Up, gasp, two deep breaths and back down to that rock, thanking the Mother as he levered more paua away from their home and stuffed his trouser legs full of clicking, oozing meat with the smell of a woman on them. He climbed out of the water, dragging his catch along behind him, blinking the salt from his eyes to see Bailey stumbling down the hill towards him.
Bailey’s face looked strange, set and hard. He was scanning for the quickest way to the boat. He was carrying something; an animal. It wriggled under his arm.
“Get the boat. Get it.”
Then the naked, struggling child kicked at him and he almost dropped her.
Billhook did as Samuel Bailey told him. He swam to the boat and rowed it to the rocks, backed it in so that Bailey could climb in, dragging the child after him. The girl was whining and grunting with fear and Bailey put his face close to hers until her running nose nearly touched his. He just growled at her. Nothing else. He growled at her like a dog and she was silent.
“Better get that net up, Billhook.” Bailey looked behind him to the shore. Smoke rose in a thin, vertical line from behind the hill, blowing off with the sea winds.
Billhook hauled up the net, silver sickles of herring and yellow-eyed mullet flashing and writhing in their cotton bonds, into the deck of the boat, pulling the boat away from the rocks.
Lean black men ran down to the shore, shouting. They began throwing spears into the water but their reach would not answer. The boat was too far away and the spears slid into the water.
“A kid, Bailey. Why a kid?” Billhook’s voice sounded vague and thin. He struggled to give it more strength when he spoke again. “What do you need a kid for?”
“Prefer a woman myself,” said Bailey. “But she didn’t wanna come.”
Bailey’s trousers were bloodied and wet. There were flecks of flesh on his bare feet. Billhook looked at the little girl. She didn’t seem to be injured. From under Bailey’s arm she stared at Billhook’s nakedness with flared eyes. She stared at the inky spirals that the tattooist had carved into his buttocks before he left for New Holland. Her fleshy, hairless cleave and her staring eyes made his tattoos, his very flesh, dirtied and, quite strangely, dishonourable.
Billhook knew when he saw the blood on Bailey’s trouser cuffs that he should never have obeyed him. That he should have gone back to the Doubtfuls and left Bailey to the blackfellas and their spears. But too late.
“You done well, Billhook,” said Bailey, as Billhook dumped the anchor and the last of the net into the boat and collected his oars, the spears well out of range now. “I owe you.”
Billhook rowed against the wind once they moved out of the sheltered bay. Bailey sat in front of him, holding the girl. She stared at Billhook, terrified. He tried to say something gentle but his words came out as a grunt and he gave up, taking a bead on the smoke rising from behind the hill to keep his course straight. They moved closer to the island.
Jimmy the Nail met them in the shore of the cove. Billhook threw him the rope. Jimmy whistled low when he saw the child.
“Whatcher got there, Bailey? Dinner? What the hell did yer think yer doing?”
Bailey repeated something of what he’d said to Billhook and picked up the girl, trying to climb over the side and hang on to her at the same time. She shrank away from Jimmy standing in the water, her arms flailing, her legs pushing against the planks.
“Get one of the Worthies,” said Bailey.
Sal was already coming down the hill, then Dancer followed her, her wild halo of hair bobbing as she walked. They stared at Billhook’s tattooed nakedness and then they saw the girl. Dancer stood in the water and became quite still. Sal’s face crumpled. She shook her head and wailed, “No, no, no,” and broke into her own language.
Jimmy the Nail cuffed her. “Talk her out Sal, or she’ll go over the side.” To Bailey, he said, “Though she’d be better off in the drink than with you, you fucking kiddy crimper.”
The women hauled the girl into the water. Dancer picked her up and piggybacked her to the shore. They stepped out of the water and walked along the beach until they reached the damp corner where the spring came out of the hill.
Billhook stayed in the boat. He sorted through the net, unmeshing the fish that were dumped into the boat in their haste. He pushed their heads through their tight bonds, their air sacs bursting from the pressure. Scales fell away from the mullet as he pushed them through. He sharpened his knife and set to cleaning the fish, throwing the guts overboard. Petrels and gulls clamoured and fought over the scraps in the water. He dropped the cleaned fish into the bailer full of salt water. A skin of oil clouded on top. He sharpened his knife again. He would not think about the girl. But he kept looking over to where she sat with the women near the spring.
