by Sam Jasper
‘Easier to see on puppies than on older dogs,’ Ma says thoughtfully. ‘What about the vibe?’
‘It’s a bit louder,’ Cha-Cha replies. She starts dancing.
‘Stop that,’ Ma says sharply. ‘It’s irritating.’
‘It’s just that,’ Cha-Cha answers bravely, ‘whatever the sound is, it makes me want to dance.’
‘I thought we were talking about singing, not dancing.’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Cha-Cha replies deflated. ‘I just feel like dancing.’
Ma is silent. All the mites stop moving: they know she’s thinking. And they don’t want to draw attention to themselves. Eventually, she focuses on Cha-Cha again. ‘What sort of dancing do you feel like dancing?’
Is this a trick question? Cha-Cha thinks to herself.
‘No, it’s not,’ Ma shouts. Cha-Cha jumps: she keeps forgetting Ma can read their thoughts. ‘Now, tell me, what do you want to dance?’
‘Er,’ Cha-Cha says hurriedly. She feels rattled. She tries to remember the vibes on the puppy. Humming, she thinks. Happy! As she thinks, she turns this way and that, from side to side, moving her mental shoulders. One, two. One, two, she counts.
‘Well?’ Ma demands loudly.
Cha-Cha jumps: she’s still in the middle of swaying to the music. ‘A Rumba! Or a Tango: I think it’s Latin.’
‘Good grief,’ Ma shouts. Cha-Cha jumps higher. ‘Latin is a dead language. Everybody knows that. How can they be singing in Latin? You can’t dance to Latin.’ She throws her little legs in the air and somersaults, something she only does when she’s very, very irritated. ‘Why did I ever listen to you?’ she says sharply. ‘All you’re ever interested in is dancing around the place and listening to some mindless beat. Get out of my sight.’ With a hangdog expression on her young face, Cha-Cha jumps listlessly on to the end of Useless’ tail and stays there, as far away from Ma as she can get. Latin isn’t dead, she thinks very quietly to herself. After all, there is such a thing as a Latin beat. So, there!
* * *
For the next week, Shirley and the “gang”, as she calls them, are very busy. Rising early at five each morning, Gull and her cousins do as many chores as they can before breakfast: feed and water the horses; clean out the stables; put in fresh straw; feed Useless and Jam and the puppies; change the straw in the puppy pen; weed and water the vegie patch; pick the vegetables for the day and collect the eggs. By six, Jake is in the kitchen, cooking up a storm for breakfast.
‘I always feel I’ve done a full day’s work even before breakfast,’ Gull remarks to Helen as she plonks herself down exhausted and ready for breakfast. Already, Helen has the toast and tea on the table. Harry and the children quickly join her. Taking a grilled sausage, bacon, a poached egg and a cooked tomato each, the four children hoe into breakfast.
‘Another day, another dollar off the overdraft,’ Harry says happily as he snags another sausage.
‘I don’t eat nearly as much at home,’ Gull confides as she grabs some toast.
‘I bet you don’t work nearly as hard at home either,’ Lucy says. ‘You won’t put on any weight here,’ she laughs.
Gull takes a look at her cousins: there’s not an ounce of fat on any of them. Not even on Jake, Gull thinks. And he spends half his time cooking and tasting. As if reading her mind, Jake says, ‘It’s all those chores, Gull: I don’t have time to put on weight.’ The others laugh, including Helen and Harry.
Surreptitiously, Lucy glances at the kitchen clock above the stove. Only twenty past seven. She breathes a sigh of relief.
‘Not another time watcher,’ Harry says facetiously, catching her. ‘You’d think we were working in an office the way one of you is always looking at the clock.’
‘Lots to do Dad,’ Lucy says breezily.
‘Yeah,’ Tom agrees. ‘Got to make sure everything runs like um, clockwork.’
‘Oh, Tom,’ Harry groans, ‘your jokes are getting to be nearly as bad as mine.’
‘You don’t think I’ve caught your sense of humour?’ Tom asks in mock alarm.
‘Could be genetic,’ Jake nods sympathetically.
‘How come you didn’t get it then, twinny?’
‘Just lucky, I guess.’ The whole table laughs.
A lone sausage lies on the serving plate in front of the six people. Then a hand reaches down from above and grabs it.
‘Gotcha!’ Shirley says as she pounces, the screen door belatedly swinging closed behind her and Useless.
‘Oh, I didn’t even see you come in,’ Helen gasps.
