The Night They Stormed Eureka (16 page)

Mr Puddleham looked up from beside the pot, where he was ladling stew onto another customer’s plate. He frowned, but said nothing.

‘Mr Puddleham?’ persisted his wife.

The little man straightened. ‘I served Her Majesty faithfully for many years,’ he said quietly. ‘But lately I have realised —’ He stopped, as though unable to continue.

The men around the pots stared at him silently.

‘I believe —’ Mr Puddleham stopped, and began again. ‘I believe that if it wasn’t for the queen my good wife would not have been made a criminal, simply for the crime of love. I believe if it had not been for the queen our daughter would be alive now. We might have had many children, instead of only dreams. I believe —’

‘No!’ Mrs Puddleham surged to her feet. The pan slipped from her fingers into the fire, spilling its batter into the flames.

‘But ye’ve got yer son —’ began one of the men.

Mr Puddleham ignored him. He stretched out his arms to his wife. ‘My dear wife, I am sorry. But a man must speak the truth, or be no man at all. He must do what he thinks right.’

Mrs Puddleham was sobbing now, her husband’s arms around her.

Sam wrapped a bit of sacking around her hand and reached into the flames for the frying pan. I’ll have to soak it, she thought, to get the burned stuff off …

She tried not to hear Mrs Puddleham’s sobs, the muttered words from Mr Puddleham. vaguely she was aware of the men gulping the last of their stew or dumplings and slipping out into the growing shadows, leaving them alone.

Of course she wasn’t the Puddlehams’ child. They knew it, and she knew it. It was all pretend; they were just people who needed each other for a while. She lifted the pan, then thrust it into a bucket of water.

‘Sam?’ It was Mr Puddleham. He kneeled down beside her, and lifted her chin with his fingers to force her to look at him.

‘Sam — you
are
our daughter. Back then — I didn’t mean you weren’t.’

It was the most he’d ever said to her, she thought. It had always been Mrs Puddleham talking and him agreeing. He had never really wanted her.

‘No, I’m not.’

‘You are. You’re not our Lucy — never mind how much Mrs Puddleham wants you to be. But you’re our daughter because … well,
because,
that’s all. You are and that’s all there is to it, and nothing’s going to change it.’

Sam let go of the pan. ‘I can look after myself, you know. You don’t need to worry about me. I’ve been doing it for years.’

‘Well, we’ll look after you now,’ said Mr Puddleham with dignity. ‘And you’ll look after us. Family, that’s what we are.’

Sam pushed the tears off her cheeks. She hadn’t even realised she was crying.

Mrs Puddleham kneeled down awkwardly and gave her a hug too. It smelled of stew and pancakes and sweaty clothes. It might have been the best hug Sam had ever had. For the first time she felt easy lifting up her arms and hugging the big woman back.

‘Well, that’s the end o’ the pancakes,’ Mrs Puddleham said practically. ‘Now how’s about I make us —’

‘They’re coming!’ The first yell came from far away, but closer voices took it up.

‘Soldiers! They’re marching down the road!'

‘They’ve got cannons!’ It was the man with the clean face and muddy neck. He ran back down the gully towards the fire and addressed Mr Puddleham. ‘Come on! Them soldiers have come to kill the lot of us! We got to stop them!’

He ran off. Mr Puddleham glanced at his wife, then at Sam. ‘I have to go.’

‘Not without me, you don’t.’

‘But, Mrs Puddleham —’

‘Where you go, I go,’ said Mrs Puddleham. She flexed her arms, strong from decades of pot-stirring. ‘An’ I’d like to see the soldier who can stop me.’

‘I’m coming too,’ said Sam quietly. Whatever was going to happen on the goldfields now — all that she knew would happen, and all the things, perhaps, that had never got into books for people to read … whatever happened, she and the Puddlehams would face it together.

She just had to keep them safe. And suddenly she realised how to do it.

It was simple, thought Sam, as she and the Puddlehams marched with the growing crowd of diggers through the gathering darkness towards the main road.

The soldiers had stormed the Eureka Stockade early in the morning, before anyone was up, hadn’t they? Then all she had to do was keep the Puddlehams — and, hopefully, George and the Professor — away from the stockade at night, and they’d be safe.

The stockade hadn’t even been built yet. So they must be safe for now …

Probably. Possibly. There was so much she didn’t remember or perhaps had never read.

