Blood in the Dust Page 18

  She placed her cheek to his nose and mouth, but there was no trace of breath. ‘He’s not breathing.’

  ‘What’s the matter with him?’ a voice called from above.

  ‘We think he’s stopped breathing,’ Jack called up.

  ‘Get him up here as quick as you can. I might be able to help.’

  Jack looked up at the patch of sky and Annie could tell he was wondering just how they were going to get her father to the surface.

  ‘We can get the rope back down. Haul him up with the windlass.’

  Paddy shook his head and bent his knees so that Frank draped across his shoulders. He locked one leg and arm against his chest and then stood, supporting Frank’s full weight.

  ‘You sure, young fella? That’s a hell of a climb with a man on your back.’

  Paddy gave no response, he stepped up to the ladder and began to climb, his legs powering him upwards. Annie held her breath until Paddy was halfway up and she realised he was going to make it, but she stood stock still until Paddy reached the top of the ladder and stepped out of sight.

  ‘Never seen such a feat of strength,’ the miner muttered. He looked over at Annie.

  ‘I’d climb the ladder ahead of you, miss, but I can’t leave you to be the last person out of the mine.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Annie said.

  Jack pointed at her clothing. ‘Your skirts. If you’re above me on the ladder, well—’

  Annie realised that Jack was now concerned with her modesty. ‘Not to worry, sir.’ She reached between her legs and grabbed the back of her skirts, pulling them through and tucking them into the belt of her apron so that it looked like she was wearing a pair of pantaloons. Then she went to the ladder and began to climb.

  As soon as she reached the surface she could see that they had placed her father face up on the ground. Six men crowded around while a man had Frank’s arms in his hands and was folding them across his chest and then opening them out repeatedly. She stepped off the ladder and rushed to his side, shouldering her way through the watching men.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Annie asked. She wanted to hug her father and beg him to wake up, but the miner working Frank’s arms was taking up all the room. She saw Paddy near the front of the throng and clung to him instead.

  ‘Saw this done to a sailor what fell overboard once,’ the miner answered, not breaking his rhythm. ‘He wasn’t breathing neither, but the bugger came back. Sure enough he did. Right as rain.’

  Frank’s lips were tinged with blue and his skin had taken on the colour of old wax that has dripped down the candlestick. His head lolled with the motion of his arms and Annie thought him surely gone. She held tight to Paddy and watched the miner work, dread building in the pit of her stomach.

  Frank gave a little cough and bile ran from the corner of his mouth. The miner kept up his ministrations and Frank coughed again, this time with enough force to spray spittle into the air. The miner stopped his efforts and Frank coughed once more. His chest rose and fell of its own accord and the crowd let out a gasp of wonder.

  Annie let go of Paddy and rushed to her father’s side. ‘Oh, Papa! Thank God.’ She lifted his head and cradled it in her lap, using her apron to wipe bile from his lips.

  Frank opened his eyes. He seemed to have trouble focusing.

  ‘I’m here, Papa.’ Annie rubbed his cheek with her hand and the eyes settled on her at last.

  ‘My girl.’ His voice was a hoarse croak. ‘You got me out.’

  ‘Yes, Papa. Me and Paddy and all these men here. All these wonderful men helped to get you out. You’re safe now.’

  On Sunday, when mining wasn’t allowed, the men busied themselves with repairing any broken equipment. Toby was using a file to put a point back on one of the partly-blunted picks and Paddy was fixing a cracked handle on a shovel by binding it with a length of cord. Maree and Betty cleaned and tidied the camp while Annie busied herself at the cooking fire, adding wood so that she would have a good bed of embers for the camp oven.

  Frank was sitting on a log by the fire, a blanket draped around his shoulders and a steaming pannikin of tea in his hands. By unanimous consensus, it was agreed that he would rest up today, as he had done for three days since the mine collapse, and look to returning to work tomorrow, at the beginning of a new week.

  ‘All right, Papa?’ Annie asked as she went to the tailboard of the wagonette and poured flour into an enamel bowl.

  ‘Yes, girl, I’m fine. Stop fussing.’

