The boy snatched at the money and then passed a paper. ‘But that’s the headline, mister.’
‘I don’t care if that’s the bloody headline. Talk about the crash in London. That’s far more important.’
The boy looked out from under a raggedy cap. ‘My father says blasphemy is for non-believers. You’ll be struck down, you know, mister. That’s what my dad says.’
Hamilton figured that was the least of his problems. ‘And did he also tell you not to argue with your elders? If you do, you’ll definitely go to hell for that.’
Playing with the satchel strung crossways over his body, the boy thought on this.
‘Just do what I say, young chap. Alright?’
The boy hunched his shoulders. ‘Alright,’ he agreed, walking to the kerb. ‘London crashes. Read all about it.’
‘That’s better.’ Hamilton edged his way back to where the horse waited patiently, the pain in his chest yet to disappear. ‘Don’t look at me that way,’ he said to the animal, reaching for the waterbag. It took a long drink and a number of anxious minutes waiting for his eyes to focus before Hamilton could consider reading. He bypassed the front page. Just for the moment. He wasn’t sure he could trust his stomach to behave if the article on Edwina and the family read as badly as predicted. Instead Hamilton turned the pages to the financial section. The editorial confirmed Gloria’s disaster, briefly outlining the loss of confidence in the London market following the collapse of Hatry’s empire.
Dragging a finger under the newsprint, Hamilton read as quickly as comprehension allowed. The gist of the editorial appeared as bullet points in his mind. Some economists were concerned. The world markets were jittery.
‘Yes, yes.’ The column was boringly long.
Sporadic selling was taking place in America where there were signs of trouble, the journalist wrote. Steel production was showing a decline, construction was sluggish, and consumers were building up high debt thanks to easily obtained credit. The Sydney Stock Exchange was monitoring the situation. Hamilton disregarded the negativity of the editorial. The piece told him nothing – at least nothing of substance – until the very end.
He read the final sentence, once, twice and then checking to ensure no-one was observing, Hamilton read the paper for a third time.
The price of American stocks had gained more than twenty percent since June.
Carefully folding the paper, Hamilton slipped it beside the business documents in the saddlebag. Gloria shouldn’t have run out on him so soon. He was still a very wealthy man.
So much for Peter Worth’s prediction that a crash was coming. Men like that knew little, their world view skewed by the limits of their interests. Hamilton was sorry for Gloria of course, but women were skittish, untried players. Only good in business to a point, then with the first problem their stomachs grew fluttery and they ran home. Were Gloria equipped with good sense, she would have seen what was so blatantly obvious. A loss was suffered, yes. But this was the correction the world’s markets had to have. It was quite healthy. In fact it was a buying opportunity.
The ride through Wywanna was not one to be enjoyed. Tipping his hat where required, Hamilton kept his path straight and unhurried, feeling the pointed stares, hearing the whispers and guessing at the spoken words.
He would have the last laugh of course. They could refuse to welcome him as an equal, blacken his daughter’s name, turn their backs on him; however, he knew how to do business. With the surge in share price the glorious days of his ancestors were almost in reach. By heavens, he may even be able to purchase a vacant British title and join the aristocracy. It was all within his grasp. Only the matter of Ridgeway Station and the unlikeable Charles soured the moment. Still, some good could come of it. He would report to Peter Worth about Charles Ridgeway’s disreputable attitude. The Ridgeway boy would be compelled to pay his debt and the lad would quickly discover that if he elected to stay in the district his acceptance would not be as he’d hoped. Hamilton would ruin him.
Hamilton stood to one side, allowing a woman to leave the building before he stepped into the cool interior of the Post & Telegraph Office. With the morning rush and lunch hour over, the postmistress was absorbed in the task of stamping and sorting mail, placing envelopes into black pigeonholes and correspondence bound for outlying properties into large canvas mail sacks. The woman greeted Hamilton with a brief hello and he pointed amiably to the telegraph operator at the end of the room.
Hamilton approached the middle-aged man, waiting patiently as the operative converted the beeping sounds coming through on the telegraph machine into a written message. The paper was then folded, placed in an envelope and the addressee written on the front.
