by Sarah Hay
‘Blackfellas,’ he said. ‘They cut em, eh? Big solid trees you get down by the creeks. They dragged them one by one behind donkeys. They’d dig a big hole, same height as you. And if they got it wrong they’d have to sit there for twelve hours, no dinner, nothing. And if they moved they got shot.’
The fan whirled lazily above them, clunking when it caught momentarily at the same point on its rotation. His chair scraped the floor as he pushed it backwards. Suddenly she noticed one of her children had disappeared. She stood up quickly, knocking her hip against the table. She pushed open the flyscreen door, banging it loudly against the wall as it swung wide. She reached the truck to find Ollie hanging off the back of it.
‘Naughty, naughty boy!’ she shrieked, pulling him down.
Ollie screamed and tried to kick her stomach. When she turned around to carry him back to the house the driver was at the door of his truck. Corellas screeched overhead, flying as a white cloud against a deep sky. They dispersed and settled in the trees down by the creek.
Texas ‘Hey young fella, you want a ride in the truck?’
Ollie stopped struggling and looked at him, angry and distrustful. She shifted him around onto her hip. Ned was hanging on to one of her legs.
‘Oh no, I couldn’t . . .’ Her voiced trailed off, panic-stricken and embarrassed.
‘Your old man’s out there? He’ll bring them back.’
No. Why couldn’t she say it? She seemed to have lost the ability to stand up for herself, for her children.
‘I’ll come with you,’ she muttered without looking at him.
He shrugged and swung up into the cab. Ollie was snuffling into her neck. She handed him to the driver and then went around the other side. She opened the door and lifted Ned onto the seat and hauled herself up. Ollie clung to the truck driver’s shoulder while Ned shuffled his bottom towards the edge of the seat, little legs dangling near the gearstick and hands holding on to the two-way radio that was attached below the windscreen in front of him. Both were solemn. She slid onto the vinyl seat, scratching her legs where there was a tear in the upholstery. He turned the key and the engine vibrated thickly. They lurched down a small slope and over dusty potholes that marked the track, chains rattling in the back. Beside the work sheds were disused vehicles with wheels missing and bonnets raised. A blackened exhaust poked out the side of the generator shed. Between the sheds was a lean-to of timber and corrugated iron attached to an old caravan. A skinny old man in a sleeveless dark shirt stood in front of it, watching them as they drove past.
‘Met the old fella yet?’
‘No,’ she said.
She waited for him to continue but he didn’t and the man in the rearview mirror slid out of sight. They reached the homestead yards, some of it old timber railings, the rest red iron bars. Frayed hessian shaded the round yard. The truck stopped at the gate beside them and she slid down on the ground to open it. The brakes hissed and she remembered as a child opening the gate for her father. Sometimes he’d let her steer, and when she was older, when her feet could touch the pedals, he allowed her to drive. He’d get the ute going in first gear and then leap out while it was moving so she could drive behind the mob of sheep while he ushered them on foot. All she had to do was keep the accelerator steady and clutch the wheel closely so she could see over the top. She remembered the throaty sound of the ewes and the bleats of their young and the smell of damp, crushed clover. Sometimes her feet would slip off the pedal and the ute would stall and then she’d swap places with her father and walk behind the sheep as they shifted like a white stain across the deep green paddock, the cold air tightening the skin on her face.
The truck moved haltingly through its gear changes. It drove down and through the creek, where water reached halfway up the tyres. They left the taller trees behind and the country opened out. Rounded mounds of hills, spotted pale green and yellow, seemingly soft and accessible. It was only when they came closer that she saw the hills were steep and between the spinifex were slabs of sharp flinty rock. On the other side of
Texas the road, bunches of grasses grew on the plain amongst sparsely leafed trees that seemed denser as they receded into the distance. She looked down on a lizard and caught the inside of its mouth, framed by the frill around its neck, as it stood briefly on splayed legs before disappearing into the grass as the wheels rolled past it. She held Ned on her lap and Ollie tucked closely into her side. She pressed her legs together to stop the skin on her thighs from jiggling with the corrugations in the road.
‘We’re going to see Daddy.’
Ollie jumped up.
‘Where?’ he said, taking his thumb out of his mouth.
‘At the base of them hills,’ said the driver. And then he looked towards her. ‘There’s an esky behind you, grab us a can, would you?’
She reached behind the seat. There were only cans of Four X, Queensland beer. His mouth covered the opening of the can as they lurched over the uneven ground.
‘Have you always lived here?’ she asked.
One hand gripped the wheel while the other hand leant against it, fingers clutching the can. He didn’t answer.
‘You don’t say much,’ she said, smiling, wanting to be liked.
He glanced at her, sideways. The track turned sharply and he held out his drink for her to hold. The truck followed the thin strip of road as they bounced over rocks and holes. The grassy plain gave way to more trees: white trunks and startling green leaves and trees with bark like the skin of a crocodile. The dirt changed from red to a softer, loamier soil and they reached a dry riverbed. The driver changed down a gear and the truck chugged through the sandy ground. She thought for a minute they would get bogged but they ploughed on. She looked upriver where water during the wet would rush densely towards the sea.
