Broome's red cliffs dissolved into heat haze as the SS Karoola churned south through impossibly blue water. Clara gripped the ship's rail, salt spray misting her face and dampening the wisps of hair that had escaped her bun. The wind carried the bite of open ocean—clean, sharp, nothing like the dust-thick air of Goddard Downs.
Four figures on the wharf had shrunk to specks. Gone now, swallowed by distance.
John. Isobel. Eleanor. Matthew.
Her chest ached.
"They'll be fine." Harry's voice came from beside her, low and steady. "We've raised them well."
Clara nodded but couldn't force words past the knot in her throat. Twenty years of mothering, and she'd rarely been separated from her children for more than a few weeks during cattle drives. Three months, perhaps four—that's what Harry estimated. Long enough to reach Gippsland, assess his father’s condition, help his mother make whatever decisions needed making.
Long enough for everything to change.
The thought arrived unbidden, unwelcome. She pushed it aside and focused on the coastline sliding past—mangroves giving way to white sand beaches, then rocky outcrops where waves shattered themselves against ancient stone.
Annie appeared at her elbow, face pale. "I don't feel well."
Clara pressed a hand to her daughter's forehead. Clammy. "Come. Let's get you to the cabin."
She guided Annie across the deck, past coils of rope and canvas-covered cargo. The ship's motion was gentle now, but it would worsen once they left the shelter of the coast. Clara remembered the queasiness from her sea journey, the way horizons tilted and righted themselves in sickening rhythm.
Their cabin was small, tucked below deck where the engine's rumble shook the walls. Two narrow bunks, a basin, barely room to turn around. Clara settled Annie on the lower bunk and dampened a cloth with water from the ewer.
"Close your eyes. Focus on your breathing."
"Will it get worse?"
"Probably."
Annie's face crumpled, but she didn't cry. Nine years old and already learning that honesty sometimes hurt more than comfort.
Clara stroked her hair. "We'll manage. We always do."
Footsteps sounded in the corridor—Harry's familiar tread, heavier than the children's. He ducked through the doorway, filling the cramped space with his presence.
"Ruby and James want to explore the ship. I told them they could, as long as they stay together."
"And David?"
"Asking the crew about steam engines. I thought I'd better rescue them before he talked their ears off."
Clara smiled despite the tightness in her chest. "He's your son."
"That he is."
Harry crouched beside the bunk, his hand gentle on Annie's shoulder. "Feeling crook?"
She nodded, eyes squeezed shut.
"Your mother will look after you. She always does."
He straightened, his gaze finding Clara's. Questions lived in his eyes—the same ones that had kept her awake last night in their room at the guesthouse. What would they find in Gippsland? How bad was Jamie's condition? Could Eliza manage on her own?
And beneath those questions, another. Would they arrive in time?
Clara stood, stepping into the narrow corridor where they could speak without Annie overhearing. The engine's throb was louder here, vibrating through the floorboards.
"How are you?" She searched his face for cracks in the calm exterior he wore like armour.
"I'm all right."
"Harry."
He exhaled. "I keep thinking I should've gone back sooner. Visited more often. It's been five years since I last saw them."
"You couldn't have known."
"That's what makes it worse." His jaw tightened. "I built a life so far from theirs that I didn't even know my own father was ill until the telegram came."
Clara placed her palm against his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart beneath cotton and muscle. "You followed where God led. Goddard Downs is your calling, same as the farm was your father’s."
"Then why does it feel like I abandoned them?"
"Because you love them." She rose on her toes and kissed his cheek, tasting salt.
He pulled her close, his chin resting on top of her head. She let herself lean into his strength, just for a moment. Let the fear that had been building since the telegram arrived find expression in the tightness of her arms around his waist.
They'd left half their children behind. They were sailing towards an uncertain reunion with a man who might die before they reached him. And somewhere deep in her chest, beneath layers of duty and determination, she felt the stirring of her own unfinished grief.
Her parents. Alive or dead, she didn't know. Somewhere in Sydney, twenty-two years lost to silence and pride.
She'd mention it to Harry soon. Maybe in Fremantle, when they arranged the next leg of their journey. The thought of seeking them out terrified and compelled her in equal measure.
"Come." Harry released her and stepped back. "Let's get some air before the boys decide to climb the rigging."
They emerged onto the deck, squinting against sunlight that glanced off the water in blinding sheets. Ruby stood near the bow, her hair whipping in the wind, face turned towards the horizon. James was questioning a deckhand about knots—his fingers working through the rope as the man demonstrated.
