by Tony McKenna
‘To be sure, to be sure. Not that I’m a bettin’ man, Father, but I’d wager that there are good men, hard as they are, that’d be takin’ good care of ’em even as we speak.’
‘I hope so, Paddy, I certainly hope so. Care for a nightcap?’ Father O’Malley started to pour without bothering to wait for an answer from his old friend.
The three men advanced slowly on the lone man beside the motionless car, the headlights from the Dodge casting their shadows in long spidery streaks down the roadway.
Joe weighed the tyre lever in his right hand and licked his lips nervously, then, everything went suddenly black as the Dodge’s headlights snapped off. Spinning around, the men couldn’t see anything but heard the door of their truck slam shut. Confused and concerned they stood together in the dark and were then blinded by the two powerful beams that flashed on from the blackness beyond the stranded car trapping them like rabbits in a hunter’s spotlight.
A disembodied voice from the darkness behind the spotlights said, ‘you always fix a motor with a tyre lever, mate?’
Joe and his friends knew then they were in trouble but couldn’t comprehend why. How could, what seemed to them to be a perfect chance to rob someone, turn out to be a trap set for them? Then they understood.
‘You blokes not as confident now that you’re not pickin’ on kids, eh?’ the voice said.
‘Hey!’ Joe was frightened now. ‘That was just a misunderstandin’, the kids got it wrong.’
‘The only thing the kids got wrong was not puttin’ the bullet between yer eyes, mate.’
Joe’s two companions began to panic. ‘It was all his idea the bloody fool, we didn’t do nothin’, mate, honest.’
‘Birds of a feather flock together I always say. You’re as bad as each other. Love the way, too, that ya stick up fer yer mate.’ The voice was behind them now and they whirled around but could see nothing.
‘What’ll we do with ’em? Shoot ’em or hang ’em?’
‘Maybe we should do what we do to all moonlighters that rob a bloke’s claim at night when he’s asleep.’ Another voice suggested.
‘Good idea … just drop ’em down an old shaft out in the bush. If the fall doesn’t kill ’em they’ll starve to death or maybe get bitten by a king brown; lots of ’em down those old abandoned shafts.’
The three men in the spotlights were terrified now, shaking and close to tears as they milled around in the powerful beams, spinning from the sound of one voice to the next like cornered animals.
Then a new voice joined the debate. ‘I thinka maybe we use da shota-gun, just blowa da knees away. Dey can then crawla back down da holes dey comma from, eh?’
‘That’s the best idea yet … yeah! You bring yer shotgun with ya, Bruno?’
‘Of course.’ There was silence for a time except for the whimpering sounds from the three men clinging together in the dirt road their hands held up to shield their eyes from the glare of the lights.
‘OK then, that’s the verdict! Court’s over … carry out the sentence.’
The three men distinctly heard the hammers cock on the shotgun seconds before the thunderous blast shattered the night calm.
Screaming, Joe slumped to the ground. One of his companions fell to his knees sobbing and begging for mercy, while the third man just stood, transfixed with fear, his arms over his head.
‘Cripes, Bruno, ya missed! I thought ya were a better shot than that.’ The first voice said.
Realising he had not been hit Joe was horrified to discover he had soiled his trousers.
Voice number one spat out the next words. ‘You blokes jump in that old Dodge and get outta town now. You’ve got a full tank of petrol, enough to get ya well away from here, and if ya run out in the desert we couldn’t care less. Just remember tonight, burn it in yer memories and lay awake thinkin’ about it but …’ the voice became louder, ‘Never forget what I’m about to say next. If ya ever come near our town again as long as ya live or ever touch or threaten one of our people, whether it be here or somewhere else, then you’ll wish we had shot ya tonight, so help me God.’
The lights flicked off, leaving the three men blinded now by the sudden darkness. In a daze, they heard the stranded car start up, and a powerful engine beyond it in the dunes, burst into life. Within seconds they were alone, shaken and disorientated in the chill desert night.
