The Locket of Dreams (20 page)

The shadows were long on the ground and the air was chilly. They were still three miles from Rosedale on a lonely stretch of track. A branch cracked. Sophie felt a shiver of apprehension ripple up her spine. She swooped off the buggy to look around.

A horse sprang out from behind a boulder to the left of the track, in the path of the moving buggy, its rider levelling a pistol directly at Charlotte. He had seven pistols and a coiled stockwhip stuck in his belt, a red kerchief knotted around his neck and a felt hat jammed low over his eyes.

‘Pull up, in the name of Captain Lightning,’ bellowed the rider, his horse prancing.

Annie had no choice but to pull up the horses, her heart pounding.

Another three men emerged from the scrub on either side of the track. One pointed his pistol at Pot and grabbed Pot’s pony by the bridle. The other two pointed pistols at Annie.

Nell screamed. Annie glanced around in horror. Charlotte gripped her box protectively, her knuckles white.

Sophie swooped towards the bushranger, hoping to disarm him.

Captain Lightning’s horse went crazy as Sophie flew around him; it bucked and reared, its eyes rolling. Captain
Lightning struggled to stay on, fighting the reins, his pistol pointing in the air.

‘What is the meaning of this outrage?’ demanded Annie. ‘How dare you point guns at my family?’

‘Hand over your valuables now, or we shoot,’ ordered Captain Lightning, bringing his mount under control.

Annie remembered Mr Thompson’s warning about the murder of the Aboriginal tracker. She held up her hand in supplication.

‘There is no need to shoot anyone,’ Annie replied calmly. ‘We have very little of value, as you can see.’

‘Well, hand it over quickly,’ insisted Captain Lightning. ‘Jack, tie up the boy and if there’s any nonsense, shoot him.’

Pot was dragged off his horse, struggling futilely, and tied to a tree.

Sophie flew to help him. Her transparent fingers struggled with the knots that bound him.

‘Do not hurt Pot,’ cried Charlotte anxiously.

Annie fumbled inside her reticule; she had only a few small coins there. She was wearing her best jewellery: a heavy gold chain bracelet, a ruby brooch at her throat and a diamond-and-gold ring on her wedding finger.

Annie handed over her coins. Her fingers fumbled as she undid the clasps of her brooch and bracelet. The wedding ring was tight on her finger and she struggled to pull it off.

Charlotte thought of her mother’s locket tucked safely inside the collar of her white dress. She longed to touch it for reassurance. More frightening still, she worried about the Star of Serendib, hidden away in her oak box.

‘Open that box,’ demanded Captain Lightning, pointing with his pistol.

Charlotte obeyed with trembling fingers, unlocking the box and opening the lid. The bushranger picked through the items – the pebble, the heather, the book of poetry. He pocketed the silver elf bolt. Charlotte felt sick with terror.
Will he find the Star of Serendib?

‘Not the elf bolt,’ Nell cried, then bit her lip.

Captain Lightning slammed the lid shut. Charlotte took back the box, keeping her eyes downcast, trying not to let her fear show.

‘Now, young ladies, take off your gloves, pull up your sleeves and show me your throats,’ ordered Captain Lightning.

Nell and Charlotte obeyed silently, Charlotte moving her collar slightly, trying to conceal the locket.

‘Aha,’ cried the bushranger, spying a glimpse of gold. ‘Hand over that necklace at once, young lady.’

Charlotte grasped the locket protectively, her face pale but determined.

‘Please, do not steal my locket,’ begged Charlotte. ‘My mother gave it to me just before she died. She asked me to wear it always.’

‘That’s a shame, missy,’ replied Captain Lightning, holding out his hand. ‘But I can’t afford to let you keep it. Take it off.’

Charlotte reluctantly took her locket off, fighting back the tears. She did not want these rough bushrangers to see her cry.

Sophie had to do something. If the locket was stolen, would that mean she wouldn’t have it in the modern world? Would that mean she couldn’t come back to Charlotte’s time any more? Perhaps she may not be able
to return to her own time, to Nonnie’s apartment?

