by Paul Howarth
Billy swiveled sideways on the rock, finished his mouthful, and swallowed. “If you’ve not worked it out yet, let me tell you: Daddy’s full of shit. He’s had years to dig them ditches. He gave up on dairying because he thought it was too hard. He’s lost both his stockmen, sold his mob for boiling down, now he’s acting like everything’s different because a bit of rain fell.”
“The drought’s not his fault.”
“No, but what’s he done about it? Look at John Sullivan. Same drought, same soil, and I’ll bet he’s sitting just fine up there.”
“We ain’t nothing like Sullivan. The two can’t be compared.”
“We’re something like him. Could be, anyway. Bloke even comes down and offers his help and Daddy’s too proud to take it. Or stupid, it’s all the same. Imagine some blackboy speaking to Sullivan like Joseph did, or people treating his missus the way they did you and Ma in town.”
Tommy stared out over the waterhole. “I wouldn’t trade places for nothing.”
“Horseshit, you wouldn’t. All that cattle. That land.”
“It ain’t worth it. You’ve seen how he is. What he does.”
“That wasn’t him, it was Noone.”
“Same thing,” Tommy said.
“How is it?”
“Daddy said Sullivan’s the one that called Noone in.”
“Christ, you sound as soft as him. When I get my own run—”
“Daddy ain’t soft. Neither am I. And you need money to buy a run, you know.”
“I’ll find it.”
“Oh, you reckon? Where at?”
“I’ll go shearing, down south. Or to the diggings if I have to.”
“The Song brothers did that and never came back.”
“Song brothers? From town?”
“Mia told me. When I got your rubber band.”
“Stole it, you mean. And that knife.”
“She put it in the book.”
“Not the knife she didn’t.”
Tommy sat there brooding. He felt bad about the knife but couldn’t figure how to make things right with Song. He had no money to pay for it, too long had passed to pretend he’d taken it by mistake, and he didn’t want Mia thinking of him as a thief.
“I’ll set that straight one day,” he said. “Or you can, when you’re rich.”
Billy was watching him carefully. “You’ve not shut up about that girl since you got back from Bewley—you’re sweet on her, aren’t you?”
“Am not. She was kind to us, that’s all. Gave credit when no one else would.”
“Sweet on a chink, Tommy!”
Billy nudged him playfully; Tommy nudged him back, then ate in silence, ignoring the smirks and glances his brother gave.
“You ever wish we’d gone to school, Billy?” he said finally.
“School? What for?”
“She said she liked it. You learn more than just reading.”
“You only want to go because she does. What’s her name again?”
“Mia—but that’s not it. There’s about twenty of them there.”
“They’re welcome to it,” Billy said, flicking at the flies. He fell quiet a moment. “So this girl, d’you reckon she was sweet on you too?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. She didn’t even know who I was.”
“What did you talk about, then?”
“Just that. And school. She said me and Mary should go.”
“What about me?”
“You just said you didn’t want to.”
Billy shrugged. Tommy picked up a stone and tossed it into the pool, watched the ripples spread. A crescent of shadow fringed the water, peeling left to right. Insects danced across the surface, rose, and fell again.
“What was so special about her anyway? Why d’you like her so much?”
“No reason. I just liked watching her. Had hair as black as tar.”
“What was she doing, then?”
He hesitated before he answered: “Sweeping.”
“Sweeping? Sweeping what?”
“The floor.”
“Sweeping the floor!” Billy shouted, and his laughter echoed around the walls. Tommy shoved him but he wouldn’t stop laughing, so he shoved him harder and Billy slipped off the ledge and down into the shallows. “Sweeping!” he howled again, then ran away laughing as Tommy slid down and chased after him, splashing into the pool. When he caught him they briefly wrestled, throwing and holding each other under, before they came to a stalemate and drifted apart in a hesitant truce.
“Make you a good wife, anyhow,” Billy said, “if she’s skilled with a broom.”
Tommy’s scowl cracked. He smirked and Billy saw it, and both were laughing now. Together they came trudging back out of the water and each went to the same rock he’d used before; they lay down to dry off, and both were soon asleep.
