Absolution Creek

by Nicole Alexander

  He slowed his horse and came level with her. ‘Hopefully somewhere I can get a bit of work.’ He ruffled her closely cropped hair.

  ‘Where are we going, Father?’ Jane mimicked softly.

  ‘Don’t annoy your father.’ Abigail tucked a tendril of hair behind her ear and pushed at the straw hat shading her face. ‘Can we stop for a break, please, Matt?’

  Squib caught the quick look of annoyance that crossed her father’s face. He gestured to a large box tree and the dray creaked to a jolting stop in the shade. Squib slid from the dray and was off and running with Jane and Ben in the direction of the creek. Soon they were splashing and kicking cool water at each other.

  ‘Where do you think we’ll end up?’ Jane asked Ben when exhaustion left them standing ankle-deep in silty mud.

  Ben jutted out his chin in imitation of his father and pursed his lips. ‘I heard Father say last night that we’d keep going until he found work. Maybe a boundary rider, maybe a stockman. He might even go droving.’

  ‘Droving?’ Squib repeated. ‘What about us?’ They all stared at each other.

  ‘Squib and Beth should stay with Mother. They’re the youngest.’ Jane gave Ben a rare smile. ‘As the oldest we’d be more help to him.’

  ‘You’re meant to be a maid at Wangallon Station,’ Squib argued. ‘Father says it’s time you went to work.’

  ‘Who told you that? It’s not true! My father –’

  ‘He’s not your father,’ Squib yelled. ‘You lost yours. He ran away when you were little and never came back.’

  Jane clenched her fists and in two strides crossed the sandy dirt. Squib landed with a thud on the ground. ‘He is my father now. You say otherwise and I’ll make you sorry.’

  ‘Me sorry? It’s your mother that got us into this mess.’

  ‘It’d be better if we all stayed together,’ Ben said, trying to placate. ‘At least for the moment.’

  Jane, hands on her hips, looked sullenly at the water’s surface. Squib brushed dirt from her dress and rose to her feet. One day she’d show Jane.

  ‘Anyway, Father wouldn’t leave us unless he had to,’ Ben added. They each nodded in agreement as he kicked at the water. ‘If he does leave, though, maybe we should take off. If your mother –’ he looked directly at Jane ‘– if Abigail gets caught . . .’ He swallowed, studying the older girl. ‘If the worst happens, you can bet they won’t let us kids stay together, alone.’

  ‘My mother did nothing wrong,’ Jane complained. ‘We ran on account of you two being –’

  ‘We wouldn’t of run if it wasn’t for your thieving mother.’ Squib clenched her fists.

  Ben flicked a stone into the sluggish water. ‘We could go somewhere else and wait for Father. Set up our own place.’

  ‘What about Beth?’ Squib asked.

  ‘We can’t take a baby with us. Besides,’ he reasoned, ‘she’s not like a real sister.’

  ‘Thanks. What does that make me?’ Jane turned briefly in the direction of the road as if checking for eavesdroppers. ‘She’s the only mother we’ve got,’ she snapped.

  ‘She’s your mother, Jane, and Beth’s. Not ours.’ Ben looked to Squib for confirmation. Squib pressed her lips together. Sometimes no speakies was the best answer.

  ‘Well I’m not going anywhere.’ Jane crossed her thin arms across her chest. ‘And you won’t either, Ben Hamilton.’

  Ben threw another stone into the water.

  ‘Squib’s right. If we’d stayed at Waverly you’d be keeping house as a maid by now,’ Ben reminded Jane. ‘Once we’re settled, Father will send you away to earn your own keep. He says you’re past the age for it already.’

  A tangle of limbs rolled across the ground. Squib wasn’t sure who would win this fight.

  ‘Kids? C’mon.’

  Squib kicked at the two bodies. ‘It’s Father,’ she yelled, booting Jane’s bare legs. Ben and Jane scrambled apart. Their father’s voice had them running across fallen logs, prickly grass and side-stepping a large mounded ant hill. They arrived breathless to stand by the dray, the sun’s rays quickly erasing the memory of the cool creek.

