Shadow of the Osprey (2 page)

David felt uneasy. Mort had capitulated too quickly.

Macalister frowned. He was becoming aware that all was not well between the young owner of the
Osprey
and her captain. ‘Mister Macintosh, I think you and I could talk over a cup of tea and some fresh scones,’ he said cheerfully.

David was surprised at the hospitable invitation. Such a custom was so far divorced from anything he expected here. ‘My wife was just making a batch when your boats landed,’ the missionary continued brightly. ‘She is a fine Christian woman. And a God-sent cook.’

As the two men walked together along the beach Macalister pondered on David Macintosh, concluding that the young man spoke with obvious sincerity. It was a queer situation to almost like the owner of a notorious blackbirding ship.

Anne Macalister was just a little flustered meeting the handsome young man her husband had unexpectedly brought to their hut. As for David, the years in the islands clearly had taken a toll on Missus Macalister’s health, and he could see that she had a touch of the fever although she was cheerful and uncomplaining. She was near forty he guessed, and wore a neck-to-ankle dress that must have been uncomfortable in the tropical heat. Even shorter than her husband, David guessed that her quiet courage was equal to that of the little missionary himself.

‘I must apologise for the scones Mister Macintosh,’ Anne Macalister said, brushing away a spot of flour from her cheek. ‘But we are away from our usual home on Aneityum and I am not used to this oven.’

David was quick to heap elaborate praise on the scones which he found not only delicious but a pleasant change from the monotonous fare aboard the
Osprey
. Many times he had regretted not taking his mother’s advice to take his own hampers. But he had somewhat foolishly insisted that he should experience life aboard one of the Macintosh ships in the same style as the crew.

John Macalister poured the steaming tea into mugs and led David outside the hut. They perched themselves on a driftwood log, smooth and white, like the ghost of a long-dead tree.

‘You know your ships bring death to the islands Mister Macintosh,’ Macalister said, without any polite preamble. ‘I suspect your captain will be trading muskets for recruits right now. I only hope that you will intervene and forbid the trade.’

‘I promised you I would not take any of your islanders away from here,’ David replied sincerely. ‘And that promise stands.’

The missionary had to be wrong, David thought naively. Mort would never dare put himself in a position to give him the excuse to have him relieved of his command of the
Osprey.

A cloud of doubt fell across the missionary’s face. He did not doubt David’s sincerity – only his lack of perceptiveness about his captain. ‘Tiwi intends to attack the other islands for heads,’ he said quietly as he stared out to sea. ‘He has this pagan idea that they are needed to appease his gods. They are children of Satan, Tiwi and his people. Missus Macalister and I have the mission to bring them into the light.’

‘You are doing fine work bringing God’s word to these poor people. But do you not feel that you might be disrupting a way of life that seems to have survived all these years without Christianity?’ David asked politely.

‘Survived, yes. But it has been a playground for Satan. Sir, I could tell you things about these people that you could never repeat in genteel company lest it caused embarrassment to good Christian men and women. They . . . ’ The sight of a young islander hurrying along the beach distracted Macalister. ‘Ahh! I see Josiah has something on his mind.’

David could see that Josiah was obviously one of Macalister’s converts, the young islander wore European clothes. ‘Mister Macintosh. This is Josiah,’ Macalister said, turning to David with a note of pride in his voice. ‘He is from Aneityum and is helping us spread the word of God among Chief Tiwi’s people.’

Josiah smiled shyly and held out his hand. His grip was strong and forthright. A fine-looking man with white flashing teeth when he smiled, David guessed him to be in his mid-twenties. ‘Mister Macintosh has promised us his ship will be leaving without any recruits,’ Macalister said to Josiah. ‘Or giving Tiwi any muskets.’

Josiah ceased smiling. He bent forward to whisper something in the Scot’s ear. Macalister paled and sprang to his feet spilling his tea. ‘Mister Macintosh, I fear I was right,’ Macalister growled. ‘Captain Mort has just traded nine muskets. But Josiah is mystified as to what your captain has traded them for as it appears that it is not for recruits as I would have presumed. I think you and I should get back to speak to your captain immediately.’

David followed Macalister along the beach at a fast pace but came to an abrupt halt when he saw the
Osprey
’s longboats being rowed away from the shore. Mort was visible in the stern of the last one to leave and waved to him with a sardonic smile.

