Tales of the Austral Tropics

Tales of the Austral Tropics

By Ernest Favenc

Ernest Favenc

(1846-1908)

TALES OF THE

AUSTRAL TROPICS

PREFACE

In these Tales of the Austral Tropics will be found the strange romances which write themselves, often in letters of blood, amid the half-unknown, mysterious regions of Tropical Australia. That they are not less true than terrible, I take it upon myself to affirm. That such is far from being the case with the larger proportion of literary manufacture professing to describe Australian life and character, I most distinctly assert. Those who know seldom write, and those who write don't know, remarks the veteran colonist with accentuated emphasis. But this author's name is a household word among bushmen and bookmen from Albany to Thursday Island, from The Gulf to the Snowy River--

Alike to him the sea, the shore,

The pen, the bridle, and the oar.

To him, familiar as highways are the endless solitudes of the Never Never Country--he has tempted the Desert Sphinx, gazed upon gold matrix and opal hoards which gleamed in mockery of the exhausted wanderer. Trusted for dear life in forest glades to a steady eye and a true rifle. Listened in a canoe on the Coral Sea to the moaning of the approaching tempest.

Long a leading actor upon Dame Nature's stage, he has turned scene-painter for the nonce, and limned with lifelike effect the drama of the Waste.

ROLF BOLDREWOOD.

TALES OF THE

AUSTRAL TROPICS

THE LAST OF SIX

PERHAPS no more desolate, depressing scenery can be found anywhere in the world than on the mangrove-flats of Northern Queensland. As you row slowly up some saltwater creek, nothing is visible on either side but low banks of oozy mud, awash at high tide, covered with writhing and distorted trees. Now and then a branch creek breaks the monotony of the scrub, for the shore is here a perfect labyrinth and network of watercourses, whilst the only living denizens visible are armies of hideous crabs, and an occasional evil-looking alligator, which glides noiselessly off the mud into deep water as your boat approaches.

By day it is dismal enough; by night it is worse. The venomous mosquitoes buzz about you in myriads, strange cries resound through the twisted roots of the trees left bare by the receding tide; and, as the night wears on, a white mist, cold and dank, breathes deadly clamminess over all.

It was just sunrise in this delectable region. The rays had even gilded the sombre upper branches of the mangroves with a sparkle of golden colour, although as yet the sullen mist was still rising in white wreaths from the bosom of the sluggish tide. Anchored in mid-stream was a small boat, apparently without occupants, but presently the sail, that in a tumbled heap had been lying on the bottom, was disturbed and a sleepy man emerged from beneath its shelter; as he stood up, another threw the sail back and got up too. They were both towzled, dirty, and looking about as cross-grained as men might be expected to do who had passed the night cramped up in the bottom of a boat, with millions of mosquitoes thirsting for their blood--and getting it.

No wind! said the first; pull again, I suppose, until ten o'clock! And he stepped forward and commenced to haul up the heavy stone that served as anchor.

I suppose so; returned the other; tide against us too, but I think it's just on the turn--and he settled himself down on the after-thwart and prepared to put out an oar.

My God! he's coming back! cried the first and elder man, dropping into the bottom of the boat the stone he had just hauled up. The other sprang up and gazed stupidly at the object indicated, that, carried down by the still-receding tide, passed slowly within an oar's length of the boat.

It was the dead body of a man; the shoulders and the back of the head were alone visible, but the horror of it was unmistakeable--it needed no second glance to tell its character.

Pull, suddenly cried the younger, dropping on his seat, his voice rising to a shriek; he's coming aboard! Released from her anchorage the boat had started to voyage down stream in company with the dead man. A few desperate strokes took them away from the corpse, and then they rested on their oars and gazed at each other with the sweat of fear upon their faces.

The very alligators won't touch him! murmured the younger man at last; let's get out of this. I'm not fit for anything after yesterday.

