Just in front of this shelter the camp oven had been built, for baking damper and roasting meat, and to one side was the well, a very important necessity, built by contract, timbered, and provided with winch, rope and bucket.
All around the bush was dense like a forest, much denser than usual. The slim-girthed trees grew in silent array, all alike and all asleep, with undergrowth of scrub and fern and flowers, banksia short and sturdy with its cone-shaped red-yellow flowers like fairy lamps, and here and there a perfect wattle, or mimosa tree, with its pale gold flowers like little balls of sun-dust, and here and there sandal-wood trees. Jack never forgot the beauty of the first bushes and trees of mimosa, in a damp place in the wild bush. Occasionally there was still an immense karri tree, or a jarrah slightly smaller, though this was not the region for these giants.
And far away, unending, upslope and downslope and rock-face one far unending dimness of these changeless trees, going on and on without variation, open enough to let one see ahead and all around, yet dense enough to form a monotony and a sense of helplessness in the mind, a sense of timelessness. Strongly the gang impressed on Jack that he must not go even for five minutes’ walk out of sight of the clearing. The weird silent timelessness of the bush impressed him as nothing else ever did, in its motionless aloofness. “What would my father mean, out here?” he said to himself. And it seemed as if his father and his father’s world and his father’s gods withered and went to dust at the thought of this bush. And when he saw one of the men on a red sorrel horse galloping like a phantom away through the dim, red-trunked, silent trees, followed by another man on a black horse: and when he heard their far, far-off yelping “Coo-ee!” or a shot as they fired at a dingo or a kangaroo, he felt as if the old world had given him up from the womb, and put him into a new weird grey-blue paradise, where man has to begin all over again. That was his feeling: that the human way of life was all to be begun over again.
The home that he and Tom made for themselves seemed to be a matter of forked sticks. If you wanted an upright of any sort, drive a forked stick into the ground, or dig it in, fork-end up. If you wanted a cross-bar, lay a stick or a pole across two forks. Down the sides of your house you wove brushwood. For the roof you plaited the long, stringy strips of gum-bark. With a couple of axes and a jack-knife they built a house fit for a savage king. Then they went out and made a kitchen, with pegs hammered into the bole of a tree, for the frying pans, the sawn surface of a large stump for a table, and logs to lie back against.
North of the clearing lay the nucleus of a settlement, with pub, saw-mill, store, one or two homes, and a farm or two outlying. And as they cleared the land, the teamsters carried the best of the timber on jinkers, or dragged it with chains hitched to bullock or horse teams, to the mill. But milling was expensive, and most of the wood was hand-split. Jack learned to cut palings and poles, and then to split slabs that would serve to build slab houses, or sheds. In the spare time they would have little hunts of wallabies or bandicoots or bungarras, or blood-rats; or they would snare opossums or stalk dingoes.
But because he was really away in the wild, Jack felt he must write letters home. So it is. The letters from home hardly interested him at all. The thin sheets with their interminable writing were almost repulsive to him. He would stow them in the barn and leave them for days without reading them: he was “busy.” And sometimes the mice nibbled them, and in that way read them for him. He was a little ashamed of this indifference. But he noticed other men were the same. When they got these endless thin sheets from home, covered with ink of words, they stowed them away in a kind of nausea, without reading more than a few lines. And the people at home had such a pitying admonishing tone: like the young naval lieutenant who made friends with the black aborigines by promptly shaving them. And then letters were not profitable. A stamp home cost sixpence, and a letter took about two months on the way. It was always four months before you got an answer. And after you’d written to your mother about something really important — like money — and waited impatiently several months for the answer, when it came it never mentioned the money, and made a mountain of a cold in your head which you couldn’t remember having had. What was the good of people at home writing: “We are having true November weather, very cold, with fog and sleet,” when you were grilling under a fierce sun and the rush of the intense antipodal summer. What was the good of it all? All dull as ditchwater, and no use to anybody. He had promised his mother he would write once a week. And his mother was his mother, he wanted to keep his promise. Which he did for a month. But in camp, he didn’t even know what day it was, hardly what month: though the mail did come once a fortnight, via the saw-mill. — He took out his mother’s letter.