It was at that moment that David realised he would never see Mort again. For that matter, he knew he would never see his family or friends again. The realisation numbed him with paralysing terror for he also knew – with the clarity that comes with the certainty of one’s imminent death – that his evil cousin Granville White had most probably conspired with Mort to have him killed. He knew that, with his death, Granville would be one step closer to controlling the vast Macintosh empire. He remembered bitterly how he had laughed off his mother’s intuition that his life might be in jeopardy. He should have known that Mort was capable of murder. His mother obviously had.

David turned to shout a warning to Macalister who was striding with a grim expression towards Chief Tiwi. He watched in horror as Tiwi casually raised a newly acquired musket and aimed at the missionary. The flash from the igniting powder in the pan of the musket was followed by a bang. The heavy lead ball flew high and struck Macalister in the jaw. The bones in his face shattered on impact and the stricken missionary flung his hands up to his smashed face as Tiwi’s howling warriors fell on the Scot with blood-curdling cries. Stone axes and war clubs rained down on the missionary. As if praying, he fell to his knees as sprays of blood splashed the white coral sands turning them a dark red.

Macalister tried to pray for the souls of his attackers without attempting to ward off the savage blows. But a stone club smashed the life from the courageous Presbyterian missionary and he pitched forward, dead.

The howling warriors turned their attention to Josiah who tried to flee but they were on him as he waded into the lagoon. He screamed for mercy, useless sounds drowned by the savage war cries of the warriors spurred on by the cries of encouragement from their women on the beach.

Paralysed, David glanced out to sea. He could see that the longboats had almost reached the
Osprey.
‘You murdering bastard Mort! You and my cousin will burn in hell,’ he roared in rage. But it was unlikely that Mort heard his cry. All that drifted to him on a gentle sea breeze was a faint and pathetic sigh above the creaking of the oars in the rowlocks and the splash of oars in the water.

Mort smiled grimly having witnessed the slaughter at the edge of the beach. He knew it was only a matter of time before Macintosh would share the same fate as the damned missionary. That was if he was fortunate to die quickly, he mused. It was rumoured that Tiwi enjoyed torturing his victims. He would have a fine time with Macalister’s wife! It was with some regret that Mort realised he would not personally witness the pain she would most certainly suffer.

Momentarily David stood alone and still untouched while only a short distance away the frenzied villagers hacked at Josiah’s body in the shallows of the lagoon. David searched desperately for somewhere to run and hide. But he knew with an increasingly fatalistic despair that his options were limited. His only rational thought was that he should flee.

He turned to run and suddenly felt a searing pain deep in his leg. An arrow shaft protruded from his thigh. He cried out in agony as his leg gave way. He fell to his hands and knees and attempted to scramble back onto his feet. But the pain refused to allow his leg to cooperate and David was still on all fours when he felt the same pain explode all over his body.

The pain was like fire as the vicious barbs of arrows punctured his flesh. However, mercifully, one soon pierced his throat, severing the carotid artery. Blood spurted onto the white sand. Just before the darkness came, David Macintosh had a vague thought about an avenging angel, images of a white warrior holding a spear above his head as if poised to strike.

David Macintosh, sole remaining male heir to the Macintosh fortune, died within sight of the crew of the
Osprey.

The first mate had anticipated his captain’s order to haul up anchor in preparation for sailing out of the lagoon when he observed the bloody events unfolding ashore. Mort prepared to scramble aboard the
Osprey
from the longboat when Horton came alongside. ‘What in ’ell ’appened?’ he screamed down at Mort in the longboat.

‘Niggers got it into their heads to attack us,’ Mort yelled back. ‘Let ’em have a taste of the stern gun Mister Horton.’

Horton pushed aside the native gunner and took command of the gun himself. He had little trouble aligning his target with the gun as the barque floated on the calm waters of the lagoon. With a savage smile he touched the fuse with a match and the stern gun belched death. The lead shot sighed through Tiwi’s people on the beach and they crumpled like a crop falling before the scythe of a farmer.

Any surviving islanders fled the beach for the jungle while the wounded screamed in pain and shock as they attempted to crawl away.

Chief Tiwi was amongst those who fled. Enraged and confused he could not understand why the blackbirding captain had fired on him. Had they not struck a deal to kill the white man that the Captain had nominated in exchange for the guns?

