The Smuggler's Curse (20 page)

‘Captain Bowen, if I might ask …?' enquires Miss Boston. She sounds extremely concerned, and Miss Barnett is rigid with fear.

‘Ladies, do not alarm yourselves,' replies the Captain, reassuringly. ‘I've dealt with this sort of situation before. Red, down on the floor before he sees you.'

I slide from the seat into the narrow space between us. I wonder how he can be so calm with an armed bandit only yards away. However, we have both been in far worse predicaments in recent weeks. Facing a lone
robber has to be better than being slowly roasted alive by Chinese pirates. I realise I feel surprisingly calm, too.

‘In my bag, there are two loaded Colts, right at the top. The hammers just need cocking. You keep one, hand me the other. Stay hidden down there until you hear me say, “not my father's gold watch”. Got that? That'll be my signal.'

I nod. ‘Your father's gold watch.'

‘When I say it, I'll distract him, and you pop your head up to the window and shoot the brigand's horse. He'll be so surprised that when the horse goes down, I'll shoot him. My father's gold watch. Not until. You won't be able to miss.'

Miss Boston looks even more shocked at that, covering her mouth with her fingers, suddenly wondering, no doubt, with what pair of desperate ruffians she shares a coach.

The Captain tucks his pistol beneath his coat, swings open the door and steps down onto the coach's step. As he does so, a chilly breeze sweeps inside.

I can hear the other passengers climbing down from up on top as well, several of them cursing at their bad luck, using language most foul indeed. Miss Boston and Miss Barnett pretend not to hear though they do blush a little.

The bandit's horse will not stay still, snorting, twisting its head back and forward and trying to turn in a circle, unhappy with its rider and trying to unseat him. He struggles to keep the horse under control with only one hand on the reins, the other gripping his pistol.

‘Damn it, forget that plan Red,' exclaims the Captain. ‘The man's a fool.' The Captain reaches back and slams the coach door. It crashes shut as loud as any gunshot. The horse startles and rears up, kicking its front legs into the air in panic. As it does so, the Captain leaps forward and grabs the robber's ankle. With a cry of surprise, the rider topples sidewards off his horse, his other foot still caught in the stirrup. He is left dangling upside down, his head banging on the ground.

Miss Barnett screams but Miss Boston remains calm, making soothing noises.

The Captain grabs the horse's reins before it becomes even more skittish and bolts. Hanging upside down helplessly, the bandit kicks and struggles, but it does him no good. In fact, I think he must have hurt himself as he groans in pain.

‘Well, thanks to you, sir, the judge will be earning his fee with this one, damn his evil soul,' says a man in a thick brown coat. ‘Well done, sir.'

The man leans forward and pulls the scarf from
the bushranger's face. I cannot believe it. He is a boy, younger than me, and completely terrified. He looks as if he is about to cry.

‘Oh, no,' Captain Bowen exclaims quietly. ‘Not this.' He sighs and his shoulders drop as if the weight of the world has just been dumped on them.

‘Here, Red,' says the Captain, handing me the reins before he untangles the boy's foot from the stirrup and lowers him to the ground. He picks the boy up as if he is a bag of feathers, carries him over to the coach and sits him down, leaning his back up against the coach wheel.

‘Red, take his horse and tie it to the rear of the coach,' he says. ‘Give it plenty of rope and be sure to tie up the stirrups so they don't dangle.'

‘Sir,' I reply. ‘I'll …' but a man interrupts me.

‘I knows youse,' he says, pointing at the Captain. He has skin as dark as a sailor's. ‘Youse are Bowen, the famous smugg …, er, sea captain. I seed you in the Smuggler's Curse, I did, in Broome, only six months past it was.' He turns to face the crowd of passengers, now all inspecting the half-unconscious boy. ‘This really is him,
Black Bowen. Out of Broome.'

The passengers look, curious. Most people seem to have heard of Black Bowen.

‘I am afraid you are mistaken, my good friend,' the Captain says. ‘The name is Read. Red Read, as you will find on my coach ticket here.' The Captain unfolds one of the receipts for the fare, which does, indeed, have my name written on it. He shows the sailor.

