Shadow of the Osprey (34 page)

Dorothy was finally alone with her aunt Penelope. Penelope had planned it to be so, and towards that end had suggested to Fiona that the girls be brought over to her house by their nanny while she went on a shopping trip into Sydney. Later she could join them for afternoon tea.

Fiona had liked the idea. She always felt a strange kind of freedom when Granville was away on one of his many trips out of Sydney. And when she experienced that freedom inevitably she was in the mood to go shopping. The suggestion also meant a pleasant interlude for afternoon tea at Penelope’s house at the end of her shopping spree.

Dorothy stood before her aunt and sensed by the grave expression on Penelope’s face that she wanted to talk to her about something grown-up. ‘Sit down on the couch beside me,’ Penelope said, gently indicating the big sofa in her drawing room. ‘You and I can have a little talk about some things.’

‘Do you want to talk to Helen too?’ Dorothy asked as she sat down beside her aunt.

‘No darling,’ Penelope said, and impulsively reached out to stroke her niece’s long hair. ‘Your sister can join us after we have talked together.’

Dorothy gazed up at her aunt with big grave eyes and wished that her younger sister was with her. But Penelope had organised for Helen to help the cook prepare scones for the afternoon tea. Prompted by her terrible nagging suspicion she had then lured Dorothy into the drawing room for a talk. Ever since she had first noticed the subtle changes in her favourite niece, Penelope had desperately tried to convince herself that it was not happening all over again. Dorothy was so like herself at the same age.

Dorothy sat patiently with her hands in her lap waiting for her aunt to speak. ‘Darling,’ Penelope said gently, ‘does Papa do things with you that frighten you?’

The sudden, stricken expression that came over Dorothy’s face caused Penelope to feel as if she had been stabbed in the stomach with a hot knife. ‘No Aunt Penny,’ Dorothy replied in a tight, frightened voice, ‘Papa doesn’t play . . . ’ she hesitated, and fell into a frightened silence. She had almost told someone what Papa had said she must not.

‘Doesn’t play what?’ Penelope asked quietly. ‘Doesn’t play games with you that frighten you very much?’ The little girl stared wide-eyed at her aunt. Her bottom lip trembled, forewarning a flood of tears to come. Penelope felt the hot knife in her stomach twist and turn to a smouldering rage. So, her brother had found another victim for his nefarious evil.

‘I cannot tell you any more Aunt Penny,’ Dorothy said in a tiny voice. She stared down at her hands folded in her lap. ‘Papa said I would be punished if I told anyone about . . . ’ The tears rolled in great wet droplets down her face and the sobbing came in great waves racking her little body. ‘ . . . He said he would send me away if I told anyone. And I would never see Helen or Mama ever again.’

Penelope drew her niece to her and held her against her breast. ‘Hush darling,’ she crooned as Dorothy sobbed uncontrollably. ‘Aunt Penny won’t tell anyone about what Papa does. Aunt Penny knows your pain and I promise you that your papa will not play his games with you ever again.’

Dorothy felt the soothing words wrap around her like a protective cloak. She could not have told anyone else in the whole wide world about Papa’s secret – except Aunt Penny. Not even Mama.

But Aunt Penny was kind and gentle. She was different.

For a long time Penelope held her niece. And as she held her, Penelope felt her rage boil to a point where even the hardest steel would melt and turn to vapour. He would pay, she thought, with a quiet and savage fury. Not only for what he had done to his own daughter, but for the continuing pain she still felt for her own lost childhood. Taking Fiona from her brother was not enough. There had to be more she could do to punish his insidious evil. A lot more – before he died and went to hell.

When Dorothy had cried until she could cry no more Penelope took her to her room and laid her down on her bed. She sat stroking her hair gently until the little girl fell asleep. Satisfied that Dorothy was resting, Penelope rose from the bed to go down to the kitchen. She had the conviction that there was one other who must know of her brother’s evil – one whose silence had contributed to the terrible anguish in the life of the little girl.

Penelope found the cook, Helen and Miss Pitcher kneading the dough for the scones. They were sitting at the kitchen table laughing and young Helen had flour streaks on her face.

‘Miss Pitcher,’ Penelope said, ‘may I have a word with you? In private?’

Gertrude Pitcher glanced up at Penelope and frowned. ‘Certainly ma’am,’ she replied apprehensively and rose to follow Penelope to the drawing room.

