At the far end, men in two boats hollered at once. A loud shotgun went off, both barrels, and one of the aborigines in the farthest boat stood, raised a spear and drove it straight down.
The quiet pool erupted in a wild spray of water. Thrashing, churning mayhem boiled up and tipped one of the boats over. Men screamed, splashing in white froth. Samantha saw a gaping snout thrust high, saw the huge tail whip the water. More spears sliced home; the froth turned red.
The pandemonium changed from fear to jubilation, though the shouting and hooting were quite as noisy as ever. As the upset boat righted itself and its soggy crew clambered back in, the farthest boat began to move this way, poled by eager hunters.
The aborigines among them laughed and sang. Samantha knew that to the aboriginal mind, “louder” meant “better by far,” and this whole boatload seemed in high feather. The rest of the line of beaters paused along the far shore as this boat brought the prize to Mr. Sloan.
Mr. Sloan transferred that hideous rifle to his left hand and gestured toward the butcher block. “Bring the knife.”
Samantha grabbed it and followed her master down to the water’s edge, as caught up in the chase now as anyone.
Four black men jumped out of the boat into the pool to drag their trophy ashore. Two yards of crocodile emerged from the dark water and still they hauled. Ten feet at least, and now twelve. Here were the limp hind legs—stubby, scaly little things for such an enormous monster. And the tail! When the men paused for breath and stood erect, a foot of the tail still lay in the water, its tip flicking absently. Samantha stood not four feet away from it and she couldn’t begin to fathom the horror of the beast.
“Leviathan,” murmured Luke Vinson beside her, his voice filled with awe.
“Oh …” Meg pressed close to the preacher’s arm, her eyes wide.
Mr. Sloan flourished the butcher knife, but Doobie held up a hand. “Wait.” He whipped out a carpenter’s rule and unfolded it rapidly, expertly. The crowd pressed tighter. Samantha was being squeezed between Mr. Sloan and Mr. Vinson and she didn’t care.
Silence reigned while the end of Doobie’s rule splashed against the twitching tail. The handyman stared through the water. “Nineteen feet, seven inches.” He stepped back.
Samantha closed her eyes. She didn’t have to watch to know what Mr. Sloan was doing. Hideous smells boiled up around her face and literally forced her to look.
Mr. Sloan was poking about with the knife blade inside the slashed belly. “Couple small bones, a bird beak. Fish and a goose is all he’s had lately.” He stood up straight. “Fat Dog, give it to your nephews for their clan.”
“Too right, Mr. Sloan!”
And the hunt was on again. The boat took its place in the line. The beaters thumped and drummed and yelled with an enthusiasm worthy of schoolboys on holiday at the beach. Inch by inch the boats moved forward across the tortured pool.
Meg and the men seemed to be drifting off to the left, closer and closer to the action. Samantha felt no desire to be a part of the scene. She had already seen more crocodiles than she cared to, ever again. She wandered off to the right along the shore. She should go back and start the stew, but she certainly wasn’t going to use that knife, and there was no other. She ought to start another pot of coffee, but she had no energy to walk back to the shelter.
The horror of all this and her lack of sleep worked in concert to turn Samantha’s brain to mush. She should be thinking deep, important thoughts just now and she couldn’t apply her mind to anything at all. Poor Kathleen. Jovial, bouncing, hard-working Kathleen. Young yet; the next best thing to being immortal. Ah, Kathleen …
The beaters were halfway across the pool now and approaching Samantha foot by noisy foot. There was Mr. Sloan, his rifle ready, striding along the mud nearly at the waterline, coming toward her.
The important thoughts finally surfaced in her weary mind. She should have moved off behind the party, not across the pool from it. She had walked in the wrong direction to get away from the action; the action was coming to her. Quite possibly, in the water between the beaters and herself there lurked a large and lethal reptile and here she stood watching the whole hideous hunting party come this way. And how reliable were those howling, trigger-happy hunters? She might well be right in their line of fire.
A twinge of terror cured her weariness instantly. What exactly might a cornered croc be expected to do? The unfocused shapelessness of the peril, her ignorance about it, multiplied her fear. She must get back away from the water. She turned and started hastily up the bank, slipping in the rain-slick slop.
