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  ‘That’s a very different story from what Mr McMaster told me,’ the sergeant grumbled. ‘And I have a witness who says she saw you attack Lachlan.’

  My head was spinning. What had I done to deserve this? I wished I’d listened to Mum and never gone to the damn dance.

  ‘There was no one there when he attacked me,’ I said, angrily. ‘If you’re talking about Amanda Price, she only came to the door when it was over. She saw me on the ground. Nice witness she is — she called me a slut.’

  ‘The witness says you have quite the filthy mouth yourself, young lady,’ Fitzpatrick said. ‘And that she saw you push Lachlan to the ground.’

  ‘He dropped when I stomped on his foot,’ I replied. ‘If that’s assault then arrest me. But he attacked me. He tore my dress, he … he did far worse to me — and might have done a darn sight more if I hadn’t got away. What they’ve told you is pure and utter …’

  ‘Erin! What d’ya think yer doin?’ Dad had woken and was propped in the kitchen doorway, scowling something fierce. ‘I’ve told ya before. No Murphy talks to cops. I don’ care what’s happened. We’re not squealers.’

  I gulped back a sob, furious. ‘But I …’

  ‘Don’ want to hear it,’ Dad growled. He turned to face Fitzpatrick. ‘If yer not arresting anyone, get the hell out of here.’

  I glared at Dad. Then, looking back at Fitzpatrick, I drew the collar of my gown from my neck. Mum gasped: ‘Erin! What did he do to you?’ In the small mirror on the mantelpiece, I saw it for the first time — a plum-coloured bruise, partially ringed by teeth marks. Vomit leapt into my throat. I forced myself to swallow, eyeballed Dad and said nothing. Just shook my head. Cried like I’d never cried before.

  Mum’s face was ashen. ‘Sergeant, I want Doctor Martyn here right now! He can examine Erin and tell you who it is that was assaulted. Perhaps then you can go and give the McMaster family a grilling. Or is that treatment reserved ’specially for our mob?’

  I sipped my tea in silence while Fitzpatrick fetched the doctor. At least Doctor Martyn was a friend — one of a select few in town we could count on. Mum had been seeing him about her arthritis ever since we moved to Murnong.

  I’d get home from school and find Mum cooking or knitting — and watch the way she bit her lip to steel herself against the pain. ‘Don’t know what I’d do without our Doctor Martyn,’ she’d pant.

  I didn’t know either. The arthritis was progressing. Her hands were often too sore and swollen for knitting, let alone hand sewing. Several times I’d told her it was time for me to quit school and get a job. She couldn’t keep taking on cleaning or mending jobs with her hands like that. Each time her answer was the same. ‘You stick with your schooling. I’m still quite capable of pushing a broom.’

  That was Mum all over. Despite her troubles, she rarely complained. But, as she poured my tea after Sergeant Fitzpatrick left, her hand shook so much she spilled hot water all over the bench. Dad didn’t bother helping her mop it up. Lighting up a smoke, he stomped out to the ute. I heard a door slam, the car cough into life and splutter away. Thanks a heap, Dad. Appreciate the support.

  By the time I heard the creak of the front gate again, I was shaking — whether from shock or humiliation and anger, I’m not sure. Directing the sergeant to wait in the kitchen, Doctor Martyn escorted Mum and me to my room. ‘Let’s have a look at you, my dear,’ he said. ‘Show me where you hurt.’

  I held my hair out of the way and turned my head to let him see my neck. After he dabbed it with antiseptic, I shrugged off my dressing gown and lifted my pyjama top and singlet. ‘He shoved me against the railing …’ Doctor Martyn’s gentle hands traversed my back. I winced — ‘Uh!’ — as he found the most painful spot. ‘Two aspirin now and two more at lunch,’ he murmured to Mum.

  Next the doctor asked me to sit on my bed as he looked at my knee. ‘It’s a nasty scrape,’ he said, ‘but it won’t need stitches.’ Reaching into his bag he pulled out a sheet with some butterfly clips on it. ‘These will do the trick,’ he said, ‘but don’t try any gymnastics for a few days. Is that all your injuries?’

  I glanced up at Mum. She wouldn’t look me in the eye. ‘My left breast,’ I said, quietly. ‘It’s very sore.’

