by Sarah Hay
He wrapped his arms around the horse’s neck and he held out his hand for the bridle.
‘Oh, it’s fine. I can do it.’
Laura came around to the front of the horse and fitted the bit into its mouth and tightened the strap around its neck.
‘Thanks,’ she conceded.
He held the horse briefly by the velvety skin of its nostrils until it flicked his hand away. He grinned and slapped it gently on the rump.
‘Good old girl.’
Laura led the grey out to where she’d left the saddle and looped the reins over the rail. The reins were different from what she was used to and the stock saddle was bigger and heavier. The horse stood quietly while she pulled up the girth, blowing gently through its nostrils, flicking its head to unsettle a buffalo fly. She looked across the seat of the saddle towards the man who had helped her and remembered his name was Texas. He opened the gate to bring in the rest of the horses. She led the horse through another gate and out into the paddock, savouring its warm, earthy smell. It was patient as she adjusted the length of her stirrups and swung up into the saddle. She leant over its neck and stroked the hair behind its ear. More men were at the yards. Their shapes moved between the rails and at times they sat perched above them. A wasp whined and circled her horse’s head. It snorted and the bit jangled. Green parrots chattered and flew from the white branch of a gum to another. Black ants trickled down the trunk and leaves clattered together as the wind moved through them.
She faced into it and took her feet out of the stirrups, letting her horse doze, its head resting on the bit in its mouth. She watched the cattle, small silken-skinned animals with velvet ears, gaze warily and nudge each other into lines. Every now and then she roused her horse to step slowly around them, carefully turning the strayers back towards the others. The men had lit a fire at the yards and horses were tethered in a row along a rail. She heard the sounds of metal banging on metal and realised they were shoeing. The cattle settled and wandered about looking for grass. She noticed the bank of hills behind the homestead and the shadows that darkened the dirt. The line of trees in the distance indicated the creek as it zigzagged through the valley, passing below the yards, with another, smaller one joining it and leading away from the homestead.
She’d discovered that one was just a dry bed of sand. The horse stiffened, alert, neck curled back towards the gate, nickering softly, like a spring that was tightening. She gathered the reins and pressed with her knees. The horse started to step a little one way and then another, pushing ever so slightly against her control. Horses streamed from the open gate, riderless, biting and squealing and kicking high. She held her horse tightly, nervously, unsure of it now, unsure of how far it would test her. She tightened one rein and turned it in on itself while hooves clattered over the rocky ground, dust hanging in the still air. She noticed the weaners had bolted along the fence line and behind her a horse galloped and halted, reined up by
Texas Texas. He sat firm as it protested. He grinned and wheeled his horse around.
‘Come on! We’re taking the horses back to the horse paddock.’
She followed at a carefully controlled canter as they circled the mob of free-moving horses, eventually reaching a gate. They ushered the stock through and positioned themselves between the gate and the weaners that followed. She found it exhilarating. Then they rode along the fence line back to the yards and her horse’s gait lengthened beside his and saffron light leaked through the gaps in the trees. He’d joked with her, teased her about her questions. It seemed that the English were always known for being ill prepared for the outback, for thinking that all roads led somewhere, for calling a creek a stream. There were no fields, only vast areas called flats and paddocks.
After she dropped hay from the back of the ute at regular intervals, scattering it in a long line so all the animals had an equal share, she returned the vehicle to its place under the shed. John’s four-by-four was parked in front of the homestead which meant he would be in for dinner. When she reached the gate into the homestead yard, she noticed there was another vehicle, the battered Toyota she’d occasionally seen the stockmen using. She hoped it might be Texas. He was crossing the lawn as she was and he stopped and told her they were moving camp; they’d be mustering towards country where two rivers met, like a forked branch. It was called the junction. She liked the way he squinted into the horizon when he talked and then looked back every now and then into her face. Frown marks were etched deep between his eyes, and his brows were thick and dark, but his mouth was ready to smile. The door of the kitchen banged shut behind them. The sound of footsteps on the veranda followed and then John was standing at her elbow.
‘You better get going if you’re heading back tonight.’
His attention was on Texas and he didn’t acknowledge her until Texas had moved away. She was disappointed that John had interrupted their conversation.
‘Laura,’ he said as she started to turn away. ‘Early start tomorrow. Heading across the river to pick up some gear.’
‘What time?’ she asked.
‘Leave about four-thirty.’
‘Okay. Great.’
She opened the flywire door into her quarters. Perhaps she would see where Texas was working. As she stepped inside, she remembered the sound of his voice.
V
Laura moved self-consciously around the kitchen. Taking the bread from the toaster and placing it on a plate, the harsh sound of the knife scraping the surface and the bright neon light; assaults on the senses which expect to be lulled at that time of the day by darkness and quiet. Aware of the other person in the room and the intimacy of the moment when he
Texas asked: ‘How do you have your tea?’ A question that somehow seemed inappropriate.
