Only Killers and Thieves

by Paul Howarth

  He peeled himself from his hovel and crept across the camp. Billy was slumped under the hood of his bedroll, his chin on his chest and his breathing thick and slow. Tommy gently shook him. Billy woke with a start. Tommy leaned close and told him to hush.

  “What is it?” Billy whispered. “What’s wrong?”

  “Come with me.”

  “What? Where to?”

  “I want to talk to you. Don’t wake them. Come on.”

  He tugged on Billy’s arm. Billy threw off the bedroll, climbed to his feet, and followed Tommy along the little passage that led out of the rocks, past the horses standing stoically in the rain, the same disgruntled air as when they were first tied. Tommy brushed his hand along Beau’s flank and the horse briefly lifted his head. Then out into the clearing, their boots suckering the ground as they walked, until they stood in the darkness and downpour, barely the light to see each other’s faces not a couple of feet away.

  “Well?” Billy said over the hissing rain. “What’s this about?”

  “You know what this is, don’t you? What they’ve got planned?”

  His silence gave his answer. Tommy thought he saw his brother shrug. He pointed in the direction of the crater. “There’s babies down there!”

  “We ain’t here for them,” Billy said.

  “We ain’t here for any of them. Joseph’s not there. He never was.”

  “You don’t know that. Even so, them others might be, them that—”

  “There were no others, Billy! You lied! Bloody Sullivan—it wasn’t ever about us, or Daddy, or Ma, we just gave them the cause, don’t you see?”

  “Killing them’s not cause enough for you?”

  “But it wasn’t them”—he jabbed his finger toward the crater again—“that fucking did it!”

  “How do you know that?” Billy shouted. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. Them is what we’ve got. Hell, the law’s with us and John’s with us; even the bloody blacks agree it’s right. The only one that doesn’t is you. It’s time you took a fucking side.”

  “Your side? Raping and killing like you’re some kind of man?”

  “You were against shooting him. I was trying to spare you, that’s all.”

  “Horseshit, spare me. Was the woman for me too?”

  Billy threw up his arms. “Christ! Everyone did it! She’s only a fucking gin!”

  “They killed her, you know that? Threw her on the rocks.”

  “And they killed Ma—what’s the difference? When are you going to learn?”

  Billy’s face swam in the rain, pale and hollow-eyed and nothing like the brother Tommy knew. “We can’t go in there,” he said quietly. “Tomorrow—we can’t be a part of what they’ve got planned.”

  “We don’t have a choice, Tommy.”

  “Yes, we do. We could leave. Tonight. Now. Untie the horses, ride off.”

  Billy hesitated, said, “Don’t be so fucking dumb.”

  “Why not? What’s stopping us?”

  “No water for one thing, no supplies, we don’t even know where we’re at.”

  “We ride east with the sun. Keep going till we find a town.”

  “They’d hunt us like dogs, Tommy. We’d be cowards if we leave, worse.”

  “I’d rather live with that than what’ll happen if we don’t.”

  “Son, you wouldn’t live to see the dawn.”

  Noone’s voice. Both brothers turned. He came sloshing through the mud and out of the darkness like some pale apparition of the night. He was naked. Entirely unclothed save his boots. His body was white and wizened and unwell as a corpse. A thick mat of hair covered his chest and crotch. He stood close enough that they could smell him, feel the heat of his skin. Rain streaming down the crags of his cheeks and dripping from his stubbled chin, his mustache drooping sadly like a painted-on frown.

  “The last deserter I had, I tied to a tree and burned. Slowly. Took about an hour before he died. We tended the fire just-so. He watched his own skin peel.”

  “We’re not deserting,” Billy pleaded. “We were talking, that’s all.”

  “I heard you talking. I heard exactly what you said.”

  He reached down and cupped Tommy’s chin with his hand, twisted his head around. Tommy tried to pull away but couldn’t, the grip as strong as a dog’s jaw. He lifted his eyes to look at Noone, his face looming close in the rain, and those eyes reaching in through Tommy’s eyes and rummaging about in his soul. Tommy whimpered. He clutched Noone’s wrist with both hands but couldn’t shift it, like gripping an ancient tree limb. Noone squeezed and lifted; lifted him onto his toes. Billy pulled at Noone’s other arm but the arm was too slick for him to hold. Noone slapped him. Billy fell backward, slipped in the mud, rose but didn’t try again. Noone pressed his nose against Tommy’s nose, his brow on Tommy’s brow, and Tommy tasted the foulness of his breath when he spoke.