I doubt he can read but he nods wisely and then touches his forelock. ‘Sorry to be bothering you, sir. I must be mistook.'

‘I can have fairly swore,' he mutters as he climbs back on the coach and up to the top, ready for the final part of his cold journey.

‘Give me a hand here!' calls the coach driver. ‘We'll deliver this devil to the constables in Fremantle.'

The driver ties the boy's hands to the luggage rack. He sits awkwardly, shaking with cold, or maybe fear. We are all aware that for highway robbery only a few years ago he would have been in for a very short walk to a very sudden stop. Now, in these more modern and enlightened times, he is in for a very long holiday in a dark, dank cell in the infamous Fremantle Prison.

A few minutes later, with a savage crack of his whip, the driver urges the horse team forward again, this time at
a gallop. The coach jerks several times and we settle back in as comfortably, or as uncomfortably, as we can for the journey to Gingin and the next change for the horses.

For the remainder of the passage, the Captain says barely a word. He stares broodingly out of the window, clearly not actually seeing the scrubby bushes and sand. In all the time I have known him, I do not think I ever saw the Captain so preoccupied. I wonder what bothers him so much.

‘Captain, will you be away from Mrs Bowen for considerable time this journey?' asks Miss Boston. She seems more than impressed with the Captain and apparently wants to get to know him better.

‘I've been travelling for some time,' he replies, giving nothing away.

She tries opening several conversations with him, but he is completely withdrawn. Even mentioning that her two brothers are senior naval men does not draw the Captain from his preoccupation. She is evidently well born, just like Captain Bowen though he spends much of his time in hotels and bawdy houses consorting with sailors, rogues and vagabonds. I suspect Miss Boston's chastity is never going to be in any danger as far as the Captain is concerned.

‘The Lobster!' yells the driver as the coach slows.

‘Not too much longer now,' announces Miss Boston.

We stop outside the Lobster Hotel, a white building at the top of a sand hill. It needs a good clean up. The Captain opens the coach door and steps out. ‘If you will excuse me, Miss Barnett, Miss Boston,' he says as he extends his arm for the ladies to be helped down the coach step. ‘I will re-join you inside in a few moments.'

‘Surely, Captain Bowen,' replies Miss Boston, her hopes suddenly revived.

‘Red,' he says after the passengers have all entered the hotel and the groom is leading the tired horses to the stable. ‘Help me down with the boy.'

The lad is awake but still half out of his mind with fear, and perhaps cold, as he shivers uncontrollably. The Captain cuts away the ropes from the boy's wrists with one slice of his sharp black blade.

‘What's your name, boy?' demands the Captain.

‘Ar-Ar-Archie. Archie Simmons, sir,' he says, so quietly we can hardly hear him.

‘Archie Simmons,' says the Captain. ‘In ten minutes I am going to fire my pistol. Before then, I suggest you get as far away from here as possible. Through the bush and north along the coast until you reach home. Don't stop, don't slow down. Someone might come after you, but you are young and should be able to outrun them with a
head start. Go now, and when you do get home, find a less deadly profession. Highway robbery will only end badly, maybe even at the end of a hangman's rope. Believe me, boy, I know.'

The boy nods in relief and does not need a second telling. He jumps from the roof of the coach in one leap, undoes his horse, and swings into the saddle barely using the stirrups. The horse bolts away like a hare at the greyhound racing.

I look at the Captain in astonishment. ‘Why did you do that?' I ask.

‘Professional courtesy, I suppose, Red. Besides, you know what the law of the land is like. Some magistrate or other would probably have jailed the little waif for twenty years. It doesn't seem right. It would have been like letting them jail you.'

‘I hope that never happens,' I reply.

‘You'll be fine as long as I'm about,' he continues. ‘I won't let them jail you. I promise.'

I am not sure how to reply. I tend to feel reasonably safe knowing the Captain is close by, but it is sure a good feeling to have his reassurance.

‘Even if I have to shoot you first myself to stop them,' he adds.

Ten minutes later, he fires his pistol into the air, scaring
me half to death. ‘Stop!' he yells.

Several men rush out from the Lobster's front door.

