A HAZARD OF HEARTS (42 page)

~*~

‘Powdered seahorse,’ Pearl muttered,
shutting the drawer of her herb cabinet. ‘Where can I get some without going to
Melbourne?’

A voice behind her made her jump. ‘Have you
tried the China Sea? What’s it for, anyway?’

Pearl turned. ‘Goitre,’ she said, automatically,
and then, ‘J.G.!’

‘In the flesh, girl dear.’ J.G’s grin faded
slowly as his gaze travelled over her ruined face. ‘Jesus, God! What happened?’

Pearl’s welcoming smile trembled, although her
voice remained steady. ‘An accident. It’s healed. Don’t fuss, J.G.’ She couldn’t
stand the shock in his eyes and moved away to continue restoring various herbs
to their places in the cabinet. ‘What are you doing here?’ For one fraction of
an instant her heart had leapt at the sight of him, and she had hoped he had
come for her sake. Then he’d seen her face, and the fantasy collapsed at birth.

He turned her firmly to face him. ‘This was done
with a knife. Who did it, Pearl?’

‘A stranger, a devil. I killed him.’ Her gaze
didn’t flinch.

Nor did his. ‘I’m glad, or I’d have done it for
you. Are you all right now?’

‘Perfectly.’

His hands shifted to cup her face, the long,
mobile fingers holding her steady while his thumb moved over the scar, tracing
the line from her curved lip to her temple.

‘Your face was perfect. Now it’s a work of art
with a small imperfection.’ His voice roughened. ‘God curse the hell-hound who
did this to you. May he fester in an unhallowed grave for eternity.’ His hands
dropped and he moved away, idly pulling out one of the drawers in the herb
cabinet then pushing it in again.

Was his emotion centred on her, personally,
Pearl wondered, still feeling the touch of his warm thumb on her cheek? Or was
it simply an obvious reaction to any such outrage?

He turned back to her. ‘You asked why I’ve come.
Simple curiosity, girl dear. Rumours abound concerning the rebellious miners’
fight with authority. I happen to think it’s coming to a head, and I want to be
here to report on the outcome.’

Pearl thrust personal matters aside to give this
her attention. ‘I shouldn’t be surprised if you were right. There has been an
increase in disturbances, meetings at night down in the gullies with firebrand
speeches. It began with the new twice-weekly licence searches ordered by the Governor.
The traps seem to regard it as a new sport, hunting men instead of foxes, and
they treat their prisoners abominably.’

‘Hotham’s a fool heading for trouble. Is it true
the men are chained like common criminals?’

Pearl flushed with the memory. ‘Too true. Some
of them have died of mistreatment.’

‘But not if you get to them first, eh? Little
Chinese Witchwoman. I’ve heard the term in the town. It’s how I found you so
easily. Didn’t you come up with your brother, after all, girl dear?’

Pearl became busy again. ‘Oh, yes. I stayed with
him awhile, then decided to set up my clinic in a more central position.’ She
knew he had seen through the careful words to the truth, yet he simply
commented, ‘And a great thing it is, your clinic, from all I hear. Have you a
cure, now, for a case of starvation? What do you prescribe?’

‘Whisky and dinner. You will be my guest J.G. Tell
me how you performed the miracle of getting through to Ballarat when the roads
have been closed since June.’

He accepted the invitation with alacrity. ‘I’ve
set up a tent not far from here, with the basics, but no food as yet. As to my
miraculous arrival, the coach service has re-opened from Geelong so I took a
place on the first one. I won’t pretend I enjoyed the journey. Still, one
suffers for one’s art.’

Arguing happily over J.G’s claims to artistic representation
of the truth in his news columns, Pearl knew the initial barriers between them
had fallen. She felt more comfortable with J.G. than she had in the past, and
intensely thankful for his presence. She hadn’t realised how lonely she had
been for news of friends and the sense of support he gave just sitting across
the packing-case table. They had finished their meal and J.G. settled himself
with his pipe before beginning a faithful account of events back in Sydney, including
his belief that Elly and Paul cared deeply for one another, without admitting
it.

