The Night They Stormed Eureka (17 page)

The man screamed. His eyes rolled back. His head slumped onto the Professor’s arms.

The Professor laid him gently on the ground. ‘I might say a good waste of fine whisky,’ he said. ‘But as it is perhaps the worst hooch I have ever had the misfortune to drink, I won’t. Nor is it a waste,’ he added. He smiled wryly at Sam. ‘I think perhaps this is the best use I have put alcohol to in my life.’

Sam said nothing. Her legs felt like they were marshmallows. She wondered if she were going to be sick. The smell of blood, of cooking mutton fat, of smoke and sweat and —

The customer put down his plate. How could he eat? wondered Sam. He grinned at them all. ‘Next week we’ll all be free. Soon as the other goldfields see how we’ve stood up to the redcoats they’ll join in. There aren’t enough redcoats in the world to stop us if we stand together. No more redcoats and their swords, no more troopers and their lies, no more magistrates and bribes, no squatters stealing all the land. Can you imagine that?’

No one spoke. Then the Professor said, ‘No, I can’t imagine that. One can hope, that’s all. Now will you help me carry this poor man to his tent?’

He’s changed since he started to teach George, thought Sam. The mockery in his voice had gone.

‘I will and all.’ The man wiped his mouth with his sleeve. Between them, he and the Professor carried the unconscious man out into the darkness.

‘He’s left his jug behind. The Professor I mean.’ Was that her own voice? wondered Sam. It sounded strange.

‘Damp the fire down,’ said Mr Puddleham. ‘That’s the end of the stew for tonight. Are you all right, my dear?’ he added to his wife.

Mrs Puddleham rubbed her hand across her heart. ‘A bit giddy,’ she admitted. ‘My deary, don’t get me wrong. The cause is right, I know. But I wish it weren’t us what had to fight it.’

‘It will look better in the morning,’ said Mr Puddleham gently. ‘Think of Sam’s children. Think of the world we will win for them.’

‘Sam’s children?’ A smile grew across Mrs Puddleham’s face. ‘Why, I never thought o’ that. Grandchildren. An’ a hotel with velvet on the seats. An’ a world where men like you make the laws, Mr Puddleham, not just the gentry. It’s got to be good, ain’t it?’

‘Yes,’ said Sam softly. ‘It will be better.’

Sam trudged down the road next to Mrs Puddleham, trying to find her usual pleasure in the sight of the distant mountains. It was midday, an almost shadowless world without even a breeze to send the tents flapping. The road was more crowded than usual; miners were coming from the other diggings to join in the excitement. Men are leaving too though, she thought, watching the bowed figures push wheelbarrows or carry swags down the road towards Melbourne. Afraid of the rebellion? Or just too hungry to stay on?

Freedom was all very well, as long as you had something to eat.

‘Why are we going to the shop? We don’t need anything, do we?’

‘You wait an’ see. It’s a surprise,’ said Mrs Puddleham mysteriously.

It had been two days since the attack on the redcoats. Mrs Puddleham looked better now: the colour was back in her face and her breathlessness was forgotten, though she leaned on Sam’s arm now as they began to climb the rise. She had left the pots to the Professor for a while. Mr Puddleham was drilling with a group of miners, one of many forming squads to practise fighting soldiers when the rebellion came. George hadn’t been back to the diggings, either. Worry bit at Sam when she thought of George. She hoped he was all right.

‘What sort of surprise?’ asked Sam wearily. She didn’t want more surprises. She just wanted things to be quiet for a while. Manageable. The stew in the pots, the Puddlehams’ wealth growing in the bank, George back studying.

Mrs Puddleham patted her arm. ‘You’ll see.’

The soldiers hadn’t attacked the camp again. Instead more than ten thousand diggers (or so it had said in
The Ballarat Times
when one of the customers handed Sam a copy that morning so she could read it aloud to everyone) had met at Bakery Hill again yesterday afternoon.

Sam had stayed with Mrs Puddleham at the gully during the meeting, for she still looked too pale to cope with crowds. But even from their camp they could hear the cheers, and the muskets fired in celebration till it seemed even the ground shook and Sam wondered that mines didn’t collapse.

Perhaps some had, she thought. Perhaps small tragedies like mines collapsing were being lost in the excitement. No, not just excitement. Like Mum when she’s on a happy drunk, she thought. The miners are drunk on dreams. And afterwards they are going to feel …

What? she wondered. What would it be like after Eureka, when the dreams of so many shattered like a bit of glass? Well, she was going to find out. She was glad that the Puddlehams had just about enough money now to get away, to find their own dream, their hotel with velvet seats. At least, she hoped they did.