Her fear made her stronger. She zoomed into Captain Lightning, pushing him away. Captain Lightning felt the sensation of a freezing shove on his body and shivered violently. His horse reared.

‘Have you no shame?’ cried Annie, her face flaming. ‘These girls have lost everything: their mother, their father, their home, their land. That locket is the only thing Charlotte has that was her mother’s. Take all
my
jewels but show the poor lassie some pity. Let her keep her mother’s locket.’

The bushranger paused, guilt chasing greed across his face. ‘Take it then,’ he snarled.

Charlotte took the locket gratefully, hiding it in her bodice once more.

‘Now lads, blindfold that boy and tie him on his pony,’ ordered Captain Lightning. ‘He’s coming with us as a servant.’

‘No,’ Annie begged. ‘Don’t take Pot. He’s just a boy and has been living with us since he was born. His parents will be distraught.’

‘Good,’ answered Captain Lightning. ‘He’ll be well trained. Don’t try to follow us if you value his safety.’

Two of the bushrangers untied Pot, blindfolded him and hauled him towards the pony. The other held the horses.

Sophie saw her chance, and moved. She swirled around the horses, slapping the buggy horses on the rump and swishing up under Captain Lightning’s horse.

All the horses bucked and reared, causing chaos. Captain Lightning was thrown to the ground, cursing.

The buggy horses bolted, racing for home. Charlotte and Nell clung to the buggy for their very lives. Annie stared
back at Pot, then at the two girls beside her. Decision made, she cracked her whip and urged the horses to gallop faster, heading north to Rosedale.

Captain Lightning’s horse kicked down on Sophie, knocking her to the ground, striking her with its hooves. She rolled away, curled up in pain, hitting her head. Consciousness faded in a jumble of rearing horses, dust, swearing and the loud crack of a pistol shot.

Sophie’s head thundered with pain. She crawled out of bed and limped across the floor, leaving smudges of dust on the cream carpet. In the bathroom, she stripped off her torn nightdress, filthy with brown dust, and threw it in the washing basket.

She turned on the shower as hot as she could bear it. In the mirror she saw dark black bruises on her body in the shape of hooves. Her left shoulder was torn and bleeding.

How could the horse’s hooves have hurt me? I was supposed to be an insubstantial ghost in the past. The horse’s hooves should have flailed straight through me. Could it be possible I am becoming more substantial in the past than in my own world?

The thought made Sophie feel sick.

Sophie washed her hair and towelled it dry. She found Nonnie’s first-aid kit and dabbed some antiseptic and a bandage on the cut shoulder, and some arnica on the bruises. She dressed and went out to the living room.

‘Sophie, what have you done to your arm?’ asked Jess.

‘Oh, I fell,’ mumbled Sophie, avoiding Jess’s and Nonnie’s concerned glances.

Nonnie looked at Sophie sternly.

‘Sophie, did you go out anywhere last night?’ asked Nonnie suspiciously. ‘You weren’t sneaking out to meet someone?’

Sophie was shocked, her heart pounding. What should she say? She couldn’t possibly tell Nonnie the truth.

‘No, Nonnie, of course not,’ replied Sophie. ‘Why would you think that?’

‘There were dirty footprints on the carpet this morning, and you have that bruise on your arm,’ said Nonnie, frowning. ‘Plus you’ve been acting very strangely this week – not eating, not talking. You look pale and exhausted, yet you sleep so much … I’m really worried about you, Sophie. Do you think you could be anorexic? Is there something else you’re doing –’

‘No, no,’ interrupted Sophie, tears welling up. ‘I’m not anorexic. I’m not doing anything wrong. Please, Nonnie, believe me,’ she begged. ‘I think I might have been sleepwalking and fallen. I dreamt a horse was kicking me, but I
promise
you I did not go out or meet anyone.

‘I just can’t sleep properly any more. I’ve been dreaming about Charlotte Mackenzie losing her home and coming to Australia.’

Nonnie was puzzled. The strangest thing was that the dirty footprints led from Sophie’s room straight to the bathroom, not from the front door. The apartment was three storeys high, so it would be impossible for Sophie to climb out the window. So how did her feet get dirty?