  “I do like you, Tommy. But talk like that again and I’ll see that you burn.”

  He dumped him back on his feet and Tommy reeled away, breathless, through the mud. Noone stood before them and neither brother moved. Slowly his face broke into a smile; he raised his arms at his sides like he held the world aloft.

  “Isn’t this beautiful? Can you imagine a more perfect night?”

  He tilted back his head and arched his spine, his cock wobbling, his hair lank and flat on his head. He closed his eyes and inhaled through his nose, then breathed out with a satisfied groan.

  “Back to your bedrolls, boys. Get yourselves rested for dawn.”

  They walked either side of him, past his outstretched arms, and made their way into camp. Tommy weak-footed, weak-legged, slipping in the mud. When they reached the mouth of the passage he looked back at the clearing and could still make out Noone, the shape of him, crucified in the darkness, imprinted on the night.

  27

  The rain had stopped come daybreak. The rocks dripped and the ground oozed and the air was close and thick. The camp slowly stirring, the men wringing out their bedrolls and moving stiffly in their damp clothes. Noone was the only one dry. Freshly shaved and fully dressed, including his longcoat, like a man stepping out from home. In the oily half-light he watched the preparations and snapped orders at his men. They too were in uniform: Noone inspected them one by one. Fiddling with each collar, adjusting each hat brim.

  Tommy stood numbly among the boulders, his rifle dangling in his hand and his sopping bedroll clutched under his arm, the others milling around him, making for their horses, bustling back and forth. He couldn’t bring himself to leave camp. As if he alone could hold them back, when of course he could not. Death is inevitable. Regardless, it comes. A man walks to the gallows and never thinks to try to run, stands obediently while the bag is draped and the noose is hung, waits patiently for the trapdoor to fall . . .

  “Tommy?” Noone said. Tommy’s eyes flicked toward him. “There a problem? You’re not thinking of running off again, I hope?”

  Sullivan overheard, called out, “The hell he is. On your horse, boy.”

  “What happens to the girl?” Tommy asked.

  “She stays here until we’re done,” Noone said. He hooked Rabbit by the arm as he passed. “Hobble her with one of the ropes, there’s a good man.”

  Rabbit nodded. He went to where Kala sat bound and gagged in the rocks, and wrenched her to her feet.

  “I’ll watch her,” Tommy offered. “Guard her till you’re back.”

  Noone was smiling. “Of course you would, Tommy.”

  “Get him on that fucking horse!” Sullivan yelled.

  Noone scragged Tommy by his collar and tossed him out of camp. He sprawled in the mud, spilling his rifle and bedroll, right beside Locke, who was seeing to his saddle pack. The overseer ran his tongue around his gums, leaned to offer Tommy a hand, then when Tommy reached for it withdrew the hand again, and Tommy fell back into the muck.

  “Yellow little bastard,” Locke said, laughing. “You won’t last the first pass.”

 
Tommy clambered to his feet, gathered his things, and went to Beau, who watched him warily while he packed. A horse always knows. Tommy checked his rifle and slung it on his shoulder, then stood there waiting, idly rubbing Beau’s neck. In the east the sky was a sloughy mix of gray and blue, a red sun threatening, the light barely touching the plains. The crater was out there. They were likely all still asleep. Women and children and old folk and infants. He had seen them. Seen them laughing, dancing, singing around the fire . . .

  The men were mounting up. Tommy had barely the strength to make the saddle but he did. He saw Sullivan vomit a dribble of green puke, wipe his mouth on his sleeve, then climb up. Locke spoke to him. Sullivan laughed and spat. Tommy turned Beau around and stood him beside Annie; Billy looked him up and down. Billy was trembling. He gripped the reins in his fists but his whole body shook. He eyed Tommy’s rifle, then reached into his waistband for the two revolvers he now had tucked there. He handed one across. Tommy took the pistol by its grip. Six shots, loaded and capped.

  “John gave me another,” Billy said, shrugging. “Don’t want you going short.”

