Sheilah McLeod: A Heroine of the Back Blocks

Out on the open it was all quiet as death, and I knew exactly why. I entered the thicket pretty cautiously, and before I had gone ten yards discovered what I had expected to find there. It was Dan Nicholson sure enough, and one glance showed me that he held in his arms buxom little Faauma, the daughter of Salevao, the head man of the island. By the way he was standing, I could tell that she had been struggling, and, from the tilt of his right arm, I guessed that his fingers were on her throat, and that he was threatening to choke her if she uttered another sound. I moved out of the undergrowth and took stock of him.

'So this is the way you attend to my instructions, is it, Mr Nicholson?' I said, kicking a bit of dead wood out of the way, and bringing my rifle to the port in case of mischief. 'Look here, I don't want to shoot you on my own grounds, when you're, so to speak, my guest, but, by God, if you don't put those hands of yours up above your head and right-about-face for the beach this very instant, I swear I'll drill you through and through as sure as you're born. You understand me now; I've got nine deaths under my finger, and all of 'em waiting to look into your carcase, so, if you turn round as much as an inch, you're booked for Kingdom Come.'

He never said a word, but dropped the girl right there, and put his hands up as I had ordered him.

'That's right, I said. 'Now march.'

Without a word he turned to the rightabouts and set off through the scrub for the beach. I followed behind him, with the rifle on my arm ready to come to the shoulder at an instant's notice. The surf rolled upon the reef like distant thunder, the stars shone down upon the still lagoon, and through the palm-leaves I could just discern the outline of the schooner.

'Now, sir,' I said, when we arrived at the water's edge, 'I'll have to trouble you to swim out to yonder vessel. Don't say no, or dare to turn round; for if you disobey me, you're dead pig that instant.'

'But I can't swim,' he cried, grinding his teeth so savagely that I could hear him yards away.

'That be hanged for a yarn,' I said quietly. 'You swam well enough the day Big-head Brown fired you off his lugger at Apia. Come, in you go, and no more palaver, or you and I will quarrel.'

'But I shall be eaten by sharks,' he cried, this time meaning what he said very thoroughly.

'And I wish them joy of a dashed poor meal,' I answered. 'Come, in you go!'

With that he began to blubber outright like a great baby, and while he was doing so I couldn't help thinking what a strange situation it was. Picture for yourself two men, with the starlit heavens looking down on them, standing on the edge of a big lagoon, one talking and the other blubbering like a baby that's afraid of the water. I was about tired of it by this time, so I gave him two minutes in which to make up his mind, and promised him, in the event of his not deciding to strike out then, that I'd fire. Consequently he waded in without more ado, and when I had seen him more than half way out to the schooner, I put the rifle under my arm and went back to the house.

My guests had evidently been listening to our conversation, and at the same time amusing themselves with my gin bottles.

'You seem to have turned mighty strait-laced all of a sudden, Mr Heggarstone,' said the skipper, a little coldly as I came up the steps and stood the rifle in a corner.

'You think so, do you?' I answered. 'And why so, pray?'

'It was only a native girl at the best calculation,' said he. 'And, in my opinion, she ought to think herself mighty well honoured to be taken notice of. She ain't a European queen or an extra special female martyr, is she?'

'I reckon she's a woman, anyhow,' I replied. 'And no Nicholson that ever was born, or any other living man for the matter of that, is big enough to play fast and loose with the women of my island while I'm about! So don't you make any mistake about that, my friend.'

'You seem to think a precious deal more of the sex on your patch than we do down our way,' says he.

'Perhaps so! And what if I do?'

'Nothing, of course, but I don't know that it's a good idea to side with the niggers against white men. That's all,' he continued, looking a trifle foolish, as he saw the way I was staring at him.

'Don't you? Well, when you've had sufficient experience, perhaps you'll think differently. No, sirree, I tell you that the man who says a word against a woman, black or white, in my hearing has to go down, and I don't care who he is.'

'Of course, you've a right to your own opinions,' he answered.

'I have, and what's more, I think I'm big enough to back them!'

The supercargo, all this time, had sat as quiet as a mouse. Now he put his spoke into the conversation.

'I suppose there's a yarn at the back of all this palaver.'

'There is,' I answered, 'and a mighty big one too. What's more, if you like, you shall hear it. And then, when I've done, if it don't make you swear a woman's just the noblest and sweetest work of God's right hand, and that the majority of men ain't fit to tie her shoe laces, well, then, all I can say is you're not the fellows I take you to be.'

'Give me a light for my pipe,' the skipper said, 'and after that fire away. I like a yarn first-rate. The night's young, this bottle's about half-full, and if it takes till morning, well, you'll find I'm not the chap to grumble.'

I furnished him with a box of matches, and then, seating myself in a long cane chair beside the verandah rails, lit my pipe and began the yarn which constitutes this book.