‘Something divides them. It might have to do
with the Honourable D’Arcy Cornwallis.’

Pearl’s eyes kindled. ‘Evil lies hidden in that
man.’

‘You think so? There are enough rumours about
him, to be sure.’

‘He is the octopus hiding under his rock, his
tentacles reaching out to trap others, to devour them.’

J.G. gave an exaggerated shudder before turning
the talk to his interest in the brewing storm on the goldfields. He wanted to
hear everything Pearl knew, plus her conclusions, then gave his own.

‘I might not have been here long, but I’ve
followed the reports since last year’s little flare-up. It’s more than the
licence row, you know. There’s a strong political upsurge, fanned by the
republican element, while plenty of diggers have come from direct experience of
revolution in Europe. They want representation in the Legislative Council so
they can have the laws changed.’

‘They have a right, when you see the
contemptuous way decent men are treated by Commissioner Rede’s bullies. There’s
no justice in these camps, except when the men take the law into their own
hands.’

‘Which only gives the enemy more ammunition. They
can point to such lawlessness then come down in force on the protest meetings.’

Pearl was indignant. ‘What other form of protest
can the miner’s make? How else can they be heard?’

J.G. shrugged and knocked out his pipe before
getting up. ‘I’m going to one tonight over at Eureka. You heard about the
murder of a man called Scobie ten days ago at the Eureka Hotel?’

‘Yes. They spoke of charging the proprietor. However,
the magistrates found there was no case.’

‘Well, Scobie’s digger mates think the court of
enquiry smells and they’re to hold a meeting about it. This could be the spark
to set off the conflagration. He grinned slyly. ‘Care to come along with me?’

Pearl responded at once. This was exactly what
she wanted, to be on the spot, to see events for herself. ‘I’ll take my bag. There
is bound to be a fight, so stay well to one side, J.G. You don’t know these
diggers as I do.’

‘Are they so belligerent?’

‘With the drink in them, they are. And the
goldfields are awash with liquor, whatever the law may say.’ She damped down
the fire then picked up her bag, which J.G. promptly took from her. He looked
around.

‘Is it safe to leave all your goods unguarded.’

Pearl laughed. ‘I’m the Chinese Witchwoman,
remember? No-one wants to touch anything in case they turn into a frog. Of
course, they don’t really believe it, but there’s just sufficient element of
doubt to keep light fingers out of my tent. You have the lantern, so lead the
way.’

Over the past two days the weather had changed. A
hot dry wind blew over the camp, fraying nerves already strained by the
situation. In the road approaching the Eureka Hotel they found a milling mass
of men, many of them armed, and most of whom had oiled their throats well with
liquor and were in a reckless mood.

A speaker mounted a tree trunk to address the
crowd, pleading with them to stay within the law while using all possible means
to have the case against Bentley, the hotel proprietor, and his men, brought
before a more competent jurisdiction. The diggers seemed amenable and began to
disperse. J.G. showed his disappointment.

‘Where are the hotheads? Are they all reasonable
men here?’

Pearl pointed out a new man climbing up on the
trunk. ‘I know him. He’s Henry Westerby, a notorious stirrer of trouble and
riot. He’s drunk.’

Westerby began to bawl at the remainder of the
crowd that the government camp was a hotbed of corruption and bribery, the
magistrates in collusion with Bentley and his like. Shouts of approval urged
him to greater heights of oratory. Bottles passed from hand to hand while the
crowd’s mood grew hotter.

‘This is more like it.’

J.G’s satisfaction disgusted Pearl. ‘You want
trouble, don’t you? All newspapermen are the same, encouraging exciting
incidents for them to report, whatever the consequences.’

‘That’s not quite true, girl dear. We go where trouble’s
expected and always to be found, mankind being what it is. And you can’t deny
the excitement in standing at the heart of things. Don’t you feel it?’

‘Yes, I do. But I don’t think I like it, after
all. These men are being deliberately inspired to throw off restraint when they’re
not sober enough to know what they are doing.’