‘I know,’ Shirley says grinning and holding up the captured sausage. ‘You don’t have to be a mind reader to see you were all picturing that sausage on your own plates. Mmm, yum,’ she says taking a bite.
Helen gets up and finds another mug and hands it to Shirley. ‘Thanks, Helen,’ Shirley says glancing at the clock above the stove.
‘Not you too,’ Harry says, staring at the clock. ‘It’s only a quarter to eight. Do you all have a train to catch or something?’
Four pairs of eyes involuntarily turn towards Helen. No, Lucy thinks, we just have to catch Mum before she falls asleep.
‘Oh, Harry,’ Shirley teases coming to their rescue as she sits down. ‘It’s just that we all know how lazy you are. And if it weren’t for the “gang” shoving you out the door with a good breakfast in your belly, the crop would never be finished. It’s not going to harvest itself, you know,’ she says wagging her finger at him like a strict schoolteacher.
He shakes his head. ‘Well, have I got enough time for another cuppa, Miss?’
Shirley glances openly at the clock: ten minutes to eight. ‘If you’re quick,’ she says grinning, her fingers crossed under the table.
Right on the stroke of eight, Helen begins to yawn, Harry puts down his empty mug, picks up his old, worn hat and hurries towards the screen door. ‘I know, I know,’ he says with a cheeky grin as he disappears towards the big shed. ‘You don’t have to tell me twice,’ he yells back. Soon after, the others hear the sound of the Harvester revving up and rolling out towards the rise. Helen’s head is already resting on the kitchen table.
‘Boy, that was close,’ Tom says.
‘Poor Dad,’ Lucy frowns. ‘I feel bad about hounding him out of the kitchen every time.’
‘It’s for his own good,’ Shirley says continuing like a strict schoolteacher, wagging her finger. Setting down her mug, she comes over to Helen and coaxes her out of the kitchen to lie down on her bed. Lucy picks up her mug, charcoal pencils and an art pad, and goes to sit by her mother in the bedroom. Useless is lying under the kitchen table searching for more crumbs.
The others finish off their tea and get ready to help Jake. With one of them always sitting beside Helen as she sleeps, the others are busy keeping up a supply of morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea for their father and the other workers in the sheds. To lift their spirits, Shirley tells them weird and wonderful stories about the characters around the district while she works, passing on stories her parents told her.
When the baskets of food are ready, Useless accompanies whoever is taking the food over to the workers. They all know this is not for their protection or because he’s being friendly. As always, Useless stays behind with the baskets, scrounging for scraps.
In the meantime, Lucy is sitting in an old comfy, cream armchair by the picture window in her parents’ bedroom. Her mother is lying quite still under a pale green, satin quilt. In Lucy’s lap is a charcoal drawing of Helen asleep. Lucy looks at it and smiles. Not bad. Although a little colour might be good, she thinks as she reaches for her pastels.
‘No colour,’ a voice calls out.
Lucy jumps. ‘Mum?’ she asks tentatively as she rises out of her chair. However, Helen looks fast asleep. After waiting a moment more, Lucy tiptoes back to her armchair. Was she talking about my sketch? Lucy wonders. But she couldn’t be, she thinks scratching her head with the charcoal. She doesn’t even know I’m here. She shrugs and op
ening the old exercise book beside her, writes in “no colour” on a sheet of paper. For the rest of Lucy’s shift, Helen sleeps wordlessly.
Jake walks into the room. ‘Anything?’ he whispers to Lucy as he takes out a grubby notebook for new recipes from his jeans pocket.
‘No colour,’ Lucy whispers back.
‘What’s that mean?’
‘Beats me,’ Lucy shrugs as she picks up her sketchbook, vacates the comfy armchair and hands Jake the old exercise book and a pen. Then, she walks out of the bedroom and into the kitchen. Gull is sitting at the table looking expectant. ‘No colour,’ Lucy sighs as she runs water from the tap into a glass.
‘What have we got so far?’ Tom asks as Gull adds “no colour” to her list of phrases entitled, ‘Helen’s Clues’.
‘So far,’ Shirley says reading over Gull’s shoulder, ‘we’ve got “bland bombshell”, “infinitesimal”, “tick, tick, tick” and “no colour”.’
‘Great,’ Lucy sighs. ‘None of this makes any sense.’
‘What I don’t understand,’ Tom says, ‘is why she didn’t say small or tiny or something. Why infin… infin…’
‘Infinitesimal?’ Gull asks.
‘Yep, that’s the one,’ Tom grins.
