Haunted Creek (2 page)

Tired was not the word for it. Rose had travelled across the world, only to find that her husband was not expecting her. But at least she was here at the Haunted Creek at last. The water looked cool and clear. Luke was right, it was a beautiful place, dotted with tall, graceful trees with trunks like pale ivory. Their site was a clearing among the trees and looked down on the water. Across the creek she could see distant mountains, blue and mysterious, soaring above ridge after ridge of dark green forest. Lonely and frightening in its size, it was still a beautiful scene.

Rose turned from the view to look eagerly for the house.

There was no farmhouse waiting for her, no civilized place in which to rest her weary bones. The only building was a small hut. Dismayed, she walked up to it. The walls and roof were made of big slabs of rough tree bark. The door creaked as she went in to stand on the earth floor. There was no fireplace; cooking must be done outside. Benches, a table and a bed were made from rough hewn planks. The one room was dark and stuffy and full of the buzz of flies. Outside was bare earth, with no sign of a garden.

‘It’s got a glass window,’ Luke said defensively. ‘Not many folks have glass at first, you know.’

So this was home. How could she live here? Was this how all the
settlers lived? Surely most women and plenty of men would want something more civilized than this.

A big white bird flew off with the harshest cry Rose had ever heard, a desolate sound echoing through the trees. ‘Cockatoo,’ Luke said. ‘You’ll like the birds here.’

‘What sort of farming are you doing, Luke?’ Rose asked faintly. They would need some money quickly, to build a decent house.

Luke looked away. ‘Well … I’ve got a few beef cattle, young ones, they’ll be a while growing before I can sell them. I’ve a few chooks. We can have eggs for tea …’ He broke off and looked past her. Rose turned round but she was too late. A flying charge knocked her off her feet.

Luke laughed so much he could hardly finish his sentence. ‘… and a goat. This is Gertrude, Rose. She maybe thought we were going to feed her.’ Rose struggled to her feet and the goat wandered off.

There was a sort of twilight here, more than in the tropics she had travelled through; there, night fell quickly like a curtain
dropping
on the day. ‘Are you going to wash before supper?’ She looked at the sweaty, dusty young man.

‘I’ll take a dip in the creek – are you coming?’ Luke’s white teeth flashed in a grin that lit his dirty face.

‘No, thank you. I’ll take a wash in a basin, if you have one.’ Rose longed for cool water, but she couldn’t bathe in the creek until she had worked out whether they might have neighbours that walked this way. She had never done more than paddle in a Yorkshire beck.

Luke laughed again. ‘There’s no crocodiles round here, you know! You’ll have to rough it a bit if you’re going to be a settler.’

‘So I see.’ Rose bit her lip and went back to the hut, while Luke went off with a towel to the water. Perhaps one day she’d be able to laugh like Luke did. But he must have had a hard time. She knew that he had saved fifty pounds and had been able to buy land for a pound an acre, but instead of the neat fields she had imagined, all
around them the huge trees crowded in. Was this the land he owned, or was it somewhere else?

There was a rough veranda on the side of the hut and Rose sat down there in the last of the daylight. It had been a long day and the days ahead would be difficult. But they would settle down; she and Luke would be established in time. Anything was better than staying in Yorkshire.

A huge spider scuttled across the dirty floor, its body as big as a saucer. Rose shuddered. Was it poisonous? A lot of women wouldn’t stay here. They’d take one look and go home.

Rose would have to stay in Australia because her father had married again. Of course, folks said it was a good idea, but why he’d picked that Pearl Harley, Rose would never know. He went and married a shrew, that was the only word for it. She found fault with everybody, nagged her husband and seemed to hate her
stepdaughter
.

Rose had been expected to earn her keep by working on the farm and this she would have enjoyed, but for the new wife. What else could she do? At school they’d said she would make a good teacher, but she never got the chance to train for it.