Headlights shone a path through the bush and they flushed out a kangaroo and the slinking flash of a dingo. They stopped in front of a pair of wide metal gates joined at the centre by thick links of chain. Instead of waiting for her to open it, John stepped out of the vehicle and walked along the fence line which was coming into focus with the bright edge of light threading through a thin layer of cloud in the east. A bird called from the treetop, a pure piping melody amplified by the still morning air, and it went on and on and then stopped and others began. Dove calls followed each other, like a dance, weaving in and out of the trees. And then over the top another chorus began, a crazed gathering of sound, echoing, and gold light shone into the leaf canopy revealing a pair of blue-feathered birds. John disappeared into the undergrowth and the sun striped the leaf litter and the sticks that crunched beneath her feet. Up ahead, she could hear the sound of his footsteps and she followed their direction. At times she thought the Australian bush looked barely alive with its broken branches and trees with no leaves, but, unlike the English deciduous, they were stark timber sculptures, bleached grey by the sun, which perhaps with the next wind or storm would be turned into mulch. Suddenly noise filled the spaces, of heavy animals crashing and bush breaking and dust dense like fog, and through it she caught a glimpse of cattle rushing towards her and then they veered away and the scrub closed behind them. The cattle had kicked up fine grey sand, and shafts of light fell through the gaps in the trees and caught the dust as it stayed suspended in the aftermath. She could see the silhouette of the cattleman. He was in the middle of a clearing, bending over something, and behind him was a trough and the strained corner posts of two lines of fences, meeting at right angles, and beyond, a low grassy hill. Her boots sank into the soft sand, pitted and potholed by the movement of many cattle. She realised on reaching him that he was standing over an injured calf. He straightened and pushed up the rim of his hat when he saw her.
‘Bloody dingoes.’
She looked down and the calf ’s head moved and then the horror. That it was still alive although its backside had been eaten.
‘Grab my gun will you, it’s behind the seat.’
She walked back to the vehicle, worrying there might still be cattl
e among the trees, but the bush was silent, even of birds.
The lever on the seat would not release, and after several attempts to get it to come forward, she thought she was going to have to return without the gun. The sun was warm through the window and she was beginning to sweat. She gave it another try and it flung forward and the gun lay there behind the seat in which she had sat. It was in a leather case and carefully she lifted it out and carried it across the sand. John was investigating the trough and she handed it to him and then walked over to the fence corner, staring past it, noticing the animal trails weaving through the grassy clumps to the top of the small hill.
The shot seemed to rearrange every cell in her body. The sounds of birds lifting en masse, collectively startled, eventually faded
Texas like a final echo. She turned back and witnessed John dragging the calf by its front leg into the bush. Together they returned to the vehicle, her steps matching his. Something like this was to be expected, and if he thought she might be affected by it, she would show that she wasn’t and that she understood. He emptied the cartridge, dropping the bullets into his trouser pocket, and replaced the gun behind the seat. The vehicle continued along the two-wheel track. Sometimes the dirt would be red and soft and then other times it was like gravel, hard and scattered with rock. They crossed creeks which seemed only to exist for the suggestion of water, the beds lined with blue sharp-edged stones and John carefully eased the vehicle over them to avoid puncturing the tyres. There were two spares, he explained, but after that it’d be a long walk. They drove onto a black-soil plain and the track became pitted with cracks; the grass on either side, dense and tufted.
‘Bloody good cattle country all through here,’ said John.
She wound down her window and gazed out to her left, nodding her head slightly to signal her interest; silvery grasslands stretching to the river line of trees in the distance, the continuity and consistency suggestive of man’s involvement, although she suspected that wasn’t really the case.
‘What kind of grass is it?’
‘Mitchell and native millet,’ he said.
Along the way John named the trees. Through the red country it was snappy gum and crocodile and bloodwoods. And by the watercourses there were coolabahs and ghost gums and paperbarks, and out in the flat country, the bauhinias and the kurrajongs.
‘Bloody good tucker. You can fatten cattle on this. But you gotta have good cattle. No use these bloody half-breed animals that’ve been running wild around the place. It’ll be the bloody jewel of the Kimberley when I get it sorted out.’
‘Are the men mustering around here?’
The vehicle slowed as they came upon some rocky ground and he brought his other hand up to the wheel.
‘They’re north-east of here, the other end.’ He turned to her.
‘Problem is, trying to get good people to work for you.’
She caught his glance and looked away.
By mid-morning they reached the river. On the other side of it the track continued and headed towards some ranges that from a distance were shaped like waves. It took several attempts for the vehicle to get through the soft sand of the riverbed and she hopped out and stood in the middle of the deep trench to watch. There was a slip of water to drive through, but most of it was dry, and it was impossible to imagine a robust, flowing current above her, swiping the upper branches of trees where a tangle of flotsam still resided. Upstream something glinted in the sun. Perhaps it was where the river widened, or maybe it was rock. She climbed back into the vehicle and as they drove up the bank John pointed to the red hill in the distance. On one side it was steeply curved and there was a narrow gap between it and the rest of the range.
‘There was a blackfella apparently hid up there, had all the
Texas bloody police after him, murdered some fella who stole his woman, or tried to, something like that.’
‘Really? What happened to him?’
‘They got him in the end. Chased him somewhere out here.’ He gestured to the area on his right. ‘He put up a pretty good fight, they reckon.’
