Daughter of Australia (12 page)

T
he night sky domed from one end of the earth to the other as Ghan set up camp with the American in the emptiness between Woolgangie and Coolgardie. In the moonlight, the flat plain glowed ice blue, the few spindly trees silhouetted blacker than the sky beyond. Stars were not diamonds on this night, but solid orbs that hung as low as the horizon.

“Never seen a sky like this. Not ever in my life.” Owen Fairfield gazed with head tilted back, his palms held against the base of his spine while Ghan set the two tents. One lantern haloed the camp as he broke mulga scrub into the burning pyramid. There was no wind and the fire burned straight, sending white smoke toward the stars.

“What do we have for eats?” asked Mr. Fairfield as he rubbed his hands together.

“Same as last night.” Ghan dug through the canvas bag and pulled out a knife, a pot, a couple cans and jars. “Beans an' salt pork.”

“Start cooking, then. I'm starving.”

Ghan chuckled. “Can't believe yeh like this slop.”

“Man can only eat so much stinky cheese and goose liver, my friend.”

Ghan warmed with the reference. “Wait till we get to Lake Douglas. Fix yeh some brown trout an' crayfish. Roast it over the coals whole. Bet yeh ain't never tasted anything so good.”

“Mouth's watering already.” The man clapped his hands. “Got any coffee?”

“I'll probably burn it. Just warnin' yeh.”

“Blacker the better.” The man sat down on a half log that Ghan had set near the fire. “This is your life, isn't it, Ghan?”

Ghan sawed the tin can with his knife until bean juice splashed his fingers. “S'pose it is.”

“You're a dying breed.”

“I know.” He dumped the beans into the blackened pot.

“When you think we'll get to the Pilchard Mine?”

Ghan searched the sky for the North Star. “Day after next. Midafternoon.”

Fire licked the dry twigs, sent light flickering over their faces. An owl called out in the night, waited for an answer, called out again. The bush air was cool against their backs while sweat glistened body parts close to the flames. Mr. Fairfield raised his eyebrows mischievously. “I've been thinking about that story you told me about your boss: Mr. Matthews. About his wife gallivanting with the workers.” He shut one eye in focused thought. “You think Matthews knows what his wife's been doing?”

“Still tryin' t'figure that one out.” Ghan chuckled. “Don't know if he's just too stupid t'see it, or if he don't care. Missus ain't much t'look at, but still wouldn't want Earl's gums suckin' on my wife!”

Ghan put the pot on the fire and the flames sizzled yellow against the juices and hardened quickly against the sides. He picked up the slab of salt pork and sliced off chunks into the beans. The cooked salt and sugar tasted good even in the nose.

Ghan stirred the beans and ladled them onto two tin plates. He handed the scalding dish to Owen, who set it on the ground quickly. Then Ghan took the smaller, clean skillet and added the coffee grounds and poured water from the bag. “Have t'make it in the skillet,” he explained. “That's why it burns.”

Owen wasn't listening, his eyes thoughtful and dark, slit like a snake's. “I'm going to buy the Pilchard Mine.”

Ghan swallowed. The man was going to buy a mine. Just like that. Buy a bloody mine. Said the words as calm as if he were buying a pair of socks. “Owners are Swiss,” Ghan offered weakly. The words came out mumbled.

“What's that?” Owen leaned in.

Ghan was suddenly jittery. “Hardly ever in Australia, is all.”

“No matter. I'm in Switzerland frequently,” Owen said lightly.

“Whot if they won't sell?”

“They'll sell.” He met Ghan's eyes and they were cold, odd in his pleasant face. “I always play fair, at the beginning. I'll offer a fair price. The gold is gone and they know it. If they're smart, they'll sell at my first offer. But sometimes these guys get greedy. They'll smell the blood in the water and try to keep me from getting the meat that's hanging. I'm willing to entertain them for only so long and then I lose patience.”

“Then whot?” Ghan listened with tight muscles.

“Then,” Owen said as he picked up a fork of beans, “it gets ugly.” If a voice could be a color, his would be black. The tone was too much of a contrast to his easy banter and Ghan stirred the coffee briskly, the syrupy bubbles popping over the sides, the burnt smell of coffee filling the smoke. He took it off the fire to cool.