  Doctor Martyn moved forward slightly. ‘Take your pyjama top off, please, Erin.’ I lifted the top carefully over my head and then slipped my singlet from my shoulder so he could examine my breast. Peering down, I was appalled. There were red bruises like fingerprints — you could see where Lachlan had squeezed. I shivered at the memory and pulled my singlet back up. As Doctor Martyn helped me put the pyjama top back on, he had one more question. ‘Did he touch you anywhere else?’ I shook my head in reply.

  ‘I’ll have to make a report,’ he said. ‘I’ll give you a copy when I give the sergeant his.’ Then he nodded his goodbye and left the room.

  At the back of the house I heard Fitzpatrick ask Doctor Martyn what he’d found. Doctor Martyn’s reply was firm and defiant. ‘You’ll get my report today.’

  In the kitchen, Fitzpatrick glared at us. ‘This is a bad business,’ he snorted. ‘You ain’t heard the last of it. I’ll be back to get your statement when the doctor gives me his report.’ And he tramped down the hall and out to his car.

  With the policeman gone, my tears started flowing again. ‘I’m sorry, Mum,’ I sobbed. ‘I should have stayed home. But I didn’t … you know I didn’t … don’t you?’

  She wrapped me in a hug. ‘I never doubted,’ she said. ‘But I’m afraid. In a town like this there’s one set of rules for folks like the McMasters and another for the likes of us.’

  CHAPTER 12

  Some people say that there are no secrets in a country town. They’re wrong. All towns have secrets. Small town secrets are like a sheep’s carcass to blowflies. Everyone feeds off the same scandal until a new secret is discovered.

  Even though Doctor Martyn’s report told the police I’d been attacked, the McMasters fed the town another story. Suddenly I was the girl who forgot my place in the pecking order; tried to snare someone out of my league, by hook or by crook. A seductress, a scarlet woman. That sort of gossip rips through a country town like a hotted-up Torana on a Saturday night. So Murnong got the message pretty damn quick, believe me.

  I lost my job at the bakery because some of the local women wouldn’t let me serve them. Mum was sacked from a couple of cleaning jobs, too. No reason was given, but we knew the McMasters were pulling strings. Lachlan was the attacker, yet I was the villain. It stunk. Big time.

  Sergeant Fitzpatrick never apologised. Never came back for a statement and never asked if I wanted to make a formal complaint against Lachlan either. I’ll bet Lachlan never even got questioned. His old man would have made sure of that. The young prince was banished to boarding school and stopped coming home for weekends. That made me even less popular because the cricket team lost their precious opening bowler. When Dunkeld beat Murnong in the final, Mum and I had stones thrown on our roof in the middle of the night.

  Shelley stopped being my mate, too. Great, eh? About a week after the dance she came to me and said: ‘I’m really sorry, Erin … I can’t be your friend any more.’

  That hurt — really hurt. Shelley was one of very few people who knew my side of the story but her dad was a truckie. He couldn’t afford to lose cartage work with the biggest grazier in the district.

  It was a rotten time. Mum had next to no work. Dad was off doing a little labouring and, if I’m any guess, a lot of drinking. He certainly only sent cash once in a blue moon. Suddenly being settled didn’t feel so good. I wasn’t sure I’d ever belong, or even want to, in a town that could be turned against us so quickly. Of course, when Dad turned up again, things got even messier — but only after he made his point in a way only Paddy Murphy could pull off.

  Since leaving the shearing team, Dad had struggled for work. He’d always been a union man but, desperate to earn a quid, he tore up his ticket and started undercutting award ra
tes. The union blacklisted him straight away. Told him he’d never work again in the Western District. Bar one last (unpaid) job, that proved to be correct.

  Mum and I didn’t even know Dad was back in town until Sergeant Fitzpatrick dumped him on our veranda late one night. Dad had hit town and made a beeline for the pub. The union boys were none too pleased to see him and, when one of them saw fit to refer to me as the town bike, Dad swung a punch. It was all the invitation they needed to hand out some bush justice. Sergeant Fitzpatrick was having a quiet one at the other end of the bar. After he finished his drink, he broke up the fight and delivered Dad to us.

  Dad probably would have slept where he fell if I hadn’t heard the thud and investigated. I hardly recognised him. One eye was as swollen as an eggplant, his nose was busted again and he’d lost one of his few good teeth. Dried blood caked half his face. He smelt like he’d been dragged through a dunny.

  As I sponged his face, he managed to get his good eye open enough to mumble, ‘Sorry, El.’ (El is short for Ellen, Mum’s name.)

  ‘It’s me, Dad — Erin. Keep still and this won’t hurt so much.’

