Ironbark (60 page)

‘I see a daughter born to you late in life. You live to a goodly age. But your husband—'

The pack of cards flew up in the air and scattered wildly across the floor. Shaken by the feeling of malevolence that swamped the room, Keziah forced herself to lie. ‘Just a gust of wind.'

Mary burst into tears. Keziah was confused. ‘Forgive me. You love your husband?'

‘Love him? He beats me when he's drunk. Every Friday, regular as clockwork.' She grasped Keziah's hand. ‘A child! Praise the Lord. You've given me something to live for!'

On her return to the
vardo
Keziah threw her arms around Jake.

‘We must leave right away! It's not safe here. Don't ask why, you'd never believe me.'

Jake compromised. ‘Tomorrow morning. That's a promise.'

‘At first light! We
must
leave this place!'

‘You have my word on it.'

He reached out to stroke her hair, but Keziah was in no mood to be gentled. She made love to him with abandon – something beyond passion drove her. When at last he had drained her fear from her and she lay spent in his arms, Jake shielded her with his body.

‘Don't be afraid, darlin',' he whispered. ‘No
mulo
can get past me.'

• • • 

At dawn Mary handed Jake fresh vegetables, dry goods and a piece of mutton wrapped in wet hessian sacking.

‘To tide your family over,' she said tactfully, then added, ‘Do you mind me asking? Are you one of them Gypsy families?'

Keziah stiffened. ‘I learned the Tarot from a wise old Romani.'

Jake added his charming lie. ‘Yeah. The nice old lady who sold me her wagon.'

Mary looked sage. ‘Gypsies have second sight. I'm sure it will happen like you said.' She waved her apron in farewell until they reached the end of the road.

As they drove past a line of haystacks, a young man in convict slops waved them goodbye.

Jake was curious. ‘You must have given Mary a bright future to lavish that food on us.'

‘I did,' she answered, trying to sound casual. ‘On her husband's death she'll have a daughter with that young convict we passed. And find true happiness for the first time in her life.'

Jake looked startled. ‘Jesus, Kez, you really let your imagination run wild.'

‘No. That is her destiny. I can't say
when
but it will happen.'

Jake was uncomfortably quiet for the next few miles. For once Keziah had no desire to comment on the world around them. She only half listened to the children's whispers. Mary's farm was now miles behind them and she was determined to block her fear of that man's evil face. Her greatest fear was what Jake would do if he knew Mary's husband was the man who'd tried to rape her.

They passed another remote homestead with a sign that read ‘Horses for Sale'.

‘One day you'll raise a line of champions,' Keziah said firmly. ‘It wouldn't surprise me if you bred them from that clever horse of Richard Rouse's that wins races at the Hawkesbury.'

Jake looked impressed. ‘Jorrocks? Jesus, that proves your psychic powers, Kez.'

‘Why's that?' she asked, suddenly suspicious.

‘Jorrocks is a bloody gelding!'

Keziah snapped, ‘Well I can't be clairvoyant
all
the time.'

Jake continued to snigger over Jorrocks, a sound so infectious that

Keziah finally joined him. It was a blessed moment of shared laughter that briefly quelled the fears she was trying to hold at bay.

• • • 

Their new camp site lay close to a crescent-shaped billabong that long ago Nature had isolated from the arm of a creek when floodwaters silted it up at either end. The sun was high as Jake took the kids off to teach them how to set an Aboriginal fish trap.

‘We won't be long, Kez. Put your feet up! I'll bring you a heap of fish for supper.'

But Keziah was restless. She couldn't shake the feeling that the aura of malevolence she had felt when reading Mary's cards had followed her here. She was so nervous she knocked over her last bucket of water. Breaking her promise to Jake never to wander off alone, she went to refill the bucket. At the billabong she knelt to cool her face and breast, halted by her reflection in the still water.

‘
Mi-duvel
, I beg you, don't take Jake from me. I can't live without him now.'

A gnat skimmed the water, rippling Keziah's image. When the water grew calm the reflection showed she was not alone. Behind her was a stranger on horseback with a hat pulled low over his eyes. His face was clean-shaven with a strong cleft chin, his voice soft.

