10

After a day pestering the population, I led the parade back to Calpa. The breeze wafted a stench our way. I knew what it was, didn’t even have to look. A dead sheep caught in a snag and happily macerating until some poor bugger fished it out. The unspoken rule was that whoever lived closest to it had the chore. I hoped it was Kev this time, but when I let my horse go into the home yard by the river, I knew it was my problem.

Denning went to complain to himself in his room at the hotel, but I took Baines through to the police station kitchen and pulled some beer bottles from the meat safe. We sat at the table to drink, lighting up two fags and washing the dust down with a soothing ale.

‘What’s Africa like, then?’ Baines asked. ‘Seen any of those darkie women dancing around naked in what God gave ’em? Now, I’d like to see that, I would.’

‘As an officer, my job was to keep my men away from fraternising with the locals.’

‘The army has licensed places, don’t they? For men to go to, like, make sure they don’t get the pox. That’s what I heard.’

‘In India they do. The British army in Bombay have whole streets of brothels just for the military.’

‘And in South Africa?’

‘It’s a … let’s just say it’s a nastier trade, unlicensed and more akin to slavery.’

‘Blimey,’ Baines said. ‘And the Australian soldiers, did they …’

‘A man spends weeks at the front killing, waiting to be killed, what’s he expected to do afterwards? Saucy postcards and a hand shandy?’

‘Yeah, right enough,’ he said and finished his beer. ‘How those statements coming on?’

‘I’ll hand them over to Mr Fraser tomorrow.’

I had very good reasons to be the one who found the killers, instead of Baines and Denning, and on the pretext of checking legibility, I took the troopers’ notebooks at the end of each day and went through them, making notes, jotting down times and finding inconsistencies, marking them for future questioning.

The young troopers were inexperienced and were not going to press a man twice their age and tough as whitleather, especially if he made it clear he didn’t want to answer questions, so I don’t know how reliable the statements were. But Baines and Denning weren’t worried. In fact, I had the sense they were simply going through the motions.

~

That night I woke to shouts and pounding on the station door, my heart just about leaping out of my chest.

Somebody was dead. More bodies. Don’t let it be Flora.

I stumbled through to the station, opened the door and found a kid of about fifteen, eyes wide, hair dishevelled, panting.

‘You’re to come quick to Gowrie, and the doctor too. There’s been trouble.’

That could mean anything. He ran off to rouse Joe and I pulled my uniform on, shook Lonergan awake and told him that until I got back he was to be ready for anything.

It was around one o’clock. Joe caught up with me and we hurried in stunned silence through the black night, memories of riding together to the Kirkbride bodies following us like spectres. At least we weren’t heading to Inveraray.

The night was bitter and still, our breath pluming and a light frost already on the ground. Lights were on in the Gowrie homestead and in the stockmen’s quarters. The overseer, Henry Peyton, met us, lantern raised, brows furrowed, shock etched deep in every line of his weathered face.

‘Doctor, you’ll be needed in there,’ he said, nodding towards the stockmen’s quarters. ‘And, Constable, you’d better see Mr Fletcher up at the house.’

‘What’s happened?’

‘A fight.’

My footsteps crunched over the frosty gravel. I entered the open door of the homestead, nobody there to greet me, so I just made my way to the sound of male voices. A woman was crying in a room off the hallway.

I found the door to the drawing room and opened it. A carriage clock on the mantelpiece ticked loudly. The dark polished furniture gleamed in the lamplight, the piano covered with a lace cloth, couches and chairs all clustered around the fireplace in a cosy circle. An open whisky bottle, the smell of camphor and cold ash. Tom Fletcher and his father Will standing in front of the dead fire. They looked over in surprise when I walked in.

‘Who called you out?’ Will Fletcher said, his craggy face pale.

‘A young lad from here woke me and Dr Pryor.’

Father and son exchanged a look. Joe Pryor burst in, looking harried. ‘Michael Pearson just passed away.’

Tom gave a strangled cry. Will Fletcher planted his hand firmly on his son’s shoulder, squeezing hard.

I took out my notebook, trying to spur my mind into action. ‘What happened?’

‘Pearson made a few ill-considered remarks about Nessie Kirkbride,’ Will said, while Tom stared at the ashes in the fireplace, tears rolling silently down his blotchy face.

‘And?’

‘Tom gave him a smack because that sort of talk won’t be tolerated on this property.’

I remembered Tom giving me a smack the day after the murders. Not an experience I’d care to repeat.

‘Pearson’s dead. Must have been more than a smack,’ I said, looking up from my notebook. ‘I’ll have to charge Tom.’

‘Do it, I don’t care,’ Tom said.

