dress him up, and perhaps give him a large hat and a pair of spectacles to wear, and we could say that he was a cousin of mine from England. Then all three of us could ride out of Adelaide without any trouble or hindrance whatsoever. No bounty-hunters are going to question the departure of a geographical expedition financed by Captain Sturt, of all people.’

  Christopher looked at Arthur closely, quite unconvinced. ‘A cousin of yours from England?’

  ‘Perhaps we can find him a wig,’ Eyre suggested.

  ‘Well, that’s all very well,’ Christopher protested, ‘but what about me? I don’t even want to go on this expedition. I was very much hoping that you wouldn’t go.’

  ‘Under the circumstances, I would think it wiser if you changed your mind,’ said Eyre. ‘Especially since I am intending to go, whatever happens; and no matter what anyone says to deter me.’

  ‘You’re inordinately stubborn, you know,’ Christopher complained.

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘No perhaps about it. When it comes to stubbornness, I’d set you up against two mules and a kangaroo any day of the week.’

  Arthur cleared his throat. ‘Is it all right if I say something, sir?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Eyre.

  ‘Well, sir, the thing is that there’s no need for either of you gentlemen to feel in any way obligated to me, sir. I never did nothing for you but try to rob you of what was yours; and that’s hardly a worthy recommendation for anyone. If I was to give myself up right away to these two gentlemen what seems to be searching for me, then there wouldn’t be any need for either of you to get yourselves tangled up in it; and that would be the end of the matter.’

  ‘Except that they could take you back to Norfolk Island and flog you so hard that they would probably kill you,’ Eyre put in.

  ‘I took my own risk, sir, when I jumped the boat for Adelaide. I always knew the consequences, should I be caught.’

  Eyre was silent for a minute or two. Christopher sat crossing and uncrossing his legs; and staring at Eyre with such concentration that if it had been possible for him to persuade Eyre by thought-transference that Arthur should give himself up, then he certainly would have succeeded.

  Eyre, at last, said, ‘I’m not a judge, Arthur. I don’t enforce the laws which sentence men to years of transportation for stealing hats, and sheep, and loaves of bread. Nor do I give the orders for men to be flogged, or kept in solitary confinement. It seems to me that you have served out your sentence, and yet the very fact that you have to remain here in Australia means that, in a way, you are serving your sentence still. You broke the conditions of your ticket-of-leave, I suppose, and you did attempt to rob us. But it is not for me to demand that you give yourself up; nor even to expect it; and if you wish to come along on this expedition, then you are welcome.’

  Christopher covered his face with his hands. ‘I knew it,’ he said. ‘I sensed it, the very moment you mentioned the idea of it. I hate camping; and I hate riding horses; and I hate discomfort of all kinds. And yet here I am, condemned to join an expedition into the very harshest country known to man. Eyre Walker, I wish I’d never set eyes on you.’

  ‘No, you don’t,’ Eyre smiled at him.

  ‘No,’ said Christopher. ‘The trouble is, I don’t.’

  Arthur said, ‘If that’s a genuine offer, sir, then I feel it in my water to take it, if that’s agreeable.’

  ‘You realise that I may be condemning you to a worse fate than any you might meet at Macquarie Harbour.’

  Arthur sat up straight. ‘I’d rather die ten times in the company of gentlemen, sir, than just once by myself, with a cloth bag over my head, in deep disgrace.’

  ‘Well, wouldn’t we all?’ said Christopher. ‘Or, I don’t know. Perhaps we wouldn’t.’

  Just then, Mrs McConnell came in and announced that luncheon was almost ready.

  ‘I don’t suppose you’d find it in your heart to root around for a spare cutlet, would you mum?’ Arthur spoke up.

  Mrs McConnell glared at him; and then at Eyre. Eyre twinkled his eyes at her, and gave her the most winning smile he could manage. And a little nod of his head, as if to say, go on, just for me, give the man a cutlet.

