The Blue-Eyed Aborigine

by Rosemary Hayes

  I frown at him, puzzled.

  He goes on. ‘There are tracks by the waterhole, Jan.’

  ‘Tracks of animals?’

  He nods. ‘Some are animal tracks.’ He pauses. ‘And some are human.’

  I stare at him. ‘Perhaps it is the others – the Captain from the Sardam and the four sailors.’

  He is looking down at the ground. ‘There are too many footprints for just five men.’

  ‘Then… then are these the Aborigines the Commander spoke of?’

  He shrugs. ‘I suppose so.’

  A shiver of fear passes down my spine.

  Wouter shifts his position. ‘And there are well trodden paths up into the hills,’ he says.

  He looks at me as I take this in. So this is not such an empty land, after all. There are humans nearby, humans who come to drink at the waterhole and have made a track up into the hills. For a while we say nothing, but I know what Wouter is thinking. Like me, he is thinking that we may not be welcomed by these Aborigines. Who knows what dangers we face? My mind fills with images of wild savages armed with sharpened sticks and stones descending upon us in a furious pack.

  ‘What are we going to do?’ I ask him at last.

  Wouter stands up, shaking off his uncertainty as he becomes the soldier again.

  ‘We’ll spend one more night here and then, at first light, we’ll make for the waterhole. We’ll be loaded down, so it will be slow going and we’ll have to make camp at the waterhole for one night. After that, we’ll strike up into the hills, keeping the river in our sights, and see if we can find a place to make camp on the bank.’

  ‘And the boat?’ I ask.

  Wouter shrugs. ‘We’ll have to leave it here. We’ll drag it well up above the waterline and hide it.’

  Suddenly he grasps my shoulder. ‘Come, Jan, take heart. We’ll have a feast tonight. We’ll drink some of the wine, so at least we can forget our cares. For who knows what tomorrow will bring?’

  Chapter Nine

  The ointment is working on my hands and the next day they are less sore, but I still protect them with the torn linen before we unload the boat.

  At dawn, Wouter opens the chest of trading goods and we look through them. I ring the little bells and handle the knives and beads. Then I unwrap some colourful wooden toys, figures of soldiers and sailors which you can make walk through a system of hooks and wires. I should like to play with them myself, for I never had toys as a child.

  ‘Do you think the Aborigines will like these, Wouter? Do you think they’ll be friendly?’ I ask.

  ‘How should I know?’ he says, and his voice has an edge to it. ‘Pelsaert has told us to make friends with the native people, but they may kill us before we have a chance to show them anything.’

  I rewrap the toys and replace them in the chest.

  Then, sweating and swearing, we take down the mast and drag the boat up into the dunes. When we look back, it has merged with the sand and the brown, windswept, spiky grass.

  We smother our fire with sand, then spread the sail on the ground and load all our goods in it, pulling the sail ropes tight so that everything is safe within. Wouter makes a rope harness so that he can drag the sail and its contents behind him, but he strains as he walks forwards. It is too heavy. He loosens the harness and squats down on the ground.

  ‘This is too heavy for one man, Jan. You’ll have to carry the trading chest and the musket.’

  He unties the sail ropes and takes out the chest and the musket. When he hands the chest to me, I stagger under its weight. Then he unstraps his leather shoulder cross-strap and buckles it over my chest, fixing the musket on it.

  I dare not complain, but when we set off again I am out of breath at once, and although our pace is slow, my arms are screaming with pain when we stop for a drink. I put the chest down on the sand and stretch my aching limbs before taking the water bottle from my belt.

  ‘Not too much, Jan,’ warns Wouter. ‘We have a way to go before we reach the waterhole.’

  I stop in mid-gulp. He is right, but I am so thirsty. Before we set off again, I look back at the way we’ve come. We’ve not made much progress, but I’m relieved to see that there is no sign of our boat. We may need it again if the Aborigines drive us away. I close my mind to those thoughts and concentrate on the here and now – getting through the next hour, the next few steps.

  Slowly, slowly we creep along the edge of the ocean. The sun is already beating down and I’m glad of my hat and shirt.

