Daniel joined the men smoking on the verandah. Henry Abbott was talking business as usual, complaining loudly to his host about a new pumping unit that had broken down. Water was always a problem in the mines. Reefs of gold-bearing quartz lay within immensely hard rock. Five hundred million years ago, superheated water had flowed down fault lines and fissures in the earth’s crust, dissolving gold from the surrounding stone. As the boiling streams cooled, they formed rich deposits that followed the course of these ancient flows. The danger of flooding inevitably accompanied any attempt to exploit such inaccessible veins of gold.
Mother Earth would not easily concede her riches, but Abbott planned to defy nature. He’d invested in four immense pumps, imported from Cornwall. They were the latest innovation and had cost a fortune. But for Henry, no price was too high if it meant the power of the underground rivers might be defeated.
The massive machines spewed eight million gallons from the mine every twenty-four hours, reaching depths of fifteen hundred feet. Enormous steam engines provided power. Each engine moved two pump rods down the shaft and each rod worked three pumps, swallowing vast amounts of water. The combined weight of the rods and pumps exceeded a thousand tons.
Despite this impressive display of engineering, pumps and flows constantly battled each other. All too often the subterranean rivers won, cutting production and company profits. Incensed by these delays, Henry pressured his managers to extend the hours of the miners. Sometimes men laboured knee-deep in water or were sent down shafts subject to unexpected flooding. Even so, failed pumps inevitably left productive pits unmined for days and even weeks. James Mitchell was listening sympathetically to Henry’s grievances.
Daniel poured himself a drink and stood close enough to eavesdrop. He quite enjoyed listening to Abbott’s misfortunes. Soon the topic shifted to one far closer to his heart. Henry wanted a local levy on sheep. Funds would go to the newly formed Hills End Tiger and Eagle Extermination Society, of which Henry was president. Stock protection associations, comprising wealthy members of the squattocracy, were becoming fashionable. Although purporting to speak on behalf of the entire farming community, Daniel noted their agenda invariably suited the wool kings best.
Abbott’s levy was no exception. He proposed that farmers pay a halfpenny per head if they owned under a thousand sheep. Those with over a thousand head paid a farthing, half the tariff of their smaller, poorer neighbours. On top of this obvious inequity, the funding flowed directly back into the hands of the very wealthy pastoralists who were behind the associations in the first place.
Daniel couldn’t leave such nonsense unchallenged. Downing his whisky, he strode over to join the conversation.
‘Don’t be taken in by this garbage, James. Henry’s running his own agenda. This levy amounts to compulsory subscription of every farmer hereabouts to his damned association. We all know its membership is falling. Little wonder, thanks to the rarity of tigers and eagles and the abundance of ways Henry invents to line his own pockets.’
James slapped his thigh and laughed. ‘By George, he might be right, Henry. Parliament won’t raise a levy based on the odd rogue tiger.’
‘I’d hardly call it the odd rogue tiger,’ said another man. ‘I’ve eyewitness accounts from my musterers, all trustworthy men. They tell of a dozen or more bloodthirsty beasts, hunting in an organised pack, led by a colossal black dog standing as high as a horse. The demon dog, they call him. It’s not unusual for them to leave twenty sheep, dead or dying, for the shepherds to find in the morning.’
‘It’s true,’ offered another. ‘I’ve lost fifty sheep these past two weeks. A few killed or maimed, the remainder entirely devoured.’
Daniel’s laugh was filled with scorn. ‘What? Sheep entirely devoured by tigers, bones and all? Utter rubbish! You’ll find wild dogs and thieves more likely candidates.’
‘I confess to taking Daniel’s side in this.’ James opened an edition of The Mercury and read aloud from a letter to the editor:
There are more enemies to sheep and lambs than tigers and eagles. Wild dogs for one. But I believe we have a greater evil to contend with . . . a greater pest, namely ‘the Duffer’, who travels far and fast, and can’t be snared or trapped. Tigers rarely kill more than one sheep a night. Whereas Mr Duffer removes sheep in fifties, aye, and in hundreds, and leaves neither skin, bone nor sign behind him.
James passed the newspaper around the group of farmers. Henry snorted in disgust, took a goose-liver appetiser and marched inside. As he went, he cast a look of pure malice at Daniel, who smiled and raised his glass.
