Corroboree (40 page)

Joolonga tapped out his pipe. ‘I have beliefs, Mr Walker-sir.'

‘Oh, yes? What beliefs?'

‘I believe that we must fulfil this expedition: that we must follow Yonguldye to Yarrakinna.'

‘Even though you know damned well that whatever riches Yonguldye points us to; no matter how many stock-trails to the north he tells us about; in return I can give him nothing? What magical secrets do
I
know? You would deceive your own people so flagrantly?'

Tightly, Joolonga said, ‘My own people, as you call them, Mr Walker-sir, are already doomed. They were doomed from the moment the first white man set foot on Australia. My own people are a sad, poor, filthy, people. They should have died out hundreds of years ago; before
the white man ever saw them. Perhaps they should never have been.'

‘You don't believe that.' Eyre challenged him.

‘What I believe is unimportant,' said Joolonga. ‘The man who was Joolonga died many years ago. He cannot rise again. It is not foretold.'

Eyre looked up at the pale, sand-coloured sky. His anger at Captain Sturt's deception had died down a little; although he knew it would continue to grate inside him like a fractured rib, until he could face Captain Sturt again and have it out with him, shout for shout. His most critical dilemma now was not whether he ought to take revenge on Captain Sturt or not, but whether he should call off the expedition altogether. Whether he ought to return to Adelaide without wealth, without glory, and without any kind of discovery to honour his name; to face both a political and a financial scandal, not to mention disgrace in the eyes of everybody he knew, especially Charlotte; or whether he ought to press on, and find Yonguldye, and accomplish everything that both Sturt and the Aborigine people expected of him regardless of how he had been tricked; and regardless of how the Aborigines would eventually suffer. And, by God, how they would suffer, especially if Captain Charles Sturt had anything to do with it.

Joolonga had already taken sides. Joolonga had chosen inevitability. Why struggle to win a battle that has already been lost? Yet, in spite of himself, Joolonga still guarded some silent and secret faith in Ngurunderi, and Baiame, and the other dreamtime gods; and that faith gave Eyre an inkling of hope that if he continued the expedition, they would be able to bring to Yonguldye's
noora
not magical knowledge, perhaps; not even the promise that the blackfellows would be able to protect their hunting-grounds and their sacred places from the ravages of the whites but the possibility that they might at least be able to survive and eventually flourish in what was one day going to be predominantly a white man's country.

Dogger, from around the bushes, shouted, ‘Eyre? What the
hell's
going on? Where are you? Not taking your morning shit already?'

‘Coming!
' Eyre called back, as lightly as he could. Then, to Joolonga, ‘I'm not sure why you felt it necessary to tell me all of this. But, I appreciate your frankness. At least I know now why I'm here.'

Joolonga said flatly, ‘It was necessary for you to know sooner or later. Captain Sturt said that I should tell you the night before we expected to reach Yonguldye's encampment. However, I saw that you were seeking an explanation for that corroboree which was held during the night; and that unless you were given an answer, you might decide to return to Adelaide.'

‘What makes you think that I'm not going to return to Adelaide even now?'

‘You are a young man, Mr Walker-sir. You have ideals that older men no longer have; and you are ready to believe things which older men no longer believe. But I have seen that you make your mistakes once only; and that you learn as quickly as a dingo. You know that you will go on, if only to prove to Captain Sturt that you can do everything he expected you to do, only better. Ahead, there is a chance of fame and wealth. Behind, only confusion and disgrace. This is not a country which rewards those who surrender, Mr Walker-sir, no matter what the perils may be.'

Eyre said, ‘Very well, we're going on. But let me warn you, Joolonga, everything I said to you yesterday still applies. I've had enough of your secrets, and enough of your arrogant manners. We're going under
my
terms, not yours, and certainly not under Captain Sturt's. When we catch up with Yonguldye, it will be my decision how we approach him; and I will want nothing more from you than to act as my interpreter. Because, by God, if you cross me once more, Joolonga, I will have your head off for it.'