* * *
Tommy was first to wake. He lifted his head into a swarm of mosquitoes and leaped to his feet, flapping at the air. The waterhole was in near-darkness. Shadow covered the pool. Outside the crater the sun still shone, but little light made it this far down. A deep shiver ran through him. Like standing in the bottom of a well. The crater rim was fringed with brightness, and between the pillowy clouds the sky was a brilliant blue, but the walls were so sheer and tall, and down here was so dark, that Tommy felt a shock of abandonment, as if they had fallen from that world without knowing how or when they might return.
He went over to Billy and kicked him awake. “Time to go,” he said.
They pulled on their shirts quickly, collected their things, and went back to where the horses were tied. Tommy walked Beau out into the sunshine, and even when the warmth hit his back it took a long time to reach his bones. Billy was already mounted. He sat waiting at the bottom of the rise; when finally Tommy joined him he frowned and asked what was wrong.
“Nothing. Just got a chill from that rock.”
They moved on. Back onto the flat, then northeast toward home. The first strains of dusk falling over the plains, shadows lengthening on the ground. A soft sunset tonight. Fiery wisps of crimson in a cotton-ball sky. The colors swirled and deepened the farther they rode, and by the time they glimpsed the house and its outbuildings the sun had begun to pool and spread in the west. Glendale glowed warm on the vast horizon, that lonely shipwreck of little slab huts the boys called their home. Both smiled when they saw it. Tommy glanced at Billy and caught a strong look of Father in him just then. Steady brown eyes, stubble on his jaw, that same crooked grin.
“Beat you to the stables!” Billy shouted, and took off at a sprint.
Tommy was caught dreaming. He couldn’t close the gap. He ran Beau as hard as he could but Annie was just as eager, and he was beaten by a couple of lengths, Billy whooping and shouting as he drew up to the stables; he dismounted and pulled Annie around, pointing and laughing as Tommy rode in.
“It wasn’t even,” Tommy told him, sliding down. “You got a start.”
“It wasn’t even to begin with—yours is the bigger horse.”
They led them around the back of the stables to the doors. The horses whinnied and shied, their blood up from racing, reluctant to go in. Billy went to open the doors. Tommy stood by with the reins. The yard sloping away from him, down toward the house, its long shadow tapering up the hill. Peaceful, but still the horses wouldn’t calm; Beau reared when Billy opened the first stable door and a waft of warm air escaped.
“Christ,” Billy said. “Hot as hell in here. Stinks like it as well.”
The horses inside began neighing. Sounds of stomping, of hoof striking wall. Billy dragged open the second door and came back for Annie, and they led them inside. The air was choking. It reeked of piss, shit, and sweat. Tommy began with Beau’s saddle strap but watched the other stalls. Buck pacing. Jess cowering against the wall.
“They’ve not been out,” he told Billy. “Look at them—they’re heat mad.”
“Daddy’ll have forgot. Too worried about ditches,
or milking, or rum.”
They stabled their own horses, a struggle to get them into the stalls, then came gasping into the outside air, snorting and spitting dryly on the ground. They left both doors open, cool the place down—no doubt they’d be back up here after supper, cleaning and feeding and filling the water troughs. Tommy wondered if Father might have even left them like that on purpose. With Arthur gone, the horses were his and Billy’s responsibility. A lesson in neglecting their chores.
Tommy spread the saddle blankets on the railing and collected up his bags, and when he came to Billy’s side, Billy said, “Quiet, ain’t it,” staring across the yard.
“They’ll be sat down for supper. Better have left us some.”
He took a step forward. Billy gripped his arm.
“Where’s the dogs at even? They never barked when we came in.”
They stood listening to the silence. Little swirls of dust played across the yard. Down at the house the front door was open but there was no movement and no sound from inside. Clothes still hung on the drying line. An uncut log balanced on the chopping block, the ax beside it in the dirt.
“Something ain’t right,” Billy said.
“It’ll be nothing.”
