by Peter Corris
Nervously, Bracken read The Argus' scant intelligence from the other colonies trying to determine whether one of them would provide a safer billet. Sydney was a definite non-starter; if anything, the Irish influence was stronger there than in Melbourne and, politically, of a more uncertain temper. With his pale complexion, sensitive skin and dislike of the heat, sub-tropical Brisbane had no appeal for him. Nonconformist Adelaide, untainted by convictism and little affected by the gold fever and therefore the dirt-scratching Irish and their priests, was a possibility, but nothing he read about the place other than its history and social composition attracted Bracken. Provincial towns like Ballarat and Bendigo he briefly considered and rejected. He had not abandoned ambition, had not travelled across the world to bury himself in mediocrity.
He decided to remain in Melbourne but to make a prudent start by entering into a junior partnership with an established legal firm. Such arrangements were not the subject of advertisements in The Argus, but Bracken heard of them by striking up conversations and buying drinks in the several taverns around the magistrates' courts. He investigated several practices looking to take in new members before settling on Gladehill & Browne, a conservative Collins Street firm of solicitors whose clients were mostly made up of substantial landowners and city merchants. His offer to contribute £300 of capital earned him a luncheon in a Flinders Street eating house with William Browne who was everything Bracken hoped he would be—a Londoner by birth who had come to the Port Phillip Bay colony as an infant with his soldier father, returned to England for his education, and migrated to Victoria to grow rich by practising law. He appeared to have prospered and also to have grown slightly vague, a fact appreciated by Bracken.
Browne forked a large portion of mutton chop into his mouth, chewed and looked short-sightedly across the table. 'Sir Frederick Gladehill is an older gentleman and rather set in his ways,' he said. 'I like to think of myself as somewhat more … go-ahead, if that is not too racy a phrase.'
Bracken nodded and concentrated on chewing the none-too-tender meat. When he had swallowed he spoke carefully in his newly acquired neutral accent. 'A balance between the old and the new?'
'Precisely. Now, your own expertise, according to your excellent letter and references, is in insurance, shipping and mineral exploration.'
Bracken, who had laboured hard at framing the letter and forging the references, had nominated areas he had studied intensely in Stevenson and in those he considered it least likely for his countrymen to be concerned. Judging from the court lists, criminal law was to be avoided if he wished to steer clear of the Irish. Indeed anything involving the constabulary was dangerous, for the Rileys and Scanlons and Lonigans were thick on the ground in all ranks. 'Just so, Mr Browne. Fascinating areas of the law I've always found, and important wherever the Queen's writ runs. Of course, I'll have to catch up on local rules and regulations.'
Browne poured judicious measures of claret for his guest and himself. 'As to that, you need to have little concern, sir. We do things here much as they do at home. Your experience in Bath … '
'Bristol.'
'Yes. Bristol and Melbourne, peas in a pod, I assure you, although a small body of legislation and case law is developing. You might find it an interesting study. Well, we are a small firm as you know and haven't done much in those areas. But you could be the man to take us in that direction. Ah, d'you have a fancy to travel?'
An unexpected turn in the conversation for Bracken. 'Travel?' he said warily.
'Indeed. Your response to our … invitation is particularly welcoming at this time. We are thinking of expanding our business into the country centres. And I mean by that port towns like Geelong, Warrnambool, Portland and the like, as well as the hinterland. I must say this is more my notion than Sir Frederick's, but I think it has great merit. Would you be interested in making journeys to these places, Mr Bracken? Sniffing the wind, as it were.'
Bracken had seen the well-appointed Cobb & Co coaches on the roads and knew also that there was a considerable degree of comfort to be had, at a price, on the railway lines connecting the major towns. What better way to acquaint himself with the colony, size-up opportunites and keep himself, to a degree, under cover? He dabbed at his mouth with a napkin. 'I think that's a splendid notion, Mr Browne. Most enterprising, and I can think of nothing that would suit me better.'