  Annie gave him her best smile and added more ingredients to the bowl. Then she kneaded the dough for ten minutes, floured the camp oven and placed it inside. Over the past weeks, she had learned to judge the temperature to perfection. When the damper came out half an hour later, it was crisp and golden on the outside and as light as a feather. She wrapped it in a tea towel.

  ‘Toby?’

  ‘Yes, Annie?’ He looked at her expectantly and Annie realised he was waiting for her to offer him the first slice, as she usually did.

  ‘Would you be kind enough to escort me through the diggings?’

  Toby’s hungry look changed to one of surprise. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘It’s not far. About five minutes’ walk. It won’t take long.’

  Toby’s brow knotted for a moment, then he dropped the pick and took the file back to Frank’s tool satchel.

  Annie gathered up the damper loaf in its tea towel and tucked her free arm through Toby’s. ‘A bit further up the gully,’ she said, and led him away.

  They found a meandering path that made its way along the lead. Toby was quiet for a little while, but when they were close to the creek, he could hold his tongue no longer.

  ‘Where are we going, Annie?’

  ‘To repay a kindness,’ she responded cryptically and tugged at his arm.

  Toby must have realised he wasn’t going to get a straight answer from her, so he remained quiet as they walked on.

  ‘Here it is,’ Annie broke the silence some minutes later. ‘The tent by that tall gum tree.’

  ‘Whose camp is that?’

  ‘You’ll see.’

  A man was sitting by the fire with his back to them as they approached. Annie cleared her throat and said, ‘Excuse me, sir? Is this the camp of Jack Burton?’

  The man by the fire turned around. As soon as he saw them, he climbed to his feet and rushed over.

  ‘Miss? What are you doing here?’

  Jack never once looked at her escort, and Annie felt Toby’s free hand come up and cover hers in a show of possession. The thought of his jealousy made her smile.

  ‘My mother and I would like to show our appreciation for your help in rescuing Papa. We’ve baked you a damper.’ She offered the bundled tea towel. ‘You do like damper, don’t you?’

  ‘Why, yes, I do.’ Jack took the damper loaf. ‘It’s a beauty. Still warm, too. You shouldn’t have gone to that trouble, miss. But tell me, how do you know my last name?’

  ‘Oh, I asked around,’ Annie said. ‘You were so brave to climb down into that mine and help me with Papa.’ She felt Toby’s fingers tighten around her hand.

  ‘I’m sure your papa would have done the same for me, had the roles been reversed.’

  ‘Oh, how rude of me. Mr Burton, this is Toby O’Rourke.’ She gestured at Toby.

  Jack held out his hand and Toby shook it. ‘Your brother?’ There was just a hint of hopefulness in his voice.

  Annie gave a little giggle. ‘Goodness, no. Mr O’Rourke is a friend. He would have helped to rescue Papa, but he was across the diggings having a shoe put on his horse.’

  ‘That I was,’ Toby said. ‘Missed all the excitement. But I’m glad my brother was there to help.’

  ‘The quiet young fella?’

  Annie nodded.

  ‘Strong as an ox, that one. Never seen such an amazing feat of strength.’ He dropped Toby’s hand and held the damper up. ‘Thank you very much, miss.’

  ‘You’re welcome, sir. I sh
ould have liked to bake one for everyone who helped, but we can’t afford all the flour.’

  They bid their goodbyes and Toby led her back towards the camp.

  ‘Seems a nice man, Mr Burton. Doesn’t he, Toby?’

  Beside her, she heard Toby give a noncommittal grunt and his fingers tightened on her hand once again.

  At the camp, Annie went straight to the wagonette and began mixing more dough.

  ‘Another thank you?’ Toby asked.

  ‘As a matter of fact, yes,’ Annie replied and turned back to her task. This time, when the damper came out of the oven, she cut it open while still hot and smothered a huge piece with butter and plum jam.

  ‘Paddy? This one is for you.’ She stepped up to the boy where he sat beside the fire and handed him the piece of damper. ‘For the strongest boy in all the world.’

  Frank sat perfectly still on his log by the fire, his attention fixed firmly on the flickering flames. Maree sat beside him on a folded saddle blanket darning a pair of Paddy’s socks, humming softly while she worked. The others had gone to bed over an hour ago and the couple were enjoying a little rare solitude.

