Western Walkabout: The Avenger
Some secrets are best hidden for awhile.
Richard Harris tells a tale of the Australian outback.
He loped across the hot red pindan sand, his feet cool in feather shoes, leaving no tracks.
The heat and color of the land reflected the anger in his heart and he was totally focused on his current task – revenge.
The stranger had eloped with his daughter, who was promised to his best friend. Their trail was clear. He could read from the marks in the sand that they had lain together. He was ashamed.
Later in the afternoon the hot white light changed, taking a golden, pumpkin hue. The desert became a different world, the landscape more forgiving. High above, his spirit bird, the kite hawk, nailed in the sky, observed his progress.
The bird spoke to him in his heart, using his secret name.
“Kaditcha, brave one, where is the merit in killing a daughter for running away from a marriage she didn’t desire?” the bird said.
“She follows her heart.
“You, too, follow your heart, seeking what you want, vengeance.
“Is it so hard to forgive her?
“Must all game fall to your spear?
“She’s truly your daughter. You are so alike – seeds from the same wattle. To kill her would be to lose her twice, and forego your grandchildren.”
He looked up into the unbelievable violet of the Murchison sunset. The hawk had gone. Life was truly exquisitely beautiful.
He camped near a river gum by a dry creek bed and dug into the sand to find cool, clear water. He plucked a stem from a tussock of dry grass and, through its hollow centre, drank in the life of the land.
He made the ritual offering to the sacred spirit and breathed the incantation, “I thank thee Mother for the gift of life. My daughter will keep her life because you gave it to her. My head tells me she belongs to the land and her life is not mine to take.”
In the morning, his rage now cooled, he returned to the billabong where his people were camped.
“What happened to your daughter?” his best friend called.
“Her name is not to be spoken,” he replied. “I have no daughter.”
In the shade of the wattle bush, his wife wept silently.
“Let her weep,” he thought. “She thinks I killed our girl. If I tell her I didn’t she’ll be so happy the others will guess my secret. I’ll tell her later.”
**
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