Skins Read online

  Manning watched Anderson. He took on the role of leader and nobody disputed it. At the time he had hair that was tightly curled against his skull. And unlike the others, he shaved occasionally. He never said much and he didn’t need to. There were always people willing to do his work for him. Especially Bathurst and Brown who obeyed him like he had royal blood or something. Despite his size he was agile. If he sensed someone behind him he would spring quickly and quietly so that it was the other person who was taken by surprise. And he would face them then with either one or both his guns. He couldn’t have been long off a ship for his clothes weren’t worn. Manning overheard him talking about the Kent Group of islands, which he knew were in the Bass Strait, but that was all he gave away. And the old Dutchman didn’t know anything about him either.

  He decided to risk it. He offered to work for Anderson if he would take him when he went west. Anderson worked a chaw of tobacco around in his mouth, spitting to the side. He said he could work for rations, which had suited Manning at the time. Manning discovered he hated sealing and that he hated the men who were sealers. He was always cold and stinking and the others would force him to do things they wouldn’t do themselves, like going over the side of a cliff to get to the seals below. One of the men lost a finger. It swelled up and went red and so his brother cut it off. Meanwhile Anderson showed no sign of leaving. They kept working the islands, Thistle and Boston. And then sometimes they would raid the mainland for women. When he asked, Anderson would say soon enough. And then one day when Manning refused to work any more, Anderson put a gun to his head.

  They were back at Kangaroo Island when Captain Jansen sailed the Mountaineer into the bay. Merredith knew Jansen, for he was another seal trader. He brought with him plenty of grog, which Anderson’s men took for payment for their share of the skins. Everyone was drunk for a few days and although Manning couldn’t recall much later, he remembered Anderson’s face when Dinah told him the new whaleboat had gone. Manning thought Anderson was going to skin her. His skin paled and the scar beneath his eye gleamed. His nostrils flared and he stood very still with his knife pointed at her gullet. Manning felt like curling into the ground like the strange spiky creatures they sometimes found on the island. But Anderson just flicked his knife into the trunk of a nearby tree and Dinah turned away. Then he called after her, who was gone? When he pulled the knife from the bark the look on his face was dreadful for he learnt that Bathurst and Brown were amongst them. They left behind three men and three women and a boy.

  Manning discovered Jansen was leaving for King George Sound and he paid him three pounds for a passage. It wasn’t until they were loading the boat with barrels of water that he learnt Anderson had done a deal with Jansen to get his men and his boat to Middle Island. On their voyage across the dark expanse of sea Jansen was drunk all the time and so Manning stayed with Anderson on Middle Island.

  But Jansen had made it to the Sound. If he had gone with him perhaps he’d be at Swan River now. The place so keenly etched in his mind. He had first heard of it from a sailor who had brought settlers from England to the new colony. He talked of still waters and black swans. Green valleys and tall trees. It couldn’t be more different from Sydney he said. There were no mean-eyed bastards to trip you up and loose women to steal your money. It was clean and the land was cheap. That night when Manning entered his lodgings it was raining and sewage had flooded the bottom floor. He decided then that he would save his money and work his way there.

  But his luck was rotten. First it was the bastards on the Defiance. Men so depraved they could have been animals. Just as he welcomed the notion of drowning, he was saved from the sea and transported from one island to the next. He had thought then that at least he was heading in the right direction and that he still had his money. But now he couldn’t even say that. He tossed about in his swag of skins and hoped that his loathing would leak into Anderson’s consciousness and that he would know that one day he was going to get what he deserved. He was momentarily comforted by that idea and his mind slipped into his body’s exhaustion and soon he was asleep.

  Manning and Jem looked down from the top of the world. Or it felt like that from the rounded mound of Flinders Peak for it was the highest point for miles. An icy breeze from the south cooled their faces and ruffled the surface of the ocean. For the first time they could see the shape of their island, its deep bays and thin points that trailed out into the sea, and it looked from where they stood like the piece of a puzzle. It was smaller than they thought. The oval pink lake, surrounded by a grey crust, was like an open wound amongst thick green scrub. Then above and below and in every direction the sky and the sea, two tones of the same colour, meeting along an indistinct curve until occasionally another rock like the one they stood on rose up and out of the water to break the pattern. Slick paths of silver ran across the sea like snail trails and foam flashed white on its edge. The mainland coast was so close they could see the stripe of the beach. From it grey bush like a coarse fabric covered the lumpy contours of the land and tucked into purple rock. A thin line of cloud lay along the pale edge of the sky. And overhead the infinite space deepened to a dense blue with the occasional thread of wispy mist.

  Jem spun around and around, laughing and squinting against the blue that wrapped around them, until he fell over.

  ‘Look out, you’ll fall off.’

  But Manning grinned too. He decided that if there was a God, then that was where He would be. He didn’t think much of religion, for anyone he had met who knew about it made him think that it wasn’t worth getting into. He twirled slowly around, squinting too but in effort to see any sign of human life. He could see many miles to the south and the east and the west so that had there been a ship passing, he was sure to be able to see it. He grabbed Jem’s arm.

  ‘Look, quick! There!’

