Seeing the vineyard near the orchards, Alexandra rode down the fenced edge of the crop fields and orchards to it. As she dismounted and went in the gate, a gardener was hoeing weeds at the other end of the large vineyard. The aged and wiry Hodgkins and Alexandra had become friends during her visits. He walked toward her, waving and smiling.
"G'day, Mistress Alexandra," he replied to her greeting. "When we planted these vines, I knew you'd soon be here to see them."
"Indeed, because I heard of them only last evening, Mr. Hodgkins. Mr. Macarthur intends to make wine, then?"
The gardener nodded, pointing toward a corner of the fence. "Just over there, Mr. Macarthur intends to put up a building with a grape press and fermenting tuns, and the ageing cellar will be under the building. We should have enough grapes this year to make a few dozen gallons."
"That's very interesting. How are the vines fertilized and mulched?"
Hodgkins explained how the vines were cultivated, leading Alexandra through the vineyard and showing her around. When he finished, they were at the edge of the vineyard adjoining the orchards. They turned back, walking through the rows of vines toward the gate and her horse.
"Improvements are constantly being made here," she commented. "From year to year, there are always new kinds of produce."
"Aye, that's true," Hodgkins agreed. "During the years that Mr. Macarthur was in England, attending to affairs there, the mistress made many improvements. Most of the fruit trees were planted then."
Alexandra went out the gate to her horse, and the gardener followed her. "You've been here a very long time, haven't you, Mr. Hodgkins?" she asked.
"Aye, I have, Mistress Alexandra. When I came here, there was about a thousand acres. Now it's sixty thousand, and still growing. Mr. Macarthur and Mistress Elizabeth are looking at some land today with a view toward buying it when it becomes available."
Starting to mount her horse, Alexandra turned back. "I wanted to see Mistress Elizabeth today, but the maid at the house didn't know where she had gone. Do you know where the land is located, Mr. Hodgkins?"
"Aye, it's a sheep station just south of the road between Parramatta and Bathurst, and east of the Nepean River. A shopkeeper in Sydney named Williamson approached Mr. Macarthur about it. He said that his father owns it, and it'll be for sale when he dies, which is expected to be soon."
"That's a distance of some miles from here, isn't it? Considering the time it'll take them to get there and back, talk with the owner, and look at the land, they'll probably be gone all day."
''No, I don't think so, Mistress Alexandra. The shopkeeper said that no one is to talk with the owner, because he doesn't want the station to be sold or broken up. Mr. Macarthur and Mistress Elizabeth took the most direct route, so they should be back early afternoon."
"What route did they take?"
"They went to the track on the east side of the river, then north on it to the station. That's much shorter than going by way of Parramatta."
Glancing up at the sun, Alexandra saw that it was several hours before she had to start for home. She knew nothing about a track on the east side of the river, never having been in that area, but the directions sounded easy to follow. She decided to ride up the track and meet Elizabeth and her father while they were riding back.
Gripping her saddle, she hopped up lightly as she told Hodgkins what she intended to do. The gardener frowned worriedly and shook his head. "You don't have an escort," he pointed out, "and that track beside the river is well out of the way, Mistress Alexandra. It might be better for you to wait until Mistress Elizabeth and her father get here."
"If I do, I'll have to leave for home shortly after she arrives, Mr. Hodgkins. But if I meet her on the track, we'll have time to talk while we ride, and it's been some time since I've seen her."
"Well, I suppose you know best," Hodgkins said doubtfully. "But you be very careful, Mistress Alexandra. G'day to you."
Alexandra replied and waved, turning her horse. She rode around the corner of the fence, then past the pens and pasture where the Merinos were grazing. The rolling, grassy hills of the estate opened out ahead of her, and she turned her horse to the northwest, toward the Nepean River.
For the first few miles, she saw flocks of sheep off to the sides with stockmen nearby. Occasionally she glimpsed buildings in the distance on adjacent properties. Then the grasslands changed to brushy, open forest, with no sign of anyone in any direction.