Looking round rather desperately for escape, Rose was
interested
when Luke came to their farm one day. He had been hired by her father to hoe turnips and he was full of plans for going to Australia. Lounging on the cowshed door while she milked, he told her about the wonderful prospect ahead. ‘You can buy land for a pound an acre. I’ve been saving since I left school,’ he said. ‘I’m off in a month or two. Want to come?’ He grinned.

Looking up from her milking stool, Rose considered him. They had been at school together but she hadn’t thought about him much. Luke was well made and strong, cheeky and always cheerful, and he seemed determined to succeed. ‘You can write to me when you get there,’ she told him. ‘Tell me what it’s like.’

For the next few weeks Luke visited every day and talked about Australia, where the sky was blue and the days were mostly sunny.
He had chosen a place in Victoria, where there was good rainfall and a climate like Italy. You could grow grapes and lemons, he said. Imagine picking a lemon or an orange from your own tree! It was too good to be true … and a nice long way from Yorkshire and the dreadful Pearl.

Luke had beguiled her with his stories of a warm sunny land and in the end he had proposed marriage. He told her she was a bonny lass and just right for the colony, and the week before he sailed they had been married.

Rose thought that her stepmother Pearl might have encouraged him, to push Rose off to Australia out of her way. It was exciting, but theirs was not exactly a romance, although she hoped for love. Rose had wanted to get away and Luke had decided he needed a wife. After a few months of silence he had written to her.

There was a sound and Luke was there, grinning through his beard. ‘Is supper ready?’

‘I don’t know where anything is,’ Rose said quietly. ‘It’s too dark to find my way around.’ It was hard to think of housekeeping in this rough place.

Luke shrugged and lit a lamp, then brought out a loaf of bread and a few eggs from a cupboard. He lit a fire in the clearing outside and boiled a tin can of water, putting the eggs in the can and making tea when it boiled. He looked better for a wash and smelled of soap. Coming to sit beside her, he put an arm round her. ‘Got a kiss for your old man?’ His beard was rough and Rose flinched. ‘Suppose I might have to shave now there’s a lady in the house.’

As they ate, Luke was quiet. ‘Your mother sends her love,’ Rose said into the silence. He asked her then for news of the village, but he seemed to have something on his mind. ‘What are your plans for the farm, Luke? Where’s your fields?’

Luke stood up and looked into the darkness. ‘I’m sorry, but this is it, lass,’ he said sombrely. ‘Good land, it grows the biggest trees in the world, and that means something. But you’ve got to chop ’em down first.’ He stopped and then went on. ‘To tell you the
truth, Rose, it’s killing me. The gum trees are hardwood, blunt a saw in no time. I’ve got my fifty acres but this bit is all I’ve managed to clear.’

The little farm was only a dream; it might be years away. ‘So what are you living on, Luke?’

‘Not much … odd jobs here and there, and for meat what I can shoot, mostly. Kangaroo’s not bad and the ducks are good to eat. But I’ve got a plan to get rich and then, you’ll see, we’ll build a fine house.’ There was a gleam in his eye. ‘I’m looking for gold. Anybody can go along the creek and pan for gold. It washes out from the banks into the water and you don’t need machinery. All you need is a shallow pan and a bag to put the gold in!’

‘You’re going to be a gold miner? But Mr Carr said it was all over. Most of the gold has been taken out by now.’

Luke laughed. ‘I’m going to be a gold prospector, Rose. Not really a miner – you don’t dig for alluvial gold. We’ve had no luck yet, but you’ll see. One day we’ll strike it rich.’

A
LTHOUGH HE SAID
little, Luke’s arms were warm and comforting and for a short time some of Rose’s doubts faded. She had longed for love, for this reunion, ever since Luke had left England. As long as they could learn to love each other, this was where she belonged. Life would be hard, but they would face it together.

Long after Luke was asleep, Rose stared into the darkness; the doubts loomed again. If only they had got to know each other in England, had established their partnership before taking on this new venture.