Joolonga bowed his head, and then trod heavily away to sort out the horses. Eyre stayed where he was for a
while, breathing deeply, and wondering what in all Heaven he ought to do. The sharpest pain of all was that Christopher should have talked about him to Captain Sturt's friend before the Spring Ball; and that he should actually have taken money to persuade Eyre to come along with him that night. No wonder Christopher had seemed so angry when Captain Sturt had done nothing at all to dissuade Eyre from setting out to find Yonguldye. No wonder he had tried to say that night how much he loved Eyre; and how much he revered him.

It had been the love of Judas; the reverence of guilt.

They crossed the salt lake towards Parachilna like slowly-moving figures in a sparkling dream. The sun shone with such shattering brilliance on the swathes of dried-out, coloured minerals that made up the lakebed; almost blinding them; that Eyre devised himself a pair of spectacles made of smoked pieces of bottle glass and wire; and rode through the days of heat and dust like Mephistopheles.

He hardly spoke at all to any of his companions; and in return they kept well away from him, Dogger and Christopher and Midgegooroo and Weeip riding in a small, close bunch, with the pack-horses on either side of them, although Joolonga rode closer to Eyre, and a little off to the right, as if he were privy to his secrets, if not his thoughts.

During the whole length of those glaring days, Eyre could think about nothing but Captain Sturt, and how he had betrayed him; and Christopher, too, and how Christopher
had hurt him more than Eyre could have imagined possible. He ate in silence at their evening fires; and slept apart in his bedroll. In the morning, with the sun rising over the crust of the lake like the unwelcome visitation of some incandescent Presence from heaven itself, he would mount up and ride ahead of them again, silently, blind-eyed, his face wrapped in scarves against the saline dust. Dogger began to talk of sunstroke, and bush-madness, and of turning back. But Christopher perversely began to talk about Eyre as if he were a doomed young knight from medieval days on a quest for the Holy Grail; and far from faltering, his enthusiasm for the expedition grew even more complicated, and more involved.

They reached Parachilna on a surprisingly mild evening, when a light dusty wind was blowing, and there were clouds moving along the horizon like sailing-ships in a nearby harbour. The rusty-coloured peaks of the north Flinders rose all around them now, the dry, wrinkled peaks of a once-forested mountain range. Eyre dismounted, and began to walk his horse up a twisting creek-bed; and there was no sound but the clinking of fragments of slate disturbed by its hoofs, and the
whirrr-whirrr-whirrr
of the cicadas.

Dogger gave his horse to Midgegooroo to lead, and hurried up the creekbed to overtake Eyre before they started climbing up the more gentle slope ahead of them.

‘Eyre,' he said, taking hold of Eyre's bridle. ‘Eyre, you can't continue like this. Come on, mate. You've got the rest of us to think about, apart from yourself.'

Eyre was silent for a while, standing very upright, his face floury with dust. His eyes were invisible behind the two darkened curves of smoked glass; like the eyes of an insect.

‘I suppose you want me to sing and joke,' he said, at last.

‘Well, why not?' Dogger told him. ‘This is a miserable enough business as it is, without a little fun. And damn it, Eyre, you used to be fun. What about those evenings
on Hindley Street? Two jugs of beer and you and me were laughing fit to bust our trousers. What happened to all that?'

‘I don't know,' said Eyre. He truly didn't know. He felt as if all the fun had been evaporated out of him, by the sun; as if now he had been kippered into mirthlessness, sexlessness, and irascibility; a leathery ascetic in search of a dried-up ideal. He no longer knew why he was here; or what moral principle he was trying to uphold. He had lost his faith in Christopher; his trust in Joolonga; and his enjoyment of Dogger.

Dogger said bluntly, ‘If you don't snap yourself out of this, old mate, I'm turning back. I know this territory, as far as here. I came out here once, looking for emu. But I'm not going any further; not unless I get some sign from you that things are jogging along as they ought to be. I'm game for adventure, Eyre. But I don't intend to die for no good reason; and especially not without a smile on my fizzog. Anyone who comes out beyond the black stump with a mien as miserable as what yours is; well, mate, they're certain dingo-fodder, that's all, and I didn't spend twenty years hunting down dogs to end up as dog's breakfast, nor dinner, nor
hoose-doovries
neither.'

Eyre lowered his head, and brushed white dust from his curls with the back of his hand. Then he carefully took off his dark glasses, and looked at Dogger, and grinned.