“You said in your letter from Colombo that you were sneezing. Do take care in Australia in the rainy season. Ask not to be sent out in the rain. I recollect the climate, always sunny and bright between showers. That is what we miss so much now we are back in England, the sunny skies. Of course, I do not want you to be a mollycoddle, but I know the climate of Western Australia, it is very trying, particularly so in the rainy season. I do hope and pray you are on a good station with a good woman who will see you are not out getting drenched in those cold downpours — — ”
Jack groaned aloud, astonished that his mother had got so far from her own early days. How in the name of heaven had he come to mention sneezing? Never again. He would not even say he was camping.
“Dear Mother:
“I am quite well and like farming out here all right. Old Mrs. Ellis knew your father. She says he cut off her leg. I hope Father has got rid of his Liver, you said he was taking variolettes for it. I hope they have done him good. Mr. Ellis says a cockles pill and a ten-mile walk will cure anything. He says it would cure a pig’s liver. But when old Tim, the half-caste, tried to swallow the pill it came out of the gap where his front tooth used to be, so Mrs. Ellis gave him a teaspoonful of sulphur, which he said would make him blow up. But it didn’t. I think I was more likely to blow up because she gave me a big teaspoon of parafin which they call kerosene out here. She is a fine doctor, far better than the medical man who lodges here, whose name is Rackett.
“I hope you are quite well. Give my love to all my aunts and sister and father. I hope they are all quite well — — ”
Jack hurried this letter in confusion into its envelope, and spent sixpence on it, knowing perfectly well it was all nonsense.
II
There was a pause in the clearing work, after the early hot spell, and word from Lennie that there was to be a kangaroo hunt, and they were to come down. An Old Man kangaroo, a king of boomers, had been seen around, hoof-marks and paw-pad trails near the pool.
They met at dawn, by the well: Easu with two kangaroo hounds, like greyhounds on leash; Lennie peacocking on an enormous hairy-heeled roadster; a “superior” young Queenslander who had been sent west because his father found him unmanageable and who wasn’t a bad sort, though his nickname was Pink-eye Percy; Lennie’s “Cornseed” friend, Joe Low; Alec Rice, the young fellow who was courting Grace; Ross Ellis, and Herbert, who was well again, then Tom on a grey stallion, and Jack, in riding breeches and gaiters and clean shirt, astride the famous Lucy.
Easu was born in the saddle, he rode easy on his big roan. He waved his hat excitedly at the group, and led off into the scrub, through the slender, white-barked trees of the open bush. The others rode fast in ragged order, among the thin, open trees. Jack let Lucy pick her way, sometimes ahead, sometimes in sight of the others. They rode in silence.
Then they came out unexpectedly into low, grey-green scrub without trees, and crisp grey-white soil that crumbled under the hoofs of the horses. There they were, all out in the blue and gold light, with billows of blue-green scrub running away to right and left, towards a rise in front.
“Hold hard there!” sang out Easu, holding up the whip in his right hand. He held the reins loosely in his left, and with the reins, the leash on which the dogs were pulli
ng. Dogs and horse he held in that left hand.
“I want y’ t’ divide. Tom, y’ lead on a zigzag course down north. Ross, you work south. — And this — this fox-hunting gentleman — — ” He paused, and Jack felt himself going scarlet.
“Says thank ye, an’ hopes he’s a gentleman, since y’ve mentioned it,” put in Lennie, in his mild, inconsequential way.
There was a laugh against Red: for there was no mistaking him for a gentleman, in any sense of the word. However, he was too much excited by the hunt to persevere.
The fellows were stowing away their pipes in their pockets, and buttoning their coats, ready for the dash. Easu, thrilled by his own unquestioned leadership, gave the orders. All listened closely.
“Call up! Call up! Follow my leader and find the trail. Biggest boomer ever ye — — ”
“Come!” cried Tom.
“And I’m here!” cried Lennie.
Away they went into the gully and through the scrub, riding light but swift, in different directions.
“Let go th’ mare’s head,” yelled Tom over his shoulder. “We’re coming to timber, an’ she’d best pilot herself.”
“Right!” cried Jack.
