The Devil's Eye (2 page)

‘So you can tell if it’s raining?’

‘Men of science such as Wragge and myself can tell,’ said Beach, ‘if it’s
going
to rain in two days time. Well, within a range of probabilities. And on the wall here…’ and he went to take the old man’s elbow, but a glance from Douglas persuaded him not to. ‘Here, your Honour. A Fortin barometer; a barograph. It’s exactly two feet and six inches from the floor, and notice the ivory pointer.’

‘You do enjoy your new Post Office, I take it, Mr Beach?’

‘Oh yes, and thank you again. Perhaps you’d like to sit?’

Douglas found a chair and sat with relief, pulling out a large handkerchief to mop his forehead.

‘Do you have any water?’

‘Of course,’ Beach replied and called out, ‘Mr Murphy!’

A minute later a languid clerk appeared at the door.

‘Could you bring a jug of iced water and two glasses please, Mr Murphy?’ said Beach, and the clerk blinked at the Government Resident, turned on his heel, and vanished.

John Douglas always dealt directly with the postmaster. The island community was so starved for news, for any form of entertainment, that any piece of official correspondence was potential gossip, and therefore it was safest to deal with just one person. Everyone who owned a pearling lugger did the same and as a result Mr Beach possessed information that could ruin every man on the island. Douglas, as a former Queensland Premier, was especially mindful of the damaging power of gossip.

The postmaster sat, smiling. Douglas nodded back. Beach’s smile confirmed the many secrets he kept.

‘Port’s quiet today,’ Beach said, gesturing out the window.

The Eastern and Australian Steamship Company’s steamer
Menmuir
, Hongkong bound, was preparing to leave the government wharf. Douglas noticed that the Customs launch was already towing the pearling schooner
Admiral
to the Burns Philp Jetty.

He closed his eyes at the thought of Maggie and Alice leaving, and forced himself back to the contents of the telegram.

Mr Murphy returned and set the dripping pitcher and two glasses on the table. Douglas restrained himself and waited for Beach to pour.

It seemed impossible to be anywhere on the island and not be thirsty. The lack of fresh water should have been fatal to the settlement, but as it turned out no one seemed to mind. There were other drinks to be drunk.

Even Beach, though an apparent abstainer, now produced the obligatory bottle of whisky. Beach offered, Douglas declined. He drank his water slowly and recovered his composure.

‘Perhaps I should dictate a telegram,’ he said.

‘Yes, yes,’ said Beach, pulling a standard form from his drawer and then holding his pencil above it.

‘To Dr Walter Roth, Northern Protector of Aboriginals, Cooktown,’ Beach wrote.

‘Dear Sir, I have just now received your telegram and I am asking all companies with fleets in the vicinity of Cape Melville to report any man missing.

‘…I am investigating,’ added Beach aloud as he wrote.

‘…Will notify you of the result directly. Please advise when more information of the death comes to light.’

‘…advise
forthwith
,’ and Beach looked up.

‘And sign off in the usual way.’

But Beach looked disappointed. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘I’ll mark it urgent.’

Douglas felt again that Beach was wrestling with something he couldn’t say, and he waited.

Eventually Beach said, ‘I believe the men were speared.’

‘That was the gist of the telegram, yes.’

‘And the fatality is an Indian fellow, from Thursday Island.’

‘How many Indians are in the fleets, Mr Beach?’

‘Oh. I shouldn’t think very many. They’re not good swimmers.’

Douglas waited for Beach to continue, and when he didn’t Douglas stood. ‘Well then, thank you, Mr Beach,’ he said, taking a few steps towards the door.

‘There’s the pearl dealer called Thomas, of course.’

Douglas turned. ‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Thomas. He’s a pearl dealer. A licensed pearl dealer. I usually help him fill in the insurance forms.’

‘What in the blazes are you talking about?’ Douglas said, pivoting slowly on his cane.

‘Oh I’m sorry,’ said Beach, flushing. ‘Thomas. He’s from India, I believe, by way of Bombay. I don’t, of course, ever speak to anyone about customers and especially not their affairs, being confidential, but I thought that under the circumstances…’

‘Who?’