An enormous paperbark leant over the sand like an old man, and a little trench on the bend held a silver slice of water. The sun was low in the sky and as they came onto the flat where the trees were thin, the soft light turned the flattened grass into the colour of gold and the red hills brightened. Dust hung in the air before the yards like a veil screening the action behind it.
Horses and riders were holding a mob that moved as a solid mass through the gate. Against the dust-filtered light were silhouettes of horns and heads, hats and horses, men in the shape of cowboys. Beasts bellowed. Long whips unfurled and snapped back, cracking like gunshot, and the dust flew in between. She was conscious of the feel of her back stuck to the vinyl seat and the way she moved with the vehicle as though it was an extension of her body. The jolts beneath her relaxed the invisible binds that prevented her from breathing freely.
‘Look,’ she said to the boys, ‘we’re almost here.’
Ollie stood up, grasping her shoulder, and Ned tried to stand on her lap. They followed the two-wheel track around the side of the yard and pulled up alongside the ramp. The driver got down from the truck and disappeared from sight. She helped the children out and as she did so she heard John’s voice. He was talking to the driver around the other side. She carried Ned on her hip and held Ollie’s hand as she walked to the front of the truck. She smiled as she made her way towards him. The children were squirming and wriggling like excited puppies.
Texas ‘Daddy!’
She let them go and as she looked up into his face that was partly obscured by the rim of his hat she saw from the straight line of his mouth that they weren’t welcome. He strode towards her, leaving the boys to trail after him. He grabbed her arm, pinching the bone above her elbow with his thumb and forefinger, and spoke into the side of her face.
‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing?’
Her teeth ground hard together with the effort of not making a sound. Her head suddenly felt full and dense as though a thick cloud of heat was expanding. Outwardly she was impassive.
‘Hey boss!’ someone called over the yards. ‘They’ve lost some.’
‘Useless bastards.’
He let go of her and
turned away, climbing easily over the yards. Skinny and long-limbed, his body moved as though it was capable of anything. In that movement she saw briefly what she’d seen when they first met. The children rushed to follow him but were stopped by the yards, peering instead through the gaps in the railings. The cattle lowered their heads and snorted, wide-eyed, tightly bunched and moving in a circle, uselessly, their red and white flanks rubbing together, tails lifting for a steady stream of shit that splattered those nearby, horns twisting and getting stuck, long threads of saliva hanging from foaming mouths, linking one to the other. She pulled Ollie down as he started to climb the rails. The driver was beside her. He took out a tin of tobacco. A light film of dust covered her face and she blinked to clear it from her eyes. Ollie was rubbing his and whining that his eyes were stinging. Ned began to too. It was getting late. It was their bath time and soon they would be hungry. She hadn’t brought anything with her. God, what was she thinking? She was suddenly so tired. So tired she could have settled into the grass and stayed there. But the boys grabbed at her. She had created them and they wanted her, wanted her to make everything all right for them. But how could she when she couldn’t even make it all right for herself?
Dust grew denser and the shouting more intense. Horses galloped while their riders tried to wheel the runaways back into the yard. The driver said something again. She couldn’t remember his name or perhaps she never knew it.
‘Sorry, I didn’t hear what you said.’
‘They won’t be loading tonight. Give you a ride back if you want. I’ll camp up at the station.’
His voice penetrated her fog and it irritated her. She was embarrassed, too, by her husband’s lack of kindness. She looked at her feet and the grass around her that had been squashed.
‘Thank you.’
She gathered the children to her. When they reached the truck, she got in first and the driver lifted her boys up to her.
‘Don’t cry, Mummy,’ said Ned as he shifted on her lap.
The driver settled into his seat.
Ollie turned to her and said: ‘We’re hungry.’
She thought about that as they left the yards, following the track as it looped around through bush and then back the way they’d come. Heading towards the pale rosy glow that softened the sharp edges of a land seemingly hacked into being with
Texas a giant chisel and hammer. We’re hungry. Ollie, who spoke for himself and his twin, condemned always to being part of another instead of the singular I. She knew what that was like.
After the truck driver showered he returned to her kitchen with two cans of beer. She glanced up quickly while stirring the pot of savoury mince. He had taken his swag out the back and across the small dry creek bed that separated the stockmen’s quarters from the homestead. The children were settled but John hadn’t returned. The driver, she remembered his name was Steve, sat at the table, ripping the top off his can with a familiarity she found disconcerting. She turned back to the pot, stirring, watching the peas and the small pieces of carrot tumble through the grey meat. He spoke and she jumped.
‘I brought you a beer.’
She suddenly panicked. What did he want? Her husband would be home soon.
‘Not for me thanks,’ she muttered into the pot.
The generator seemed to miss a beat and the light above her flickered as though it was going to go out. He started to whistle between his teeth. The light was strong again. She heard Ollie calling out to her.
‘Excuse me.’
She walked outside. Ollie was waiting at the door.
‘What’s the matter?’
The light coming from the sleep-out lit half his face. An eye was wide and dark like a pool.