She looked across the dashboard, through the windscreen. The country was the same as it had been all along, and there was nothing there that signified a past she could recognise. As they drove closer towards the range the shape of it filled more of her window. Without a watch she didn’t have much idea of the time, but when they stopped again for a gate she realised the sun was overhead. She struggled to open the gate since it was made of wire and timber and she couldn’t work out what she needed to do to release it. John opened the car door and he was grinning.
‘I was waiting to see how far you’d get with that old cocky gate.’
He reached down to a wire band that seemed to hold a piece of timber wedged between the fence post and the gate. He slipped it off and the gate collapsed. They were back in the vehicle.
‘Bloody pain in the arse those gates. We’ll be replacing all of them and putting in more fences all round the joint.’
Laura realised she was hungry and thirsty and she was about to ask how far when the track rose a little and turned a corner and there were buildings huddled at the base of the hill that marked the end of the range, with a creek running below them.
‘This place used to be another station. Too small now to be viable.’
‘Does anyone live here?’ she asked as they pulled up in front of a fence, white paint peeling to reveal rust-coloured railings.
The entrance into the yard was marked on either side by painted wagon wheels.
‘The buggers haven’t done any watering by the looks of it.’
He opened the car door and placed one foot out into the dirt and then turned to face her. ‘Oh yeah, couple of Swedish fellas been caretaking the place.’
She followed him through the gate. A bougainvillea seemed to have taken over one end of the house and the lawn had yellowed and gone to seed. Windows were covered by metal shutters which presumably had the effect of screening out the sunlight but letting in the breeze. The building was L-shaped and at the end there was a flywire door which was ajar.
‘Stupid buggers leaving the door open. Letting in the bloody snakes.’ He held it open and called out, ‘Hans, Sven, you in there mate?’ He stood in the doorway and took off his hat and scratched his head and looked around. ‘I reckon we better go and have a look over at the sheds.’
They started around the other side of the house and heard voices. Two men were walking through the long grass towards them from the direction of the creek. When they reached the yard, she realised they looked more like boys. One of them was blond and flushed, wearing a light-coloured T-shirt and long
Texas khaki shorts, and the other was dark, with thicker, wavier hair, collared shirt and shorts. Both wore long socks and boots and were without hats. They were carrying a bucket between them.
‘What are you up to you blokes? Leaving the bloody door open. Get a bloody big snake in there you’ll know all about it.’
They glanced at each other, and at John, and quickly at her, smiling.
The blond answered: ‘We catch some little fish.’
He held up the bucket and inside it were fingerlings swimming in brackish water.
‘What, there’s water in that creek?’
‘A little,’ answered the darker one and then he turned to Laura. ‘Hello, I am Sven and this is my friend Hans. We have been staying here for three month. We are from Sweden.’
‘I’m Laura,’ she smiled and for some reason she didn’t bother mentioning that she was from England.
‘Put the billy on, what do you reckon?’ John was heading towards the door.
They sat around a dirty formica table in the dimly lit kitchen. The remnants of recent cooking lay scattered about the bench and the sink. The kettle was whining on the stove as the metal started to heat. A fan overhead pushed the warm air around but did little to dispel the closeness.
‘Would you like some food?’ asked Hans.
‘
Mate. Not if it’s any of that fish in a tube stuff,’ said John and he pushed his chair back and stood up. ‘Got a few sandwiches in the esky.’
‘How did you come to be out here?’ asked Laura. She was sitting with her back against the wall on a low bench, glad to be out of the vehicle and finding the heavily accented English a little unexpected.
Hans disappeared through a door to her left and Sven, who was assembling cups on the bench, said: ‘Our Kombi van broke down. We didn’t have enough money to get it fixed. The mechanic said they needed a caretaker. So they pay the mechanic while we are here. We stay here for three months.’
‘So where do you go for supplies and food, that sort of thing?’
John returned and slapped the sandwiches wrapped in grease proof paper on the table.
‘There’s a roadhouse,’ said John. ‘Here, help yourself.’ He looked at Laura and opened the paper around the sandwiches.
‘There’s a track on the other side of the creek. Shortcut to the highway. About an hour or so away. That’s where they fixed the Kombi. Going all right now?’
‘Yes but the track is very rough. We only go there two times.
It takes much longer, maybe two hours.’
Hans entered with a cardboard box and a tube of some sort of paste. While Sven poured hot water into cups, Hans opened a box of crispbread and pointed to the tube.
‘This is Swedish caviar. You must try. We buy it in Darwin.’
His face was still rosy, particularly his nose and cheeks. His eyes, framed by pale lashes, had a glassy look that suggested he hadn’t slept for a while.
‘Mate. Tried it last time. Think I’ll stick to the roast beef.’
‘I’ll have some. Thanks,’ said Laura.
Texas It tasted like fishy mayonnaise and she took a large mouthful of tea to wash it down. John drained his mug and picked up another sandwich and stood up.
‘Sven, give us a hand, mate. Lift a post-hole digger onto the back of the Toyota.’ He looked back at Laura. ‘You finish your dinner. I’ll be back in a bit.’