‘Can I help you, sir?’ He pushed at the peak of the cap he wore, revealing a craggy, sweaty brow.
Hamilton nodded. ‘I’d like to send a telegram please.’
‘Of course. Would you mind writing it out for me, sir?’ He placed the recently received message in a pile at his elbow. ‘Usually I’d do it, there being no queue, but it’s been a busy morning. There was a problem at the Brisbane office. I had to resend the daily weather observations and then one of Mr Worth’s sale results came in. The man has more cattle than the population of Queensland.’
‘Yes, yes.’ Hamilton took the slip of paper and pencil offered, noting the name and address of his broker. In the message portion he wrote:
Keep 10,000 pounds aside STOP Invest remainder of savings across share portfolio STOP Immediately STOP Provide financial position by return mail STOP
Hamilton Baker
The operator took the coins offered, quickly reading the message. A shade of interest touched his office-white face. ‘No problem, Mr Baker,’ he replied tentatively.
‘It’s not true,’ said Hamilton. ‘About my daughter. Mistaken identity.’
The operator studied the written lines, as if a letter or word was incorrect. ‘Yes, sir. I really wouldn’t know, Mr Baker. Sir.’
As the clock tower struck three, Hamilton took the road out of Wywanna that curled past the river flats, his stomach churning as the site of the circus came into view. Beneath the wooden bridge boys fished for yabbies in the yellow-green swirl, a mother hollering at the group to come home and do their chores. The wind gusted hot and dry across the fringes of the town. Grasses bending. The sky a razor’s edge of blue steel. He pushed the mare onwards, his limbs heavy. Palpitations came and went in little ticks of feverish anxiety. When he gave thought to Gloria the heat in his body rose.
The mare soon refused to keep pace with Hamilton’s demands. The horse slowed and stayed slow, doggedly refusing attempts to be urged. Finally Hamilton gave up using the spurs, gave up trying to decipher a feasible plan from the wreckage of ideas spinning around in his head. Now he was sobering, the greater ramifications of Edwina’s antics became clear. Would Peter Worth still be inclined to do business with him, and what of Charles Ridgeway? Would the man pay up in a timely manner?
The road that freed him from Wywanna curved to the right, bending through a frill of silent timber. Trees bordering the road grew sparse, allowing glimpses of life. Sheep feeding in the gritty breeze, chickenhawks chasing a small brown bird, circling and diving, and the flat surface of cleared land, throbbing shade-less under the sun.
Hamilton held the reins loosely, the horse’s pace edging back. There was noise ahead. The gravelly taste of dirt on the air. Ahead, the ball of dust balancing between sky and road grew into the ambling shape of walking cattle. Hundreds of cattle. The dust rose to hang feet above the herd as they plodded south. The thrash of hoofs on brush and the crack of stockwhips, steady and reliable in the heat. Hamilton counted two men tailing the mob and more on the wings ensuring the animals kept a steady pace. They were some miles from Mrs Landry’s Inn and Hamilton knew the drovers would be pushing to make water by nightfall.
It didn’t take long to catch up with the herd. Hamilton drew level with one of the men, suddenly hungry for company, for
the comfort of a stranger’s words. A furry-faced man with round dust-puffy eyes glanced in his direction, pulling a triangle of dirty cloth away from mouth and nose.
‘G’day.’
‘And to you. Travelling far?’ Hamilton brought hand to mouth. The dust was thick. ‘You’ll have a thirsty mob,’ he commented, noting the inverted PW brand that marked the livestock as belonging to Peter Worth.
The man’s face was grime-free and white where the cloth protected fairer skin. ‘Not far, mate, no. Heading to Ridgeway Station. Taking the shortcut past Woodville’s waterhole.’ He winked. ‘A bit of free-range grazing along the way. We’ll camp there I reckon. Man and beast alike could do with a breather. It’s filthy dusty and summer’s come. I could do with a swim myself.’
‘Ridgeway?’ Hamilton didn’t understand. ‘But they’re in sheep.’
The drover yawned, showing cracked yellow teeth. ‘Well, there’s a story there. I was meant to be droving these girls over the border for the Boss, but the young fella on Ridgeway’s just back from the Territory. A true son of the saddle he is now, I hear. Ride anything. Hates sheep, he does. Wants to buy cattle. Just bought a spread further north, the boy has. Beyond the dingo fence.’
