Haunted Creek

by Ann Cliff

  A publican’s life was quite dangerous, thought Rose. ‘Yes, please, I would love some coffee.’ Rose felt quite protective of her patient and she wondered whether the men would pursue the quarrel. Lordy might be safer with her for a while yet.

  They drank strong coffee and then Maeve called to the kitchen. ‘Come and mind the bar, Boris, I’m going out.’ To Rose she said, ‘Might you spare a few minutes? We could go to Jasper’s house and collect some things for him. He must be needing a change of clothes.’

  EIGHTEEN

  ‘PRETTY STRIPES, MAMA! Come and look at him!’

  Rose was at the door of the hut when she looked up and saw what Ada had seen. A tiger snake was emerging from the flowers at the far side of the yard and Ada was running towards it with outstretched hands. She liked to look carefully at each new animal, frog, butterfly or beetle that they found and Rose had encouraged her interest.

  Ada had never seen a live snake at close quarters before, or admired the pretty stripes. Rose had seen to it that they were kept away; if she saw one she made loud noises and beat the bushes with a stick until it disappeared. Ada had been warned that snakes could bite you, but Rose had avoided making the child too frightened to go outside. Now for the first time she was faced with one and she forgot the warnings.

  Rose prayed that it would slide away. They usually did. But Ada let out a whoop of delight and it must have felt threatened; it came on aggressively.

  ‘No! Come back, Ada!’ Rose called desperately, but Ada took no notice, intent on the snake. Rose started to run towards them, stumbled in her haste and fell.

  The creature was thick and well over three feet long, with vivid stripes. Its head was weaving from side to side, the mouth opening as it came. Rose started forward again but there was a lot of ground to cover. Too much; she could not save the child.

  Lordy was sitting on the grass not far from Ada. He had been dozing, or the snake would have been chased off before the girl saw it. Waking suddenly at Ada’s shout, Lordy flung himself bodily between the child and the snake, and fell forward at the last moment before it reached her. It lunged and struck him with its fangs, while Ada backed off in alarm. His reaction had been amazingly fast, but the snake was faster.

  ‘Get back, Ada!’ Rose shouted.

  Lordy twisted round and gave the snake a kick with his stout boot. It took off at great speed, but the damage was done. Rose’s mind started to race. Snakebite remedies – what were they? Martha had said that they were not likely to work. Once the poison was in, you couldn’t get it out. It had all happened so quickly and in a few seconds someone’s life could be taken. It might have been Ada’s. It was probably going to take Lordy’s.

  Lordy lay on the grass where he had fallen, breathing heavily while Rose bent over him in an agony of remorse. She should have been watching Ada more closely; this should not have happened. ‘Jasper?’

  With difficulty Lordy sat up. ‘The nearest run thing you ever saw, as the Duke of Wellington once said,’ he drawled. ‘Ada, my child, may I suggest that you keep a careful watch for snakes and try to avoid them? Snakes are not friendly, you see.’

  ‘Jasper – you’ve been bitten.’ The striped tiger snake was deadly; they all knew that it could kill a horse. He had saved Ada’s life. There were no words to thank him.

  Ada was looking at him with concern. ‘That pretty snake’s gone away now. ‘Did it bite you, Lordy? Oh, dear.’ She sat beside him on the grass and patted his shoulder.

  ‘Not very much, dear child, don’t worry.’ Ada was looking very scared.

  Rose didn’t believe him. She had seen the flickering fangs sink into his side. ‘But I saw it bite you,’ she whispered. ‘Whatever shall we do?’

  ‘Jumping in the creek’s the thing, so I’m told. Cold water to slow down the heart rate if you’ve still got one. But there ain’t much anyone can do for a tiger snake bite, you know.’ Lordy winced and then smiled. Smiled in the face of death! Rose gasped and then he said, ‘Fear not, Rose, I shall not perish – not just yet. The fangs struck the bandage, luckily. Thanks to your extremely thorough bandaging, they didn’t reach my skin.’

  ‘Jasper … what can I say?’ Relief was following remorse and a great thankfulness and Rose felt very shaky.