David had found a new victim, a grey-haired sailor with a pipe clenched between his teeth. The man was pointing at the smokestack, and David was nodding with the gravity of a judge hearing evidence.
Clara's heart eased slightly. Her children were adaptable. They'd weather this journey, same as they'd weathered drought and floods and the isolation of Goddard Downs.
Harry moved to the rail, his eyes on the coastline. "Five days to Fremantle. Then we book passage around the Bight."
"How long?"
"Another week to Melbourne, perhaps longer if the weather's rough. Then the train to Gippsland."
Two weeks minimum before they reached Jamie. Clara calculated backwards from the telegram's date. He'd had the stroke nearly three weeks ago. Would he still be alive when they arrived?
Please, God. Let us not be too late.
Ruby joined them, her cheeks pink from wind or excitement, or both. "This is wonderful, isn't it? Being on the water, going somewhere new?"
"It's a long journey." Clara kept her voice neutral. "And we're not going for pleasure."
"I know." Ruby's expression sobered. "But still. Doesn't it make you want to see more? Travel beyond the Kimberley?"
There it was again—that hunger. Clara recognised it from her own youth, the restlessness that had driven her to elope with Harry, leave Sydney, and follow him into country that had nearly killed them both.
"The Kimberley is home."
"I know that, too." Ruby's gaze drifted back to the horizon. "But maybe home doesn't have to be in just the one place."
Harry's hand found Clara's, squeezing once before releasing. A silent message: Later. We'll talk about this later.
The ship pushed south. Gulls trailed in their wake, crying for scraps from the galley. The sun climbed higher, turning the deck into a furnace. Most passengers retreated to whatever shade they could find.
Clara returned to the cabin, where Annie had fallen into fitful sleep. She dampened the cloth again and laid it across her daughter's forehead. Then she sat on the opposite bunk, her back against the wall, and let exhaustion pull at her bones.
Three months away from Goddard Downs. Three months trusting the older children to manage without her and Harry. Weeks on the water, followed by however long it took to help Harry’s parents.
And somewhere in those weeks, if courage held, a reckoning with the parents she'd left behind.
The sun hung low over the water by the time Clara emerged from the cabin again. Annie slept soundly now, her breathing steady, colour returned to her cheeks. The deck had emptied—most passengers retreating from the fierce heat—but she found Harry and the other children gathered near the bow.
David sat cross-legged on the planks, arranging shells he'd collected in Broome. Ruby leaned against the rail, book open on her knee, James stood beside his father, both watching the horizon where sky sea met sea in a perfect line.
Harry glanced up as she approached. "How is she?"
"Sleeping."
"Good." He held out his hand, and she took it, letting him pull her close. "We should gather for evening prayers before the light fades."
Ruby closed her book. "Can we pray for Eleanor and the others?"
"Of course."
They formed a circle—Harry, Clara, and three of their children. David slipped his hand into Clara's.
Harry opened his Bible, the thin pages flapping in the gentle breeze. "From Psalm 121: 'I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.'"
Clara closed her eyes, letting the familiar words wash over her. They'd read this psalm countless times at Goddard Downs, during drought, during floods, during the years when it seemed the land itself conspired against them.
"'He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.'"
Ruby's hand found hers, warm and steady. On her other side, David pressed closer.
"'The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.'"
Harry closed the Bible. "Let's pray."
They bowed their heads. The ship's engines thrummed beneath their feet, and somewhere overhead, a gull cried.
"Heavenly Father," Harry's voice was quieter now, stripped of its earlier strength. "We're far from home. Far from those we love. We ask You to watch over Eleanor, Matthew, John, and Isobel as they journey to Goddard Downs. Keep them safe. Give them wisdom."
Clara's throat tightened.
"We ask You to sustain my father. To ease his suffering. And if it's Your will, would You heal him?” Harry paused, and she heard the tremor he tried to hide.
David's fingers squeezed hers.
Harry continued. "Be with us on this journey. Calm the seas and still our fears. Help us trust You, even when the way ahead is uncertain. In Jesus' precious name. Amen."
"Amen," they echoed.
The sun touched the horizon, painting the water gold and crimson, and then it slowly sank, the day dying in a blaze of fire.
And something loosened in her chest.
They'd left Goddard Downs behind. Said goodbye to half their children. They were sailing towards the unknown.
But God was here, too. On this ship, in this moment, in the space between what they'd left and what awaited them.
"Come." Harry's hand found the small of her back. "Let's have dinner and get the children settled for the night."