The two women and the girl sat in the sand. Dancer reached into her bag and showed the girl a ball of ground seed paste. The child looked at the ball with its flakes of husk and seeds. Her eyes travelled from Dancer’s bandaged hand, up her plump arm with its scrapes and gashes, to Dancer’s barnacle-slashed face. Her breath sucked in and then came out in great racking sobs, snot and tears gathering on her chin.
Sal hauled over the big dog to sit beside the girl and held out the girl’s hand to stroke her.
“What is your name?”
The girl shook her head. The dog rolled over and Sal picked fleas off the clear skin around his genitals.
“Sal not nice to him,” Dancer said to the girl. “Sal tiall wee pella kaeeta. She beat him and throw him into the sea.”
Sal frowned at Dancer.
“What is your name?” she asked again.
Silence.
13. DOUBTFUL ISLANDS 1826
“Another titter?” Jimmy the Nail picked at his scabby knuckles and then squinted at Billhook. “You want me to get another woman for that kid thief?”
“Tell him he can have the next one. A bleeder.”
“Didn’t you help him snatch her?”
Billhook closed his eyes. “She is little. Too little for Bailey. Let the Worthies look after her. She can work.”
“Bleeders are one fuck away from being with child, Billhook. That’s why Bailey got her little, like that.”
“She’s too little. He will hurt her.”
Jimmy laughed. “… hurt her …” He laughed again and then coughed. He swept one arm around the bay across from the island, to the dark mountains beyond, the unravelling threads from his canvas sleeves whispering against his wrist. “Tell me Billhook. Do you see law here? Do you see some knob with a wig, a hanging judge, a captain with a gun, a preacher, a peeler, a keeper of my fucking conscience?”
“No,” said Billhook.
“Well, what then?”
“No one here but us, Jimmy.”
“Well, tell me. What do you want me to do then?”
“Tell him. Tell him he can’t have her. Tell him he can have the next one we get.”
“What the fuck does this have to do with me?”
“You are boss,” Billhook nodded at him. “Trouble with the Worthies, if he takes her.”
“Trouble if he don’t,” Jimmy sighed. “And we all done things. Bailey’s not the first tar with a black child wife.”
“It’s different to shooting some blacks at their fires and getting out.”
Jimmy narrowed his eyes at Billhook.
Billhook knew about Jimmy killing those black men on the cape near Kangaroo Island. As well as Pigeon, Sal had told him of a gang of men going to the mainland, hunting for women. One woman with an infant at her breast was stolen away to Kangaroo Island and passed around the camp that night. After they raped her, she crawled away from the sleeping men, gathered her baby from Sal and was never seen again.
“She swam,” Sal had told Billhook. “She swam with baby on her back, long, long way home. Baby died.” When Sal said that, she fingered the little white skull at her throat.
“This is different,” Billhook said to Jimmy. “Bailey getting a kid like that. I’m
not like Bailey. I don’t need a poor kid. You are not like Bailey but you have Dancer. There will be trouble. Trouble with the women.” Billhook fought away the desperation from his voice.
“He should just take her back then,” Jimmy said. “Or drown her. Either way, we’ll have to ship out of here if we can’t go ashore. Just be thankful those blackfellas don’t have a boat or we’d be stuck like pigs in our sleep.”
Bailey left the child alone. Wherever she was, Splinter the lurcher, the piebald terrier or one of the women were beside her. Billhook wondered if Jimmy had talked to Smidmore because neither men made use of Sal or Dancer at the same time. Bailey seemed to retreat from his claim on the girl but Billhook saw him watch her, and snake his eyes at Sal, especially Sal. He looked to have it in for her and whenever he had a chance, he would aim a kick at one of her dogs.