‘The boy. He's escaped!' exclaims the Captain, sounding surprised. ‘He went that way,' pointing in precisely the opposite direction to where the boy fled.

‘Ah, civilisation,' announces the Captain, taking a deep breath.

I look out of the window, but nothing very much seems to have changed. The bush has thinned out a little, a paddock is dotted with dusty sheep, and a herd of cows stands unmoving and uninterested in us passing. I do notice a faint smell on the wind, though.

More houses line the road. Surprisingly, many are crowded together considering there is so much space about. Children stand in their doorways and stare out at the coach as it thunders past. Occasionally, it scatters chooks pecking in the road and scares dogs, which then come running after the coach, barking loudly.

Fremantle, when we arrive late in the afternoon, is nothing like I expected at all. As we reach the bridge over
the Swan River, I see off to the left a large tanning factory at the water's edge. It smells bad, really bad. Even the cesspit at Mr Tosser's, the butcher near our hotel, smells sweet compared to this horrible, foul pesthole, and Mr Tosser is a famous stinker. We often say the vile smell of his cesspit is enough to kill seagulls in flight.

Miss Boston and Miss Barnett both take handkerchiefs dipped in scent and hold them to their noses, as the coach rumbles its way slowly through the mass of coach and wagon traffic and people crowding the streets. From the look on Miss Boston's face, I do not think the scent works all that well.

‘I fear the odour gets worse every year,' she announces, shaking her head in disapproval.

‘Indeed,' replies the Captain, being polite, but not continuing the conversation.

I try holding my nose, but it does no good, and I nearly pass out from lack of air. I wonder how the locals can live with it.

Small boats ferry passengers upriver towards Perth. Cargo ships are moored against a long, wide jetty, with scores of masts and rigging lost against the buildings and a steep limestone hill. A small steamship spews out thick black smoke from its stack. Just as well the Dragon crew are not here with us, I decide. They all
hate steamers. There are even more of the horrible iron ships anchored offshore between the mainland and an island.

The smell soon fades, but the noises of the street grow louder. It could have woken the Devil himself from the very depths of Hell. In all directions the sound of metal wheel hoops on the rough gravel streets rattle, screech and grind along.

The coach rolls towards the central part of town. High on the hill overlooking the town the infamous Fremantle Prison, looking more like a castle from Ivanhoe, looms like a spectre. On the street below the hill, canvas-covered stalls laden with vegetables, fish hanging by their tails and dead rabbits, and carts with clothing, pots, knives and wicker brooms line the street into the town centre. Stall keepers all yell hoarsely as they try to flog their wares.

The coach makes its way along, the horses trotting quickly. The driver yells and people on foot leap out of the way as he is clearly not stopping for anyone who doesn't move. Ten minutes later, he wheels the horse team away from the outskirts and directly into the town.

A huge town hall and rows of neat shops line a dead straight street leading to an octagonal sandstone building high on a hill near the water's edge. Flags and a black
time-ball waiting for the one o'clock cannon are attached to a ship's mast in its courtyard. Further on, massive brick wool warehouses, magnificent hotels and really grand buildings line every other street.

I notice a surprising number of beggars slumped miserably in doorways, staring blankly or pleadingly at us as we pass by. In a vacant block between two warehouses, a team of prisoners dressed in drab prison clothes is cutting limestone building blocks without enthusiasm. Further on, by a circular horse trough, a gang of boys is fighting. One has landed in the water, ending the fight with wild laughter.

Three worn-out looking women displaying their legs shout at us as we pass by. Miss Boston and Miss Barnett look particularly shocked and turn their faces away from the window.

The sun is fading, but it seems later than it is as the smoke-filled air from countless chimneys and fires darkens the sky.

Can this really be the Fremantle people have talked so enthusiastically about? I am disappointed, after all the stories I have heard. I had imagined it to be a glittering, wonderful city full of rich and attractive people, but now as far as I can see from the coach window, the place is just a bigger, smellier version of Broome. Where are all
the attractive people, especially the pretty girls?

‘Welcome to Fremantle, Red. The most wonderful city on earth.'

‘Sir?' I ask, screwing my face up in disbelief.