‘I’m scared, Mummy.’
She looked at him, feeling the fluttering of the vessel in her throat as her heart trembled. God, what to say? To tell him that she was scared too, of the fog that seemed to have wrapped around her. The hands that held his were wet with fear. She lifted him into bed and tucked the covers tightly around him.
She whispered a little rhyme that her mother had taught her:
‘Diddle, diddle, dumpling . . .’ Those silly words connected her to another time, and they calmed her.
When she returned to the kitchen John was standing under the light. It was the charming John. The one who stood with his feet slightly apart, hips thrust forward, moving his hands as though he was exercising his fingers while he talked. He offered Steve a Bundy and Coke and winked at her as she took her place at the stove. His hair was plastered flat at the sides and it made his face seem narrower and his eyes closer together.
Dirt ringed his mouth and highlighted his teeth.
IV
John had taken the boys with him on a bore run. As she carried the heavy basket from the laundry to the clothes line she wondered if he was feeling guilty about the way he reacted when she turned up at the yards. A light breeze moved the threadbare sheets already on the line and the shadows beneath formed and re-formed. She had no idea what he was thinking but he’d been in a better mood since the truck left with a load
Texas of steers for the meatworks. Over breakfast he’d explained how a helicopter muster worked. Cattle were ushered into yards through long wings of hessian that spanned out into the country like a funnel, channelling them into captivity. They were brought there by fear, the flapping hessian and the throb of the machine above.
She thought of her marriage and remembered how her mother had called John good husband material when she met him for the first time. He wore an open-neck shirt and moleskins and he told her that he’d just sold his V8 ute and bought a four-wheel drive since he was planning to settle down. Susannah was working as a cadet journalist, filing stories from the Perth Royal Show about the animals that had won their competitions. John had been showing his stud’s prize bull. They met one evening at the stockman’s bar. Together they went outside to watch the entertainment in the arena before the fireworks. They were called the chuting stars, parachutists spilling from a plane that was like a large insect letting loose its young. They fell quickly until their parachutes ballooned above them. Then they drifted steadily downwards. Susannah discovered that she and John had friends in common. Over the next year, in between travelling around the countryside interviewing breeders and carefully reporting the way they described the attributes of their animals, she met John every now and then at the pub where all the country people congregated. It had large windows facing the broad expanse of the Indian Ocean but no one went there for the view. She’d always liked the way he looked in those early days of their relationship. And she liked the casual weight of his arm around her shoulders, the way he claimed her in front of the others at the pub. She thought he was someone she could rely on.
She placed the second basket of dripping washing on the ground and stretched out a wet work shirt, squinting at the bright light that was filtered by the leaves of the gum tree on the other side of the fence. Drops of water fell loudly on the hard slivers of dried leaf scattered beneath the line. The spin-dry on the twin-tub didn’t work and she’d struggled to put everything through the hand-wringer. She’d asked John if she could take it into town to get it fixed or perhaps get a new one, but he’d said there wasn’t any money for it in the station budget.
She remembered the first time she doubted him. After they were married they went to live on the stud where John had been appointed the overseer. She was excited to have her own home and, being from the country, it didn’t matter that the nearest town was about thirty kilometres away. The housework didn’t take up the whole day then, when it was just the two of them, and she suggested that she should get a horse.
‘Why?’ he’d asked over the scones she’d proudly baked from her mother’s recipe.
She was surprised by his tone.
‘I told you, I always used to ride. It’d be fun.’
‘You won’t have time for that.’ He put the last piece of scone in his mouth.
‘What do y
ou mean?’
He stood up. Smoko was finished and she could see that he was about to leave through the back flywire door and down
Texas the concrete path to the ute parked by the gate. He would get in that vehicle and drive off like he always did.
‘What do you mean?’ she repeated. ‘Are you saying I can’t have a horse?’
‘I’m just saying, I don’t think you’ve thought it through.’ He spoke carefully as though he was concerned she might misunderstand him.
But he needn’t have worried. She knew what was meant.
When the hours between meal breaks seemed to swell and change shape she took to phoning a few of her friends from school, girls with whom she’d shared five years of living in a boarding house, where the partitions between each room didn’t quite reach the ceiling. She was careful to ring only the unmarried ones. And when John became concerned about the phone bill, after all they were only on an overseer’s wage, she took to inviting one or two down from the city for the occasional weekend. John was happy with that. He liked being the host, showing off his wife and his house, and he would invite the unmarried son of their next-door neighbour for dinner. It wasn’t long before her friend Liz was engaged to the neighbour.
They were the happy married couples, meeting for a barbecue on a Sunday; their husbands talking about the weather and cattle prices and whatever else it was that they had in common. It was important to support John. He needed to feel confident that he was like any other man who had grown up on the land.
Then she became pregnant and, not long afterwards, she realised her mother was very ill, and it was like a wave that caught up with the next one so that when it broke, its impact was so much heavier. She started to see less of Liz. To tell her anything, when their husbands were friends, would have been disloyal to John. And although Liz was at their going-away party, Susannah knew the distance between them was too great now for the friendship to continue.