  Across the gully, a fight broke out at another camp. Frank tried to distract his mind by listening to the shouted argument. Someone wanted to pull up stakes and move to the Creswell diggings. Someone else insisted that their fortune was waiting for them, just a few feet further down. All they had to do was dig a little more.

  The thought of returning to the claim and climbing back down into that mineshaft made Frank shiver. Maree must have felt it for she put down her darning and threw another piece of wood onto the fire. Then she leaned over and pulled the blanket tight around his shoulders.

  ‘We don’t want you catching a chill, Frank.’

  ‘Don’t fuss, woman,’ he grumbled, but clutched the edges of the blanket together under his chin.

  Maree picked up the socks and darning needle again and Frank returned to staring into the flames. He could feel the darkness beyond the circle of firelight. It was a malignant thing, prowling around in the trees, stalking him, waiting, and all he had to keep it at bay was the flickering flames of the campfire. He had never known such darkness before, had never known it existed, not the way he knew it now. As the gravel poured into the mineshaft, burying him behind the piece of shoring and blocking out the light, he had discovered the darkness for the first time in his life. It had reached out and touched him, wrapping him in its cloying cloak so that the world beyond the darkness had ceased to exist.

  He shivered again and leaned forward to grab another piece of wood and throw it on the fire.

  ‘Leave some wood to cook breakfast with in the morning, Frank.’

  He grunted an acknowledgement and settled back onto the log. Beside him, Maree placed the socks and darning equipment back into her sewing kit and stood up.

  ‘That’s me done. I’m off to bed. You coming?’

  He shook his head. ‘I just want to sit up a bit longer and enjoy the evening air. You go on, love. I won’t be long.’

  Maree nodded and went to their tent. He watched her untie the flap and stoop inside, then turned back to the flames. A few minutes later he heard the creak of the ropes beneath their cot as Maree settled herself into it.

  Frank sat for a long time with only the dancing flames of the campfire for company. He ignored Maree’s warning and fed another stick of wood onto the fire, then another. It was Betty’s job to ensure a good supply of firewood, and the girl had a pile a foot high stacked beside Frank’s log seat. As soon as the fire began to ebb, he would feed it again, until his hand reached for a piece of wood and there was no more to be had.

  He dropped the blanket from his shoulders and stood up, searching the camp for more fuel, but Maree and Annie kept the place swept clean. There wasn’t so much as a gum leaf left around the fire. Frank lifted his head and looked at the surrounding bushland.

  A lantern hung from the end of the ridge pole of their tent and he went to it. As he took it down, he could hear Maree’s soft snores from inside. He took the lantern back to the fire and used a burning twig to light the wick, adjusting it so that it burned at its brightest. With his shield of light about him, he turned and walked into the night.

  The immediate surrounds of the camp had been picked clean of firewood, but Frank knew that more could be found among a dense grove of trees further up the gully. He made his way there, lantern held high. Somewhere in the distance he could hear men laughing. Probably a group of late drinkers at one of the sly grog shops that dotted the diggings.

  He entered the grove and hooked the lantern to a convenient branch, then began picking up sticks, loading them into the crook of his elbow and always staying within the circle of yellow light. Once he had a good load, he went back and took up the lantern, but as he moved it, the flame inside the glass began to gutter and dim.

  ‘No. No. No.’ Frank dropped his load of wood and gave the lantern a gentle shake. The noise told him the oil reservoir was almost dry. A cold sweat broke out on his face and he looked about frantically. He needed light, any light. To his right, beyond the trunks of the trees, he could see the glow of a lantern through the wall of a tent. Frank started towards it and almost made it to the edge of the grove when the lantern in his hand went out.

  The darkness rushed in and he was back in the mine with the gravel crushing down on him. He ran as fast as he could towards the distant light, and the darkness was a savage beast, chasing him. He could hear men’s voices at the tent as he reached it and flung the flap open to allow the light to flood outside. He had beaten the beast. He was safe, for now.

  The tent was larger than those normally used for shelter by the diggers. This one was tall enough to stand in and covered four times the ground area. A bar of rough-sawn timber had been built along the back wall where a publican shuffled back and forth, filling the glasses of five men who were leaning against the near side. Another man lay prone across the threshold, out cold.

