The River Charm (10 page)

Down in the kitchen, Bridget was packing up hampers of crockery, cutlery and cooking implements. Mamma tackled books, papers and food supplies. When the children went to bed after a picnic supper, Charlotte's ears strained in the darkness listening for any telltale sounds. Much later, when Charlotte finally fell asleep, Mamma had still not come upstairs to bed.

 

10

Flight

 

‘Charlotte, dearest,' whispered Mamma, shaking her gently on the shoulder. ‘Charlotte, wake up.'

Mamma stood over her bed, black hair hanging down her back and a shawl thrown over her white nightgown. Mamma's face looked pale and drawn in the flickering light of the candle. Charlotte glanced over to the other bed where Emily was still asleep, her nightcap tied tightly under her chin.

‘I am sorry to wake you,' apologised Mamma. ‘But we must get ready to go. I need you and Emily to dress and help me. We can leave Louisa and James asleep until the very last moment.'

Charlotte yawned and nodded reluctantly, not wanting to leave her warm bed.

Mamma woke Emily quietly and lit a candle for them to dress by.

Charlotte shivered in the cold early morning air as she climbed out of bed and grabbed her shawl. The floorboards felt icy under her bare feet. The rest of the house was dark and quiet, except for the long, rumbling snores that came from Mr Barton's room at the opposite end of the hall.

The girls splashed their faces in the washbasin and dressed hurriedly in chemises, petticoats, dark riding habits, stockings and boots.

Together, Mamma and the girls carried down the trunks to the rear courtyard. Charley and Mr Ash had saddled up a number of horses, including Ophelia and Clarie, and they were tethered outside the stable, stamping their hooves and jingling their bits. Charlotte worried that the noise might wake Mr Barton. Fortunately, his bedroom faced the front of the house. Charlotte shivered and wrapped her woollen shawl more tightly around her shoulders.

Mr Ash, Charley and Bill the bullocky were now loading the trunks onto three red Devon bullocks by the light of several lanterns. The track to Budgong was too narrow and precipitous to drive a vehicle. The bullocks would be driven on foot by Bill and one of the convicts.

Mamma flitted to and fro anxiously in the darkness, glancing back to the house, giving the men directions and checking that all was packed to her satisfaction. The men loaded sacks of flour, potatoes, sugar and tea from the storehouse. The first two bullocks had already been loaded up with tents, bedding, Mamma's medical chest and foodstuffs. Bridget carried a wicker hamper of provisions from the kitchen.

Charley had captured a number of chickens, which were now imprisoned in a wicker hamper, squawking with disgust. The bullock at the rear bellowed mournfully. Samson ran among the bullocks and men, barking with excitement.

It was impossible that Mr Barton had not heard the commotion.

‘Run and fetch Maugie, if you please, Emily,' asked Mamma. ‘I have a pannier here for him. He'll be snug in a nest of old clothes.'

Emily ran to obey, her brown ringlets tangled and tousled.

‘Charlotte, my dear, would you be so good as to wake Louisa and James and help them dress?' asked Mamma. ‘We must get away as soon as possible. It is nearly dawn.'

The horizon to the east was streaked with a glimmer of crimson. The men fumbled with buckles and straps on the packsaddles in the dim light. A cock crowed.

Charlotte ran upstairs, her heart thumping. The house seemed bare and cold and her footsteps echoed on the timber floorboards. In the middle bedroom, she woke James first, urging him to be quick and quiet. Then she went to Mamma's room next door. Louisa was fast asleep in Mamma's wide four-poster bed, tangled in the damp sheets, her thumb in her mouth.

Charlotte leant over her youngest sister and breathed in the warm, milky scent of her skin.

‘Louisa,' whispered Charlotte. ‘Poppet? It is time to wake up.' Louisa rolled over and burrowed deeper into the blankets, her back to Charlotte. ‘Come on, poppet. We are going on a wonderful adventure today. You get to ride your pony all day long. Won't that be lovely?'

Louisa moaned and her eyelids fluttered open. Charlotte lifted her gently out of the sheets and sat her on the side of the bed. Using a wet cloth, she quickly sponged her face and hands, then dressed her sister like a limp doll. Louisa was too sleepy to either help or complain.

