The Dark Mountain

by Catherine Jinks

  She fared very well, as it happened. Her father always said that she would. But he was somewhat prejudiced, having introduced George Garlick into the family himself when they were both carriers together. They were very good friends. In fact I have always had a suspicion that George married Flora so that he might remain close to her family. For George worshipped my husband. He thought him the very best fellow in the whole world.

  It was no coincidence that we went to Orange shortly after George and Flora went to Blayney. George would have had it no other way, I am sure. He was so lavish in his praise of the region that we would have been foolish not to try our luck here. And his advice was good. Though not the Promised Land, it was certainly fertile ground. I would not go so far as to say that we have all flourished in Orange (God knows, I have lost three children here) but there can be no doubt that we have met with some success.

  In 1867, however, we were faltering. While my husband had quickly secured a new job with the railways, he knew that it could only be a temporary post. The line reached Mittagong in March of ’67, when the station was finished. By the end of that year all the track would be laid between Mittagong and Moss Vale, and we would be faced with a choice: either follow the work to Marulan or find some other occupation. In April Eva was born, leaving me sadly worn down—for I was not young, and she did not thrive. In July, flooding rains destroyed part of our roof, ruining many of our possessions and ushering in the most terrible fevers. It was a bad year. A very bad year.

  And then, in October, my mother died.

  I believe Flora’s wedding announcement must have alerted Louisa to my whereabouts. I had not seen my sister since 1865, nor kept her informed of my movements; she sent her letter to the post office at Mittagong, where the postmaster knew me. Though still nursing Eva, I took the first mail coach to Berrima with a hold-all as my only luggage. Then, upon arriving in Berrima, I threw myself on the mercy of the Reverend Hassall, who kindly sent me in his carriage to Sutton Forest. But it was a close-run thing. I almost missed the funeral. Perhaps there were some who would have preferred that I had.

  Or am I being ungenerous? Though James looked quite stricken when I accosted him outside the new stone church, one would have expected him to look stricken; he had just lost his mother, after all. And though Louisa seemed startled, I cannot really blame her for that. I must have been a startling sight, with my hair all awry, and my eyes red-rimmed from long night watches, and my shabby shawl (sporting many a crusty stain) wrapped tight around my pale, mewling infant. I could have been a beggar, from my appearance. And indeed, I almost felt like one. Some of the Throsbys were in evidence, you see. And the Nicholsons. And the Badgerys. I have no idea why they felt constrained to come. In honour of my father, perhaps? But come they did, and in all their mourning glory. I have never seen so much black satin and jet in one place—unless it were at the Orange Town Hall on the occasion of Queen Victoria’s death.

  James was very sprucely dressed too. As was Louisa. They did not disgrace their mother’s memory. They were not encumbered by a wailing infant who had to be removed from the church at least twice during the ceremony. I can still recall feeding Eva in the churchyard, near my mother’s open grave. My mother was buried to the west of the church, under the stone vault that we had erected in my father’s memory. Emily lay there also, and Emily’s poor little son.

  There was a family reunion, in other words. And a far more peaceable one than that which occurred above ground.

  I will not lie to you: it is a terrible thing to bury one’s mother, no matter how estranged from her one might have become. There had been nothing resolved. Nothing forgiven. And I was tired—so tired. Fatigue had eaten into my very bones. I almost envied my mother, because her sleep was the deepest there is.

  Yet I did not break down. While Louisa silently wept, and James lifted his chin as if to hold the tears back, I stood there with a face of stone. The others had not buried children, you see. There is nothing worse than that: nothing. When you have watched your darling precious child suffer torments that you cannot ease—when you have opened your arms to release him, and laid his fragile, flaxen head to rest beneath falling clods of earth—then you can truly say to yourself: I have suffered the worst punishment that heaven and earth can inflict.