  Their father sized them up briefly, ruffling Squib’s lice-controlling shaggy haircut for the second time that day. ‘I want you to all have a bit of bread and a swig of water and then we’ll keep going.’ He looked down to where Beth lay asleep in Abigail’s lap. ‘I don’t want to be stuck on the wrong side of the creek in case that storm arrives early. There’s nothing for us on this side.’ He paused and checked the road in the direction they had so recently travelled. ‘The sooner we’re on the other side the better.’

  ‘What’s on the other side?’ Ben asked.

  Their father scratched his head. ‘Dunno.’

  ‘Dunno?’ Ben repeated. ‘We want to know, Father. It’s bad enough we had to leave because of what she did.’

  ‘Don’t talk about your mother that way.’

  Ben jammed his hands in the pockets of his shorts.

  Matt Hamilton’s hand struck Ben’s cheek with a loud slap. Father and son judged each other, Ben holding his cheek silently as tears welled. ‘Get in the dray, Ben.’

  Ben ignored the command and sat heavily in the dirt.

  Squib looked at the woman who had replaced her mother. Their reason for leaving Mr Purcell’s had festered like a blister waiting to break and now Abigail Hamilton’s actions were beginning to poison the family she’d married into. Squib wished her stepmother and Jane would walk into the bush and disappear. The stout woman was staring out towards the gathering storm clouds, her eyes red-rimmed and vacant. Jane lifted Beth from her mother’s arms.

  ‘Don’t wake her,’ Abigail cautioned, clambering to her feet and dusting off the dirt from her ankle-length dress. ‘And I won’t be talked to that way, Ben.’

  Despite the edge to her voice Squib knew that Abigail Hamilton no longer wielded authority.

  Ben spat in the dirt. ‘A fly,’ he responded in defence at his father’s glare.

  ‘I don’t think you should go droving, Father,’ Squib blurted. ‘I think you should stay with us.’

  Her father lifted Squib, sitting her gently on the rear of the dray. ‘Things will work out. You’ll see.’ He touched her nose briefly.

  ‘Move over,’ Ben complained, spreading his legs until Squib was left with only a few feet of space. Beth curled up behind Jane and Ben, who after a series of angry kicks took ownership of separate sides of the dray. Squib found herself sitting upright at the rear, Ben’s feet only an inch from her behind. Their father tied the dappled mare to the rear of the wagon, before seating himself by Abigail and taking charge of the reins. The dray trundled onto the road and Squib let her body relax into the rolling, bumpy progress of the cart. She looked to where her father and Abigail sat, their backs straight, voices silent. They hadn’t always been like that; now a whole day could pass with the sun glistening between them like a third person.

  As the sun began to sink in the west, Squib thought of the crooked trees, the stockman with the busted wrist, the yellow dog, and Mrs Purcell in her high-necked blouse and fancy pearl necklace. She didn’t like to think about Abigail stealing the necklace as it reminded Squib of her own mother’s thieving. For the second time in her short life they were on the run. Tiredness seeped through her. She wondered if she could squeeze up between Jane and Ben. Surely there was room enough for her as well. The shadows lengthened. With a sneeze and an itch of her sunburnt neck, Squib’s head began to droop.

  It was dark when Squib woke. She felt herself slipping and her slight fingers grappled for something firm to cling to. A beam of moonlight breaking through overhead cloud revealed the outline of a person. Slowly her stepsister’s features came into view. Squib opened her mouth to call out as a jolt bumped her partially off the end of the dray. She could feel her feet dragging on the dirt. Her father’s horse struck her leg, once, twice, and she frantically reached for Jane’s legs, her fingers touching the older girl’s toes. Jane withdrew
them abruptly and, in the instant that her pleading eyes met her stepsister’s, she slipped off the end of the dray into the night.

  Chapter 22

  The North West Plains, 1965

  Scrubber picked the bindi-eye burr free of Dog’s paw and flicked it into the grass. He had awakened in pain at daybreak and managed to down half a pannikin of lukewarm tea before setting off. Four hours on, a stretch of the legs was more of an ordeal than a man supposed. He straightened stiffly as Dog tested out his burr-pricked paw.

  ‘Get on with you, Dog,’ Scrubber hollered, scrambling atop his ride. ‘No time to stop now.’ Dog gave a lazy yawn and trotted on ahead. Scrubber checked the pouch at his waist. It made for some good conversation having a mate tied to your belt. You could speak when you liked about what you liked, although Scrubber refrained from antagonising the dead.

