Читать книгу The Squatter's Ward - Edward S Sorenson - Страница 8

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Tipparoo was enlivened about once a week by the arrival of bullock teams, passing to and from Pine Mountain and the mouth of Tomki Creek, engaged in trucking pine logs to the river, to be rafted to sawmills and to vessels at Coraki.

Saturday evening was marked by the advent of these teams; and the thunderous crack of whips, the creaking of the low block-wheels, and the deep-toned voices of the drivers, re-echoed through the resonant wood, as the long teams came filing up the hill, and went creeping on past the homestead to a camping place below. There the bullocks were unyoked, and big brass bells strapped to the necks of those that were given to wandering. Then the tucker-boxes were hauled down from the tops of the loads, and fires built to boil the billies. The light-hearted bullockies bustled about in their shirt-sleeves and torn trousers—often ripped from boot to belt—some whistling a lively hornpipe or a quick waltz, others singing scraps of bush songs; while the deep tones of the bells mingled with the sharp clear notes of the mopokes. The fires were burning briskly, the billies were boiled, and the supper of damper and beef was in progress, when Richard Merton appeared on the scene and at once entered into conversation with a dark-bearded giant, named Harry Wren.

"Have you seen my blackboy—Mumby—in your travels, Wren?" he asked.

"Not since Monday—Monday, wasn't it, he came to our camp, Jim?" said Wren, in a strong, deep voice, to one of his three companions.

"Yas, lookin' for a bool," drawled Jim, a long, loose-made, clean-shaven rustic, as he sliced off a huge piece of damper.

"You've missed him since Friday dinner time, old Ralf was tellin' me?" said Wren.

"Yes, he ought to've been back last night. His horse was found feeding along the fence this morning with the saddle and bridle on—but the reins broken as though it had pulled away from somewhere. We've been searching all day, but could find no sign of him. I'm afraid he's met with an accident, as his dog came back to camp last night. The blacks took him out round Goolgolgon, thinking Mumby had got a buster and was unable to get up, and that the dog would lead them to the spot; but they might as well have had a nanny-goat for all the good he was."

"That's strange!" said Wren musingly. "Did he ever stop away before?"

"He ran away once when he was a youngster, and went back to his camp at Cobar Top. I'd whipped him for chasing calves about. He's always been a good blackboy since then."

"He might be lyin' hurt somewhere, Mr. Merton," said Wren.

"I'm afraid so," Merton rejoined. "He's not been to any of the camps on the Bargo—Hulloa! Who is this?"

"Magnus Susman, by the go of him," answered Jim. "Yer ken tell that cove a mile off. His legs is allers goin' like the pendulum of a clock. His 'orses never take no notice of him. They knows darn well he can't ride. No mistake, he makes me laugh."

Magnus Susman, the owner of Wangooma Station, the newcomer proved to be. He was riding a little chestnut mare, which shied at the group by the fire, and nearly added Mr. Susman to their number, thus verifying Jim's declaration as to his indifferent horsemanship.

Harry Wren, who was quaffing tea from a pannikin at the moment, nearly choked as Mr. Susman's foot flew out of the stirrup while something guttural that sounded suspiciously like suppressed laughter emanated from the vicinity of "Long Jim." The other pair, more modest, looked away from one another.

