The Green Mill Murder (21 page)

‘When I got home, I couldn’t hear what people said over the big guns. I knew I had to get away; actually, I came here to die. I felt that I couldn’t just up and kill myself in my mother’s house. There was Charlie to consider, you know. Then, it was the most astounding thing, Phryne. I came up here on foot, with just a tent and some gear, and the gun I meant to use, and I was so tired after the climb that I decided to wait until dawn. I didn’t even pitch the tent, just lay down in the grass next to the springs. I fell asleep because I was so tired. I used to get dreadfully tired then, and when I woke up I heard the water; the stream running over the rocks and singing. It took me a moment to realise where I was and what had changed, and then I knew that the guns were silent. They had just stopped. I lay there and listened to the water for the whole day, just the sound of falling water. I never heard a sweeter song. I was afraid to sleep, in case it came back, the noise and the shaking. But I did sleep, and I woke again with a terrible cold from lying in wet grass and still just the noise of water. I put up my tent and lit a fire and sneezed a lot and I was perfectly happy for the first time in my life. Then I went down the mountain again, bought some stores, and sent a message to the leaseholder asking if I could stay. He didn’t mind me.’

‘Then what did you do?’

‘The stockmen helped me. They were a bit wary at first, but when they realised that I wasn’t going to make trouble and I showed them I could ride, they came to the conclusion that I was a good chap. Bit strange perhaps, but not a cattle thief or a mad hunter, and they showed me how to build a log hut. They build them, you know, each family, for the muster. They gave me a lot of tips. It took me all summer to get it right—you have to build the chimney first, as I found when my first effort burned down. I got it right the second time. They know about what you can eat from the bush; there’s no need to starve here as long as you have your wits about you. And I got handouts from Dad and bought luxuries, like jam and books and tobacco and the occasional bottle of brandy. And it’s a very comfortable hut, don’t you think?’

‘Palatial,’ agreed Phryne. ‘Do you know the ladies in Talbotville? Anne Purvis and Josephine Binet. I asked Miss Binet why she lived there and she showed me the mountains. It seemed reasonable. I have never seen such beautiful scenery.’

‘It’s more than the scenery. The people have an exquisite delicacy which astonished me. I was dreading a barrage of questions, but no one asked me any. They are rough fellows, to be sure, but the most anyone has ever said in my hearing was that they ’sposed I had a bad war. Quite true. But it was almost worth it. If it hadn’t happened I would have just stayed in the city, been incompetent at business, and been halfway happy.’

‘You might have married and had children,’ commented Phryne.

‘Yes, I suppose so. And made some poor woman miserable. I’ll never marry now. I’m too used to my own company. Old Mr Treasure sold me Lucky. Said that he was the only neddy he’d ever met who hated other horses. “He’s a cross-grained cuss,” he said, “so I reckon you’ll match.” And we do.’

‘I don’t find you cross-grained.’ Phryne smiled up into the trout-stream eyes. ‘You have been very kind to me, seeing that I dropped in on you out of the sky and broke your solitude into bits.’

He did not answer at once, but took her hand consideringly.

‘If anyone had to break it, I am glad it was you,’ he said.

Phryne was a little disconcerted. This was a man who, on his own admission, had been completely loopy for almost a year. On the other hand, he was now extremely sane, and strong, and gentle. She gave the hand a squeeze and released herself.

‘I must get back from this edge,’ she said. ‘I don’t like heights.’

‘You don’t like heights! What about that plane?’

‘That’s different.’ Phryne retreated until she could sit down on the grass a good ten yards from the precipice. ‘You don’t feel the ground pulling you down in a plane. I’ll show you tomorrow. I’ll take you for a ride, if you like.’

‘Perhaps,’ said Vic dubiously. ‘I’ll think about it.’

Phryne was conducted on a tour of the rest of the manor. Lucky the horse, on neck-rope and long line, grazed contentedly. He was provided with a very comfortable stable, complete with manger, soundly padded with bark against draughts. Alpine hay cushioned the floor.

‘Look at this,’ said Vic, lifting away a wisp of grass. ‘I found them yesterday and moved Lucky’s feed into the other crib, in case he disturbed them.’

