by Paul Howarth
“Hey!” Tommy shouted, running. “Hey, stop that!”
He met them in the clearing between the house and the sheds. Rabbit offered a muted wave. Tommy noticed scratches on Kala’s body, marks on her legs.
“Where you taking her?”
Rabbit answered: “Tie her in stable, Marmy says. Big trouble this one.”
“Leave her with me. I’ll do it.” He waved for them to bring her down.
Mallee was scowling at him. “Stable,” he said.
Tommy looked from the trooper to Kala again, sitting upright and alert on the back of Rabbit’s horse, listening from inside her hood. Tommy pulled back his shoulders and fixed Mallee in the eye.
“She’s ours now,” he said. “A gift from Noone—from Marmy. I’ll tell him you wouldn’t let me have her. He won’t be pleased. I’ll tell him it was you.”
He pointed at Mallee. The trooper glanced worriedly at Rabbit, whose shrug said he didn’t disagree. Mallee dismounted and dragged Kala kicking from the horse. She fought him all the way down. Tommy snatched the feed bag from her head and she fell still, stood there blinking and squinting against the sun. Air surged through her nose. Her face was swollen in places and her bottom lip was cut. She looked at Tommy and he smiled warmly but her gaze went right through him as if they’d never met. He took hold of her arm. She struggled and Tommy let go.
“Big trouble this one,” Rabbit repeated, shaking his head. He smiled at Tommy and the smile was very familiar, like it meant something, like the two of them were friends. It wasn’t impossible. In another life, maybe. Another place. Another world.
“Help me get her to the stables,” Tommy said, then to Mallee: “You stay here.”
To quieten her screaming, Tommy wrestled the feed bag back onto her head, then he and Rabbit each took an arm and dragged the writhing girl past the sheds to the stable barn. One of the doors was already open. They hauled her inside. The barn was empty, the air shaded and cool; Kala stopped fighting once they were in. The horses nickered in their stalls and watched the trio curiously—the smell of the feed bag, maybe. Tommy made for Beau’s stall. His gray snout poked over the gate, sniffing at the air, then he lifted his whole head out. Tommy spoke to him. A hushed greeting and that was all. But Rabbit was reading his intentions and he pulled Kala to a halt, and he and Tommy stood facing each other in the aisle.
“Tie her in stable, Marmy says.”
“No, she’s mine now.”
“Marmy says—”
“He’s not even here.”
Rabbit’s eyes flared. He looked terrified. “Marmy everywhere.”
“Not where I’m taking her.”
Rabbit’s head inclined slightly. “Taking her?”
And Tommy was thinking: tell him Glendale, as their housemaid; or into the woods to fuck her; or somewhere she can be sold.
“The camps outside Bewley. I aim to turn her loose.”
Rabbit stared at him a long time. Tommy fidgeted in his gaze. An urge to flee or lunge at him, neither of which felt sound. He’d lose Kala if he ran, and despite Rabbit’s being unarmed, Tommy still had only one hand with which to fight. And then there was Mallee, waiting with the horses not a hundred yards away, out of sight behind the sheds. One shout from Rabbit and he would come.
Rabbit blinked and nodded, drew his lips tight. There was a sadness in him, a pain at the choice Tommy was forcing him to make. Whatever was between them was over now. One way or another, this was the end.
Rabbit reached for the bag on Kala’s head, took it off slowly, and spoke to her. She looked at Tommy. Her eyes were wild and very wide. Tommy waited, unsure what to do. Rabbit offered him the feed bag.
“For she start screaming,” he said.
Tommy took the bag. Rabbit turned to leave. Tommy called for him to wait but he didn’t and it was to his back that Tommy said, “Thank you.” Rabbit raised a hand. He didn’t pause or turn. He walked out into the sunshine and over toward the sheds, and there was no telling what he might do next. Might have been genuine, might have been a ruse. Tommy hoped he knew. Hoped he’d read him right.
