Dust of the Land Page 14

  He stood, staggered, and made his way laboriously to the corridor leading to the bedrooms. ‘Since we cannot talk like civilised people I shall go to bed.’

  There was an edge of damaged pride in his voice and Bella remained rigid until she heard his bedroom door click. Only then did she collapse into her chair. She drew a deep breath and closed her eyes, her body shaking. For the moment the crisis had passed but she knew it was not the end of it. This was the second time. Sooner or later Johnson would try his luck again.

  She had to get away, she told herself. If only she’d accepted Garth Tucker’s offer!

  For several minutes she stayed where she was; she could not have stood if she’d tried. There was no sound from Johnson’s bedroom but she could not relax, knowing that the rest of the night remained. Finally she managed to drag herself out of her chair. She switched off the lights. Heart in her mouth, she tiptoed to her room.

  Her door had no key. She thought of blocking it in some way but the back of the only chair was not high enough to reach the handle and the chest of drawers, a relic of the previous owner, was too heavy to shift. She normally slept naked despite the cold, but tonight she put on a nightdress and buttoned it to the neck. For a long time she lay unsleeping, nerves wound tight, but heard nothing. Eventually she drifted into a troubled sleep.

  Some time later, her bedroom door whispered open.

  At once she was awake, hands clenched, nerves screaming.

  ‘Are you asleep?’ Johnson said softly.

  She did not speak. She was so afraid, praying silently that he would go away again. She could feel him waiting. Listening. The door closed but she sensed he was still in the room. She could barely breathe, her body sour with terror. She sensed him standing beside the bed and could keep quiet no longer. ‘What are you doing, Mr Johnson?’

  She spoke reasonably, hoping to shame him, but her words had the opposite effect. He was on her at once, growling like an animal as he ripped at her nightdress. She tried to fight him off but he was too much for her. A jet of pain, white-hot, speared as his fingers wrenched at her breast.

  ‘Stop it! Stop it!’

  He took no notice.

  ‘You want it. You know you want it…’

  Pain, terror and outrage combined as she fought him. She screamed as loudly as she could, shocking even herself, but he took no notice. His knee forced her legs apart. He was moving on top of her and instinct took over. She smashed her knee into his groin. A strangled scream as she did it again, kneeing him with all her might.

  She felt his strength run away like water. He fell off her and lay moaning and sobbing, knees tight to his chest. She inched away from him, her face a mask of horror and disbelief. Her breath came unevenly; her heart threatened to explode in her chest. She was crying, the darkness spinning in a whirligig of coloured lights, every part of her being spastic with shock.

  She closed her eyes, still panting. The night was still. Miraculously, the children in their room at the end of the corridor seemed to have slept through it all. She drew a deep breath. Slowly control returned. She staggered to the door and turned on the light. She turned, hating even to look at him, and saw him lying there weeping, eyes blind to anything but pain. The bed… a battlefield.

  Rage rose like the tide. She crossed to the bed and glared down at him. His eyes were open yet he seemed unaware of her.

  ‘Get out.’ Her voice was jagged with fury.

  He did not move.

  She was loath to touch him but forced herself, dragging him off the bed and dumping him on the floor. She bent over him, eyes and mouth taut with horror, and whispered in his ear.

  ‘Come near me again and I’ll kill you.’

  She meant it; at that moment she could have killed him without a thought.

  Still he did not move.

  ‘I’ll drag you if I have to,’ she threatened.

  He whimpered, but inch by inch gathered himself and began to crawl away from her. When he reached the door he clawed his way up far enough to open it. Still hunched, he dragged himself out of sight. She slammed the door behind him.

  Now weakness returned. She was shaking so much she could barely walk. Somehow she reached the bed and fell across it. So cold… Arms tight about her body, eyes open, she saw only images of the frenzied battle in the dark. Tears poured down her cheeks. The night seemed without end.

  The morning came with a bone-white sky and frost in the hollows. Bella, defiled, sat on the verandah and stared out at an empty land. The sun was still hidden and there were no shadows. She hugged herself against the frost, against despair.

