The Haystack

by Jack Lasenby

  He stopped the tractor near us, tilted the mower and did something with a spanner. He lowered it and drove past so close, Aggie heard the sickle bar—Click! Click!—and saw the green wave tumble and lie in a smooth swathe behind.

  Ken and Jean Carter joined me on the stile, then Freddy Jones, but he had to show off and run out on the paddock.

  Somebody yelled, “Bah!” Freddy bolted back; and I told him, “Humbug!”

  The air smelled green and rich. “The long grass is turning into an island,” I told Aggie. The red schooner sailed round and round, and the island grew smaller and smaller.

  “That patch left in the middle,” said Freddy Jones, “it’s full of rabbits and hares and pheasants and wild ducks and pukekos. And the mower’s going to chop off all their legs.”

  “Don’t listen to him,” I told Aggie and Jean Carter, but though we watched the last grass fall, nothing flew or ran away.

  “See,” said Freddy Jones.

  “There wasn’t nothing there,” Jean was crying as we walked home.

  “There was so, but they’re all chopped to bits.”

  “The pheasants and ducks and pukekos flew away this morning,” I told Jean. “The rabbits hid in their burrows, and the hares hid under the hedge. I saw them before. So there!” I said to Freddy Jones.

  When Dad came home from work, he said, “Crikey, but the air smelled good, coming past the hay paddock. It reminded me of something in a book about a sailing ship off the coast of South America, and how the sailors smelled new-mown hay.”

  “Away out at sea?” I asked.

  Dad thought for a moment and said: “‘They have been making hay somewhere under the slopes of the Andes, Starbuck, and the mowers are sleeping among the new-mown hay.’”

  My back wriggled all by itself. “It sounds like poetry.”

  “It’s poetry all right.”

  “What’s the Andes?”

  “Mountains.”

  “Who’s Starbuck?”

  “The ship’s mate.”

  “Do you think Mr Bluenose smelled the hay, when he was on the cod schooner?”

  “Fish smells a lot stronger than new-mown hay.” Dad shook his head. “Mind you, those men smelling the hay out at sea, they were whalers, and whale ships pong, so the wind must have been coming off the land, carrying away the stink, and bringing the clean smell of hay.”

  That night, I lay in bed with the windows open, and told Aggie and Milly we were sleeping on the slopes of the Andes, among the new-mown hay. I sniffed and said, “Smell it?”, but Aggie was far too ladylike to be seen sniffing, and Milly just closed her eyes. “You’d sniff if it was a rat,” I said, but she took no notice. “You’re not a reliable cat,” I told her.

  Aggie had a sunburnt nose next morning, so I left her at home. Jerry, Sam’s older brother, and Mr Hoe were working along a row, turning the hay with pitchforks, when Sam drove a horse into the paddock. He sat high up on a machine with long wires that rose and fell on crooked wheels, picking up the hay, tossing and turning it much faster than Jerry and Mr Hoe.

  “It’s a tedder,” said Freddy Jones.

  “How do you know?”

  “My father told me. They’re new.”

  “Why isn’t Sam pulling it with the tractor?” asked Ken.

  “They only borrowed the tractor for the mowing. My father says Old Man Hoe doesn’t like new things on his farm. He said Old Man Hoe’s going to miss having Old Peter Rust there to build the stack.”

  I asked Dad that night, and he said, “Freddy’s right. The machine’s much faster than tedding by hand, and it’s true, Mr Hoe doesn’t like tractors. He used to mow his hay with horses. It took longer, but a lot of the older cockies reckoned it made better hay.

  “I’ve heard men talk of when they used to scythe the hay in the Old Country. And all the women and children coming behind the line of men, raking and tedding by hand. I’ll bet people said that made better hay, too.”

  “What did Freddy Jones’s father mean about building the stack?”

  “There’s an art to building a good haystack. A poorly built one can get a lean on it and have to be propped. Mr Rust was a natural; he had an eye for it. Mind you, Mr Hoe’s been at it long enough to do it himself.”