Sam glanced across at Bakery Hill. The new flag the diggers had put up to show their independence from England flew high above the diggings. It was blue, with a white cross and the white stars of the Southern Cross. How many times had she seen the Eureka flag back home? But to the people of this world it was a new flag of rebellion and pride.

Suddenly Sam saw a familiar figure ahead of them up the road, using his crook to keep a small mob of sheep from wandering too far away from him. ‘There’s George! He must be taking those sheep to the butcher.’

Mrs Puddleham lowered herself onto a log by the road. ‘'Bout time we got some more meat. Where
has
that lad been? You run an’ catch up with him an’ tell him we needs four forequarters. No need to take the best meat for a stew,’ she added practically. ‘Not if the butcher can sell the best bits to someone else.’ She shook her head. ‘A rebellion is all very well, but people still has to eat.’

It was almost what Sam had been thinking. But then Mrs Puddleham added, ‘An’ they’ll still pay for it, too. You run along an’ tell him while I wait here. Oh, it’s hot,’ she muttered, fanning her red cheeks with her hand, upsetting the flies trying to drink her sweat. ‘There’ll be no flies an’ no heat when we has our hotel …’

Sam smiled down at her. ‘Our hotel will be the best in the world.’ And it would be, she thought, with Mrs Puddleham overseeing the cooking and Mr Puddleham grand as the queen’s butler — even if he hadn’t been.

She bent down suddenly and kissed Mrs Puddleham’s cheek, watched the smile of delight spread across the big woman’s face, then ran up the road, zigzagging between the bullock droppings towards George. He wore his usual too-big trousers and flapping shirt, and one of the big hats made of what looked like palm leaves.

‘Where have you been?’ she demanded, puffing. The sheep bleated at her, alarmed. ‘You haven’t been round for ages! We were worried!’

George glanced up at her, his face expressionless. ‘Was you?’

‘Of course. I thought you’d be at yesterday’s meeting. There were ten thousand people there and —’

‘I heard,’ said George heavily. He hauled a straying sheep back by the neck with his crook. ‘So many coves about these days we hears everything, even at the farm.’

‘Then why didn’t you go to it?’

He shrugged. ‘Only went that first time to hear the bleedin’ bands. An’ I heard them. ‘

‘Well …’ she hesitated. She’d been going to say history was being made. ‘It … it’s exciting,’ she said instead.

He shrugged. ‘Won’t make any difference to me, will it?’

She looked at him more closely. His face was closed, without the joyousness of the past few weeks since he’d met the Professor. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothin’.’

‘Yes, there is.’

‘My business then. None o’ yours.’

‘You’re my friend.’

He glanced over at her from under his hat. ‘Friends with a native?’

She stilled. ‘Did someone call you that?’

He shrugged. ‘I’m used to it. Nah, it were more’n that. At that meeting, the one with the bands …’

‘Go on,’ said Sam quietly.

‘Cove spat on me, didn’t he?’ George tried to sound indifferent. ‘Said I’d jostled him, what were I doing crowdin’ a white man, mixing in things that weren’t none o’ my business.’

Fury ripped through her like lava up a volcano. But she tried to keep her voice calm. ‘What did the Professor say?’

‘He were at the grog shop. That’s what I were doing — waiting for him.’

Typical drunk, thought Sam. All nice and smiling till he’s really needed. She shook her head helplessly. ‘The man was stupid. You’re a hundred times better than him. A million. And it
is
your business. It’s about getting you a vote too. When you grow up, anyway.’

George laughed. It was like the laugh he’d given when the sight of the dying sheep had made her feel ill. ‘An’ the bunyip down the river is gunna cook dinner. They’ll never give me the vote.’

‘But —’ Sam stopped. It was true, wasn’t it? She just hadn’t thought. Had forgotten. Indigenous Australians hadn’t got the vote till when? She tried to think. Some time when Mum was her age. Far, far in the future from now.

George saw her expression change. ‘There ain’t no better life for me whether the miners win or the redcoats,’ he said more gently.

She nodded. ‘I’m … I’m sorry. I didn’t think.’

He tried to smile. ‘It’s funny. Bein’ here’s taught me to think properly. An’ now I can think I knows there’s no point gettin’ mixed up in white man’s business.’

‘But more people getting the vote is still good. It’s worth fighting for!’