  She had to leave, that much was clear. But go where? There was nowhere. Behind her in the house the children were sleeping. Mr Johnson? She would not think of him. Yet he was there, too, a presence and a threat. In the chilly light of morning it was hard to believe all that had happened last night, yet it had. A darkness heavier than the darkest night, it lay upon her spirit and she did not know what to do.

  A blink of brilliant light appeared above the rim of the distant hills. The shadows leapt across the pale land as the sun rose. A flock of ravens stirred the air. Raucous-voiced, wings black against a sky that to the east was now flushed with golden light, they flew eastwards towards the sun.

  The movement of the birds, the distant curve of the hill’s dark shoulder, meant nothing. The air was cold but Bella did not move. After the traumas of the night shock remained, preventing thought or movement.

  She remained motionless as an hour later she heard the first cough of the car’s engine. It appeared around the side of the house, crossed the bridge and drove away up the road in a smear of dust. Mr Johnson was going to collect his wife. Soon they would be back.

  What had happened the night before had left a stain on her mind. Perhaps also on her life. If she could, she would have left already, would even now be striding along the road to somewhere. But where? It was a question she could not answer, so she stayed. Besides, there was a question of wages owing to her.

  Presently she got up and went to the kitchen. She made herself a cup of coffee. She came back and sat down, warming her hands on the hot cup and staring once again at the empty landscape flowing away from the house. Soon the Johnsons would be back. She had injured him, perhaps badly. It was unlikely that he could hide it from his wife. Would not want to, perhaps. After what had happened he was probably as eager to get rid of her as she was to go. In which case he would say something to his wife. If he did that, Bella thought, he was bound to lie.

  She sat unmoving, the empty cup clutched in her hands, until she saw the sunlight flashing on the approaching car as the Johnsons returned.

  ‘After your conduct last night there is no place for you in this house,’ Mrs Johnson said.

  Bella, exhausted by lack of sleep, was not prepared to be dismissed like an insolent housemaid. She felt anger and an overwhelming sense of injustice. ‘Do you have the slightest idea what happened last night?’

  ‘My husband has told me what happened.’

  ‘Did he tell you why he decided to rush home and leave you behind, Mrs Johnson?’

  ‘He was feeling unwell. He had to leave early.’

  ‘That wasn’t the reason. I’ll tell you why he did it. To make a pass at me. Did he tell you why he can’t stand up straight this morning? Why he can’t walk without limping? Did he tell you that, Mrs Johnson?’

  Bella had been brought up a lady and ladies did not talk of such things, but this lady had been forced to fight off a would-be rapist only a few hours earlier and now, it seemed, was to be dismissed for the crime of defending herself. That made for plain speaking. ‘Did your husband tell you that he tried to rape me last night, Mrs Johnson?’

  Mrs Johnson flinched as though Bella had struck her. Mouth set, lips white, she said: ‘You will pack your things immediately. I shall take you into Charters Towers in one hour’s time.’

  Bella was furious. It was one thing to hand in her notice and leave with a suitable r
eference, quite another to be driven out like this. ‘And if I refuse?’

  ‘Then I shall contact the police and have you put out. I shall not tolerate home wreckers in my house.’

  ‘Your husband attacked me in my bed –’

  ‘I refuse to listen –’

  But Bella shouted over the top of her. ‘I had to fight him off the only way a woman can. I kneed him in the groin, Mrs Johnson. That is why he’s limping. What do you have to say about that?’

  Mrs Johnson’s hands were over her ears. ‘I refuse to listen to such wicked lies –’

  ‘Perhaps I’m the one who should be going to the police.’

  Bella’s voice might have knocked the paint off the ceiling but Mrs Johnson, face contorted, screamed louder still. ‘Wicked woman! Wicked! Wicked! I won’t listen to another word.’

  It was hopeless. To Bella, raised from the age of six in a household of power and privilege, it was a nightmare beyond imagining, but she knew she would be blamed whatever she said. She saw from her expression that Mrs Johnson suspected what had really happened. Perhaps she’d experienced the same thing in the past. However that might be, it was clear that she was now determined to get Bella out of the house. If Bella complained to the police they would not believe her; no one would believe her.