‘The word is you tell fortunes. Just
one
of your gifts.' He rode closer, leaned over and touched her breast as he slid a sovereign down the front of her bodice. ‘There's more where that came from if you give me a fortune that pleases me.'

I know that voice!
The coin pressed against her skin, but she dared not risk exposing her breast by removing it. She fought down her panic. Jake and the children's voices had died away.

‘Lay one finger on me again and my husband will kill you!'

His voice was soft, derisive. ‘A Gypsy's husband is any man willing to cross her palm with silver. Let's do a little business, girl. You'll find me generous.'

‘You reckon?' Jake stood with his rifle aimed at the rider's heart. ‘Piss off right now if you want to live to see tomorrow's sunrise.'

Jake jerked his head in Keziah's direction. ‘This woman's
mine
. Go buy your own!'

‘I meant no harm. Sorry, lady, for my mistake.'

The stranger bowed to Keziah then backed his horse a safe distance before riding away. Jake kept the pistol trained on him until he was well out of sight. ‘You all right, Kez?'

Coldly she fed his words back to him. ‘
This woman's mine. Go buy your own!
I'll remind you that I am a Romani woman – not a cattle dog.'

Jake refused to apologise. ‘I'm well aware of that. Cattle dogs are trained to
obey
a man. Don't dare wander off, you hear? It only takes a man seconds to ravage a woman.'

She flinched. Jake tried to soften his warning.

‘I don't blame any man simply for offering to pay a woman. There ain't enough girls to go around in the colony, but if any man took a woman by force, I'd shoot him down like a mad dog. Understand me?'

The heat of the day was upon them, but Keziah shivered at the threat in his voice.

‘Do you know him?' she asked carefully.

‘No idea. I wouldn't forget that cleft chin of his.'

Keziah sensed he was lying, but when Jake asked, ‘Have
you
ever seen him before?' she only gave him half the truth. ‘I saw his face in Mary's cards.'

• • • 

Later that night Keziah studied Jake across the campfire as he cleaned the gun. A storm had been fermenting since the blood-red sun had disappeared behind the hills. There was a misty ring around the moon. Tomorrow would bring rain. And what else?

When the children were out of earshot she whispered, ‘I really
thought you were going to kill that man today.'

He looked her straight in the eye. ‘Should have. When I had the chance.'

Keziah had a vivid flash of the symbols in her recurring nightmare. Blood, rope, fire, Jake's face behind prison bars. She must do her damnedest to distract him.

She whispered to the children and sent them racing inside the
vardo
. They returned giggling, Pearl wearing Keziah's petticoat as a dress, a Romani scarf around her head. Gabriel was half covered by Jake's hat and waistcoat as he strutted in a parody of Jake's Currency swagger.

Gabriel launched into a pitch-perfect rendition of
The Wild Colonial Boy,
accompanied by Pearl on a gumleaf whistle. Jake applauded their performance and demanded an encore.

Then it was Keziah's turn. Gabriel played for her. As she danced for Jake she used music, vitality and laughter to blot out her fears of the future. It was more than a dance of seduction for Jake. She made him smile when she proudly flaunted the curve of her growing belly, knowing full well this did not detract from his admiration.

Wild and untamed she was carried along by the power of her Romani music, ready to dance all night, but Jake quietly took over. He tucked the children up in their bunks then slipped his arm around Keziah's waist and shepherded her gently but firmly to his swag beneath the stars.

‘Past your bedtime, Kez. Got a long way to travel tomorrow.'

She lay with her head on Jake's chest, smiling dreamily at the stars.

As she drifted off to sleep she murmured, ‘Thank you for giving me your Milky Way, Jake. I can never repay you.'

‘Think nothing of it, love.'

• • • 

The sound of galloping horses woke her. Keziah froze when she saw the hated blue uniforms of four mounted police, their brass buttons
gleaming in the sun. They were heading straight for the campfire where Jake was brewing tea.

The young sergeant in charge confronted Jake in a crisp English accent, ‘You be Jakob Isaac Andersen?'

‘Yeah. Who's asking?'