The river came into view, lined with tall, thick trees. Approaching the trees, Alexandra slowed her horse, then saw the track. It was more a path than a track, but on it were fresh hoof prints leading to the north, apparently made by Elizabeth Macarthur and her father.
Encouraged by the hoofprints, Alexandra turned her horse up the track at a canter. When the track suddenly curved into the forest, she leaned over the saddle and reined back, a branch almost knocking off her wide hat. The horse slowed to a trot, and the huge, ghostly gray gum trees surrounded Alexandra in the twilight under the dense canopy of foliage.
Colorful parrots screeched, and bellbirds made their chiming call. But in a more profound way not touched by the noise of the birds, the forest seemed eerily quiet to Alexandra. While she was accustomed to riding about without an escort, this was the first time she had a sense of being completely alone.
She recalled what Hodgkins had said about the track, not having fully considered it before. As he had said, she was far from the roads between Sydney and the villages. She thought about stories she had heard of bushrangers who prowled the remote paths of the hinterlands, attacking isolated farms and solitary travelers.
Just as she was on the point of turning back, the track curved out of the forest. With bright sunlight beaming down and wide, open verges on each side of the track, Alexandra dismissed her fears. As she continued up the track, the hoofprints sustained her hope that Elizabeth and her father would come into view around the next curve, then the following one.
The track turned into the forest again, but it was more open, less dark and threatening than before. Alexandra leaned over the saddle, maintaining a canter. The track curved deeper into the forest, but was blocked by a fallen tree. She slowed the horse to a trot and tugged a rein, guiding it around the right side of the thick mass of limbs.
As the horse passed the obstruction, Alexandra turned as she glimpsed a movement on the left from the corner of her eye. The most terrifying man she had ever seen sprang at her from behind the fallen tree, and two others charged out of brush a few yards away. Ragged and bearded, the man had thick, ugly features that were covered on one side by a crimson birthmark.
Leaping out of concealment, he snatched at the horse's reins, frightening it and making it shy away. At the same instant, Alexandra instinctively whipped her riding crop down and hit the man across the head. The blow with the heavy crop knocked the man's hat off, staggering him as his fingers closed on the reins behind the bit.
The startled horse neighed in fright and tried to rear up, pawing at the man with its forefeet. As a heavy hoof thudded against his leg, the man's grip on the reins loosened. For a split second, Alexandra was only a hairbreadth away from escaping as the other two men were still too far away to seize the horse. She hammered at the man's arm with the riding crop.
He clung to the reins, his cruel, pale blue eyes glaring at Alexandra and his ugly, birthmarked face a mask of rage. Catching her arm with his free hand as she beat at him with the crop, he jerked her off the horse. She plummeted from the saddle, sprawling on her face.
"What the bloody hell's holding you up, Crowley?" the man roared. "And you, Snively! Get your arses over here and hold this horse!"
The two men dashed forward, taking the horse's reins. Dizzy from the bruising fall, Alexandra started to lift herself to her hands and knees when the man snatched up the riding crop from the ground and slashed it across her back. Searing pain coursed through her, and she cried out involuntarily as she collapsed again.
"Give i
t to her good, Hinton!" one of the men shouted gleefully, the other one laughing raucously. "Make her squall, Hinton!"
Hinton stood over her, beating her viciously with the riding crop. Fiery agony spread across her back, and she bit her lip to keep from screaming as the other two men howled with cruel laughter and cheered Hinton on. Then he finally stopped and stepped back, throwing down the crop.
"That's just a taste of what you'll get if you give me any more trouble, you slut!" he snarled. "Your kind has ripped the skin from our backs with the lash for long enough, and now it's our turn to even the bloody score a bit. What do you say about that, men?"
The other two shouted their agreement, laughing in fiendish delight. Hinton moved toward the horse, and he and the other men discussed it with satisfaction. Alexandra was stunned, her mind reeling in shock. Events had moved too rapidly for her. Her life had been normal one moment, then in the next she had been brutalized by a savage bushranger.
