Benworden (3 page)

3

T
HE
C
LUB

It was 9.27pm and I had almost forgotten about the meeting I was supposed to attend with Josh at 9.30. I raced up the stairs and down the end of the corridor and stood outside his door until I regained my breath, then knocked. Josh opened the door and asked me in.

I said to him, “I thought there was going to be others here.”

Josh smiled and said, “There won't be others here, but there will be at the meeting. But before we go anywhere I have to ask you if you would be interested in joining a club?”

I asked him, “What sort of a club?”

He paused for a moment as if he was trying to think of a way to say what he needed to say and then said, “A very secret club − one with two members from each of the years at school, from year 7 to year 12.”

Being the new kid on the block and not knowing many people, this sounded great to me . I thought I'd be stupid if I didn't snap up this opportunity. So I said, “What do I need to do to become a member?”

Josh replied, “As silly as this sounds I need to know an embarrassing secret about you that no one else knows and then I can be sure if ever you leave the club our secret will never be revealed.”

I reluctantly agreed, thought about it for a while, then told him my secret. He smiled and said, “Come with me.”

He slid back the wardrobe door and felt around inside until there was a loud click. The back wall of the wardrobe opened up into a compartment which he asked me to get into. He then showed me how to pull on the rope that ran through the centre of it which he said would take me to the club rooms below and that once I was there he would follow me down. This made sense because there wasn't enough room in the compartment for two.

My heart was absolutely racing and now that I think back I still can't believe I was so naive to trust this guy without question.

The compartment came to a halt, the door opened and I found myself in a cave with shadows dancing across the walls from the flickering candle light. The candles were sitting in timber fruit crates which were stacked up on the rear wall and used as a very large bookcase.

As I climbed out of the small elevator I was warmly welcomed by a group of male and female students who ranged in age and height − they made me feel like a superstar! Josh arrived shortly after and by then I had met everyone else in the group. This was my first introduction to the Bull Ants Club – and I'll never forget it.

On Josh's arrival a meeting was called. A girl with a slight Irish accent named Geraldine, who was also a new year 7, and I were asked to go through an initiation ceremony which consisted of swearing an allegiance to the Bull Ants Club and its members. Once it was over we were presented with the same ring that caught my eye when I first met Josh.

Josh asked Geraldine and me to step forward and said, “This is an honour bestowed upon very few students and if you are to accept this ring you are required to make a declaration of
your loyalty to the Bull Ants Club. Are you prepared to make this declaration?”

Both Geraldine and I answered at the same time, “Yes, I am.”

Then Josh asked us to place our hands on our hearts and repeat after him: “I will uphold the rules and regulations of this club. I will never reveal the secrets of the Bull Ants to anyone unless instructed to by my leaders. I will remain true to my word and obey the requests of my leaders no matter what those requests may be. To this vow I'll be true.”

Once we had repeated everything Josh asked us to hold out our hand and he placed the rings on our fingers. All the club members arched both arms and hit their fists together to give the impression of Bull Ant nippers and cried out, “Hoo, hoo, hoo!”

Josh then declared us members of the Bull Ants Club.

After the ceremony we all sat in a circle on old wooden fruit crates and Josh pulled a large book from one of the fruit boxes and began to read us the history of the Bull Ants and the story of the founding members. I couldn't believe how fortunate I had been to be selected and I couldn't believe how incredible their club rooms were but what I didn't realise was that the best was yet to come.

All the members were silent as Josh began to tell the story of the Bull Ants' beginnings:

“Many years prior to our arrival at Benworden there was a year 9 student named Tim Tovey who enjoyed hiking and exploring. His parents had always encouraged his will to explore and had given the headmaster and the head of boarding permission to allow him to do it one Saturday a fortnight on
the proviso he was back at the boarding house before dark.

“One weekend Tim had been out on one of his adventures and, like always, had with him his handy backpack with an array of goodies neatly stacked away inside. These items included his trusty Swiss army pocket knife, compass, pen and note book, matches, a torch and spare batteries, a can of beans, a small first aid kit, magnifying glass, strong rope, tea and sugar, and a billy which was tied to the outside of his bag.

“He had left right on sunrise and was about a kilometre from the boarding house when he saw a bird fly from a bush at the base of a hill. Thinking that there might be a nest in the bush Tim went to investigate. While clumsily working his way into the dense bushy surround he stumbled and grabbed hold of a branch which broke, unveiling a hollow in the hill side behind the bush. Tim could see that there was just enough room to squeeze beneath the tree and into the hollow and, being the explorer he was, he wasn't about to pass up this adventure into the unknown. He took his backpack off and could feel his senses tingling as he slithered like a snake below the branch and into the cave. He then reached back under the branch and pulled his backpack through.

‘“Tim could now get to his knees but no higher and as he opened his backpack his imagination began to swell with excitement, ‘Better get out the old trusty blade, compass and torch,' he said to himself as he reached into his backpack. ‘Never know what I might encounter down here.'

“Tim weighed up the situation by putting his flashlight through the opening and was astounded to see that this had been an old mine shaft that had had a cave-in at the very front of it. He could also see scratch marks where an animal (possibly a wombat), looking for a home, had burrowed through and the
weather had taken over to erode it further. Whatever the case there was an adventure to be had here and nothing was going to stop him now.