  He turned and peered at me with a bloodshot eye. Oddly enough, he was up for a chat.

  ‘Erin. How’ve ya been, darlin’?’

  ‘Better than you by the looks.’

  ‘Yeah. Had a bit of a scrap … Mum won’t be too ’appy, eh?’

  ‘You can say that again.’

  ‘Aah well. Matter of honour. They ’aven’t heard the last of me, the pricks.’

  That was certainly true. Within days, Dad was the talk of the town.

  CHAPTER 13

  Every spring, Murnong holds its annual agricultural show. Basically that means a handful of tatty sideshow stalls, a second-rate wood-chopping competition, shiny new tractors that no normal farmer could afford and horse jumping out on the main arena. The postmistress, Mrs Armitage, always wins the prize for best jam. The Anglican vicar’s wife wins ‘best fruitcake’. And the McMasters always take home the grand prize for their merino ram. This year was no different.

  On the Saturday, I’d wandered about the showgrounds with Bron, sharing some fairyfloss and doing my utmost to avoid Amanda Price and her jodhpur-clad coven. Bron had the hots for a guy from Dunkeld whose dad had some Friesian calves on display so, with nothing better to do, we checked out the sheep and cattle pavilion. In prime position, at the front of the dusty, manure-perfumed shed, stood ‘The General’, the McMasters’ impressive stud ram. Blue ribbons festooned his stall, alongside a certificate detailing his aristocratic bloodlines.

  ‘Would ya look at him, Bron? Even their sheep think they run the town!’ Bron’s mind was on other things. We left the General haughtily munching on hay and headed for the calves.

  On Sunday, I had homework to finish but Bron was dead keen on hanging round the showgrounds again. I threw on a duffle coat and followed her. ‘He’s gotta know I’m rapt in him,’ Bron sighed, as we wandered through the gates. ‘I dunno,’ I said. ‘Maybe he thinks you’re after his bull calf.’

  As Bron chased me towards the cattle pavilion I noticed a bunch of people milling around the entrance. The crowd parted as Mr McMaster emerged, Sergeant Fitzpatrick sullen at his heels like a kicked kelpie. I shrank towards the back of the mob, whispering a question at Andy Armitage from school. ‘Why all the kerfuffle? What’s up?’

  Andy was enjoying the drama. ‘It’s the ruddy General,’ he grinned. ‘Some bugger’s broken into the shed overnight and given him a haircut.’

  ‘Fair dinkum! Mr McMaster must be spewing.’

  ‘That’s not the half of it,’ Andy smirked. ‘Whoever did the job had an accident with the clippers …’

  ‘Whaddaya mean! The General’s not dead, is he?’

  ‘Nup. But his days of being the number one stud ram in Murnong are over.’

  I jogged home, desperately hoping it wasn’t Dad’s handiwork, certain it was. He’d go down for this for sure! Who else had such an obvious grudge against the McMasters, other than me? Who else would be mad enough to break into the showgrounds and castrate the General? Who else would the cops bust for it, knowing they had to make a quick arrest before Mr McMaster trashed their chances of ever scoring a promotion?

  As I burst into the kitchen, the look on Dad’s face told me everything I needed to know. ‘Oh, Dad! You didn’t!’

  ‘Had to do somethin’, love. The arsehole’s lucky it wasn’t his son.’

  He gestured towards a package on the kitchen table. ‘Anyways, I only borrowed ’em. I was gonna mail the bloody balls back to him.’

  Talk about mad! I was so furious I could barely speak. What was Dad thinking? Lachlan McMaster assaults me, humiliates me, leaves me black and blue all over, and this is Dad’s idea of justice? Mutilating a ram? When I could have made a formal complaint and maybe got Lachlan charged? No, that wouldn’t do for a Murphy. Oh no no! We don’t talk to the police. Dad had to go and do something bloody stupid instead. Something anyone with half a brain would know was Paddy Murphy’s handiwork. Something so dumb and poorly thought out that there could only be one suspect in a town this small. Something that could spell the end for us in Murnong.

  What did this mean for Mum and me? How would we survive with Dad in gaol again? This was too juicy an opportunity for Mr McMaster to miss. He’d make sure the local magistrate threw the book at Dad this time. What were Mum and I s’posed to do for a living? We could barely afford the rent as it was.

