Kitabı oku: «"Chinkie's Flat"», sayfa 2

CHAPTER III ~ JIMMY AH SAN

Consternation was depicted on the faces of the men. And they all began to question Jacky at once, until Grainger appeared, and then the black boy gave them farther particulars—the Chinamen, he said, were all on foot, each man carrying two baskets on a stick, but there were also five or six pack-horses loaded with picks, shovels, dishes, and other mining gear.

“Curse the dirty, yaller-hided swine!” cried Dick Scott, turning excitedly to Grainger. “What’s to be done? They’ve come to rush the Flat again; but, by thunder! I’ll be a stiff ‘un afore a Chow fills another dish with wash-dirt on Connolly’s Creek.”

“And me, too!” “And me, too!” growled the others angrily, and Grainger, as he looked at their set, determined faces, knew they would soon be beyond control, and bloodshed would follow if the advancing Chinamen tried to come on to the field. But, nevertheless, he was thoroughly in sympathy with them. The advent of these Chinese—probably but an advance guard of many hundreds—would simply mean ruination to himself and his mates, just as their prospects were so bright. The men looked upon him as their leader, and he must act—and act quickly.

“Let them come along, boys. Then we’ll bail them up as soon as they come abreast of us, and have a little ‘talkee, talkee’ with them. But for heaven’s sake try and keep cool, and I daresay when they see we look ugly at them, they’ll trot on. How many of you have guns of any kind?”

Four rifles and two shot guns were quickly produced, and then every one waited till the first of the Chinese appeared, marching one behind the other. The foremost man was dressed in European clothes, and the moment Scott saw him, he exclaimed—

“Why, it’s Jimmy Ah San! I used to know him at Gympie in the old times. He’s not a bad sort of a Chow. Come on, boys!”

Grainger, who was not just then well enough to go with them, but remained in his seat with his revolver on his knee, could not help smiling at the sudden halt and terrified looks of the Chinese, when Scott and the others drew up in front of them with their weapons at the present. Half of them at once dropped their baskets and darted off into the bush, the rest crowding together like a flock of terrified sheep. The leader, however, came steadily on. Scott stepped out and met him.

“Good-morning. What do you and all your crowd want here?”

“Nothing,” replied the Chinaman quietly, in excellent English, “nothing but to get down to the creek and camp for a few days. But why do you all come out with guns? We cannot do you any harm.”

“Just so. But we can do you a lot if you try on any games, Mr. Jimmy Ah San.”

“Ah, you know me then,” said the man, looking keenly at Scott.

“Yes, I do, an’ you’re all right enough. But me an’ my mates is going to keep this field for white men—it ain’t goin’ to be no Chinaman’s digging’. So what’s yer move?”

“Only what I said. Look at my men! We do not want to stop here; we wish to push along to the coast. Some of them are dying from exhaustion, and my pack-horses can hardly go another quarter of a mile.”

Soott scratched his chin meditatively, and then consulted with his mates. He, although so rough in his speech, was not a bad-natured man, and he could see that the Chinese were thoroughly done up, and worn down to skin and bone. Then presently Grainger walked over and joined them, and heard what Ah San had to say.

“I’m sorry that you are in such a bad fix,” he said, “but you know as well as I do that if any of your men put a pick into ground here, there will be serious trouble, and if they lose their lives you will be responsible—and may perhaps lose your own.”

“I promise you that nothing like that will happen,” replied the Chinaman. “My men are all diggers, it is true, but we will not attempt to stay on any field where we are not wanted. My name is James Ah San. I am a British subject, and have lived in Australia for twenty-five years. That man” (pointing to Scott) “knows me, and can tell you that ‘Jimmy Ah San’ never broke a promise to any man.”

“That is right enough,” said Scott promptly; “every one in Gympie knew you when you was storekeepin’ there, and said you was a good sort.”

“We have come over three hundred miles from the Cloncurry,” went on the Chinese leader, quickly seeing that Scott’s remark had much impressed the other miners; “the diggers there gave us forty-eight hours to clear out. The blacks killed fifteen of us and speared ten of my horses, and six more men died on the way. We can do no harm here. We only want to spell a week, or two weeks.”

“Poor devils!” muttered Grainger; then he said to Ah San: “Very well. Now, you see the track going through that clump of sandalwood? Well, follow it and you’ll come to a little ironstone ridge, where you’ll find a good camping-ground just over a big pool in the creek. There’s a bit of sweet grass, too, for your horses, so they can get a good feed to-night. In the morning this black boy will, if you like, show you a place in the ranges, about four miles from here, where you can let them run for a week. There’s some fine grass and plenty of water, and they ought to pick up very quickly. But you will have to keep some one to see that they don’t get round the other side of the range—through one of the gaps; if they do, you’ll lose them to a dead certainty, for there are two or three mobs of brumbies² running there. Do you want any tucker?”³

“No, thank you,” replied Ah San, with an unmistakable inflexion of gratitude in his voice; “we have plenty of rice and tea, but I should like to buy a bullock to-morrow, if I can—I saw some cattle about two miles from here. Is there a cattle station near here?”