Browne extended his hand across the table. 'Welcome to the firm, Mr Bracken.'
Everything proceeded to Bracken's satisfaction. The partnership documents were drawn up and he noted with satisfaction that his name was not to appear on the firm's nameplate or stationery. He rented rooms in West Melbourne and occupied an office in Gladehill & Browne's chambers. He travelled extensively and mostly in comfort (a few enforced horseback rides and bone-shaking journeys in ill-sprung carts the exception) and, as he had anticipated, found the change of scene and the variety of the work very much to his taste. He appeared in court rarely and without flamboyance, resisting all suggestions that he apply for registration as a barrister. In truth, a good part of his work was social and involved drinking and eating with local dignitaries, advising thrusting businessmen on their opportunities and suggesting investments to clients. This was all well within his competence; he earned substantial fees for his efforts and made judicious and profitable investments himself.
The disease he had brought with him from Dublin disappeared in time and he was able to enjoy several interesting and comfortable liaisons with women in Melbourne and several provincial towns. He preferred the discreet wives of discreet men and retreated at the first sign of disturbing symptoms of possessiveness or jealousy. His only complaint, which he frequently voiced to a small circle of acquaintances, mostly connected with the profession, was climatological. Bracken found the summer heat of Victoria trying. There was no escape, such as to the hill stations of India which he had read about. The entire continent baked under a fierce sun for three months and Bracken attempted to limit his travelling as much as possible in this season.
As he prospered, he began to think of building himself a house. He had a fancy to have his own residence by the age of thirty. His thoughts naturally turned to water and shade, and he weighed the merits of South Yarra and Kew. He knew to proceed cautiously; several of the firm's clients had brought themselves close to insolvency through ambitious building plans. His initial investigations were discouraging—the architect's charges, labour and material costs would stretch him to the limit even if he could secure a suitable block at a reasonable price. With the novelty of his professional life wearing off and for want of other mental stimulation, the house-building project began to obsess him. He poured over books on architecture and garden design, made excursions to study buildings of the ilk of Hillview, of which there were many, and made an intense study of the real estate market.
In idle moments, now increasingly common, he contemplated his investments, considered various quick-return speculations and rejected them. Although his earnings were substantial and his dividends from the practice satisfactory, he had saved little. He lived well, having moved to more comfortable rooms and indulging a taste for expensive English clothes and shoes and good meals in stylish surroundings. He had joined several clubs and was obliged to provide lunches and dinners for clients at his own expense. A few evenings in a gambling room convinced him that that uncertain way to a fortune was now closed to him. He had lost his skill with the cards and his nerve for betting and playing the odds. Stories of the good fortune of others began to irk him and he became short-tempered and prone to bouts of depression. Disinclined to the civilities of female company, he took to drinking with male friends, sometimes to excess. He began to feel the substance of the life he had carefully and successfully constructed evaporating and all, as he saw it, for the lack of several thousand pounds.
This mood of despondency, inattention to work and aimlessness was immediately dispelled when he became aware of the correspondence between William Browne and one Henry Fanshaw
e of Fanlock station in the Mount Perfect district to the north-west.
15
The correspondence came Bracken's way initially by sheer mischance. One of the clerks deputised to draft a letter to the squatter had inadvertently left a rough copy of his effort on Bracken's desk along with work meant for him. Bracken, bored and suffering from a cold, had detached the sheet with an irritated sniff and read it with a view to putting a flea in the young man's ear. The subject was mineral rights, land claims and the abstruse areas of treasure-trove and salvage. Bracken was fascinated by the possibilities hinted at. He returned the rough to the clerk's desk, said nothing, but seized the first available opportunity, by staying back to work late, to look through Browne's files.
The several letters he discovered intrigued him with their original allusiveness giving way to more specific information and queries. The file also contained copies of Browne's replies written in his own hand. Evidently the lawyer had not been willing to entrust the copying to an underling except for the letter which outlined aspects of the law with no reference to anything concrete.
