“You don’t have to stay here.” It was as if he could hold the words inside no longer. A knife twisted in her. She had no choice, whatever he might urge.
“I do,” she told him.
The horses were nearly on them. They both heard the jingle of harness.
“Remember your promise. You will send me word if you need me.” He grasped her hand. “You will do that? One of the packers is here a couple of times a week.”
She looked at his hand and made no effort to escape. Then lifted her head. “I promise.”
He released her.
Then Philip was on them with the horses, and John was mounting. She was lifting her hand in farewell. It could not be real. Too soon he had disappeared over the ridge line.
“I promise,” she whispered to the rising wind. “I promise.”
He was riding away, again. Bleak despair crashed in on him. He was over the ridge now, all hope of seeing her was gone.
Was this all he would ever have? Must he forever be forced to endure the pain of leaving her in a place that made his skin crawl in terror?
Unlike the miners, he knew the weather here—and knew what the diggers said: that the farmers’ fears were nothing but the words of men who never wanted the miners here anyway—but he had been here long enough to know that this year was unusual. It was well into autumn, but still the days stretched warm and dry, with just a chill in the nights to warn of what was to come. The rush to Campbell’s was a new one. Men had tramped past his home daily, all heading for Chamonix and over the range to Campbell’s, Potter’s and the other bleak gullies carved into the southern faces of the Old Man Range. Not even the snow on the tops had put them off. The glitter of gold banished all reason.
Now Nessa had followed the call. No, not Nessa … that brother of hers.
The boy was growing up. Even John had to admit that. He had kept his sister safe amidst the raucous hurly-burly of the mining camps—no mean feat. And he had pulled his weight at Chamonix while Nessa was recovering, working in the kitchens of Tom’s place to help offset their board and writing letters home for those who had never learned how to set pen to paper. There were good bones there. It did not make John forgive him. Not when he had such a hold on his sister.
Would she ever be free of him? Worse, would Nessa ever let him go? John had thought he was patient, but that was before he met Miss Nessa Ward. Would she ever turn to him?
If she survived the fields. Fear gnawed his guts, jolting him with each leaden footfall of the horses trailing after him. Most of the men here were sound, but some he did not trust at all. Not with Nessa. That sullen one hanging at the back of the crowd. The way he had eyed Nessa. John’s guts churned.
That man had worried Nessa, too, but right now, she was too sunk in misery, staring up at the ridge line long after John disappeared from sight. What was she doing here?
“Are you all right, Ness?”
Philip had finished unloading their gear into the tent.
“Yes, fine,” she lied. “I better get down and see what supplies the store sells before it gets dark.”
“Hang on a minute, and I’ll come with you. We don’t know how safe this place is.”
He strapped his pistol to his side, she noticed, and was grateful.
As it turned out, only a few men were at the store. Most were still out working. Still, she was glad to have Philip beside her.
The butcher and baker were much as in any other mining camp. The only meat available was mutton, but that was plentiful.
“We bought some old ewes off Mr Reid just two days ago,” said the butcher. “Plenty of good mutton stew on those cuts, and here’s a fine joint you might fancy, ma’am. A man needs a full belly to dig at Campbell’s, and no mistaking.”
“Thank you. Mr Brown, is it? The stewing meat will be ample for now.” She sounded like the old governess her father had insisted she employ when she turned fourteen. The widow of an officer, fallen on hard times since the loss of her husband, the woman favoured the military discipline of her late husband’s parade ground. Her life had known much hardship, and she had been hell bent on ensuring that Nessa shared in her misery. Nessa had got rid of her as soon as humanly possible, by the simple expedient of convincing the woman that her father was much in need of a new wife. Her marked attentions had terrified Professor Ward into giving the woman her marching orders in no time at all.
Now Nessa felt the same disapproving pucker blight her own lips. Philip looked at her in surprise but said nothing. In the bakery, she was even worse, leaving the talking to Philip and merely selecting a loaf and placing it on the counter with the politest of nods to the storeman.
