The Dark Mountain

by Catherine Jinks

  That, at least, was good news. George Barton was in poor health. As for the rest, I hardly knew how to take it. On the one hand, Barton had at last been clapped in irons. On the other, he and Lynch and the bloody years at Oldbury had once again been dug up and thrust into the public’s face, no doubt to engender all kinds of whispered remarks around the neighbourhood.

  I wondered if my mother had seen the item. She was still married to Barton, after all. And now her husband was gaoled at Parramatta. How, I thought, would the respectable Mr Warren take this?

  It was something about which I questioned her after Emily’s funeral, back at Oldbury.

  ‘Louisa was telling me that you and she are planning to move,’ I remarked, gazing down at my mother’s bent, grey head. ‘I assumed it was because there must have been a lot of talk hereabouts. On account of the newspaper reports concerning Mr Barton’s trial.’

  My mother then lifted her chin, and fixed me with a quelling look.

  ‘We are moving,’ she said coldly, ‘to aid Louisa in her work. It is better that she should be closer to town, if she is to publish more widely and profitably.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘The people with whom we associate,’ my mother added, ‘are generally charitable, and do not concern themselves with squalid details. As do some.’

  And in this remark, I must assert, lay my mother’s mistake. She should not have spoken thus. Having insulted my husband, she deserved a set-down, and should have taken her punishment. Striking back was inadvisable.

  For I was younger and stronger, and had more to forgive.

  ‘So Mr Warren is not concerned that he has a felon for a father-in-law?’ I asked, seating myself on the battered sofa. ‘That does surprise me, in the circumstances.’

  ‘Ah, Charlotte.’ For the first time, my husband interjected. ‘Leave’t alone, lass—there’s no luck’ll attend such talk. Not now.’

  ‘Oh, but I naturally thought that Mr Warren’s sensibilities were easily offended, there having been such a concerted effort to keep us away from him.’ I saw James cover his face with his hand. ‘Indeed, I was most surprised that Henry was to be permitted to sleep in the same room as my children.’

  This, perhaps, was a little strong. I must concede it. James gasped, and Louisa was moved to protest.

  ‘Charlotte,’ she said, her voice breaking. ‘How could you? Today of all days . . .’

  ‘Indeed, Charlotte, it is ill breeding that arouses the deepest disgust in anyone of a refined nature,’ my mother interrupted, narrowing her eyes. ‘And I am very grateful that Mr Warren was not exposed to yours.’

  ‘Yes, I fear that my manners have rather coarsened, over the years. What with my prolonged exposure to ceaseless domestic strife of the very worst description in my youth.’

  ‘Oh, what nonsense!’ My mother sat up straight, her nostrils flaring. ‘I do not see that your brother and sister have become bereft of their finer feelings, as you have!’

  ‘Which is to say, I suppose, that they have not had the temerity to ask for an explanation?’

  ‘George Barton went mad! ’ my mother exclaimed, her voice quivering. ‘You know that perfectly well, and yet you persist in tormenting me with these cruel questions—’

  ‘Insanity does not enter into it.’ I folded my arms. ‘George Barton was vicious long before he went mad, but you married him anyway. And I want to know why.’

  ‘I refuse to discuss this.’

  ‘What happened at Belanglo?’

  ‘Your lack of consideration is utterly repugnant.’ My mother rose. ‘If you wish to remain here tonight, Charlotte, I suggest you confine yourself to your room. Or I shall.’

  ‘Mama, please . . .’ Louisa began, but was not permitted to finish.

  ‘I no longer wonder that you married as you did, Charlotte,’ my mother continued, a patch of bright colour flaring on each cheek. ‘Indeed, I would have to say that Mr McNeilly, despite his humble birth, sets an example of gentility that you would do well to emulate, if such a thing is within your powers at all. I am ashamed of you.’

  ‘Is that why you’re moving? Because you’re ashamed of me?’

  There was no reply. My mother turned on her heel, making for the door.

  ‘You’ve a deal to be ashamed of, have you not?’ I called after her. ‘More than you’ll admit to, perhaps?’ At which point James stepped forward.