Then the world exploded. As one the beaters screamed and pounded, Mr. Sloan shouted, his rifle roared—the pond burst high behind her, a great crashing wall of water. She dived forward without thinking into the slime and flung her arms over her head. Her face pressed tight into the mud as all the cannon of the Crimea thundered and volleyed.
Many footbeats came pattering toward her, but she dared not move, much less raise her head. Samantha Connolly, Mum’s little helper, the chief domestic of Sugarlea’s household staff, the woman in sure command of herself at all times, began to weep. She choked on mud and still she couldn’t stop her wild and violent sobbing.
“Sam!” Warm and powerful hands gripped her shoulders and pulled her to sitting. “Are you shot? Did I hit you?”
She shook her head; it was the best she could do for the moment. She tried to say “I’m fine, really,” but all that came out was a coughing fit. Against her better judgment she raised her eyes. The long, pointed nose and pallid gorge lay at her very feet. If crocodiles have eyelids, this monster wasn’t using them; the glassed eye stared unseeing at her shoe.
She forced her eyes higher. Mr. Sloan’s face was tight with concern, his dark eyes studying her anxiously. She tried again to ease his mind but only blithering came out. And then in the aftermath of her terror, he utterly surprised her. The master of Sugarlea wrapped his long arms around and gathered her in firmly against him. She was tear-streaked and muddy; her nose was plugged and slurpy from crying; and he didn’t seem to mind a bit.
Another heavy sob or two and she began picking up the pieces. She sat erect and drew a deep, shuddering breath. “Thank ye, sir. I’m all right now.”
One of the beaters, a black fellow, approached the beast. Mr. Sloan twisted swiftly toward him and snarled, “It’s mine!” The man backed away instantly. The strange little vignette struck Samantha almost exactly like a lion laying claim to its kill—or a dog defending a bone.
She struggled to her feet, her legs all tangled in her skirts, and his strong hands steadied her. He left her then, and straddled the carcass. He rolled it to its side, its back toward her. The stubby little foreleg flopped limp. She couldn’t see the belly as he ripped it open, and just as well.
He stabbed and poked a moment, then stood erect. “The hunt is over.” Almost carelessly he tossed a black handful of something into the mud beside the beast’s snout. He dipped his head toward Gantry nearby. “Go find her.”
The mill foreman stared scowling at the black lump for a moment and turned away. He walked off toward the boats, shouting orders.
Mr. Sloan handed Samantha the knife. “Wash it off in boiling water first.”
“Aye. Of course.” She looked at him and didn’t feel the least ashamed of the hot tears in her eyes. “I dinnae understand, sir. Kathleen’s gone, aye? Ye’re certain?”
He turned toward the rain fly, so she walked beside him. He rubbed his face. “Yes, I’m certain.”
“The black thing?”
“Her shoe. Guess you didn’t recognize it. You see, Sam, a croc’s jaws are murderously strong, but its teeth aren’t really all that sharp. So it seizes its victim and drags it underwater ’til it drowns. If the prey is small enough to swallow, down it goes. If it’s big, the croc will simply hold the body in its mouth until it softens up—decomposes—or stashes it away underwater for a while.”
“And returns to it lat
er when ’tis nice and tender.” Samantha shuddered. She stepped in under the rain fly and glanced at the chopping block. A curtain of noisy black flies had descended upon the beef haunch. She took a deep breath and met Mr. Sloan eye to eye.
“I wish to thank ye—express me gratitude—for coming to me rescue moments ago. I should never have walked to that part of the shore; ’twas pure foolishness. I would have gone the way of—” her voice stuck a moment—“of Kathleen, had ye not dispatched the beast so promptly and skillfully.”
He laughed. He threw his handsome head back and laughed so heartily even Samantha could feel a wee bit of his pleasure, though she hadn’t the foggiest notion why. “You were safe that far up the shore, Sam. I didn’t save you from as much as you think.” He sobered. “Kathleen must have waded out into the pool, probably with her shoes in her hand, much the way I saw you on the beach yesterday. She probably almost escaped its first attack—the blood and hat on the bank.”