“Every man has a weakness, Ghan. Some have more than one. Purity is an angel's halo in a Rembrandt, not a man's life.”

Now that the food had cooled, Owen shoveled it in quickly between words. “If a man is being difficult, I find his weakness and exploit it.”
Scoop, chew.
“Sometimes it's gambling or drink.”
Scoop, chew.
“Sometimes it's women.”
Scoop, chew.
“Sometimes it's young boys.”

Owen Fairfield scraped his plate clean. “Seems the richer they are in money and power, the more degenerate the vice.” He pushed the plate away and took a cup of coffee. “I find the chink in the armor and use it—it's not pretty.” He looked sad for a moment, then triumphant. “When I'm done, they sell for a song and are grateful they got out alive with skin intact.”

Owen finished his coffee and spit out the grounds, wiping his thin white mustache with the back of his hand. “Every man's got a weakness, Ghan. Even you.”

Despite the scalding coffee, a chill raised the hairs on his arms. Old training turned tinges of fear to defense. He rubbed his wooden stump and insult rose. “Yeh talkin' 'bout my leg?”

“No, my friend. Rest easy. Your leg has nothing to do with it,” he answered easily, moving the conversation up and down like a wooden yo-yo.

“Work,” he said. “Work is your weakness. You need work like a man needs breath in his lungs. You got no family, no girl, nobody but yourself. You'd do any kind of work just to do it, just to keep breathing.” Owen stood, stretched to the sky, then took out his bedroll and laid it against the log for a pillow. “It's a noble weakness, Ghan, so don't take offense. Noble, but lonely.”

Ghan chewed on the words but not long enough to awaken anything deep. The American turned to him and said sleepily, “I like you. I could use a man like you in my corner. You're better than working for transport. You're loyal, honest. I'll remember that, Ghan. I will. Hell, maybe I'll bring you back to Pittsburgh with me.”

Ghan did not know praise and he tried not to let it tickle his stomach like a feather. But the praise tasted good and sparkled over the horizon. Praise didn't mean anything from a stupid man, but coming from a man like Owen Fairfield, it meant something. Ghan spit out his bitter coffee grounds, but the words still tasted good in his mouth and he grew bold. “Whot's yers?”

“My weakness?”

“Yeah.”

“My wife.” He gave a resigned laugh, closed his eyes to the stars. “Always has been.”

 

If the Bailen Mine was a village, the Pilchard Mine was a city. The town swelled around the pit, a wide-open sore in the land, descending in rings like a flat rock skipping upon water. Shacks, humpies and tents freckled the outskirts. Everything grew from the mine—the telegram and post office, the market store, two restaurants, a blacksmith, a livery stable. The mine paid the workers; the workers paid the businesses. The businesses were funded by the mine, so the money went right back to the deep pockets that started it all.

Two boardinghouses kept the drink. Pubs weren't allowed within the immediate miles of the mine. But drinking was a vice that could be contained, not eradicated, and the boardinghouses had their rooms in the basement with the cards and the drink. Ladies for hire were brought in every Wednesday by train.

The stores were open but traffic light. All the men were underground. The acrid air settled in the nostrils and the back of the throat. The metallic clang of the mine's poppet vibrated through the ground. Ghan's horses flared noses, their gait nervous.

“Drop me off at the main office!” Mr. Fairfield ordered.

Ghan followed the steel hammering. The smell of raw ore and rock thickened the air, made a man's teeth hurt. There was no beauty here. Gray-blue smoke eclipsed the sun. Hard dins made the chest thump in unison. No flowers. No birds. Only tools. Rusty metal. Men.

“I'll be here awhile.” Mr. Fairfield buttoned his white coat and Ghan stopped the wagon so he could get off. “Park the wagon on the main street,” he directed without looking back. The man was a sight walking into the office, strong and confident, nearly mean in intensity.

Ghan parked the wagon and stretched his leg, took off the peg, let it throb unrestricted. He didn't mind waiting. Waiting was easy as moving. A minute's a minute whether you're sitting or walking. He took out an apple and munched into the warm skin, each crisp bite cracking the sound of pounding metal in the air. Ghan figured the meeting would take most of the day.
Might as well rest a spell,
he thought lazily. Owen never said where they were headed next. Might need to drive all night. Ghan chucked the apple core to the dirt and climbed in the back of the wagon, rested his head against his swag and fell asleep to the mine's brittle lullaby.