Penelope closed the door behind them and turned to face the stern nanny. Gertrude immediately felt her unexplainable apprehension turn to fear as she noticed the strangely dark expression on the Baroness’s face.

‘There is a grave matter I wish to speak to you about,’ Penelope said, with the hint of a cold fire in her blue eyes. ‘Concerning my niece Dorothy.’

‘I’m sure I do not know what you mean,’ the nanny replied coldly, attempting to disguise her own rising fear. Had the damned girl talked, despite her father’s threats?

‘Dorothy has told me everything, including that you know what has been happening,’ Penelope bluffed. She watched carefully for the flicker of guilt in the other woman’s eyes. Miss Pitcher caught her breath and a trapped look flashed in her eyes. Penelope knew she was right. The woman had known of her brother’s evil and yet had done nothing to stop it. She could guess just what means her brother had used to coerce the nanny into his conspiracy. ‘How much did he pay you Miss Pitcher?’ she asked, without giving the woman time to gather her thoughts. ‘I said how much?’

‘It wasn’t the money,’ Miss Pitcher whispered, as she stared down at the parquet floor.

‘Threats then,’ Penelope proposed harshly. ‘Did my brother threaten violence against you?’ Miss Pitcher nodded. She opened her mouth as if to say something but no words came. Instead, she stood and stared bleakly at the floor. Penelope realised that she would achieve more by adopting a sympathetic attitude. ‘Sit down Miss Pitcher,’ Penelope said gently. Gertrude reacted with a puzzled expression as she took a seat on one of the imported French chairs. ‘I am not going to tell anyone of your part in my brother’s evil,’ Penelope continued. ‘And for my silence on the matter you will do exactly as I tell you.’

‘I fear that Mister White will find out that I have talked to you ma’am,’ Miss Pitcher said, trembling. ‘He is a dreadful man I greatly fear.’

‘He is,’ Penelope agreed. ‘But you have more reason to fear me if you do not do what I command, Miss Pitcher. Believe me when I say that,’ she added, fixing the frightened woman with her icy blue eyes.

‘What is it that you require of me?’ the nanny asked wearily. She was resigned to dealing with the Baroness who she sensed may indeed be more dangerous and devious than her depraved brother. The stern nanny had little respect for men, and was almost glad that she would no longer have to cooperate in the depraved activities of her employer. She had tried to pretend that nothing was happening. But the reality of the traumatised little girl after her visits to the library had worn her down. She knew herself that she would not be able to stay much longer under the Whites’ roof.

‘You will provide me with a full written account of all you know,’ Penelope said. ‘That account will be held by me. Also, you will give notice to Missus White without notifying her why, other than that you have better prospects elsewhere. She is not to know what her husband has been doing to her daughter. Do you understand what I am saying so far?’

Miss Pitcher nodded her head slightly. ‘Good!’ Penelope said. ‘When you have done all I have requested you will go to a place for employment where I will be able to contact you should I need your corroboration on the account of my brother’s evil activities. Oh, do not look startled Miss Pitcher. You will be safe. My brother will never know of your whereabouts. It just happens that I know a family in need of a nanny. I suspect that other than this lapse in your duties as regards the well-being of my nieces, you have provided an excellent service to them.’

Penelope could see tears welling in the stern woman’s eyes. As she ducked her head and sniffed loudly, Penelope felt just a touch of pity for the woman’s obvious distress. She knew that Granville would have coerced her with a combination of greed and fear.

‘Baroness von Fellmann, I . . . ’ Miss Pitcher was lost for words of gratitude for her apparently lenient treatment, considering the gravity of what had occurred whilst Dorothy had been in her care.

Disgusted, Penelope turned her back on the woman and walked to a window with a view of the lawns. It was still raining outside. Afternoon tea would be taken in this very same room with Fiona. It was strange how one place could suffer within its walls so many diverse emotions, Penelope thought, as she gazed out at the grey sleeting rain. When Fiona arrived she must feign cheerfulness. She did not want to alert her cousin to anything of what had transpired during the day.

She turned from the window to see the nanny standing forlornly. ‘You may leave me now Miss Pitcher,’ Penelope said tersely. ‘I will expect your account to be clearly written and in my hand before you leave with Missus White this evening. You can go to my husband’s library to carry out your task. You will find pen and paper on his desk. That is all.’