Picking Louisa up, Charlotte piggybacked her into James's room. James was up and dressed, wearing his fawn trousers, white shirt, a blue jacket and boots – his hair standing on end. He was standing by the fireplace, penknife in hand.

‘What are you doing, James?' Charlotte demanded.

James started and guiltily hid the knife behind his back. He had carved some letters on the mantelpiece.

‘I'm carving my name,' he confessed, shamefaced. ‘Just in case we never come back. I wanted to leave my name as a record that we belong here and Oldbury belongs to us.'

Charlotte nodded, a lump in her throat. ‘Then you had better finish it,' she suggested. ‘I'll wait for you.'

When Charlotte, James and Louisa came downstairs, the men were loading Maugie's basket on top of a bullock, opposite Mamma's portable writing desk and a large hamper of earthenware crockery. Maugie roared with indignation.

It was this roar that finally roused Mr Barton. He began banging on the locked door, yelling and swearing at the top of his voice.

‘We must make haste,' Mamma urged the men.

A loud crash came from upstairs. The children glanced back towards the house in fear.

‘Hurry up,' whispered Charlotte, jiggling up and down.

At last, the final parcel was strapped onto the rear bullock's packsaddle. Bill the bullocky swung his long-handled whip over his head, cracking it sharply over the bullocks' backs.

‘Walk on, boys,' called Bill. The three bullocks started forward slowly in unison, directed by Bill's verbal instructions and whip cracks.

‘We will be right behind you, Bill,' said Mamma.

‘Right you are, ma'am,' he replied, lifting his cabbage tree hat.

As the bullocks moved out of the yard, the two men walking along their left side, Mamma hurried the children and Bridget towards the horses.

Another loud crash came from the house. This one sounded closer.

Louisa had just been lifted onto her grey pony and James mounted on his gelding when Mr Barton staggered onto the verandah, carrying a pistol.

‘I outwitted you, woman,' jeered Mr Barton. ‘I smashed the door off its hinges.'

Mr Ash started forward but Mamma gestured to him to stay back. She grasped Samson by the collar, holding him by her side.

‘Mount your horses, girls,' whispered Mamma, holding Ophelia and Clarie by the reins with her other hand.

Charlotte and Emily scrambled up into their side-saddles as quickly as they could, their eyes trained on their step­father and his gun. Mr Ash helped Bridget into her saddle with more difficulty, as she was not used to riding on horseback.

‘What d'you think you're doing?' bellowed Mr Barton, waving the pistol in the air.

‘We are leaving, George,' explained Mamma gently. ‘You have succeeded in driving us from our home.'

‘You can't leave,' he shouted. ‘You can't leave me here alone.'

In answer, Mamma lifted her skirt in one gloved hand, stepped on the mounting block and swung into the saddle.

‘We are going away to a place where you cannot harm my children ever again,' said Mamma, pulling the reins.

Mr Ash and Charley mounted their own horses.

Mr Barton raised the pistol and took aim at Mamma, squeezing the trigger – nothing sounded but an empty click. He tried again. Mamma ignored him and twitched her horse's neck with her riding crop. The cavalcade of horses and riders moved forward.

Mr Barton sank to his knees and sobbed. ‘I'm sorry. Don't go. Don't leave me alone, I beg you.'

‘Farewell, George,' replied Mamma. ‘I pray you find peace away from here.'

Mr Barton leapt to his feet and threw the unloaded pistol after them.

‘I'll show you,' he shouted. ‘I'll burn the place down. I'll ruin your reputation so that no decent person will ever speak to you. I'll make sure you and your brats never get a penny from this place ever again.'

Louisa whimpered. James wheeled his pony to charge back at his stepfather.

‘Keep riding, dearest,' Mamma insisted. ‘We cannot do anything more for him.'

‘Mamma, how did you know that Mr Barton couldn't shoot you?' asked James, his brow furrowed as he nudged his pony towards the others.

Mamma smiled at him reassuringly. ‘Of course he could not – I hid the lead shot and dampened the powder of all the guns myself.'