‘Hush,’ Will snapped. ‘You take my boy and not one family in the district will cooperate with you on your damned Kirkbride investigation.’

‘It’s not my investigation,’ I said. ‘It’s the law.’

‘You leave my son here, with me.’

‘I’ll have to take him into custody now and he’ll go up to Bourke tomorrow and appear before a magistrate in Bourke.’

‘You’re going to put him in the lock-up?’ Will shouted. ‘No, I won’t have it. Pearson was a nasty piece of work and lazy to boot. Just like him to stir up trouble.’

‘This is murder, Mr Fletcher,’ Joe said. ‘Pearson’s character is irrelevant.’

‘Thank you, Dr Pryor,’ I said. ‘Would you care to wait outside?’

Shaking his head, Joe retreated.

‘What are you charging him with?’

‘Manslaughter at this stage, and if I don’t charge him, Mr Fletcher,’ I said, when we were alone, ‘no working man in the district will cooperate with the Kirkbride investigation, or any investigation in the future, including the one into what happened out there between Pearson and your son. Could be Tom was acting in self-defence – we don’t know yet.’

He looked at me, then saw what I was getting at. Appease Dr Pryor and sort it out later.

~

I wasn’t going to handcuff Tom, even though Joe wanted me to. He was waiting for me outside on the homestead verandah.

‘Look at the men,’ Joe said, nodding towards the crowd on the verandah of the men’s quarters. ‘They must see justice being done, for the sake of good relations in the community. They sent for us – Fletcher didn’t.’

‘I’ll sort it out,’ I said, buttoning up my coat.

‘I was in the men’s quarters, Gus, I heard what they were saying about Tom, about bosses and workers. You don’t read the papers, you think Europe is far away, but ideas travel.’

‘Listen, mate, before you build the barricades, tell me: did you find out what Pearson said to Tom Fletcher?’

‘No, I don’t know. But I do know that to the men it appeared as an unprovoked attack on Pearson by Tom.’

I fetched Tom, and after he’d mounted up I cuffed him so everyone could see what I was doing, then we rode off. Once we were out of sight, I took the cuffs off. Justice was an abstract noun, and therefore as rubbery as you wanted it to be, especially out here.

~

‘Pearson said Nessie got what she deserved,’ Tom said, half an hour along the road. ‘I gave him what he deserved and I’m not sorry I killed him.’

‘Fair enough, but don’t say things like that to me,’ I said as we plodded along in the darkness. ‘Judge will go easier if you show remorse.’

‘The hell with that,’ Tom cried. ‘Why don’t you just let me go? I’ll head west, wait it out somewhere.’

‘Spend the rest of your life on the run? Nope, the smarter choice would be to plead gross provocation and good character on your part.’

‘Pearson said she was just a cunt on two legs like every other woman, said she got what she deserved for thinking she was too good for the likes of the working man.’

‘There you go, gross provocation.’

The chorus of crickets and frogs along the dark river suddenly fell silent. I looked around, pulse rising. Nobody behind us, or not that I could see. Took my rifle out, mindful of unknown killers on the loose, madmen and careless roo shooters. And of the swirling animosity that had blown into the district from nowhere.

‘Maybe the bastard killed her,’ Tom said, oblivious to everything but his brooding pain.

‘Could have. We’ll look into it.’

I was thankful to see the lights of the police station looming in the distance. Lonergan was in full battle dress, armed and tense.

‘At ease, Trooper, you can go back to bed. All sorted.’

He sagged with a mix of disappointment and relief. Tom went into the lock-up calmly. I gave him a slug of whisky and an extra blanket. He sat still and silent in the cell, looking up when I reappeared with a cup of tea for him. As far as I knew, he wasn’t aware of what had been done to Nessie, or how she was killed. If he had been aware, I reckon he’d have done more damage before now, either to himself or someone else.

Tears suddenly appeared on his cheeks. ‘I don’t care what happens now, I just want to see her.’

Maybe the whisky wasn’t such a good idea.

‘Better give me your belt.’

He looked up, surprised, but gave it to me. Sometimes the darkness creeps up fast and you can’t outrun it by thinking. I didn’t want to wake to a sight like that. I dragged my armchair from the kitchen around the corner and into the small hall and parked it in front of his cell, covered myself with a blanket and tried to doze, hoping I’d wake if he tried anything. I don’t know how long passed before I heard him speak.

‘Gus.’

‘Mmm?’

‘What was she doing on that road in the first place? Why were they there?’

‘Don’t know.’ I pulled the blanket up closer to my chin and sighed.

‘Jimmy probably had some dollymop at the dance and took his sisters along to hide behind.’