In her turmoil of terror, mixed with pain and outrage from the beating, her eyes filled with tears. Then she summoned her will and struggled to keep from crying. Refusing to surrender to the men in spirit, she also knew that her only chance lay in maintaining her composure. If she could, she might be able to talk the bushrangers into ransoming her.
A desperate battle warred inside her, fear and anguish threatening to overwhelm her attempt at self-control. Somehow, she managed to stop herself from weeping, but she was unable to overcome the terrified shaking of her hands and legs as she stood up and straightened her clothes. To hide the nervous tremor, she stiffened her legs and tucked her hands under her riding cape. But the men's crude manner and slovenly appearance made it doubly difficult for her to maintain any composure at all.
All three of them were ragged and filthy. Crowley was a large, muscular man with a long, greasy tangle of hair and beard, his sardonic face scarred from many fights. Snively was much smaller and a young man, appearing less hardened, but he eagerly aped the other two. Hinton, with his thick, coarse features disfigured by the birthmark covering the left side of his face, was by far the worst of the three. His icy, pale blue eyes inhumanly cruel, he looked like the very personification of evil.
Hinton turned away from the horse, picking up Alexandra's reticule from the ground. He looked in it, then flung it away in disgust. "No bloody money!" he snarled. "How is it that you ride a horse like that and wear such fancy garb, but you've got no bloody money?"
Steeling herself, Alexandra tried to keep her voice steady as she replied, "I rarely carry money with me, unless I intend to make a purchase. However, I can get money for you."
"How will you do that?" he sneered skeptically.
"From my father. He will pay you a ransom."
Crowley reacted with quick interest, his eyes gleaming with greed. "How much will he pay?" he demanded.
"I've no idea of how much changes hands in this sort of instance, but he will pay any reasonable amount. If you act in good faith, I should think you might expect as much as a hundred sovereigns."
"A hundred sovereigns!" Crowley exclaimed gleefully, Snively echoing him in delight. "By God, that's as many times as much as we'd get from robbing farms. What do you say, Hinton?"
"What do I say?" Hinton jibed sarcastically, mocking Crowley. "What do I say?" He stepped closer to the man, raising his voice to a roar. "I say you're a swining fool! If you two were by yourselves, you'd be dancing on a gibbet before you could steal a bag of corn!"
"But what's wrong?" Crowley asked. "Her family must be rich."
"You're right there," Hinton agreed grimly. "And they raised a conniving doxie who'll lead you to your doom. If you went to collect a ransom, you'd find soldiers and hot lead waiting instead of gold."
Alexandra spoke up quickly, "That danger could be avoided by using an intermediary. For a shilling, any boy would carry a message and get the money for you, and my father would make no attempt to"
"You close your bloody mouth!" Hinton interrupted in a hoarse bellow, lifting a fist and advancing toward her. "You don't fool me with your sly talk! If I hear any more of it, I'll break your head!"
Her moment of hope fading into despair, Alexandra fell silent. Taking the horse's reins, Hinton told Snively to hide in the brush and watch for other travelers on the track, then he motioned Alexandra deeper into the trees, toward the river. She turned and walked through the forest, fighting once again for self-control as her eyes filled with tears of anguish.
The two men talked as they followed her, Hinton leading the horse. Crowley complained that the track was too isolated, that there would be very few travelers on it to waylay. Hinton retorted that it was safe, even if it yielded little. The trees became thicker, and Alexandra picked a path through them. Each time she slowed or hesitated, Hinton growled and shoved her impatiently.
When they neared the river, Alexandra saw a clearing in the trees where five horses were hobbled and grazing in the glade, saddles and bags piled under a tree at the far side. Hinton gripped Alexandra's arm and stopped her, handing the gelding's reins to Crowley. He laughed in understanding as he led the horse into the clearing, and Hinton pushed Alexandra toward the brush at one side.
As she realized his intentions, her terror swelled into panic, and she struggled frantically to pull away from him. His fist slammed into her temple with brutal force, and pain exploded in her head. Everything suddenly spinned around her, and she collapsed in a semiconscious daze. Numbly, she felt him lift her dress and petticoats, then jerk at her underwear, tearing it open.