“Quickly,” he said, grabbing Kala’s wrist and dragging her into Beau’s stall. She didn’t fight him this time, stood by while he got the saddle on, difficult with his hand but he managed. She mounted up without him asking. Tommy found a folded blanket draped over the stable partition and offered it to her, thought she might cover herself with it, but she only held it to her chest. He didn’t take the feed bag. Beau trampled over it as Tommy led him from the stall. They walked slowly down the center aisle, and at the door Tommy halted and stepped into the sunshine and scanned the clearing and the sheds. No one was out there. A man’s voice was shouting: could have been Rabbit, the kitchens, the distant workers’ camp. Tommy hesitated. Glanced up at Kala, who watched him dead-eyed. Nothing in how she looked at him. No warmth, no recognition, no thanks. Tommy led Beau by the bridle out of the stable door and doubled back around the side of the barn. He paused at the corner. In the distance two horses were crossing the yard behind the house, unhurried and casual: Rabbit and Mallee, calmly riding away.
Tommy mounted up clumsily, a struggle to get in front of her, to swing over his leg. She held on to him and the touch stirred a flurry in his gut. She had never done that before. One hand on his waist, a fistful of shirt fabric, the other holding the blanket, he assumed. They moved on. Down the side of the stables and into the scraggy bush that bordered the compound’s edge. Some tree cover, plenty of loose scrub: his intention was to conceal their tracks until they were clear of the homestead, then pick up a trail heading southeast. He was assuming they’d be followed, but would they? Would anyone even notice they were gone? Tommy could have been taking Kala to Glendale for all they knew—in their eyes she was his property now. Billy certainly didn’t want her and Sullivan wouldn’t care: to the squatter’s way of thinking, couldn’t Tommy do with his property whatever he damn well pleased?
* * *
They picked their way along the tree line, then struck out over open ground, until eventually they came across a track. Tommy paused and traced its course through boulders and sparse bush, took a bearing off the sun, must have been a few hours after midday now. The track seemed a likely route. Roughly southeast in its heading, and where else but Bewley could it lead? He glanced back at Kala and caught her eyeing the country to the west. All through the ride he’d felt her twisting in the saddle, checking behind them, checking all around.
“It’s alright,” he told her, setting out on the track. “It’s alright.”
He had brought nothing with him. No weapon, no water, not even a hat. He wondered how close they were to Glendale, whether he should stop for provisions, use the well. No. It would cost them at least a couple of hours, maybe longer if he’d read their position wrong. They might have to camp there, which was not a good idea. Someone might come looking, Kala might be scared. Still, he imagined them bedding down in the house, maybe next to the open fire. He could show her the grave markers and perhaps her eyes would soften and she might see him differently then. Like he was forgiven, like she understood; like everything between them was changed.
She threw herself from the horse without warning and with only the blanket to break her fall. Tommy didn’t even see her land. He felt movement behind him and thought she was checking the terrain again, then something in Beau’s gait made him turn. Kala wasn’t there. She was lying on the track a few strides back, dragging herself to her feet. Tommy reined up and brought the horse around, saying, “What happened? Are you hurt?”
She looked at him but didn’t answer, hobbling to the trackside, the blanket in her arms. He swung down from Beau and let go of the reins. The horse dropped its head and sniffed the dirt. Kala shuffled into the fringe of scrub, watching Tommy over her shoulder as she went. He reached out toward her, calling, “Wait! There’s a camp, I was taking you to a camp!” but she didn’t stop, limping through the spinifex, until Tommy ran after her and she spun around to f
ace him and screamed.
They stood watching each other, fifteen yards apart. Surrounded by wiry grass hummocks, flies buzzing, no wind. Silence save the noises they made. Their breathing. Beau snuffling at the ground. Kala jabbed her finger at the horse. Tommy didn’t move. So she bent and picked up a rock and launched it at his head.
“Hey!” Tommy shouted, the rock flying by.
Kala picked up another and brandished it, ready to throw. Tommy held up his hands, then lowered them again, conscious of his bandage, of how he’d got his wounds. “Okay,” he said. “Okay.” He checked the ground behind him, took a step back. Kala did the same. They were many miles from Bewley and many more from Broken Ridge, the middle of the journey just about. Nothing else out here. Nothing around them but flatland and bush. Her direction was west, he realized; she was heading for the interior again. With only a blanket by way of provisions. And all on her own.
