A Far Country

by John Fletcher

  ‘If it keeps raining—’

  Challoner’s white fingers played with a cylindrical ebony ruler. ‘It is no concern of ours.’

  ‘But common humanity—’

  ‘That is enough. They should have thought of the dangers before they built there.’ The accountant did not sound angry but Jason would have found anger easier to bear than his evident indifference.

  ‘They may drown.’

  ‘Unlikely, I would say. In any case, that is not our concern.’

  ‘I think—’

  Challoner interrupted. ‘Hallam, I said that’s enough. The dockets for the shipments to the foundry … Do you have them there?’

  That night, somewhere up in the range, some natural barrier to the floodwater gave way. Even from his room Jason heard the roar of the creek. He learned later that the level rose three feet in ten minutes, sweeping away all the puny barriers that had been raised in its path. That was how long it took for every dugout to be under water. Sticks of furniture, crates of chickens, livestock of various kinds, were swept away in the flood. Babies, too: at least three. The burrows dug out of the creek banks collapsed. People who owned nothing suddenly found themselves with even less as their homes disappeared.

  Morning shed grey light on a scene of devastation: swirling waters as brown as chocolate washed-out banks, saturated scarecrows picking over banks of mud in search of anything that might be salvaged. Destitution, misery, despair under the leaden weight of the rain.

  First thing Jason was there, too, along with a maintenance team from the mine. They salvaged what there was to save. It wasn’t much.

  ‘What shall we do?’ Gwyneth wept.

  ‘Start again,’ he said uncomfortably. It was useless advice but what else was there?

  John Davey was up from the mine, grumbling about lost time, lost production, lost wages.

  Saw Jason talking to his wife. His face darkened.

  ‘You get away from her,’ he shouted.

  Sixteen hours non-stop, fingernails ripped, hands raw from picking over debris in the pelting rain, seeing scenes of misery that no man should have to see, Jason had had enough.

  He bunched his fists, moved closer to Davey, crowding him. He stared down at him. ‘Take my advice. You want to keep your wife, look after her. Another thing. Don’t raise your voice at me.’

  He was out of line, of course he was. A man’s dealings with his wife were his business and Davey was the sort to prove it.

  The next day Gwyneth, face bruised, lip cut.

  ‘An accident, that’s what it was!’

  Jason did not believe her. He went looking for her husband, found him in the pub, picked a fight. John Davey was tough but little whereas Jason was now six feet tall and big with it. He was also mad with rage. Three minutes of one-sided warfare and he had to be dragged off the Welsh miner before he killed him, ended up in the Redruth lock-up with the drunks.

  He stared out at the still-pouring rain. Talk your way out of this, he thought.

  ‘When do I get out of here?’ he asked the gaoler.

  ‘Got an appointment?’

  ‘I’ve got a job.’

  ‘Not any more you haven’t. The Secretary sent word from Adelaide. You’re fired.’

  Even in the gaol, everyone knew everyone else’s business.

  ‘Why?’

  The gaoler shrugged. ‘Fighting?’

  Jason knew better. Henry Ayers had obviously not believed his lies about the petition. John Davey, friend of management, might have had something to do with it, too.

  ‘The magistrate will be here in a couple of weeks,’ the gaoler said. ‘In the meantime you can stay where you are.’

  ‘The magistrate? But—’

  ‘Who did you expect? The Queen, maybe?’

  This was serious. A magistrate meant the possibility of a gaol sentence. For affray? Six months, probably more.

  One of the drunks, sore but sober, was on his way.

  ‘Find Michael,’ Jason said to him. ‘Find the black boy. Tell him what’s happened.’

  He had no hope that Mura could do anything, could not even be sure that the drunk would find him, but at least had done what he could. Mura, if he was sober enough to understand, would have been told what had happened. What he would do with the knowledge, if anything, would be another story but at least he would know.

  How do I get out of here? Jason wondered. The idea of six months was unthinkable but the walls of the gaol were sixteen feet high, crowned with broken glass, and the gate was of studded oak. There was no way out.