Through the murky haze of the stupor gripping her, she felt intense revulsion as he pressed down on her, fumbling with her. Then there was a wrenching stab of pain. It became piercing agony as he moved rapidly, panting and grunting on top of her. The welts on her back from the riding crop stung from his heavy weight pressing her against the ground, his sweaty stench choked her, and her head throbbed where his fist had struck her.
By the time he finished, the excruciating pain had brought her back to full consciousness. He climbed to his feet, fastening his clothes, then took her arm and jerked her to her feet. A wave of nausea swept over her, a sour taste of bile rising in her mouth as her stomach heaved in a sudden urge to vomit. She swallowed and fought the retching impulses as Hinton shoved her out of the brush and toward the clearing.
Crowley sat among the saddles and baggage, waiting impatiently, and he jumped up as Alexandra and Hinton appeared in the clearing. "It's time for my turn at her," he said, a leering grin on his face.
"No, you leave her alone for now," Hinton replied.
Crowley was surprised at first, then flushed in rage. "What do you bloody mean?" he demanded. "We share and share alike!"
Hinton pushed Alexandra aside, approaching the other man threateningly. "I mean that I'm the one who says when we share and how we share alike!" he bellowed. "I said for you to leave her alone for now, and that's what you're going to bloody do!"
Crowley shouted a furious reply, and Hinton roared at him again as the men faced each other only inches apart, their fists clenched. Alexandra's nausea had passed and she no longer had to fight to keep from weeping, because she was beyond tears. Gripped by wretched, dry-eyed misery because of her humiliation and outrage, she stood and waited numbly for whatever happened as the men fought like two dogs over a bitch in heat.
Her anguish was lightened a degree by relief when Crowley backed down, ending the confrontation. Hinton motioned her toward the saddles and baggage, and as she went to them and found a place to sit, the men sat down nearby in hostile silence. Alexandra gazed at the ground without seeing it in a bitter torment of physical and emotional pain.
Late that afternoon, Snively raced into the clearing, beckoning excitedly and saying that two riders were approaching from the north. Hinton snatched up a rope and hastily tied Alexandra's hands and feet. Then he and the other men checked their pistols, muskets, and knives as they disappeared into the trees, running toward the road.
They retur
ned a short time later, disgruntled, and Crowley angry as well. He had wanted to attack the travelers, but Hinton had refused because the riders had been armed. As they argued, describing a man and woman riding down the track to the south, Alexandra realized that the Macarthurs had just passed on their way home.
She silently sighed with deep remorse. If fate had been kinder, at this moment she would be riding with them and happily chatting with Elizabeth. Or, she candidly acknowledged to herself, if she had used better judgment, she would be waiting at Camden Park for Elizabeth to arrive.
The bushrangers prepared to leave, Crowley and Snively sorting out the baggage as Hinton untied Alexandra. Then he went to the gelding and unfastened the girth. He tossed her sidesaddle to the ground, then turned to her. "There's no one to wait on you hand and foot now," he snarled, "so you'll have to stir your lazy arse and shift for yourself for a change." He pointed to a horse. "Put that saddle on that horse, and be quick about it."
All five of the horses were young animals, but in poor condition from mistreatment, and the thin, abused mare he indicated was the worst of them. Alexandra carried her saddle to the horse, as the men discussed what they would do that night. They were going to raid several farms and then flee to a hideout, somewhere west of the Blue Mountains.
After saddling her horse, Alexandra mounted it. When the men were ready, Hinton tied her hands behind her back, grimly warning her against trying to escape or making any noise, then they set out. Snively went a hundred yards ahead to watch for travelers, Hinton led Alexandra's horse, and Crowley followed with the two pack horses.
Through the rest of the afternoon, they moved up the track at a walk, the men ready to duck into the trees at any moment to avoid detection. At dusk, Hinton called Snively back and told him to join Crowley, then increased the pace to a canter. At nightfall, Hinton slowed to a walk again on dark stretches where the track wound through the forest.
Outback Station Page 15