True History of the Kelly Gang (11 page)

Bail up I am Harry Power.

O Mr Power said the owner of the horse I am sorry to disappoint you but I have come out without a farthing on me.

In this you will say she were behaving no different than the other women except her voice were different her accent were all Englishified in other words she took a certain tone.

Dismount roared Harry.

Would you assist me please says she.

Assist your adjectival self says he.

She did so rather smartly and in a moment were standing beside her splendid horse her face v. red with embarrassment.

Now aint it wondrous strange said Harry addressing all the gathered passengers aint it very queer to see a filly like this in the company of an empty purse. I do believe that is the queerest combination since the Queen of England took an adjectival German to her bed.

With respect said the butcher.

Shut your gob butcher.

But the butcher were a plucky chap and he jutted his chin at Harry and continued.

With respect this is Miss Boyd she’s a poor schoolteacher she aint got 2 bob to rub together.

Jesus butcher you think I am a fool?

I heard you never robbed the poor.

Poor! Look at her adjectival saddle man a saddle like that is worth 14 quid. Since when does poor women have 14 quid saddles?

Not unless.

Unless what? You should be very careful butcher talking back to Harry Power is a dangerous occupation.

I aint talking back said he but his colour were rising and he planted himself opposite the bushranger with his legs astride I’m just pointing out that saddles like this is often won in raffles but perhaps having been elsewhere you were not aware.

Elsewhere?

I read you was away.

You mean PUT AWAY you mongrel.

No offence but I heard you was in prison I know that aint your fault but they are raffling saddles only recent like.

Even from my distance I seen Harry were uncertain he couldnt tell were he being gammoned or no.

Well said he what about the horse did she win her in a raffle too?

At this crucial moment come a loud cooee from up the road there then appeared one more punter a tall red headed Irishman with no other wealth apparent but a walking stick cut from ironbark root. Harry had him turn his pockets out but they was empty too and the traveller were then sent to stand with the other prisoners gathered around Miss Boyd and that horse I was now imagining my own. I were expecting Harry to effect this transaction when a Chinaman arrived also on foot followed shortly behind by a dairyman from Whorouly who were riding a poor & broken nag of no use to anyone. Harry robbed them both apologising as he done so with his little speech about how he were forced to crime I will not trouble you with it here.

By the time the celestial handed over his money Harry had taken a grand sum of £3 while Coady had lit a little fire beside the track and there were now a total of 9 prisoners huddled around the flames all waiting to see how they would be disposed of.

Now said Harry to Mrs Boyd will you swear on the Bible that you is the teacher?

She eagerly performed this perjury as were later reported in THE ENSIGN for she were Miss Phoebe Martin Boyd the niece of a wealthy squatter a valued customer of Allan Joyce the butcher.

I swear on the Bible of King James.

Very well said Harry it aint my business to rob a poor teacher I’ll take the lead horse off the coach.

It were one of those days where nothing will go right. The lead horse were not prepared to be his servant so Harry chose the brown sniphorse that is the offside wheeler from the coach. It were a serviceable enough animal but broken in its spirit.

And it were the selection of the sniphorse which resulted in my being seen by Dr J.P. Rowe the squatter from Mount Battery Station.

May 23rd fell cold and dark there were no moon. I stood on the front veranda of a shanty in the Oxley shire but it gave no protection from the bitter wind the heavy rain were in my face and splashing off the muddy floor. I did severely miss the sweet dry fug of my home but I were still Power’s unpaid dogsbody ordered to keep the watch for policemen although God only knows how the traps could of reached us in this torrent the King River Bridge were 2 ft. under and groaning in the current. I were v. tired and fed up with my life.

The poor sniphorse off the Buckland Coach were sheltering with me under the veranda she had been fired on by the squatter Dr Rowe and were now wounded. It were Harry’s fault there were no reason to take her from that dull and honest coachhorse life her great heart pounding on the daily climb up the mountains the drear cycle of ceaseless labour must seem sweet enough to her now. She had taken the bullet high in her shoulder and when she cooled would certainly be lame for good. Thence only death a sledgehammer between her blindfolded eyes such is life.