  Two nights later, another drunk, yelling and singing, was brought in: Mark Mitchell, friend of Silas Tregloam, not much given to booze.

  ‘What happened to you?’ Jason asked.

  ‘Brought a message,’ Mark whispered, suddenly sober. ‘You got to get out of yur.’

  ‘How do I do that?’

  ‘There’ll be a rope over the wall tonight.’

  ‘If they see me they’ll shoot me.’

  ‘You must get out. The way you went for Davey, they’ll be after you for attempted murder. They convict you of that, it’ll mean ten years.’

  Jason could not believe it. ‘Ten years?’

  ‘Or more. People know ’bout his wife, see. Don’ like it.’

  ‘What about his wife?’

  ‘Don’t treat me like a fool.’

  There were cells along the back wall of the exercise yard, each with its door and lock. Jason prayed that the gaoler, confident in the security of his walls, would follow his usual practice of leaving the cells unlocked. A rope over the wall would not help if he was locked away in a cell.

  His heart sank when at dusk the gaoler said, ‘Inside …’

  For a wild moment Jason thought of resisting but it was pointless. With bad grace he shuffled into the cell, small, with a tiny barred window not more than a foot square and a heavy wooden door. The door slammed behind him. The steel bolt securing the door shot home. Footsteps crunched, withdrawing across the yard. Silence but for the almost inaudible cawing of crows in the gum trees on the far side of the wall.

  He sat, head in hands, on the edge of the wooden plank that projected from the white-washed wall. Despair settled on him in the silence.

  Slowly the daylight faded. Occasional clangs and shouts came from the rest of the building. He welcomed them. They showed that even in here he was not entirely alone but eventually they died and silence settled over the prison.

  Jason went to the door, tested it cautiously. It did not budge. The closely barred window, steel bars set firmly into the stonework, was as impassable as the door. Even without the bars it would have been too narrow to crawl through. In his mind’s eye he could see the outer wall, smooth and high, its crown of jagged glass shining in the moonlight. Absolutely impossible.

  He was here until someone decided to let him out.

  A whisper of sound, barely audible.

  The prison had been silent for what seemed hours. For a moment Jason thought he had imagined it. A tiny mouse of sound, the barest shift and scuttle of sound, followed by silence. The gaol’s previous noises had all been assertive, whereas now … It was its very furtiveness that drew this particular sound to his attention.

  He waited but it did not come again.

  After a few minutes he stood, went to the door and pressed on it with the flat of his hand, so cautiously that he could barely feel the smooth wooden planks against his palm. The door quivered. He pressed again, a shade harder. It shifted, opened a fraction of an inch. The hinges screeched. Blood flooded his head. He froze. After a minute tried again. Again the screech of rusted hinges. Someone, somehow, had drawn the bolt on the far side of the cell door but how was he to open it without the rest of the world hearing?

  Outside the window he could see the white glare of moonlight but inside the cell everything was dark. His fingers felt for the hinges secured by iron straps to the walls of the cell. He spat on his fingers, used the spittle to lubricate the h
inges, tried, oh so cautiously, once again. Another creak, not so loud this time. Did it again, mouth rapidly drying, what spittle remained now rust-tasting, but this time when he tested it the door shifted with barely a whisper. Heart hammering, he slid the door open a foot, eeled through the gap into the yard.

  On this side of the yard the gaol was in darkness but beyond the shade cast by the buildings the moonlight glared on the bare ground, the blank whiteness of the wall. Anyone glancing out of a window would have seen a fly, had one moved on it. Jason looked about him. The building lay in darkness, silent under the brilliant glare of the moon. Nothing moved.

  He studied the wall. It looked utterly smooth, not a crevice anywhere to give the slightest hope of scaling it without a rope. He was as helpless here in the yard as he had been in the cell.

  Yet the door would not have been unlocked without reason.

  He waited in the shadow of the building, watching the wall in the pitiless white glare.

