Wild Lands (40 page)

‘I've been wanting to do that for a while,' Adam grinned. ‘Come.' Taking her hand they moved to the door. Sunlight slid into the room as he peered outside. ‘Do you want me to tie you up to make it look like an escape?'

Kate shook her head. Her thoughts were spinning, whether from the bash she'd sustained or his attentions she couldn't be sure.

He lingered a moment. ‘I must find Jardi.'

‘And then?' The question was tinged with expectation. She wished she'd said nothing.

‘You understand that I have nothing to offer you, Kate Carter?'

She nodded, but she didn't, not really. They barely knew each other and yet a sense of loss was already spreading within her. ‘I …' What could she say? That she missed him already, although they stood so close as to suggest indecency. Was it possible that
a liking for a person could form so quickly or was it because Adam had shown her kindness and saved her life in a wild, lonely land?

The door swung open and a grey-bearded man lifted his musket. Adam knocked the weapon from his grip and, punching the sentry in the face, caught him as he fell. Dragging the unconscious man indoors, he took the musket and ammunition and closed the door quietly. ‘You go first,' Adam suggested as they followed the curved wall of the smokehouse. ‘Head straight for the house.'

Kate hesitated. ‘But what will you do? Where will you run to?'

‘Go,' he urged. ‘There'll only be trouble if you're caught with me, you know that.'

Reluctantly Kate moved clear of the stone wall, intending to walk directly back towards the homestead, but two of Nettie's children, the girls who'd been washing, were approaching from the far side of the house to sit on the verandah, and they had seen not only Kate but her companion as well. The taller of the two, undoubtedly Joanna, pointed an accusing finger at Kate, while the younger yelled for their mother.

‘I should have tied you up,' Adam complained. Taking Kate by the hand, they ran towards the stables.

Kate stumbled after him. She sensed movement to her left. Jardi was running towards them.

‘You're injured?' Adam cried as they weaved through the vines.

‘My foot, I can't run,' Kate gasped. Her head pounded with the movement.

‘White brother?' Jardi yelled. He too ran towards the stables.

A pot was being banged with something metallic and the warning clang was loud and clear.

‘Where have you been?' Adam complained, though he slapped Jardi on the arm in greeting.

‘Not talking with pretty girls,' Jardi chided. ‘I've been crawling through the grass since daylight.'

The yarded horses inside the stables grew restless as they ran into the oblong building.

‘Load this for me.'

Kate took the stolen musket Adam handed her and, loading it, rammed the shot down hard before adding the powder. Jardi threw Adam a bridle from a selection hanging from hooks on the wall and he fitted one to a horse. There was no time for a saddle and Adam sprang onto the animal bareback, pulling Jardi up behind him.

‘Come,' Jardi pressed, ‘we have to leave.'

‘Kate.' Adam held out his hand for the firearm. The Major, Mr Stewart and another man were riding hard towards the stables. ‘Kate, give me the musket, lass, now.'

But she didn't. Instead Kate stepped away from the two men doubling on the bay mare. What if Adam was a murderer? she mused. What if the kiss had been a ploy to trick her and James was right and she was wrong and Adam really was a criminal? A woman simply couldn't trust men, not in this world. Besides, if Adam was guilty then she too would be punished for helping him to get away. And yet … doubt gnawed at Kate. She could still feel his mouth on hers.

A low cloud of dust preceded the approaching men as they drew hard on the reins to halt abruptly at the entrance to the stables. The Major dismounted immediately.

Mr Stewart cocked his musket and pointed it from where he sat on his horse. ‘Get down off that horse of mine or I'll blow your head off, son.'

Adam glanced at Kate, his eyes dark with disappointment. He slid from the horse in one fluid movement, Jardi followed suit.

Mr Stewart called out to the eight or so convicts and freed men who came running in from varying directions, informing them to go about their tasks and to be quick about it. These men loitered about before slowly peeling off one by one when it appeared that the action was over.

‘You should just hang him here, Major.' Mr Stewart tilted his head towards the single beam that ran the length of the stables. ‘Save everybody a heap of trouble. And what about you, lass? Were you staying or going?' he asked. The meaning was clear.

‘Are you alright, Kate?' James asked.

‘Yes, yes, I'm fine.' She lowered the musket.

‘It seems to me that you were about to put yourself on the wrong side of the law.' A deep line etched its way across Mr Stewart's forehead as he addressed Kate. ‘And what on earth do we do with the black?' he continued. ‘Hanging a murderer's one thing, but …'

The Major lifted his own weapon, levelling it at Jardi. ‘He's just helped a murderer escape. The two of them can go back in the smokehouse and they can both stand trial for their crimes.'

‘Well, it's of no concern to me, and the law must come first, of course.' Mr Stewart sniffed.