  We were watching the following morning, when Mr Hoe walked around the paddock, picking up bits of the drying grass, feeling, sniffing, even biting it. Jerry was driving the tedder, turning the hay, and Sam was sitting on a rake behind another horse. The long curved tines of the rake dragged a heap of dry hay towards the end of a long row; Sam leaned forward and pulled a lever, the tines lifted, and the heap was left behind. Sam dropped the tines again—Clang!—and raked more hay into more long rows, what Freddy Jones said were called windrows.

  “Why?”

  “‘Cause the wind blows between the rows and dries the hay. My dad said.”

  In the middle of the paddock, Mr Hoe tossed hay into heaps with his pitchfork. A heavy lorry drove between the windrows and stopped on the clearing he’d made.

  “Ellery Transport’s big sweep-rake stacker from Matamata,” said Ken. “Mr Hoe always gets it.”

  “Yeah,” said Freddy Jones. “Mr Hoe always gets it.”

  “Huh,” I told him, and we watched the men bolt together the pieces off the back of the lorry till the stacker stood like a red, wooden giraffe, tall and silent in the middle of the paddock.

  “They’ll start bringing in the hay tomorrow,” Dad told me that night.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Why You Mustn’t Put Hay Away Damp, Why the Gate Sweep Looked Sorry for Itself, and Why Jerry Had to Run Backwards and Forwards.

  “WHAT TIME WILL THE HAYMAKING START?” I asked Dad.

  “They’ll have to wait till any dew’s dried. Put hay away damp, it can burn.”

  “How?”

  “You know when you stick your hand into a heap of clippings, after you’ve mown the lawn?”

  I nodded.

  “It’s like that. The damp gets the hay so hot it starts itself off inside. You don’t want it too dry either, or all the goodness is baked out. There’s a lot to making hay.”

  “How does Mr Hoe know when to make it?”

  “He’ll get it right. Mind you, this is when he’s going to miss having Mr Rust.”

  “I saw him biting some bits of hay.”

  “He’d have been making up his mind about when to stack it.”

  “Does he ever get it wrong?”

  “One wet summer, it rained after they mowed. There wasn’t enough sun, and the hay turned black and rotted on the ground; but it happened all over the district. There’s a lot of skill to it, and there’s a bit of luck.”

  “What did the cows eat?”

  “Came winter, the cockies had to buy in hay for feeding out, and that costs money.

  “Milly and Aggie are waiting for you to jump into bed.”

  Aggie’s sunburn was still hurting, next morning. “If it’s no better tonight, I’ll dab some cold tea on it,” I told her. “Mrs Harsant said that’ll take the sting out of it, and she said honey and vinegar’s good for sunburn, too. If you want anything, Milly will be here. I must run or I’ll miss the haymaking.”

  I sat on the stile with Ken and Jean. Sam and Jerry drove a couple of horses pulling a gate sweep between them down one of the windrows. Hay piled on the long teeth and the sweep carried it in beside the red stacker.

  Mr Hoe stuck a pitchfork into the heap of hay, leaned against it, and Sam and Jerry turned the horses around. The gate ends of the sweep turned with them, so the teeth on the other side swept up the hay as they went down the windrow again. Mr Hoe forked the hay they’d left, marking out the bottom of the stack, so Ken reckoned, and tramping it down. He was still forking and tramping when they came back with another load.

  Mr Dunlop and Mr Lines from out Wardville came with their sons. Mr Dunlop took a pitchfork and tossed hay to Mr Hoe.

  “I want to see them start using the stacker,” said K
en.

  Mr Dickey came from down Cemetery Road, old Mr Weeks from out the Turangaomoana road, and some others I didn’t know. They were pulling out ropes, waving their arms and shouting, and all the time the sweep kept bringing in more hay, and the heap in the middle got higher. Other men forked hay up to Mr Dunlop in the middle, and he forked it out to Mr Hoe who worked his way around the edges.

  “It looks fun jumping around up there.”

  “Building’s the trickiest job on the hay paddock,” Ken said. “Dad told me. You’ve got to keep the sides straight yet make them come out a bit at the top to keep off the rain; and you’ve got to make sure every forkful’s tramped down so it all binds together. Old Peter Rust was a whizz. He could build a stack with his eyes closed, my dad said.”