  Tommy cradled the revolver loosely in his lap. He didn’t speak. He was way down inside himself, or many miles distant, watching all this from afar. Him holding the revolver and Billy trembling and the horses stepping uneasily and Jarrah’s waddy blade humming as he tested it on the air. Locke grinding his tobacco; Pope sitting still as an owl, his sunken eyes scouring the land. The faraway sun inching into the sky and behind them the water still dripping from the rocks, Kala lying among them, her wrists and ankles roped.

  “You got any of them lollies left?” Billy said. “For after, maybe?”

  Tommy only looked at him. Billy was smiling but seemed on the edge of tears, the smile clinging uncertainly to his face as Noone brought his horse around to address the group front on.

  “Stay together for the first pass,” he told them. “Then unleash hell. Don’t let me see none of you waste a single bloody shot.”

  And then they were riding, full gallop across the plain, Tommy jerking out of himself and stowing the revolver in his waistband and clinging to Beau as they rode, watching for the crater far ahead, watching, watching . . . and for a long time it was not there, then suddenly it was, the crater’s edge looming upon them like the earth had fissured, like the edge of the entire world. None of the horses slowed for it. They cleared the crest as one. Nine riders sweeping down the crater wall in a tumble of mud and dirt that set the dogs away barking below. Descending on the camp like a flood, the dogs yapping wildly, and here and there Kurrong heads turned. Those early risen or woken by the noise. Then came screaming. At first a single shout ringing in the dawn, then a chorus of shouting and Noone began shouting also, his voice deep and otherworldly, drawn from long ago. He roared and the others roared and despite himself Tommy roared too. The camp below now an ant nest of people fleeing and running madly back and forth, men assembling loosely in a line directly in the horses’ path. The first desperate spear was thrown. It landed short of the riders and Jarrah plucked it quivering from the ground. Other spears fizzed past them but none found their mark, and soon the spears were spent. Only their waddies left: the gathered men raised their clubs while their bare feet inched backward through the dirt. A jittering, doubtful stance. Jarrah launched the spear. It carved through the air and skewered one of the men and he went down. A Kurrong boy beside him fled. The others dared to hold their ground. They readied their waddies anew. Noone called for rifles and all rifles except Tommy’s were raised, and they were holding, holding, holding while they rode . . . at twenty yards Noone gave the order, and in a thunderclap of gunshot, they fired.

  Every man before them fell.

  The horses trampled their bodies and swept into the camp.

  28

  They slaughtered them. Save a few women kept as bounty, they slaughtered them all.

  29

  Daylight peeled open the crater. A slow-moving crescent of shadow drawn west to east by the sunrise. The sodden ground steamed. A churned and bloody stew. Crimson soil, crimson wet. The steam whispered through the scrub and over the bodies and parts of bodies sunken there. Some still moved: inching through the slurry, dragging themselves along, raising a supplicant hand. A chorus of low moans underpinned the irregular popping of waddy and rifle butt, as the posse roamed the crater, finishing off its task. Pop, pop, pop. Not unlike the sound of a wheat field, ripening in the sun.

  Tommy lost amid the chaos, rifle held before him, turning circles on his horse. Aiming nowhere, at no one, while around him the bodies fell. To rifle shot and pistol shot and the swing of waddy blade: Jarrah lopped the head off a kneeling Kurrong like a flower from its stem; Rabbit cleaved a path through the crowd, whipping side to side with the ease of splitting wood.

  When the last of them was finished, when the moaning had finally ceased, the bodies were collected and heaped into a pile. A heavy slog with heavy cargo through the turgid mud. The few Kurrong who had made it as far as the crater walls could be rolled or tossed to the floor, but then needed dragging like the rest. The pile grew. A bonfire of torsos and limbs. Some were missing ears or scalps or teeth, fingers, heads, breasts: trophies taken, then discarded, for the taking had been all. They littered the soupy ground, were kicked and trampled underfoot. The kind of relics which in years to come might be unearthed and thought queer. What’s this finger buried here? This jaw, this piece of skull? Why a single forearm bone?