He ranted curses upon all white men and quivered with impotent rage as the
Osprey’s
small cannon raked his canoes lining the beach. Turned to shredded scrap the outriggers were now useless to retaliate against the ship floating arrogantly in the lagoon, mocking them with its devastating power.

The bloody, mutilated bodies of David Macintosh and John Macalister lay on the beach amongst the wounded islanders who cried pitifully for help.

Then the cannon was loaded a third time for a parting shot. Horton swung the brass barrel onto the village itself. He did not expect to cause much damage as he was not using explosive shells. This shot was intended merely as a demonstration of the power of the blackbirding ship. The small cannon let loose a booming blast of lethal lead balls which tore through the woven fibre sides of the huts. Satisfied at the damage Mort gave his orders. The
Osprey
unfurled her wings and fled the placid waters of the lagoon for the open sea.

Chief Tiwi did not get a chance to vent his rage on the one remaining live white person on the island. Anne Macalister had been struck down in the final hail of lead shot.

From the
Osprey
Mort surveyed the island disappearing on the horizon whilst Horton standing beside him wondered at the events that had occurred so explosively fast. His captain’s explanation had not coincided with what he had witnessed from the deck of the ship. But there was little chance that he was going to say anything about what he had seen; he now feared Mort more than ever. The man was by far the most ruthless killer he had ever met, even more dangerous than himself, Horton grudgingly admitted.

‘It was a terrible thing Mister Horton,’ Mort said casually as they both stared at the island, now a wounded turtle in that turquoise sea. ‘The way those niggers fell on Mister Macintosh and that poor brave missionary. I only regret that we were unable to punish them all for the cowardly murder of Mister Macintosh. But at least we were able to teach them a lesson for their treachery,’ he added sardonically.

‘That we did Cap’n,’ Horton answered dutifully. ‘I ’ope that will be a consolation to Mister Macintosh’s family when you make your report to Sydney.’

Mort turned to his first mate. He knew that he would not have to kill him. There was just enough trace of fear in Horton to keep his mouth shut. ‘I am sure you saw everything happen the way I will report it, Mister Horton,’ he said, fixing his first mate with his pale and terrible blue eyes.

‘That I will, Cap’n,’ Horton replied without hesitation. The eyes that stared at him had that madness Horton had come to know so well. ‘That I will.’

Mort smiled as he thrust his hands behind his back and turned to observe his crew going about their assigned duties. The death of one of his employers meant nothing to him other than that he had followed orders from Mister Granville White. But he also brooded that there would be many more he would have to kill to ensure that he kept his beloved
Osprey.

A
t that time between day and night, the time before the curlews called with mournful and haunting cries from the depths of the brigalow scrub, the warrior came armed with spears and hardwood fighting clubs known as nullahs.

The tall, broad-shouldered young Aboriginal’s black skin bore the scars of his tribal initiation – and the wound of a white man’s bullet. His long beard touched his chest and he was naked except for the belt of human hair encircling his waist. Two lethal nullahs were tucked behind the belt. Balanced in his left hand were three long and deadly spears whose tips bore the distinctive barbs that white settlers on the Queensland frontier had come to recognise over the years as the spears of Wallarie.

Wallarie strode purposefully across the plain towards the setting sun which was hovering low over the brigalow scrub. For countless generations the Nerambura clan of the Darambal people had lived out their lives on these plains. But that was before the white man came with his herds of cattle and flocks of sheep to tear forever the fragile fabric of the world the Nerambura knew.

The red earth was warm beneath the warrior’s feet even as the sun cooled in the shadow of the range of low and broken hills that rose from the drought-parched plains. Beyond the hills once sacred to his people the plains stretched to a limitless horizon that petered out to the great desert marking the desolate and lonely heart of the ancient continent.

To Wallarie, the last full-blooded Nerambura clansman of the Darambal people, the sun was a spirit that marked each day of his tenuous freedom from the men who hunted him across the length and breadth of the colony of Queensland – a spirit fire that had marked the land for the twelve dry seasons he had known since the slaughter of his people by the Native Mounted Police under the command of the devil he had come to know as Morrison Mort. Since then the former police lieutenant had moved on to command a blackbirding ship belonging to the Macintosh family. But his evil went with him and its shadow still fell on the place where his small troop of heavily armed Aboriginal police had attacked and slaughtered the peaceful Nerambura clan by the waterholes one early December morning in 1862. No-one was to be spared and only a tiny group managed to flee the killers. Even they were gone now. Only Wallarie lived to remember the horror of that day: the screams of the women and children as the bullets scythed them down; the sickening crunch of bone shattering under the impact of a police boot and the sobbing of the survivors begging for mercy – to no avail. A dispersal was the name the white police called the brutal massacre.