The ‘farmhouse’ was a huge shock. How could anyone keep it tidy or even keep their clothes and food clean in a place like this? You wouldn’t be able to invite anyone in, even for a cup of tea; you could take no pride in your work. Rose was too tired to make any plans for improvement but she doubted whether anything could be done. What would her father say if he could see her now? She imagined a huge spider, crawling over the wall towards the bed, and drew the sheet tightly round her although the night was warm.

The darkness was full of shrieks, wails and hoarse cries,
frightening
even behind a barred door. At first Rose started at each new sound, while Luke slept on. What unknown creatures lurked in this wild place? Instead of the sleepy twitter of birds in an English wood, there were howls, long drawn-out sounds of misery floating up from the creek below them. They must be dingoes. There were
weird moans from among the trees. No wonder it was called the Haunted Creek.

The bed was fairly comfortable after the hard and narrow bunks on the ship, but Rose could not sleep. For the first time, she was worrying about money and how they would make a home and earn a living. Money had not seemed very important in her life up to now, on a well-established farm where in most years there was a profit.

But Luke was a dreamer, it was clear. He was spending time running about with Jim – what had they been doing in Moe that day? Their next plan was to start searching for gold instead of getting on with the work of carving a farm out of the bush. It looked as though Rose would be the one to make a garden and with luck she might be able to sell herbs and vegetables to the local folks. But how many people lived here? She was in the dark in more ways than one.

A harsh scream pierced the night and after a while Rose decided it must be a bird. But what sort of bird? Beside her, Luke continued his regular breathing. It was a blessing that he seemed to be at home here. Perhaps she would get used to it, in time.

Just before dawn she dropped into a light doze and soon
afterwards
Luke got up. He ate the last piece of bread and put on his boots. ‘I’m off to help Jim,’ he said. ‘We’ve got to get a fence up so he can get his block registered and all that.’

Rose sat up in bed. ‘Jim’s got to do this urgently?’ Luke nodded. She bit her lip, realizing she would need to tread carefully and not seem to be taking charge. ‘But Luke … wouldn’t it be better if you spent some time here, improving our place? I can help you, there’s two of us now …’ She stopped as she saw his obstinate expression.

Not looking at Rose, Luke stood up. ‘As a matter of fact, I have to help Jim. I owe him.’ Going to the door he added, ‘Don’t worry, lass, I’ll be back about noon – it’ll be too hot to work by then.’

‘Owe him? What do you mean?’

‘Well, he lent me some money when I was short, see? I’m paying
him back in labour.’ He banged the door and was gone. Luke was going to work, but the earnings were already spent. It looked as though they’d be eating a lot of kangaroo.

Rose peered round slowly, avoiding the eye of That Spider who now sat on a chair, watching her in a far too intelligent way. She was on her own in the forest, in a rough cabin with no water and no food.
Babes in the Wood
came to mind and Rose laughed at the thought. Things had to get better; they would get better than this.

There was no privy, of course. Luke had waved a vague hand in the direction of the forest when she’d asked. ‘Anywhere you like,’ he’d laughed. Surely he could have built a little shelter for an earth closet? Luke had not tried very hard to make a home, but to be fair he hadn’t known exactly when to expect her.

Outside the hut in the fresh morning, the world seemed less hostile. Rose decided to wash at the creek and then bring some water back for making tea.

The morning light fell softly through the trees, their pale trunks glimmering in the first rays of the sun. Here there was green grass, even in the summer heat. A light mist moved up from the water and there was the rustle of birds in the high canopy of branches. These trees were taller than any she had seen before; Rose had to tip her head back to see the tops of them. The shade was lighter than the heavy gloom of summer under English trees, the sunlight glancing off the shining gum leaves as they moved in a soft breeze.

The peace was shattered as a peal of heartless laughter made her start. How could anyone be so cruel as to laugh at her
predicament
? She looked round but saw no one. It would be easy here for people to hide behind the trees … The laughter came again and then died away in an evil chuckle, a horrible sound. Rose shuddered and remembered some tale of a laughing bird. It was hard to believe that a bird could sound so evil.

The creek wound through the bottom of a little valley, the clear water flowing in and out of the shade of trees and bushes on the bank. Rose went down to the water and bathed her face and hands,
then filled the can. There was a crock of flour in the hut and she could make a bread cake, once she had lit the fire.