14. DOUBTFUL ISLANDS 1826
For the next few moons they roamed the islands and rocky headlands looking for seal and watching out for the natives’ fires. The days became shorter, the air stilled and cleared as regular rains cleaned away the dust. They worked to the east and west of the islands. Jimmy watched the coast through his looking glass for seal on the rocks. When he shouted, the men slowed at their oars or slackened the sails and they cruised in to where the sea swayed against the land. On days when the water sparkled with sunlight, they could see the seals stark against the rocks, rolling about like maggots. But on days when the westerlies blew over the land and harried the waves offshore in fizzy rainbow plumes and blew the rain sideways, the seals were not so easy to sight.
Neddy and Smidmore came back from exploring with news of a cave on the seaward side of the second island. “Full of seals, a dozen at least,” said Smidmore. “They’re resting up in there. Ready to get cornered.”
“Let’s go then,” said Jimmy the Nail. “Before the tide comes in.”
They packed wick, a crock of seal oil and extra ropes into the boat. They crammed cooked seal meat and damper into their pockets. Sal directed Dancer to stay behind with her big hound and the child.
“What are you bringing the runt for then?” Bailey asked, nodding at the terrier.
“Keep you company,” Sal grinned but her eyes were dead. “You like the little ones, yes?”
Smidmore snorted with laughter and Bailey’s jaw tightened.
The cave gaped its enormous maw at sea level but the tide was low. Neddy pointed out the bridge where two men could stand, while the others went into the cave. They would have to swim into there, to get the seals.
Bailey and Jimmy jumped overboard feet first and rose to the surface, their hair slicked over their faces, spouting water from their mouths. They swam to the bridge, each holding a rope that spooled from the deck of the boat. Billhook and Smidmore placed match tins and the oil-soaked wicks under their beanies, strapped clubs over their backs, and eased themselves into the water. They swam past where the two other men were climbing onto the low rocks at waterline in dripping shirts, their clubs readied, and continued into the cave. Billhook swam on his side, reaching his right arm towards the darkness, keeping his head dry. He couldn’t see further than a body’s length in front of him. He willed himself not to turn and look for the light. He knew it would destroy any dark vision he had. Water sucked at the rocks as the light swell moved into the darkness. He could smell the seals but he couldn’t see anything, only feel the rocks beneath his hands and feet. It became shallow. He heard the shuffling of bodies against stone and Smidmore climbing, dripping, across the submerged rocks behind him.
A breathing, a snorting, as the seals scented the men.
Billhook stood up on a slippery rock and felt above him for some dry stone. He struck a light, put it to the wick, and orange light flared against the walls.
“Look,” Billhook whispered to Smidmore, pointing to the ceiling.
The ceiling bulged with boulders held together with mud or clay and the light wavered against the concentric circles cut into the stone, perfect round holes pocked into the granite in symmetrical lines. Light glittered against hovering droplets of water about to fall.
“What are they? Someone was here once. Who would live in this wet hole?”
“Before the seas rose up maybe,” said Smidmore. “Before the Great Flood. Let’s get on with it.”
Around them seals, males and females and pups, lay across the rocks at shoulder height, on the lower, wetter rocks, and rolled in the small pools at the men’s feet. A small seal child, its eyes glowing orange against the flaming wick, teeth and saliva flashing, turned to Billhook and shrieked in alarm.
The two men worked as fast as they could, before the wicks burnt through or the seals escaped. They crashed their clubs across whiskered snouts and cleaved open heads. The older seals shouted and barked and the pups gave low-pitched screams as the men stepped and slipped between the rocks. The stench of the seals’ breath, their blood and their fear, mingled with the earthy, weedy scent of the cave. Billhook heard Bailey’s shouts and then Jimmy’s laugh as the first escaping seals were slaughtered at the cave’s mouth.
After a while Billhook felt water rising up his trousers, so that wherever he went, his knees were wet. Around him dead seals floated, knocking against his legs and swilling against the walls. The light flared once and then they were in darkness.
“Bring in the rope,” said Smidmore and Billhook stumbled along the dark passage, towards the mouth of the cave and the blue sky. He saw the silhouettes of Bailey and Jimmy hanging onto the stone bridge. Outside, the boat bobbed on the rising swell as Sal and Neddy hauled a brace of bound seal pups aboard.