They pulled a few strokes in silence, then the elder spoke. Let's get back to camp before we do anything. I'm like you, done up altogether. We'll turn down this creek and then we shan't have to pass him again. And he indicated the direction of the corpse.

The boat was headed down a branch creek, and now went with the tide aided by a few lazy strokes from the men, who silently kept on their course. In about an hour's time the creek widened and the sound of surf was audible; then suddenly they shot out from the gloomy, reeking mangrove swamp into sight of the ocean, and a fresh sea breeze came with a puff in their faces, as if to welcome their return.

We're close to the camp, said the elder man as they rested on their oars; we might have got here last night instead of catching fever and ague in that accursed place.

There's so many of these creeks, returned the other; we could not have made sure in the dark. However, let's land and go across the spit. Pulling the boat well up the sand and making her fast with a long painter to a straggling mangrove-tree, they stepped ashore; then, having taken the sail out and spread it to dry on the sand they shouldered their oars and ascended the low spit. Before them, within a short half-mile, lay a semicircular bay protected by a sand-bank, on which the long surf rollers were breaking white. Within shelter of the bank lay a small lugger, and on the beach, above high water-mark, were rough sheds, and frame erections indicating that it was a béche-de-mer station.

As the two men approached the camp, a woman came out to meet them; a few aborigines and a Kanaka or two were also visible. The woman who advanced was dark in complexion, with wild black eyes and hair. She was rudely dressed and barefooted; there was an air of semi-madness about her that was startling, yet fascinating--such awful horror shone in her eyes.

Well, she said in fairly good English, you found them?

One of them, said the elder man, and when we've had a feed we'll go and look for the other.

One of them! cried the woman; which?--which?

The one you call Alphonse--the big one.

Oh! shrieked the woman, where is he? Why is he not here?

Why! he's in that creek out there, and there he can stop for me; after what you told us he's not fit to be buried.

Dead! she returned in an awestruck whisper. But no! the devil cannot die.

Devil or not, he's dead; dead enough, and nearly turned our stomachs this morning, for his ugly carcase came drifting right on top of us after we thought he went out to sea yesterday.

Now, missus, said the other, suppose you let us get something to eat, for it was nigh this time yesterday when we started.

You have brought good news, said the woman, the devil is dead, I will wait on you--and she hastened to the rude cooking-place and soon returned with food and tea.

The meal finished, the two men lit their pipes, the women watching them anxiously.

You will go again? she said at last, timidly. One man looked at the other, and then the elder spoke--

Well, we'll have another hunt, but I warn you, there's little hope.

No matter, she said, but let me go with you.

I suppose it's not much odds, returned the man. Come, Jim, the tide's turning now. They shouldered the oars and, followed by the woman, walked back to the boat. The tide was about the same height as when they landed, only now it was flowing. Stepping in they pushed off, and were soon once more amongst the mangroves.

The two trepang-fishers had picked up a leaky boat with a starving crew, a strange crew--two men and a woman--escapees from New Caledonia, whom they brought to the station and fed. The fishers had no intention of handing them over to justice--or, let us say, to the law; the affair was no business of theirs; but if they took them in to Cooktown the capture of their guests would be certain. Then the refugees organised a plan. The two men would take their boat and pull up one of the salt-water creeks to the open country; here they would sink the boat, and make their way, as best they could, through the bush till they happened upon some of the outlying stations. The woman, who spoke good English, could go with the fishermen to Cooktown and take her chance; it was impossible she could stand the hardship of a bush tramp. To this plan the woman vehemently objected, and begged the man she called her husband not to go. Apparently he consented, but during the night the two men slipped away, and in the morning the woman found herself deserted. Then followed a scene of wild lamentation, during which the horrified Englishmen learned some of the ghastly details of the voyage from New Caledonia--horrors that made them shudder and vow that if one of the men ever turned up he should be delivered over to justice. With frantic passion the woman appealed to them to go after the two fugitives and persuade her husband to return; for, she said, the other man had an old and bitter grudge against him, and had only lured him away to his death. Overcome by her entreaties, the two men started and found the body of one man floating in the mangrove creek; of the other they could see nothing, and, returning, were benighted.