  I think back to November in Holland – a cold, grey month with bare trees and damp mists rising up from the dykes. But here, in this topsy-turvy world, summer is just beginning and the heat is worse than even the hottest summer’s day at home.

  My mind and my body start to go numb, but I know I have to keep going. Blindly I follow Wouter, stepping in his footprints on the sand, the sweat pouring down my face and trickling down my back. I am glad that my sore hands are still bound with strips of linen, otherwise I might lose my grasp on the trading chest.

  At last we round the point and I have my first sight of the river mouth. It is as Wouter described it: a long sand bar trapping its lower waters into a lagoon of brackish water. Higher up, it can be seen snaking up the valley between steep, tree-lined banks on one side and a high ridge on the other.

  I start to salivate as we approach the lagoon, and when I reach it I drop the chest and kneel down beside the water.

  ‘Don’t drink here,’ says Wouter sharply as I scoop up some of the stagnant water into my hands. I take no notice but before I can drink, he strikes my cheek hard and my hands fly to my face.

  ‘You stupid boy,’ he hisses. ‘If you drink this, you will be sick. Wait, damn you. Wait until we reach the waterhole.’

  I feel like sobbing, with all this water before me.

  Wouter kicks me in the rump. ‘Get up, boy,’ he says sharply. ‘We might come upon the Aborigines at any moment.’

  When he mentions Aborigines, I stand up, my thirst forgotten. Wouter stands close to me.

  ‘Now,’ he says. ‘Look up there’ – and although there is no one near to hear us, his voice is a whisper. I follow his gaze, and my heart lurches. For, further up the valley, in the distance, a plume of smoke is rising above the trees, drifting straight up into the blue sky.

  We look at each other. ‘We are not alone,’ says Wouter grimly.

  ‘Perhaps it is the lost captain from the Sardam,’ I say weakly.

  ‘Perhaps,’ says Wouter, ‘But I doubt it. They would have kept to the coast so that the Sardam could find them. No, I’m sure that the good captain and his men were lost at sea in that storm.’

  ‘Then … then we must be the only white men in this great South Land.’

  Wouter nods. ‘So it would seem.’

  The going becomes harder as we make our way round the bottom of the ridge which plunges down to the water’s edge. There are great slabs of slippery rock here, and it is difficult to keep my balance as I carry the chest. When I take my eyes off my feet, I stare into the rock pools and see movement within them. Perhaps there are shellfish we can eat. Wouter is making slow progress with the loaded sail. I have to put down the chest and help him carry the sail over the jagged rocks so that it does not tear open.

  Our water supply has nearly gone, and I ask Wouter how far it is to the waterhole.

  ‘Not far now, Jan.’

  He takes a final swig from his water bottle, and points. I see a bare patch amidst the vegetation, and now I can make out the paths which wind down to it from the hills above.

  ‘We’ll camp there for the night.’

  ‘What if the savages come while we are there?’

  Wouter snaps at me. ‘We need water, we are exhausted and I cannot drag this damn sail any further today, so we have little choice.’

  I keep quiet, and soon we are on our way again, shuffling with our awkward loads towards the waterhole. It is much further away than it looks and when we finally reach it, we
are both parched.

  Wouter is right, there are footprints all round the hole, many of the impressions baked hard, but some are fresh, sunk into the mud and not yet dried by the sun. I look round in every direction but there is no sound, no sight of another human being. Yet I feel as if I am being watched.

  Wouter flings himself down on his stomach and starts to scoop water into his mouth. I have a better idea. I take the iron pan from inside the sail, dip it in the water and hand it to him. Wouter looks up at me and smiles, his first smile all day.

  ‘Well, Jan,’ he says. ‘You have some good sense, then.’

  We find some flat ground a little way from the waterhole, shaded by trees, and make camp. The trees here are tall and straight and their bark hangs off them in untidy strips. When we are settled, I lie back and look up through the branches, listening to the dry rustle of the undergrowth. But my peace is soon disturbed as I am suddenly bitten by some vicious insect. I leap up and see an ants’ nest beneath me.