Inside the shanty were much laughing and singing the shadows flitting across the curtains. Harry Power were dancing I heard not a word about the bunions he otherwise were whingeing about night and day. I never knew a man to make such a fuss about his feet. Feet & bowels never ceasing bowels & feet. My 1st job each soggy morning were to find them blackberry roots for his bowels thank Jesus he ministered to his smelly bunions by himself. He had a red string with 7 knots he must wind in a particular way around his inflamed joint then recite the following:

Bone to bone blood to blood
And every sinew in its proper place

The sniphorse pissed forlornly on the muddy floor I could smell bacon frying inside the shanty but none had been sent out to me. I were working myself into a temper on this point when the door swung open it were Harry Power holding a red hot coal in a pair of blacksmith’s tongs. Beside him come the landlord’s big chested wife she had narrow hips like a boy and very pretty hands in which she carried a sugar bowl. She were tipsy laughing pretending to fall against the famous bushranger.

Hold the horse Ned Kelly said he I did not thank him that he used my name in front of witnesses. Only 2 days previous he had caused Dr Rowe of Mount Battery Station to clearly see my face. We was lying on the rock above his paddock looking for a more spirited replacement for the sniphorse. Rowe were a cunning old fox he crept up beside us and let off a shot which kicked up the dust in front of my nose. I would of surrendered there and then but were more afraid of Harry than of the squatter thus we made this mad rush riding 2 days into the face of the storm arriving on this veranda drenched to the bone I were whipped and cut across the face by myall scrub my lip consequently swollen as if I had been thrashed.

Now the landlord’s wife give Harry Power the sugar he sprinkled it onto the red hot coal.

Hold the effing horse he says to me.

I took the bridle while Harry encouraged the smoking coal to pass over the horse’s wound I had seen this remedy practised by the Quinns and Lloyds but Harry were drunk so he placed the coal too near the skin I could smell the burning hair. The 1st time she were burnt the horse kicked but the 2nd time she reared and I couldnt hold her she broke through the bark roof of the veranda. Of this damage to the shanty Harry seemed oblivious. There he said that’ll fix you girl. That were a lie because the ball were buried too deep it had gone to a place no smoke could reach.

To me he said he would soon send out some tucker.

I’ll come inside said I.

O you will will you?

There aint no point in watching here I said unless the traps is coming in an adjectival ship.

For answer I got a mighty clout across the head I took a swing back at him. This he would not brook he grabbed me by the bawbles.

You want to fight me boy?

No Harry.

While the landlady watched he squeezed my bawbles till I could not help but cry out with pain and having wrung that humiliation from me he turned his back and took his girlfriend back inside. I calmed down the frightened horse swearing this would be my last adventure with the famous Harry Power.

By and by the door opened it werent Harry the stranger were more like a farmer with his powerful sloping shoulders and heavy arms but he bore no greater burden than a glass of liquor which he offered though I never liked the smell.

Too strong for you boy? He were a so called HANDSOME MAN a neat beard framing his naked face. You want some lemonade in it?

He were watching me very close a smile playing round his lips so I sipped to show I could of drunk it if I wished.

Your ma is very partial to that drink I’m sure you know it.

I might.

Very partial said he.

All my childhood there were always some man thought he could tell stories about my mother he rested his back against the veranda post and grinned. You know Bill Frost?

I admitted the connection.

Thats a chap who is awful partial to his rum and cloves. He made it sound so dirty I were embarrassed laying my face against the mare’s cold wet neck and stroking her but still the man would not cease.

You been absent from home a little while I hear.

It were not his nosey business where I been I did not say nothing. Perhaps you aint heard your mother’s news.

I werent going to be drawn by his familiarity.

Your ma has been busy baking said he.

Thats good.

Good for Bill Frost he said for he’s the chap what put the bun inside her oven.