  A few weeks after Scrubber’s arrival at Waverly Station the Hamilton family were gone; the troublesome elder daughter, the boy, Ben, and the one called Squib, all packed up in the dead of night with an ankle-biter in tow. The demise of the Purcells began soon after, not that Scrubber cared, not after he heard the story.

  They were on the boundary where the slopes spread out into the plains; ten men with axes and enough trees to keep them busy over summer. It was the last area to be tamed by Purcell, and Scrubber enjoyed seeing the land made useful, wanted to see the white gold of the north. Day after day he swung at the thick woody plants, his shoulders aching, palms splitting open and rehardening. His bandaged wrist suffered. It was a rewarding job, though. A man could see where he’d been and Purcell left wind breaks and shade lines, wise enough to the mechanisms of nature to know what both earth and animal needed to survive.

  As fading light streaked the countryside, they sat around the open fire. ‘Welcomed Hamilton’s missus into the big house like an equal, Mrs Purcell did,’ the camp-boss, Archie, informed them. He was new to their team, having arrived only that afternoon from Waverly Station. They chewed on roasted rabbit and doughy damper. ‘Next thing, old Dobbs reckons a fancy necklace is missing, and a few days later the whole Hamilton family have run off,’ the man continued.

  Scrubber paled. ‘Are you telling me –?’

  ‘Guilty as.’ Archie nodded. ‘The new overseer, Evans, said Hamilton’s missus stole the necklace, and –’ He leant towards the fire, drawing the nine men together in confidence ‘– there’s talk that the old overseer, Martin, who was found hanging in the woolshed, didn’t kill himself.’

  The listening men craned forward.

  ‘Evans says Hamilton really wanted that overseeing job.’ Archie brushed dirt from his patched trousers, his words hanging in the air.

  ‘That’s a lie,’ Scrubber said loudly.

  ‘How would you know?’ one man asked, narrowing his eyes.

  Scrubber chewed over his words. The air tensed. The men looked at him.

  ‘If you know something, kid,’ Archie warned, ‘it would be best to come out with it now.’

  Scrubber was beginning to feel sick. He’d only taken the scrub-cutting job because it gave him a reason to leave Waverly Station. The timing had been perfect. In a week or so he’d intended to high-tail it out of the flat country. ‘It’s just that Matt Hamilton practically saved my life and he got me the job with Purcell. Then his kid, Squib, fixed my wrist.’ He held his hand aloft for inspection. ‘I could’ve been a cripple. Ain’t no one ever helped me the way the Hamiltons did. Not even my own family.’

  The men relaxed. ‘Well, kid, you never can tell with some people,’ Archie replied. ‘Anyway –’ he sucked on a bone ‘– they set black trackers onto them. They finally caught up with Matt Hamilton and his missus and clapped her in gaol.’

  ‘Was there any proof?’

  ‘Mr Purcell’s word is good enough and his missus swore it must have been Abigail Hamilton that done the thieving.’ Archie rubbed his greasy hands on his shirt front. ‘As for Matt Hamilton, well, they let him go. Whether that’s right or wrong –’ He shrugged ‘– who’s to know? They reckon he was a right mess. One of his kids had fallen off the back of a dray while they were on the run. They never found her.’

  ‘Her?’ Scrubber swallowed. ‘Was . . . was it Squib?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I seem to recall Dobbs said the name was something like that.’

  Scrubber found it painful to breathe. He’d barely known Squib, yet when he closed his eyes the only people he gave a thought for was the girl and the man who’d showed him kindness.

  He looked at his left wrist and formed a ball with his fist. In the end freedom didn’t taste so good.

  Chapter 23

  The North West Plains, 1924

  Squib awoke to the earthy smell of rain. Splats of moisture struck her face and back, growing steadily heavier until her dress was sodden and her skin cold. Struggling into a sitting position, she touched the side of her pounding head, pressing tentatively at puffy skin. One of her eyes was shut tight. Drops of rain mixed with streaks of blood when she drew her hand away. Where was her father? Squib wondered. Why had he not got them to cover before the rain came? Gingerly she stood, then screamed, her right leg buckling in pain. A curtain of heavy rain blocked her view in every direction.