‘Thomas. The telegram…it mentioned Indians, and Thomas is the only Indian on Thursday Island itself. I thought…’

‘Oh, I see.’ Douglas nodded. ‘I see.’ He had a vague recollection of a Thomas. ‘I suppose he might know a
countryman who’s gone down to Cooktown. Where does the fellow live?’

‘His shop is in Hargraves-street. But you won’t find him there now.’

‘No?’

‘He’s off the island. Caught a steamer south.
Tokio Maru
, I recall.’

Douglas twisted his cane into the floor. ‘When?’

‘Oh, that would have been, let’s see, about two weeks ago.’

‘Mr Beach,’ said Douglas, returning to his chair. ‘I’d like to redraft that telegram to Dr Roth.’

When they’d finished, there was a pause as Beach again appeared to be wrestling with some internal dilemma. He had turned towards the window and Douglas saw the trees were swaying.

‘Here’s the wind back,’ said Beach. ‘Looks like the
Admiral
will be sailing this evening.’

‘My daughter Maggie intends to join her husband at Cape Melville.’ Douglas stared at the scene, full of grief. ‘She’s taking my granddaughter.’

‘Is she?’ said Beach, who knew, had known, of course, when he handed Douglas the telegram that morning. ‘If she’s not going ashore, I can’t see much danger in that department,’ although he clearly could. He ran a finger under his collar, and added, ‘Wragge reports that the natives along that stretch of coast are cannibals.’

Ignoring him, Douglas said, ‘Maggie seems to have formed the view, an unshakable opinion in her case of
course, that the thing to do is to bring her sister back. Thinks I can’t live without her help, Hope I suppose being a nurse as well as a daughter. But can you imagine? Maggie’s determined to fetch her from Cooktown.’

‘Oh my God,’ said Beach, reaching for a form. ‘Would you like to draft another telegram to Dr Roth?’

Douglas looked at Beach as if he’d forgotten he was there. ‘Why?’

‘To alert him that Mrs Porter is coming. He might be able to make, uhm, arrangements, considering the difficult position it may, ah, put you, or at least your daughters, in.’

Dear God, how much did Beach really know about his family?

‘Discreet,’ said Douglas, feeling weak.

Beach stood and poured two fingers of scotch into his empty glass.

And as he sat back down again, Beach said, with what Douglas prayed was absolute sincerity, ‘I guarantee discretion. A few well-chosen words will convey the message without giving away too many secrets, I’m sure.’

Douglas dictated and Beach wrote.

The first person Constable Jack Kenny saw when he arrived at the Cooktown Hospital that evening was Hope Douglas. She was standing in the yellow lamplight of the hallway with her back to him, and appeared to be talking down to someone. Or perhaps she was chiding one of the fat Hope-street goats that sometimes wandered through the wards. Constable Kenny couldn’t quite hear her words, but the tone suggested admonishment. In any case, she was leaning away from him while managing to keep her back perfectly rigid.

Kenny stood awkwardly at the top of the steps, hat in hand. A wisp of hair had escaped Hope’s pins and clung to the nape of her damp neck. The breath of the hospital swept over him from the open door, the smell of urine, polish and carbolic making his heart pound.

He stood there in his irrational anxiety until she turned, exposing a small Chinaman in hospital pyjamas. When the startled man saw the officer of the
Queensland Native Mounted Police at the door he did a little jig backwards.

Hope, with hands on hips, said, ‘Constable Kenny, you’re late.’

‘I didn’t know that I was expected.’

‘It’s after seven,’ she said, as the man shuffled quickly away behind her.

‘I had to find my horse. Saddle it,’ he said. ‘Ride ten miles.’

But Hope was frowning at him.

Kenny tried to smile beneath the moustache, but his expression rarely had the response he hoped for. The Chinaman had disappeared.

‘Is it past visiting time?’ he asked.