“Once Tim had manoeuvred his way through the entrance he was able to stand and begin to explore the tunnel further and not far up the tunnel he came to an upright beam where four kerosene lanterns and a pair of overalls hung from large rusty nails. At the base of the beam lay a pair of very old boots alongside a stylish pair of shoes that would have been worn back in the time of the gold rush. Once the dust was removed it was easy to see the formal shoes had been well looked after and Tim felt a chill go up his spine as he began to wonder what had happened here. It was no longer looking to him like an abandoned mine − it was more like something weird had taken place and whoever had been here had just vanished, leaving everything behind. If only Tim knew the meaning of this find and how it would connect with what we were to discover later.

“Although Tim was feeling a little jittery he convinced himself to push on as any good adventurer would, but each time he disturbed a colony of bats or saw an enlarged shadow cast onto the mine walls by the light of his torch, he would again feel that sense of insecurity. After a while he found himself back in adventure mode and was amazed by the simple yet ingenious methods that the old miners had used to keep the roof from collapsing on top of them. He was in awe of those that had dug and carted away truckloads of dirt, and had cut timber the size of half-grown trees and hoisted them to the top of the mine as a support for longer slender poles that would follow the path down to the next cross beam.

“Tim came across a damp section of the mine and the air smelt like rotting leaves. Looking up ahead he could barely
make out whether there was a tepee like structure or whether there'd been a collapse and some beams had fallen from the ceiling of the mine. He also noticed that the floor of the tunnel had become extremely dark towards the centre. He decided to slow down and take his expedition more cautiously.

“Once he had reached the structure he could see it was similar in shape to the old fashioned wishing well. Coiled around the cross bar was a rope that dangled down through a hole in the mine's dirt floor and possibly into another tunnel below. Tim's curiosity got the better of him and he began to crank the handle to elevate whatever was attached to the end of the rope, if anything at all, and he eventually hauled up an old hessian bag. He realised there must have been two people that operated the mine; they would have taken it in turns of going down the hole and the one below would send up the excavated dirt − or perhaps gold − while the other would hoist it up from above. Tim manoeuvred his way around the pit and continued on.

“Checking his compass along the way he couldn't believe the direction the path was heading. It was going directly to Benworden. He had been walking for quite a while now and thought he should head back soon and perhaps return on a day when he had more time, but just at that moment he noticed a flickering light in the distance, similar to what you would see when the sun passes through the crack in a wall of the inside of an old shed. He was now caught in two minds: it was getting late and he needed to get back but on the other hand he would have to wait two weeks before he could come back and find out where the light was coming from. He knew he couldn't leave; he had to push on and find the source of the light.

“Tim had no idea just how far away the light was and he
walked for what seemed to be a lifetime, always remaining cautious in case other holes in the floor were hidden in the shadows.

“What was once like a minute flicker of light had now turned into glowing beams coming from overhead and on arrival he looked upwards to find them penetrating what seemed to be floorboards on the tunnel's ceiling. There was a large gap at one end of the floorboards and another large gap at the other but the boards were too high for him to reach. He remembered passing some spare beams a little way back down the tunnel and, less cautious of the path already travelled, he raced back down to fetch the longest beam he could find. It was heavy and he struggled, dragging it like a lion would a limp wildebeest, but eventually he had it below the floorboards. Reaching into his backpack he pulled out his rope and tied one end of it to the beam, whirled the other end of the rope like a lasso and flung it up through the crevice on one side of the boards, just missing his target which would see it drop through the crevice on the other side. After eight attempts he was exhausted but persisted, and on the ninth attempt the end of the rope plummeted down through the second crevice almost hitting him on the head.

“Tim heaved hard on the rope and the beam began to stand upright. Once in position, he tied the loose end of the rope to the beam as well and then climbed up it. Once he was at the top he stood securely on the end of the beam and he saw the old boards above him were only secured by a few nails here and there. So by hanging onto the rope with one hand and pushing upward on one of the boards with the other it began to make a loud creaking noise and then gave way. Once one was removed the rest followed without too much trouble, so it wasn't long before he was able to squeeze himself up and into the room above.

“Tim was now in an old abandoned shed, and once he had wiped the grime from a window and looked out at its surroundings he realised it was the old blacksmith's building and stables that are connected to the boarding house. Just to be sure he panned his flashlight around the darkened room and he could see the interior was filled with everything that a blacksmith would require such as an anvil, fireplace and bellows, which left no doubt in his mind of where he was.

“The original blacksmith's quarters and stable area had been padlocked and shuttered for years and the students had been warned of the dire consequences if they were to venture anywhere near it. If there hadn't been one shutter missing off the window that drew direct sunlight to that particular part of the floor, he would never have found his way in.

“Tim couldn't wait to tell his three most trusted friends, John Christianson, Fred Sharman and Dorothy McGee. He had known all three for as long as he could remember and their parents had been friends for years. Tim and his friends' parents were all farmers in the close knit town of Maryborough and they had formed a partnership to protect their farms being swallowed up by larger corporations which had been buying land in the area for different reasons. At the time that the partnership was created they all had young children, and as part of the deal a certain amount of money had been placed in a trust account for their children's education in the future; Benworden was always going to be their first preference once their kids had completed junior school.