“I can help you,” Tommy said. “Please—I want to help you.”
Kala threw the rock. Tommy ducked out of the way. She yelled at him. Her voice trembling, her eyes wide. She waved the blanket, pointed to the sky, gestured at the surrounds. He didn’t understand. They watched each other in silence.
“I’m sorry,” he said weakly. He swallowed, raised his voice: “For everything. I’m so sorry. Please.”
His eyes filled. Kala blurred. Blinking away tears, he thought he saw her nod. He wiped his eyes and she was moving, refolding the blanket and backtracking into the scrub. This time he didn’t follow her. Fighting to keep it all in. He watched her turn and break into a weaving run. She looked back only once. When she was almost out of view Tommy returned to Beau and mounted up, and from the higher vantage was briefly able to pick her out again. A small, dark figure in the sunshine, moving swiftly through that land. And then nothing. He swept the terrain but she was nowhere, gone. He looked about hopelessly. She didn’t reappear. The immense and total silence of all that empty bush. He drew a breath of hot air and let it out again, clicked Beau forward, and moved on, still watching for her as he rode, couldn’t help himself, until the first speck of Bewley appeared in the distance, upon the sun-bleached plain.
35
He entered the town at walking pace, keeping to the center of the road. A man and boy loading a dray paused to watch him pass. Few other people about. The street mostly empty, the storefronts bare. Quiet. Lonely sounds of a dull hammering and the clang of the blacksmith’s iron, which only amplified the silence more. He walked his horse in the direction of the general store, more out of habit than design. Dismounted. Tied Beau to the rail. The horse bent his head to the trough and drank the dusty green water it held. Tommy looked along the street. He shielded his eyes from the sun. Outside the Bewley Hotel two men were watching him, leaning on the rail, and he wondered if they were the same men who had called his mother a whore. He stared at them. They spoke to each other and one of them laughed. Tommy spat into the road and looked away. Across the street, the verandah of Song’s Hardware was empty and the door was closed. Tommy glanced again at the men—still watching him—then turned and walked up the steps and into the general store.
The bell tinkled above the door. Spruhl looked up from his newspaper. He was red-faced and lightly sheened with sweat, and his shirt had stains on the chest and under the arms. He pushed his glasses up his nose, straightened, and attempted what Tommy supposed was intended as a smile.
“Master McBride. I am so very sorry to hear.”
Tommy stalled, nodded grimly; he’d not counted on people knowing yet, when of course they all probably did. Word traveled quickly. Quicker than it ought.
“A terrible outrage,” Spruhl was saying. “Those animals deserve the worst.”
Tommy scanned behind the counter and along the dusty shelves.
“You got any water?”
“Of course,” the shopkeeper said. He fetched a jug and a small glass and filled the glass to the brim. Tommy came to the counter and drank it in one.
“Thank you,” he said, setting the glass down.
“Is my pleasure. Can I help with something else?”
“Sausage. Biscuits. Maybe a piece of cheese.”
Spruhl glanced at the meat cabinet, but didn’t move to serve. He worried his little hands. Tommy said, “How’s our credit here these days?”
The shopkeeper’s redness burned. His eyes fell to the desk. “Was different then, you understand. I didn’t mean harm. But your father had not paid and I—”
“It was a bag of bloody flour.”
“Is business. I am sorry.”
“Sullivan told you, didn’t he?”
“He is very important customer, very important man.”
“So you pulled a pistol on a woman only trying to make some bread.”
Spruhl held up a finger. “Ah, no. I pulled pistol on you.”
“You planning on trying that again?”
“No, no, of course. Is okay, is okay . . .”
He bustled about, collecting the items, placed them into a paper bag. Folded the top, held the bag for Tommy to take.
“No charge,” he said. “Is gift from me to you.”
Tommy snatched the bag from him. The shopkeeper flinched. Tommy opened the door, then paused. “No gifts,” he said. “Put it on Sullivan’s account; he’s standing for us these days. Which I suppose makes me fucking royalty as far as the likes of you’s concerned.”