CHAPTER I

OLD BARRANDA ON THE CARGOO RIVER, SOUTH-WESTERN QUEENSLAND

When first I remember old Barranda Township on the Cargoo River, South-Western Queensland, it was not what it is to-day. There were no grand three-storeyed hotels, with gilded and mirror-hung saloons, and pretty, bright-eyed barmaids, in the main street then; no macadamised roads, no smart villa residences peeping from groves of Moreton Bay fig-trees and stretching for more than a mile out into the country on either side, no gas lamps, no theatre, no School of Arts, no churches or chapels, no Squatters' Club, and, above all, no railway line connecting it with Brisbane and the outer world. No! There were none of these things. The township, however, lay down in the long gully, beside the winding, ugly creek just as it does to-day – but in those days its site was only a clearing out of the primeval bush; the houses were, to use an Irishism, either tents or slab huts; two hotels certainly graced the main street, but they were grog shanties of the most villainous description, and were only patronised by the riffraff of the country side. The only means of communicating with the metropolis was by the bullock waggons that brought up our stores once every six months, or by riding to the nearest township, one hundred and eight miles distant, and taking the coach from there – a long and wearisome journey that few cared to undertake.

One thing has always puzzled me, and that was how it came about that my father ever settled on the Cargoo. Whatever his reason may have been, however, certain was it that he was one of the earliest to reach the river, a fact which was demonstrated by the significant circumstance that he held possession of the finest site for a house and the pick of all the best country for miles around the township. It was in the earliest days that he made his way out west, and if I have my suspicions of why he came to Australia at all, well, I have always kept them religiously to myself, and intend to go on doing so. But before I say anything about my father, let me tell you what I remember of the old home.

It stood, as I suppose it does to-day, for it is many years since I set eyes on it, on a sort of small tableland or plateau on the hillside, a matter of a hundred yards above the creek, and at just the one spot where it could command a lovely view down the gully and across the roofs of the township towards the distant hills. It was a well-built place of six rooms, constructed of pisa, the only house of that description in the township – and, for that matter, I believe, in the whole district. A broad verandah, covered with the beautiful Wisteria creeper, ran all round it; in front was a large flower garden stretching away to the ford, filled with such plants and shrubs as will grow out in that country; to the right was the horse and cow paddock; and, on the left, the bit of cultivation we always kept going for the summer months, when green food is as valuable as a deposit at the bank. At the rear was another strip of garden with some fine orange and loquot trees, and then, on the other side of the stockyard rails, the thick scrub running up the hillside and extending for miles into the back country. The interior of the house was comfortably furnished, in a style the like of which I have never seen anywhere else in the Bush. I have a faint recollection of hearing that the greater part of it – the chairs, tables, pictures, bookcases and silver – came out from England the year that I was born, and were part of some property my father had inherited. But how much truth there was in this I cannot say. At anyrate, I can remember those chairs distinctly; they were big and curiously shaped, carved all over with a pattern having fruit in it, and each one had a hand clasping a battle-axe on a lozenge on the back – a crest I suppose it must have been, but whose I never took the trouble to inquire. The thing, however, that struck people most about the rooms was the collection of books – there were books in hundreds, in every available place – on the shelves and in the cupboards, on the tables, on the chairs, and even on the floor. There surely never was such a man for books as my father, and I can see him now, standing before a shelf in the half light of the big dining-room with a volume in his hand, studying it as if he were too much entranced to put it down. He was a tall, thin man, with a pale, thoughtful face, a high forehead, deep-set, curious eyes, that seemed to look you through and through, a big, hooked nose (mine is just like it), a handsome mouth, white teeth, and a heavy, determined-looking chin. He was invariably clean-shaven, well dressed, and so scrupulously neat and natty in his appearance that it seemed hard to imagine he had ever done a stroke of rough work in his life. And yet he could, and did, work harder than most men, but always in the same unostentatious fashion; never saying a word more than was absolutely necessary, but always ready at a moment's notice to pick a quarrel with you, or to say just the very one thing of all others that would be most calculated to give you pain. He was a strange man, was my father.

Of my mother my recollections are less distinct, which is accounted for by the fact that she died when I was only five years old. Indeed, the only remembrance I have of her at all is of a fragile little woman with a pale, sweet face, bending down to kiss me when I was in bed at night.

Drink and temper were my father's chief failings, but I was nearly eight years old before I really found that out. Even to-day, when I shut my eyes, I can conjure up a picture of him sitting in the dining-room before the table, two large candelabras lighting the room, drinking and reciting to himself, not only in English, but in other outlandish tongues that I can only suppose now must have been Latin and Greek. So he would go on until he staggered to his bed, and yet next morning he would be up and about again before sunrise, a little more taciturn, perhaps, and readier to take offence, but otherwise much the same as ever.