  ‘Stop it, Charlotte,’ he said. ‘I will not allow this kind of talk in my house.’

  ‘I used to wonder why you never accused anyone—since some of our men must have been involved in the flogging,’ I continued, ignoring James as I addressed my mother. ‘Had they not been, Thomas Smith would never have been murdered—or so it’s been assumed. I used to wonder if you might have had something to hide. Something that Thomas or his cronies might have seen, when they came across you and Mr Barton. Something that they might have revealed in court!’

  The words (much regretted, I have to admit) were barely out of my mouth before my mother attacked me. She positively flew across the room, heavy as she was, and slapped me hard across the cheek. I might have returned the compliment had my husband not intervened. James, too, was quick to join the fray. He grabbed my mother while my husband grabbed me.

  ‘How dare you!’ my mother shrieked. ‘Get out! Get out of this house!’

  ‘You can’t order me out of this house!’ I spat. ‘Remember? You threw this house away when you married a drunken peasant!’

  ‘Speak for yourself, Charlotte McNeilly!’ my mother cried—and I swear to you, I saw red. I could have killed her. My husband knew it, too; he picked me up bodily, his arms clamped tight around my breast, and swung me into a corner. There he bent his head to murmur in my ear.

  ‘Enough,’ he said. ‘D’ye hear? I’ll not have this, Charlotte, shamin’ us in front o’ the family.’

  Louisa was sobbing. My mother was whimpering, her hands to her cheeks, while James tried to soothe her. ‘The ingratitude!’ she gasped. ‘The effrontery!’

  ‘Shh,’ James begged. ‘I know, but—’

  ‘The sheer gall of it!’

  ‘Mama, please recall, we are none of us ourselves. Not today.’

  ‘What have I done to deserve such treatment?’ My mother was in tears. ‘Do you all hate me so much? All of you?’

  ‘Of course not!’

  ‘I have lost two daughters! Not one, but two!’

  She was right, as it happened. For I would not stay, preferring to avoid a discordant evening and perhaps more fractious breakfast. I roused my children, packed them onto the dray, and departed.

  I never spoke to my mother again.

  Eighteen

  1839

  Oldbury’s decline gained momentum in the beginning of 1839.

  It was a very bad year. Summer was marred by drought. The crops were an almost total failure. From fifty acres we reaped only about thirty bushels, and were obliged to purchase our flour. We lost many of our sheep too, and those left were in a parlous state. Then, when the rain did come, it came in such great force that there was some flooding, with the usual accompanying diseases. And while our neighbours suffered equivalent setbacks, ours were aggravated by George Barton’s complete inability to deal with them.

  Slowly, item by item, we were deprived of every luxury. First went Miss Rudd, then our annual delivery of new books, then our hock and sherry and soda water. The selection of spices in our kitchen was much reduced, though there was no shortage of meat; feed being in such short supply, we were obliged to kill off many failing animals who would have flourished on a better diet. The men did not want for anything (there being laws governing the exact content of their rations, and the distribution of their slops), but they did begin to grumble at the disappearance of those little luxuries that my father and mother had once been moved to bestow on them: extra tobacco at Christmas and Easter, for instance, and plum duff on the Sabbath. George Barton could see no merit in such ‘coddling’, especially in view of the f
act that he himself was being deprived.

  Though not of his newspapers, I might add.

  While he agreed to stop buying some of the English journals, we continued to subscribe to the Sydney Herald and the Sydney Gazette—since their perusal had become almost his main occupation. Whenever my mother tried to suggest that we did not in all prudence require both Sydney journals, he would lash out at her. I once saw him flailing at her head and neck with a rolled-up Herald. On another occasion, he hurled a pot of hot tea across the room. He was fond of throwing hot tea. I myself was once scalded on the left arm when I put it up to shield myself from a flying tea-cup. The scar is there still. It is one of many, both visible and invisible.