Floating through the trees she heard children’s voices and
realized
that the Carrs’ bullock dray was camped quite close. There was a splash and a lot of shouting. Little Peter Carr came running towards her. ‘Mrs Teesdale!’ he said breathlessly. ‘Charlie’s fell in the water!’ The little boy was about six and very frightened. Rose took his hand and they ran along the bank to where Charlie was thrashing about in a deep pool made by a bend in the creek. He seemed to be entangled in some branches that had fallen into the water.

On the opposite bank, a small figure could be seen hurrying towards them. Martha Carr, the children’s mother, was not
frightened
. She was annoyed. ‘Charlie! Stop that at once and come out of there!’

Charlie surfaced, gulped air and cried out, ‘Save me!’ The poor child was drowning – or was he playing the fool? She couldn’t afford to wait and see. Rose took off her long skirt and jumped into the water. She gasped with cold as she went down, her petticoat floating up round her legs. The water was deeper than she expected, but she managed to grasp the child firmly under his arms.

‘Keep still, Charlie!’ Rose tried to hold him up, but then she realized that the boy was swimming strongly, quite at home in the water. ‘You bad boy, you made me jump in for nothing!’ He made for the bank and hauled himself up, and Rose followed, water streaming from her long hair.

Charlie lay on the bank panting and laughing; he had been trying to frighten his brother and she had fallen for it. He looked up at Rose with hangdog eyes. ‘Me ma’ll kill me,’ he muttered, still giggling. ‘She’s done it before.’

Rose laughed, slightly hysterically. ‘You probably deserve it, you horrible boy!’ It had been a frightening two minutes.

Martha stamped along the bank, uttering threats, and Rose stood protectively in her wet petticoat in front of the lad. ‘I think he’s
learned a lesson – he won’t play about in water again, will you, Charlie? Next time, you might really need help and I wouldn’t believe it!’ She had been told that Australians had a strange sense of humour and this seemed to prove it.

The sun was gaining height and its warmth would soon dry her light cotton underclothes. It was embarrassing to walk about without her skirt, but the most practical thing to do. Rose picked up her skirt and turned to go. ‘I’d better go and make myself some breakfast.’

‘That bloke of yours gone off and left you already? Some men don’t know how lucky they are. Well, girl, you’d better come and have breakfast with us, then. And after that we’re off to look at this here block of land.’ Martha led the way along the creek to where their cattle were grazing not far from the cart. Blue smoke curled lazily into the air and Rose could smell coffee and frying bacon. Their camp seemed to be a much more civilized place than her new home. Rose put on her skirt as they neared the fire, where Bert was frying the breakfast in a huge iron pan.

‘Your man – Luke, you call him? He’ll be able to tell us who lives round here and where – even draw us a map. We must find out where everybody is,’ Martha said firmly as she took over the cooking.

‘Well, it’s nice to be sociable …’ But what was the hurry? They could meet the neighbours when they’d established a homestead and Rose herself didn’t want any callers while she was living in a hut like that.

Bert shook his head at her. ‘It’s nothing to do with being sociable. If we’re going to select land it has to be good for growing onions and greens. Locals can tell us that. And there has to be somebody here to buy them off us.’ He took a deep slurp of his coffee. ‘Does anybody live up here, barring a few crackpot gold miners?’ Bert was short and solid and never seemed to waste words. ‘The gold fever and maybe the whisky gets a lot of ’em and they go right off of their heads … that’s what you hear.’

Rose hid a shudder, but she was feeling braver already, with breakfast inside her and her clothes drying out. ‘Of course you’ll know better than me, but I was brought up on a farm,’ she told them. ‘I think this soil is good, but we’re high up in the hills. I noticed the air cool down as we came up from the valley yesterday. If it’s too cold, crops won’t grow.’