  Time passed. The moon climbed higher, the area of moonlight advancing inch by inch across the yard. Somewhere in the trees beyond the wall an owl called. Along the top of the wall the crusting of broken glass glistened frostily. Time passed.

  When something did happen it was so quick, so furtive, that he almost missed it: a flicker of movement like an eye-blink, an uncoiling thread of darkness as something flew through the moon-bright air.

  In the corner of the yard a rope had been flung over the wall and now hung motionless in the silent moonlight.

  This was it.

  His head turned slowly, cautiously. Nothing moved. He took a step. Waited. Still nothing. Another step. Waited. Absolute stillness. His heart had settled down during the long wait; now it beat as wildly as ever. He took a deep breath, ran on tiptoe across the yard, seized the rope and yanked it as hard as he could. It held firm. Far above his head the cruel glitter of glass waited. He got a good grip, took one final breath, leant backwards and set the soles of his boots against the face of the wall. Slowly, step by step, inch by inch, he began to climb.

  Hand over hand he rose, breath gusting audibly. Below him the empty yard sucked at him as he climbed higher. If he slipped, if he fell …

  He told himself not to think about it but that was hard to do. Every foot was hard-won, now. The rough texture of the rope was harsh against his burning palms, the muscles of his upper arms quivered under the strain.

  If anyone looked out of the window, if anyone heard the noise he was making …

  An inch, another inch. One by one, the stone slabs of the wall receded beneath him. He dared not look up, had no idea how far he still had to climb, but could feel the glass waiting for him. Now the muscles of his hands were threatening to cramp.

  One more pull, he told himself. Just one. He made himself do it, face contorted, shoulders on fire. He was almost crying with effort and frustration. One more pull. On and on.

  He reached the top. The glass gleamed like green ice in the moonlight. He clung to the top of the wall, drawing deep breaths into tortured lungs. He felt glass fragments puncture the skin of his palms, blood run down his arms. He hooked one leg up and over. The jagged edges of the glass snagged in the cloth of his breeches.

  At least now he was in no immediate danger of falling back into the yard but up here, on top of the wall, he could hardly have been more exposed.

  Teetering on top of the foot-wide wall, he tried with only partial success to use his boots to chip away some of the worst pieces of glass. It made so much noise he was afraid it would waken the township, never mind the gaol.

  I shall never do it, he told himself with mounting panic. Or if I do I shall geld myself on this goddamned glass.

  Another piece of glass cracked and fell away, the sound as loud as a pistol shot in the silence. A sudden yell from below him.

  ‘What’s going on up there?’

  That was it. Gelded or not, he couldn’t risk staying up here a moment longer. In this light, a rifle shot would knock him off the wall as easy as winking. Recklessly he drew up his other leg, gathered himself precariously on top of the wall for a second. He stared down wildly but could see nothing of what lay below. The thought of ten years in prison steeled his nerve. He took a deep breath, launched himself forward into the void. As he did so there came the sharp concussion of a rifle shot.

  He landed in a heap, unsure in the general pain of landing if he had been shot or not. A rush of footsteps. Hands helped him to his feet.

  ‘You all right? Run, can ee?’

  He didn’t know if he was all right or not. Bruised and shaken by the fall, the stealthy slither of blood from a dozen gashes, he could barely speak. He stood, swaying.

  ‘Don’ want to hurry you none,’ Silas said, ‘but if we don’ get movin’ there’s a good chance we may all end up inside. Always assumin’ they don’ shoot us first.’

  Lurching and staggering, helping hand on either elbow, Jason crossed the open ground in front of the gaol into the shelter of the trees.

  ‘’nother ’undred yards,’ Silas urged him. ‘Tes all. Then we got ’osses.’

  Somehow he made it. There were three rescuers—Silas, Eli and Mura—and two horses.

  ‘Git movin’,’ Silas urged him. ‘Fast as ee can. Get a couple miles away ee can afford to rest up a while. Not yur. Go on: git!’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘Don’ ee worry ’bout us! We’ll be fine. Haven’t stirred outa bed all night, ‘as us?’ and nudged Eli in the ribs.