Swell burst into the cave. Jimmy and Bailey jumped onto higher rocks at the mouth as a wave threatened to suck them both out to sea.
“Rope,” shouted Billhook and Jimmy climbed down after the next wave to retrieve the coil of rope. He hung on to one end and Billhook turned back to the dark tunnel and the stench of dead seal. Hanks of wet, tarred rope played out from across his shoulders. He could hear Smidmore dragging a carcass towards him over the rocks, water dripping and the odd, anguished cry of an injured animal.
They hauled nine seals bigger than men as close as they could to the mouth of the cave, tied them off and shouted to Jimmy and Bailey to pull them out. Smidmore cursed as he stumbled about. Billhook repeatedly bashed his shins against the slippery rocks and then crushed his big toe in a crevice. His eyes never adjusted with the constant movement from light to dark. He began thinking the two gatekeepers had it good until he saw Bailey get knocked over by a wave, hit his head and lose his rope. It was bloody work all round.
Once the stress of hauling out the seals to the boat was over, the men grabbed the rope and were hauled themselves. Bailey missed his rope, cursing. He had to swim. Sal and Neddy had let the boat blow off the shore. Billhook, already aboard, watched Sal’s curious satisfaction. She would have been happy to see a huge fish rise out of the water and swallow Bailey whole.
“Go in and get him, come on,” said Jimmy.
“Ahh, he’s alright,” said Smidmore.
The boat continued blowing away from Bailey, swimming over the chop, his shirt billowing behind him in the water, trying to catch the end of the rope that lay on the surface like a taunt, a little wake behind it. Finally Billhook and Jimmy took the oars and rowed in to get him. Bailey gripped the gunwales. The terrier, having been kicked so many times by the man, took his chance and leapt forward to bite his hand. Bailey hauled himself over the side. When he wriggled into an upright position, he was furious.
The little dog growled at Bailey. Hardly a raised lip but enough. Bailey looked over to Sal, grabbed an oar and it fell behind the strength of his rowing arm across the nose of the piebald terrier, a killer blow for the old dog who fell to the bowels of the boat, silent, his gnarled paws twitching.
Sal shrieked and went for Bailey. She grabbed his wet shirt and bloodied his nose, whilst he was one-armed trying to stow the oar. His fleshy thud into her face flew in amongst all this. A
creamy slop rocked the boat, broaching it sideways. Seal carcasses rolled to one side. Billhook fell to starboard against Smidmore, who swore at him, trying to bring the boat about and head back into the chop.
The little whaleboat fairly throbbed with grunting, shouting men, Sal with her bloodied face and the dead piebald dog.
“I’ll get that lurcher next and you’ll have no dog to look out for her then,” Bailey said to Sal.
15. DOUBTFUL ISLANDS 1826
In the night Billhook heard shouts and the clanking of an anchor chain. The dawn revealed a whaling barque holed up in the lee of the island, sitting in the calm waters like a mirage.
He kindled a fire and lit it, holding his hands over the flame, waiting for the sun to come over the island and warm him. Winter was setting in and the ground was chill beneath his bare feet. He looked back out to the whaler. Three of its spars were broken and one of the furled sails looked torn.
“Yanks.” Jimmy appeared beside Billhook and he too reached for the fire. “They’ll have some rum.”
Billhook didn’t ask what the trade would be. Skins he hoped, but already he knew.
“We visit them, before they visit us,” said Jimmy.
The whalers looked tired as they lined the deck and waited for the small boat of sealers to come alongside. They smelled bad too. The whole ship reeked; even the stays were coated in whale oil.
“The boat ahoy!” shouted the second mate.
“Permission to board!” shouted Jimmy the Nail, and a black jack threw down the rope ladder. Sal, Dancer, Neddy and the little girl stayed in the boat, while the men climbed aboard the whaler.
Billhook tried to hide the assault on his nostrils but still, the whalers smirked at his attempt.
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