  She could not imagine what would happen to her now. She had neither job nor prospects; there were few enough jobs for men out there, for women they were virtually non-existent, and once people heard Mrs Johnson’s version of what had happened there would be no chance for her at all. She would starve in the gutter and no one would lift a finger. Yet she had no choice. Go she must, and now.

  If I’d let him do it I wouldn’t be out of a job, she thought bitterly. One last spark of defiance: ‘You owe me for the months I’ve been here,’ she said.

  But that, too, was doomed to failure. Bella saw madness in Mrs Johnson’s eyes.

  ‘Pay you?’ She laughed hysterically. ‘After what you’ve done?’

  ‘Without money I can go nowhere,’ Bella said.

  ‘Not one penny!’ There was froth on Mrs Johnson’s lips. ‘You hear me? Not one penny!’

  It was useless to persist. No matter, Bella told herself. She would survive.

  An hour later, Mrs Johnson drove Bella into town. Neither spoke. Dropped off at the bus station, Bella barely had time to grab her bag before the car door slammed behind her. A clash of gears and Mrs Johnson was gone.

  Mrs Johnson went into the newsagents, where Miss Wickes the proprietor greeted her.

  ‘I need your help,’ Mrs Johnson said. ‘I need a new nanny for the children.’

  Miss Wickes pricked up her ears; gossip was good for the soul. ‘Is Miss Richmond leaving you?’

  Mrs Johnson allowed her distress to show. ‘Speaking in the strictest confidence, Miss Wickes, I had to let her go. She proved completely unsuitable to live in the same house with a married man.’

  ‘Oh?’ Miss Wickes was agog. ‘Is that how it was?’

  ‘I do not believe in spreading tales, Miss Wickes, but I would not want others to be deceived, as I have been deceived.’

  ‘Certainly not,’ said Miss Wickes.

  Her mission accomplished, Mrs Johnson bought a newspaper and went out. Miss Wickes picked up the phone; she was not only a news vendor; she was a news purveyor and news like this, in a town like Charters Towers, spread like wildfire.

  * * *

  Dumped in the shadow of the mullock heaps beneath which she and Garth Tucker had explored the potential of the town’s abandoned mines, Bella thought: God knows how, but somehow I have to get to the Pilbara. Garth offered me a job. I turned him down but what choice do I have now?

  Getting there was as close to impossible as made no difference. It was a district of which she had only the vaguest knowledge, thousands of miles away on the far side of the continent, and she had no money. Even if she did somehow manage to get there, she had no idea what her reception would be. Yet what other options did she have? She answered her own question.

  ‘The fact is,’ she said to the deserted street, ‘I have no choice.’

  Charters Towers was a ghost town; there would be no jobs here. She had to get to Townsville, find work, save her money, take a passage to Wyndham. How she would then get to Garth Tucker’s property she had no idea, but at least she would be in the district.

  Walking into town, Bella saw Paul McNab’s van outside the general store, with Paul and another man carrying cartons into the shop.

  When he saw her expression, his smile of greeting changed to concern. ‘What’s up, darl?’

  ‘The Johnsons have thrown me out.’

  ‘Want to talk about it?’

  She hesitated. ‘You’re busy.’

  ‘This can wait. Come and have a cup of tea, tell me what’s biting you.’

  There was a café across the road.

  Paul ordered two teas. The café owner – middle-aged, grey hair pulled savagely back, tight mouth – shook her head.

  ‘I ain’t servin’ that one with yer.’

  ‘Don’ be like that, Myrtle.’

  ‘I mean it.’

  Paul set his shoulders. ‘You will, Myrtle. If you want to keep my trade.’

  ‘Askin’ for trouble, you are,’ said Myrtle.

  She poured the two cups, all the same, and shoved them across the counter. Even the most ordinary customer was worth keeping, in the Charters Towers of 1937.

  Bella and Paul went and sat at a table.

  ‘Tell me,’ Paul said.