Jess came up to Sophie and hugged her.

‘You’re worrying about us losing
our
home, aren’t you?’ asked Jess. Sophie hugged Jess back and nodded.

Nonnie searched Sophie’s face. She did not know what to think.

‘I don’t know what the future holds for your family, Sophie,’ Nonnie said. ‘But I do know that fretting like this will not help you, or your parents.’

Sophie remembered Nanny saying to Nell, ‘Wha’ canna be changed must be endured.’

‘I know, Nonnie,’ Sophie answered, smiling shakily. ‘I’ll try not to worry so much.’

It was dark when the horses cantered up the last stretch of track towards Rosedale homestead.

Mr McLaughlin rode to meet them, his face creased with worry.

‘Are you all right, Annie?’ called Mr McLaughlin. ‘I was worried.’

Annie spilled out the news of the attack and Pot’s kidnapping. The bell was rung at the homestead to call in all the men. Mr McLaughlin organised the men into teams to search for Pot and the bushrangers. The horses were caught, saddled and bridled, the rifles loaded.

Someone rode to Dalesford to fetch the police. Pot’s parents, Billy and Mary, were informed, Mary shrieking with grief.

Annie organised hot soup for the girls and ordered them to huddle in front of the fire, wrapped in blankets. Charlotte and Nell were miserable, worried about Pot and frightened
by their experience with the bushrangers.

The search party clattered out of the stable yard into the dark, heading back to where the hold-up had taken place.

Annie, Charlotte and Nell sat in the sitting room too nervous to eat or talk. Charlotte read aloud to take their minds away from the endless waiting. At last, Annie sent them both to bed.

Many hours later, Charlotte and Nell were woken by the sound of bits jingling and saddles creaking. They jumped out of bed, threw shawls over their nightgowns and hurried out to the sitting room, where Annie was still sitting up in her chair.

‘It sounds like they are back,’ agreed Annie.

A few minutes later, Will, Henry and Mr McLaughlin came into the house, looking exhausted. Mr McLaughlin shook his head despondently in answer to Annie’s questioning gaze.

‘No sign of them,’ Mr McLaughlin said. ‘We looked everywhere, but it was too dark to find any tracks. They could’ve been just under our noses. At last we decided to come home and sleep, so we can make an early start in the morning. Tomorrow we’ll take supplies, and Billy might be able to find their tracks.’

Annie stood up, tightening her shawl around her shoulders.

‘Sit down, my dears,’ urged Annie. ‘Charlotte and I will heat you some soup and bread for supper.’

The next morning, the search party set off before dawn, carrying saddlebags of food, blankets and supplies in case they needed to camp out. Charlotte had begged to be allowed to join the search party but had been refused and told to stay home where it was safer.

Charlotte and Nell occupied themselves by feeding the animals: the poultry, the newborn chicks, the lambs, wallabies and the pigs. They read their books and helped Mrs Gregory make marmalade in the kitchen.

The day dragged by slowly. Annie, Charlotte and Nell ate by themselves that evening and there was no sign of the men. Nor the next day or the next.

At the end of the third day, well after sunset, the men finally returned, their weary ponies stumbling, with their heads hung low. Charlotte and Nell rushed out to meet them, hope surging in their hearts.

‘No, we didn’t find Pot,’ admitted Mr McLaughlin. ‘Billy discovered their tracks and we followed them for fifty miles. They must’ve known we were following because they took to the river and we lost them.

‘We searched up and downstream but found nothing. At last the horses were tired and we were worried about everything at Rosedale, so we came home.’

Everyone looked worried and disappointed. The men set to work unsaddling the horses and giving them all a good feed. The horses rolled happily in the dust, pleased to be home once more.

Mrs Gregory set to work boiling water for hot baths and preparing a hot meal.

So life continued on much as normal, except everyone missed Pot’s cheerful face around the homestead. The police came and questioned the McLaughlins about the robbery, although they seemed more concerned about the loss of Annie’s jewels than the loss of Pot.

Two weeks later, at dusk, Charlotte was out picking thyme and marjoram in the garden, when she noticed a
small dark figure stumbling up the track. She looked closely. The figure looked familiar.