'This squatter's on to something,' Bracken said to the empty office as he made rapid notes. 'And old William knows it's fishy.'
He turned up a copy of Fanshawe's latest account, which suggested that Browne had performed services not recorded in the office correspondence. For the first time in many months, Bracken found himself excited by something other than his dreams of a grand house. Several times he tried to engage Browne in conversations about squatters and their problems, once even mentioning the Mount Perfect district which he had heard about but never visited. Browne failed to take the bait, but Bracken observed a furtiveness in him that was entirely foreign to his usual bluff, hearty manner. Bracken did not want to overplay his hand so contented himself with learning everything he could about Fanshawe and Fanlock and looking for an opportunity to visit the district.
It came, or rather he contrived it, in the form of an insurance matter involving Wimmera Gold Mines Incorporated and Samuel Richards, saw-miller, of the town of Wilding. After a collapse and flooding in the western extension of the Murchison mine, resulting in the loss of two men's lives, the mining company's insurers, Colonial Underwriters Limited, had been obliged to pay compensation to the dead miners' wives. Consequently, it had lodged a claim against Richards for supplying defective timber shoring. Prudently, Richards had taken out insurance cover against just such an eventuality with Industrial Protection Limited. The dispute had become the talk of the insurance and legal world in Melbourne when it became known that both sides were anxious to avoid heavy court costs but neither was prepared to admit liability.
'Fat fees in this for certain,' one of Bracken's drinking companions confided in a Lonsdale Street tavern.
Bracken agreed over that and the following tankards of beer and elicited more information in the course of an expensive dinner. He then returned to his office and drafted letters which resulted, in a remarkably short time, in both parties agreeing to the appointment of an arbitrator, a legally qualified expert in matters of insurance, Mr Daniel Bracken of Gladehill & Browne. It meant travel in late January, which Bracken was not normally prepared to do, and bearing his own expenses until his submission was made. Others at the firm doubted the wisdom of such shortcuts through the normally remunerative legal processes, but Bracken persisted in maintaining that arbitration would come to play an increasingly important part in the administrative affairs of the colony and the thing to do was to get in on the ground floor.
Sir Frederick Gladehill, seventy-five years of age with failing eyesight and hearing but sharp in his prejudices, was at the partners' meeting when the matter of Bracken's mediating role was discussed. 'What was that you said?' he inquired, cupping his ear.
With some difficulty, Bracken controlled his impatience. 'I said we should get in on the ground floor with this, sir.'
'And what, precisely, does that mean?'
Browne leaned across the table and spoke close to Gladehill's better ear. 'It means we should involve ourselves in this new business at the outset, Sir Frederick. Show that we are a modern, progressive firm.'
'I wasn't asking you,' Gladehill snarled. 'I was asking the Irishman.'
It was at that moment that Daniel Bracken began to think that his talents were wasted on the firm of Gladehill & Browne.
Bracken's journey to Wilding was the most arduous he had so far taken in the colony. The weather was oppressive and the north-west road was rough, with little comfort offered along the way. Bracken's cold, which had developed in the early summer, had persisted and he was suffering from other maladies—intermittent toothache, shortness of breath and stiffness of the joints. The dread thought that he had taken a more severe disease from the Dublin whore or one of his subsequent conquests haunted and depressed him. Anxiously, he investigated his parts for sores and checked for fever and unusual bowel motions.
The coach suffered several breakdowns caused by the bad state of the road. One of these, on the outskirts of Beaufort, was prolonged and the unhappy passengers were assailed by a two-hour dust storm that blanked out the sun and raised the heat so that one woman fainted and Bracken himself thought that each breath might be his last. The dust was followed by warm, lashing rain that quickly put a layer of mud over the road, causing the coach to slide sickeningly and jolt in newly exposed ruts. By the time he reached Wilding, Bracken was fit only for a few mouthfuls of stew in the dining room of the Commercial Hotel, several stiff hot brandies and bed.