“They getting much out of the ground here?” Philip was asking.
“Good enough.” The baker was not a man of words, she was relieved to find.
Philip was not put off. “I’m more used to panning in a river. It looks more like what I’ve heard of the Tuapeka here. You have to dig for the shine?”
“Yep.”
Philip persevered. “So who do I talk to about getting some water from that race for the digging?”
“Next door.” The man pointed with his thumb to the adjacent store.
Then he grunted something, and Nessa handed what she guessed he had claimed in payment. The man was honest at least, shoving back two pennies.
“We’ll be off then,” said Philip. “Thank you for your help.”
They walked out. She could feel the laughter Philip was struggling to contain, and a part of her responded.
“Friendly folk here.” Then Philip stopped outside the next store. It looked to sell a little of everything: hardware, trousers, gold office and sly grog shop. “Looks like somebody is making money out of Campbell’s.”
She had been long enough in the fields to know what he meant. Philip was still looking the place over.
“Better not come in, Ness. Doesn’t look quite the place for a lady.”
A fine time for Philip to find his conscience, but Nessa had to agree. “I’ll go back to the tent,” she said.
“Keep your gun handy, just in case.”
So Philip was also infected with the edge this place held. She pulled her gun out of her pocket and slipped it into her bag. She had loaded it before coming to the store and knew how best to use it, placing it in the bag containing the bread and meat in such a way that the handle stuck out very obviously.
For all her nervousness, the return to the tent was uneventful. The few men she met were pleased to see her, respectful and easy, but still courteous in the friendly ways that ruled in the colony.
She had a strong suspicion John Reid had made his attachment clear to the men here even before their arrival. Not one called out a cheery proposal of marriage, as usually happened when they came to a new camp. She was still glad to see familiar canvas walls and her own fire place, and busied herself starting a fire and preparing the stew.
It was the main staple of the miners. Vegetables were scarce, and Nessa had learnt to use some of the wild plants of this place to ward off the ever present threat of scurvy. She pulled the heart from a tussock to add to the pot, thanking the wisdom of Ada Cooper. It was something she did every day. She dreaded to think what hardships they would have faced in this place without the knowledge she had learnt in Mrs Cooper’s kitchen. A very special day, and her hand paused as she saw in her mind once again a sunny hillside, felt the warm rock beneath her and remembered the rich male scent and warmth of a large body beside her. A painful ache invaded her chest. What was she doing here?
It was late by the time John reached home, and the dark shades of night were already closing in. He turned his horse towards the tack shed and dismounted. Tiredness seemed to infest every bone in his body. Sheer will alone made him fetch the brushes and slowly, methodically rub down every part of his equally tired horses. Finally finished, he turned them out and went to fill the trough with an extra measure of mash for the night.
It was already full. Bob had been
there before him. The mangers were also stuffed with hay, and a first glimmer of light broke through the dark cloud that engulfed his spirit. More hopefully, he trudged over to the hen house and dog kennels. Bob had been ahead of him in both places. He was free to go into the house. He pushed open the door and reached for the flint he kept with a candle stub on the ledge beside it. A cold kitchen, cold house.
Maybe it was fitting. It certainly felt like it. It scarcely seemed that Nessa had been here. He refused to remember how she stood in his kitchen that first night, casting the spell of her presence on his home. Tonight, that hurt too much.
He struck the flint and lit the wick of the small candle. He carried it across and lifted down the oil lamp from its hook in the ceiling to light the wick. Gradually, the yellow light pierced the gloom in the room. It could not take away the chill.
He supposed he should think about something to eat. Bob had been busy here too. A pile of logs and kindling was laid by the fireplace, yet he could not summon the energy to set the fire and prepare a meal. Some leftover bread and cold meat were in the safe. That would do for tonight. He sat down in his chair by the fire and stared at the pile of cold logs.