  A couple of tumbler sweeps started, each behind a horse, and Jerry Hoe went over to the gate and came back leading Old Clop. Mr Hoe used Old Clop for taking his milk over to the factory. He had big feathery feet, and he always let me rub his nose and pat his neck. I watched now as Jerry led him towards the stacker where the tumbler sweeps were coming in.

  They carried smaller loads, and the men behind them pushed up the long handles till the sweeps tumbled right over, dumping their loads in front of the stacker.

  “Tumblers are old,” said Ken. “So’s the gate sweep. Mr Tiddy’s bought one of those new sweeps that you put on the front of a lorry, and it’s ten times as fast. Here he is now.”

  Through the gate, a lorry rolled, stopped, and several men went across and heaved at something on the tray.

  “Things’ll start moving once they get it bolted on,” Ken said.

  The gate sweep came in again, and the tumbler sweeps kept dumping their heaps.

  “They’re forking a load on to the stacker,” said Ken. “Now you’ll see something.”

  Everything stopped, sweeps, rakes, tedder. Everyone turned and looked towards the clearing in the middle where Mr Hoe and Mr Dunlop stood with their pitchforks on the low, brown mound of hay. The air smelled dry and hot. Somewhere a cow mooed. Across the still and silent paddock came Jerry’s voice: “Giddup, Clop.”

  Out from the stack Clop walked, traces lifting the swingle tree behind him and pulling a rope. The heap of hay slid up the red giraffe’s neck high above the stack. Clop stopped, the giraffe’s head turned over backwards, the hay slid off the stacker’s teeth and fell, and somebody yelled.

  “The first load,” said Ken, and we all laughed.

  The giraffe’s head with seven long teeth swung back. Thump! It slid back down to the ground, the rope drawing Clop backwards into the haystack. Already, the forks were flashing, another load going on to the stacker’s teeth.

  “It’s called a sweep-rake stacker, ‘cause it’s got long teeth,” said Ken. “It’s an International.”

  “I didn’t know giraffes had teeth that long.”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  “Out on my uncle’s farm, they use a grab for stacking.” Freddy Jones had arrived too late to see the first load go up. “Grabs are faster. They’ve got sharp teeth, curved like a rake’s. My father says that old one’s called an overshot stacker.”

  “Sweep-rake,” said Ken.

  “Did you hear it go thump?” said Jean.

  The paddock was alive again: the tedder tedding, rakes raking, sweeps sweeping, men on the stack forking and building.

  The sweep bolted on in front, Mr Tiddy’s lorry drove down a windrow, picked up a load on the long teeth and, instead of dropping its hay, ran it right on to the stacker’s teeth. A couple of men shoved in forks to hold it, the lorry backed, and the sweep’s teeth came out clean.

  Clop walked out, the load went up and tipped. Thump! The stacker came down, and the lorry ran in with another load. Sam tied the horses in the shade and left the slow old gate sweep by the hedge. It looked a bit sorry for itself.

  Up went the stacker, as Mr Tiddy backed off and swept another load. Sam scrambled and joined the men on the stack. Somebody else handed up a fork.

  “Sam’s crowing for his father and Mr Dunlop,” said Ken. “My father says it’s hard work, being crow, feeding out enough to keep the builders going. And you get all the seeds and bits of hay down the back of your neck as the stacker drops it.

  “Clop must be strong, pulling up that load.”

  “It’s the pulleys the rope runs through,” Ken told Jean. “They make it easier.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Something about a purchase,” Ken said. “Dad knows about it.”

  “Everybody knows about it,” said Freddy Jones.

  “I don’t,” I told him.

  Ken and Jean Carter had to go home; Freddy Jones had already gone; and I had to run down to the shops.

  Mr Cleaver put our parcel into the basket. “Something for Milly in there,” he winked. “You might just mention to your father that Pat Malone was talking to a drover last Saturday who thinks he saw Old Peter Rust carrying his swag this side of Ngongotaha, and heading for the Mamakus.”

  “Did Mr Cleaver give you a message for your father?” asked Mr Bryce at the store. “That’s all right then.”

  By the time I dropped the shopping at home, saw Aggie and Milly were behaving themselves, and climbed on to the stile again, Mrs Hoe and her grown-up daughter, Laura, were carrying the baskets and billies from morning tea towards the farmhouse the other side of the paddock.

