‘What are you doing here?’ he demanded in as controlled a fashion as he could manage.
Kitty met his gaze steadily, although her fear was still very evident. ‘I came to see that you were safe. We heard there were other women here.’
‘On a field of battle?’ Rian asked, his voice so low now it was almost inaudible.
Leena and Maureen exchanged a nervous glance.
‘But there are women in there, aren’t there? I saw them.’
‘They’re trapped, Kitty. They can’t get out.’
‘You got out,’ Kitty snapped, fear making her shrewish. ‘But are you all right? We heard the muskets open up and we thought…Well, we were worried,’ she finished lamely. To be truthful, they hadn’t expected the soldiers to attack the Queen’s own subjects with such determined vigour, and in such numbers, but once they’d made their way into the compound they’d decided they might as well keep going.
‘I’m fine,’ Rian said shortly. ‘And so are Patrick and Ropata.’ This last was directed at Maureen and Leena, although he hadn’t actually seen Ropata once the fighting had started.
To Leena, he said, ‘Does Amber have the children? Kitty, you shouldn’t leave Amber by herself at night.’
‘I’m not by myself.’
Kitty, Rian and Leena all stared, varying degrees of shock registering on their faces.
Behind them, Amber stood against a barrel some yards away, Tahi at her side.
Kitty demanded, ‘Amber, why aren’t you at home!’ at the same time that Leena said, ‘Amber, where are Molly and Will?’
‘I’m not at home because I wanted to see what was going on,’ Amber replied with more than a hint of defiance. ‘Binda has Molly and Will, out at her camp. I hope you don’t mind, Leena. She said it would be safer for them out there.’
Leena relaxed a little; Binda was probably right.
Rian said, ‘How many times have you been told not to go out alone?’ God, why could the women in his family never behave?
‘I said, I’m not alone,’ Amber insisted, as Tahi’s arm settled around her shoulders.
Oh dear, Kitty thought, something’s definitely changed there, while Rian said to himself, Christ, I’ll have to have a word to Haunui about this. Then he sighed. Perhaps it was time he accepted that his days of trying to control his wife, and clearly now his daughter, were long gone. He wasn’t sure, either, that he could be bothered fighting other people’s fights any more. Perhaps it was time, too, to concentrate on extracting as much gold as they could from the claim, then move on. He missed the sea so much that he could physically feel the ache in his bones.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Ropata, then Pierre and Haunui emerge from the smoke drifting over the compound, and knew the others wouldn’t be far behind.
He slipped his hand into his wife’s. ‘I’m starting to get tired of this, mo ghrá. I think we’ll take what we can, then go home.’
Kitty turned her face to him and her eyes held a glow he hadn’t seen there for some months. Then she blinked and coughed, as a wreath of gunpowder and smoke enveloped them. ‘You mean, home to the sea?’
Behind her, several tents in the compound burst into flame. They all ducked and Rian nodded. ‘Not now, but soon.’
And Kitty squeezed his hand, hard.
The fighting had lasted little more than twenty minutes. The soldiers tore down the Southern Cross and trampled it into the dust, then the police systematically hunted the insurgents and arrested over a hundred not quick enough to flee, including Patrick. More than twenty diggers had died, some from wounds received after the battle had ended, and six soldiers and police had been killed. Rian and the crew, who had left Eureka before the fight was over, kept their heads well down.
Now, later in the morning, Amber, Leena and Kitty walked north along the track out past the Old Gravel Pits towards Black Hill, where Binda’s people, the Watha Wurrung, were currently camped. Although the upper reaches of the low mountain were densely timbered, the lower slopes were now almost bare, denuded by the miners. The morning was already glaringly hot and the sky cloudless, and Kitty was deeply regretting so cavalierly giving away her bonnet. She might well be forced to purchase another one, or perhaps she would start a new mode and wear a panama hat like Rian.
‘We must be nearly there,’ Leena said hopefully. She hadn’t been to Binda’s camp before, but Amber had.
‘Not far,’ Amber confirmed. ‘I hope they haven’t gone walkabout,’ she added, then instantly wished she hadn’t.
Leena stopped. ‘But they were here last night?’