‘Mmm.’

‘But why did Nessie agree to go with him? She knew I was going to be at the ball – she knew I was waiting for her … Gus?’ He banged the enamel tea mug against the bars, startling me out of my comfortable doze.

I straightened up a little with a groan. ‘I don’t know. Mr Kirkbride said they were going to the ball, leaving later because Grace wasn’t well. He has no idea why they were on the Larne Road.’

‘Kirkbride’s a prick.’

Moonlight streamed in through the high-barred window in his cell. I took out my watch and checked the time. Three forty. I found the bottle of whisky, poured a splash into a pannikin and handed it through the bars to him, gulped from the bottle and sat down again, hoping the alcohol would make him sleepy. But it made me sleepy, him talkative.

‘I want to talk to Nessie, I … just need to see her one last time, tell her how much she means to me.’

‘She knew.’

‘We wanted to marry but Kirkbride said no. Then Father spoke to him and Kirkbride came around. He fixed a time in Bourke with his lawyers, who came out from Sydney, to discuss what he’d settle on Nessie. We were so happy that he’d finally agreed, even Mother said she’d attend the wedding, and she never goes anywhere.

‘We go to the lawyers,’ he continued. ‘And we’re sitting at this big shiny table and Kirkbride gets to his feet, pulls a handful of dirt out of his pocket and throws it on the table. Says, “That’s all you’ll get of my land.” He’d organised it all just to humiliate us. Wasn’t going to settle a penny on Nessie.

‘I’d marry her with nothing but the clothes she was wearing, but Father said to hell with Kirkbride, marriage was off and I was to find someone else. Nessie thought it was me, that I didn’t love her anymore. I couldn’t tell her it was her father being a bastard. He was never going to allow us to marry, never. He was going to pick Nessie’s husband and I wasn’t in the running.’

I straightened up as Tom spoke. Everyone knew Tom and Nessie would marry. Everyone except Bob Kirkbride, it seemed.

‘Kirkbride told me you were going to propose at the ball.’

‘I just told you, he’s a lying prick. When Nessie didn’t turn up I thought it was because she was upset with me. I was desperate to talk to her, waiting and waiting … and all the while she …’

His face was in shadow, just his massive arms and chest illuminated. Outside, a rabbit screamed as it died. A god-awful sound. The wild dogs hunted them down. Rabbits must have haunted sleep, all of them waking to the sound of their friend’s death.

I picked up the whisky bottle, splashed some more in his pannikin and took a slug myself. Thought of how I’d failed to protect Nessie and Grace, Jimmy too.

Tom’s big shoulders began to shake, his tears falling hard, then he raised his face, opened his mouth and howled again and again. I couldn’t stand it another moment. Went out the back into the yard.

I could still hear him wailing for her, and I thought of Flora, how I’d failed her. I lit a cigarette, my hands shaking, tears suddenly coursing down my cheeks. Then I dropped my fag, went into the stable and buried my face in Felix’s neck. I could barely hear Tom out here.

I stayed with the horses until I thought Tom had cried himself to sleep, then went and roused poor old Kev and sent an urgent wire to Bourke for an escort.

~

As expected, I was woken by Will Fletcher barging into the station before dawn, banging doors, calling out. Lonergan, half-dressed, hurried out and fell over me in my chair, kicked the empty whisky bottle spinning into the wall and fell against the station door. Tom, still alive, sat up, the blanket dropping to the floor.

I unlocked the cell and let him out. His father hugged him and I left them, washed my face, put on a fresh shirt, applied some ointment to my scar, rubbing it back and forth, trying to organise my sleep-deprived mind.

‘Mrs Schreiber will be here soon, she’ll do breakfast for you, Tom,’ I said, entering the kitchen, working the coals and feeding kindling into the stove.

‘What are you going to charge him with?’ Will Fletcher said.

‘Manslaughter.’

‘I don’t want those detectives on my property, y’hear?’ Will said, trembling. ‘I’ll horsewhip them if they so much as walk past.’

‘It won’t be them. I’ll take the statements. Lonergan, that means you will have to escort the detectives today.’

‘But … but, sir, I—’

I shut him down with a raised eyebrow. A day with Denning, Baines and the boys was an assignment nobody wanted, but this business with Tom Fletcher had to be done properly.

‘I wired for an escort last night,’ I said. ‘So they’ll take him back to Bourke.’

‘Not in a van, I won’t have it,’ Fletcher bellowed.

‘Please, Mr Fletcher, calm down. An armed escort, a trooper, will ride with Tom to Bourke. You can go with him if you like, organise bail. But both Lonergan and I have duties here.’