  The hero winked at her. ‘There’s something you can do. Reach into my bag in the cabin, if you please, and bring me the bottle of whisky you will find therein. I think we both would benefit from a wee dram, as the Scots have it.’ Rose smiled as she went to the cabin. Maeve must have slipped a bottle into the bag with Lordy’s change of clothes.

  They sat on the veranda with Ada playing at their feet, drinking diluted whisky – in Rose’s case, well diluted. After they had relaxed a little Jasper said, ‘But I’m afraid, such a nuisance, the wound has opened. All your good work has gone for nought.’ He unbuttoned his shirt and Rose saw that a bloodstain was spreading through the bandage.

  ‘No wonder – that fall and twist could have injured anyone. Your wound was only just healed; it wouldn’t stand the strain. Why didn’t you tell me before?’ Rose went off for the basin and swabs. When she came back she noticed that Ada was playing with a new toy; it was a tiny doll’s house made of pieces of bark. Its occupants were twig people.

  ‘Lordy made me a house,’ the child said happily. She had forgotten all about the snake.

  ‘Just a diversion. I made it the other day,’ Jasper said quietly. ‘The young mind needs to be diverted, you understand.’ Rose did understand. Ada had been pale and scared after the snake episode, probably because she could see her mother was upset.

  That night as Ada got ready for bed, she took the toy house with her. She was thoughtful and then she said to Rose, ‘Lordy stopped that snake from biting me, didn’t he?’

  ‘He did. Wasn’t that brave of him?’ Rose was still feeling the effects of the fright they’d had. ‘You really will have to watch out for snakes, Ada.’

  ‘Yes, Mama, I will. Lordy is a good man, isn’t he? Do you like him?’

  Rose pulled the little nightgown over Ada’s head. ‘Of course I do, we both do.’

  Ada snuggled into bed with enthusiasm. ‘I’m tired. Mama, are you going to marry Lordy?’

  ‘Heavens, no. What put that idea into your head?’ Rose was alarmed.

  ‘They thought so at school.’ Ada’s big brown eyes looked up at her, considering.

  Her carefully preserved reputation was in ruins. Rose spoke more calmly than she felt. ‘Now why would they think such a thing? How do they know he’s here, anyway?’ She hadn’t told anyone except Martha, and the Carrs were too busy to gossip.

  ‘’Cos I told them he’s living here and he has breakfast with us and you are looking after him. So they thought you might be going to marry him.’ Ada sat up. ‘Please mey I have a drink of watah?’

  She sounded just like Lordy; she was picking up his speech. Ada would be the only pupil at Wattle Tree school to speak with an English upper-class accent. But Rose was far from laughing; this was serious. ‘Here’s your water. Now, Ada, you know that Lordy is here because he’s been sick. We’ve been making him well again and then he’ll go home. And do you know, it’s a secret – don’t tell anyone – but Lordy is going to marry someone else.’

  ‘I hope she’s nice,’ Ada said sleepily. ‘Good-night, Mama.’

  It was going to take more time to heal Jasper’s wound after this and more care and attention. The patient had obviously worked this out and he suggested the next day that he should move somewhere else. ‘I have presumed upon your goodwill long enough, dear Rose,’ he said in his formal way. Rose was dismayed. How could she abandon a man who had just saved her daughter?

  In one way, it would be better for her if he left, after what Ada had said. But the damage was done by now. Rose knew theirs was an innocent relationship, so what did it matter what the neighbours thought? In any case, she liked his undemanding company. Lordy was a gentleman; she understood what that meant now. He was quite used to ordering
people about and he certainly liked his own way, but he was gentle and considerate. He would make Maeve a very good husband, if she could but see it.

  ‘Well,’ the nurse said thoughtfully, ‘your own house is better than mine and it’s neat and clean, I saw it when we collected your clothes. But you need company and treatment for a while yet and we’d like you to stay.’ She’d been surprised at the bare cleanliness of Lordy’s little wooden house. ‘I hope that you would like to stay.’

  Lordy looked pleased. ‘Of course I would, delighted, my dear, but I am thinking of you. There is a great deal of work here for you, without medical orderly duties. So you like my house? I built it myself, you know. When I first came here I worked with a carpenter … the poor fellow was appalled at my lack of skill, but we did make progress in the end.’ He thought for a while. ‘Do you know, I think I could stay at the All Nations. Maeve has plenty of rooms.’