‘Er…’
Kitty looked at her daughter. ‘Amber, you did bring the children here yourself last night. Didn’t you?’
Amber made a face that was part defiance, part discomfort. ‘I saw Binda in town. She had some other children with her. White children. She looks after them sometimes, like she does with Will and Molly, and she said she was bringing them out here because it would be safer. And I…well, I wanted to see what was happening at Eureka so when she asked if I wanted her to take Will and Molly as well, I said yes.’
‘You just gave them to her?’ Leena was outraged. ‘You just gave her my babies!’
‘Yes, but Leena, you like Binda! She minds them all the time!’
‘But not to take away! Amber, you do not even know where she has taken them!’
Kitty knew that Leena liked Binda, but could see on her face that somewhere inside her, perhaps not even on a conscious level, she did not quite trust the older woman.
‘I do know!’ Fear was beginning to replace indignation on Amber’s face. ‘She brought them out here. To her camp!’
Kitty could also see that this was getting them nowhere. Deserving though she thought Amber was of Leena’s ire, she urged, ‘I think we should wait until we get to the camp before anyone gets upset, don’t you? I’m sure there’s nothing wrong. Will and Molly are probably having a lovely time.’ But, mentally, she crossed her fingers. God help them all if anything had happened to Leena’s children.
Leena stalked off ahead, and soon they came to the camp, an open patch of ground on one side of the track in the shelter of a high bank of rocks. A semi-circle of five mia mia—shelters made from sticks jammed in the ground and hung with bark and branches—stood around several low fires, and the camp clearly hadn’t been abandoned. Three elderly men sat around one of the fires, even though the morning was so hot, turning something that had been alive not long ago on a green stick. They stared as the women approached.
‘They’re not here,’ Leena said dully.
‘They will be,’ Amber countered, slightly desperately.
Kitty addressed the men; ‘Good morning, my name is Kitty Farrell and—’
‘I’ll do this,’ Leena interrupted, and launched into a short speech in her own tongue. There was no response, so she tried what sounded to Kitty like a slight variation. Still nothing. Leena rolled her eyes, sighed in irritation and said in rapid but diluted pidgin English, ‘Me Leena from Cadigal Sydney. Your woman Binda got my kids Will an’ Molly. Where they be at? I want ’em back.’
The three men looked at her, then at each other. Then one said, ‘Up the hill. In the cave, eh?’ He pointed.
Leena looked at the narrow track that wound up through the rocks behind the camp and disappeared into the trees. ‘Who you be?’
‘Barega of Watha Wurrung.’
‘They safe?’ she asked, meaning the children.
He nodded. ‘They all safe.’
Visibly, Leena relaxed somewhat.
‘Big fellah business in town last night? Or sorry business?’ the man asked.
‘Sorry business,’ Leena replied.
He shrugged. ‘Well, not ours, eh?’
Leena led the way past the camp and up through the rocks.
‘Why are they the only ones down there?’ Kitty asked, lifting her skirts so she wouldn’t trip herself up. She had been perspiring before, but now she could feel the sweat tr
ickling freely down her back and sides. ‘And where are the young men?’
‘Out hunting. Probably been out before dawn,’ Leena replied over her shoulder.
Kitty noted her voice was still tight with worry, and knew she wouldn’t relax completely until she had seen her babies with her own eyes. She couldn’t blame her. Sometimes she could happily throttle Amber.
After half an hour of what was turning into a thigh- and buttock-torturing climb, they finally moved into the shade of a canopy of pungent eucalypts and blackwoods, with wattle and other shrubs growing beneath them.
Leena stopped, parked her backside against a rock and rubbed her sleeve across her sweating face. She stared accusingly at Amber, who looked away, her bottom lip beginning to tremble.
Then Binda herself stepped silently out of the bush. ‘They in here. No worry, they safe.’ She wore her usual faded old dress, which barely skimmed her thin calves, her dusty feet were bare, and her customary wide, white smile was in place.
Kitty watched as Binda and Leena locked eyes. Something passed between them, then Leena’s shoulders slowly subsided and the suspicion and guarded fear drained from her face.