“So that’s why ye forbade us going near the estuary. Linnet and meself. And Fat Dog said … I see now.” She closed her eyes, but she couldn’t close away the constant, hideous buzz of the flies. “I am grateful anyway, Mr. Sloan, for yer concern.”
“And you’re very, very sorry you came.”
She opened her eyes. “Aye, I am that. But as I’ve already told ye, a Connolly can be trusted. I made the deal and I’ll stick it out to the end.”
“You’re a good woman, Sam.” He laid his warm hand on her shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze and shake. “A good woman.”
From the far side by the jackstraws, a man’s voice called out. “We found her.”
Mr. Sloan strode back out into the rain.
And the good woman sat down beside the buzzing butcherblock and buried her face in her apron and wept.
Chapter Five
Rotten Cane
For years now, postal service had been the responsibility of the new federal government, although each state still issued its own postage stamps. Unfortunately, no higher level of competence prevailed despite the change of leadership. Luke Vinson didn’t trust the postal service any further than he could finance it. He sent Martin Frobel a letter. He also sent a telegram. And at the last moment, almost certain something would go awry, he went himself.
An hour west of Townsville, Luke perched on top of a load of fetid green sugar cane as the sun beat on his head, and watched the flies work the sticky sap. He had abandoned chemistry and physics but they had not abandoned him. In spite of myself, he thought, I can never help pondering a sticky, excuse the pun, problem in physics.
This was an open slat-side railroad car and the train’s velocity had to be close to thirty miles an hour. And yet, unless a fly flew above the top rail where the wind caught it and whipped it away, that insect, unattached to any surface, could zig and zag, hover or cruise, as if the train were standing still. There was a defined physical principle involved here, and Luke was certain that at one time he could have quoted it, but he could not for the life of him remember it. And while he racked his memory, the flies nonchalantly ignored the fact they were hurtling west at breakneck speed.
The fellow named Josip popped up like a jack-in-the-box from the back end of the train. He had worked his way forward, hopping from car to car, staggering drunkenly across the shifting loads until he could join Luke here.
Josip settled cross-legged on the pile and grinned. “Goot ting dis cane going in stakesides. Stink to high hebben. Inside closed boxcar, build up, and poom.”
“Poom!” Luke chuckled. “The dreaded cry of the chemistry lab. I’m contemplating flies and physics, but you’ve offered me a more pressing question: why don’t you fall off the train? This cane is treacherous footing indeed.”
“Fall off! Not yet. Tricky going is when you haf the open car of cows. Walk on cows’ backs, den it gets snakey. I don’ unnerstand why preacher-man rides on stinking cane. Come back to dem caboose. Haf a little drink, relax, don’ stink, eh?”
Luke grinned and spread his hands. “But I’m having a wonderful time up here. Blue sky, wide open spaces, wind in my face—”
“Also all dis smoke and soot. You don’ ride train much maybe, tinks is great, eh?”
“I rode the train constantly in Canada. That’s the way to get around there, especially in winter.”
“Snow. Snow, eh? Lahssa snow in winter there, right?”
“More snow than any man deserves.”
“Been long time I don’ see snow. Since old country. Miss it, sometimes.”
“No, not I. Look at me. It’s late April, we’re coming on winter here, and I don’t have a coat on. I don’t even own a winter coat anymore, Josip, and it’s glorious! No shoveling snow, no bundling up. No calculating the coefficient of friction of glare ice when all you want to do is get across the street. This is my kind of winter.”
“So you shovel cane. I seen you. And sit on stinking bundle. You hopeless.” Josip rearranged his seat in vain pursuit of comfort. “Where your friend? West a piece?”
“About a hundred miles out from Charter’s Towers, give or take some. Quite a cattle station he has, he and his brother. Both of them dinkum Aussie.”
Native Aussies, good colonial boys. The distinction was still being made, but not as much anymore. A generation ago most of Australia’s population, barring aborigines, had been born under distant fealties. Today most Australians knew no other flag. History. And lack of it. It intrigued Luke. When the Hudson’s Bay Company was turning Luke’s native land from a wilderness into a civilization, this country had not yet begun.