Give up, said a voice in his head. Forget her. Maybe that’s what he should do. He supposed that was what he should do. Maybe he would … when he felt up to deciding anything.
There was a bang on the door. It opened and the Coopers’ eldest son poked his head in.
“Mum says you’re to come down to our place for your dinner. She said she won’t take no for an answer.”
“Thanks, Timmy, but not tonight.”
“She said you’d say that. Then I got to tell you it’s an order and you got to come. I have to stay here till you do. So please hurry and say yes, Mr Reid. I don’t want to have to stay here all night.”
Even through the fog enveloping him, John recognised the inevitable. He gave the ghost of a laugh. “Then we’d better get going, young Timmy.” And he lifted the kitchen lamp and followed the boy out the door.
Later that night he sat back in the visitor’s chair at the Coopers’. He had been hungry after all, it seemed, or maybe it was just Ada’s cooking and the exuberance of the Cooper brood. Now Ada was attempting to clean up after dinner and get them all to bed, leaving Bob and him to sit “out of the way” as she put it, by the fire.
It seemed an eminently sensible idea to John, one ear half listening to the chatter over the dishes. Then Bob did something he had never done before. He interrupted his evening puff on his pipe to speak.
“So when are you going to bring the lassie home?”
He looked at Bob to check whether it was really his taciturn head shepherd sitting there.
“It better be soon, boy. This place ain’t going to run without you forever.”
“I’m here now.”
“Maybe.” Bob took another puff on his pipe then pulled it out and pointed it at John. “But not your head. Nor your heart.”
What was he to say? He took refuge in the good whiskey Bob had poured him and, for the first time ever, wished for Ada’s ready tongue to deflect Bob from his line of questioning.
“It’s none of your business,” he finally mumbled in defence.
“It is when a good man is throwing away his life and a good bit of land in fretting for a lass who doesn’t want him. Is she worth it?”
“Yes.”
John had answered without thinking. It was the simple truth. She was worth anything. He glanced across at Bob, only to be met by the man’s rare smile.
“So what are you going to do about it, laddie? With winter coming on, that Campbell’s field is no place for a body, let alone a pretty young lass like Miss Ward.”
“Tell that to her brother.”
“Hmmph.” Bob leaned back, checked the bowl of his pipe and stirred it with a matchstick to stir up the embers. “I’ve watched that boy. The lad’s got good makings; but some of the folks going over the hill? Not the kind of folks I’d like one of my daughters to be around. Happen the lad will come to his senses in good time.”
“And Nessa? Will she come to her senses?”
Bob shrugged, and took a puff on his pipe. “In good time. It do no good to back a woman into a corner, not like you and that brother of hers have done. Give her a way out, laddie, and see what happens.”
John sat silently, savouring his whiskey and thinking. Finally, he looked up again.
“You’re a wise old one, Bob. Thank you.”
“So when you off to get her? To end that fretting of yours?”
John had to smile at that. “That won’t stop till I’ve got her tied up and safe, married to me and in my home. Until then, don’t ask me to stop fretting. Do you know what could happen to her over there?”
But Bob had said more than enough for now. He leant back in his chair, ignoring the sounds of Ada in the scullery and the children arguing at the table, and puffed contentedly on his pipe. Expecting no more, John copied him, staring into the fire, trying to ignore the images he saw in the sharp toothed flames. Nessa. Always Nessa.
The silence of old friends enveloped their corner of the crowded cottage. Ada and the eldest children finished in the scullery, then came into the main room. He was aware she looked at the end where her men sat, but she kept her orders for her children. First the youngest, then the older ones were hurried off to bed. The rustles and whisperings continued for quite some time before quiet fell over the house. Ada came and took her own chair by the hearth. The three sat in companionable silence, Bob puffing on his barely glowing pipe, John nursing his barely touched whiskey between his long, powerful hands as he stared into the fire, and Ada, biding her time.