Westerby’s shout of ‘We’ll have the bugger
Bentley out,’ was met with a roar from a hundred throats, and cries of ‘We’ll
smoke the bugger out. We want Bentley. We want Bentley!’

A detachment of troopers arrived to parade along
the outskirts of the crowd, clearly hesitating to tackle such a number. Minutes
later Westerby with two other men raced over to the canvas bowling alley
attached to the hotel, their arms full of paper and rags which they rammed
against the wall. A flame spurted and the hot north wind did the rest. A gout
of fire rushed up, followed by an explosion of sparks which drove the men back.
The wall of the hotel had caught alight and the diggers hailed this with glee,
passing their bottles of rum freely while spreading out around the building in
the hope of catching Bentley on the run.

Pearl grasped J.G.’s arm. ‘What will happen to Bentley?
Those troopers won’t stop them.’

J.G. concentrated on the burning hotel. ‘When it
reaches the liquor she’ll go to Glory. Don’t worry about the proprietor. I saw
him scuttle off while the firebrand preached his message.’

‘Then let’s leave. If there’s a riot we can’t do
much except get caught up in it.’

‘Not yet.’

Sheets of fire devoured the wooden walls,
turning the verandah posts into flaming torches. An orange light played over
the gleeful watching faces, while owners of nearby stores ran with buckets and
billy-cans and any other available utensils to fling water over their canvas
and timber shanties. The crowd had grown quiet as the voice of the fire rose
from a crackle to a roar, while plumes of smoke and sparks shot into the sky to
be blown like a comet’s tail out into the dark. With the crash of a thousand
tin kettles the roof fell in on the heart of the holocaust. The windows blew
out like shotgun blasts and, as J.G. had predicted, the liquor bottles
exploded.

Anguished howls greeted such waste and men began
stamping on the flames, beating at them with branches or sheepskin waistcoats
torn from their own backs, finally daring the burning embers in a bid to save
the kegs. Despite J.G’s hopes for more action, little else happened beyond the ransacking
of the ruined hotel by the mob, while Westerby and his crew fell down dead
drunk. The troopers marched away to their barracks and J.G. and Pearl
administered to a few broken heads then went home, agreeing that it had been a mere
flash in the pan - not at all indicative of the true diggers’ spirit. There
would always be wild men, brawlers and destroyers for the fun of it, but it
would be a pity if they were to spoil the chances of those seeking compromise with
the Government.

J.G. saw Pearl to her tent before he retired to
his own modest shelter nearby.

‘We’ll see what tomorrow brings,’ he said. ‘Commissioner
Rede is not the man to take this tweaking of the nose and say “thank you”. Meanwhile,
I’m for my bed. It’s been a long, full day. Good-night, girl dear. Angels guard
your dreams.’ He lightly kissed her scarred cheek and closed the tent flap
behind her.

Spring had invaded Sydney Town, launching
itself on a fresh salt breeze blowing up from the harbour, scouring away winter’s
residue of stale odours. Spring rains had washed down streets, rooves and
gutters, carrying away refuse and freshening buildings and yards, while
blossoms burst from trees and bushes to scent the new-rinsed air. Housewives aired
out mattresses and rugs, maidservants polished doorknobs and whitened doorsteps,
street-sellers and delivery boys whistled at their work.

Dressed in fresh muslin and carrying a pretty,
frilled sunshade, Jo-Beth set out to walk through the Botanical Gardens out
onto the promontory known as Mrs Macquarie’s Chair. The water curving in so
closely to lap the point glinted like sequinned silk. Surely, she thought,
there could be no more lovely harbour view in all the world, with the naval
ships bobbing at anchor and colourful ferries beetling between the green and
gold foreshores.

On the rocks below, a native fisherman stood
with his spear poised as if cast in bronze, while his catch flapped in a pool
at his feet. Behind Jo-Beth, below the brow of the hill, children played ball
in the gardens, oblivious of the heat. To the east a bay lay edged in sand
where gulls strutted amongst the tide wrack. In the shade of a Moreton Bay fig
tree Jo-Beth furled her parasol and proceeded to think seriously about her
position.