Absolution Creek (69 page)

The burly hand of McCoy’s companion was on Jack’s shoulder. ‘Leave off, mate, whoever you are.’

‘You leave off,’ Thomas growled, edging at the man with Jack’s rifle.

For a moment Jack was back in Sydney again fighting off McCoy’s thugs. He could smell the tang of the salt-crusted sea; there was blood in his mouth as the coin he’d laboured for was thieved. Jack tightened his grip. Sweat smothered the Irishman’s brow and dripped down his nose. Slowly Scrubber pushed his knife fist against the weight of Jack’s grip.

Jack strained against his opponent. He rammed his hand harder against the Irishman’s windpipe, knowing what was coming yet unable to stop the path ahead. He saw Olive, alone and frightened, ruined for eternity. Jack felt sinew and muscle depress slowly under his grasp. He could hear Thomas asking the stranger’s name, what his business was. The man’s voice was tight.

‘Matt Hamilton. Scrubber and I are here to find my daughter, Squib.’ For the briefest moment Jack loosened his grip on Scrubber’s knife-wielding hand. ‘You’re here for Squib?’

‘Yeah,’ Scrubber croaked. ‘She belongs with her father, not you.’

Jack thought of the girl he loved. His brief dream of a life with her dissolved in seconds. Squib was too young. Matt Hamilton would never allow them to be together. He thought of Squib. If she did care for him, she would feel torn between her father and him. Hadn’t she suffered enough? And once she left, what would become of his life?

He loosened his grip on the Irishman’s knife hand.

In the split second that followed, McCoy’s knife was in Jack’s side. Jack kept his fingers pressed hard against the man’s neck as the sharp pain rippled through his body. The busted face of the Irishman turned puce and he stopped breathing. When Jack stepped away the Irishman slid down the wall to land with a thud on the dirt.

‘Are you all right, Jack?’ Thomas asked, keeping his rifle on Matt.

‘Sure,’ Jack replied shakily. Turning towards his brother he too fell to the ground.

Thomas dropped his rifle and was by Jack’s side instantly. With only the slightest hesitation he pulled the knife free of Jack’s body. He undid his brother’s waistcoat and pressed his hand against the glossy redness staining the shirt.

Jack looked at Thomas. Behind his kneeling brother, Matt Hamilton stood by Olive’s side. ‘You should have told me,’ Jack gasped, ‘about Olive.’

‘Would it have made any difference?’ Blood seeped between Thomas’s fingers.

‘Only for you and me,’ Jack winced. ‘It’s bad, isn’t it?’

‘No,’ Thomas lied, ‘not too bad. Anyway, it’s not too late. You know the truth of things now.’

‘I should have known better,’ Jack admitted. ‘Looks like you’ll be carrying on the family name, eh?’ Jack gave a pained smile. ‘Do one thing for me, Thomas. Tell Squib –’

‘I need a tube, something I can get air in with!’ Matt yelled.

A few feet away Mills ‘Scrubber’ McCoy was thrashing about like a landed fish. Jack watched as Squib’s father, pocketknife in hand, flicked open the blade, made a rough incision in Scrubber’s throat and jammed it into the dying man’s windpipe.

‘Well, he’s dead now,’ Thomas uttered, clearly stunned.

Jack felt in his coat pocket for his wooden pipe, and flicked it across the dirt. Matt gave him a surprised glance and then broke the end of it before rotating it into the Irishman’s throat.

Scrubber spluttered as a gurgling noise rumbled up from deep within.

‘He’s breathing.’ Matt rested back on his heels. From upstairs in the hotel came the sound of footsteps.

‘You’re a regular Florence Nightingale,’ a gruff voice said. The butt of a rifle knocked Thomas sideways.

Jack looked up to where Adams towered over him, and then back at the ground where Thomas was lying, out cold. Olive was crying.

Adams laughed. ‘Now back up,’ he growled, pointing his rifle at Olive and Matt, indicating that they should flatten themselves against the hotel wall. As they did as they were told, something caught Matt’s eye. ‘That’s my daughter!’

Squib was being held by Will, the man who had accompanied Adams out to Absolution Creek. A filthy rag was clamped between her teeth as she struggled like a wild cat.

Jack couldn’t believe it. He’d imagined he would lose Squib to her father, not Adams. Now, when Squib needed him the most, he lay on the ground mortally wounded.

‘So you’re the infamous Matt Hamilton.’ Adams gave a bow. ‘Well, well. This is a pretty picture. I really have to give Scrubber there my congratulations.’ He pointed the rifle at Matt’s chest.

‘Damn it, man,’ Matt yelled, ‘let her go!’

‘Now that you’ve had your quarrel, I’m here to tell you that there won’t be no problems if you mind your own bees wax.’ Adams gestured for Squib to be brought forward, patting her mussed hair, oblivious to a number of well-aimed shin kicks. ‘The kid must have ridden half the night I reckon. We found her camped not five mile out of town.’ Squib continued to wrestle with her captor, rips to her dress proof of a fair struggle. ‘Saved us a lot of travelling, she did. Now I’m sorry but the government says that these here minors have to be removed for their own safety.’