Beneath his breath Daniel muttered, ‘Hope you choke on your pâté.’
CHAPTER 16
Luke woke the next morning at first light, having shivered through a cold and miserable night. He called to Bear. The big dog was an excellent warmer-upper, but he didn’t come. His wallaby-skin rug lay empty by the hearth. Pulling on an extra coat, Luke went outside to brave the morning. To the north, mountain peaks lay shrouded in mist. To the south, pillows of cloud piled high upon each other, billowing to the roof of the sky. A silver rim outlined the thunderhead. A storm was on its way.
He stood for the longest time, scanning the gully’s edge, expecting any moment to see Bear emerge from the trees. But the only movement came from the strengthening wind, roaring through the leaves and branches, whipping them into a frenzy. What to do? Had his fear turned to reality? Had the forest claimed Bear? Daniel was expecting him, but Luke would not leave till Bear came.
High aloft, a pair of wedge-tailed eagles wheeled across the leaden face of the sky, harnessing the turbulence of the coming storm. Flight feathers in their upswept wingtips opened wide, tempering the force of the gale that battered the mountain.
They surveyed the earth with eyes that could see rabbits half a mile away. To the east, on the crest of the range, the she-eagle spotted movement. Reading the wind, she altered the angle of her wings and veered into a new flight path. Her mate followed close behind her, attracted by the same desperate scene.
Three half-grown tiger cubs sat together on a stony ridge. They presented an easy target, making no effort to seek cover. Instead they remained dangerously exposed, peering over the edge of the track. In the shadow of rocks beside the trail, Coorinna’s body hung from a wire snare drawn tight around her throat.
Jim Patterson had finally outsmarted his quarry. A growing obsession with the demon dog had caused him to venture high into the uplands, where he’d chanced upon a narrow mountain track. It showed signs of recent use, not in itself unusual. What caught Jim’s trained eye was a tuft of thick, black fur snagged on a wattle branch, fur unlike anything he’d ever seen. Soft and wavy, nothing like the coarse black hair of devils. The stony ground made tracking difficult, but he persevered, following the trail uphill. In a patch of soft earth where a spring bubbled from the hillside, he found what he wanted. The footprints of a dog and a tiger. He paused to get his bearings and hurried back to camp.
Gathering bundles of bracken, he placed the fronds in a can of water along with ten wire snares, and set it on the fire. Boiling snares with ferns removed the scent of man and metal. After ten minutes he fished out the wire loops. Using a piece of clean hessian like a rough mitten, he carefully wrapped the snares in fresh gumleaves, ensuring his skin didn’t touch the wire. Next he stood by the fire, allowing smoke to billow over his body and the snares, permeating his clothes from top to bottom. Chaining his kelpie to a tree, Jim began the long climb back up the mountain.
He positioned the trap right where the precarious path down the mountain narrowed to the width of just a few feet. On one side rose a sheer rock face – the other fell away to steep, ferny cliffs. No room for his victim to sidestep the danger. Rubbing his hands in dirt to further disguise his scent, Jim carefully set the snare. Anchoring its free end to a stump, he rested the loop between two bauera bushes flanking the trail. To hold the noose open, he used painstakingly collected filaments of spider web, wound with de
licate care at intervals along the wire and attached to leaves and twigs. After he’d completed his work, invisible gossamer threads held the noose in the path of any large animal using the trail. Clever Coorinna’s luck had finally run out.
With wings folded against her body, the she-eagle dived. The cubs cowered in fear of the shadow as she screamed earthwards. And a furious snarl rose in Bear’s throat. He sprang from his vigil by Coorinna’s body. In a measured leap he flung himself into the air, his snapping jaws almost snatching the eagle mid-flight. She banked and somersaulted, letting the wind restore her to the sky.
Bear crouched over Coorinna’s frightened cubs. Now a new sound startled him; something was coming. Jim Patterson rounded a bend in the track. Ever so slowly he raised the rifle to his shoulder. Bear recognised the action, familiar with the bright flash and deafening noise that inevitably followed. Once before, the pain of seared flesh had accompanied that same noise, that same threatening gesture. Before Jim could properly take aim, Bear hurled himself back up the path and around the corner, driving the cubs before him.