The crowd marching beside them grew. All around them men left their campfires or struggled up the shaky ladders from their mines, a human tide washing across the diggings towards the road.

Somewhere far off she could hear drumming — not just the beat of so many feet and tin plates and billies, but a real drum. This beat was different from the tunes played at the roll up.
Ratty tat tat. Rattatty tat tat …

They reached the road just as the soldiers came into sight: the redcoats Sam had seen in so many movies, their rifles — or were they muskets? — over their shoulders, a drummer boy out front, rapping out the beat to march to.

Ratty tat tat. Rattatty tat tat…

Behind the first lot of soldiers were carts pulled by straining horses, their heavy loads hidden by tarpaulins. And then more soldiers, and more carts …

Miners lined both sides of the road. The air was thick with jeers, but the thin sound of the boy’s drum sounded above them.

Ratty tat tat. Rattatty tat tat.

‘Halt!’

Two diggers stepped out into the road in front of the drummer boy. The child stopped and looked startled, but refused to step backwards.

‘Who is in command here?’

A soldier stepped forwards. ‘I’m Captain Wise. In the name of Her Majesty Queen Victoria, I demand that you let us pass!’

One of the diggers laughed. ‘Do ye now? Well, in the name o’ ten thousand diggers I demand you tell me if there’s cannon on those wagons.’

‘I have no information to give a parcel of rebels.’ Captain Wise lifted up his hand. The drummer boy took up the beat.

Ratty tat tat. Rattatty tat tat.

The soldiers began to march again. The horses heaved at the big wagons. The diggers didn’t move.

Sam stared. Would the soldiers knock the miners down? Run the wagons over them?

The crowd’s jeers grew louder. Then suddenly the diggers surged onto the road.

What had been orderly columns of soldiers turned into chaos. Sam and the Puddlehams clung together as men swarmed across the dirt. Horses screamed and reared over the thunder of gunfire.

‘Get back there, missus!’

It was a digger, vaguely familiar from the cook shop. He always sucked at the bones … now he and a mob of others hurriedly unharnessed the horses pulling one of the wagons. The horses reared up, their tack dangling, while the diggers pushed the wagon off the road. Diggers and soldiers grappled in the confusion.

As suddenly as it had begun it was over. The captured wagon had vanished into the growing darkness of the diggings; another wagon lay overturned, a digger sprawled beneath it; another body was lying in the road. A small body. The little drummer boy, the drumstick still in his hand.

The child didn’t move.

Sam stared. She had to help. But already two soldiers bent to pick the boy up. They carried him between them off into the darkness.

What were the other soldiers doing? Night had gathered around them. The world was all black and shadows; there was only the pool of light from the soldiers’ lanterns, and the red flickers of the campfires.

‘Come on!’ Someone pulled Mr Puddleham’s elbow. ‘Get your missus away from here! Don’t let the redcoats nab you! Get out of it!’

‘Yes.’ Mrs Puddleham grabbed Sam’s hand and her husband’s. She began to tow them back into the dimness, along the track to the gully. Sam looked back. Was the boy alive? Surely the soldiers wouldn’t be cradling him so gently if he were dead.

But a last puddle of yellow light showed the small body hanging limply in the soldiers’ arms.

All around them men jostled back towards the safety of the tents and darkness. Women called from campsites, asking what had happened.

Someone peered through the shadows. ‘You! Puddleham, ain’t it? Here! A present from the queen!’ The man thrust a musket at Mr Puddleham. Mr Puddleham held it as though it were a loaf of his wife’s damper and he wasn’t sure how to slice it. ‘I don’t know … I never have used a firearm —’ he stammered.

‘Ye know how to fire a musket, lad?’

Sam shook her head.

The man grabbed the musket back from Mr Puddleham’s unresisting hands. ‘I’ll give it to them as does then.’ He grinned. His teeth were white in the darkness. ‘We’re going to show em, eh? By this time tomorrow the diggings will be free! There were enough muskets and ammunition in that wagon for us to fight the whole bleedin’ army!’

‘What should we do now?’ whispered Mr Puddleham.

The man looked drunk with adventure and excitement. ‘Get back to yer camp. Get what ye can — piles o’ stones, knives. Reckon a good sharp knife on a broom handle’d do the trick, missus,’ he added to Mrs Puddleham. ‘You try stabbing that into a redcoat an’ he won’t be getting up again. They’re going to be after the guns what we captured tonight. But let ‘em come!’ He gave a wild whoop, the sort the diggers gave when they’d struck a vein of gold, and vanished into the darkness.