  A single sail above a small boat flickered white, just on the other side of Goose Island, to the west. Perhaps it was Anderson. But they knew he was caulking his boat for they could see smoke from the fire on the beach. It had to be the Mountaineer’s whaleboat.

  ‘Mother of Jesus! You know what that means, don’t you?’

  Manning looked at Jem, shading his eyes from the sun. Jem shook his head. His lip seemed to stick out further than normal and his hair, which he had hacked off, framed his face in ugly spikes.

  ‘That’s Jansen. The bastard’s gone.’

  Manning hit the rock as hard as he could with his stick. It didn’t break for it was hardwood they had cut for clubbing seals. They had gone to the base of the rock to cut the clubs that morning and then decided to push their way through the scrub to see the view from the top. As he swung it he felt the pain in his back where Anderson had kneed him and it seemed to expand into his chest so that he could hardly breathe. He was aware of Jem and he turned into the wind and wiped the corners of his eyes. Then he sat down. He knew Anderson would be furious. Another whaleboat gone. Bitterly, he wondered who had escaped this time.

  ‘We have to do something.’

  ‘What?’ asked Jem.

  They faced west, towards the Sound.

  ‘Keep coming back here until a ship passes and then signal them.’

  ‘How?’ asked Jem as he watched a sea eagle hover in the air in front of him and dive deep and straight down the rock face to the sea below.

  ‘Fire.’

  ‘Think it was blacks.’

  Manning scraped the crumbly surface of a small indentation in the rock with the end of his club.

  ‘We could build a boat.’

  ‘Build a boat?’

  ‘I saw him on Kangaroo Island.’

  He nodded towards the beach where they both knew Anderson was. Jem didn’t speak. They could hear the roar of the sea as it broke on the steep southern side of the island. Manning looked at his friend and suddenly he wasn’t sure about him.

  ‘You want to leave, don’t you?’

  Jem nodded. ‘But I want me share.’

  ‘He ain�
�t going to give it to you.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean he ain’t going to pay me or you.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Because I know that filthy bastard.’

  They were both silent for a moment, the wind parting their hair on the backs of their heads. The breeze had increased and moved into the southeast. There was a band of cloud that was thickening above the mainland and to the east. Manning was suddenly glad he wasn’t in Jansen’s whaleboat that morning. His eye followed the coast as it curved from the purple hills of Mount Arid to the flat line of beach that continued for miles.

  ‘You know, we could get him to put us across there.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘We walk. It ain’t that far.’

  ‘Thistle Cove took three days sailing.’

  ‘Be quicker, us walking.’ He poked his stick towards the coast. ‘Look there, we just follow the coast. Easy, can’t get lost.’

  Jem followed Manning’s gaze.

  ‘Yeah.’ He ran his fingers over his mouth, sighed and then said: ‘We’ll need a gun.’

  ‘Of course and we’ll get it, even if we have to steal it.’

  Manning stood up and rubbed his hands together to get rid of the little loose stones that stuck to his palms.

  ‘When?’

  ‘Come on, we’ll go see Anderson.’

  Jem frowned. ‘Now?’

  But Manning was already clambering down the rock.

  January 1886

  I see their faces at night. They open their mouths like beached fish but I can’t hear what they’re saying. When Mother died she looked like a blowfish. The doctor peeled her fingers from the bottle and took the snuffbox out of her lap. They lifted her onto the bed but it was too late for they couldn’t straighten her legs.

  Our little brother William, whose face is framed by curls like a dirt-streaked angel, has eyes bright with fever and knowing. I want him to stay but he passes too quickly. There is Charlie who was twenty when they speared him while he looked after someone else’s sheep. They all died not long after you left. Father wouldn’t let me go to their funerals because of what had happened. Then he died too.

  Much later Jem took a black woman and they had a child. It was many years before Jem forgot. And then one day he came to my house. He never said much and there was the sweet smell of liquor that followed him. Sometimes he didn’t have any money. Then he began to work for my husband who had land and sheep at Tackalarup. But George has sold them now and Jem is buried on the side of the hill that faces away from the sea.

  Middle Island 1835, Dorothea Newell

  Dorothea closed her eyes and turned her head away from the smoke. When her gaze returned to the fire, the smoke had lifted and in the embers she saw a house with walls of grey stone and windows that glowed and inside it was painfully blue with heat. She had been watching Anderson threaten Manning and her brother. Something about stolen money: she couldn’t quite hear what was being said. It didn’t surprise her. They would often find Jem where there was trouble. It was the other reason her father had sent him away to Hampshire when he was eight years of age. She did worry for him but it was a feeling she could easily reason herself out of. Particularly now that he was always with that James Manning. Manning made her uneasy for it was as though there was something that seethed beneath his skin, waiting to burst out.

  Jansen was on the other side of the fire and the flames looked as though they were lapping his chin. He ripped chunks of meat from a bone with his teeth. When he turned to talk to the man beside him, his mouth glistened with fat. She decided that they ate better on the island than they had ever done at home.