‘Pot!’ shrieked Charlotte at the top of her lungs. ‘Pot’s back.’

Charlotte dropped her handful of herbs and raced down, over the fence and along the track towards Pot. Nell, Annie and Will followed behind, alerted by Charlotte’s shouts.

Soon Pot was surrounded by an anxious, happy, boisterous crowd of well-wishers welcoming him home and asking him dozens of questions.

‘Are you all right?’

‘How did you escape?’

‘Did the bushrangers let you go?’

‘Did you walk all the way home?’

‘How did you find your way back?’

Pot nodded, too tired to talk, but grinned his happy, familiar smile.

‘Leave the poor boy alone,’ insisted Annie. ‘He looks all done in. Come inside, Pot, and we will get you some food, then you can tell us all about it. Will, run and get your father. Charlotte, fetch Mary and Billy too.’

Everyone ran to do Annie’s bidding. Soon Pot was seated at the kitchen table, wrapped in a blanket with a big bowl of hot beef stew in front of him, which he stuffed in his mouth hungrily. An eager audience, including the McLaughlins, the Gregorys, Mary and Billy, Charlotte, Nell and Sophie, sat around the kitchen, waiting for him to finish and tell his tale.

At last, after his third serving of stew, Pot pushed away his bowl, which had been wiped clean with bread.

‘Do you feel up to telling us, Pot?’ asked Annie with concern. ‘Or would you rather wait until the morning?’

‘I feel much better now,’ admitted Pot. ‘Is there any pie, Mrs Gregory?’

Mrs Gregory obligingly cut him a huge wedge of apple pie and smothered it in golden cream. Pot wolfed that down, as though he hadn’t eaten for a week. At last he finished, with a huge sigh and a rubbing of his bulging stomach.

‘The bushrangers took me to their hiding place far to the south,’ Pot began. Everyone listened avidly.

‘We rode for three days, riding down rivers to hide our tracks. At last we stopped in a valley deep in the bush. The bushrangers untied me and ordered me to hobble and unsaddle the horses.

‘We climbed up a cliff to a big cave. There were sacks of food, cooking gear, beds and weapons stored there.

‘The captain made me collect wood, build fires, cook meals, wash up, cart water up the hill. They fed me nothing but scraps, and hit me if I was slow. At night I was tied up.’

Annie bristled as she heard about how Pot had been mistreated. She gently patted him on the arm.

‘Captain Lightning made sure they always watched me, with a pistol. A few days later, the captain and another bloke went to town for supplies. The others became lazy, drinking rum.

‘They sent me to get firewood, but didn’t come with me, just watching from the cave.

‘I got a big pile of firewood, collecting it till they were more interested in the rum than me. When it was getting dark, I slipped away.

‘I walked and ran all night. Once I heard the bushrangers coming after me and hid in a tree till they passed. It was dark and I had a good start, though they had horses.’

Charlotte’s heart pounded as she thought of Pot hiding in a tree with the bushrangers in pursuit.

‘When the sun rose I hid my tracks, then slept in a hollow log. I walked only at night, until I was far away.

‘The cockatoos showed me where to find water and I found grubs and bush fruit to eat. I didn’t waste time fishing or hunting, and I couldn’t light a fire in case they saw it.’

Mary and Billy nodded proudly, patting Pot on the back.

‘For the first four days it was hard, because I didn’t know the country or the way home, so I just kept heading north. Then suddenly I felt the spirits of my people. Then it was easy because the spirits guided me home. Seeing the lights of Rosedale homestead was the best sight I’ve seen in ages.’

Pot stopped talking and gave a great yawn.

‘Well done, Pot,’ cried Annie. ‘Welcome home. I think now you need a good night’s sleep.’

Mary and Billy ushered Pot away to their room, murmuring their goodnights. Pot received many pats on the back and hearty congratulations from the family on his way out.

‘Extraordinary,’ pronounced Mr McLaughlin. ‘That boy found his way home with no map or compass, no food or water and no boots. He must have walked more than a hundred miles. It is a miracle he found his way here.’