Ghan woke with a dry mouth. A line of drool stuck to his whiskers. When he wiped his cheek he felt the indent left from the edge of the bedroll. He drank deeply from the water bag, tied on the wooden peg leg and pissed behind a tuart tree. He brushed the horses, filled the feedbags and waited against the wagon.

No sign of Mr. Fairfield, or anyone else for that matter. He looked toward the manager's office and smirked. “Give anything to be a fly on that wall,” he said out loud. Ghan scanned the storefronts. The boardinghouse looked decent, its full verandah screened. There were tables and chairs set up for the restaurant. He was getting hungry.

If the meeting went well, maybe Mr. Fairfield would want to celebrate, Ghan thought. Seemed like the kind of bloke who would. Maybe they'd spend the night.
How about that for a kid from the Sydney slums? Staying in a fancy hotel on an American's dime! Probably eat a steak in the dining room.
Of course, he'd be just as happy under the stars.
Then again,
he argued with himself,
fine living like this doesn't come around every day.

This rich American liked him and it felt good. He was getting used to it, didn't feel so odd anymore. Almost like the man thought he was smart, nearly treated him like an equal. Kind of a glow about it. Who knew where this could lead. Plenty of mines he could show the man. If he did it right, if he showed him the real story like he wanted, hell, he could pick his work. As mines went, Bailen was on the bottom rung. Pilchard would be good. Nice to be in town. He could work at Pilchard.
Hell, there's always Pittsburgh. Never had options before.
The faint smell of hope, sweet and foreign, tickled his slanted nose.

A young bloke came out the side door of the brick manager's office, jogged head down to the wagon, a grin on his lips like he was listening to an old joke. Ronnie Peters. Ghan met him a few times during transport. Snot-nosed office assistant trying to make his way up.

“G'day, Ghan.” The half boy, half man waved.

“G'day,” Ghan answered, shoving his hands into his pockets.

Ghan watched the boy's face for clues from the meeting, but Ronnie just scratched his head, widened that shit-eating smirk. “Damn, that bloke got stories!”

“Been travelin' wiv him awhile.” Ghan nodded, proud in familiarity. “He's full of 'em.”

Ronnie reached an arm over the side of the wagon and hefted out a bag, set it on the ground before reaching in for the big leather satchel.

“Whoa,” Ghan warned. “Those belong to Fairfield.”

“I know.” Ronnie pulled the heavy bag to the ground and reached for the next. “Told me to bring 'em in.” He grabbed the last one, placed it on the pile, then slapped Ghan on the shoulder. “Yer free t'go, mate.”

The kid's voice waffled between insult and stupidity. Ghan leaned back into the wood of the wagon, crossed his arms at his chest. “Naw. Gotta wait 'ere for Mr. Fairfield.”

Ronnie cocked his head. “Yer done, mate. He told me t'send yeh on yer way.”

Ghan spit on the ground and grinned at the kid. “Must of heard wrong. Got another week on the road at least. Probably just wants t'stay in town for the night.”

“Yeh his mother now? Heard him just fine.” Ronnie scowled. “He's in there smokin' cigars an' sippin' scotch. He says, ‘I'm not moving any more north. When a man sees what he likes, he doesn't go any farther. ' ” The boy's American accent was piss-poor.

Ronnie beamed. “Naw, I heard every word. Bloke talked t'me like a mate. ‘Ronnie, my boy!' he says. ‘Bring me my bags and send that poor man home!' Then he says, ‘I swear if I sit on that rickety wagon one more minute my nuts gonna crack like a walnut!' ” Ronnie laughed hard at this, rubbed a palm over his eyeball, then picked up the bags, strained under the weight.

Ghan swallowed something rough and jagged in his throat. A tightness crimped his belly.
Poor man.
That's what he called him.
Send that poor man home!
Heat inched from the tightness and flushed into his face and he shrank against the wagon. “He say anything else?”

Ronnie thought for a minute, shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “Oh yeah, said yer ear givin' him the bloody creeps!” He hoisted up the bags. “Christ, cover that thing up, mate. Gives everybody the bloody creeps.”