‘Oh, I don’t mean to say that you aren’t welcome, Constable.’ She came forward and lowered her voice. ‘But Jack, Dr Roth is here already.’

‘Roth?’

‘He said you should have been here an hour ago.’

‘Did he?’

‘Not that I mind. In fact, you’re welcome at any hour.’

He searched her face for meaning and said hesitantly, ‘I might come in then.’

‘Oh yes, of course. I am so sorry.’ She took his hat, put it on a peg beside Roth’s large and silly American variety, and led the way down the corridor, her wide black hospital dress sweeping the floor, the perspiration on her fine straight neck shining in the lamplight.

He caught an impression of patients as they passed open doors: oriental diggers and pearlers, the faces of two whites as poor as himself. No blacks, of course. They’d all been cleared out to the lock hospital at the Eight Mile Police Camp, to the paddock behind his quarters.

Thank you, Dr Roth.

Dr Walter Roth, the Northern Protector of Aboriginals, sat deep in a worn wicker chair on the verandah, blowing smoke towards the insects swarming around a lamp. He stood and offered his hand to Kenny, who squeezed it as hard as he could.

‘You look tired, Constable,’ said Dr Roth. ‘I can prescribe something, if you like.’

They were each an inch or two over six feet, but Roth looked the better fed.

‘You’re looking a little pale yourself, Dr Roth,’ Kenny said.

Roth’s face was actually red and a rash burned beneath his open collar.

‘Very observant of you, Jack. Even for a police officer. No, this climate is a bit much for anyone not born into it or disinclined to drink, but I believe I’m managing.’

‘You could try Clements Tonic. My father swears by it.’

‘So he tells me. No, I was going to prescribe you something along the medicinal line, though. Brandy perhaps.’

‘I don’t drink.’

‘Good. It’s the curse of the Irish,’ said Roth. ‘And the police.’ He looked up and down the verandah, as if searching for someone. ‘How is your father, Jack? Is he still here?’

‘Went home two weeks ago.’

‘He was passing water like a fire pump when he left,’ said Hope, from behind Kenny’s shoulder.

‘Splendid,’ said Roth.

There was a last, thin line of light behind the mauve hills to the west. Night insects were already making a racket in the dark hospital grounds, and Hope disappeared to light more lamps.

‘Where’s this Kanaka, then?’ said Kenny.

Roth waved his cigarette in the direction of an open door. ‘He’s no Kanaka. Hope reports that he’s an Indian.’

Kenny heard Hope say from a dark room: ‘Dr Korteum says I shouldn’t presume to diagnose a patient’s race, let alone anything else. So don’t take my word for it.’

‘Quite right, Hope,’ and to Kenny he said, ‘A Kanaka from Bombay.’

Kenny tugged an ear. ‘Dr Roth, can I ask why you are here?’

‘Certainly.’

Kenny waited. Roth inhaled from his cigarette and then gazed at Kenny behind a screen of smoke.

‘I’m here,’ said Roth, ‘because it’s my job.’

‘As the Protector?’

‘Yes.’

‘Of Aboriginals.’

‘Very good.’

‘But this man, you just said, is an Indian and he was attacked
by
the blacks.’

‘So he says. I’m no policeman.’

Kenny looked at the darkened doorway. ‘So who do the blacks need protecting
from
in this case?’

‘Why, Constable Kenny, from you of course.’

The wound was as clean as any Kenny had seen. Hope had brought a second lamp with its swarm of insects in from the verandah and placed it on a bedside table.

‘Well?’ said Roth, poking a finger at something on the lampshade.

‘I’m no doctor,’ said Kenny, but the gaping tear was pink at the edges and starting to close.

‘You’ve seen your share of spear wounds, though,’ said Roth.

Kenny lifted the arm and the man didn’t protest but kept his eyes squeezed shut.

‘I imagine a fatal result’s not anticipated?’ said Kenny.

Hope said, ‘We won’t know that for sure for a few more days. There’s still a chance of infection.’ She added, ‘That’s what Dr Korteum believes.’

