The first sensation John was aware of when he woke was the warmth of the sun on his face. There was another sensation, too, but in his sleepy state he couldn’t make sense of it. Then he felt it again. Something was moving beneath his outstretched leg. With some difficulty, he opened one eye. To his horror, he saw a black-coloured snake crawling through a small gap between the underside of his left knee and the ground. He tensed involuntarily and the reptile bit him. It bit him twice in fact, but it happened so fast he thought it had only struck once.
You are reading an excerpt from our critically-acclaimed historical adventure WHITE SPIRIT (A novel based on a true story).
The subject of this drama is one John Graham, an Irish convict who escaped from Australia’s notorious Moreton Bay penal settlement in the early 1800’s. Convicts considered Moreton Bay a hellhole, so bad they committed suicide rather than serve out their sentences there. John earned infamy for being the only convict to escape Moreton Bay and evade his pursuers to remain free.
Novel excerpt continues:
John leapt to his feet and scurried away in case the snake came for him again. To his relief, it slithered off into the surrounding bush.
Only after it had disappeared did he give any thought to what variety of snake it was. He had no idea whether it was venomous or not. It had happened so quickly, he hadn’t identified the snake. If he had to guess, it was a harmless tree snake, but it could just as easily have been a red-bellied black snake, which he knew was highly venomous. He had observed the Quandamooka treating them with the utmost respect whenever they came across one.
Lordy, what else can go wrong?
He discovered what else could go wrong when he rolled the left leg of his breeches up and saw two distinctive sets of fang marks just above the side of his knee. “Jesus!” he cursed. “The bastard bit me twice.”
John’s first thought was to retrieve one of the rocks from his makeshift shoulder bag – the rock with the cutting edge – to cut the wounds and then suck the poison out. Then he remembered the Aborigines at Parramatta had recommended not using that technique. “Shit, shit, shit!” he cursed again. He fought to suppress the panic that was welling up inside him. If it was a red-bellied black snake, he knew he’d be dead within the hour.
Somewhere, in the furthest recess of his mind, he recalled an account he’d heard of an early European explorer, in Van Diemen’s Land, who had survived a venomous snake bite by lying down and remaining totally still for half a day or so. John never did know whether that was an old wives’ tale or a true story, but he had no better ideas, so he decided to try it.
Returning to his sleeping position inside the cliff-face, he lay down and willed himself to go to sleep.
What if I never wake up?
The thought of dying in his sleep frightened him so much it kept him awake. So he just lay there, determined not to move a muscle.
Damn it, I need to piss.
He considered standing up, or at least kneeling, to urinate, but decided against it. If the story about the European explorer was true, he’d survived the snakebite only by remaining perfectly still. Makes sense staying still, he thought. Slows the blood flow to the heart.
When he could hold it in no longer, he peed where he lay.
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WHITE SPIRIT (A novel based on a true story) is available via Waterstones UK & Europe bookstores, public libraries and via Amazon.
The Amazon link is: https://www.amazon.com/White-Spirit-novel-based-story/dp/0473372266/
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