Billy unslung his rifle. Tommy brought his own around. It was so quiet. Not a sound save the horses and the windmill creaking in the breeze. Tommy’s breathing quickened, surged through his nose, quivering as his body began to shake. His gaze was fixed entirely on the house, a thing of total blackness haloed by the sunset, and in the middle of the dark verandah the faintest sliver of daylight through the open door.
Billy started walking. Tommy followed at his side. Edging into the long shadow that swallowed most of the yard, rifles braced, boots scuffing the dirt.
The silence. The silence. The silence.
They found the dogs first, in the clearing between the house and the well. Both had been run through. Lying together, one beside the other, tongues lolling, paws crossed; like they only slept. Around them a churn of bloody dirt, imprints of the scuffle, of boot marks and paw marks: a slow, unclean death. The brothers stood over them, incomprehension in their young eyes, then Billy walked around the bodies, toward the well, bent and collected something from the ground. He rose again. His back to Tommy, his head bowed, examining whatever he had found. He turned. Something metallic in his hands. He came forward. Tommy stared. He saw but did not see, not until Billy was right beside him, the thing in his outstretched hand like an offering, which Tommy would not take.
Joseph’s old five-shot revolver, open-framed, missing half its grip.
Billy bundled past him, running for the house. Tommy watched his brother vault the steps, onto the porch; heard his anguished groan. Tommy went after him, moving very slowly along the front of the house. Through the verandah railings he could see Billy on his knees and the tread of a pair of boots sticking out. Tommy turned the corner. He took each step slower than the last. Billy looked back at him, over his shoulder. His face was red and twisted and his narrow eyes brimmed.
“That fucking nigger cunt.”
Tommy looked beyond him. Father lay slumped against the wall. He was wedged between the doorframe and the bench, and his eyes were open but they did not blink. He had three holes in him. Shoulder, stomach, chest. Blood soaked his shirtfront and pooled in his groin and spread over the boards below. His mouth hung slackly. His empty eyes stared. A fly crawled onto one of the eyeballs and sat in the corner of the lid, drinking. Drinking his final tears. Billy lunged to his feet and went into the house but Tommy stood watching the fly. He leaned and flicked it away, then propped his rifle against the frame of the door. Father’s carbine lay in his lap. Tommy propped it beside his own, then crouched and looked Father up and down. It was him but not him: no longer the same man. He went to touch him, then withdrew his hand as, inside the house, Billy cried out again.
Tommy rose and went inside. The shutters were closed. Thin spindles of sunlight broke through the gaps and crossed the darkened room, and when Billy burst through the bedroom curtain the dust swirled wildly within each one. Billy was raging. A crazed and faraway stare. For a moment he seemed not to notice Tommy, then traced him from the boots up. When their eyes met, Billy’s lips parted, strings of saliva peeling between them, and a noise sounded deep in his throat. He shook his head. Eyes pleading. Tommy’s gaze slid from his face to the blue curtain swaying back and forth. He stepped forward. “Don’t,” Billy said, but Tommy reached out and parted the curtain and held it open with his arm. Mother was in there. She lay twisted on the floor. Her face was turned away from him, her hand reaching for the bed and the pistol they kept underneath. A hunk of her head was missing. A mush of flesh, hair, bone. Her skirts were ruffled around her ankles and from their folds her feet were poking out, dirty and rough-skinned, the little buds of her toes.
Tommy let the curtain fall. His stomach lurched and he vomited on the floor. He looked up for Billy but Billy was no longer there. Tommy spat, straightened, surveyed the room. Nothing was amiss. Nothing any different, the same as when they’d left. Tommy’s eyes filled suddenly. He squeezed them closed and tears ran. He could feel it coming now, the force of it breaking over him. He opened his eyes and his face began to crumble, and at that moment Billy threw back the other curtain, panting, “She’s alive. I found her. Mary’s still alive!”
She lay on the floor in their bedroom, her hands folded, covering a bloodied hole in her gut. Blood stained her little fingers, stained her housedress, stained the floor. But she was breathing. Shallow snatches of air passing quickly in and out. She had her eyes closed. Her hair in bunches still. Her freckles looked to be fading, Tommy noticed. He hadn’t seen that before. She’d have been beautiful fully grown.