‘But he hasn’t got any money!’ blurted Hamilton.
The drover’s eye twitched.
‘I mean that’s what I heard. Something about the place being foreclosed on,’ Hamilton hedged.
‘I dunno nothing about that, mate. Excepting that he’s a tough nut the lad is. Knows his mind.’ He yelled at a soil-crimped dog snapping at a cow’s heels. ‘There’s talk of him having sheep lifted by a neighbour. The coppers will be on to that right quick.’
Things were as bad as they could be. Even with his detailed notes of fair exchange for the damage done, he didn’t need the district to get whiff of another problem. They’d think the worst. Hamilton let the drover walk on, wondering who Ridgeway’s backer was. However, the stockman wasn’t letting him have any peace. He slowed his horse, drawing abreast with Hamilton, eager for conversation.
‘They say the Ridgeway boy knows his cattle. They say he’s got a fine eye for big beefy types and he’s gone and bought this here mob.’
‘Peter Worth sold these cows to Charles Ridgeway?’
The drover’s head tilted solemnly, clearly equally taken aback by the news. ‘I might tell you too, friend, that the Boss isn’t too pleased by the turn of events. Nope, he’s none too pleased at all. Between me and that gate post over there, I think he was fixing on buying the station. He booked me up a while ago for the next twelve months in order to shift cattle from one run to another.’
Hamilton felt his throat begin to shrivel and close.
‘I only got told of it myself last night. But a sale is a sale and in the end the Boss ain’t never been one to poke an eye when he can tend a fire.’ One of the cows darted away from the mob. The drover whistled and a dog appeared out of the grasses tufting the side of the road. The cow was brought to heel with a couple of barks.
Hamilton was stunned. After all the wrangling and careful positioning he’d crafted, how on earth could this have occurred? How had the insufferable Ridgeway and Worth ended up conducting business together, without him, when it was he, Hamilton Baker, who was meant to be acting as the go-between? He’d been inches from accomplishing a major sale for the highly esteemed pastoralist. Had come so close that, after years of plying his trade, he’d finally gained admission to the President’s office. Only the final step was required to seal his favour with Peter Worth. Now it was all destroyed by that damnable Ridgeway. There would be no opportunity to even wreck Ridgeway’s reputation now he was in cahoots with Worth.
This final piece of news quite took the fight from him. Hamilton doubted he would mount another charge amongst the custodians of privilege, well aware that it might be years before an opportunity presented itself again. Besides which, after Edwina’s recent performance, the level of acceptance he’d previously enjoyed in Wywanna could no longer be relied upon. There would be no advantageous marriage now. No private discussions in the President’s office. The only consolation was knowing that Peter Worth’s aspirations were also crushed. Hamilton felt tired. The earth dragged on his bones.
‘Word is the Ridgeway boy’s got himself a backer of note.’ The drover tapped the side of his nose. ‘And this is a man no-one says no to. Not even my boss.’
Hamilton chewed at powdery black soil and bile. ‘Grazier?’
‘You could say that,’ replied the drover evasively. ‘Pastoralist is the term I’d use. Never met him myself. But I know plenty of men that work for the family. Now there’s a man that knows the land.’
There were a handful of pastoralists in Australia who commanded that type of respect. Hamilton blinked away the grime, his eyes watering. He thought back to that extraordinary day at the Guild, when the man himself had arrived. If one was going to be well and truly felled, it might as well be by a consummate axeman. ‘Who is it?’
‘It’s Mr Luke Gordon himself of Wangallon Station.’
Chapter Twenty-five
The Chinese camp was a neat assembly of tents pitched within a clearing. From a distance the area was all angled surfaces of canvas alternately caving in and billowing out like lungs against the push of the wind. Thin trails of smoke tangled with the leaves of overhanging boughs from a number of fires and as Edwina approached she saw the ground had been swept clean of twigs and branches. A man stirring a large copper with a stick lifted a pair of trousers from the steaming water and hung them over a makeshift line. He looked up as Edwina passed, bowing politely. Men were honing axe-heads, iron gleaming under swift, brisk strokes. Another fitted a fresh handle to a blade. These were the country’s new artists. Craftsmen from another place and time who would chisel away at the ancient timber, creating new land from old.