That he had always a rooted dislike to me, I know, and I am equally aware that I detested and feared him more than any other living being. For this reason we seldom met. He took his meals in solitary grandeur in the dark, old dining-room, hung round with the dingy pictures that had come out from England, of men in wigs, knickerbockers and queer, long-tailed coats, while I took mine with the old housekeeper in the kitchen leading off the back verandah. We were a strange household, and before I had turned eight years old – as strong an urchin as ever walked – I had come to the conclusion that we were not too much liked or trusted by the folk in the township. My father thought them beneath him, and let them see that he did; they called him proud, and hinted that he was even worse than that. Whether he had anything to be proud of is another matter, and one that I cannot decide. You must judge from the following illustration.

It was early in the year before the great flood which did so much damage in those parts, and which is remembered to this day, that news got about that in a few weeks' time the Governor of the colony would be travelling in our district, and would probably pay our township a visit. A committee of the principal folk was immediately chosen to receive him, and big preparations were made to do him honour. As, perhaps, the chief personage in our little community, my father was asked to preside over their deliberations, and for this purpose a deputation waited upon him. They could not possibly, however, have chosen a more unpropitious moment for their call; my father had been drinking all day, and, when they arrived, he burst into one of his fits of anger and drove them from the house, vowing that he would have nothing at all to do with the affair, and that he would show His Excellency the door if he dared to set foot within his grounds. This act of open hostility produced, as may be supposed, a most unfavourable impression, and my father must have seen it, for he even went so far as to write a note of apology to the committee, and to suggest, as his contribution to the general arrangements, that he should take His Excellency in for the night. Considering the kind of hotels our township boasted in those days, this was no mean offer, and, as may be supposed, it was unhesitatingly accepted.

In due course the Governor arrived with his party. He was received by the committee in the main street under an archway of flags, and, after inspecting the township, rode up the hill with the principal folk towards our house. When he came into the grounds my father went out into the verandah to receive him, and I followed close in his wake, my eyes, I make no doubt, bulging with curiosity. The Governor got off his horse, and at the same moment my father went down the steps. He held out his hand, His Excellency took it, and as he did so looked at him in a very quick and surprised way, just for all the world as if my father were somebody he had seen before, in a very different place, and had never expected to meet again.

'Good gracious, can it be?' he said to himself under his breath, but all the same quite loud enough for me to hear, for I was close beside him. 'Surely you are – '

'My name is Heggarstone,' said my father quickly, an unwonted colour coming into his face, 'and you are His Excellency, the Governor of the colony. If you will allow me, I will make you welcome to my poor abode.'

They looked at each other for a moment, pretty straight, and then the Governor pulled himself together and went into the house, side by side with my father, without another word. Later on, when the dinner given in honour of Her Majesty's representative was over, and the townsfolk had departed, His Excellency and my father sat talking, talking, talking, till far into the night. I could hear the hum of their voices quite distinctly, for my bedroom was next to the dining-room, though, of course, I could not catch what they said.

Next morning, when his horse was at the door, and the escort was standing ready to be off, His Excellency drew my father a little on one side and said in a low voice, so that the others should not hear, —

'And your decision is really final? You will never go back to England to take up your proper position in society?'

'Never!' my father replied, viciously crumpling a handful of creeper leaves as he spoke. 'I have thought it over carefully, and have come to the conclusion that it will be a good thing for society if the name dies out with me. Good-bye.'

'Good-bye,' answered His Excellency, 'and God help you!'

Then he mounted his horse and rode away.

I have narrated this little episode in order to show that I had some justification for believing that my father was not merely the humble, commonplace individual he professed to be. I will now tell you another, which if it did not relieve my curiosity, was surely calculated to confirm my suspicions.

It happened that one day, early in winter, I was in the township at the time when the coach, which now connected us with civilisation, made its appearance. This great event happened twice weekly, and though they had now been familiar with it for some considerable time, the inhabitants, men, women and children, seemed to consider it a point of honour that they should be present, standing in the roadway about the Bushmen's Rest, to receive and welcome it. For my own part I was ten years old, as curious as my neighbours, and above all a highly imaginative child to whom the coach was a thing full of mystery. Times out of number I had pictured myself the driver of it, and often at night, when I was tucked up in my little bed and ought to have been asleep, I could seem to see it making its way through the dark bush, swaying to and fro, the horses stretched out to their full extent in their frenzied gallop.

On this particular occasion there were more passengers than usual, for the reason that a new goldfield had sprung into existence in the ranges to the westward of us, and strangers were passing through our township every day en route to it. It was not until the driver had descended from his box and had entered the hotel that the crowd saw fit to disperse. I was about to follow them when I saw, coming towards me, a tall, dignified-looking man whom I had noticed sitting next to the driver when the coach arrived. He boasted a short, close-cropped beard, wore a pair of dark spectacles, and was dressed better than any man I had ever seen in my life before, my father not excepted. In his hand he carried a small portmanteau, and for a moment I thought he was going to enter the Bushmen's Rest like the remainder of the passengers. He changed his mind, however, and after looking about him came towards where I stood.

'My lad,' said he, 'can you tell me which path I should follow to reach Mr Heggarstone's residence?'

My surprise at this question may be better imagined than described. It did not prevent me, however, from answering him.