‘Remarkable, don’t you think,’ continued Roth, ‘that the man’s managed to keep his arm—not to mention his life—carrying around a wound like that. In this climate. For seven days without treatment.’

‘Seven days?’

‘I’ve known men to die from infected insect bites,’ said Roth, bending to examine a beetle.

‘You’ve questioned him already?’ said Kenny, staring at Roth, who didn’t look up.

‘A short interview. You weren’t here. And just as well I did, too, because as you can see he’s now in a coma.’

Kenny, annoyed, looked at the man’s face, closed so tightly that he might have been expecting a blow. He believed he saw one eye open partially, and shut again. The brown body was naked and slight, the ribs showed, and he was covered in scratches. The wound in the side wept a little, but didn’t look mortal. If the man had been in the bush for a week, thought Kenny, any number of things could have finished him off: heat, thirst, fever, crocodiles, snakes, blacks. Even healthy men died frequently in that country.

‘Wouldn’t you agree that it looks more like a stab wound?’ said Roth. ‘More the thin sharp knife than the spear.’

Kenny straightened suddenly and the man flinched with his eyes still shut.

Hope came to the bed and dabbed once at the man’s forehead with a wet cloth before standing back and shaking her head.

‘What else did he say?’ said Kenny.

‘He insists he was speared,’ said Roth. ‘I suppose he would know. But most spear wounds around here aren’t so clean. I’ve seen kangaroo hunting spears thrown with a woomera with such force that even ones that aren’t sharp go right through the animal. They split the flesh by force. Makes a wound ragged at the edges, even if the spear had a tip of stone or piece of wire. The shaft will tear as it passes through and when it’s drawn out. Anything that survives the initial wound usually succumbs to infection.’

Kenny wasn’t surprised that Roth knew so much about spears and spear wounds. The man spent most of his time collecting the damned weapons.

One of Kenny’s trackers, Pompey, had a spear wound in the chest that still wept and would not close two years on. The flesh of the man who lay rigid in front of him looked as though it had been sliced with something long and clean and very, very sharp.

‘Perhaps it was an arrow,’ said Kenny, thinking aloud.

‘Do you know of any local tribe that uses bows and arrows?’

‘Indians?’ suggested Hope.

Kenny turned to her, and she raised an eyebrow. He smiled back.

Roth coughed and Kenny bent down and examined the man’s face. The flesh was dark and yellowish and tight against the bones, and he was constantly licking
his lips. Hope leant over and put the wet cloth to them. He sucked, perhaps reflexively.

‘What name belong you?’ said Kenny.

‘He savvies Englee pretty well,’ said Roth. ‘When he’s awake.’

‘Well, what’s his damned name then?’

‘Didn’t catch it,’ said Roth.

The man himself said nothing.

Kenny said to the man, ‘Where from?’

‘Thursday Island,’ said Roth, who was holding up some struggling insect under the shade. ‘I’ve had a telegram back from Mr Douglas. No pearlers have yet been reported missing. Hardly surprising.’

‘I’m sure I’ve seen him,’ said Hope.

‘He might be a new boy,’ said Roth.

‘No, Dr Roth,’ said Hope, with absolute authority. ‘He’s not a pearler. Look at his hands.’

Roth said, ‘Hope, could you leave us for a minute?’

Hope took the cloth away from the man’s mouth, glanced at Kenny, and went out the door. Roth watched her depart.

Kenny cleared his throat and stood back from the bed. ‘All right Dr Roth. What else?’

‘He says his boat sank,’ said the Protector, flicking the insect away. He wiped his hands on the blanket, and sat at the end of the bed.

‘Where?’

‘Just south of Cape Melville. He and his mate came ashore. Stumbled about a bit. Says the blacks found
them and if that’s the case they no doubt assumed the pair was up to no good with their women. Which is probably closer to the truth.’

‘His mate?’ said Kenny.

‘What?’

‘Are you saying he came ashore with someone else?’

‘Oh, well that’s the thing, I suppose. He says they were both speared. He didn’t elaborate except to ramble on a bit about fate or some such nonsense.’