Miss Pitcher mumbled her gratitude and left the room with her back bowed under the weight of her conscience. Penelope remained staring out at the rain. She was trembling. It was easy to make a threat, she realised grimly. But it was another thing to carry it out.

P
astor Otto Werner and his wife Caroline were lost in the wilderness. It was to them as desolate as any place Moses had crossed in the great exodus from Egypt. Otto Werner was a man in his late thirties. Stolid, with a strong face graced by a bushy black beard to his chest, he wore a black suit and his once-white shirt was stained by sweat to a dirty red colour. His wife was a contrast to her husband: fair and dainty. They were an odd couple, but shared a burning zeal to bring God’s word not only to the impressive numbers of German settlers and miners in North Queensland, but also to the Children of Ham.

Off the ship from Hamburg they had purchased a horse and sulky, packed supplies and a crate of Bibles in both English and German, and set out from Cooktown to visit a devout German Lutheran grazier who they had been informed was considering setting aside land for a mission station.

But, being Europeans, they had presumed in their ignorance that the vast, semi-arid continent had landmarks which would show them the way. Furthermore, the sketchy map they had purchased in Cooktown did not indicate distances between the vaguely marked creeks and hills. This they discovered, as their supplies dwindled and the landmarks ran out. Soon enough they faced a flat, endless horizon and realised that they had passed the point of no return on their lonely trek south west. But despair was not an emotion Otto entertained. All adversity was merely a test from God, of the strength of his faith.

The discovery of the wounded Aboriginal who spoke a rough form of English was perceived by the Lutheran minister as a sign from God. His wife was not so sure. A request for tobacco from the wild-looking heathen were the first words he uttered in their meeting in the wilderness, a request far from Godly, in her opinion.

With his big, battered leather-bound Bible in his hand, Otto knelt beside Wallarie. ‘God of my fathers,’ he intoned in a booming voice, ‘thank You for sending us Your messenger to guide us out of the wilderness.’

Caroline glanced at her husband from the corner of her eye. She was more practical than he in the ways of life and wondered how this badly-wounded native could help them find the Schmidt farm. ‘And now Lord guide my hand so that I may heal this poor heathen’s body and save his soul from eternal damnation.’

Wallarie listened to the strangely guttural words being said over him. He wondered if this man were some kind of magic man. As weak as he was Wallarie still checked for any sign of a weapon, and when he could not detect a pistol or rifle, felt a little more reassured that the strange man in black meant him no harm.

‘Wife,’ Otto commanded, ‘fetch me the medicine chest from the sulky.’ Caroline did so as the missionary examined the badly infected bullet wound. It had swelled into an ugly dark lump, hot to touch.

She returned with a small wooden box and knelt beside her husband. ‘Be careful my husband,’ she said quietly. ‘He has weapons with him.’

Otto gave the spears and war clubs beside Wallarie a scornful look. ‘He will be dead if I don’t help him,’ he replied. ‘I think the bullet is lodged in the muscle and I will have to get it out to relieve the pressure.’ He riffled through his medicine chest to produce a scalpel and a pair of forceps. A year at Heidelberg University medical school had not been entirely wasted. ‘This vill hurt my friend,’ he said in English. ‘But I vill not hurt you more than I must. Do you understand?’

‘Yeah boss,’ Wallarie croaked, and tried to grin. He knew just what the man was going to do. He had once helped Tom remove a spray of shotgun pellets from his back when a squatter had resisted their attempts to steal his horse. The evil magic of the bullets was greater the longer they were in the body. ‘You cut ’im this blackfella good.’

Otto nodded and proceeded to cut into the flesh. A steady stream of yellow-green pus burst from the lump, followed by a stream of dark blood. For Wallarie the pain was beyond even the initial impact of the Snider bullet. He tried to spring to his feet, but a powerful blow from the man of God’s fist laid him out, and for the rest of the operation Wallarie was blissfully unconscious.

Grunting and sweating, Otto probed for the bullet while his wife hovered nearby with the forceps, blanching at the sight of the open wound. Wallarie was coming around as Otto clamped the lead projectile with the forceps. He paused and steadied himself for the final tug at the bullet which was stubbornly clamped in the muscle. Wallarie came out of his unconscious state as the bullet came out of him, vaguely aware of the bearded face grinning at him. Otto held the misshapen projectile before his eyes. ‘I think he will live,’ Otto said to his wife. ‘I have read that these people have an unusually strong constitution in such matters.’