Gentle slopes and open woodland gave way to prairie and broken patches of gray-green acacia. Six at night, dinnertime, they pulled into Frobel’s siding. Possibly someday it would be a town—Frobelsville, or Frobel’s Corner. Martin’s Landing, perhaps. Right now it was a siding.
Beside the stock tank, Martin Frobel himself sat astride his horse and watched the modest engine huff to a stop. He urged his old mare forward to meet Luke halfway.
Luke hopped off the car and crossed to him. He offered a hand and received a warm, friendly shake. “Which got here first, the letter or the telegram?”
Martin looked a bit blank. “Didn’t know you were coming. Just rode out here in case there was any mail. You’re welcome, though. More’n welcome. Hope you can stay awhile.” He nodded toward the train. “What’s all that?”
“Cattle feed. The letter will make things clear—if it ever arrives.”
Martin studied him a moment and rode over to a car. He stood in the stirrups, sniffed and touched. “Some larrikin’s got himself a lucky streak longer’n my line of credit.”
Josip yelled, “I get to do dis alone, eh?”
“Coming.” Luke would let Martin figure things out unaided. He could barely stand not staring at the old stockman’s face.
The weight of this wet green cane bulged the gates out and made pulling the pins more than a little difficult. Talk about your basic coefficient of friction! Luke thought. He was sweating profusely by the time they sprang the gate open on the first car. He and Josip let tumble out what would and pushed the rest out with coal shovels. One car unloaded, four to go, and it had taken fifteen minutes. They’d be here all night, and Luke was starved.
Josip must have been reading his mind. They took a breather before tackling car number two, and the railroader leaned on his shovel, grinning. “Look the goot side. You do dis on a railroad in New South Wales, eh? Different gauge. Irish gauge. Dese tracks tree feet six, but New South Wales, the tracks five feet tree. Trains twice as wide, hold twice as much. Take twice as long. We’re lucky, eh?”
“Aren’t we. On to the next.”
The engineer stepped down from his cab, in no hurry at all. The engineer does not, as part of his job, load or unload. “Marty. You got two letters and a telegram here. One from the Townsville Bank and one from some fellow named Vinson. And a package from your sister in Brisbane. Gotta sign that you got the package.”
�
��It’s the letter from that drongo Vinson that I wanna see.”
Luke cast an occasional glance toward the stockman and almost lost his thumb when the second gate gave way while he wasn’t paying attention. He watched Martin read his letter. He saw Martin wipe his eyes, but squatters are tough old cockies who would never in a million years admit to being misty-eyed. And then Martin, strong as new hemp, was in there helping with the unloading, and it all went much quicker.
The train departed and Luke had no idea where Josip was going to eat his dinner; he knew only it would be late, for the sun cowered close to the flat line, ready for the plunge. It was nearly seven by now.
Martin beamed like the noonday sun upon his long, long pile of cattle feed. “Still don’t quite understand where it come from.”
“I overheard a sugar grower tell his mill foreman to dump it. It’s apparently not good quality. I got the mill foreman aside and offered to take it off his hands, all of it. Knew you could use it. And the foreman was grateful. Didn’t have to bother with it.”
Martin grunted. He pulled a rifle from his scabbard. “You take the horse home, Luke. Send Jack to me with the hay wagons. All of ’em. Tell Grace I said she’s to feed you a seven-course dinner by candlelight. Tell her I’m gonna count the courses when I get back and it better be the full load and it better be extra grouse or there’ll be he—” He cleared his throat. “Sorry. Keep forgetting you’re a revrin now.”
“You ride and I’ll walk, Marty. We’ll dine together.”
Martin grinned suddenly. “I ain’t leaving this pile of gold. It’s dusk. The kangaroos’ll be abroad now, and they’ll find this stuff in no time flat. But ain’t no ’roo in Queensland gonna get a taste of it. Go on now.”
Luke climbed on the mare. He didn’t even have to turn her head. She started off home with a relieved sigh. When he looked back over his shoulder, Martin was standing on top of the highest stack of cane looking for all the world like the bronze statue on a military monument, his rifle cradled in the crook of his arm. And he was smiling the smile of a hopeful man.
Code of Honor (Australian Destiny Book #1) Page 5