  Mrs McConnell hesitated. Then she turned and called down the hallway, ‘Dogger! Lay the table for two more, please! Yes, soup spoons, too!’

  Fifteen

  On Monday, Eyre and Christopher ate lunch with Captain Sturt at the Wilson’s house on Grenfell Street. Mrs Wilson was a plain, flustering woman who baked raised pies that could have been exhibited in a museum, and perhaps should have been: perfect to look at, but tasting of nothing very much at all, except shortening, possibly, and potatoes boiled without any salt. The dining-room was heavily curtained and painted in brown, and on the sideboard there was a huge sorry-looking salmon in a glass case.

  Every time Captain Sturt said anything witty, Mrs Wilson would let out a sound like a stepped-on mouse; a quick, suppressed squeak; and then giggle. Captain Sturt obviously found her responses almost intolerable, for every time she squeaked he closed his eyes for a moment, and gripped his fork as if he could cheerfully jab her with it.

  Christopher glanced across the table at Eyre with some unease. But Eyre was determined that the expedition should go ahead as he and Captain Sturt had agreed, and as quickly as possible.

  Sturt, in fact, had been most industrious since he had last spoken to Eyre. He had already talked to Mr Town-send of the South Australian Company and arranged for Eyre to take whatever leave of absence might be required; and now he knew that Christopher was to accompany Eyre, he would make the same arrangement for him.

  He had bought half-a-dozen horses; complete with saddles and saddle-packs; and leather bottles for the carrying of water. He had also arranged for the delivery of jerked meat, dried fruit, flour, salt, rice, and tea. These would be carried on a mule, although he hadn’t yet been able to find a satisfactory mule.

  The single item of provisions which he plainly considered to be the most valuable, however, was a leather-bound copy of his own Expeditions. This he laid reverently on the table in front of Eyre, and opened the cover to show him the inscription on the title-page. ‘For Mr Eyre Walker, in Trust and Confidence, that he will follow in my footsteps to the very heart of the Australian continent.’

  Eyre picked up the book, and leafed through it. He was actually very moved; because for all of Sturt’s pomposity, he was still the greatest
explorer the Australian continent had yet seen, and he was certainly the most celebrated man in Adelaide.

  He said, ‘Thank you, Captain Sturt. I shall treasure this above everything.

  ‘Not above food and water, I hope,’ Sturt grinned at him. ‘Although you will notice that the binding is leather, and that it may always be good for nourishment. Before they started dining on themselves, you may remember, Alexander Pearce and his companions actually devoured their kangaroo-skin jackets. Did you know that? Men can be pushed to extraordinary extremes in the outback.’

  Mrs Wilson squeaked and sniggered, and Captain Sturt pulled a twisted kind of a face.

  ‘Do you think it will be possible for us to leave on Wednesday?’ asked Eyre.

  Sturt forked up the last of his pie, and washed it down with a liberal mouthful of red wine. ‘I don’t doubt it,’ he said. ‘Mrs Wilson, that was a capital pie. A pie by which all other pies should have to be judged.’

  Squeak, and giggle, from Mrs Wilson’s end of the table.

  Eyre said, ‘I’m sorry my cousin couldn’t be here today. He likes his pie; and, of course, he was very anxious to make your acquaintance, Captain Sturt.’

  ‘I’ve never met him, I suppose?’ asked Sturt. ‘Did you tell me his name?’

  ‘His name? Well, yes, I believe I did. Mr Martin Ransome, that’s it. One of the Clerkenwell Ransomes.’

  Sturt buttered himself a large piece of soda-bread, and nodded, although it was plain that he wasn’t really interested. That was just what Eyre had been counting on: a general lack of curiosity about his soon-to-be-bespectacled cousin that would allow them to set off from Adelaide unharassed by bounty-hunters or militia.