“She was under the bed, hiding,” Billy said, crouching and raising her up. He tried to lift her but unbalanced and fell into a squat. “Will you fucking wake up and help me! Tommy! Get her ankles—come on!”
Together they carried her out through the house. Her skin was soft and cold. Her hands slid from her belly and Tommy got a look at the wound. It had gone in messy. You’d do an animal a kindness after a shot like that. Not Joseph. And that bastard would have known. He’d plugged her and left her to die slowly, and alone.
As they passed by the curtain, Tommy asked, “What about Ma?”
“Leave her.”
“No, Billy.”
“She’s gone. Mary’s not. We’ll come back later, do it right.”
“Where are we taking her?”
“For help, Tommy. Where d’you bloody think?”
They paused in the front doorway, came cautiously onto the verandah, beside where Father lay. Billy didn’t look at him. Tommy reached for Father’s carbine but picked up his own rifle instead. Father was precious about that gun. Tommy nudged it so it fell back onto his lap, not neatly but it was with him anyway. He would have fought, Tommy knew. Would have fought as long as he could. As they came down the steps he saw bloody drag marks leading from the yard, meaning Father had crawled onto the verandah after he’d been shot, must have gone out to confront Joseph head-on. He imagined them arguing, Joseph pulling the revolver, Father too slow with the carbine, three balls already in him . . . bang, bang, bang. The noise would have brought Mother onto the verandah and Joseph would have chased her back into the house, got her before she reached the pistol under the bed, Father crawling after them but it was too late, too late. Mary hiding, petrified, but Joseph knew where she would be; the dogs must have tried to get him coming out. No balls left in the revolver so he had to use his spear, or maybe there was another one, an accomplice, some other Kurrong bastard come with him for revenge.
Tommy could almost see it, their ghosts all around, as he and Billy lumbered across the yard with Mary in their arms, then lowered her gently outside the stable door.
“I’ll get the dray,” Tommy said.
“Too slow. The track’s not clear. Get the saddles on.”
“Me and Ma managed.”
“The saddles, Tommy.”
He stood there numb. Billy fetched the blankets from the rail and shoved one into Tommy’s arms. The blanket still warm and sweat-damp, the horses still unsettled in their stalls.
“If we hadn’t slept at Wallabys, if we’d come back after lunch . . .”
“That’s enough.”
“We might have stopped him, though.”
“Or we might be dead. Get your bloody saddle on.”
When it was done, Billy hoisted Mary onto the front of Tommy’s saddle, her legs skewed together at one side. Billy tied a rope into a harness that Tommy looped under her armpits then wore like a cartridge belt across his own shoulders and chest. He had his arms around her also, and he gripped tight on the reins. Her hair brushed his face, through it the soft shell of her ear. He put his lips there and told her she’d be alright, they would make it, they’d be in Bewley in a couple of hours.
“We’re not going to Bewley,” Billy said, mounting up, both of them walking their horses clear of the barn.
“Shanklin’s in Bewley—who else is there?”
In the leeching twilight Tommy saw his brother’s head turn.
“Sullivan’s got a medic up at Broken Ridge.”
Billy didn’t wait for an answer. He set out across the yard, yelling for Tommy to follow; Tommy pulled Mary against him and did so, leaving the house behind, everything within, riding for the northern scrublands, into the darkness they held.
11
Through the trees, across the border, onto Sullivan’s land, past the bushes from where they’d once watched a man killed. A low moon rising, the light slippery and faint, objects rearing from the shadows and making the horses flinch. Already they were wary, of the scree underfoot, of how the boys rode, of this strange nighttime mission, of the darkness, of the cold.
In the valley the terrain plateaued and they found a trail leading northeast, through swaying grass meadows, undulating like the sea; beneath trees whose tall branches spread spidery against the gloom. Neither brother speaking. Sounds only of hoof fall, occasionally a rustle in the treetops, the downbeat of wings, the pained catlike screech of flying foxes overhead.