He looked at Tom, who was lost in his own misery and didn’t seem to care what happened to him.

To my surprise, Trooper Parry from Larne turned up.

‘I’m to take him as far as Larne,’ he told me, ‘then a Bourke trooper will take him from there. Short on horses at the moment.’

Not unheard of. I watched the two Fletcher men mount up and set off upriver with Parry. Inside, Lonergan was at the armoury, staring at the weapons like he was in a flower shop choosing the prettiest bunch for his girl. I couldn’t stand it and went back outside for a moment to calm my nerves.

Wally appeared out the front of the pub, combed his hair back and slipped the comb into his shirt pocket, then lumbered over to say good morning, his dog trailing behind.

‘What’s goin’ on, Gus? Why the Fletchers heading to Bourke?’

‘Incident up at Gowrie last night. Tom Fletcher punched a bloke, killed him with one hit.’

Wally rubbed his enormous belly with a sigh. ‘Gowrie is bloody cursed. Always bloody something happening on that bloody property.’

‘Like what?’

‘Will’s father, old Bill Fletcher, died in the Federation Drought, just dropped dead in his paddocks. Bloody ravens ate half of him by the time he was found.’

‘Were you here then?’

‘I was. Like being in hell. Dead and dying stock, roos, birds, people starving. The bloody land blowin’ away. But we’ve come back out of it, always do.’

‘What else has happened on Gowrie? I asked.

‘Overseer before Peyton cut his own bloody throat.’

‘Jesus, why?’

‘Drought got to people. Lotta death, lotta hardship. Hundreds of thousands of bloody sheep, just dropped dead. Roos, cattle, birds, you name it. Still haven’t cleared the bones away.’

‘And?’

‘Mrs Fletcher broke her back, year before you came. Can’t get out of bed now.’

‘While riding?’

He laughed long and loud, big belly jiggling. ‘You could say that, mate. She was having an affair with Bob Kirkbride, meeting out bush in secret. Didn’t you know that?’

‘Why would anyone tell me?’

Wally shrugged. ‘Nuthin’ else to do but talk about other people out here. Not like we have a music hall and moving pictures.’

‘An affair with Bob Kirkbride, of all people,’ I said, shaking my head at the recall of the man’s tyrannical ways.

‘Yeah, you and I wouldn’t want to play a game of nug-a-nug with Kirkbride, but the ladies used to like him. He’d joke and carry on, lively up a dance or picnic, something Will Fletcher never done. But after the accident Kirkbride changed. Everything did.’

‘Mrs Fletcher and Kirkbride were out riding together when she came off?’

‘Yeah,’ he said, giving a great sigh. ‘A sad business. You’d never see a more handsome woman than Hester Fletcher, born to the saddle, could shoot, dance all night, run the homestead, always organising picnics and cricket games … Yeah, she brought life to this place, I tell you.’

‘Reckon Will Fletcher could have gone looking for vengeance?’ I asked.

Wally turned and gaped at me like I’d lost my mind. ‘Kill Kirkbride’s kids for tupping his wife? Will’s a good Christian man, turns the other cheek and sends the account to Heaven.’

Yet there were only so many times a man could turn his cheek before he gets jack of it. Kirkbride was ploughing Fletcher’s wife, and then refused to let Fletcher’s son marry his daughter? Insult piled on injury, by which time I’d be well up for a retaliatory strike.

‘Virtue in suffering, mate,’ Wally said, as if he heard my thoughts. ‘That’s what the nuns told us kids when they whipped us.’

He whistled to his dog and went back inside the pub. Baines and Denning appeared, Lonergan and the troopers assembled and off they went. I suspect Denning was relieved I was not on escort. I know I was.

Back inside, I pulled down the files for 1907, flipped through the reports until I came to the Hester Fletcher accident. Harry Greenleaf had been the trooper in attendance. Killed himself not long after, poor bastard.

I thought of Tom Fletcher’s tale of Kirkbride’s cruelty in the lawyer’s office and wondered if Tom had told the detectives about it. I doubted it – no man wants to relate his humiliations to a stranger, particularly a fish-eyed, clammy-skinned prick like Denning. And Kirkbride had declared to the detectives that Tom intended to propose at the Coronation Ball, so he wasn’t telling the truth either. Had Will Fletcher told the detectives Kirkbride had been at his wife? Again, how many men would admit that they could not keep their wife in order?

I leant back, put my feet up on the desk and lit a fag, watched the smoke rise. It was my duty to pass all this information on. But I decided to do some discreet digging first. I knew that while Will Fletcher could take a one-two punch, Tom could not, or would not. I had to be careful.