On any other day Edwina may have felt anxious entering the camp alone, but after hours of staring at an unyielding sky a dragging listlessness had leached into her bones. Sitting by the stump of her mother’s tree would not return the plant to health, nor would thinking on her father be of any good.
The wagon was in the centre of the clearing. She rode towards it, listening to men talking as they went about their tasks. A water carrier with two buckets appeared from the direction of the creek, dumping his load near one of the camp fires. Another man skinned a rabbit, a pile of glassy-eyed carcasses on the ground beside him. Each man attended to his role with deliberate movements. Even the group of card players sitting cross-legged under a gum tree were quiet in their laughter. They could have been here for a year, such was the feeling of permanency. Wet clothes, the smoke of green timber, tobacco fumes and the heavy scent of spice thickened the air. Nearing the wagon Edwina dismounted, smoothing the skirt she wore and tying the horse so it couldn’t wander. Two men sat at a table by the wagon talking animatedly, a fire nearby. They rose on her approach, the taller of the two smiling cautiously, as the second Chinaman was subtly dismissed.
‘I am Han Lee.’ He bowed.
‘I have come to fetch some stores,’ replied Edwina awkwardly. Even though, with his roundish face and almond eyes, he looked different to her kind, Edwina could tell from his features that he was a good man.
‘You are Mr Baker’s daughter?’
‘Edwina, yes.’
He gestured politely to one of the chairs. ‘You will take tea, Edwina, and then we will see to your needs.’
She didn’t want tea, but Edwina sat politely as Han Lee poured hot water from a billy into a teapot patterned with Chinese calligraphy. He swirled the liquid around before throwing it on the ground, then added a spoonful of green leaves from a canister and more hot water to the pot. ‘Now we wait, a few seconds only; there is enough bitterness in life I fear,’ he said, examining her face, ‘without drinking in such things.’
Embarrassed at how she must appear, Edwina lifted a hand to the brim of the hat she wore.
‘I have an ointment that will he
lp with the bruising.’ Han Lee poured the pale green tea into two handle-less earthernware cups. ‘You will think that I am very British, but the Chinese developed tea thousands of years ago.’ He studied her face. ‘Drink it. It is restorative.’
He observed her over the rim of his cup as she sipped the liquid. When Edwina put the cup down he topped it up with hot water.
‘It is said that Shennong, an Emperor of China, was drinking a bowl of just boiled water when a few leaves were blown into it from a nearby tree, changing the colour. The Emperor took a sip of the brew and was pleasantly surprised.’ Han Lee smiled. ‘Better?’
‘Yes, thank you.’
He rose to stoke the camp fire, selecting lengths of cut timber from a stack of wood. Pouring water into the billy, he set it on the embers, adding a handful of rice from a cloth sack to the water. ‘Now what do you need, Miss Edwina?’
Mrs Ryan’s list in hand, Han Lee began sorting through the goods. A set of scales was produced and he began weighing the spices selected from a series of small drawers that were fitted to the wagon, placing the contents in small paper bags. Canvas sides could be rolled down to protect the contents of the dray, which included a stack of cloth and hessian sacks and a number of wooden crates.
‘Rice, some potatoes and a little flour,’ Han Lee explained, noticing her interest. ‘You would think to have such staples would suffice but I miss my mother’s noodles,’ he admitted.
‘When were you last home?’
‘Years. But I should be happy here in this jade-and-gold world. That’s how this land is seen by my people. It has always been so.’ Han Lee busied himself with a basket containing dried herbs. ‘You will understand, Miss Edwina, that I do not carry the normal wares of a hawker. If you asked me for household linen and feather dusters, these things I do not have.’
‘You don’t much look like a hawker,’ admitted Edwina, thinking of the fruit and vegetable seller in Wywanna with his catchy phrases. Han Lee was dressed in clothes that her father would wear and she noted that, unlike the rest of his clan, he didn’t have a long plait hanging down the length of his back.
An Uncommon Woman Page 22