My fist went up into his gut before I knew what I were doing I felt his very entrails part to accommodate my hand and smelled the air push out him it were sour as week old pollard mash he were a big fellow 12 or 13 stone but he staggered back with his mouth open like a Murray cod. I hated him I spat in his face pushing him out in the rain he stumbled and I rode him like a pig down into the mud and out into the woodpile as he wailed and hollered out for help I cried I would kill him if he ever said her name again.

From the corner of my eye I seen the door open and Harry come across the veranda his great bull neck thrust forward he were keen to damage me. The sniphorse recognised her torturer and let out a high whinny pulling violently against her reins which I had tied to the veranda post. Harry Power stooped for a stick of firewood I saw it in his hand I did not care.

The post give way at the floor as the horse backed out into the rain pulling the pivoting pole along while Harry Power begun to whale into me with the firewood belabouring me about the kidneys I did not feel a thing instead I got the Handsome Man’s arm behind his back his face down in the mud.

The horse could not escape but were bucking and kicking in a frightful manner her hooves was death her eye panicked white no one dare go near. It were her made me release the gossip not a bit of Harry. They both watched as I spoke to the poor trembling creature she permitted me to untangle her and then lead her down into the yard.

The downpour meanwhile increased it were very loud but could not prevent me hearing Harry Power apologising. Enough light spilled from the shanty for me to see the Handsome Man were seated bow-legged heavy with mud as if he had fouled himself. When I come back from the yard he retreated he would never speak so casually of my mother again. When I turned to Harry his thumbs was in his belt beside his guns.

Come here said he.

He’s going to shoot me I thought but followed. One minute I were a warrior the next stumbling down into the rainy dark like a poor scouring beast on its way to slaughter explain that if you will. I come down the side of a steep gully beyond even the pale yellow illumination from the shanty here Harry put his hand upon my shoulder and I stopped. I could feel the water flowing around my ankles it might as well been around my heart.

Give me the boots.

I obeyed and felt the gluey wet clay puddle at my feet at length understanding that he had gone away. I were dismissed.

My mother were sitting up in the hut at Eleven Mile Creek she had already covered the fire with ash to keep its life for the morning but now something kept her from her bed and she remained seated on a low 3 legged stool her legs out straight her large hands resting on her pinny.

Mother were still a handsome woman her hair as glossy as a crow’s feathers the light of the hearth dancing in the sheen. She could of gone to sleep but instead she were brushing her hair again and when 200 strokes were done she started braiding and when the braid was woven she pulled it into a bun and now her head felt tight as a drum and she could not go to bed. She remained before the ash banked fire and her children filled the hut with their cold breath the mice rustling in the wall behind the pasted layers of THE BENALLA ENSIGN.

When the rain relented it were very quiet nothing louder than the tatt tatt of the leaking roof above the table but my mother’s handsome head tilted listening to something else. She says it were worry about the level of the creek that finally drew her outside not nothing superstitious. She knocked the pegs out of the door then picked up the lantern and in her long nightdress walked through the dead ringbarked gums they was ghosts of trees their sappy trunks now dry as bones. The kangaroo dogs was silent but circling on their chains.

As my mother held up the lantern I were many miles away limping along the road in stolen boots I could see no more road than a smudge of charcoal in the blackness.

My mother picked up her hems coming down to inspect the flood her bluchers leaden with mud and manure but all that were soon washed clean off them for the creek had risen rapidly insinuating itself across the track to claim the oats.

It must of been after midnight when I left the road now travelling through grasslands my hands ahead of me no idea where on earth I stood. My mother returned to the hut but still did not take her bed. When she imagined hearing Mr Pawson’s goat bleating she once again knocked the pegs from the door and went outside with the lantern. There was no goats to be heard or seen.

She were about to go back inside when she seen a shadow at 1st she thought it a savage but looking hard she made out an old white woman wearing a red dress.

Are you lost dearie my mother called but the woman paid her little mind she were no taller than the pigpen which is to say less than 3 ft. in height.