Binda beckoned, and they followed her into the cool dimness of the eucalypts. Soon they came to the mouth of a cave, a tall, narrow crack in the side of the mountain. They all fitted through it comfortably, but a really corpulent person, Kitty reflected, could run the risk of becoming stuck. For some reason the image struck her as immensely funny and she stifled an inappropriate snort. Maybe she was more tired than she thought.
Inside the cave, which opened out some fifteen feet into the mountain, it was light enough to see quite easily, owing to a natural skylight formed by a fissure in the roof, through which dangled the roots of several bushes.
But the real surprise was the children. As well as three other, presumably, Watha Wurrung women and their little ones, there were also eight white-skinned children, as well as Will and Molly, all playing a game. Around them were heaped possum-fur rugs, on which they had clearly spent the night, and the detritus of a morning meal.
On seeing their mother, Will and Molly jumped up and ran to her, gripping her skirts but appearing perfectly happy and hale. Leena knelt and spoke to them in her own tongue, and, apparently satisfied that they were indeed unharmed, said to Binda, ‘They be good, Binda. You did right bringin’ ’em here.’
Binda inclined her head in acknowledgement, then stooped to lift her small grandchild and perch him on her ample hip, where he clung to one of her flat dugs beneath her dress in a manner that looked very painful to Kitty. ‘Better safe than sorry, eh?’
Amber had the good sense not to look too vindicated.
‘The fighting all done?’ Binda asked.
Kitty said, ‘It seems to be, but things are still very on edge.’
Binda looked across the cave at the children playing on the sandy floor, oblivious to what had happened overnight. ‘But better take ’em back, eh? Nannie Binda can’t keep ’em for ever.’
Everything was packed up, and twenty minutes later the whole party snaked its way down the mountain to the Watha Wurrung camp, where the three old men still sat by the fire, a small pile of picked-clean bones on the ground in front of them.
The younger men were back now, a dead wallaby evidence of their hunting expedition. They carried spears and the boomerangs Kitty had previously seen used to such spectacular and lethal effect. As if reading her mind, one of the young men withdrew a boomerang from his belt, cocked his arm and, with what seemed to be little more than a flick of his wrist, threw it so far that it disappeared from view. The visitors present all waited open-mouthed—Amber, in particular— for almost a minute, until it came spinning back and landed only inches from his feet. The young man turned and grinned hugely in a manner that suggested he knew full well how impressive his throw had been and the effect it had had on his audience. Show-off, Kitty thought.
Reading her mind, Binda snorted and said, ‘That Warrun, he throw good, he hunt good, he track good, and he think he be so clever.’
Kitty laughed out loud. It was time to go home.
Chapter Twelve
When Kitty and Amber got back to Lilac Cottage, there was a note on the table saying: Gone out, keeping low. Mr Wong would like you to visit him at the Chinese camp. Will see you tonight. Rian xxx
Kitty was vaguely annoyed: she had wanted to talk to him about exactly how soon they could leave Ballarat. She did realise, however, that it wouldn’t be particularly prudent of him, or the crew, to sit around waiting to be visited by the police. They wouldn’t be at the top of Commissioner Rede’s list of insurgents to be arrested, but they had been in the compound the night before, and Rian, especially, was known to Sergeant Coombes.
She showed the note to Amber, whom she had decided to forgive now that it was clear that Leena’s children were safe. ‘I wonder what he wants?’
‘I don’t know. But it might be about Bao.’
‘Why would it be about Bao?’ Through the window, Kitty watched Bodie stalk a bird.
‘Because she hasn’t been very happy lately.’
‘Bao hasn’t?’ Although, now that Amber had mentioned it, Kitty did recall that Bao had been even quieter and more reticent than usual. She had lost weight, too, her hair had lost its lustre, and shadows darkened the delicate skin beneath eyes that now appeared perpetually dull. Kitty had assumed the child was simply not sleeping well, perhaps because of the heat, but had not, to her shame, given the matter much thought beyond that. ‘Do you want to come with me, then? To the village?’
‘I do, but I want to go and see Patrick as well.’
‘I’m sure you do, love, and it’s a nice thought, but you can’t.’