‘Let’s think about it,’ Shirley says. For some time, the room is completely silent. At last, Gull says quietly, ‘Smaller than small. Tinier than tiny?’ She looks around expectantly.
‘Well, what’s tinier than tiny?’ Tom asks. ‘Breadcrumbs? Hundreds and thousands?’
‘Smaller,’ Shirley says.
‘Commas? Full-stops?’
Just then, Useless lopes in and wags his tail happily. ‘Welcome to your favourite room,’ Shirley smiles. ‘After the Folly, of course! Just don’t know why you like that room so much. There’s nothing up there, not even food. But all your ancestors liked it. Must be in the genes.’
Useless sits down suddenly and begins to scratch.
‘Oh, Useless,’ Lucy complains. ‘Do you always have to scratch? Especially when we’ve got company.’
‘Fleas!’ Gull yells suddenly.
‘We know he’s got fleas,’ Lucy says sighing. ‘It’s so embarrassing. You’d think he was a flea hotel the way he scratches.’
‘No, Lucy,’ Gull says shaking her head. She looks up at Shirley desperately. ‘Fleas! Fleas!’
‘Oh,’ Shirley says suddenly realizing what Gull is getting at. ‘Of course! Fleas are very small. I think you’re on the right track, Gull. But I wonder, is there something even smaller?’
Jake bends down and looks at the spot Useless is scratching. ‘Poor old Useless,’ he says solicitously. ‘I think you’ve got mange.’
‘Mange? Where?’ Lucy asks, kneeling beside Tom. ‘We need to get some flea powder.’
‘Fleas don’t give dogs mange,’ Shirley says, bending over both of them. ‘At least I don’t think so. I wonder what it is?’
‘Oh,’ Gull says jumping up. ‘Let’s look up “mange” on the Internet.’
‘Good idea,’ Lucy agrees. With that, they move into the lounge room where Helen keeps all the paperwork. Quickly, Gull turns on the computer and clicks on the Internet. She searches for “mange” and sits back to wait. Soon, a full page of websites appear: “Mange and its Description”; “Mange: Cause of’”; ‘”Mange and Dogs”; “Managing Mange”; “Mange and Humans”.
‘This list goes on to eternity,’ Gull groans.
‘Let’s try ‘Mange and Dogs’, Lucy says.
Gull accesses it. She reads, ‘Mange is found on dogs but not humans. Mange is caused by a tiny, microscopic mite…’
‘Tiny,’ Tom repeats. ‘Tinier than tiny.’ The others nod and murmur.
Gull continues, ‘… a microscopic mite that is called ‘scabies’ in humans but is a different kind of scabies from the one dogs get. The scabies mite can’t go from human to dog or dog to human: the mites are completely different.’
‘Let’s look up “Mange and Humans” then. This says the mite can’t go from one to another. So, I wonder what’s under that heading?’ Gull asks curious.
Hitting the heading, “Mange and Humans”, they wait impatiently.
Gull reads and laughs. ‘Very funny,’ she says laughing out loud.
‘What?’ Lucy asks, bending down to search Useless’ hair.
“Mange and Humans”? No such thing! Gotcha! See scabies. See microscopic spiders and ticks.” ’
‘Er, yuk,’ Lucy shivers. ‘I really don’t think I want to know any more. It makes me itch just thinking about it.’
‘Well,’ Shirley says, biting her lip, ‘what have we got now?’
Lucy recites, ‘Bland bombshell, tick, tick, tick, no colour and really, really tiny.’ She stands up and pats Useless’ head.
Shirley says suddenly, ‘Maybe Helen’s been bitten by a tick, and that’s why she’s falling asleep. But it doesn’t fit in with “bland bombshell”. Oh, I don’t know.’
‘Does any of this make sense yet?’ Tom asks hopefully.
‘Nope,’ Shirley answers as she straightens up. ‘Then again, we’ll probably find the solution was right under our fingertips all the time,’ she adds as she gives Useless’ head another absentminded pat.
Chapter 5
Awake early at 5.00 the next morning, Harry lies in bed smiling to himself. Already half the harvest throughout the district is in and it’s only been ten days. The weather forecast says no rain for at least three weeks. By then, we’ll be well and truly finished. Yep, it’s about time things started going right instead of up and down every year. And goodbye overdraft for the first time in ten years! He stretches cautiously so as not to wake Helen sleeping beside him. Poor luv, he thinks, working flat out all day organising the kids. And what with Shirley popping in for a chat every morning, it’s a wonder Helen gets anything done.