  Today, Arthur was hiding in the hut out at Adelaide racecourse, with plenty of cold mutton sandwiches and a bottle of tea, and the day after tomorrow they would be riding northwards, well away from Aborigine constables and sea-captains who would tell anything for a bottle of rum; and all the other grasses with whom Adelaide was rife. Mrs Wilson rang the bell for the pie-plates to be removed, and her freckly Irish servant-girl brought in jaunemange and baked carrot pudding.

  Christopher looked at Eyre with an expression which clearly illustrated the hope that the luncheon-table would be cleaved in half by a bolt of divine lightning, and that Mrs Wilson would be burned to a manageably small cinder.

  ‘A very agreeable meal, Mrs Wilson,’ said Captain Sturt, and Eyre began to understand that it took more than twelve weeks’ rowing along wild and uncharted rivers to become, and remain, a hero.

  That afternoon, excused from the office, Eyre and Christopher went for a long walk in the Botanic Gardens, neglected and abandoned now; and strolled among the tangled acacia bushes and discussed the expedition. Then they went to Coppius’s Hotel and sat in the high-ceilinged lounge, and ordered rum punches. A new Axminster carpet was being carried into the hotel, freshly arrived from England, and the patrons in the lounge were continually being asked to move their chairs as the carpet-fitters manhandled it in.

  Eyre and Christopher were standing next to the window, waiting for the carpet to be shouldered over their table, when they saw two men by the hotel’s reception desk; two dark and unfamiliar men in frock coats and stovepipe hats and side-whiskers; and there was something about them which immediately led Eyre to suspect that they were the men who were looking for Arthur Mortlock. One of them was smoking a small cigar and reading the messages which had been left for him at the desk; the other was leaning against the wall talking to the porter.

  ‘You see those two fellows?’ Eyre asked Christopher. ‘Ten to one they’re our bounty-hunters.’

  Christopher glanced at Eyre, and nodded. ‘That’s what I was thinking. They don’t look at all like salesmen, or government men. Too surly for salesmen; too smartly dressed for government men. And hard, too. Look at their faces. They’d just as soon hit you in the face as say good afternoon.’

  Eyre finished his drink. ‘Do you want another one?’ he asked Christopher, ‘or shall we call it a day?’

  ‘Too late, I think,’ said Christopher.

  Eyre turned around. The two dark men had begun to walk towards them, stepping over the rolled-up carpet, and circling around the table. At last they came right up to Eyre and Christopher, and stood with their hands clasped in front of them, their faces bored and arrogant, their collars clean and sharp but unfashionably low, their black silk neckties sparkling with diamond stickpins.

  ‘You’ll excuse us, gentlemen,’ said one of them, in a marked ‘flash’ accent. ‘But do we have the privilege of addressing ourselves to Mr Eyre Walker and Mr Christopher Willis?’

  Eyre looked at them. The one who had spoken was thin, with a high domed forehead and a drooping moustache. He was very pale and veiny; and he gave Eyre the impression that if he were to take off his shirt, you would be able to see his heart pulsing underneath his ribcage, and his blood coursing through every vein. His companion on the other hand was thick and ruddy, with a gingery moustache and a body like beef.

  Eyre said, ‘What can we do for you?’

  The thin man inclined his head in a bow that was patently not meant to be subservient. ‘My name is Mr Chatto; this is Mr Rose. We are here on the direction of the government of New South Wales, to look for two ticket-of-leave men, one named Bean and the other named Mortlock.’

  ‘Yes?’ asked Christopher, with complete deadpan innocence.

  Mr Chatto gave a thin smile, as transparent as a finger drawn through water. ‘It came to our attention, Mr Walker, that you and Mr Willis were the last customers to hire Mr Mortlock’s carriage; on the night of the Spring Ball at Government House; on Thursday last week.’

  ‘Were we?’ asked Eyre ‘What of it?’

  ‘We were hoping that you might have engaged Mr Mortlock in conversation,’ said Mr Rose. ‘Perhaps he might have told you where he lived, or where he was going.’

  ‘Is he missing?’ asked Eyre.