Jim swore out loud and lowered the rifle as the animals vanished into the forest. He slid down the shaly slope to examine Coorinna’s body. He scoured the ground up and down the trail for evidence of other tigers. Apart from the spoor of the half-grown cubs, nothing more was to be found, aside from Coorinna’s own tracks. The scoffing words of a local landowner came back to him.
‘There’s no pack of tigers around here. The odd one maybe, is all. Feral dog packs? Now that’s a different story. But not tigers. You’d make more money selling a live tiger to a zoo than trapping one for its scalp.’
Taking cutters from his belt, Jim snipped the wire noose and shouldered the strangled tiger up the bank and onto the path. Perhaps the farmer was right. On an impulse Jim decided to track the tiger cubs to their lair, wherever that was, and take them alive. That was where the big money was. And as for that monstrous brute of a dog, his scalp also carried a generous bounty.
Jim glanced at the threatening sky. Black clouds boiled in from the west. The weather was closing in, but the prospect of capturing the animals was too sweet to resist. Ignoring the elements, Jim hauled Coorinna’s corpse into a tree and started off after Bear and the cubs.
Tracking them was simple. It wasn’t possible for large animals to move through such thick forest without leaving an obvious trail. Trees sheltered him from the worst of the storm as it gathered strength and fury over the range. Only when forced to cross rocky, open ground did the driving rain almost knock him off his feet. Hour after hour, he pursued his quarry, battling the cold and growing exhaustion.
Jim finally lost their tracks when he came to a creek at the edge of a clearing. He stopped to catch his breath. A hut loomed out of the rain. Wait, he knew this place. Years ago Clarry had disputed Jim’s right to trap here, and he’d agreed to move on. Since then the two men had remained civil, if not friendly, to each other.
Jim abandoned the trail. If old Clarry could put him up for a bit, he’d continue his chase in the morning when the weather cleared. He ran across the clearing to the hut, shook off the worst of the rain, and pushed inside. A broad-shouldered figure, back turned, stood before a fire. Too tall for Clarry. Jim raised his rifle and trained it on the stranger, grateful the noise of the storm had allowed him to enter unheard. ‘Turn around slowly.’
The figure swung to face him. A young man, his firearm safely out of reach.
‘Who are you?’ asked Jim. ‘Where’s Clarry?’
No answer. Perhaps there was advantage in this. A bounty was on offer for an escaped prisoner. Henry Abbott himself had posted a fifty-pound reward. If this was the bloke, the tigers could wait.
‘Hands up, son.’
Desperately Luke lunged for his rifle. Jim kicked it away, firing a warning shot into the roof of the hut. Luke lost balance, his head smashing against the stone chimney.
In that instant, Jim was thrown to the ground from behind. With a terrifying snarl Bear went for his throat. The trapper screamed as the dog seized him by the scruff of the neck, shaking him as a terrier shakes a rat. Bear threw Jim on his back, and stood over him, mad with rage and fear. Luke lay as if dead on the floor. First Coorinna, now Luke. And both were somehow connected to this man who lay whimpering before him.
If Jim had stayed quiet, offered no threat, he might have escaped. Instead, he reached for his rifle.
Bear struck. Jim folded his arms over his face and throat, trying to shield himself from the dog’s slashing fangs. First his oilskin coat-sleeves were torn to shreds, followed by his flannel shirt. Soon his arms were ripped and bleeding. He was weakening. His hands fell to the floor. Bear struck again. Seizing the man’s unguarded throat, he hurled himself backwards, tearing the carotid artery. Blood spurted in time with the beat of Jim’s heart. Soon the man lay, glassy-eyed, on the muddied, gore-drenched floor.
Bear went to investigate Luke’s still form. His master still lived. Bear lay down beside him and barked to summon the cubs. If the young tigers heeded his call, well and good. If not, they must fend for themselves. Bear would not leave Luke’s side tonight.
CHAPTER 17
When Luke came round, Bear’s warm, comforting body lay pressed against him. The dog licked his face, rousing him, bringing memories of the armed intruder rushing back. His head ached and felt heavy as lead. Perhaps he’d been shot? Slowly he sat up and looked around the hut.