Caroline frowned. She could not understand why they should have stopped their journey to assist an Aboriginal heathen when they were so desperately close to death themselves. Another day and their water would run out.

The missionaries set up camp a short distance from where Wallarie lay under the shade of a small bush. Otto had bandaged the wound with a liberal application of stinging antiseptics. Wallarie had flinched but accepted the doctoring. He sensed that the strange man in black had a magic not unlike that of the big Irishman Patrick Duffy who had helped save his life so many years earlier when Mort had shot him during the Glen View dispersal. Otto’s gruff words had the same soothing effect as those of the Irish bullocky.

‘I will take him water,’ Otto said to his wife who was unharnessing their horse from the shafts of the sulky. ‘He will need it if he is to last the night.’

Caroline bit her lip. She wanted to point out that the water was the last of their supply, but fought her natural response in favour of her husband’s decision. He was a good man, whose faith in the Lord was very rarely disappointed, and she prayed silently that he was right this time. If not, then they would most probably be dead within days.

Otto bent to Wallarie and helped him so he could sip the water from the canteen. When he had finished drinking, Wallarie lay back and fell into a deep sleep. The loss of blood had drained him of strength and left him feverish.

When Otto was satisfied that his patient was resting, he rose and returned to the campsite, where a blackened pot of coffee steamed over a small fire. Caroline poured a cup and passed it to her husband. ‘We only have enough water for one more pot,’ she said quietly. ‘Not even enough for our horse tomorrow.’

Otto squatted by the fire and gazed out at the sun sinking below the flat horizon. ‘Have you noticed how beautiful the sunsets are in this country?’ he said, as if ignoring his wife’s slightly accusing statement. ‘It must have been like this when God created the earth.’ Caroline did not comment, but continued to busy herself around the fire preparing the evening meal. ‘In Berlin,’ he continued, ‘we would be shivering with the cold and praying for the warmth of summer.’

‘Instead we die of the terrible heat out here,’ Caroline replied bitterly. ‘And the dreadful scourge of flies.’

‘I thought that you must have lost your tongue wife,’ Otto said with a touch of mirth. ‘I thought that it had dried up and fallen out.’

Caroline looked up from her work and into the dark eyes of her husband. She saw the humour, and a slow smile spread across her face. ‘I am sorry my husband,’ she said. ‘I fear my faith is not as strong as yours. I fear that . . . ’ her words faltered as she touched the edge of a great concern.

‘Fear what my wife?’ he asked gently.

‘It is nothing,’ she said, and continued with preparing the meal.

‘Fear that we may die out here in God’s wilderness,’ he said. She glanced up at him with just the hint of tears. He saw her fear and placed his arms around her. She wanted to cry, but knew that if she did, she would only cause her husband to feel despair. Her quiet strength had always supported her idealistic husband in his ventures since he had joined the Lutheran ministry. To cry now would strip him of confidence in his faith. ‘God will find His way to provide for us,’ he said tenderly as he held his wife. ‘Just as He did for the Chosen People on the Exodus. Just as He does when He brings us the cool evenings out here to take away the terrible heat of the day from our lives. And now He has sent us the Aboriginal man as our dark angel to guide us to the Schmidt farm. I know that the Lord will always be with us in our mission to bring light to this new country.’

Caroline gently pushed her husband at arm’s length. ‘You are right Otto,’ she said with the faintest of smiles. ‘God has not forsaken us.’

‘You will see,’ he said, beaming her the brightest of smiles. ‘His will be done.’

Caroline disengaged herself from her husband’s arms and went about serving the meal.

That night, Caroline lay on her back and gazed at the spectacular canopy of shimmering southern stars. Beside her, Otto snored loudly, blissfully confident in the Lord’s providence. She could not sleep. Her faith was weak and she wondered at God’s cruel sense of humour in sending them a badly wounded heathen whose only concern was for tobacco and who drank the last of their reserve of water.