  Bella was exhausted. The night’s traumas; the way Mrs Johnson had behaved that morning… The memories beat like hammers in her head. She could have put her head on the table and howled. She did not, nor could she tell him exactly what had happened; he was a relative stranger still, and a man, and at the moment she found it hard even to look at a man. But he was kind, and she needed a friend. She said: ‘Mr Johnson… He…’

  It was no use; she could not tell him.

  ‘What did he do?’

  She opened her mouth to say, but no sound came.

  ‘I can’t talk about it.’ Tears flowed without warning. ‘I am sorry,’ she sobbed. ‘Sorry…’

  Paul McNab had not come down in the last shower of rain. ‘Do something to you, did he?’

  ‘He tried.’ More tears. ‘I stopped him but now I’ve lost my job.’

  Her hand, lying on the table beside her cup, clenched. She hid it in her lap. The world was an aching void, herself alone in the middle of it.

  ‘Mrs Johnson didn’t believe you?’

  ‘She did believe me,’ Bella said. ‘That’s why she got rid of me.’

  ‘Bastards,’ he said. ‘What you gunna do?’

  ‘I have to get to Townsville. I’ll never get a job here.’

  ‘Ain’t that the truth?’ he said. ‘Tell you what I’ll do. I’ll take you home with me when we finish up here. Have a word with the wife, put you in the spare room tonight, run you into Townsville in the morning. How does that sound?’

  It sounded wonderful but, when Paul took her home, his wife had other ideas.

  ‘We’re Christian folk in this town, miss. We don’t want your sort here.’

  Bella could not believe what was happening to her. ‘I have done nothing –’

  Trix McNab glared at her husband.

  ‘I heard about it. I’m telling you I won’t have her in the house.’

  ‘Stay where you are, Bella,’ said Paul.

  No job, no money, now this… Despair threatened, but pride prevailed.

  ‘I’ll start walking,’ she said to Paul. ‘I’ve caused you enough trouble.’

  ‘You’re going nowhere,’ Paul said. ‘And you can quit your maggin’,’ he said when his wife tried to interrupt. ‘You talk about Christian principles? What you expect her to do? Walk all the way to Townsville? Sixty miles alone, in the dark? Is that how a Christian behaves? I’ll tell you something else, too: I don’t believe a word that Johnson cow’s
been saying. Not a word.’ He turned to Bella. ‘Sleep in my truck tonight,’ he told her. ‘Like I said, I’ll run you into Townsville in the morning.’

  Trix glared but eventually turned away with a look of disgust. ‘Do what you want.’ She threw the words over her shoulder. ‘You always do, anyway.’ She went back into the house.

  Paul winked at Bella. ‘I’ll get you a blanket.’

  ‘I’m causing you trouble.’

  ‘I’ll talk to her. She’ll be right.’

  Paul brought her two blankets and some cushions. Bella stretched out in the back of the truck and pulled the blankets over her. It was cold and would become more so but she knew how fortunate she was to be sleeping here and not by the roadside, covered in frost. Although sleep, when it came, was riven by nightmares.

  Archibald Johnson ripped at her like a maniac.

  ‘No! No!’

  She came awake, heart pounding, frightened eyes staring into the darkness.

  Mrs Johnson’s screams echoed in the cold night. ‘Wicked woman! Wicked, wicked woman!’

  Accusing faces swung in a cacophony of accusing voices.

  ‘I ain’t servin’ that one with yer!’

  ‘I won’t have her in the house…’

  Bella lay, despair like acid in her mouth. What was she to do? What would happen to her?

  Light came by inches. Bella was stiff and cold, apprehension a weight on her chest. She looked around the yard in which the truck was parked. Lights shone through a window in the McNab house. The world, which yesterday had turned its back, was returning to life.

  And today?

  She wanted to get moving, to face down the worst. Anything, however terrible, was better than what she could imagine.

  Lying in an alleyway, or beside a lonely road… Lying dead…

  She climbed out of the truck, swinging her arms to get warm, and walked out of the gate and down the road, then back. She did it three times, putting all her effort into it, until the blood was singing in her veins and the night-time terrors had slipped away. For the moment, at any rate.

  Paul came out of the house. ‘You’ll want the bathroom,’ he said.

  She certainly did. But…