  ‘Father? Ben?’ Squib cupped her hands as she’d been taught, waves of pain shuddering through her head and leg. ‘Ben? Coo-ee?’ She dragged herself from the road, her toes sinking into an ooze of mud and grass. Slipping through a stand of skinny saplings she huddled beneath a thick-girthed tree. Teeth chattering, she inspected her leg, poking at it carefully. She had seen a broken leg before. A tree had fallen on a man at Waverly and he had ended up with bone poking out through his skin. The men pulled the leg straight and then set it with splints, much like she’d done for Scrubber’s wrist. Squib figured that even if her leg wasn’t broken all the way through it still needed attending to, however she had nothing to tie splints with even if she could find two straight branches. She prodded at her closed and swollen eye. With a sob she squeezed her good eye shut. It was then she heard the roar.

  When the surge of water came Squib was lifted up in a torrent of froth and sticks. Grappling uselessly for something to hang onto, her slight body hit floating timber and tree trunks. Murky water engulfed her nose and mouth, and she was barely able to keep her chin above the water. The water kept sucking and swirling, flinging Squib continually from one obstacle to another. Eventually her good leg gave way and the air she so desperately gasped at didn’t seem to want to come to her any more. She thought of her father and closed her eyes.

  The tree Squib struck held her firm in its dense arms, and had she not opened her eyes and seen a glossy brown snake curled only feet away on another branch, she happily would have remained in its clutches. Instead she searched frantically for an escape, launching her body at a large piece of wood as it sailed past. She clung fiercely to the board and twirled through waterlogged trees. Then the board was knocked from underneath her and the world became dark.

  ‘Mary, Mother of God. What have we here?’

  Squib looked up into a man’s face. There was a bright light behind him, a glow that haloed his face. Lifting a weak arm she wondered if she were in heaven. If so, was this man God? She thought of her father. She expected she would float away with the angels, perhaps see her dead mother.

  ‘That’s better,’ God said lifting her and moving her to dry ground. God squatted beside her. There was a dead pig on the bank. It lay on its back with two of its legs pointed skywards.

  ‘You’ve got yourself a nasty bump over your eye, and your leg looks –’

  Squib yelped in pain.

  ‘Sorry.’ God pushed his hat onto the back of his head. ‘What’s your name, then? Where did you come from?’

  Squib opened her mouth to speak, but her tongue was dry and the words wouldn’t come. Nothing seemed to be working. Not her legs so she could stand, nor her arms so she could wipe her eyes, which had filled with tears. Through her one good eye she saw kangaro
os hop past and a short distance away an echidna ambled to the creek’s edge. There were spiky-looking trees and wavering grasses and God smelt of pipe smoke and a sort of thick pungent scent that Squib knew well. ‘Sheep,’ she said loudly.

  God sat back on his haunches and rubbed his chin. Actually, he looked a little young to be God, Squib decided. Maybe this wasn’t heaven. Maybe she’d been saved.

  The man gulped water from a canvas bag like her father’s and swiped the back of his mouth. He was writing something down. Every few minutes he’d pause and stare off into space before returning to the book, his thumb and forefinger twirling a lock of brown hair. A pile of books sat to the left of his elbow, a slush lamp to the right. The stink of the lamp reminded Squib of home. A dirty wide-brimmed hat rested on an outstretched knee and a cracked leather boot moved occasionally across the dirt floor of the hut, piling sand from left to right. He looked at the scraped-clean plate beside her on the camp bed and pointed at it.

  ‘You finished?’ he asked quietly, putting his pencil down and wiping a hand on his trousers.

  Squib nodded. The food had been good. She prodded the sturdy splint on her injured leg. It ran from the top of her thigh to her foot and was tied on with lengths of material.

  ‘I’m no doctor, but I figured that was the best thing to do.’

  Squib nodded.

  ‘I don’t know if it’s actually broken or not.’ He frowned. ‘There wasn’t any cracking sound when I pulled your leg straight. It could be a bad fracture.’

  Squib nodded again.

  ‘Do you want some more water?’

  ‘Yes.’ She watched as the water bag was lifted from a peg on the wall. Streaks of morning sun inched through the split timber walls. The slabs of wood were piled one on top of the other and were held in place with wooden stakes. It was an old hut. Squib hadn’t seen anything built that way before.

  He passed her the water. ‘What’s your name?’