  ‘Look at the size of them, Wouter!’ I gasp, rubbing my leg. ‘They are giants!’

  Wouter laughs. ‘What a child you are, Jan, to be bothered by a few ants.’

  But he wasn’t the one who was bitten.

  He goes on. ‘This is a good place. We have water and shade and no doubt animals will come here to drink. We may yet have fresh meat.’

  My mouth waters at the thought of meat. On the island we only had seals and seabirds to eat. In time, we may be able to kill some of those furry, jumping beasts that Wiebbe and his soldiers ate, but for now I take the salt pork, black bread and cheese from the sail and we swill this down with wine from the flagon we broached yesterday.

  There are plenty of dry branches scattered beneath the trees and the flints and tinderbox are still dry, so we soon have a merry fire going. As the sun begins to sink, there is a noise in the trees above us and chattering, brightly coloured parrots come in to roost. I stare up at them, wondering whether they would be good to eat.

  Warmed by the food and wine, and knowing that we have water to drink, I want to talk, but I get little response from Wouter. He tells me to save my strength and sleep.

  I lie staring up at the sky and wonder at the stars – so different from the night sky in Holland. Is Lucretia looking up at this sky on board the Sardam? Does she think of us – of Wouter – and wonder whether we will live or die?

  We have done everything together today. We cannot part company now that we are in this strange new land. Like most soldiers and sailors on Batavia, Wouter despises me, but he is stuck with me, however much he dislikes the fact – and I, for my part, would rather be with him than with many of the other mutineers.

  I sleep at last, too tired to worry about what the next day will bring.

  I wake as the sun is rising and lie still listening to the birdsong, but I am conscious of something else – some other presence. Slowly I raise myself on one elbow and look towards the waterhole.

  And then I see them: the strange animals that the soldiers on High Island talked of – the animals whose meat kept Weibbe Hayes and his soldiers alive. I found it hard to believe the men’s stories, but now I see the creatures with my own eyes.

  Several of them are drinking from the waterhole, but as soon as I move, they hear me and bound away, startled. I have never seen any animal like these, with their huge, strong back legs, their long faces with large eyes, their furry ears and tiny, shrunken forepaws.

  When he wakes, I tell Wouter about the animals, and he laughs.

  ‘Now we shall have water and meat, Jan.’

  We coax our fire into life again and make more flour cakes, before repacking our belongings into the sail. Then we fill our water bottles and set off, following one of the steep tracks that leads from the waterhole up into the wooded hills.

  Our progress is even slower now. Wouter cannot drag the sail along the narrow path, so we have put the musket and the trading chest back inside the sail and are carrying the ungainly load between us, shuffling forward at a snail’s pace. And all the time, the sounds of the birds surround us. Such strange sounds! One bird cry is like a faint, persistent bell, another is a raucous laugh, and always there are flashes of colour – red, blue and green – as the parrots dart between the trees. And in the background the constant sound of the river below us.

  All day we plod forward. Each time I spot a good place to make camp, Wouter finds fault with it. The ground is too uneven, it is too close to the river bank, too far away from it, too crowded in with trees, too exposed. I try to reason with him, but he snaps at me.

  ‘It must be perfect, Jan,’ he says, wiping the sweat from his brow. ‘We are looking for somewhere to make our home.’

  Home! Are we to call this strange land our home?

  Then, at last, we come round a bend and before us is a huge sandy hollow, shaded by trees but not too dark. Wouter stops, and I hold my breath.

  ‘Here?’

  He nods. ‘See Jan, it was worth the wait.’ He stands on the edge of the hollow, and points to the flat centre. ‘We shall build a hut here, and make a garden where we can grow vegetables.’

  Vegetables! He is mad. We are not in gentle Dutch farming country now. But I keep quiet and help him heave our goods into the centre of the hollow.

  He is right, though. This is an ideal spot, and it is pleasing to hear the sound of the rushing water in the river below.

  Wouter unties the sail and takes out all our goods, piling them up neatly, then we tie the sail between trees to give us shelter. When we have done this, Wouter tells me to start making a fire, but as I scrape away the sandy soil to make a place for it, I see that the sand is discoloured by old ash.