He opened the bag as he came down the steps, found the sausage, took a bite. He stood in the street chewing. The sausage was salty and fatty and good. Beau lifted his head and watched him. Water dripped from the horse’s lips and matted the hairs on his chin. Tommy rummaged in the bag and offered him one of the biscuits. Beau puckered his lips and drew it into his mouth, then chomped the thing down whole. His tongue swept the crumbs from his lips and he made a move for the bag, but Tommy jerked it away.
“These are mine, you greedy bastard. Lucky I gave you even one.”
He wandered along the street, eating. The men were gone from the hotel railing and only a couple of others were about. Shuffling beneath their verandahs, smoking in the shade. The butcher stood glumly beside a rack of bloody meat, cleaver in hand, watching Tommy pass. Tommy nodded to him. The butcher simply stared.
When he reached the doctor’s surgery he paused in the street and considered the stenciled window a long time. A dog came sniffing past him but he paid it no mind, munching idly on the stick of sausage meat. He could see Dr. Shanklin writing at his desk. Alone.
Tommy swallowed dryly. The lump slid down his throat. He went to the window and stood over Shanklin, just behind his shoulder, the other side of the glass. The doctor scratched entries into a notebook, dipped the nib, wrote again. Tommy could see only the top of his head. Thick black hair parted centrally and neatly combed. Tommy put the sausage back in the paper bag, made a fist with his hand, and banged on the window so hard the glass shook.
Shanklin jerked upright. Ink slashed across the page. He peered through the window as Tommy walked along the frontage, and was still half-risen in his chair when he came in through the door.
“Yes?” Shanklin said. He noticed Tommy’s wounded hand. “Can I help you?”
“Know who I am?”
“You might need to remind me.”
“You were meant to fix my sister only you didn’t and now she’s dead.”
Shanklin exhaled. He sank back down and dropped the pen into its holder. “Billy McBride. I didn’t recognize you. It’s been a long time.”
“Wrong brother. I’m Tommy.”
“Oh, Tommy, right . . . you’ve grown.”
Tommy was standing behind the chairs in front of the desk, the paper bag still clenched in the three fingers of his bandaged hand.
“Well?” he said. “What about it?”
“Will you sit?”
“Nope.”
Shanklin shifted uncomfortably. He was dressed in a gray three-piece suit with a white pocket handkerchief and gold watch chain.
Black mustache, weathered skin, tired eyes. “Look,” he said, “I’m terribly sorry to hear about everything. What a rotten god-awful time you must have had.”
Tommy said nothing. Breathing heavily through his nose.
“You know, when I first came out west I was more sympathetic to the native point of view, even wrote to The Courier about it once or twice. But you live here long enough, your opinion will change, and frankly I believe they deserve everything they get. They ever catch the culprits, I’ll be there cheering when the trapdoor swings.” He paused and pointed. “Your hand, is it bad?”
“That’s not why I came.”
“The dressing looks fresh.”
“Weeks did it. Sullivan’s vet. Same one Mary had.”
“Would you like me to take a look?”
“Why’d you never come? She died because of you.”
Shanklin scowled. “No, she was already dead.”
“On account of you never came. That vet’s the only medic they’ve got.”
The doctor reclined slightly, interlaced his fingers and laid them on his stomach, sat there frowning and tapping his thumbs.
“See now, I think there’s some confusion here. Yes, I received a message saying a girl had been hurt, but before I could get up there I got another saying she’d died.”
“You took long enough about it.”
“On the contrary. There was barely even time to saddle my horse.”
Tommy hesitated. The bag crinkled in his hand. He studied Shanklin doubtfully. “What d’you mean there wasn’t time?”
“Well, I don’t remember it exactly, but one message followed the other, an hour between them at most.”
“She died that night.”
“No, I’m certain. As soon as I heard, I began finishing up here, but the second telegram arrived before I could leave.”
“Who sent it? The second one?”
“From Broken Ridge, that’s all I know. There was no name.”
Tommy tried to hold the stare but couldn’t. His gaze wandered around the room. In the back was a wheeled curtain, a restraint table, a benchtop filled with bottles and implements of all kinds. Two human skulls on a shelf: adult and child.