‘Dead?’

‘Well, I wouldn’t know. He was a bit vague on the details, but he seems to believe so.’

Kenny rubbed his forehead hard, turned to the prone man on the bed and raised his voice. ‘Who was with you?’

The man’s face screwed up as tears flooded from his closed eyes.

‘That’s a good sign,’ said Roth. ‘For someone who nearly died of thirst.’

‘So,’ said Kenny, turning back to Roth. ‘The blacks have murdered his mate.’

‘You see,’ said Roth, ‘now you’ve said “murder”, and when a native policeman says “murder”, the next thing he says is “dispersal”.’

Kenny opened his mouth, closed it again. He turned back to the bed and slapped the man across the face, not very hard. The eyes opened in shock.

‘You can hear me. What is your mate’s name?’

The man began to moan and Kenny thought he saw
something pearly white slip with the stream of bloodied saliva to the pillow and down into the white hospital sheets.

Leaning closer he muttered, ‘I didn’t hit you that hard,’ and as Kenny reached down into the sheets, Roth grabbed him by the shoulder and said, ‘Leave him.’

Kenny spun around and put his face close to Roth’s. ‘You can’t tell me when I can and can’t stop questioning a witness,’ he said, the fury hollowing out his voice.

‘Can’t I?’ Roth took a step back, but kept his voice steady. ‘I didn’t know that. I must tell the Commissioner.’

Hope was staring in at the two of them. ‘Be quiet there,’ she said, at the door.

The hospital suddenly seemed very still except for the noise of insects beating their lives out against the lamp, and the whimpering Indian.

Kenny was shaking. He wanted to tell Roth to go to hell, but he pushed past him and strode on to the verandah.

‘Christ!’ said Kenny, wondering what the punishment would be if he struck the Protector.

It was Kenny’s job, as an officer in the Queensland Native Mounted Police, to stop the blacks terrorising people. Roth’s job appeared to be the reverse. They
both reported to the Police Commissioner, who lived a thousand miles away and who apparently didn’t see any conflict in this.

‘Jesus,’ said Kenny.

‘If you’re going to swear and hit a man,’ said Roth behind him, ‘you might as well start drinking, too,’ and a flask appeared in front of Kenny.

Hope, unseen, called out, ‘Oh no, not here you don’t. Dr Korteum will horsewhip you both.’

Kenny marched down from the verandah and into the garden, and behind him Roth said, ‘Nonsense,’ but followed.

‘The cheek of that Hope,’ Kenny heard Roth say. ‘Perhaps she should go home. Nothing but trouble.’

Kenny stopped suddenly. ‘What did you say?’

‘What do you say about women, Jack?’ said Roth, in the gloom. ‘None is ever who we think she is. I wonder if that’s in their nature, or do we deceive ourselves?’

Kenny thought Roth might be drunk and didn’t reply.

The evening sea breeze cooled the sweat that had soaked through his shirt. Across the street, over the houses and down to the waterfront, Cooktown was lighting up. A dog barked incessantly as people emerged from their gates to suffer an evening stroll.

Kenny eventually said in a steady voice, ‘I don’t suppose your patient in there mentioned the dead man’s name to you?’

‘Not to me. Ogilvy didn’t get it out of him either, and
he was the one who brought him in. Poor fellow must have been too cut up about it to talk.’

Kenny couldn’t see Roth’s expression in the gathering gloom, and said, ‘Why don’t you believe the man was speared?’

‘As I said, I’m no policeman.’

‘You think they had a fight and this fellow was stabbed?’

Roth sighed. ‘It seems on probability a more likely scenario, don’t you think?’

‘No.’

‘How many spear wounds come into this hospital?’

Kenny said nothing.

‘How many knife wounds? I’ll tell you. Dozens. Scores.’

‘Not many men come in here with a hole in their arm saying they were speared.’

‘That’s my point exactly.’

‘
My
point is,’ said Kenny, ‘that this man has made a serious complaint involving the blacks and I have to investigate it.’