‘
And
he was half starved and beaten,’ added Annie. ‘Those bushrangers are villains.’

‘With Pot’s help, the police might have a much better chance of tracking down those bushrangers,’ suggested Mr McLaughlin. ‘I wonder if Pot can find his way back to the cave as easily as he found his way home?’

A couple of days later, when Pot had rested, another party set off on horseback, made up of Pot, Billy, Mr McLaughlin, stockmen and police constables. They were gone for over a week, but eventually returned happy and triumphant.

They had taken the bushrangers by surprise in their lair. One was captured down by the creek; the others had surrendered after a lengthy gun battle, when they realised they were outnumbered and trapped.

The police had taken the bushrangers into custody and were sending them down to Easthaven to stand trial. The police felt sure the bushrangers would be hanged for their crimes.

Mr McLaughlin returned with Pot’s missing pony, the silver elf bolt and Annie’s jewellery.

‘Yes, but can you
please
get up now?’ Jess insisted. ‘Nonnie wants to do some cooking with us today. She wants us to pick oranges and lemons from the trees down in the courtyard, to make marmalade, and we are going to make scones.’

‘Okay. Okay. I’ll be right out.’

Sophie felt pleased. She loved cooking with Nonnie. They had the time to make things properly and cook them from scratch. Mum always seemed to be too busy these days, with Will and work, to cook anything except mince, mince and more mince.

Sophie and Jess went down into the garden of the apartment and picked four oranges and two lemons from the trees.

‘Wonderful, girls,’ said Nonnie with a smile, handing over a juicer. ‘Let’s start by juicing the lemons. Be careful to save all the seeds because we need them to make the pectin.’

Sophie and Jess squeezed the juice out of the halved lemons, setting aside the lemon seeds.

Nonnie carefully peeled the skins off the oranges with a sharp knife and scraped the white pith off the orange flesh. Jess chopped the oranges, while Sophie thinly sliced the peel. Nonnie showed Jess how to pop the lemon seeds, pith and chopped lemon peel into a clean stocking.

‘We cook the bag in with the fruit to make pectin, which makes the jelly set,’ Nonnie explained. ‘This is how my mother taught me to make marmalade, and her mother taught her before that.’

‘All the way back to Charlotte Mackenzie?’ asked Sophie quickly.

‘Probably,’ laughed Nonnie, scraping all the chopped orange fruit and sliced peel into a saucepan. ‘Now we add four cups of water and cook it all up with the bag of pith and seeds.’

The orange mixture simmered for fifty minutes. Nonnie, Sophie and Jess cleaned up the mess, then placed the clean jars in the oven to heat.

‘You girls add the sugar, while I stir.’

Four cups of sugar were added to the mix while it was brought to the boil.

‘We have to keep stirring or the sugar will burn,’ warned Nonnie, stirring vigorously. ‘Now let’s taste it. If it’s too sweet we add more lemon juice, if it’s too bitter, it needs more sugar.’

The girls tasted the warm mixture and decided it needed a touch more sugar. When Nonnie judged the mixture was ready, she turned off the heat and left it to cool down.

‘Now we test how our mixture is setting,’ explained Nonnie. She tipped a teaspoon of the hot fruit mixture onto a cold saucer and placed it in the fridge. A few moments later, she tested the fruit, which was now firm like a jelly.

‘Perfect,’ pronounced Nonnie. She scooped the seed-and-pith bag out of the mixture and squeezed it between two teaspoons to extract all of the pectin.

The warm marmalade was finally poured into hot sterilised jars and left to cool.

‘And there we have it – the finest Scotch marmalade, as made by the Mackenzie women for generations!’ announced Nonnie with pleasure.

‘It looks beautiful,’ agreed Sophie, feeling a sense of pride in the row of jars, glowing bright orange in the sunlight.

‘Can we have it on our toast tomorrow morning, Nonnie?’ asked Jessica.

‘Of course, and there should be plenty of jars left for you to take home to your mama,’ Nonnie assured her. ‘Now, do you have any cooking energy left for making scones, or should we go out?’

‘Scones. Scones,’ cried Jess enthusiastically.

‘Scones it is, then.’