  So I did not shame my blood by falling to the ground, or wailing uncontrollably. I might have looked like a gypsy, but I did not behave like one. Instead I kept my spine straight, as my mother herself would have done. And the other mourners, who had been well disposed to pity me as the ‘black sheep’ and the ‘poor relation’—who no doubt would have liked to witness, for their own edification, the way in which poverty and its attendant ills can slowly destroy one’s dignity and self-worth—these good people were sadly disappointed. When they approached me with their words of comfort, I turned on them an eye of flint.

  They were obliged to cluster about Louisa instead, for she looked very ill. In truth, she was ill. I saw it at once, for I was accustomed to the signs. This was not mere grief. This was the pallor, the sluggishness, the wasted appearance of physical debility.

  ‘Has Louisa been ill?’ I asked James, in a low voice. We were making our way across the churchyard, past many familiar names.

  ‘Of course,’ he rejoined. ‘Her strength has been sorely tested. She nursed Mama devotedly for two years, in the most dutiful manner. Mama’s fall affected her spine, you know. She had to be lifted and guided. And being so deaf, she required a great deal of tendance. Poor Louisa tired herself out simply talking to Mama. You know how bad her lungs are. She has ruined her health for Mama’s sake. She laid all other considerations aside.’

  In contrast to my behaviour. I heard at once the implied criticism, but chose to ignore it. Bickering at funerals is not the proper occupation of anyone with a respectable background; I was not about to have the Badgerys and the Nicholsons shaking their heads primly over my lack of decent self-control. So I postponed our discussion until a more suitable time, and turned to accept Mrs Elizabeth Throsby’s condolences.

  You will remember Mrs Elizabeth Throsby, whose childhood adventures were always the subject of such great interest at Oldbury. In 1867 she was nearing her sixtieth year, a rather stout and placid woman still wearing her widow’s weeds, which were enlivened to some degree by a very elaborate arrangement of white lace on the head and at the throat. I had always liked her as a child. As an adult, I admired her for the fortitude with which she had endured the deaths of four children.

  For this reason I heard her out in a spirit of meek acceptance. Following a formal exchange of compliments, she went on to inquire after other members of my family, as if unaware that I was an unlikely source of information. (This may have been true courtesy, or it may have been absent-mindedness; I have no way of knowing.) She asked about my uncle, who had long since moved to the Tumut plains, and I was obliged to confess my ignorance as to his present state of health. She asked after my cousin John: was he married yet? I did not know. She then gave me an account of his marvellous cattle-driving feat, which I have already mentioned in this narrative.

  ‘You know, my dear,’ she added, placing a gentle hand on my arm, ‘that I was always very fond of your dear mother. As was Mr Throsby. We were both deeply troubled by all the terrible reverses that she suffered.’

  I said nothing to that. If I had, I might have regretted it later. But Mrs Throsby must have sensed something of my feelings, for she continued.

  ‘I should have been a better friend to her, but there were family considerations. My sister-in-law Mary took against her to such a degree after that voyage to New South Wales. Mary was always a great friend of Harriet Macarthur, you see. And Harriet was so disappointed at losing your mother that she became ungenerous.’

  ‘Losing my mother?’ I was utterly confused. ‘What do you mean, Mrs Throsby?’

  ‘Why—because your mother was such an excellent governess, of course.’ Mrs Throsby smiled her tranquil smile, sublimely unconscious of
the tumult that had suddenly arisen in my breast. ‘Mrs Macarthur was most unreasonable, I think. She persisted in viewing your mother’s conduct in the very worst light, and Mary was loyal to that opinion. But I cannot agree with them. Your mother had every right to fall in love with your father. They were ideally suited. And she was, after all, the daughter of a gentleman.’

  ‘But—but—’ I could not help myself. I had to reveal my ignorance. ‘But my mother came over with my father. He brought her here.’

  ‘Oh no. No, Mrs Macarthur paid her passage. Or perhaps it was her sister, Mrs Philip Gidley King. Yes, I believe that Mrs King engaged your mother’s services, for Mrs Macarthur’s sake.’ Mrs Throsby put a finger to her chin, and furrowed her brow. ‘Do you know, there was so much talk at the time, but I have quite forgotten . . . it is so long ago . . .’