The horses turned right onto the carriageway and trotted away to the east, away from the home where the children had lived their entire lives. Charlotte felt a huge lump in her throat that made it difficult to breathe. Her eyes swam with tears so the road ahead was a blur of green and ochre.

She was determined not to look back. She was determined not to cry.

The road, still deep in shadows, twisted and rose up the hill. Samson followed behind, his pink tongue lolling as he panted, running to keep up.

To Charlotte's right was the tall, prickly hawthorn hedge, which blocked the view towards the estate. Then came a small break in the vegetation, offering a glimpse back to Oldbury. Charlotte couldn't resist. Through it she could see the house of golden stone, its windows dark and empty, surrounded by trees. Beyond that she could see the graceful elm, with the empty bench seat where they loved to sit and read and sketch. Further still she could see the waterhole, where she imagined the dragonflies dancing above the shadowy water with shimmering wings. And then, a moment later, Ophelia passed the gap and it was gone.

Charlotte glanced at Emily to see that her sister's face, like her own, was slick with tears. They rode on in silence, except for the drumming of the horses' hooves and the jingling of the tin mugs and pannikins tied to the saddles.

The road crested the hill and beyond that, as far as they could see, lay a dense, green forest bathed in the rosy glow of the rising sun. A narrow, twisting track led to the horizon.

It's a beautiful day
, thought Charlotte.
A beautiful day for an adventure.

After about three miles they reached Sutton Forest, a village consisting of a small schoolhouse, several bark-and-slab huts, a store and three inns, all huddled around a wooden chapel. Just outside the village, they overtook the two servants and the trio of bullocks, plodding steadily along with all their possessions.

Mamma directed Mr Ash, Charley and Bridget to wait for them at the Talbot Inn while she took the children into the cemetery, fringed with weeping willows. Mamma led them to a sandstone tablet that marked a burial vault, carved with the name of James Atkinson.

‘I wanted to come and say goodbye to your dear papa,' said Mamma, her voice shaky. ‘He was a good man – kind and just.'

Charlotte breathed in. Her mother rarely spoke of their father.

Charlotte's memories of him were hazy – a man with soft brown hair and a gentle voice, who would swing her up in the air and make her laugh. Her father, strong and safe, holding her in his arms on the front of his saddle, way up high on his thoroughbred stallion. Her father gently handing her Samson as a wriggling, chubby puppy and telling her that Samson would protect her with his life. She cherished these memories because she knew the other children could barely remember him at all.

‘He was taken from us far too early,' Mamma continued. ‘Louisa was just a babe of two months. He died of a lingering illness after drinking impure water on top of Razorback Mountain on his way back from a trip to Sydney. He loved you all very much.'

‘Did he know me?' asked Louisa, pouting.

‘I carried you into his bedroom, and you began to cry,' said Mamma. ‘He saw you for just a moment, but then I had to take you away. The crying was too much for him in his delirious state.'

Mamma closed her eyes then pulled out the golden oval locket that she always wore. She opened it to reveal a plaited curl of hair, twisted from six strands of hair – two black and four brown.

‘Rest in peace, my love,' she murmured, touching the thin wisp of hair, then snapping the locket closed.

Over against the fence, at the edge of the bushland, some native wildflowers grew. Charlotte ran over and picked a bunch of creamy flannel flowers and gently laid them on the grave.

‘We'll be back, Papa,' whispered Charlotte.

At the Talbot Inn, they said a reluctant farewell to Bridget, who was travelling to Sydney to seek another job. Mamma had no money left to pay her. They paused for a few minutes while Mamma wrote a hasty letter to the executors to explain that the family had left Oldbury and Mr Barton and were fleeing to Budgong. She begged for the quarterly allowance to be sent to them there.

Charlotte kept glancing back down the road, expecting to see Mr Barton chasing after them at any moment. It was a great relief to ride out again.

Once they left Sutton Forest, Mamma began to tell them stories to pass the time, pointing out native plants and animals and teaching them the Latin, Aboriginal and common names for many of the plants and wildflowers they passed. The dusty, rutted road continued north-east towards Bong Bong. Along the way they passed several bullock-drawn drays plying north to Sydney and south to Goulburn, and the odd neighbour on horseback.