"Whoa, you brute!" cried Mr. Susman, reestablishing his equilibrium in the saddle and giving the reins a jerk that caused the mare to throw her head up and smack him in the mouth. Something that was wholly incompatible with the laws of polite language as laid down by Lord Chesterfield was evoked from the afflicted gentleman, who now made haste to plant himself on terra firma. He was a little, squat, bandy-legged man, with a hard, beardless face. His head was as bald as a claypan, though he was yet under thirty. His complexion was sallow, almost unhealthy in its look, and his eyes were small and shifty. He was unmarried; some said he was a misogynist. So far as the women-folk were concerned, it mattered little whether he hated them or loved them, for they certainly could never admire him, as his face was a decided sin against handsomeness, while his voice was weak and effeminate. But he had one redeeming point, which, in the eyes of many women, would counterbalance his defective qualities. He was wealthy, the Tyson of that little quarter of the world, who scarcely knew where his thousands ended. His home, secluded in a dense environment of trees and shrubs, built for the most part of solid stone, with its many lichen-covered gables and turrets, its long, wide walls, and its clematis-screened porticoes, was a veritable castle in its way; a palace, whose cheerless walls had echoed the foot-treads of many a dead generation, that was attractive alike to the archaeologist, the curious and inquisitive tourist, and the lover of the romantic and weird; yet rendered inaccessible to all by the retiring disposition and somewhat hermitical habits of its occupant. In years gone by, it was rumored, its sturdy doors had stood wide in welcome to a certain lady, who chose not to enter, and they closed with a posthumous obdurateness against the female world—against all but one old withered hag, who had been there for an unknown number of years, and who did all the housekeeping, which was not a great deal, seeing that she and her master were the only inmates of Wangooma. True it is he had made several attempts to evict her, but she had stubbornly refused to be evicted, claiming privilege to live there by virtue of her having served his grandfather and his father before him, and had seen them laid one by one in their graves in the garden, where grew the richest and most luxuriant rose-bushes on Wangooma. It had been her long hope, her one ambition, to be made mistress of his castle, and to have servants and maids to wait on her to felicitate her declining years. But the sour and wrinkled aspect of Hannah Grubbins's countenance, her flat bust and hunch-back, had ever been an eyesore to Magnus Susman, and he would much rather be laid with his forefathers under the rose-tree than linked with her in matrimony.

He had sworn to go to his grave unmarried, and believed that he would never desire to break the oath; and so with his decease would pass away the last of the race of Susmans. Theirs was a long race, whose genealogy was traceable to the days of Queen Anne; but it had never been an illustrious one. There was always something of a stigmatical character in their successive careers, and an hereditary inclination to sordidness and covetousness that made them unpopular members of society—men who were openly shunned and studiously snubbed by the fastidious and the well-born.

Though for many years Magnus, the last of the Susmans, had led a life of honor, and striven against the evil genii that had shadowed his progenitors, to wipe out his birthstain and purify his ignoble name, his rejection on the threshold of Love's realm was disastrous to such resolutions, and shaped his course in the way which all had gone before him. It was not exactly a course of utter dissoluteness and degradation; but it imparted enough of abandonment to destroy his equable standing with gentlefolk—to make him an outcast.

He was indifferent to the state and style of his dress, though he exhibited a little care in this respect when he paid a visit to Tipparoo. That was seldom; being, for the most part, when some pressing necessity demanded such diversion from his wonted routine of solitude. Those unacquainted with his every-day life, and of his past, attributed his moodiness and solitary habits to the tragical episodes that had given the "castle" such wide renown. His father, Septimus Susman, the reputed owner of Wangooma, had fallen downstairs and sustained injuries from which he shortly afterwards died. Magnus had just before returned from college, where be had conceived a passion for a young lady not definitely known, but supposed to have run away with a penniless nondescript; and he resided at the station with his Uncle Lincoln, and his cousin Floyd. The latter was a quiet and unassuming young fellow, who was spoken of as the best of them all, though he was much like his cousin Magnus in courting seclusion. It was said that Magnus Susman had come to vegetate in the country until he had recovered from the mystic blow the unknown had dealt him. He was no longer the civil and courteous young gentleman of former days. He was surly and bearish in manner, unsociable, quarrelsome, and at times violent in his temper. His wicked propensities soon destroyed the equanimity of the household, and caused him to be disliked by everyone. He cherished an insatiable hatred of his cousin Floyd, as it transpired after his father's death that his uncle Lincoln was the owner of the estate, and consequently Floyd was directly heir to the property, which Magnus had believed from his boyhood would one day be his, and had looked upon his cousin Floyd as a "two-legged object without expectations."