“No. The cattle you saw belong to one of us—this man here,” pointing to Jansen, “will sell you a beast to-morrow, I daresay.”

Then the armed protectors of the integrity from foreign invasion of the rights of Chinkie’s Flat nodded “Good evening” to Ah San, and walked back across the road to the “Digger’s Best,” and the Chinamen, with silent, childlike patience, resumed their loads and trotted along after their leader. They disappeared over the hill, and ere darkness descended the glare of their camp fires was casting steady gleams of light upon the dark waters of the still pool beneath the ridge.

CHAPTER IV ~ GRAINGER AND JIMMY AH SAN TALK TOGETHER

It was eight o’clock in the morning, and Jimmy Ah San, a fat, pleasant-faced Chinaman, dressed in European costume, came outside his tent, and filling his pipe, sat down on the ground, and with his hands clasped on his knees, saw six of the white men emerge from two or three humpies, and walk down to the new shaft to begin work.

He was well acquainted with the previous history of the spot upon which he was now gazing, and something like a scowl darkened his good-humoured face as he looked upon the ragged, half-famished surrivors of his company, and thought of the past horrors and hardships of the fearful journey from the Cloncurty. Fifteen of their number had been murdered by blacks in less than a fortnight, and the bones of half a dozen more, who had succumbed to exhaustion or thirst lay bleaching on a strip of desert country between the Cloncurry and the Burdekin River.

But Ah San was a man of courage—and resource as well—and his five-and-twenty years’ experience of bush and mining life in the Far North of Australia enabled him to pilot the remainder of his men by forced marches to the Cape River, where they had spelled for a month so as to gain strength for the long stage between that river and Conolly’s Creek, on one of the deserted fields of which he hoped to settle and retrieve his broken fortunes.

As he sat and watched and thought, eight or ten members of his company came and crouched near him, gazing with hungry eyes at the heaps of mullock and the mounds of tailings surrounding the “Ever Victorious” battery, watching the Europeans at work, and wondering when they, too, would give it up and follow their departed comrades. For the Chinamen knew that those dry and dusty heaps of mullock and grey and yellow sand, on which the death adder and the black-necked tiger snake now coiled themselves to sleep in the noon-day sun, still contained gold enough to reward patient industry—industry of which the foreign-devils were not capable when the result would be but five pennyweights a day, washed out in the hot waters of the creek under a sky of brass, “with flour at two-pounds-ten per 50 lb. bag,” as Dick Scott said.

Presently, turning to a sun-baked, lanky Chinaman near him—his lieutenant—he bade him tell the men to prepare to go down to the Creek, and drag some of the pools with a small seine.

“There are many fish in all these creeks which run into the great river” (the Burdekin), “but I will first go to the foreigners and ask their permission. The tall, sick man is well disposed towards us, and we must be patient and submit to the tyranny of the others for a little while. But all may yet be well with us if I can but get speech of him alone. Meanwhile, keep the company under close watch; let no man wander from the camp till I return.”

Then entering his tent, he took from a canvas pack-bag a small bottle, put it in his coat pocket, and, descending the ridge, walked towards the “Digger’s Best.”

As he drew near, Grainger, followed by the landlord, came out of the house and sat down on rudely made reclining chairs, composed of two pieces of sapling, with cross-pieces, from which was slung a flour sack.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” said the Chinaman politely.

“Good morning,” they replied civilly, and then Grainger, who was wearing a heavy overcoat, for the chill of an attack of ague was near, asked him to sit down and inquired how his men were.

“They are getting on very well, thank you, sir,” replied Ah San, “but several of them are very weak, and will not be fit to travel for a fortnight unless we carry them. But the rest will do them much good, especially if they get a change of food. I have come now to ask you if you and your mates will let us drag some of the pools in the creek for fish. We have a small net.”

“Certainly,” replied Jansen; “some fish will do them good, and the pools are alive with them now that the creek is so low. And anyway, we don’t want to stop you from getting food—do we, Mr. Grainger?”

“Certainly not; we have no earthly right to prevent you from taking fish in the creek, and even if we had we should not use it. We are not brutes.”

“Thank you very much,” said Ah San—and then, addressing himself to the landlord, he asked him if he had a bullock to sell.

Jansen was an alert business man at once. He had a small herd of cattle running wild about the creek! and was only too glad to sell a beast.