‘You're right,' he said. ‘I've been a sour and miserable bastard, and I'm sorry. But let's go on.'

‘We can turn back if you want to. Nobody will think the less of you.'

Eyre shook his head. ‘I've forgotten why I'm here. The whole desert is so overwhelming that I don't think I really care any more. But let's go on.'

‘And you'll smile, now and then?' urged Dogger.

Eyre nodded.

‘Not just at me and Weeip; but at Christopher, too. You've been giving
him
a pretty uncomfortable time, these past three days. Come on, Eyre, you know it.'

‘I'll do my best.'

Christopher caught up with them, leading his horse with difficulty up the narrow, fragmented creek-bed. He frowned at Eyre from beneath the brim of his wide kangaroo-skin hat, and there was a look in his eyes which was a mixture of admiration and despair; a look to which Eyre was bound to respond. Bound not only by their friendship; but by plain human dignity; and by the circumstances in which they now found themselves, hundreds of miles from anything but scrub and salt and mountains as dry as a nine-hour sermon.

Eyre let go of his bridle, and came forward over the clattering slate, and put his arms around Christopher, and held him close; and then turned to Dogger, and held out an arm for him, and embraced him, too. And the three of them stood under the violet evening sky, on the side of a rust-red mountain, holding each other in the comradeship that would one day be known in the outback as ‘mateship'; the love man-for-man that is blatantly forged on the battered anvil of self-preservation; the love that knows neither dignity nor suspicion; that asks no questions; and expresses no desires; but which fades in city streets as rapidly as an uprooted desert rose.

Joolonga watched this embrace dispassionately from the ridge above the creek-bed, among the vivid-green acacias. Weeip and Midgegooroo stood by their pack-horses, equally expressionless, both of them chewing on pitjuri leaves, which always made them placid and detached.,

At last, Eyre said, ‘Let's get ahead. It's going to be dark before long and I want to find a decent place to camp.' He felt more encouraged now, especially since Christopher had made it quite clear that he would follow him and support him wherever he went. ‘Joolonga,' he called, ‘do you think there's any chance of catching up with Yonguldye before nightfall?'

‘I smell an encampment close, Mr Walker-sir; big one. See, there is smoke over the ridge there.'

‘Do you think it's a good idea just to go barging in to a
strange community of blackfellows?' asked Dogger. ‘I've heard that some tribes are quite partial to explorer casserole.'

Eyre put on his dark glasses again. ‘We'll carry the rifles with us; just in case. Midgegooroo, unpack three rifles for us, will you; three; and make sure that they're properly loaded, the way I showed you.'

He felt in his pocket and made sure he had one essential item: his magical
mana
stone. Weeip came up and brought them water. There were streams running through the Flinders, which the Aborigines called
aroona;
streams which bubbled up from underground springs and danced their way down between the limestone rocks, sometimes forming pools of stunning clarity. The water attracted sea-birds, grey teal and white-faced tern, as well as wallabies and euros and emus, so there would be plenty of fresh food for them to eat while they were here.

Eyre led them up the creek-bed until they found themselves in a wide gorge, with overhanging rocks rising up on three sides; and extraordinarily, like a silently-shrieking governess throwing herself from an attic window, a single ghost-gum growing out from the rocks almost thirty feet above their heads.

Eyre said, ‘We'll leave the horses here. Weeip, you keep watch on them. Joolonga, Midgegooroo, you come up with us. If we can find Yonguldye, we'll come back and fetch the horses; if we can't, we'll settle here for the night. Weeip?'

‘Yes, Mr Wakasah?'

‘Light yourself a fire. If we don't find Yonguldye, we'll be hungry by the time we get back.'

‘Yes, Mr Wakasah. And—Mr Wakasah?'

‘What is it, Weeip?'

Young Weeip covered his face with his hands, so that his dark eyes sparkled through the gaps between his fingers. ‘Don't bring back the devil-devil, Mr Wakasah.'

Eyre knelt down beside him. Weeip kept his hands over his face, and his soft curly hair blew in the evening breeze.
‘You're not scared of the devil-devil, are you?' Eyre asked him, kindly.