‘Under the authority vested in me by His Excellency Governor Gipps, I am arresting you, Jakob Andersen, on suspicion of aiding and giving succour to bushrangers.'

‘Jesus wept,' said Jake. ‘You're joking. We haven't seen a soul in weeks.'

‘You will accompany me to Berrima Gaol where you will await your trial.'

‘Like hell I will!' Jake stood his ground, his fists clenched at his sides. ‘I'll not run out on my woman and kids.'

A trooper began to fix the bayonet in his Brown Bess musket. Keziah screamed out Jake's name as she ran towards three troopers who were struggling to manacle him. The children hammered their fists at the troopers' legs. When Pearl bit her teeth into the sergeant's leg, his reflex wallop sent her flying.

Jake went berserk. ‘Leave my daughter alone, you rotten mongrel!'

It took all four troopers to wrestle Jake to the ground. They punched his face and gut, finally manacled him, then roped his body to a lead, forcing him to run behind their horses.

Jake yelled over his shoulder. ‘I promise you, Keziah. I'll come back to you!'

His last desperate words caused him to stumble and Keziah's last sight of him was his body being dragged along behind the galloping horses.

When the children screamed in terror, Keziah held them tight in her arms.

‘You want to help Papa? Then help
me
. We need to pull together!' They flew into action just as the storm broke and rain began to fall.
They raced around in the downpour, slithering in the mud as they threw everything inside the wagon. Keziah harnessed Horatio and looped the other horses' reins in place. In the driver's seat she cracked the whip in the air although Horatio didn't need it.

Rain plastered her hair to her face and obscured her vision. She had no map, no idea where she was going, but she prayed for
baxt
to lead her.

A few moments later, she halted at a fork in the road. An uprooted tree had knocked the signpost off its axis. Both tracks looked the same.

God of my ancestors. Which road leads to Jake?

Blinded by sheets of rain and icy wind, Keziah was so disoriented she did not realise she had taken the wrong road until the black outline of Bran's forge leapt out of the chaos of the storm.
Baxt
had delivered her into the hands of a friend.

The gentle giant was crouched by the fireplace heaping logs on a roaring fire. He stared open-mouthed at her dishevelled figure in the doorway. Drenched by the storm, Saranna's blue cloak weighed heavily on Keziah's shoulders.

‘Help me, Bran! Jake's been taken by the traps to Berrima Gaol!'

The blacksmith effortlessly lifted up a child in each arm, carried them inside to the fire and wrapped them up in blankets.

Keziah was stunned by the figure that appeared from an adjoining room. Daniel.

‘What on earth's wrong, Keziah?'

Trying to suppress her agitation in the children's presence she kept her tone muted as she recounted the day's events to Daniel. ‘I don't know if the charges against Jake are true or even who laid them. It smells like the work of Gilbert Evans. Jake has already done time. As a second offender it could mean Norfolk Island.'

Daniel went pale. ‘I'll take you and the children to Berrima. We'll leave at dawn and fight this with everything we've got. Joseph Bloom's bound to help us.'

Keziah shook her head in confusion. ‘There isn't time! He's in Sydney Town in his new legal practice. You know how they rush through these local trials. I was going to seek help from Dr Ross but I took the wrong road.'

‘You were meant to find me instead. You know you can count on me, Keziah. I failed you as a husband, but I'm Jake's friend. I won't fail him.'

Keziah noted his frown when he saw the curve of her belly. ‘Yes, Daniel. I
am
.'

Daniel took her in his arms protectively like a big brother.

‘Don't cry,' he said. But Keziah knew she was beyond tears.

• • • 

When Keziah and Daniel drove into Berrima village Keziah looked across at the huge new sandstone complex that dominated the main street. Behind the high stone walls the gaol buildings were designed to house three hundred prisoners. On the other side of a laneway stood a massive stone courthouse with a columned façade that looked like a Roman temple. The buildings were grand and forbidding, as if to enforce the system for eternity.

Red, white and blue bunting was draped outside the nearby Surveyor-General's Inn and other buildings in the main street. Keziah felt confused. ‘It isn't the Queen's birthday yet, is it?'