“You can have any bullock you like—the biggest in the lot—for a fiver—but, cash down.”

The Chinaman pulled out his purse, handed him a five-pound note, and asked when he could have the beast.

“In about an hour, if you want to kill right off; but you ought not to kill till sundown in such weather as this. But, anyway, I’ll saddle up and get a man to help me run the mob into the stockyard. Then you can pick one out for yourself–there’s half a dozen bullocks, and some fine young fat cows, so you can have your choice.”

In a few minutes the landlord had caught and saddled two horses, and riding one, and leading the other, he went off to the new shaft, where the spare horse was mounted by one of the men working there.

Then Ah San turned to the sick man, and said interrogatively—

“You have fever?”

“Yes, I caught it up Normanton way in the Gulf Country six months ago, and thought I was getting clear of it, but a month back it came on again, and I have been pretty bad ever since.”

“I can see that, and the Gulf kind of fever is bad—very bad. I know all about it, for I lived in the Gulf Country for ten years, and have had it myself. Now, here is some medicine which will do you good—it will cure you in ten days if you take a dose every time you feel the ‘shakes’ coming on. But you must not eat more than you can help.”

“Thank you,” said Grainger eagerly, as he took the bottle; “it is very kind of you. But you may want it yourself?”

“I have three or four more bottles left. I had a dozen from the doctor at Georgetown on the Etheridge River. He is a man who knows all about fever, and I can assure you that you will be a well man in ten days. Show me your hand, please.”

The European extended his hand languidly to the Chinaman, who looked at the finger-nails for a moment or two: “You will have the ‘shakes’ in a few hours.”

“Yes. They generally come on as soon as the sun gets pretty high—about nine or ten o’clock.”

“Then you must take a dose now. Can I go inside and get a glass and some water?”

“Yes, certainly. It is very good of you to take so much trouble.”

Returning with a glass and some water, the Chinaman poured out a dose of the mixture, and with a smile of satisfaction watched the sick man drink it.

Then Grainger and his visitor began to talk, at first on general matters such as the condition of the country between the Cloncurry and the Burdekin, and then about Chinkie’s Flat, its past glories and its present condition. The frank, candid manner of Ah San evoked a similar freedom of speech from the Englishman, who recognised that he was talking to an intelligent and astute man who knew more about the Far North of Queensland and its gold-fields than he did himself.

Then Ah San saw the opportunity for which he had been waiting, and drawing his seat nearer to Grainger’s he spoke earnestly to him, told him exactly of the situation of himself and his company, and ended up by making him a certain proposition regarding the working of the abandoned claims, and the restarting of the rusting and weather-worn “Ever Victorious” battery.

Grainger listened intently, nodding his head now and then as Ah San emphasised some particular point. At the end of an hour’s conversation they heard the cracking of the landlord’s stock whip and the bellowing of cattle as they crossed the creek, and the Chinaman rose and held out his hand.

“Then good morning, Mr. Grainger. I hope you will be able to convince your mates that we can all pull together.”

“I am sure of it. We are all pretty hard up. And you and your men can help us, and we can help you. Come down again to-night, and I’ll tell you the result of my talk with them.”

CHAPTER V ~ THE RESURRECTION OF THE “EVER VICTORIOUS”

At six o’clock in the evening, Grainger was seated at one end of the rough dining-table in the “Digger’s Best” with some papers laid before him, At the other end was Dick Scott, and the rest of the men sat on either side, smoking their pipes, and wondering what was in the wind.

Grainger did not keep them waiting long. Taking his pipe ont of his month, and laying it on the table, he went into business at once, He spoke to them as if he were one of themselves, adopting a simplicity of language and manner that he knew would appeal to their common sense and judgment far more than an elaborately prepared speech.

“Now, boys, I’ve got something to say, and I’ll say it as quick as I can. None of you know anything of me beyond what I have told you myself; but I don’t think any one of you will imagine I’m a man who would try to ring in a swindle on you when I bought the old rattletrap down there?”

“Go ahead, mister,” said Dick Scott, “we didn’t think no such thing. We on’y thought you was chuckin’ away your money pernicious.”

Grainger laughed so heartily that his hearers followed suit Then he went on—

“No. I’m not throwing my money away, boys. I am going to make money on this field, and so are you. But there are not enough of us. We want more men—wages’ men; and presently I’ll explain why we shall want them. But first of all, let me show you what I obtained the other day out of between 200 and 250 lbs. weight of those tailings.”

He rose, went into the second room, and returned with a small enamelled dish, and placed it upon the table. The miners rose and gathered round, and saw lying on the bottom about an ounce and a quarter of fine powdery gold.