  Today I have been in good spirits, but now the fear returns.

  ‘Wouter,’ I say, and point at the ground. ‘There is old ash here.’

  He squats down and picks the ash up. ‘Then we are not the first to use this place, Jan.’

  I nod, and a shiver goes through my body. I hope that whoever used this place before us will not come back to claim it.

  Chapter Ten

  I know that they are around us, the Aborigines. Days have passed and we have not seen them yet, but they leave us signs.

  One morning, I notice unfamiliar footprints close to our fire. They must have come silently, for they did not disturb our sleep. Did they watch while we slept? If so, what did they make of these two fair-skinned Dutchmen? Next time, will they come with spears and kill us?

  Another morning, we wake to find a beautiful conch shell laid on the ground on top of a long piece of bark. I pick it up and stroke its smooth surface. I am sure that to the Aborigines this is treasure. What does it mean? Are they welcoming us with a precious gift? I show it to Wouter, and he frowns.

  ‘Why don’t they show themselves?’ he says. ‘It makes me uneasy that they come when we are sleeping. I would rather see them face to face.’

  For the next few days, we try every way we can think of to trap the jumping furry animals, but they are too quick for us. At first it seems like a game, but as our food supplies dwindle it becomes more serious. We need meat to survive.

  ‘I shall have to use the musket, Jan,’ says Wouter at last.

  We only have a small supply of shot and Wouter wants to preserve it, but we need to eat. Wouter is worried, too, about what the Aborigines will make of the loud report of a gun. Will it anger them? Will it drive them away?

  That night, as we sit round our fire eating salt pork, Wouter makes a decision.

  ‘I shall go back to the waterhole and camp there tonight,’ he says. ‘Then, when the creatures come to drink at dawn, I shall have a clear shot at them. It will be easier there. Here, there’s too much vegetation where they can hide.’

  ‘I’ll come too, then,’ I say quickly, but he shakes his head.

  ‘One of us must stay here and guard our things,’ he says firmly.

  After we have eaten, Wouter shoulders the gun. and, wrapping one of the blankets round his shoulders
, he sets off holding the lantern before him, following the path back to the waterhole.

  I am left alone with only the light of the fire. Everywhere I sense movement in the darkness. I know that there is no one there, but my mind makes the splashing of the river into the sound of whispering voices and the light breeze in the treetops into the rattle of clashing spears. I get up and walk to the edge of the hollow, away from the trees, and look up at the sky. The sailors on Batavia could sail by these stars, but the night sky here is a mystery to me. I only know our position because we are near the mouth of a river which spills out on to the Western coast of the great South Land. If we went further inland I should get lost, for the stars would be no help to me.

  I walk back to the fire, bank up the embers and lie down on the sand nearby, wrapped in my blanket.

  I wake early, when the pale light of dawn is just touching the trees and rocks and the sun has no warmth in it. It feels strange without Wouter, and I wonder whether he will be able to shoot us some meat. I walk into the trees to collect more firewood, to where the steep bank plunges down to the river, and I stand there for a while, watching as the light begins to strengthen and sparkle on the water.

  A slight movement upstream catches my eye. I stand stock-still, clutching my bundle of firewood, my heart hammering in my chest – and stare. Coming round the bend of the river, moving rapidly downstream, is a boat! A rough canoe. Is it made of bark or a hollowed-out tree? I cannot tell. It is being steered by a man who doesn’t need to row because the river is fast, but he plunges his paddle expertly into the water, first on this side, then the other, keeping a straight course. I watch him as he passes beneath me, but he is too far away to see clearly. I can see only that he is black and naked.

  Suddenly, there is the unmistakable sound of the musket being fired. I jump at the noise, even though I know what it is. But the man in the canoe does not. At the sound of the gun, his head spins this way and that, and then it jerks up to the sky. He drops his paddle, leaps out of the canoe and makes for the bank, dragging the craft behind him. I watch as he scrambles out on the far side, abandons the canoe at the river’s edge and bounds into the undergrowth out of sight.