  ‘Never a step,’ Eli agreed.

  Jason needed no further urging, climbed up painfully into the saddle, put heels to the horse’s flanks and took off through the scrub, Mura riding alongside him.

  For all his cuts and bruises his heart was singing.

  Free!

  He galloped on through the moonlight.

  They didn’t get far. Within half an hour Jason was swaying with exhaustion, the pain of the lacerations rapidly becoming more than he could bear.

  He turned in the saddle.

  ‘We’re going to have to find somewhere to lie up,’ he said.

  Until now he had barely taken note of where they had been heading. Now he looked about him. In the dazzle and glare of moonlight it was hard to tell where they were but from the shape of the ground around them he could see that they had climbed out of the valley and were now crossing the range that overlooked the cluster of settlements—Kooringa, Redruth and the rest—with the mine itself on the far slope. Ahead of them, to the west, a dense stand of timber stood black in the moonlight.

  Jason gestured. ‘We’ll rest up there.’

  It could not have been more than half a mile ahead yet he scarcely made it, slipping semi-conscious from the saddle when they were no more than twenty yards into cover.

  They hobbled the horses and turned them loose. Jason stretched himself full length on the ground and went immediately to sleep.

  It was daylight when he woke, Mura shaking him out of an exhausted slumber.

  ‘What is it?’

  A black finger counselled silence. ‘Listen …’

  He did so, heard at once the distant baying of hounds.

  ‘We can outride them,’ Jason said hopefully.

  Mura shook his head. ‘Once we’re out of this timber they’ll see us as we cross the slope. They’re bound to have horses themselves. They’ll ride us down.’

  ‘What, then?’

  ‘We look for water.’

  ‘What do we do with the horses?’

  ‘Take them with us. If we don’t, they’ll find them and know we can’t be far away.’

  A hundred yards further on, in the densest part of the forest, they found water. There was a mere rimmed with reeds from which the creek flowed down the hill. Mura urged his horse forward into the water, dismounted and slid into the hissing reeds until both horse and rider were completely hidden. Jason followed. Bubbles of foul-smelling gas, disturbed by the hooves, burst on the surface around them.

  Beneath th
e trees the water stretched away amid dappled pools of sunlight. Through the dense scrub nothing was visible; neither movement nor sound marred the stillness. Then Jason heard again the baying of the hounds and shivered. Slowly he urged his mount forward. The reeds closed about them. All he could see now was the wall of greenery, a blue patch of sky overhead.

  He waited. Water lapped. Insects buzzed.

  He might have been alone in the world. The green light changed to gold as the sun climbed higher, the horse pricked its ears and shook its head.

  A voice, shouting.

  Jason strained his ears.

  ‘Nothing,’ the voice called. ‘Nothing over here at all.’

  Over where?

  Another voice, so close that it could not have been more than a few yards away.

  ‘If he’s got into this lot we’ll never find him.’

  ‘The dogs …’

  ‘Them dogs is useless.’

  The sound of bodies forcing their way through the crackling undergrowth.

  Further away now, the first voice asked, ‘Why are we bothering with him, anyway? He was only some bloke worked in the office, wasn’t he? You’d think he’d stolen the crown jewels, the way everyone’s going on.’

  ‘Politics,’ the second man explained. ‘Challoner reckoned he was the bloke wrote the miners’ petition. They want to get rid of him before he causes any more trouble.’

  ‘He’s on the run, ain’t he? What trouble’s he going to cause?’

  The voices faded.

  Still Jason waited, looking for a lead from Mura. At last, after what seemed hours, the black man stirred.

  ‘Let’s get on,’ he said.

  Mud sucking beneath the hooves, they waded slowly through the edges of the mere until they arrived once again at dry ground. They rode up the bank and between the trees until they reached the woodland fringe. Once again they paused, eyes and ears alert, but nothing stirred.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Mura asked.

  Jason hesitated. After he had heard the news of Alison’s marriage he had thought never to go back to Whitby Downs. Now, however, it seemed the only refuge.