  I stomped into my bedroom, seething. Yet part of me felt Dad had done me a favour. What he’d done was rash and stupid but it was also crudely poetic. There weren’t many ways the McMasters could be made to suffer but Dad had found one. And by sticking it up the McMasters, he’d stuck up for me.

  Maybe he regretted barring me from talking to the police about Lachlan. Maybe he wanted to show me he really was loyal to his daughter — and give Lachlan McMaster a scare at the same time. Dad was shrewd enough to know what the townsfolk would be saying. If Paddy Murphy was crazy enough to cut the balls off a ram for a payback, what would he do if he ever laid hands on Lachlan?

  I was considering going to Dad and giving him a hug. Telling him he was mad but thanks anyway. I never got the chance. Sergeant Fitzpatrick pulled up outside, the lights flashing on the divvy van as if to tell the whole town he’d cracked the case.

  Fitzgerald had another officer with him, too — the bullock-like young copper from Dunkeld, Constable Hall. Maybe they hoped Dad would try to resist arrest so they could give him a decent going-over — and add assault to the list of charges. They needn’t have worried. Dad went like a lamb, grinning and willingly putting his arms out to be cuffed.

  They soon wiped the smirk off his face when they arrested me.

  CHAPTER 14

  ‘Erin Murphy, I am arresting you for conspiracy to commit criminal damage. You have the right to remain silent …’

  ‘Dad! Tell them! Tell them I had nothing to do with this!’

  ‘You lousy mongrel, Fitzpatrick,’ was all Dad snarled. Then he gobbed in Fitzpatrick’s face.

  As they shoved me into the divvy van, Mum turned up from cleaning Doctor Martyn’s rooms. She was mortified to see me being bundled away with Dad.

  ‘Paddy! Tell them this is a mistake,’ she pleaded. ‘Tell them Erin had nothing whatsoever to do with whatever they’re here for. Tell them!’

  ‘Yer wasting your breath, Missus,’ Fitzpatrick crowed. ‘No Murphy talks to police, ’member. Yer lucky we’re not taking you in, too.’

  In the back of the van, Dad leaned against me and muttered, ‘You’ll be right, love.’ I slapped him. Then I moved to the far side of the van, refusing to even look at him. To think that I nearly thanked him!

  Fitzpatrick didn’t hurry to the cop shop. The van crawled around the town, stopping at the entrance to the showgrounds so Fitzgerald could brag to old Baz Cunningham on the gates. ‘We got the folks that did the General,’ he skited, leaning out the window. ‘Murphy and his da
ughter had the balls sitting all wrapped up on the kitchen table.’

  ‘Fair dinkum,’ Baz replied. ‘Bloody idiots. Mr McMaster will ’av Murphy’s guts fer garters.’

  Fitzpatrick knew that once Baz Cunningham knew about the arrests, everyone at the showground would be put in the picture real quick. The bush telegraph would ensure the McMasters knew too. But as we waited outside the showgrounds, Dad blew a fuse. ‘Get on with it, ya pricks,’ he roared. Then he started belting the sides of the van, yelling to anyone in earshot: ‘Lapdogs! Yer nothing but McMaster’s bloody lapdogs!’ It was enough to get the van moving again.

  Mum was waiting at the police station when we arrived. They wouldn’t let me speak to her. I heard her say something about bail but Fitzpatrick was enjoying himself too much to respond. With Hall restraining Dad, Fitzpatrick took the laces from my desert boots, the belt from my jeans, my watch and the choker Mum gave me for my sixteenth birthday. Then he led me to one of two tiny rooms at the rear of the station. ‘Enjoy,’ he sneered. ‘Best room in the house.’

  The slam of the heavy metal door was the worst sound I’ve heard, believe me. I can’t tell you how long I was in the lockup but I can say what I was feeling. Despair, shame, shock, outrage, humiliation. All of it more intense than anything I’d known before. It sounds like a cliché but it felt like my life was over — my childhood, anyway. Being Paddy Murphy’s daughter suddenly meant something else. I was marked, stained, smeared. Whether I was guilty or not, the town would see me as a crim, genetically doomed to follow the family trade. ‘I knew that girl was just like her old man. Tarred with the same brush, those two. Good-for-nothing crooks …’

  Something about being behind that metal door magnified every thought I had in the dark, smelly lockup. I wasn’t just cross with Dad, I hated him. I resented the way the McMasters manipulated an entire town. Loathed the arrogance with which they had destroyed me. They’d already cost me friends and a job. After this, I could write off any other chance I had of making a go of things in Murnong — possibly anywhere.