Despite the animosity existing between them, however, they were frequently hunting and shooting together. But there came a sudden and violent severance; and there were those who turned to their companions afterwards with, "I told you so!" "I knew this would happen!" and such commentaries.

Ralf Havelock, addicted to certain hobbies as well as most men, had a penchant for cutting paragraphs out of papers and pasting them in a bulky album—paragraphs relating to convicts. police, squatters, floods, droughts, fires, stock and station matters, and anything that was mysterious and marvellous. Among the matter thus stored up was the following script, over which Ralf, when referring to his album for something to clinch an argument, or opening it to add to his treasures, would often pause and shake his head:—

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

Gundurimbar, Friday.

The flood, which is now subsiding, was synchronous with the sad disappearance of Lincoln Susman, Esq. of Wangooma. He was observed going towards the creek late on Thursday evening, and has not since been heard of. Parties have been out searching two days, and it is now feared he is drowned. Local opinion is that he got beyond his depth while rescuing some floating pumpkins, as he was observed thus occupied an hour or two earlier, and was swept, away by the strong current. Much sympathy is expressed for his bereaved nephew, who is now the only living member of the long race of Susmans. It will be remembered that a month ago Mr. Magnus Susman had the misfortune to shoot his cousin Floyd, through a gun accidentally exploding on Kangaroo Flat while they were shooting together; and a little time previously his father was killed by falling down stairs in the dark.

Wangooma has been a cynosure to dozens of surrounding settlers during the last two days, and the sad events, occurring one so closely upon another, that have given this well-known homestead a kind of melancholy fame, are paramount in the minds of all. Mr. Susman was seventy-five years of age, and could not swim.

Since all this had happened, some mouths ago, Magnus Susman had not been seen at Tipparoo till this particular night, yet, as he stepped within the light of the camp-fire, there was no effusive greeting on his part, or enthusiasm in his manner at the meeting with his neighbor—the only gentleman who still honored him with the hand of friendship, now an almost forgotten quality with Magnus Susman.

"How do you do, Mr. Susman?" said Merton. "This is a pleasure I did not expect." Long Jim turned his head and grinned.

"I've just come over from Long Swamp," said Susman, and his appearance would not have belied him, if he had said he had come out of a quagmire. "I saw you had a big fire over here as I was crossing Stony Ridge," Susman continued. "I thought your grass might be alight, and feared it would spread on to my run. The grass is long and dry now, and would go like billy-ho once it got a-start."

"A fire!" cried Merton, alarmed in a moment. "Where?"

"Over Goolgolgon way. Look, you can see the redness of it from here."

All had risen to their feet, and turned their eyes in the direction that Magnus Susman indicated with a jerk of his thumb. There, through the murk, could be seen the broad, ruddy glow of a great fire reflected on the dusky sky, growing broader and deeper every moment as the flames increased below; and gradually the long, dark bank of the mountain grew clearer till the tops of the tallest pines stood out faintly in the dim light.

"By cripes!" drawled Jim, "it's a gorner with them logs we drawed out o' the bend Monday, two weeks, or I'm a spifflicated goslin'."

"Gerrout, yer fool," said another man: "fires don't burn green scrubs."

Don't they! That's all you know about it. By gum! I've seen 'em burn scrubs in Gippsland—never leave a blasted leaf. An' I've seen flames leap over the Murrumbidgee, an' run down gallopin' horsemen an' burn 'em to cinders! Would yer b'lieve that?"

"No, Jim, old man. Been bullock-punchin' too long. Try it on the kids."

"Garn!" said Jim. "You mud-splodgers don't know wot a bush fire is. Why, knock me stiff! There ain't nothin' 'ere ter make a bloomin' fire!"

His mate, pointed to the bright crimson glow in the eastern sky. "Look there!" he said, an' tell me yer mulgas ter-morrer night!"