His health remained precarious throughout his stay and he made an indifferent job of the arbitration. In truth, the details of the case bored him and he had difficulty in summoning up all the facts and appropriate judicial manner as required. Somehow he staggered through it, giving satisfaction to neither party but at least laying the matter to rest. He found consolation in the thought that the representatives of the insurance companies, Melbourne and Sydney men, were more disconcerted by the roughness of the town than he, and more anxious to be quit of it. Also, the major reason for his lacklustre performance was that he had not come to Wilding to save insurance companies' money but to make some for himself by finding out what Henry Fanshawe and William Browne were up to.
'Mr Fanshawe?' the barman at the Commercial said in response to a cautious approach from Bracken. 'He runs a fine property, Fanlock, out along the Jardwalong River. Reasonable country, very good in fine seasons like the last few.'
'Yes, the district is looking prosperous,' Bracken said.
The barman wiped a glass and wondered if the rather overweight and pale city man would order another drink. Beer at eleven o'clock in the morning was one thing, but brandy and soda was quite another. He'd already run up quite a bill in the hotel, mostly for beverages, and the licensee's instruction had been to humour him. 'Have you got business with Mr Fanshawe, Mr Bracken?'
'No, no,' Bracken said hastily. 'A member of my firm represents him. Just making conversation.'
The barman nodded, judging that the two brandies he'd served him weren't the lawyer's first drinks for the day. He noticed Wesley Lincoln saunter into the bar and pointed in his direction. 'Here's one of Mr Fanshawe's men now. An American, he is. I'd like to take a trip there myself … '
Bracken abruptly offered his glass for a refill and then shuffled along to where Lincoln was leaning his lanky frame against the bar. 'I'm told you're an American.'
Lincoln removed his hat with his black-gloved left hand and placed it on the bar. 'That's correct, sir. And right proud of it.'
Bracken extended his hand, taking care to keep it from shaking. He did not feel at all well. 'Daniel Bracken—a good many of my relatives went to your country in the time of the famine.'
Lincoln shook the offered hand. His beer arrived and he raised it ceremoniously. 'I met a good few of 'em up and down the country. No Brackens that I recall, but Kellys and O'Malleys aplenty.'
'I had a fancy to go there myself once, but chance led me to this country. I'
ve always wondered whether I made a mistake. I'd like your opinion on that, Mr Lincoln. Which is the better country?'
Lincoln, an experienced bar-room performer, knew he had encountered a drink-buyer. Instead of answering immediately he stared off into the distance and drained his glass in two long swallows.
'Another?' Bracken said.
Deliberately, Lincoln took out his tobacco pouch, and, as he had expected, his companion produced a cigar case and snapped it open. 'Don't mind if I do, Mr Bracken.'
Bracken tossed off his own drink and lifted two fingers to the barman. Lincoln took a cigar and rolled it in his gloved fingers. His right hand then moved with a rapidity that amazed Bracken. Suddenly, after a bare flicker of movement, he was holding an open clasp knife and delicately cutting the end from the cigar. The American looked up and smiled. 'Cut your cigar, sir?'
Mesmerised, and although he had been smoking too much of late and didn't really want a cigar at that moment, Bracken took one from the case and gave it to Lincoln. The razor-sharp blade nipped the end of the cigar. Then the knife was gone and Lincoln was holding out a lit match with a rock steady hand. Bracken put the cigar in his mouth, leant forward and puffed. 'Thank you. I must say you have remarkable manual dexterity.'
Lincoln lit his cigar and held up the gloved hand. 'I try to make the one do the work of two.'
'I see.'
'War wound.'
The barman brought the drinks. Bracken was feeling slightly tipsy and resolved to go slowly but Lincoln drank with gusto, finishing the beer in a couple of long swallows. 'Well, sir, thank you for the drink. I guess I'd better be getting along.'