  ‘Dear Lord Barrington.’ Rose too was beginning to pick up his style. ‘I believe that you should avoid the All Nations hotel in the interests of safety, for some time at least.’

  Lordy grinned. ‘Maeve told you how I lost a fight. Damned careless of me.’

  After this, Lordy settled down; he took Rose’s advice, ate everything she gave him and made good progress. The wound healed again with generous applications of honey, following bathing in eucalyptus water as before. Honey was an old-fashioned country remedy that Rose had learned long ago in Yorkshire. She was impressed with the way honey kept the wound clean of infection and it must have also healed, because every day she could see an improvement. More honey was bought at the store; she would always keep some by her in future.

  One evening when she was gently dressing the wound, Rose said, ‘The Ganai women told me that gum leaves in water stops things going bad, or I might not have thought of it.’

  Lordy raised aristocratic eyebrows. ‘Really? At one time I thought of going into the eucalyptus business. I understand from friends in Melbourne that surgeons are using eucalyptus oil as an antiseptic these days. And about time, too. The insanitary conditions in our hospitals were appalling until Miss Nightingale took it upon herself to improve matters.’

  ‘You didn’t fight in the Crimea, did you, Jasper?’ He had a military way with him sometimes. Freda had lent Rose a book about Florence Nightingale and her heroic deeds and she would have loved to talk to someone who had actually met the lady.

  ‘A little before my time, don’t you think?’ Lordy was shaking with laughter. ‘I fought in the third Ashanti war with Wolseley in ’74, that’s all, and I came here straight afterwards. Decided that I’m a man of peace.’

  Maybe that was where he’d got the jagged scar. ‘All the same, if you have fought Ashanti in – Africa, was it? – it was rather careless to allow three drunken miners to get the better of you. Keep still while I fasten the bandage,’ Rose said severely. ‘Jasper, you wriggle too much.’ She passed the bandage round his slim body once again.

  ‘How very critical you can be at times, nurse! That was a little hard, you know.’ They both laughed. Rose looked up at that point and she thought she saw a motionless figure at the gate, watching them. The next moment it was gone. Had she imagined it? If someone had been there, who could it be?

  In three weeks, Lordy was feeling restless. He was mending, but still needed care. ‘I want some occupation. Have you a tape measure, dear lady?’

  Mystified, Rose gave him one and he measured the floor of the hut. Then he walked slowly off to visit the Carrs. Some time later he was driven back by Charlie in a cart and Rose thought the walk must have been too much for him.

  ‘I thank you, Charles, please unload here,’ he instructed and the youth took down boards from the cart. A bag of tools and nails followed. ‘I hope to fit a floor in this room of yours …’ Lordy avoided calling it a hut. ‘But we will need to remove the furniture.’

  Rose was worried that Lordy would injure himself again but he assured her that he would be very careful. A wooden floor would be luxury – but should she allow it? Carpentry was hard work, particularly sawing. ‘Can I help you with it?’ She found herself being politely overruled and decided that the English upper classes had not bossed people around for centuries without knowing how to get their own way.

  Fortunately, Charlie stayed long enough to help to move the furniture. He giggled when he saw Rose’s sewing basket. ‘Reminds me of those classes we had with the girls at school. Mind, Mrs Teesdale, I can still sew a patch!’

  Charlie had also brought some canvas for a makeshift tent. While the improvements were in progress, Rose and Ada should have the cabin and Lordy the tent. While he was sitting on the veranda, Lordy must have planned it all. Rose had never mentioned the trouble she had with the earth floor, the dirt and the dust and the insects. But Lordy had worked out that this was the priority when it came to improvements. If only Luke had seen it.

  On the veranda in the evenings, Lordy talked about many things. He had travelled all over the world before he came to Victoria and Rose enjoyed his stories. One night she asked him about the eucy men. ‘Joe’s a villain and I suspect the others may indulge in criminal activities from time to time,’ he said. ‘Stealing cattle, that sort of thing, y’know.’

  ‘They didn’t look very honest,’ Rose agreed with a shudder. ‘Was that why they meant to frighten me? Or perhaps they just wanted an excuse to … assault a woman.’ To change the subject she added, ‘But you worked with them on the oil distillery.’