  And the reason for this assault? I seem to recall that I had given my stepfather a sullen look on being informed that, if I once more talked to any of the male convicts in my usual ‘shameless fashion’, I would be ‘flogged like a bullock’ and locked in the cellar for a week. My ‘sullen looks’ were something that George Barton found increasingly hard to stomach. As I approached my eleventh birthday, I became more and more the target of his rage. This may have been on account of Oldbury’s rapid decline, which undoubtedly aggravated my stepfather’s uncertain temper. Or it may have been the effect of my own growing sense of outrage and contempt, which I sometimes found hard to disguise. Although I do not wish to suggest that I was anywhere near the age at which one could expect to ‘come out’, I was on the point of developing, with all the concomitant changes—both physical and emotional—which that implies. Girls can become very fastidious as they approach womanhood, and George Barton revolted me. His foul breath and bloated face made me shudder. When he addressed me, I could hardly forbear to wince. My dislike of him became less a silent, seething resentment than a wild and open hatred, which must have flashed in my eyes a dozen times a day. Is it any wonder that he began to turn on me with increasing anger?

  Not that I was his main target. My mother occupied that unenviable position. As our circumstances deteriorated, she was frequently obliged to present her husband with bad news, which he never received in a tranquil spirit. I remember an incident early in the winter of 1839, when Barton was being particularly reclusive. He disliked the cold weather, and would sometimes not emerge from his room all day. I cannot pretend that such conduct was viewed with disfavour among the children, but for my mother it could be exceedingly awkward, especially when there was business to address. The business arising in this instance was a letter from one of my father’s executors, Mr Alexander Berry. It had made my mother very anxious, and she was keen to discuss it with her husband. But he refused to oblige her.

  Though she knocked and entreated, he would not unlock his bedroom door. When she offered to push the letter under the door, he threatened to set it alight if she did so. That, at least, is what I assume he said—for I could not hear his responses from my concealed vantage point down in the vestibule.

  I could only hear my mother’s voice.

  ‘Burning the letter will not solve our problem!’ she said sharply. ‘This is a serious matter, George, it will not go away . . . what? No, of course not! It is to your own advantage—much more so than mine! He has taken against you thoroughly! He intends to terminate your lease, and sell all the livestock! Listen: only hear what he has to say . . .’

  And she began to read the missive aloud, through the panels of the closed bedroom door. I do not remember every word. Much of it, however, remained with me, no doubt because the insults were so numerous and cutting. Mr Berry declared in his letter that he feared for the property of myself and my siblings, purely on account of Mr Barton, whose intemperance was known to the whole world. He described Barton as ‘a useless idler who neglects his own concerns’, complaining of my stepfather’s refusal to set foot outside of Oldbury. In the circumstances, he said, there was reason to fear that everything would be squandered.

  ‘“Therefore the step I intend to take is to put the remainder of the property beyond his control,”’ my mother read. ‘Do you hear, George? “You and Mr Barton have often attributed the anxiety of myself and Captain Coghill to get the property out of Mr Barton’s hands to sinister motives . . .” (That is true, at least!) “This step, however, will convince you that we are disinterested, as the property will then be entirely beyond our control . . .” George, are you listening? We will be thrown out of our own home! George!’ She hammered once again on the door. ‘Is this what you want? To see us paupered and homeless? Are you going to lie there drinking while your livelihood is sold from under you? George! Answer me!'

  He would not, however. And soon I heard the muted sound of sobbing, which brought me to the bottom of the staircase.

  My mother was sitting on the top stair, her face in her hands.

  ‘Mama!’ cried Emily, who was with me. ‘Don’t cry, Mama!’

  ‘Oh!’ My mother uncovered her face. She searched in her sleeves for a handkerchief, and finding none, dabbed at her cheeks with her apron instead. ‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded hoarsely. ‘Can you find no other employment? I thought you had darning to complete.’

  ‘Mama,’ I said, with a trembling lip, ‘will we have to leave Oldbury?’

  ‘Were you eavesdropping?’ My mother’s voice was crisp. ‘You should not be so ill-mannered, Charlotte!’

  ‘We could hardly help but overhear,’ was my equally crisp response, ‘since you made no attempt to speak softly!’

  ‘We will not have to sell our sheep, Mama?’ Emily interrupted, shrill with distress. ‘All our lovely sheep and cows?’