In a woven, cup-shaped nest, such as a bird might make, were three small baby creatures of some sort, their heads visible through the slit in their mother’s pouch. She opened one eye at the light, then closed it again as Vic’s shadow blocked the sun.

‘What are they?’ asked Phryne, as the babies uttered little squeaks and dived into their pouch.

Vic covered the mother again before he replied. ‘Flying possums. I can’t imagine why she chose to live in the hay, they are supposed to live in tree-hollows. But there is no accounting for possums.’

Phryne observed that the creature had long grey fur, unlike the short dark velvet of lowland possums. Obviously an adaptation against the cold. For no reason Phryne was suddenly reminded of the problem she had left unsolved in the city. Charles had been released and gone back (presumably) to his mother. She would tell him that Phryne had gone in search of Vic. And what of Nerine? Phryne found that she regarded all of them with weary indifference. Who cared what happened to any of them? Except, of course, the delectable Tintagel Stone. Phryne came out of the stable to inspect the wooden tub which Vic had constructed to dam the waters of the MacAlister Springs on its way down the mountain. Next to the tub was a curious sort of sieve. Phryne picked it up.

‘What’s this?’ she asked idly, struck with a disconcertingly sensual image of Tintagel Stone. Vic took it out of her hands.

‘Oh, nothing. Just a sieve.’

‘Oh, nothing?’ mocked Phryne, releasing the image reluctantly. ‘You don’t haul artefacts twenty miles up the mountain for nothing. You do not strike me as a frivolous man, Vic.’

Vic said nothing. Phryne inspected the thing again.

‘Aha!’ she said. ‘I have seen something like this before. What is your source of income, eh? Enough to give you books and onions and a packhorse?’

‘You’ve guessed,’ admitted Vic, ‘but for God’s sake promise that you won’t tell anyone.’ He grasped Phryne by the upper arms and she shook herself free irritably.

‘Of course I won’t tell anyone. What do you take me for? And don’t lay hands on me unless I ask you to!’ Green eyes flashed, black hair flew as she shook her head.

Vic stepped back a pace. ‘Sorry.’

‘So, you found gold. I should have guessed. Alluvial gold, the book said. But I thought it had all run out.’

‘Not run out, just uneconomical to dig and transport. It was down Crooked River and Black Snake Creek way that they made the big strikes: Pioneer Reef, Star of Australia. But almost all of the little creeks have some gold in them. I found it entirely by accident, I was experimenting with making vellum. There is a receipt for it in one of the
Settler’s
Handbooks.
Useful ideas they have sometimes, though their Supreme Mousetrap does not work, I tried it.’

‘What did it trap?’

‘Me, mostly. I decided I needed my fingers and could establish a reasonable compromise with the mice. Anyway, I laid a sheepskin in the tub, fleece up, for a week, and when I took it out to work it . . .’

‘It was a golden fleece,’ Phryne laughed. ‘How very classical.’

‘Yes. That is how they trapped water-borne gold in Jason’s day, I imagine. I dried the fleece (ruining my vellum experiment) and shook it out over a cloth, and I had a small amount of pure gold. I took it down to Talbotville, swore Albert Stout to secrecy, and sent the package to the assayer in the city. He buys it at currency prices. The sieve does the same as the sheepskin but lets the water through better. I don’t want to interrupt the flow of the springs more than I can help, especially in the summer, and in the winter the spate of groundwater is too great. But in spring and autumn I can catch enough gold to keep myself in luxury. It was so providential, Phryne. I felt that the mountains had no objection to me, that they didn’t mind if I stayed, that in fact they were encouraging me to stay, as though I was accepted. Do you see? That’s why I don’t want anyone to know. Times are getting tough in the city. If it were known that there was gold here, the place would be flooded with miners digging up the bush, cutting down the trees, murdering each other. Men will do anything for gold. Do you see?’

His face was still a mask, the eyes anxious. Phryne put her arms around his neck.

‘Of course I see, and no one will ever know from me. I promise,’ she said, and kissed him. His mouth was warm and his embrace strong as his arms closed around her. She heard his heart beating under her cheek, fast as a trip-hammer.