  ‘He is not in immediate evidence, if we can put it that way,’ said Mr Chatto. He cracked his knuckles one by one, ten distinct cracks, and looked around the hotel lounge as if he were expecting somebody; not Arthur, but somebody equally fateful. Then he turned back to Eyre and Christopher, and looked at them wanly, as if he didn’t believe anything that either of them had told him, not for a moment.

  ‘Would you recognise Mr Mortlock if you saw him again?’ he asked, expressionlessly.

  ‘Who?’ Eyre frowned.

  ‘Mr Mortlock,’ Mr Chatto repeated, patiently. ‘The coachman who took you to the Spring Ball.’

  Eyre turned to Christopher in exaggerated bafflement.

  ‘Mr Mortlock?’ he said. ‘Was that his name?’

  ‘This gentleman seems to think so,’ said Christopher.

  ‘Come now, Mr Willis, you must recognise the name,’ said Mr Chatto. ‘It was you who went to Meredith’s for the phaeton; and you who Meredith’s sent around to Mr Mortlock, because all of their own fleet of carriages were out on hire.’

  ‘Well, well, was that his name?’ asked Christopher. ‘Mortlock, hey? I could have sworn it was Keys, or Morton, or Locket, or something to do with padlocks. But Mortlock. Well, well.’

  ‘He took you to the Ball, didn’t he?’ asked Mr Rose. ‘Of course.’

  ‘And then he took you home?’

  ‘Well, naturally.’

  ‘And in all that time, he didn’t say anything at all that struck you as untoward?’

  Eyre clamped his hand over his mouth as if he were thinking very deeply. Then suddenly he snapped his fingers, and said, ‘There was one thing.’

  Mr Chatto took out a notepad, and an indelible pencil, and licked the pencil with a tongue that was already a bright shade of laundry-purple.

  ‘He said he was thinking of taking up the pianoaccordion.’

  Mr Chatto’s pencil remained poised over the notepad; trembling very slightly, like the motion of a crane-fly on a late-summer porch.

  He said, flatly, ‘I don’t think, M
r Walker, that you fully realise the gravity of our investigations; nor the weight of the authority we carry. We have been given special approval to hunt down these men by the Governor and Commissioner of South Australia himself.’

  Eyre peered over the edge of his notepad. ‘You haven’t written down “piano-accordion”,’ he said, in a helpful tone.

  Mr Rose put in, ‘Our authority, sir, also extends to bringing to book those who may have given the fugitives succour and shelter.’

  Eyre turned to Christopher, and said, ‘The quality of the clientele here seems to have sunk rather low lately, wouldn’t you say? I think a quiet drink at home is called for; among more civilised company.’

  Mr Chatto put away his notepad and his pencil, and fastened up the buttons of his coat. ‘I want you to know, Mr Walker,’ he said, in a particularly drear voice, ‘that your answers to my questions were not at all satisfactory, and that I regard you as under suspicion of knowing the whereabouts of Mortlock and Bean.’

  ‘You may regard me however you like, that is your privilege,’ said Eyre. ‘But I had better remind you that I have influential friends; Captain Charles Sturt among them; and that if you attempt to harass me in any way at all, then he shall get to hear about it, and take whatever action he considers fit.’

  Mr Chatto said, ‘Even Captain Sturt is not above the law, Mr Walker. Look—this is my address—at the Torrens Hotel. Leave a message for me there if it should occur to you to change your mind about Mortlock.’

  Eyre took the scrap of paper on which Mr Chatto had written the address, 75 King William Street. He crumpled it up between the palms of his hands, and tossed it on to the floor. Mr Chatto stared at him with eyes of a curiously neutral amber, in which his tiny black pupils were suspended like insects. He made no attempt to pick the paper up. Instead, he tugged at each of his cuffs; cracked at all of his knuckles; and then inclined his head to Eyre and Christopher, and said, ‘Very well. I think you have made yourselves perfectly clear. Whatever it is that you know, I am to receive no help from you, whatsoever.’