Fiery Possession by Margaret Tanner

too. He got male convicts assigned to him to work on the property, a crueler man you never saw, gave one fellow two hundred lashes because he broke the handle on an axe. I've seen men with flesh hanging off their backs in strips.”
    “Granny, please.” Jo shivered.
    “Well, I did. Where was I?  Ah yes. He got women convicts to share his bed. One wasn't enough, always two, three, more if he could get them. He'd take turns with them all in the one night, like a rutting bull, he never got tired.”  She spat. “Filthy pig. If you didn't give into him, he'd tie you to the bed with your legs...”
    “Granny!”
    “All right, you can guess what I mean. We used to have to watch, listen to his grunts and groans, and the screams sometimes if the girls were virgins. He made us stay there, knowing we would have to go through the same things.”
    “Did you fight him?  I mean…”
    “No, I lay there and took it, hoping some day I'd get the chance to kill him. On my first day there, another girl told me what would happen to anyone who fought him. He stripped them naked, absolutely naked, and paraded them in front of fifty or so convicts and several free men, then let them all have their way with her.”
    “How dreadful, wasn't there anything you could do?”
    “No, against regulations to do what he did, but when you're forty miles from the nearest town, there ain't no laws. There must have been something wrong with him. He never got any woman with child, which made him even worse.”
    “After serving my time, I left a free woman so the government said, but who could forget five years of that. I didn’t get married until I turned forty. Arthur was a most understanding man. Didn't worry too much after I had Will, knew how I hated it after what I’d been through. I was too scared to go near a man for twenty years, that's what you saved Amy from.”
    “Oh, Granny.”
    The old lady knocked out her pipe and immediately refilled it.
    “Thank you for coming over. I do feel a little better knowing I saved Amy from something so horrible. Will you be all right?  I could ride home with you.”
    “I've driven horses for years, used to be harnessed to a cart in the early days. I saw men working in chains, pulling wagons like bullocks.”
    She watched the old lady drive off. What a horrific story. To think a young girl had been forced to endure such terrible violations. And to think it still happened.
     
    ***
     
    The weather became hotter, no rain fell and the creek turned into a trickle. They all knew why, although none of them voiced their suspicion. A worried Ian received word that if he wanted to go on the drive, he must leave within the next couple of days.
    This news coming hard on the heels of Granny Kirkman’s visit brought Jo out of her depression. If she could not take over the running of the property for Ian, they would go under.  Even her sister-in-law’s friends would have to admit Fiona was incapable of doing anything of the sort.
     
    ***
     
    Fiona sobbed uncontrollably and Jo had to put aside her own sadness to try and comfort her when Ian rode away to join the drovers. For a king’s ransom, she wouldn’t tell Fiona that it was more than likely he could be away for several months. In fact, if he didn’t get back in time to harvest their small crop of wheat, he had instructed her to seek help from Kirkmans.
    “I miss him already,” white faced, Fiona blubbered between sniffs.
    “Of course you do, but he'll be back soon,” she lied. Her sister-in-law could have passed for seventeen in her blue sprigged cotton gown, with a little white collar and matching cuffs. What an awesome responsibility taking on a helpless sister-in-law, a young child and a farm virtually on her own. Her shoulders slumped.
    “You aren't frightened, are you, Jo?”
    “Frightened?  Me? Of course not.”  Her spine stiffened. “I fear nothing or no one.”  No one?  A cold shiver ran up her spine. She forced a carefree laugh