  Down they went everywhere. Down, down, down. Shot and clubbed and stabbed and trampled and drowned in the mud. A din to echo in the bones. Screams of life, screams of death, of joy, hatred, terror, despair. Children crying. Little faces riven by tears. Mothers, their mouths gaping, clutching infants to their chests and running for their lives. Men fighting hopelessly, pawing at the passing horses, until they too were dispatched. Tommy watched Noone dismount and stride through the bedlam like a gentleman out of doors, picking them off as he went; he saw Sullivan thrashing and firing at will, flailing like a rabid old cur. Locke in the midst of it all took a girl to the ground and rutted with her in the slop, her dead eyes rolling, head bouncing with each thrust, while around them carnage reigned. Billy also part of it, revolver in hand, taking purposeful aim at the natives as they fled, shooting them in the back, the chest, the head. And down they went everywhere. Down, down, down.

  At first they worked in silence, collecting up the bodies, building up the pyre. But soon the sun was upon them and the task was near done and the elation of victory found its voice. Hesitant talking between the troopers, stories traded back and forth. Sullivan wrapped Billy in a sidelong embrace, one arm around his shoulders, slapping his chest, both of them mud-slicked and red, Sullivan laughing, telling Billy how proud he was, how well he had performed. Billy nodded shyly but a smile teased his lips, the same reluctant smile as when Father gave out praise. Billy acting like he didn’t care, when of course he always did.

  Now the pair of them stood watching the troopers dragging in the last of the dead, and Noone wandered about the camp, making notes in a little book, like a man tallying up his stock. He inspected the bodies, rummaged through their flattened humpies and personal effects. When he found a woman still living he cupped his hand to her face and knelt beside her in silent prayer. The woman spoke to him. Noone listened and nodded and gently replied. Then he took out his knife and slit open her rounded belly and she gave out a cry and died. He rolled up his sleeve and rummaged in the cavity, then pulled out something clotted and lifeless and studied it awhile, before cutting it loose and tossing it aside and wiping his hand clean. He stood, scribbled something in his notebook, moved on to the next, and Tommy sank to his haunches and vomited on the ground.

  The man was upon him without warning: a performer from last night’s dance, white paint still smeared on his face, eyes wide and full of fire. He came yelping from out of Tommy’s eyeline and leaped saddle high to grab him by his arm and drag him to the ground. They landed together b
ut the man scrambled quickly and straddled Tommy from above, pinning him and trying to wrestle the rifle from his grip, while Tommy on his back clung to the stock and fought the muzzle into line with the man’s sunken and scarified chest. He fired. Pulled the trigger and heard the empty click. Both fell still for a second. As if watching the misfire for proof. Tommy tried cocking the hammer again, but in the pause the man twisted the rifle free and flattened the barrel against his throat. Tommy sank deeper into the reeking mud, felt his windpipe closing, darkness creeping; he hadn’t the strength to throw the man. He pawed at his face while reaching for the revolver tucked into his belt, fingering eyes and nose and mouth, feeling the damp of each orifice, the mucus and the warmth of his breath, no purchase to dig his fingers in. Suddenly the man bit him. Tommy cried out and gave up on the revolver—his last two fingers were knuckle-deep in the man’s mouth and he was clenching down hard with his teeth. Tommy pulled but they were clamped there. He was helpless against the bite. Blood drooled from the man’s lips. Tommy began hitting him, but his breath was almost out and each blow fell weak as a kiss. There was a crunching sound, and tearing, and the knuckles gave way. Tommy screamed but the scream gurgled mute in his throat and the man jerked his head and Tommy got the two digits loose. The hand came out mangled and bloody and limp. No pain anymore. Like it wasn’t even his hand. The man started shouting, blood and spittle spraying, as he weighed down on the rifle again. Tommy’s arms fell to his side and he felt himself going out, then his good hand brushed his pocket and the knife he carried there. The folding knife he’d stolen from Song’s Hardware Store. He teased it out, worked open the blade, and with all that was left in him, swung.

  The bonfire was doctored with gunpowder and kindling from the crater floor, then left to dry out in the sun. The posse sat resting on a nearby grassy bank. A gruesome collection of men. Caked in gore, smoking and drinking and eating the few provisions they’d rustled from the sacked camp, leavings from last night’s meal. Huddled beside them, unbound but tightly grouped, were five females they’d retained. Six at first, but one had run; they’d let her get so far before Jarrah brought her down, a two-hundred-yard shot with his carbine balanced on the pivot of his knee. Now those five remaining shivered together in the sun. None looked older than eighteen.