  The noise of the black women broke into her thoughts. Their voices rising and falling as they moved about in front of their fire. She never looked directly at their nakedness but under the cover of darkness her eyes were drawn to them. Their skin shone in the flickering light and their empty breasts swung unfettered. Strands of shells were wrapped in layers around their necks. Hanging from Dinah’s necklace was a bone like a small jawbone which glowed against her skin.

  She realised it was only Dinah and Sal who were singing. Mooney sat quietly to one side. The other two were different. They shaved their hair and their features were finer. Mooney’s face was broader, her nose and lips more pronounced, and instead of shells she wore an amulet of skin and hair. Their scars were different too. Mooney’s were symmetrical lines connecting her breasts. The others had marks drawn indiscriminately on their backs and arms as well as on their chests. She never took much notice of the natives at the Sound. And it had never occurred to her to think about the women on the island. Tonight, though, she wondered where they had come from. Where were their families: their mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers and, perhaps, their children?

  She looked around for her sister and straightened her legs for they had gone to sleep. Mary no longer bothered to tie her hair back and a streak of dirt smudged her cheek. Her eyes were shadowed. Matthew moved from his wife’s side to Jansen’s. Dorothea hadn’t told Mary of Jansen’s plans. There was no point. Mary noticed her and moved closer.

  ‘Those buggers are up to something,’ she said, nodding towards her husband and Jansen.

  Dorothea frowned. After a while Matthew stood up and brushed the dirt from his trousers. He walked around the ring of the fire, behind the backs of the others, until he met Anderson at the doorway to the hut. When Anderson spoke his teeth flashed white but the rest of his body merged with the darkness. She sensed he was looking in their direction. She adjusted the skin that lay around her shoulders over her thin shawl. Her hands were sticky with grease and sand stuck to them. She tried to wipe it off on her gown but they just collected more dirt. She jumped as she felt a hand on her shoulder, and then looked up.

  ‘What do you want?’

  She hadn’t seen Jansen get up and come around the other side of the fire. He coughed and leant down towards her.

  ‘Get up,’ he said.

  ‘No.’

  His hand was on her shoulder and he pinched her bone between his thumb and forefinger. She realised that it was useless to fight. And she didn’t know what would happen if she drew attention to herself. Maybe someone would stop him but then they all might decide to take a turn. She pushed herself up off the ground. She felt sick and saliva flooded her mouth as though she was going to throw up. But she didn’t.

  He placed a heavy hand on her arm and led her away. As she walked beside him she thought at least if he reached the Sound he might send someone for them. She smelt the tart tang of the bush and felt the crunching beneath her feet of its dried and twisted twigs. He took her down to the beach where a sharp splinter of a moon hung before them. It was too hard to see where the sky met the sea and if she stared long enough she started to doubt that she could see anything at all. She stumbled in the sand and they moved awkwardly together. He pushed her down and it was cold on her back. The sound of the sea swamped the noise of his breathing. He lifted her skirts. She pulled them further up over her face, feeling the heat on her cheeks as she breathed against the stiff fabric. Cocooned beneath her skirts, she was reminded of her brother William who would cover his eyes and think that because he couldn’t see her she was no longer there.

  The canvas slapping in the wind woke her. She sat up and realised that she and Mary were alone. Mary was already awake. She didn’t seem to notice Dorothea.

  ‘Are you alright?’

  She didn’t answer.

  Dorothea pulled herself up. Through the gap, silver light glittered on the water as it caught the wind ripples, and the sound of the waves slapping the sand suggested that the swell had risen overnight. Mary looked sideways at her.

  ‘Matthew’s gone.’

  ‘Oh.’

  She hitched up her skirts and crawled across to the entrance to look out, squinting at the brightness of the white sand beach. The whaleboat was gone. Despite Mary’s distress she was relieved.
/>   ‘That’s good, ain’t it? He can send someone for us.’

  Mary’s eyes were dark. She turned her head towards the dirty canvas wall.

  ‘Anderson gave him three quid.’ She paused for a moment and then continued. ‘For a gown, he said.’

  Dorothea frowned. Neither of them spoke for a minute.

  Finally she said: ‘I don’t understand.’

  Mary brought her hand up to her forehead and covered her eyes.

  ‘Three quid. I’m to be nice to him, he said.’

  ‘What? Anderson?’

  She nodded and choked. Dorothea reached for her arm and stroked it, thinking she always knew Matthew was a stupid bastard but she never thought he was capable of that. She didn’t know what to say. She wondered why he needed three pounds, unless that sly dog Jansen was charging him for a place on the boat. But then Anderson couldn’t have known that was what Matthew wanted the money for otherwise he would have stopped them from leaving.

  The tent rustled behind her. At first she thought it was the wind but then she saw Mary’s face. She turned around. Matthew’s head was inside the tent.

  ‘You ain’t gone!’ Mary mumbled and sat up, her cheeks wet.

  He looked grim. His eyes flicked from her face to the ground and he moved inside.

  ‘Bastards left without me.’

  ‘That’s alright then. You can give Anderson back his money,’ said Dorothea, glaring at him.

  He squatted down and reached for Mary’s hand.

  ‘It ain’t like that.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Dorothea while Mary gazed at him, eyes full and glassy.

  He cleared his throat.