“Don’t ye kill Lucy,” shrieked Lennie. “Because me heart’s set on her. Keep y’ hands an’ y’ heels off y’ horse, an’ y’ head on y’ shoulders.”
The bolt of horsemen through the bush sent parrots screaming savagely over the feathery tree-tops. Jack let Lucy have her way. She was light and swift and sure-footed, old steeplechaser that she was. The slim straight trees slipped past, the motion of the horse surging her own way was exhilarating to a degree.
But Tom had heard something: not the parrots, not the soft thud of the following horses. He must have heard with his sixth sense: perhaps the warning call of the boomer. With face set and eyes burning he swung and urged his horse in a new direction. And like men coming in to supper from different directions, the handful of horsemen came swish-swish through the scrub, toward a centre.
Lucy pricked one ear. Perhaps she too had heard something. Then she gathers herself together and goes like the wind after the twinkling grey quarters of Tom’s stallion. Her excitement mounts to Jack’s head, and he rides like a catapult on the wind.
Again Tom was reining in, pulling his horse almost on to its haunches. And Jack must hold like a vice with his knees, for Lucy was pawing the air, frantic at being held up.
“Coo-ee!” came Tom’s clear tenor, ringing through the bush. “Coo-ee! Coo-ee! Coo-ee!” A marvellous sound, and Lucy pawing and dancing among the scrub.
“Coo-ee! Coo-ee! Coo-ee!”
It seemed to Jack, this sound in the bush was like God. Like the call of the heroic soul seeking its body. Like the call of the bodiless soul, sounding through the immense dead spaces of the dim, open bush, strange and heroic and inhuman. The deep long “coo,” mastering the silence, the high summons of the long, “eee.” The “coo” rising more imperious, and then the “eee!” thrilling and holding aloft. Then the swift lift and fall: “Coo-eee! Coo-eee! Coo-eee!” till the air rocks with the fierce pulse, as if a new heart were in motion, and the shriek and scream of the “eee!” rips in strange flashes into the far-off, far-off consciousness.
Much stranger than the weird yelp of the Red Indians’ war-cry was this rocking, ripping noise in the vast grey bush.
The others were coming in from right to left, like silent phantoms through the sunny evanescence of the bush, riding hard. Tom is displaced by Red. A few quick words given and taken. Easu has unleashed the dogs, slashed the long lash with a resounding crack in the air. The long lean dogs stretch out — uncannily long, from tip to tip. Tom lets go and away. Jack lets go and away, and unconsciously his hand goes down for the bow of the slippery saddle.
Lucy had the situation well in hand, which was more than Jack had. Thud-thud. Thud-thud. Thud-thud! Up, fly! Crash! — Hello? — All right. A beauty! A dream of a jumper, this Lucy. But Jack wished his seat weren’t so slippery.
They were turning into bigger timber: trees further apart, but much bigger, and with hanging limbs. “Look out! Look out f’ y’ head!” Jack kept all his eyes open, till he knew by second sight when to duck. He watched the twinkling hind quarters of Tom’s grey, among the trees.
There was a short yapping of the dogs. Lucy was going like the wind, Jack was riding light, but she was beginning to breathe heavily. No longer so young as she was. How hot the sun was, in the almost shadeless bush. And what was leading, where was the ‘roo? Jack strained his eyes almost out of his head, but could see nothing.
They were on the edge of the hills, and the country changed continually. No sooner were you used to scrub, than it was thin trees. No sooner did you know that Lucy could manipulate thin trees, than you were among big timber, with more space and dangerous boughs. Then it was salty paper-bark country — and back to forest again: close trees, fallen logs, blood-rat holes and sudden outcropping of dark-brown, ancient-looking rocks with little flat crags, to be avoided. But the other men were going full speed, and full speed you must follow, watching with all your eyes, and riding light, and swept along in the run.
Up! That was over an elephant log, and down went a man at Tom’s heels. It was Grace’s young man. No matter. Jack was going to look over his shoulder when Tom again shouted “Up!” and Jack and Lennie followed over the fallen timber.