  ‘The process is fascinating – do you understand it? I rather thought of setting up a distillery myself one day and that was why I worked with them for a time. The cutting is dirty hard work, of course, but no harder than mining.’

  Rose thought back to the first time she’d seen Lordy and the other eucy men. They had been dirty, unshaven and carrying sharp knives, a world away from Jasper’s cultivated ways. How had he put up with them? Their treatment of her still made her shiver when she thought of it. They were completely heartless.

  ‘Wouldn’t the others be annoyed if you set up in competition with them?’ Rose kept thinking of the different ways in which Lordy could be injured and tried to discourage him from taking risks.

  ‘They are currently operating well to the south of us, near Port Albert, my dear,’ Lordy said with a smile. ‘Took the big tank and all their gear with them. A sensible choice, I feel. One can always leave on the next boat if things get a little too hot. You may not know that a party of black gentlemen was earnestly enquiring as to their whereabouts.’

  ‘I was there when one of them shot a Ganai woman,’ Rose reminded him fiercely. ‘They deserve all they get.’ Because of that action, she would probably never see the Ganai again.

  ‘Unfortunately, the young woman died. I know you will be sad to hear it. The clan is after them and so are the police by now. That makes Haunted Creek a safer place for women and children, of course.’

  ‘Poor Sal … she lost her baby and now she is gone.’ This was another case of bad luck, of being in the wrong place. Rose felt like weeping for Sal. With an effort she asked, ‘So you think of distilling?’

  ‘Haunted Creek is the perfect place for a eucalyptus plant,’ Lordy said happily. ‘Just down there on your land you could fit one in. You have to pack the leaves into the vat with a tank of water underneath it. A fire is lit under the water tank and the steam filters through the leaves and takes out the eucalyptus oil with it.’

  By this time Rose was wondering whether this would be a good business venture for her. Once you had a vat, the materials were free, although she would have to employ men for the cutting. ‘But why Haunted Creek? There are gum leaves all over Victoria.’ She waved a hand towards the vast tracts of forest that lay between them and the mountains.

  ‘Ah, then to get the oil you need to pass the steam through pipes submerged in cool water … hence the creek. An ingenious system … invented by an Englishman, of course,’ Lordy finished.

  After some minutes Rose said do
ubtfully, ‘Would you really like to start up a plant down there, Jasper, on my land?’ It would mean more people, probably rough men, and carts coming and going. The peace would be shattered.

  Rose suddenly realized that she didn’t miss village life any more. The peace of their little clearing was precious to her. This place had changed her, but what would she become? Ada would grow up and need to go away, to live her own life. What then?

  Rose noticed that Lordy was looking at her. ‘I think not. It would change the nature of your property. The peace here has been so good for me, Rose. Even though my house is not far from here, it’s not a bit like this. The gold field is a busy place, men coming and going all the time. Besides, I hope to marry Maeve and then she will choose what we do next.’

  By now it was early autumn and the weather was fine and mild. One afternoon Rose was working among the vegetables and looked up to find a woman standing over her. ‘Good day,’ she said politely. Was this a new customer for produce? The woman’s golden hair shone in the sun and her tightly fitting bodice was cut rather lower than was the custom in Haunted Creek. The way she thrust out her bosom made it more obvious.

  ‘Oh, I – er …’ The woman seemed surprised to see Rose. ‘I’m actually looking for Mr Teesdale, Luke Teesdale. This is his property, I believe?’ She looked at Rose’s shabby black dress and added, ‘He’s a particular friend of mine.’

  NINETEEN

  ‘YOU’RE A FARM servant, I suppose?’ The woman looked down her nose, although she was not very tall. Rose looked hard at Luke’s ‘particular friend’. What did she mean by that? The sound of hammering came from the hut, where Lordy was finishing off the floor, working slowly and cautiously as instructed. ‘Perhaps he’s in there, is he?’ She took a few little steps towards the hut and Rose noticed that her pointed shoes were not going to get her very far down the Haunted Creek.

  ‘I’m afraid not.’ Rose stood straighter and pushed back her hair. ‘Luke died some years ago … I am his widow. What did you want with him?’