IN A REMOTE Methodist community of New South Wales in 1852, aspiring lay preacher Charles Muncey is tasked with recording the sins of every soul who signs up for a week-long revival.

He has plenty to work with. Pardoned convict Thomas Gunson knows the way through the wilderness and agrees to guide the faithful on a circuit of their struggling chapels, though he fears the company of people now that he’s out of his shackles. Irish emigre Oona Farry, recruited as a candlemaker, resents the devotion of the women during their ecstatic praising, convinced that God has abandoned her for her lustful secrets. Even righteous hosts Jacob and Anne Temple harbour transgressions they dare not voice.

But when Californian preacher Charisma Groom stirs up unbridled repentance during a watchnight on the edge of wild country, illicit sex and sudden death come to light. The congregation is ordered to hunt the devil through the ancient Fish River Caves, a dangerous underworld where raptures more powerful than faith are awakened.

With nothing but his fledgling moral compass, Muncey must see through blind faith to uncover which member of the flock is a callous killer.

This is a bold reimagining of the untold story of the Methodist settlers who colonised Australia’s renowned Jenolan Caves during the Frontier Wars.

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The prologue of The Watchnight

Gunson thought about firing a potshot over the head of the kid who was dragging a pony up the spine of the treeless hogback, but there was no time to fish out his pistol. Besides, the white smears of the beast’s eyes told a story of near death. The lad must have forced his ride through the flooded gully below, and the way he aimed his own pale peepers right at the hut meant there was no hiding.

‘Creek up?’ Gunson shouted like a smartass.

The kid nodded between tight shoulders. ‘If you’re Thomas Gunson, I’m to go straight back to Mr. Temple with your answer,’ he said, holding out a damp envelope.

Judging by the dark sheen of his duds, the lad had worse weather at his heels. The last thing Gunson needed was someone stopping the night, but he lashed Lizzie’s reins to the post on the sheltered side of the hut, cranky that his mare would have to share the cramped space with a half-dead pony and shoved the door open.

‘Clothes over the chair,’ he said, throwing the lad a blanket and rattling up the fire inside the granite chimney.

Words on a page still dazzled him, so he poked the envelope onto a nail above the mantle, lit a candle in the iron cage hanging from the rafters, and threw bits and brats into the stew pot. By the time Gunson sat on the cot and peeled the letter open to see what his old master wanted of him, the kid had dozed off.

I hope this letter finds you home, friend, and not tempted to go digging for gold. We lost more souls to its baneful influence this spring, including a Reverend who preached his treachery to several stockmen and their women. All walked away from their places in our chapel, faces bereft of-

Jacob Temple had taught Gunson to read, and the memory of his old master’s turn of phrase usually helped unravel the scrawl that came off the ends of his preachy fingers, but the next word – a nest of curls and loops – stumped the pupil.

‘Speak this for me,’ Gunson said, loud enough to rouse the boy.

The lad squinted while sounding it out with chirps and hisses. ‘Ek-stay-see,’ he said.

‘Ecstasy!’ Gunson said, whipping the page back. ‘What does it mean?’

Faces bereft of ecstasy yet full of shameful greed.

‘Go back to sleep,’ Gunson said, recalling the mask of joy that Temple and his faithful wore. If yet another preacher had the sense to run off to the goldfields, good luck to him.

Our Savior replaced them with a young tutor from Cambridge, whose soul I saved on the banks of the Turon. He will make an excellent lay preacher, and is bringing his intended bride from Sydney this week. In addition, a devout widow straight off the boat from Ireland with a marriageable daughter and a lad fit for mustering.

More Irish living on Temple’s overpriced land because they’d fled the famine. Gunson felt for them, because soon enough they’d be indebted beyond their wildest dreams.

We want you back to guide the faithful of Fish River on a Circuit of our chapels. The Reverend Charisma Groom of California has disembarked in Sydney and is mak- ing his way here to lead our Revival. We would count your attendance on the first Friday of summer as a contribution to your capital for the land, and put you well ahead on your loan.

Gunson reached for the tin under the cot, knocked the lid off and sifted through the tobacco left from this month’s supply, adding up the days on dusty fingers. With a groan he calculated that he was expected in under a week.

Temple prided himself about walking his country, which was all very well along the well-trodden trail from Templevale to Cave Hill, but the way on to the chapel at Hampton was along steep-sided waterways that the men of the Burra Burra mob had shown Gunson years ago. Although he would never say it, Temple feared that route because it was not part of his kingdom.

Gunson had no grounds for refusal, not if he wanted peace in his new place.

It wasn’t the idea of guiding a party that left him feeling dead in his own skin, it was bitter experience that told him whenever the Bible thumpers from Fish River ventured beyond Cave Hill, at least one would lose their way in the dark. Temple’s new tutor, fresh Irish, and an American preacher sounded just like the type to tumble down a very deep hole.

Gunson held the letter up to the light for another look at the name of this Reverend.

Charisma.

He tried speaking it out but gave up after hearing the noises coming off his tongue. The lad had pulled his feet under the blanket and the fire was begging for a log. Hooves scraped under the belting gusts outside. Lizzie would have her head down against the door and be mostly out of the rain, the pony trying to keep behind her.

It was still early. Hours of night lay ahead. He’d eat, wake the lad and make him shove down a mouthful to warm his guts, then push him into the cot.

After struggling to rest while the candle burned, Gunson woke with a jolt, dazzlers at the edges of his sight, wondering where the fuck he was. Gaol? Ship? Cave? Harriet Dacre had been in his trance again, yammering about what he’d done to her. If it weren’t for the lad calling out to calm his shouting at the old bird, Gunson might have clawed through the rock wall for a glimpse of light.

Then he remembered: Temple wanted him back to lead lost souls through the wild country. It would be Gunson’s first time in a company of people since he’d become a free man. The rain had let up, but the gale seemed to bounce off his skull. Splinters slid under his nails as he grappled with the arms of the chair, trying to shake the dread.

© Michael Burge, all rights reserved.