What was she saying? The last thing she wanted was for George to fight. Her tongue had run away with her. But even as she hesitated he was speaking again.

‘Not for me it ain’t. That fool were right. Nothing to do with me. I know what I’m gunna do now.’ He looked at her, his face set in a way she’d never seen it before.

‘What?’

‘Stay out of it. I’m gunna wait till it all settles down again, an’ the Professor’s stopped going to them roll ups. Then I’m gunna learn the stuff I need to know to get a job — the readin’ and the writin', none o’ this democracy lark. I’ll get me the best job anyone’ll give a darkie. And then one day I’ll tell me children how their country got like this, with white men burrowing like wombats just for a speck of gold.’ He stared at her. ‘You think it’s really better if I go and stand with the whiteys and get killed?’

‘No,’ she said softly.

His face grew gentler. ‘You shoulda seen this place afore the miners came. It were beautiful. They talk o’ gold — the stream here looked like gold when the sun shone on it the right way. There was ducks and ‘roos an’ so many koalas you wouldn’t think they could all fit in the trees. Ma’s got a koala-skin cloak. Softest thing you ever saw.’

‘How is your ma?’

‘Kept coughin’ blood last night. That’s why Da’s not helping with the sheep today — he’s stayin’ with her.’

Sam stared at him in horror. ‘But … we have to do something. Get a doctor.’

‘Doctor couldn’t do nothin’ when Da got one last time. She’s dying.’ His voice was emotionless again, but his eyes were dark with pain. ‘Not today or next week maybe, but soon. Just another native dyin',’ he added bitterly. ‘Most round here would say a good thing too.’

‘I don’t. Or the Professor.’

He looked at her consideringly. ‘No. Ye don’t, do ye? I’d best get goin',’ he added. ‘Sooner I get these to the butcher the sooner I can get back to Ma. Can you tell the Professor why I ain’t helping him this week?’

Did he mean because he had been spat upon? Or because his mother was dying? Both, she supposed, each adding to a pain impossible to bear.

But you did bear things. Life went on.

‘Of course,’ she said quietly. ‘I wish I could go back with you. Help you look after your Ma. But the Puddlehams need me too.’

‘It’s all right. Me and Da, we manage.’

She stood on tiptoe and kissed his cheek impulsively. He blushed and rubbed the spot, but smiled.

‘Mrs Puddleham’d have pink kittens if she saw you do that.’

‘Let her,’ said Sam. ‘Take care, George. I’ll see you soon.’

‘You take care too. All this —’ his wave took in the marching diggers, the flag flying high on its pole ‘— it ain’t safe for a girl. If things get too bad you come out to the farm.’ He hesitated. ‘If you can’t reach the farm, get to Ma’s folk. They’re good people. They’ll keep you safe. An’ bring the Puddlehams and the Professor too.’

‘I don’t think they’ll come. But thank you, George.’ She held out her hand.

He pressed it briefly, then looked down at her as she smiled. ‘What you grinnin’ at?’

‘I almost forgot. Mrs Puddleham said she wants four forequarters of mutton. Seems funny, talking about mutton when there’re so many things that are much more important.’

‘Suppose food’s important too. I’ll get the butcher to bring ‘em. He owes me a favour. An’ you take care o’ yourself.’

He turned back towards the butcher’s shop. The sheep plodded along the road with him, unaware of the fate around the corner.

Like everyone here, thought Sam, as she turned to walk back to the waiting Mrs Puddleham. Everyone but me.

But at least, she thought, George would be safe back at the farm. Now she only had to keep the Puddlehams and the Professor away from the stockade when it was stormed by the soldiers.

The surprise was a bonnet. ‘I asked for the biggest, fanciest one in the whole of Melbourne town,’ said Mrs Puddleham, lifting it proudly out of its tissue paper so everyone in Wilson’s shop could see it.

‘It’s certainly … big,’ said Sam. The hat was made of fine creamy-coloured straw. But so much pink lace and so many ruffles had been added, as well as two bunches of pink ribbon on the side, that it was almost impossible to see the hat itself.

‘You like it, lovey?’ Mrs Puddleham’s face shone.

Sam smiled at her. ‘I’ve never ever seen a hat as wonderful.’ It was true too, she thought. It was a wonder that any hat could hold quite so much decoration.

Sam handed it back to the woman across the counter. She put it back in its hatbox and added the usual string around it to make a handle. ‘You’ll look like a queen in it,’ she said to Mrs Puddleham.