‘The law?' Kate spat the word out. ‘What law, sir? You who sit there passing judgement will soon ride out to steal what sheep are left of the Hardys' flock, while their overseer clings to life under your care quite unaware of your deceit.'

‘That is quite enough, Kate,' the Major ordered. ‘You are overwrought and should return to the house immediately.'

‘No, it is
not
enough. It is by far
not
enough. I have witnessed more hardship, more fighting, and more death than a person should during a lifetime and you, James, you who saw this man save my life, twice no less, and who guided us to this very farm, remain intent on fulfilling your obligation to Queen and Country out here.' Kate gestured around them. ‘Out
here
,' she repeated. ‘Do you not see where we are? Do you not know the difference between good and evil? Is it not hard enough for all to survive out here that you must then turn on those who have done you service? You have no real proof as to this man's identity other than similarities and supposition, and yet you would forget all that he has done in order to do your “duty”. It is a poor man who thinks so highly of his
office, of himself, that he cannot see the difference between right and wrong.'

‘I will forget that you have spoken to me in this manner, Kate. It is clear that you have become enamoured with this man and have lost sight of reason.'

Kate frowned. ‘And in hindsight I was wrong to think highly of you,' she retaliated.

‘Kate,' Adam's voice was tight, ‘enough. The Major has his duty to do, as is his right.'

Very slowly Kate lifted the musket, the barrel wavered slightly from left to right as she cocked the weapon and pointed it, at Adam.

‘Kate, this is not the way,' James told her. ‘Please, put the musket down and leave us. This is men's business.'

Mr Stewart laughed. ‘Let her pull the trigger, Major, then the task will be done and we can go about our business.'

Adam looked down the length of the barrel. Kate gave him the softest of smiles.

‘I am sorry.' Pivoting on her injured foot, Kate pointed the barrel at James and Mr Stewart. The men paled with disbelief.

‘Think what you're doing, Kate,' James pleaded. ‘You are choosing a criminal over justice, the civilised over the uncivilised world.'

‘For a long time now the two have been blurred to me.' Kate held the musket straight and tight. Her finger rested lightly on the trigger, her breath stilled.

Adam and Jardi were quick to disarm the men. They took one horse only, hit the others on the rump so that they galloped off into the scrub and readied to leave. Adam stood before Kate, aware of the observant ears and sight of the men who, under Jardi's instructions, were now removing their boots. Turning his hand over, Adam showed Kate the mark on his palm where she'd bit him the night they'd sought cover in the burial ground.

‘It is a deep wound,' he told her, ‘and may never heal.'

Kate traced the injury with a fingertip. ‘I cannot stay in this place,' she whispered.

‘The Major will not take lightly to your interference.'

‘I know,' Kate replied.

Jardi was busy tying the men, back-to-back, with rope.

‘I will come for you, Kate Carter. At the next full moon. If I see you walking around the yard without that fancy tartan wrap then I'll know that you are ready, and I will come.'

Kate dropped the musket on the ground as they rode away.

Two months later
1838 September – the Stewart farm

George Southerland limped into the parlour. On seeing him, Kate dropped the hem of the skirt she'd been stitching and rose. The overseer had been bedridden for two months and she'd been forbidden to visit him while he convalesced. But the wiry Englishman was made of stouter stuff than most and now managed to walk with the aid of a sturdy branch.

‘Mr Southerland, I'm so glad to see you. They would not let me visit you.' The man looked pale and his clothes hung from him but Kate was pleased to see a friendly face. ‘Are you fully recovered?'

‘When my leg regains its strength.' He sat on the opposite end of the long sofa, resting the stick against a leg. The room was pleasantly but sparsely furnished with a polished wooden table and a number of carved chairs placed about the room. Kate knew the area intimately having recently been given the task of sewing hangings for the window. In fact the room, like the rest of the homestead, had become somewhat of a gaol since Adam's escape.

‘It's time you called me George.' His beard was thicker and longer than Kate remembered. ‘I can't say whether you did the right thing or not, Kate, but I admire your spirit.'

‘So, you know the worst of what I have done.' Kate wondered what Mr Southerland would think of her actions; strangely, his good opinion was important to her. Biting the sewing thread with her teeth, Kate placed the cotton reel in a basket and folded the skirt. ‘My deed was far from appreciated. They feed me and house me and I work in return but there is no friendship here.' She looked about the room. ‘This is a fine house, with a fine family under its roof, and I have no doubt that Mr Stewart is a capable manager. But for all Nettie's talk of this being a new world with new rules, they have brought the old ones with them like a well-travelled sea-chest.'

‘They are afraid,' George replied. ‘Scared of where they live, of who they share the land with, afraid of its lawlessness, of the blacks, of the isolation, the hardships. You cannot blame them for clinging to the old ways, Kate. They have moved here carrying their dreams and hopes with them. You and I, we bring nothing but grit and determination. We have nothing and so we have nothing to lose.'