“Holy Moses!” cried one of them, as he drew his forefinger through the bright, yellow dust, “there’s more than an ounce there.”

“There is,” affirmed Grainger: “there are twenty-five pennyweights, and all that came out of not more than 250 lbs. of tailings!”

The men looked at each other with eyes sparkling with excitement, and then Grainger poured the gold out upon a clean plate for closer examination.

“Why,” exclaimed Scott, “that means those tailings would go ten ounces to the ton!”

“Just so,” said Grainger, “but we can’t get those ten ounces out of them by ordinary means, though with new screens, new tables and blankets I am pretty sure we can get four ounces to the ton. But we want the ten, don’t we?”

“You bet,” was the unanimous response.

“Well, I’ll guarantee that we shall get eight ounces at least. But first of all I’ll tell you how I got the result. You can try some of the stuff in the morning, and you will find that those tailings will pan out about eight or ten ounces to the ton.”

“But acid is mighty dear stuff,” said Scott.

“Just so, but it is very good as a test, and of course we are not such duffers as to try to treat more than a couple of thousand tons of tailings with acid. We’d die of old age before we finished. Now, I’ll get on and tell you what I do propose. You remember that I said I had seen tailings treated in Victoria without roasting. Well, we could do that now, though we should only get half the gold and lose the other half in the sludge pits. Now, as I told you, I have about four hundred pounds’ worth of alluvial gold, which I brought with me from the north, and which I can sell to any bank in the Bay. I intended when I bought the ‘Ever Victorious’ to spend this £400 in buying some fine screens, a couple of grinding pans, and some other gold-saving machinery, so that when I was not crushing stone for you men I could be running those tailings through. But we can do better—now that the Chinamen are here.”

Something like dismay was depicted on the men’s faces when they heard this, but no one interrupted as he went on—

“We can do much better. Instead of treating those tailings by simply running them through the screens again and losing half the gold, we can build a proper roasting farnaoe, and then we can grind them, keeping the stampers for crushing alone. This morning I had a long yarn with Ah San, the boss Chinaman, and he is willing to let us have as many of his men as we want for twenty-five shillings a week each, and indenture them to me for six months—there’s the labour we want, right to our hand. It’s cheap labour, I admit, but that is no concern of ours. The Chows, so Ah San tells me, will be only too glad to get a six months’ job at twenty-five bob a week—of which he takes half.”

“Aye,” said Scott contemptuously, “they’re only bloomin’ slaves.”

“To their boss, no doubt; but not to us. They will be well pleased to work for us and earn what they consider good wages. I propose that we get at least twenty of them and set them to work right away. There is any amount of good clay here, I know, and we’ll start them digging. I know how to build a brick-kiln, and we’ll get a proper bricklayer up from the Bay, and I guarantee that by the time the new machinery is up that the roasting furnace will be built.”

“No need to get a bricklayer from the Bay and pay him about eight pound a week,” said a man named Arthur O’Hare; “I’m a bricklayer by trade.”

“Bully for you,” said Grainger; “will you take four pounds a week to put up the furnace and chimney?”

“I’m willing, if my mates are.”

“Well, boys, that’s pretty well all I have to say. We’ll build the roasting furnace; the Chinamen will do all the bullocking⁴ both at that and the battery, and we’ll put on half-a-dozen to help at the new shaft. I’ll boss the battery, drive the engine, and do the amalgamating, and you men can go on roasting stone. Every Saturday we’ll stop the battery and clean her up, and at the end of every four weeks we’ll send the gold to the bank and go shares in the plunder. Now, tell me, what do you think? Do you think it’s a fair proposition?”

After a very brief consultation together, Scott, speaking on behalf of his mates, said they were all willing, and not only willing, but pleased to “come in” with him, but they thought that he would only be acting fairly to himself if he, as manager of the battery, amalgamator, and general supervisor of the whole concern, took a salary of ten pounds a week.

“No, boys. I’ll take six pounds if you like. Of course, however, you will not object to refunding me the money I am expending on the new machinery. As for the profits, we shall divide equally.

“Well then,” said Scott, banging his brawny fist on the table and turning to his mates, “if you treats us in that generous way, we must do the same with you as regards the stone we raise. Boys, I proposes that as our new mate is finding the money to start the old battery again, and going even shares with us in the gold from the tailings, that we go even shares with him in whatever gold we get from the claims.”

“Right,” was the unanimous response. And then they all came up one by one and shook hands with Grainger, whose face flushed with pleasure. Then Jansan produced a bottle of rum and Grainger gave them a toast—

“Boys, here’s good luck to us all, and here’s to the day when we shall hear the stampers banging away in the boxes and the ‘Ever Victorious’ be as victorious as she was in the good old days of the field.”