  One of the drinkers turned and saw Frank at the entrance. ‘Don’t mind Templeton,’ he said. ‘Never could hold his liquor. Just step over him and come and have a drink.’ He moved sideways, pushing his fellow drinkers along to make room at the bar for Frank.

  Frank stepped over the unconscious Templeton and moved into the space provided. The barman, a squat man with slicked down, greasy hair, placed a glass in front of him.

  ‘House special is rum at tuppence a glass,’ the barman said. ‘Sixpence if you want whisky.’

  Frank reached into his pocket and felt the few coins there, not having to look at them to count their worth.

  ‘Rum will be fine,’ he told the barman and slipped a coin onto the bar.

  The barman reached under the bar and produced an earthenware jug, pulled the stopper and filled Frank’s glass. He stared at it, his hands flat on the bar. He was conscious of the other men watching him, but he ignored them. The contents of the glass settled and the liquid was perfectly still, refracting the lantern light into a tiny rainbow that washed across the back of his left hand.

  Somewhere in the distance a dog barked, drawing his mind outside to where the darkness waited. He took up the glass and watched the liquid slosh about.

  ‘Please, forgive me,’ he said under his breath and threw the contents of the glass into his mouth.

  Toby sat beside Paddy at the campfire and surveyed the glum faces sitting across from him. Maree was propped against Frank’s shoulder, one arm draped across his lap, the other clutching her woollen shawl closed against the night chill. Betty prodded at the fire with a stick and, as usual, Annie sat beside Toby on another log. Even though two feet of distance separated them, he imagined he could feel the heat of her body.

  ‘It’s going to take some time to sink that shaft down to where the pay dirt is,’ Frank pointed out. ‘Judging by the first shaft we’ll have to dig to about thirty feet before we start getting any sort of return.’

  ‘What about trying somewhere else?’ Maree
offered. ‘The butcher’s wife told me they’re taking good-sized nuggets right off the ground over on Pennyweight Hill.’ She instantly regretted the remark. She’d been on the diggings long enough to know that rumours far outnumbered the amount of gold and put her hand up in front of her face to silence any rebuke.

  ‘We need to bring in a few extra quid and still be able to work the claim,’ Frank said. ‘I can always throw up a sign and do a bit o’ work fixing wheels and such. God knows, the roads and tracks around here will give me plenty of work. Toby and Paddy will still be able to do some digging. Now the girls are washing dirt it will free me up to do something else.’ He used the stem of his pipe to point at each of them in turn as he spoke.

  ‘Sounds like a good start,’ Toby nodded, wishing he had some sort of trade to offer their small syndicate.

  ‘Toby, are there lots of possums around here?’ Maree asked. ‘In the bush I mean.’

  ‘Plenty. Why?’

  ‘There were some native women over near the Melbourne road yesterday selling possum-skin rugs. The diggers were buying them up for five pounds apiece. With the cold nights here, everyone is trying to get a warm night’s sleep. I hate to cut those women out of their meagre earnings, but the girls and I could sew together some rugs of our own and sell them – if we could get the possum skins, that is.’

  Toby’s face broke into a broad smile. ‘Paddy and me can bring in plenty of possums. We’ll go out on a Sunday when we aren’t allowed to dig. After work tomorrow, I’ll get started on some curing racks. They can smell a bit while they’re drying, so it’s probably best if we build ’em up near the horse yard. You can sew them together as they’re ready. We should do all right. I’ve heard plenty of complaints about the cold nights.’

  Now that a plan of action had been decided on, everyone’s mood brightened a little. Toby was too excited to sleep. He sat by the fire long after the others had gone to bed and stared into the flames, adding a stick every now and then to prevent it from dying down and to chase away the chill he could feel building on the wind.

  He thought about the coming Sunday. It would be great to saddle Moonlight and head off into the countryside, to escape the diggings for a while. He missed the bush. He missed the wild country where a man could be miles and miles from anyone. He missed working with cattle and sheep and building things for the future, like chook pens and vegetable gardens. As he sat staring into the flames, he realised that he was homesick.