  ‘Do you mean to say that my mother and father met on board the Cumberland?’

  ‘Oh yes. Such a romantic tale. But the Kings were furious, of course. And the Macarthurs. And Mary would hear nothing good about your mother, for all that no offence had been committed against her.’ Realising what she had just said, Mrs Throsby hastened to elaborate. ‘Not that any offence was committed. Your mother had no blameworthy object, or the marriage would not have been so successful. And if there had been any impropriety, your father would certainly have felt it, for he was an honourable man. No, no—the match was perfectly acceptable, for all Mary’s talk about your mother giving herself airs. And if the truth be told, my dear . . .’ Mrs Throsby leaned closer. ‘I believe that my sister-in-law may have been a little jealous. She was not married herself at that point, if you recall. And your father was such a prize. Such a wonderful man.’

  ‘Yes. He was.’

  ‘In this time of trial, you have that one comfort, at the very least,’ Mrs Throsby concluded, with genuine feeling. ‘At last your mother has gone to meet her husband again in that place where sin and sorrow and sighing are forever done away. How happy she must be, after all her long years of waiting. How joyfully he must have welcomed her.’

  There was no mention of my mother’s second husband, of course. It was as if he had never existed. All the same, I regret that I did not respond more graciously to Mrs Throsby’s good wishes. I regret that I simply mumbled something incoherent, and turned from her abruptly.

  No doubt she attributed my rudeness to a sudden access of grief, and freely forgave me. But it was not grief that shackled my tongue. It was shock. It was outrage. I find it hard to believe that I was able to contain myself through the walk back to the parsonage, where funeral meats were being served to a select group of mourners. How did I ever keep silent during that interminable reception, with its muted clinking of tea-cups and murmured remarks about the weather, and the state of the crops, and Sir John and Lady Young’s visit to Mittagong in April? I suppose that I must have been distracted by other considerations. The ecclesiastical sobriety of the furniture, for instance. The unhealthy shade of the wallpaper. And my brother’s settled air, as he helped Miss Sarah Anne Horton—the Reverend Horton’s eldest daughter—to distribute cakes and sandwiches. It seemed to me that James was very much at home. He was quite obviously such a favoured guest that I no longer asked myself why the parsonage had been offered up as a venue for this genteel gathering. And I was not surprised when, years later, I learned of James’s marriage to Miss Horton.

  But my brother’s marriage lay far into the future. At the time of which I speak, his thoughts were not fixed on that ‘star of every wandering bark’. On the contrary, they were fixed on Death, and his hands shook, and his face was stiff with suppressed feeling. His knuckles looked red and raw.

  Louisa was more composed. She still wore her hair in girlish ringlets to her shoulders, but the face framed by these curls was far from youthful. There were heavy pouches under her eyes, and dark lines around her mouth. She looked as tired as I felt.

  When most of the mourners had departed, leaving the three bereaved in possession of Reverend Horton’s front room, I said to her: ‘You should rest. You don’t look well.’

  Louisa turned to regard me, in her quiet way.

  ‘Neither do you,’ she rejoined.

  ‘It has been a hard winter, I suppose. For everyone.’

  ‘How is your family?’ Louisa asked, very much as if she wanted to know. I swallowed some obscure resentment and said:

  ‘Depleted.’

  ‘I was just talking to Mrs Throsby.’ No longer could I restrain myself. ‘She told me something very interesting. Very interesting indeed, all things considered.’

  ‘And what might that be?’ said James, in a dull voice—as if he found me inexpressibly wearing, with my impassioned outbursts and sudden, unlooked-for appearances. But I kept my temper. I told myself that he was in a nervous state, and had never been particularly stalwart to begin with.

  ‘It appears that Mama was a governess when she married Pa. A governess engaged by Mrs Hannibal Macarthur.’ Glancing from face to face, I was startled to observe no great change of expression in either of them. ‘It is quite well known, apparently. Except by her own children.’