The Nerambura warrior was also known to his hunters as the myall who had once ridden with the notorious Irish bushranger Tom Duffy. But Tom Duffy was long dead to the bullets of the Native Mounted Police.

Wallarie was alone to face the wrath of the British legal system. He had eluded his hunters until the younger Mounted Police recruits began to doubt that he actually existed; he was just a figment of the older troopers’ imaginations, used to colour their stories of past exploits. Nobody could remember what he looked like and the wild bush blackfellas never spoke his name for fear that his spirit would come for them in the night.

But Wallarie was flesh and blood and felt the weariness of the hunted man. Nothing really mattered in his lonely life anymore except returning to the sacred site that nestled in the folds of the ancient volcanic hill. For there lay the timeless spiritual heart of his people.

And the beating heart could be felt in the place where the giant slab of rock concealed the cavern that held the fossilised bones of the mystical giant creatures that once roamed the land: the carnivorous kangaroo and the tiny, ferocious marsupial lions. Wallarie had seen the bones and marvelled at the strange creatures that had existed in the time of the Dreaming.

In that sacred place his people had recorded life and death, things witnessed and events unexplainable as far back as the original Dreaming. Even the coming of the white squatter and his shepherds had been faithfully recorded by the last of the Nerambura elders. That was before they too fell to the guns of the invaders and destroyers of the land.

Wallarie faltered in his stride as he drew close to the hill. He could see the evil spirit which fed on death watching him with its reptilian eyes. Instinctively he raised a long hardwood spear to defend himself. But the crow cawed a lazy defiance at the frightened warrior’s gesture, and hopped arrogantly away from the rotting carcass of a cow, to flap its wings and rise with a shimmer of purple-black light into the darkening sky.

The warrior lowered his spear and muttered a frightened curse on the crow as it flew on and up towards the craggy hills starkly outlined by the setting sun. This was not a place to be when the night came. The vengeful spirits of the dead roamed the bush in the dark hours. Although Tom Duffy had tried to convince him the night was their ally, Wallarie still avoided places of the dead.

Even the European stockmen of the Glen View run avoided the hills. A primeval superstitious dread, inherent in long forgotten memories, caused them to give the eerie place a wide berth. Had not six years earlier the owner of Glen View been found in the same area with a spear through him? The same magical spear that had killed Sir Donald Macintosh, had flown from the body of his son, to kill the tough Scot squatter. The magical spear of the spirit warrior Wallarie, who roamed in the night, seeking revenge on all those who should foolishly dare threaten the sacred site of the Nerambura people – or so the Aboriginal stockmen whispered amongst themselves. And via the station kitchen the whispered stories had been carried to the European and Chinese workers at the homestead.

Had Wallarie known of his elevation to the mystical world of legend he might have smiled sheepishly with embarrassment. Tom’s laughter would have boomed around the ancient, eroded hills they once rode through in far off Burkesland. ‘You black bastard. No-one will remember Tom Duffy. But old women will frighten kids to bed with threats that Wallarie will come and get them if they don’t do as they are told. Long after we’re gone from this world people will remember you, not me.’

And so it would be.

Tom was gone now. Also Mondo, Tom’s Nerambura wife, who had borne him three children, Wallarie mused as he continued striding towards the ancient hills misted in the filter of red dust that hung in the air.

He knew about Tom and Mondo’s children. It was his duty. They had the last remnants of Nerambura blood in their veins and were with the white woman called Kate O’Keefe who had been Tom Duffy’s sister.

And there was a strange link with the white woman that Wallarie knew was one with the spirit of the white warrior of the cave. He did not know what the link was. Maybe the spirits of the cave would tell him this night as he sat cross-legged before the fire he would make in the cave. He would sing the sacred songs of the elders that only he and the possums living in the trees above the cave remembered.