‘You are right, of course. I hadn't thought of things that way, but I still can't agree with their beliefs.' And it was true that whether Kate believed her actions were right or not she had gone against the law and set Adam and Jardi free, and the Major still chased them. ‘James continues to search for them, you know. He returns here every few days, as I'm sure you are aware, but he must leave very soon to rejoin his regiment.'

The overseer leant back into the couch. ‘And you? Will you journey with him?'

Kate tucked a strand of hair behind an ear. The injury to her head was healed, but the wooden club had left a reddish bump.

‘He would still take you as his wife,' Mr Southerland told her.

‘Please don't tell me that you have come here to act as his broker
in the matter.' She began to tidy the reels of cotton in the round basket, standing the spools on their ends and ensuring that the needles were safely back inside the thick card folder.

George gave a slight cough and stretched out his wounded leg, his eyes narrowing with the effort. ‘Hardly. I only know by what he doesn't say that his interest is still there.'

Kate sat the lid on the box and placed it beside her on the sofa. ‘Interest? That is not enough for a marriage.'

‘After all you have been through, Kate Carter,' George shook his head, ‘and still you bridle against the accepted standards of society. I would marry you myself if I were so inclined but I fear you would be like a headstrong racehorse, difficult to break in and impossible to control.'

Kate laughed. ‘Well, we will never know, for I am not the marrying kind. Best you tell the Major that, lest he pine away.' She shook out the skirt and then refolded the material. Kate was flattered by the Major's interest, particularly after everything that had transpired, but if she ever had fancied him it had been the briefest of thoughts in a moment of need.

‘You are a hard woman.' George stood awkwardly, leaning heavily on the stick. ‘I can't sit or stand for long and the Stewarts don't offer enough rum to help with the pain, but I come with news for you.'

‘Good, I hope?'

He began to walk slowly across the room, the foot of his injured leg dragging along the floorboards. ‘With the wages due to you, I imagine you'd be able to set yourself up back in Syd-e-ney.'

‘Wages? How? No sheep have been brought in to my knowledge.'

‘James tells me that he solicited Mr Stewart to ensure that those sheep remaining from the Hardys would be mustered, counted and eventually shorn. There are six hundred currently being walked back to this run.'

Kate thought of the coin due her and clapped her hands together, before slowly dropping them to her sides.

George stroked his beard, which was longer and greyer since his injury. ‘Whatever is the matter, Kate?'

She waved away his concern. ‘Nothing.' In his own way Major James Shaw was an honourable man.

‘That's the reason why James returns every few days, to ensure the Hardys are not stolen from in death as their lives were stolen from them. Sarah Hardy's sons are in England. They should benefit from what is left of the estate, after the labour has been duly paid of course,' George said. ‘What will you do with the monies owed you?'

‘I'd once thought of a school,' Kate answered dreamily, ‘my own school. Must I go back to Sydney with the Major as he wishes?' Kate grew anxious. ‘Could I not stay here until after the Hardys' sheep are shorn and travel with you when the wool goes to market?'

The Englishman rubbed at his leg and grimaced. ‘I don't see why not, but it will be another month before we leave. And you must make your peace with James and tell him that you have no interest. Think on it, Kate. His offer of marriage should not be thrown away lightly.'

‘I know, and I am not ungrateful.'

George looked out the window to where cattle grazed in the hills. ‘If you turn him down, Kate, make sure it's for the right reason. He won't come back,' he finished pointedly.

‘I know that.'

George turned towards her, the walking stick scraping on the floorboards. ‘I don't mean James, Kate, I'm talking of Bronzewing. No matter your opinion, no matter how you feel, he cannot. Bronzewing will forever be on the run from the law.'

‘I don't know what you mean.' Kate gathered the skirt and sewing basket in her hands as George crossed the room and made to leave.

‘I have seen you outside looking to the land beyond.'

Kate stiffened. ‘As we all do.'

He merely nodded. ‘Every night? When the moon is full? You have been through much, Kate, think hard about your future.'

When he'd left her alone, Kate wandered absently about the room, dragging a hand along the back of the sofa, across the chairs, until she returned to the spot where she found herself every day. Before the window, waiting.

Kate had done as Adam said. She had spent the days and the early evening of the full moon outside, without the plaid wrap, but he had not come. And now another month had come and gone. Another full moon. And still she had waited and once again there had been no sign of him. Kate now knew that Adam wasn't coming. That she couldn't expect him to. What man would risk death for a woman? Hers was an infatuation, a daydream. One born of danger and loneliness, one that couldn't come true. How would they live, how would they survive? If the truth be told Kate hated this wild place she'd come to and as a child she'd been determined to grow old with only cats for company. Now she didn't want that at all. A month, George had told her. A month and then they would head south with the wool clip. One more full moon.