  There was a brief pause. Then Louisa spoke.

  ‘I knew it,’ she admitted.

  ‘You did?’

  ‘She told me. And I told James.’

  ‘She told me. And I told James.’

  I could hardly believe my ears. ‘She told you?’ It was an effort to keep my voice from rising. ‘When? When did she tell you?’

  ‘Not long ago.’ Louisa’s small white hands began to twist about in her black silk lap. ‘You have to understand, she had very little with which to occupy herself,’ my sister explained gently. ‘She could not hold a book for long, and she could not hear me if I read to her. So she talked. She talked about London, and our grandparents . . . she talked about the time that she spent teaching five children in Lancashire, without any assistance. Apparently, mention was made of it in the newspapers while she was fighting for us in court—which is why we were never permitted to read them, Charlotte.’ Louisa smothered a cough, in which I could detect a rather ominous rattle. ‘She was fifteen years old when she began to teach. It was a considerable achievement. In many ways, it is a cause for pride.’

  ‘Then why did she not think to mention it sooner?’ I was almost beside myself with rage, though I managed to bank it down. ‘Why this quite obsessive concern with the distinctions of rank?’

  ‘Charlotte—’

  ‘Why these interminable lectures on the subject of ill-judged unions?’

  ‘It is not the same thing at all, Charlotte, and you know it,’ my brother declared. Whereupon I fixed him with such a look that he flinched, and lifted one hand in an involuntary gesture.

  ‘Please—James. Both of you.’ Louisa put her own hand over her eyes, and her voice cracked. ‘I couldn’t bear it. No. Really. I could not bear it.’

  ‘And what else did she tell you?’ I demanded, ignoring this plea for mercy. Rounding on my sister, I took full advantage of my superior strength. ‘What else did she happen to reveal in these nostalgic monologues?’ I spat. ‘Did she tell you why, Louisa? Did she finally explain? Am I actually going to discover why we’ve had to endure such misery over the years?’

  ‘Charlotte—’

  ‘Why did she marry Barton?’ I leaned forward. ‘Did she tell you that? Did she tell you that?’

  ‘Don’t speak to your sister so roughly,’ said James, but I ignored him. He saw himself as the head of the family, no doubt. He believed that the possession of Oldbury gave him precedence in any gathering of the clan. He was wrong, however. He had neither the sense nor the authority to direct my actions.

  And that was Barton’s fault. It was all Barton’s fault.

  ‘She did not mention George Barton,’ my sister replied huskily, uncovering her face. ‘Not once.’

  ‘Nor Belanglo?’ I pressed her.

  ‘Oh, no.’

  ‘She must have said something.’ I could not
keep my voice steady. ‘Just a word of explanation . . . an apology . . .’

  ‘Recollect her position, dear.’ Louisa responded to my obvious distress by softening her tone. ‘The whole world knew that she had gone with him into the forest. What could she do but marry him?’

  I shook my head. ‘No,’ I said. ‘No. You are not thinking clearly. Consider the woman. Consider her conduct. Time and again, she defied convention. Did the world’s opinion affect her decision to renounce the marriage? To fight that villain tooth and nail in court? To go with him to Belanglo in the first place? Would loss of reputation have outweighed for her the loss of all her legal rights over her family, and her family’s estate?’

  ‘I—’

  ‘Something happened, Louisa. Do you see? Something happened to her, and now . . . now I don’t suppose I shall ever know what.’

  There was a long silence. I cocked my ear for any warning cries from Eva, who had been laid down to sleep in one of the back rooms. But I heard only the distant clash of cutlery being washed in the kitchen.

  ‘She mentioned you,’ said Louisa, all at once.

  I raised my head again. ‘What?’ I said.

  ‘She mentioned you,’ Louisa repeated. ‘Towards the end.’

  I swallowed. My sister was regarding me with a clear and steady gaze. Her courage had always been of the quiet sort.

  ‘What did she say?’ I asked.