In the early evening Wallarie climbed the old path and found again the entrance to the cave. He paused before entering the cavernous structure and gazed across the plains bathed in the soft silver glow of the rising full moon. He gazed across a land now occupied by the employees of the Macintosh companies: black stockmen who worked for tobacco, flour, sugar and tea. They had replaced the old-time shepherds who had once guarded the ill-suited flocks of sheep. Chinese gardeners tended the vegetable gardens around the sprawling timber and corrugated-iron residence. The homestead set on the land marked the permanent occupation of Darambal lands by the former tough old Scot squatter’s new manager.

Wallarie hesitated. Was it that the surrounding bush had fallen into an expectant hush? Was it that he had been too long away from his country and that the sacred place might have forgotten him? He chanted a song asking permission from the spirit guardians to approach, took a deep breath, and forced himself to enter the darkness of the sacred place.

Fear pounded his heart and his head throbbed. He trod cautiously as the smell of wood ash from long-dead fires, and the desiccated droppings of the animals which continued to visit the cool sanctuary of the overhang on hot days, drifted to him on the evening breeze. He felt the crunch of bones underfoot and recoiled in terror. His nerves were at a breaking point and he expected an evil spirit to rise up to meet him. But nothing happened. Wallarie froze until he could feel his heart pounding once again reassuring him that he was still in the lonely world of the living. He continued into the cave until at last his foot touched the dry ends of old logs.

Wallarie slid his hand inside his belt and his fingers wrapped around the only white man’s invention he carried with him – a small tin of wax matches. In the inky, brooding darkness he pulled apart shreds of a log and stacked them into a tiny pile. The match flared and the wood caught alight.

He averted his eyes from the shadows that danced tentatively on the walls. For he needed the full and secure comfort of light before he dared view the sacred icons of his people.

Flames danced as brazen spirits greedily devoured the spirit of the timber. The spreading glow illuminated the interior of the cave as he sat cross-legged facing the wall at the back of the cave.

There! There they were!

The ancient images came alive as the light of the fire touched them and joined the fire spirit’s dance in a corroboree. Ancient and mystical figures interspersed with the outlines of stick-like warriors hunting the giant kangaroos. And, always, the mysterious white warrior, alone with his spear poised seeking a target. An ochre panorama depicting all that was important to his people – earth, rocks, waterholes and the trees of the sprawling brigalow plains of central Queensland.

Wallarie felt cold awe grip him. The fire rose to the ceiling, revealing the scattered bones of Kondola, the old warrior, who had last sung the sacred songs to the spirits. The possums said that he flew to the cave as the spirit of the wedge-tailed eagle to escape the white shepherds who had hunted him long ago.

Wallarie did not look upon the scattered bones as he was afraid Kondola’s spirit might be vengeful to any intrusion on his sleep. Instead, he began to chant the songs of his people. He clacked his two hardwood nullahs together. The sound echoed eerily and soon the warrior heard the voices whisper to him from the corners of the cave.

He was no longer afraid of the awesome power of the sacred place and only felt an unfathomable sadness for the loss of all the children’s laughter, the raised voices of the old people bickering in the spreading shade of the bumbil tree with its broad canopy of cooling leaves, and the soft murmur at night of a contented people with full bellies sitting around the campfires gossiping, laughing and recounting exploits of the day. Campfires, the ashes of which were long scattered by the hooves of stock searching for the life-giving water of the nearby creek.

In the distance the mournful, wailing cry of curlews drifted to the cave. But Wallarie did not hear them. He was absorbed in a world beyond the Dreaming where he saw things he did not fully understand. Strange things that he instinctively knew were linked to the future memories of his people. He chanted until he could chant no more then curled up on the cave floor and fell into a deep sleep.

The fire spirits died when they had devoured the spirits of the burning logs and Wallarie slept in a troubled sleep of visions until the first rays of the morning touched the face of the hill.

The warrior rose from his sleep and picked up his spears. The whispers in the dark had told him to leave the sacred place and trek north once again. They told him that his lonely journey was not over and that he must go to the country of the fierce warriors of the rainforest and the eucalypt plains of the Palmer River. He had a sacred mission passed on to him by the ancestor spirits: to find the last remaining blood relative of his people and warn him of the future. Wallarie knew his name. He was the one called Peter Duffy, son of Tom and Mondo.

The spirits had also told him that the spirit of the white warrior was restless. He had been awakened and had set out in his quest for vengeance against the blue-eyed devil known as Morrison Mort, the man who had carried out the terrible dispersal on Wallarie’s clan.