Swinging his long legs over the side of the bed, Harry stands up and yawns. He strolls over to the window and peers out sleepily at the hundreds of hectares still to be harvested. ‘That’s funny,’ he says quietly to himself, ‘I thought I had more to do.’ He takes a second look the crop.
With a queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach, Harry throws on a pair of jeans and a faded canary yellow t-shirt. Then he races upstairs to the “Folly” to get a better look. “It can’t be,’ he whispers. Racing downstairs Harry grabs his boots on the way out and jumps into the old orange truck.
Useless wakes up suddenly and yelps: Ma has given him a quick bite. Goaded by her, Useless jumps onto the back of the truck as Harry takes off following the tracks left by yesterday’s work. Then he climbs down from the truck and stands at the edge of the hemp, scratching his head.
‘What the …’ Harry bends down and takes a long stalk between his fingers. ‘Not broken,’ he confirms as he examines the unharvested hemp lying limply on the ground. Useless jumps down from the back of the truck and begins to sniff at the flattened hemp.
‘Looks alright,’ Harry says to Useless who wags his tail. ‘But how do I harvest a crop that’s lying down? Hang on,’ he says suddenly, ‘I started harvesting Bill’s little pocket yesterday and I thought I’d finish it up today, seeing he’s next door. I wonder if his crop’s still standing?’
With his heart pounding, Harry jumps back into the truck and heads off for the farthest corner of his farm. Useless runs along behind barking happily. He jumps three fences on the way, eager to catch up with the speeding truck. Within minutes, Harry is standing in front of Bill’s crop.
‘Only a bit left to do, Useless,’ Harry sighs, ‘and it’s all flattened.’ As before, he bends down and examines the tall stalks. ‘It’s like mine – just lying down. Not even broken. Useless,’ he says to his panting dog, ‘what’s going on? Come on boy. Get in. We’d better go back. I’ll ring Ted and Jimmy and get them to come over. If it’s only here, I can manage. But,’ he says pausing, ‘if it’s anywhere else, we’re in big trouble, Useless, really big trouble. Come on, back in the truck.’
Sens
ing the urgency, Useless jumps straight into the back, barking all the way home. Even faster than the journey out is the journey home. Skidding the truck to a halt, Harry dashes into the kitchen and picks up the phone. Within twenty minutes, the other two farmers are standing staring in disbelief at the fallen crop.
‘It looks fine,’ Ted says as he rolls a stalk between his rough hands.
‘Still attached to the ground and healthy,’ Jimmy nods.
‘I’m going back out to old McDonald’s today. Might just nick out a bit earlier,’ Ted says calmly, his slow drawl hiding his feelings, his heart racing.
‘Good idea,’ Jimmy nods. ‘Might do the same with Bailey’s.’
Just then, Ted’s mobile sounds, the dulcet tones of a lovesick cow. ‘That’ll be Shirley wondering where I’ve got to,’ he tells them as he puts the mobile to his ear. ‘Yeah. Oh? Oh! Aagh! Right! Yup!’ Ted clicks off the mobile. ‘Guess you heard?’
‘Couldn’t help. He was yelling fit to burst,’ Jimmy says.
‘Yep,’ Ted nods. ‘About half of his crop’s down, he reckons.’
Just then, Jimmy’s mobile rings. He grabs it up. ‘Right. Yep. Gotcha. On my way.’
‘Bailey’s?’ Harry asks wincing.
‘Yep,’ Jimmy nods. ‘About the same, half of what’s left is down on the ground. And I’m probably half-way through.’
Ted says, ‘But there are a lot of farms we haven’t even started on.’
Just then Harry’s mobile rings shrilly. ‘Oh, yeah, Bill? Yeah, I’ve been over. We’re working on the problem now. No, no, the hemp’s all right. It’s just lying down, having a nap. No, no, I know it’s no time for joking. I’m just trying to think …’ Finally, Harry, walks back to Ted and Jimmy. Harry says, ‘If this spreads, we could lose…’ The three men stand silently calculating the loss to the district.
‘… almost half the crop,’ Ted says very quietly.
Suddenly the three men jump: their mobiles are ringing madly. As they wander off in different directions, the better to hear the callers, Harry feels his heart drop into his boots. This was all my idea, he thinks.
After thirty long minutes, the mobiles are silent. Ted takes one look at Harry’s pale, stricken face. ‘It’s not your fault, Harry.’