She longed for white fields of snow and the pungent smell of the dark pine trees of Germany. This land was so alien with its harsh, ugly landscapes of grey scrub and dry red earth. But, as she gazed up at the Milky Way, she noticed the constellation of the Southern Cross and felt a strange peace, as if she were seeing for the very first time God’s sign of hope. Now, if only the black heathen lived, and Otto’s faith in Him was rewarded, they would live to carry out her husband’s ministry.

A short distance away Wallarie stirred in his fevered sleep. A voice was calling to him from a place beyond the living world. It was Tom Duffy! He needed Wallarie to return to the dark forests of the dreaded northern warriors.

Wallarie groaned his protest. It was not possible, he responded. He did not have the strength to do so. And besides, the journey was fraught with danger from the armed prospectors. Had he not already felt the sting of their bullets? But Tom was calling to him with the voice of the White Warrior spirit. He must leave as soon as he could and travel north. For there a great event would take place. An event that would still the Nerambura’s cry for vengeance.

When the morning came to the plains Wallarie still lay in his fevered world. Otto tended to him, as the sun rose to a pinpoint of biting heat, scorching the earth below. He changed the bandages whilst Caroline looked on with a worried frown. ‘I think the Lord has willed that the heathen depart this world,’ she said over her husband’s shoulder. ‘He does not appear to be recovering.’

‘He sleeps,’ her husband grunted. ‘It is a good sign. These people have a reputation for being able to suffer wounds that might kill a European.’

Caroline turned and walked back to their horse. Its head lolled and it did not appear to notice her presence. ‘I do not think our horse will last the day without water,’ she said when Otto joined her. ‘We are down to our last cup, and unless we are found very soon, we will be joining the heathen.’

Otto gazed at the sweeping panorama of flat plains dotted with clumps of spindly trees that seemed to dance in the heat haze above the earth, and knew that his faith was being tested by the God of the Old Testament. ‘God has sent us the black man,’ he said simply. ‘He will save us.’

‘God helps those who help themselves,’ his wife retorted, with an edge of frustration for her idealistic husband’s optimism. ‘I think we should attempt to travel further west. Surely we must find a river or a stream soon.’

‘We cannot,’ Otto replied quietly. ‘To travel with no reserve of water would certainly kill the horse and most probably us as well.’

Caroline shook her head angrily. Inactivity was not something she perceived as an option. ‘So we stay and wait for providence to save us,’ she said with a bitter smile. ‘But I will accept God’s will my husband,’ she added, ‘so long as you do.’

Otto glanced at his wife and realised why he had grown to love the once flighty golden-haired girl from Brandenburg. She had been an unlikely catch for a man devoted to his ministry, a young woman who had given up a whirl of parties and balls to join him in a life devoid of luxury. But she had and now they faced possible death in a harsh land thousands of miles from their home. The flighty girl had matured, possessing a courage greater than his own, he admitted to himself. ‘Have faith my beautiful wife,’ he said gently, as he reached for her hand. ‘God loves us and I love you.’

Caroline felt the tears well up in her eyes. Otto was not a man to express his love very often. He was a taciturn man, except when he preached to his congregations. He had been so different from other men she had known: quiet, strong and intelligent, a man whose charisma she often felt should have been turned to politics or business. ‘I have faith in you Otto,’ she said as she took his hand. She did not mention God.

They spent the day in the shade of the sulky. Otto read silently from his Bible whilst Caroline occupied herself sewing. The day droned with a silence broken only by the screech of an eagle and the distant cawing of crows.

At sunset the horse lay down and refused to rise. Death was near. Otto gazed sadly across at Wallarie who had not moved all day. Was it that God had deserted them? Was it that he was a hopeless dreamer as Caroline’s father had once accused him?

The night once again came to blanket them with its crystalline spread of tiny white lights. Otto held his wife in his arms and realised with savage self-recrimination that he had brought her to the point of a slow and terrible death from thirst. She was weak, and her skin felt hot and dry, but she had not complained. He knew that water was all she now craved. She had retreated to an imaginary world of icy waterfalls and clear-running streams of abundant water. He too felt the thirst but had to remain strong for his wife. As a last resort, he would put the horse out of its misery and they could drink its blood. It was not an option he wanted to consider, but it was all they had left.

Sleep came fitfully to Otto. When he woke in the morning, he gazed through rheumy eyes, to where the black man was lying under the bush. He was gone! Otto jerked fully awake and cast about the plain for a sign of the Aboriginal warrior.