  They’d just disappeared, when a car drove into the hay paddock, up to the stack, and somebody leaned out and shouted. Mr Dunlop slid down off the haystack and got in the car, which drove across to the man on a second rake, Mr Lines. He climbed off the high seat, leaving the horse and rake standing, and they drove away. The Dunlop and Lines boys got into a cut-down Model A and went after them.

  Everything slowed down again, everything but Mr Tiddy’s lorry sweeping more and more loads of hay, and Jerry running to help Mr Dickey hold them on the stacker teeth with a fork, then running to lead Clop out on his rope. His father yelled at him from up on top of the stack, and Jerry shouted something back. He sounded angry.

  I slid off the stile.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Why Clop Wore Blinkers, Why He Shook His Head Till His Harness Creaked and Jingled, and Why Mrs Hoe Said It Was a Disgrace.

  I SLID OFF THE STILE and took a few steps towards the stack. The cut ends of grass felt prickly under my feet. I took ten more steps, then another ten, and nobody noticed. By the time I got to where Clop finished his walk, I’d given up counting.

  Jerry grinned. “G’day, Maggie.” His face brown with dust, bits of hay stuck in his hair, his nose burnt red, he looked like his father.

  It popped out. I heard myself saying, “Can I lead Clop?”

  “I don’t know if he’ll let you. He’s not all that good around strangers.” Jerry clicked his tongue and tugged at the halter so Clop backed up, the rope ran through the pulleys, and the stacker lowered its long teeth.

  “Clop knows me.” I said, reaching up and patting his neck. “I talk to him in the yard at the factory, when your father takes the milk over on his cart.”

  Clop was wearing blinkers, so he could only see straight in front. He lowered and turned his big head, snuffled my hair, and gave an enormous wet snort on my hand, as I rubbed his nose.

  “He only does that to people he likes,” said Jerry.

  The sweep ran in. Jerry pulled his fork out of the ground and ran to hold the next load. Mr Dickey drove in his fork from the other side, and they leaned their weight while the lorry backed off, leaving the teeth of the stacker hidden beneath hay.

  “You remember me, Clop.” I reached up to his halter, “Giddup.” He followed, no trouble. I knew to walk on his left, and I talked as he dragged the rope through the pulleys, the hay rising on the long teeth, tilting over at the top—Thump!—and tumbling down on the stack.

  “Back up, Clop.” The rope ran back through the pulleys, the stacker slid down for another load, and Jerry and Mr Dickey for
ked the ground around the stack clear.

  “Your father let me ride Clop home from the factory once, as far as the crossing,” I told Jerry before he could tell me off, “and Dad was waiting and gave me a dub home.”

  “He doesn’t mind you,” Jerry grinned, and let me have a couple more goes. Clop pulled the stacker up and down, up and down.

  “You sure you can manage on your own?” Jerry’s dusty-brown face looked serious. “There’s been an accident, out Wardville, so we’re short-handed. I could work the other rake, if you’re sure you’re okay with Clop.” He lowered his voice and said, “We all knew Dad would miss having Old Peter Rust.”

  That reminded me of Mr Cleaver’s message. I’d tell Dad tonight, I thought.

  Mr Dickey had to hold the hay on his own, when the sweep backed off, but he said he could manage that. “I’ll keep an eye on the horse, and give Maggie a hand, if she needs it. Go for your life, Jerry.”

  “They’ll yell out from the stack, if they can’t take another load. Otherwise, just keep it going up.” Jerry’s teeth flashed white as he turned and ran. “Just watch out he doesn’t step over the traces.”

  I clicked my tongue, Clop pulled up the stacker, and Jerry was getting on the seat of the other rake, still standing where Mr Lines had left it. Somebody else climbed on to the stack to help Mr Hoe and Sam. After that, the hay started coming in a bit faster again, but Clop didn’t mind. Out he walked from the stack, out and back. I just clicked my tongue, and Clop did the rest. Out and back. Out and back. He never stepped over the traces.

  Our track was dry and dusty, the grass wearing out. Where the lorry ran in with the sweep, it was polished shiny-white. I didn’t need to sniff: the air was full of the smell of hay and Clop.