‘We can’t just leave him in the lock-up by himself.’
‘He’s not by himself, and I’m sure Maureen will have been to see him by now.’
Amber kicked the leg of a chair so that it shunted across the floor in grating increments. It was rather annoying. ‘Will they hang him, Ma?’
‘What? No, of course they won’t!’ But Kitty mentally crossed her fingers for the second time that day.
‘They might, you know.’ Silence for a moment. ‘Will Pa be arrested, too?’
Ah. Kitty sat down. ‘Oh, I really don’t think so, sweetheart. Is that what’s worrying you?’
‘But he’s already been arrested here twice. And he was right in the middle of the fighting last night.’
‘Yes, he was, but he’s going to do his best not to be arrested for this.’ Kitty realised how weak her words sounded, and saw that they weren’t doing much to bolster the girl’s confidence. She took Amber’s hands in hers and looked her daughter in the eye. ‘I know your father gets into some scrapes from time to time. Some quite bad ones, occasionally.’ They both allowed themselves a little giggle. ‘But nothing is going to happen to him here, I swear.’ She looked towards the door as Bodie trotted in, a recently murdered willie wagtail in her mouth, dragging it between her front paws. ‘I swear on Bodie’s life, all right? Your father will be fine.’
Amber regarded her for a moment, then nodded in acceptance and ducked under the table to shoo the cat outside.
Kitty, however, didn’t feel quite so convinced by her own words.
Wong Fu passed her a tiny cup of the aromatic green tea he always offered her when she came to visit, and perched on the tea chest that served as a stool.
‘Forgive me for insisting that we talk in my tent, but I wish this conversation to remain private. You are not discomposed by being alone with me?’
It was a very frank comment, but Kitty had become accustomed to such ingenuousness. Out of the public eye, at least. Around those he did not count as friends, Wong Fu could be extremely circumspect.
She settled herself more comfortably on the cot which was presumably his. Its twin—just as narrow and no doubt equally unforgiving—sat against the other side of the small tent, the worn fabric doll on the flat pillow confirming that
it belonged to Bao.
‘No, I’m not, Mr Wong. Thank you for asking.’
Wong Fu sipped his tea and looked uncharacteristically ill at ease. And very tired, the shadows beneath his eyes accentuated. ‘How is Amber?’ he asked.
‘She’s well, thank you.’
He nodded. Another silence. Kitty waited. Then: ‘The clash at Eureka last night. You witnessed it?’
‘It was more than a clash, Mr Wong, it was a rout, and it hasn’t stopped yet. The soldiers and police are still out and about causing havoc, and the town’s reeling. Have you not left your camp today?’
‘No. And we will not until this has settled. It is nothing to do with us.’
It wasn’t, either, Kitty reflected. The Chinese would go on working the edges and the dregs of the goldfields regardless of the politics of the other diggers, silent, inscrutable and unpopular.
Wong Fu set down his cup and sighed. ‘Bao has been terrified. She has spent the past four nights cowering on her cot, the blanket over her head, weeping.’
Kitty looked at him aghast. ‘But…why?’
His shoulders rose, then slumped again in defeat. ‘I have asked her, of course, but she will not tell me. Not directly.’ He sighed again, the creases at the corners of his mouth betraying his anxiety. ‘I fear something has happened to her mind. With our continued persecution, and the growing tension over the past months and the soldiers coming, she has been…not quite with us.’ He picked up the end of his queue, examined it momentarily for split ends while he gathered his thoughts, then let it drop. ‘And since the terrible business with Tuttle and Searle, she has become so much worse. I am very worried, Mrs Farrell. I wish her mother were here.’
Now Kitty knew why he had asked her to call, and her heart ached for him. ‘Would you like me to talk to her, Mr Wong?’
‘Thank you for your kind offer, Mrs Farrell, but I do not think talk will help.’
Kitty blinked at his bluntness.
‘Please do not be offended. What I believe she needs most is to leave Ballarat for a time. My brother in Melbourne has his wife with him. I would like her to go there. I will be forever in your debt if you would take her there for me.’
Band of Gold Page 17