‘You promise?’ he whispered.

‘I promise,’ she replied. This time the kiss lasted for longer, and she slid her hands down his muscular back. He gasped.

‘Come inside,’ she suggested. ‘It’s getting cold, and we need to talk. I did not come here to seduce you,’ she added. ‘I would not take advantage of you. Come on. I have all sorts of goodies in that hamper which I haven’t even opened.’

One of the goodies she had brought along was her diaphragm. One never knew.

Charles Freeman, released and vengeful, was in Dargo post
office, trying to get the postmaster to pay attention.

‘It’s a place called Talbotville,’ he said urgently. ‘I need to get there right away!’

‘You’ll need a riding horse,’ said the postmaster indifferently. He did not like the look of Charles. The young man was dishevelled and exuded an air of panic which the postmaster instinctively distrusted.

‘Isn’t there a bus or something?’

‘Bus? There isn’t even a road, just the packhorse track. You sure you want to go to Talbotville? There’s even less there to interest a city chap like you than here in Dargo.’

Charles looked at Dargo from the post office door. It was a dilapidated place; it looked half-built. It seemed to have been constructed on the ruins of a larger town. Houses were falling into disrepair. His bed in the pub had been cold and vaguely damp, and the drovers carousing under him had not let him sleep. The publican’s wife had served him a slab of steak the size of his hand for breakfast, with two fried eggs that had stared up into his queasy face. The only coffee in Dargo came out of a bottle marked ‘Coffee and Chicory Essence’, and he was scared by the rough men and the slatternly women. He wanted desperately to go back to Melbourne, where they understood civilisation. However, he had a mission. His mother had made that clear. Unless he completed it he would lose all the position and wealth he held dear. So he persisted.

‘Where can I hire a horse?’ he asked the local policeman.

The hamper proved to contain a fruit cake—freshly baked, and sewn in its baking tin into a canvas cover—a goodly portion of a ham, a loaf of new white bread, a pound of butter, two tins of condensed milk and several other tins, a tin opener, knives and forks and spoons and plates, a tin of tea and one of the dark Italian espresso coffee that Phryne favoured, a camping kettle and a spirit stove, a bottle of methylated spirits that was carefully sealed in oilskin, and the box of Hillier’s chocolates.

‘Game soup.’ Phryne was reading the labels of the tins. ‘Tomatoes, and this one is apricots. What a feast, eh?’

Vic stared at the food spread out on the floor.

‘I would never have bought all this luxury stuff,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t justify loading poor old Lucky with chocolates and coffee. Coffee! I haven’t tasted it in years. And milk! I really miss milk. I thought of having a milking nanny-goat but they’re herd animals and she’d be lonely, and also she might get away. Goats destroy the bush. What’s in that padded box?’

‘Eggs,’ said Phryne, investigating. ‘Only one broken. It’s getting dark, so I’ll just slip out to the outhouse. Back in a tick. If I’m not, send out a search party,’ she added, rummaging in her own little case for a certain appliance.

The privy was spotlessly kept and provided with newspaper cut into neat squares and threaded onto a string. It was getting dark, and cold, and the silence was beginning to get to Phryne. It was not the absence of sound such as is produced by earplugs. It was the silence of great emptiness, in which all sorts of small lives were pursuing their way in the centre of a space so huge that the sounds of their living and dying did not impinge at all.

Something screamed in the valley. Phryne jumped, told herself firmly that it was a bird, and re-entered the cabin just short of a run.

Vic had piled up the fire with knotted logs, which produced a bright flame. Phryne took off her boots and her flying suit, and sat down on the warmed boards dressed in her long woollies and her rug. She wished that she had thought to bring a dress. Vic looked down at her and thought that she looked delicate and strong, with her limbs clad only in sensible red flannel and the rug falling from her straight shoulders over the small, well-defined breasts. He caught his breath. She tilted her head, the black hair flicking aside from green eyes.

‘We must talk,’ she insisted. ‘What’s for dinner?’

He lit the kerosene lamp and it shed a soft golden light. Phryne, used to the white glare of electricity, was pleased by this glow that produced no sharp shadows.