The fire began to die down, but Ada let it be. At last, a log collapsed, falling into the embers in a shower of sparks and a loud crackle.
It was enough to rouse John. He looked up from the flames at his two oldest friends here.
“Next week. That is when I will bring her back. Long enough by then for that brother of hers to come to his senses.”
Ada nodded in agreement. “And where will she stay?”
John took a deep breath. “Would it be too much to ask? No, forget I spoke. You’ve no room.”
Ada tutted. “Wondered when you’d think of us. Of course we’ve room. I told Sally she’d be losing her bed as soon as I saw Miss Ward back again.”
“Thank you. The pair of you. I cannot tell you how grateful I am.”
“Just you get that girl to marry you. I’ve got the cake already planned,” said Ada complacently. Bob just smiled.
He waited a full week. It was the longest week of his life. The previous months had been hard enough, never quite knowing where she was, whether she was safe, but now she was just over the other side of his own hills, almost on his land; and he knew exactly what dangers she faced.
One week and not a moment more. The morning after, he saddled up in the barely grey light of night’s ending. The worst of the weather was holding off this year, but his breath still announced itself in ghostly puffs of winter white and there had been heavy clouds shrouding the ranges the last few days. He wrapped the muffler his mother had sent him last year securely round his neck and pulled on his leather gloves. He had already checked his saddle bags; they held an extra coat, hat, woollen scarf and gloves for Nessa. It could turn hellish cold up on the tops. They had brought their own stock down to sheltered paddocks around the homestead over a month ago.
Everything in place, he nudged his horse into motion, tugging on the reins of the mare he was bringing for Nessa with the unthinking ease of long practice.
He knew the hills above as well as he did the ordered lanes of his family home back in England. These harsh slopes and rocks were his, and he loved each dangerous crag and unwelcoming, steep slope with a passion that he had thought could never be surpassed—until the evening Miss Nessa Ward walked up to his front door.
In his short years here, he had studied every inch of this land, spending the early mon
ths here walking and riding over all he laid claim to. He learned where sheep would flourish, and where he could grow the small crops they depended on for survival in the cold months: oats, barley and the winter kale he had introduced this year. Now, he thanked his innocent self. That hard-won knowledge would keep Nessa safe when he brought her home, no matter what demons the weather gods of this place sent against them.
He pushed his horse as hard as he dared, mindful of the return journey. He sighted Old Man Rock before mid-morning. He stopped, only to give his horses a spell, letting them drink from the water he had brought and giving them a small shot of mash, then mounted and pushed on again far too quickly for his irritated steed. It reached round and gave him an annoyed bunt as he lifted himself up, champing bad-temperedly at the bit. The mare he’d brought for Nessa was much more accepting, John was pleased to see, placidly lifting her head and settling into the steady walk of the best of stock horses.
By midday he was on the slopes heading into Campbell’s and rehearsing his speech to Nessa, turning the words over and over in his head. Then he caught sight of the camp and the words went out of his head completely.
After a week at Campbell’s, Nessa had learned the ways of this field enough to make her way here. It was second nature after making a home in so many new places. Find out how to get food. Who were the people to trust and who to avoid? What places were safe and where she should steer clear of. The butcher, the baker, her brother’s claim, the trench where the miners worked: these were the safe places. The general store with its continual trail of newcomers and the two saloons that had sprung up: these were not.
She was forced to pass the general store every day on her way back to their tent, and every day was just as this morning. Her head down, she hurried past the store and saloons with quick, purposeful strides, deliberately deaf to the calls from the porch in front. Not all were in English, but after the first day when her cheeks had glowed red from the comments she had heard, she had been very careful not to let the callers see she understood them. Most of the men here would have been hugely embarrassed by her knowledge. But there were a few, more than enough for comfort, who would have relished speaking to her in a way that would have enraged Philip if he could have understood. At the thought, her feet picked up their pace. She was almost safe.
Mary Brock Jones Page 17
