Dedication
To my parents, Stephen and Marion, for making anything possible
Epigraph
The chief topic of the past week has been the trial of the seven black troopers for the murder of aboriginals at Irvinebank, and that of ex Sub-Inspector Nichols for being an accessory before the fact to the same. The trial of Nichols only lasted about half a day. The evidence for the Crown was of such a nature [that] the police magistrate said there was not much use going on with the case. The prisoner was discharged amid considerable applause.
—from “The Irvinebank Murders,” an article in The Queenslander, February 7, 1885 (abridged)
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
Prologue
Part I: 1890
Chapter 1: Billy McBride
Chapter 2: Tommy McBride
Chapter 3: Billy McBride
Chapter 4: Tommy McBride
Chapter 5: Billy McBride
Chapter 6: Henry Wells
Chapter 7: Billy McBride
Chapter 8: Katherine Sullivan
Chapter 9: Tommy McBride
Chapter 10: Billy McBride
Chapter 11: Henry Wells
Chapter 12: Katherine Sullivan
Chapter 13: Billy McBride
Chapter 14: Tommy McBride
Part II: 1897
Chapter 15: Henry Wells
Chapter 16: Billy McBride
Chapter 17: Henry Wells
Chapter 18: Tommy McBride
Chapter 19: Billy and Katherine McBride
Chapter 20: Tommy McBride
Chapter 21: Henry Wells
Chapter 22: Tommy McBride
Chapter 23: Inquest
Chapter 24: Inquest
Chapter 25: Inquest
Chapter 26: Billy and Katherine McBride
Chapter 27: Henry Wells
Chapter 28: Tommy McBride
Chapter 29: Reverend Bean
Part III: 1906
Chapter 30: Katherine and Billy McBride
Chapter 31: Tommy McBride
Chapter 32: Billy McBride
Chapter 33: Police Sergeant Percy
Chapter 34: Tommy McBride
Chapter 35: Henry Wells
Chapter 36: Tommy McBride
Chapter 37: Tommy McBride
Chapter 38: Tommy McBride
Chapter 39: Magistrate MacIntyre
Chapter 40: Tommy McBride
Chapter 41: Tommy McBride
Chapter 42: Katherine McBride
Chapter 43: Tommy McBride
Chapter 44: Tommy McBride
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Paul Howarth
Copyright
About the Publisher
Prologue
1885
Central Queensland, Australia
They stood on the bank of the desert crater, staring down into hell. Trampled humpies, scattered possessions, discarded weapons,severed limbs, all bogged in a churn of crimson mud; the camp had become a slaughter yard. One of the men wept openly. Theother vomited on the ground. Not two days ago they had been here, in this crater, welcomed by the Kurrong people, attemptingto preach to them, sharing a meal. Now that same entire community lay heaped in an enormous pyre: a knot of mangled bodies,popping, crackling, peeling as they burned. A thick smoke column rising. A smell both men would carry to their graves.
After four days’ nonstop riding over a wasteland of sun-scorched scrub they reached the settled colony in the east, and thesingle-street outpost of Bewley perched on its frontier. Desperate and disheveled they tore into town, slid from their saddles,and scrambled along a narrow path to the courthouse, bursting through the black-tarred double doors into the cool flagstonelobby beyond.
“An outrage! A most terrible outrage!”
From his desk by the wall, the clerk looked up at the piebald-faced white man, fair skin bleached and blotted by the sun, and a properly dressed native like none they got round here. “Help you?” he called, and startled, the white man spun.
“There’s been an outrage in the desert. A hundred killed! More!”
A guard wandered out from the cell block and crossed the lobby to where they stood, glaring at them, cocking and uncockinghis revolver with his thumb, but before he could speak, a side door opened and out barreled Police Magistrate MacIntyre, barking,“Donnaghy, get that darkie out of here, or else throw him in the cells.”
The accent was thick Scots. The guard smiled, clicked his tongue, tossed his head toward the doors. Nobody moved. The guardcocked the revolver again, but the white man said, “Matthew, please,” and reluctantly he went outside, Donnaghy followinga few paces behind.
“Well now,” Magistrate MacIntyre said, “what do we have here?”
“There’s been an outrage in—”
“Yes, yes, I heard all that. What I mean is: who the hell are you?”
“Reverend Francis Bean, sir. That is Matthew.”
“Ah, missionaries.”
“Yes we are.”
“I don’t suppose you’d thank me for a whiskey then?”
Reverend Bean cast about the lobby. “Perhaps just some water, if I may.”
The magistrate steered him toward the office. “Come through here and I’ll find you some. Let’s you and me have a little talk.”
They sat on either side of a rosewood writing desk, MacIntyre cupping his chin in his hand, Reverend Bean fidgeting in hischair. Wiping his hands on his trousers, picking at his shirt hem; he’d soaked his chest with water, gulping it down. MacIntyrewaited, expressionless, slumped over the desk, as falteringly Reverend Bean began recounting all that had happened, all theyhad seen: the horror of the crater, the posse they’d encountered the day before, the tall man who’d been leading them, theone calling himself Noone.
“And how are you so sure,” MacIntyre asked finally, once Reverend Bean was done, “that this group of men you claim you metwere Native Police?”
“The officer admitted as much himself.”
“I see.” With great effort the magistrate shifted his bulk and heaved himself upright. “And did Inspector Noone tell you thenature of his work out there, I wonder?”
“He had two young white boys with him. There’d been a murder, he said.”
“Exactly. Three innocents, butchered by savages in their own home. Those poor McBride brothers lost their parents, their littlesister, their whole family just about. Meaning it now falls on Inspector Noone to find the culprits and bring them beforethe law. You don’t object to justice being done in the colony, do you, Reverend Bean?”
“They can’t all have been suspects, surely. There were women and children in that camp. It was obviously preplanned.”
“Obvious to who? You? Yet you didn’t try to stop them, or warn the Kurrong?”
Reverend Bean was aghast. “But, I couldn’t have . . .”
“You did nothing. Ran away, in fact. Do I have that right?”
“There were far too many of them. We were unarmed!”
MacIntyre only shrugged.
“You don’t understand. The things Noone threatened me with . . .”
“Are nothing compared to what he’ll do if he learns you’ve been in here telling tales. Noone is not a man to be trifled with.Not if you value your life.”
Reverend Bean had turned ashen. He looked suddenly unwell. Steeling himself, he said, “There is only one