It seemed impossible to ladle out stew after that. But what else were they to do? As Mrs Puddleham said, the food was there, waiting to be ate, and customers were back again, waiting to eat.

Tonight though, most had muskets by their sides, and horns of powder at their belts. Scattered cheers rose across the diggings as men related to their comrades the brief triumph on the road.

‘No puddings tonight,’ said Mrs Puddleham wearily. ‘Didn’t have time to make none.’ Her voice came in a curious pant, as though she found it hard to breathe. Her face was pale.

‘You had better things to do, eh, missus?’ said one of the men. ‘Come on,’ he added to Sam. ‘Serve it up fast, lad. Them redcoats will be back soon enough.’

Sam filled his plate. ‘Are you all right, Ma?’ she whispered to Mrs Puddleham.

Mrs Puddleham nodded. ‘Just a bit breathless like. I’d say me corsets were too tight if I ever wore any.’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t like it. I don’t say the cause is wrong. But that poor boy lyin’ there —’

‘An’ how many boys has this government killed, eh?’ muttered one of the diggers around his spoonful of stew. ‘Boys who starved ‘cause of the taxes, because the big landowners wouldn’t give their pas an acre to grow food for their families?’

‘I knows well enough about children dying,’ said Mrs Puddleham quietly. She peered into the pot. ‘Two more servings if anyone wants seconds,’ she said, with something like her usual manner. ‘Who’s going to be the lucky ones?’

Another yell shattered the darkness. ‘Soldiers on the diggin’s! They’re coming back!’

The men scrambled from the fireside, vanishing into the shadows of the camp. Mr Puddleham hesitated. ‘I should go too —’

‘Where?’ demanded Mrs Puddleham.

To where the screams and gunshots are coming from, thought Sam. But she didn’t say it. Safety seemed so fragile now.

Suddenly cheers took the place of screams. One of the men ran back into the firelight. ‘Got ‘em!’ he cried. ‘Them redcoats tried to storm the diggin’s. But we got ‘em! We didn’t even have to use the guns. Just rocks and darkness did the trick. We got them soldiers on the run.’ He grinned up at Mrs Puddleham. ‘Still got those two servings left, missus? Just think, we bettered an army afore the stew even had time to get cold.’

Mrs Puddleham reached over automatically and ladled stew onto his plate. She stepped back, and her husband put his arms around her.

If only it was going to be as simple as that, thought Sam. We want to do right, the miner and me and the Puddlehams. Maybe even the soldiers too, doing their duty to keep law and order. We’re lost, the lot of us. If only the darkness would light up each night, with letters splashed across the stars, telling everyone what they should do, and what they shouldn’t.

Another figure stumbled through the darkness. It was the Professor. At first Sam thought he was drunk. Then she realised he was half carrying another man. Blood dripped onto the ground. ‘You have a needle and thread, Mrs Puddleham?’ The Professor’s voice was hoarse, but his enunciation was still knife-edge clear.

Mrs Puddleham nodded. ‘But what —?’ She stopped as the Professor laid his companion down by the fire. His shirt was slashed. No, not just his shirt, thought Sam numbly, but the arm inside his shirt, the flesh opened, the blood steaming in the cool air as it pooled on the soil.

The Professor kneeled and held the edges of the wound closed with his fingers. The man screamed. The Professor nodded to Sam. ‘Go along to my campsite and get my jug. Hurry!’

For a second Sam was about to refuse. How could he demand alcohol now? And then she realised. Alcohol disinfected wounds, didn’t it? And if the man drank some it would help ease his pain.

‘Here!’ One of the customers pulled a burning branch out of the fire and held the unburned end out to her. A light to see my way through the darkness, thought Sam, still numb. She grasped the branch, keeping it slanted forwards so the sparks didn’t fall back on her hand.

And then she ran, the sparks streaming behind her, the light from the branch dimming as the flames flickered, but the glow enough to let her find the way.

Mrs Puddleham was still kneeling by the man when she got back. Even by the firelight Sam could see the big woman’s face was white. The hands that held the needle and thread were shiny with blood.

The wounded man seemed to be unconscious. But he opened his eyes when the Professor lifted his head and held the jug to his lips. He gulped weakly, and the grog ran down his chin. Then, as Mrs Puddleham moved back, the Professor poured some moonshine on the neat stiches along the wound.