‘Aye, well, we are in the hills, it’s true,’ Bert agreed. ‘But beggars can’t be choosers, Rose. Valley land is all taken and folks are spreading out all over these hills. River land’s best, but that’s gone now. I’m looking to find a block further along the creek.’

Rose knew she should have been trying to clean up the hut, but it would be interesting to go along with the Carrs to visit the block. Martha was friendly and it would be good if they were to be
neighbours
. The bullocks were left to their grazing with young Peter to guard them.

A rabbit ran across the track and the Carrs all yelled at once. ‘Rabbit pie!’ Martha said, her eyes shining. ‘They’ll be right handy.’

‘If we can keep them off the crops,’ her husband reminded her. ‘I thought it would be over cold for them up here. They led us a merry dance at Melbourne, I can tell you.’

There had been rabbits at Kirkby, but Rose hadn’t thought of them as a nuisance. ‘They’re not an Australian animal, are they?’

‘Nobs brought ’em in for the hunting,’ Bert said briefly. ‘Rabbits to feed the foxes, so they could chase foxes on horseback, like what they do in England.’ He laughed. ‘But rabbits, they got out of hand and it’s folks like us that suffer when there’s too many.’

‘But you do like your rabbit pie, Bert,’ his wife reminded him.

The available block of land on the Haunted Creek was not far from Luke’s land and covered with the same big trees, apart from a clearing by the water. ‘A miner lived here in the sixties, they say,’ Bert told them, but there was no sign of a house. It might not be true. Then he found a broken clay pipe in a heap of stones and the place took on a new meaning: it had been somebody’s home.

‘Them stones were probably the fireplace,’ Martha said. The rest of the hut, if there was one, had dissolved back into the earth. Roses were blooming among the wattles down by the creek, perhaps the remains of a forgotten garden.

‘When folks walk off the land, the bush soon takes over,’ Bert said as he turned the soil with a stick.

‘Was all this land used at one time?’ Rose wondered. She had thought that this was wilderness and the settlers were the first on the land, but Bert nodded.

‘The miners spread out a bit, of course, and then all this land was leased as a cattle run, the Wattle Tree run, thousands of acres without fences. They turned cattle loose and collected them months or years later. Up the road here there’s a little place called Wattle Tree; there’s a few houses and maybe a store. At least I hope so.’

The land turned out to be a useful piece of dirt, as Bert said. It sloped up fairly gently to a level plateau and this, Martha decided, was where they would build a house if they settled here. Bert was handy with a hammer, and they would get sawn timber and do the job properly – none of your slabs of bark for the Carrs. ‘Luke needs to get sawn timber, too,’ Rose said quietly, looking at the roses peeping through the wattles. ‘Maybe you could get a load together, save in some way.’

When she got back to the hut, Luke was sweeping the floor and doing his best to clean the place up. ‘Thought you’d gone back to England,’ he said with a grin. He had a brace of rabbits hanging up outside and some onions in a bag. ‘We’ll have a grand tea, better than last night. Jim made me come home early – said you need company.’

Luke was happy to draw a rough map of the area for the Carrs while the rabbit meat was stewing in a big cast-iron pot. ‘It’ll be good if they stay, somebody for you to talk to when I go prospecting,’ he said happily. ‘I’ll likely be gone for a few weeks at a time.’

Rose turned to him in shock. ‘Weeks? But I thought we’d be farming! It’s a gamble, isn’t it, looking for gold?’ How could she stay here alone?

Changing the subject abruptly, Luke pointed to the map. ‘There’s a few folks round here. I think the Carrs would be able to sell vegetables. Down here towards the Tangil River there’s a pub called the All Seasons: it was busy in the gold rush days and there’s a few miners left. Landlady’s a bit of a character. Maeve they call her. Irish, I suppose. There’s not many women up here, though. And then—’ He pointed to a track leading out of the Haunted Creek ‘—this goes up the ridge to Wattle Tree. There’s a store there, a few houses and a little school, that’s used sometimes as a church. Mrs Jensen is the schoolmistress and her son Erik farms a couple of blocks. I reckon he’s a big bore … but very straight, you understand.’