Suddenly they were in a great black blanket of burnt country, clear of undergrowth or scrubs, with skeletons of black, charred trees standing gruesome. And there, right under their noses, leapt three kangaroos, swerving across. The baby one, Joey, was first, lithe, light, apparently not a bit afraid, but wildly excited; then the mother doe, all out, panting, anxious-eyed, stiffly jumping; and behind, a long way, with the dogs like needles coming after, ran the Old Man boomer; a great big chap making mighty springs and in varying directions. Yes, he was making a rear-guard action for the safety of his mate and spawn. Leaping with great leaps, as if to the end of the world, leaning forward, his little hands curled in, his immense massive tail straight out behind him like some immense living rudder. And seeming perfectly calm, almost indifferent. With steady, easy, enormous springs he went this way, that way, detouring, but making for the same ridge his doe and Joey had passed.
The charred ground proved treacherous, holes, smouldering trunks of trees, smouldering hollows where trunks had been. Soon two horses were running loose, with men limping after them. But on went the rest. Thud and crackle went the hoofs of the galloping horses in the charcoal, as after the dogs, after the ‘roos they followed, kicking up clouds of grey ash-mounds and red-burnt earth, jumping suddenly over the still-glowing logs.
The chase paused on the ridge, for the drop was sudden and steep, with rocks and boulders cropping out. Down slid the dogs in a cloud, yelping hard, making Easu at all costs turn to try the right, Tom to try the left.
They dropped awkwardly and joltingly down, between rocks, in loose charcoal powder and loose earth.
“Ain’t that ole mare a marvel, Jack!” said Tom. “This nag is rode stiff, all-under my knees.”
Jack’s face was full of wild joy. The stones rattled, the men stood back from the stirrups, the horses seemed to be diving. But Lucy was light and sure.
Down they jolted into the gully. Easu came up swearing — lost the quarry and dogs, Jack pulled Lucy over a boulder to get out of Easu’s way: a thing he shouldn’t have done. Crack! went his head against a branch, and Jack was bruising himself on the ground before he knew where he was.
But he was on his feet again, intently chasing Lucy.
“Here y’are!” It was Herbert who leaned down, picked up the reins of the scampering mare, and threw them to Jack. Jack’s face was bleeding. Lennie came up and opened his mouth in dismay. But somebody coo-eed, and the chase was too good to lose. They are all gone.
Jack stiffly mounted, to find himself blinded by trickling blood. Lucy once more was stirring between his knees, stretching herself out, and h
e had to let her go, fumbling meanwhile for a handkerchief which he pushed under his hat-brim, and pulled down the old felt firmly. Wiping his eyes with his sleeve, he found the wound staunched by the impromptu dressing.
The scene had completely changed. Lucy was whisking him around the side of a huge dark boulder. They were in the dry bed of the gully, on stones.
Lucy stopped dead, practically on her haunches, but her impetus carried her over, and she was slithering down into a loose gravelly hole. Jack jumped off, to find himself face to face with the biggest boomer kangaroo he had ever imagined. It was the Old Man, sitting there at the bottom of the gravelhole, in the hollow of a barren she-oak, his absurd paws drooping dejectedly before him and his silly dribbling under-jaw working miserably.
“He’s trying to get the wind up for another fly,” thought Jack, standing there as dazed as the ‘roo itself, and feeling himself very much in the same condition. Then he wondered where the doe and Joey were, and where all the other hunters. He hoped they wouldn’t come. Lucy stood by, as calm as a cucumber.
Jack took a step nearer the Old Man ‘roo, and instantly brought up his fists as the animal doubled its queer front paws and hit out wildly at him. He wanted to hit back.
“Mind the claws!” called somebody, with a quiet chuckle, from above.
Jack looked round, and there was Lennie and the heavy horse, the horse head-down, tail up, feet spread, like a salamander lizard on a wall, slithering down the grade into the hole, Lennie erect in the stirrups. Jack gave a loud laugh.
And the Old Man, either possessed of a sense of humour or terrified to death, seized the nearest thing at hand — which happened to be Jack; grabbed him, gripped him, hugged him in desperate fury, and tried to get up his huge, flail-like hind leg, to rip up the enemy with the toe claw. One stroke of that claw, and Jack was done.
Complete Works of D.H. Lawrence (Illustrated) Page 394