What he saw astonished him. The stranger lay dead in the middle of the floor, an ugly, gaping wound at his throat. Bear pushed his head against Luke’s hand. Caked blood matted his coat. Luke looked from the dead man to Bear, then back to the dead man, struggling for another explanation, but there was none. Absurdly, he wondered what Belle would think of Bear now – all her careful grooming ruined.
The dreadful reality was sinking in. Bear had killed a man, living up to his reputation as a demon dog. Yet without his intervention, Luke would be on his way back to prison – or dead. He knew, given the choice, he’d take death over captivity.
Luke couldn’t stop staring at the dog, stunned by what he’d done. Bear smiled back, wagged his tail a little and then curled up on Luke’s ferny bed. This was a first. Luke called to him and patted the dog’s own mat, indicating where he should lie, but Bear remained on the bed. Luke went over and took him by the collar. Still he refused to move.
A rustling beneath the bracken caught Luke’s eye. Had the young devils found themselves a new daytime den? But a quick check of their improvised pouch confirmed all three babies sound asleep within.
Bear nuzzled the bed. What was that? A tawny, whiskered face with bright eyes peered up from among the fronds. Luke gently parted the bracken. How on earth? Three young tigers cowered between Bear’s body and the wall. It made no sense. Luke closed the door to stop the animals escaping into the forest. For once Bear showed no sign of restlessness despite the late afternoon hour. He lay contentedly beside the cubs.
The bloodied corpse in the centre of the room demanded Luke’s attention. Its dead eyes seemed to follow Luke about the room, as if pleading for help that could never come. He threw a blanket over the body to avoid seeing the stranger’s face. Then he drank some rum, feeling it burn his throat and warm his freezing body. Sitting down on the bench, he tried to process what had happened, marvelling at Bear’s split-second timing and the savagery of his attack.
What now? Luke didn’t fancy the grim task of burying a man barely cold, but bury him he must. The truth could only be concealed if the stranger’s body vanished. At least this time Luke had the proper tools for the job. He struggled to drag the body to the door, pausing for a moment to tie Bear up and place the devils’ pouch in the old meat safe, which doubled as a cage. The hut now housed quite a menagerie.
Luke chose a soft patch of ground near Clarry’s grave and proceeded to dig. Wet earth gave way easily, and before long the trench was deep enough to receive a body. He paused to retrieve a few rounds of ammunition from
the man’s belt. Then, with a shove of his foot, the body slid and fell, landing face-up. Urgently Luke shovelled dirt into the grave. Earth rained down on the stranger, but no matter how quickly Luke shovelled, he couldn’t bury the image of the man’s dead eyes and the gash in his throat.
There. The job was done. Luke wanted to say a few holy words, as Angus had done for Clarry, but he had no right. This man’s death felt like his fault. So he received no sacrament, however humble.
In the hut, Luke shovelled the blood-soaked dirt from the floor into a burlap sack. Then he lugged it down to the creek. Dark, sticky earth stained the stream a muddy red. Luke repeated this process again and again, obliterating all evidence of Bear’s crime, then fetched fresh river sand and ferns for the floor.
Was his imagination playing tricks or did the sour stench of death lie just as heavily in the air as before? Luke levelled the ground as best he could. The twilight sky was streaked with rosy clouds, indicating that the storm had passed. Luke’s spirits lifted enough for him to light a fire and cook a rabbit for dinner. He cut another into pieces for the devils. They were awake now, and growling hungrily from the confines of their makeshift cage.
Luke fed them and allowed the babies a run around the hut. The devils began digging where the man had died. Had they smelt his blood? Revolted, Luke locked them away again.
The tigers lay quiet, hiding as best they could behind Bear. Luke chopped up his last rabbit and tried tempting them with pieces of meat. Bear gulped down the offerings, but the cubs shrank from Luke. So he retreated to the opposite side of the hut and sat down on the bench, quietly observing. Bear’s lack of fear appeared to give the biggest cub confidence. It poked his head up and sniffed the air. He threw it a lamb shank that he’d turfed from the meat safe to make room for the devils. These days Abbott’s sheep had him to fear as well as wild dogs.
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