  ‘Certainly not,’ my mother snapped. She rose, sniffing, and tucked the letter into her pocket. ‘I shall write some letters of my own. Mr Berry is wholly misguided, and will be made to see sense. You may be sure of that.’

  Her protests, however, fell on deaf ears. Mr Berry’s plans continued apace, without regard for my mother’s wishes. And as she fended off his attempts to sell our livestock, George Barton’s behaviour became increasingly erratic.

  He seemed to think himself the victim of a huge and complicated conspiracy. Though my mother was at her wits’ end, and complained ceaselessly of being persecuted, Barton preferred to see her as a party to the executors’ attempts to throw him off the estate. Once or twice, in his cups, he even raised the possibility that my mother and Mr Berry had together hired the would-be assassin whose gunshot had shattered our sitting-room window, the previous year. (I have no doubt at all that, during his more delusional periods, Barton actually believed that Mr Alexander Berry was colluding with John Lynch, as well.) And when my mother fretted over the cost of a lawyer’s advice, Barton would simply growl, ‘You have no need to be concerned. Your situation will not be affected.’

  For a while she disregarded him, but some remarks cannot be ignored. On the morning of my eleventh birthday, matters came to a head.

  My anniversary was celebrated in a very modest fashion that year. My gifts were few and inexpensive: from my family I received some coloured ink, a sheaf of writing paper, a knot of yellow ribbon and a bouquet of unusual wildflowers, as well as a length of cotton stuff (for new chemises) which my mother would have ordered in any case, since our wardrobes were sadly dilapidated. The servants gave me a jar of dessert apricots, on the understanding that I would return the jar. George Barton gave me nothing but some ill-timed advice. He told me that I should behave myself, for I was altogether too froward for my age. ‘If you had any looks to speak of,’ he said, ‘I’d be worrying about yer reputation.’ Then he complained about the cost of celebrating my birthday.

  ‘All I ever hear is talk of retrenching and economising,’ he rumbled, ‘yet here is a roll of cloth at four pounds nine shillings, and there must be half a pound of currants in that cake. Is this sheer, unjustified extravagance, or are you keeping something from me?’

  My mother sighed.

  ‘You know perfectly well,’ she said, ‘that the expense of this celebration was defrayed by the sale of the epergne. You know t
his.’

  ‘I know only what I am told. It seems to me that you are making yourself very comfortable for a woman on the verge of ruin.’

  ‘Comfortable?’ My mother’s mouth twisted. ‘Is that what you call it?’

  ‘If you were truly worried, you would not be throwing your money away on trinkets and titbits. I know your game, Madam.

  You think yerself a deep ’un, but I can read you well enough.’

  ‘What is the point of reading me when you will not read Berry’s letters?’ my mother rejoined, flushing. ‘Can you not understand that he loathes me? That he would rather see me a pauper than grant me the slightest condescension? Would he be looking for a tenant if he intended that I should stay? He is advertising—you must have seen it! Do you actually read the newspapers, or is it all a pretence?’

  I believe that I was not alone in flinching at this last remark. It was of the type guaranteed to annoy Barton, whose face suddenly turned red under a lowering brow.

  ‘I read as well as any man in England,’ he spat.

  ‘Then read Berry’s letters! Satisfy yourself as to the urgency of our situation!’ My mother’s voice began to rise, as her harried nerves failed her. ‘I have told you that he intends to sell our flour mill to Charles Throsby, yet you persist in doing nothing! And how much can I do, without your help? You hold the lease, not I! Under the law I have no claim whatsoever, and must stand helpless while my own dear husband’s legacy is broken up—while the sleek cows that he was so proud of are driven from the pastures—his favourite riding horse is disposed of . . .’

  As my mother faltered, close to tears, Barton scowled horribly. His eyes narrowed and his nostrils flared. He slammed his open palm onto the breakfast table.

  ‘I am your husband now! I am!’ he barked. ‘God damn you to hell, with your arrogance—you think you can get rid of me like this?’

  ‘Run away, children,’ my mother croaked. ‘Go and play.’

  ‘He is no longer the master here, I am!’ Barton roared. ‘And you will not force me off, by damn, or you will suffer for it! D’you hear?’