At that moment a young woman stuck her head out of the hotel door. ‘Scrubber, my lovey, what have they done to you?’ The girl rushed to his side, cradling his head. His throat was covered in blood. ‘You mob of heathens.’ She rested Scrubber’s head on the ground, stepped over his body and was in Adams’s face in a heartbeat. ‘That would be right: I should have known a man like you would be involved. Bog Irish, that’s what my Scrubber calls you. Piece of trash.’ She spat on the ground. ‘And what are you doing with that girl tied up and gagged?’ She swung around. ‘You should all be ashamed of yourselves. You either dumped her or hunted her, and it’s only my man who thought to save her.’ She glared at Squib. ‘I hope you’re worth it.’

Adams pushed her away and she returned to Scrubber’s side, sobbing quietly as she cradled his head in her lap.

Thomas came to and rubbed his head. ‘Jack needs a doctor.’

‘Dark blood.’ Adams pointed to the stain seeping across Jack’s shirt. ‘He’s finished.’

Squib bit the man holding her and rushed forward.

She was stopped mid-flight by Adams’s burly arm.

‘Leave her alone,’ Jack managed to whisper, clutching at his bloody side. He gave Squib a wan smile. ‘Everything will be all right now, Squib. See, your father’s here.’

Squib’s eyes flicked towards Matt, then to Scrubber and back to Jack.

‘Now, this is an interesting conundrum,’ Adams said, removing the gag from the girl’s mouth and casually lifting his arms to show he no longer barred Squib’s path. ‘She doesn’t know which of you to go to.’

Matt called Squib’s name. She inclined her head weakly towards him and then fell to her knees by Jack’s side.

‘Squib!’ Matt exclaimed. ‘How do you even know that man?’

Squib took Jack’s hand, holding it against her cheek. ‘He’s the one who’s been looking after me all this time. I waited and waited for you, Father, but you never came.’ She laid her fingers on Jack’s chest; his breathing was shallow, raspy. ‘Why didn’t you come?’ she sobbed.

‘I wanted to.’ Matt took a step forward.

Scrubber remained partially stunned on the ground. ‘My Scrubber cared for you, girly,’ Veronica sobbed. ‘He’s the one that spurred your father on. Like a dog after a bone he was chasing you, and for what?’ Veronica prostrated herself across Scrubber’s body.

‘For what indeed,’ Adams agreed. ‘For a half-caste gone feral.’

Squib blanched.

‘You’ll always be my Squib.’ Jack coughed. Interlacing his fingers with hers he pulled her closer. ‘I’ve left everything to you. Absolution Creek is yours to manage now,’ he whispered.

‘Jack, don’t.’

He laid a bloody finger on her lips. ‘While you have Absolution you have a home, Squib. Take care of her and she’ll take care of you.’

‘But I don’t belong anywhere except with you. Please, Jack, let them fetch a doctor.’

Jack cradled Squib’s face and brushed at a tear tracing the curve of her cheek. ‘While you’re on Absolution I’ll be there beside you. Always.’ It was then he saw it, the wanting. It was as he imagined her heart to be, layered with sunlight. ‘I’m sorry to be going, now I know –’ he wheezed ‘– now I know that you love me more.’ He smiled under the pressure of her lips and, slowly retrieving the knife from the ground, slid it across his bloody wounding into Squib’s hand. He folded her fingers over the bone handle. ‘Live a good life.’ Jack held her eyes as Adams walked forward. ‘Stay on Absolution and be safe, Squib, be safe.’ Then he gave a nod of consent.

Squib’s fingers curled tightly around the knife. She held Jack’s gaze.

‘Do it,’ he encouraged. ‘You’re surrounded by people who will protect you.’

‘That’s enough.’ Adams dragged Squib up, twisted her around roughly. ‘You’ve given me a pretty chase.’

Gritting her teeth, Squib speared the knife into the lard of Adams’s belly. When her knuckles hit flesh she twisted the blade. Adams staggered backwards, looked at the protruding knife in stunned silence and lifted his rifle.

A single shot rang out.

Chapter 60

T
he flood water appeared like a shimmering mirage in the distance. It slipped quietly over the countryside, driven on by the strength of the surging water behind it. Cora slapped at ants and beetles as they swarmed to safety. Kangaroos and wallabies splashed in the distance as they trailed those that had already bounded towards higher ground.

Below them the water lapped at the trunk of the tree, while next to her Scrubber slept. His head had sunk onto his chest, and his breathing was ragged. Seeing him after all these years, having him next to her again, was a comfort; the memories he rekindled were not.

Cora bit her knuckle to stifle a cry. It wouldn’t do to start bawling now, especially with Scrubber sitting next to her like a cockatoo, his head tucked under a wing. What would she say to her old friend? That she still lived in the past? That her previous life with Jack haunted her days and nights? That Jack was the reason she still rode out at midnight, hoping to be near the spirit of him and the land he loved? A habit of sleeplessness had been replaced by a desperate longing for a man she could never have, for Cora didn’t see Jack as dead, merely physically missing from her world. That was why she continued her own nightly haunting of Absolution Creek. She searched for a world only darkness could conjure.