Arrived at the spot where the two creeks joined, the boat, with the woman in the stern, was headed up stream with the tide, and they pulled quietly between the dreary groves of trees.

Have you been up there? she said suddenly, pointing to an opening on the right.

No, said one of them, and they turned up the branch.

There it is! she exclaimed quickly. I knew it, I felt it!

Sure enough there was the Frenchmen's boat just ahead of them, ashore on a small open space, a chance patch of clear ground. They pulled up to her, but the dead body of the second man was visible before they got there. The woman was quite calm, and stood by while her companions examined the corpse. The man had been stabbed in the side and had bled to death; a hideous stain was in the old boat.

How did Pierre kill him? she muttered to herself in French. Ah, I know, he was stabbed from behind, then he turned and knocked the devil overboard. Then he fell and died.

You will take him back and bury him, she said, in a sad, almost sweet voice. See, it will be no trouble; just tow the boat; and she indicated her meaning with a wave of the hand. Then she took her seat in the boat with her dead, the men having thrown the sail over the body, and so they started back.

Arrived at the junction she spoke again. You will wait, will you not? He will come back, perhaps--I must see myself that the devil is dead.

The men looked at each other, and then, with a few strokes of their oars kept the boat motionless in the tideway.

He comes! said the awfully quiet voice of the woman, and with indescribable horror the men saw the now bloated corpse come up the stream once more.

As if influenced by some terrible attraction in the glaring eyes of the woman, the ghastly thing approached the side of the boat where she sat. She rose to her feet, in her hand one of the oars. Dog! devil! she cried, dashing it into the face of the corpse. O you, who ate my child before my eyes. You! who lived on man's flesh to save your life--you who have assassinated my husband! Wolf! what are you now? Dead, dead! And you who ate others shall be eaten by the foul things of this place! At every epithet she spurned the corpse with the oar until with a hideous, life-like action it slowly turned over and disappeared.

The spell-bound men, who had not understood a word of what she said, for she spoke in French, now started into action, and called to her to sit down. She obeyed; and, hastening to leave the scene the two men, their hearts in their throats, were soon back at the mouth of the creek.

They buried the murdered man, and next morning the lugger hoisted sail for Cooktown having on board the woman, the last survivor of the party of six who had escaped from New Caledonia.

A CUP OF COLD WATER

A SILENT and gloomy man. For a man of wealth, who, at one time, had been noted for his social qualities and his hospitality, Marten was looked upon with some little wonder by those who lived in his neighbourhood. People spoke of his solitary habits and the frightened, hunted look he always had in his eyes. Rumour even said that that stalwart and attentive man-servant of his was, in reality, a keeper.

Marten was a man whom vengeance had overtaken in this world and he could never forget it.

Dull, dark scrub all around, a sandy, barren soil underfoot, a cloudless sky and a hot, relentless sun overhead. Even more desolate than the usual dreary-looking scrub of the interior of Australia is this lonely thicket. The trunks of the stunted trees are gnarled and crooked, the foliage is scant and almost shadeless, the ground absolutely free from all undergrowth, and a deep, lifeless quiet reigns throughout. Footsteps and laboured breathing; and the repose of the scene is broken by the appearance of a human figure, a worn and wearied man slowly and painfully dragging himself along some horse-tracks forming a trail through the scrub. The unfortunate traveller is a pitiable sight, his sun-scorched face is thin and haggard with starvation, and his bloodshot eyes gleam with the delirium of thirst, his boots are absolutely ragged, and he leaves a bloody track on the baked ground. At times he sinks beneath the mockery of shade thrown by one of the scrub-trees, then, after a brief rest, renews his toilsome way.

Presently a break is visible ahead, and with restored hope the exhausted man