Bruno arrived at the nine-mile diggings the next morning just on sun up and the boys noticed he was in a bubbly mood as he greeted them but they didn’t ask why and Bruno never offered any explanation. They shared a mug of tea around the campfire and when Bruno asked how they were progressing with the dugout, they told him they were ready to start a drive off it and seriously look for opal.
Bruno nodded his approval as they entered the oval shaped cavern that was now used as a rough dwelling. They had moved the old wooden table into the cave and it took pride of place against one wall where a couple of shelves had been carved into the clay, now housing some tinned goods, cooking pots and other odds and ends. Although Reynold had been responsible for the major part of the excavation, he still opted to sleep outside as he had done most of his life, under the stars. Jack and Harry however, were using the dugout as their main dwelling except for cooking that, for obvious reasons, was done outside the entrance.
Bruno asked where they planned to start their drive. When they pointed to the rock face, he took a small pick and began to scrape away at the area, examining his findings closely as the boys watched with interest, wondering if their selection was right.
‘You have picka good spot,’ Bruno eventually said. ‘Itsa where I would dig. Follow seam down lika dis,’ he traced the sandstone with his finger, ‘and with a littla luck you maybe finda stone.’
‘So you reckon this is where the opal is, Bruno?’
‘Harry, the opla is where the opla is.’
‘What do ya mean, Bruno?’
‘Opla isa where you find her. Dis dirt she looka probable.’
When Bruno came outside he looked at the pile of clay and rubble from the cavern the boys had heaped near the entrance. ‘You looka in dis?’
‘No we didn’t think it was worth it as we hadn’t started on the drive yet.’ Jack realised they had made a mistake when Bruno arched his brows and rolled his eyes.
‘As I said … opla issa where you find her. Gooda luck, boys. I see you fewa days time.’
‘Well I guess we should start here then.’ Jack reached down, picked up a golf ball sized rock from the dusty heap of rubble and chucked it toward the dugout entrance.
‘Good shot, Jack … ya hit the shovel dead centre, mate,’ Harry said. ‘I’ll go and get the old sieve from the shed and you grab the two shovels. We’ll sift through this lot before we start diggin’ the drive.’
‘Righto, Harry … ya never know I suppose. Come on, Reynold, let’s grab the tools.’ They walked off to get the shovels.
Shaun Logan had been born in Bendigo Victoria. Although proud of his paternal Irish heritage he considered himself Australian to the core. His father, an underground miner on the Bendigo goldfields, had married his mother, a nurse, in 1914. Shaun was born eighteen months later just two months before his father was tragically killed when a roof collapsed, entombing him under tons of crushing rock. Shaun’s mother, grief stricken, could not bear to stay in Bendigo, seeing as she did each day, the mine head-works dominating much of the city’s skyline, so she accepted an offer from a maiden aunt to move to Adelaide and escape the constant reminders of her husband’s death. She was able to work there as a nurse, and her aunt offered rent-free accommodation which meant she could save a little money to ensure her son got an education that would enable him to follow a career, she determined, would not in any way be associated with mining.
His mother was thrilled when Shaun had entered the seminary and was ordained a priest. She accepted, with some misgivings, when he served as a chaplain with the army during the war, but cried for weeks, long buried ghosts of gr
ief haunting her, when he was appointed to the parish of Coober Pedy, the roughest and most remote mining town in Australia.
Father Shaun fitted Coober Pedy like a made-to-measure suit. He was a strongly built man with an outgoing personality, played football, enjoyed a beer, and officiated at the annual race meeting. In a town where religion was accepted as necessary only for the rare wedding or odd funeral, but was otherwise considered by most as superfluous, Father Shaun was the exception, held in high regard for his beliefs and his commitment to the community with its diverse residents.
The priest knew everything that happened in Coober Pedy and was intrigued when the three young drovers had come to town. He laughed when he heard how they had run off the claim jumpers and understood the bush justice that had been metered out to the perpetrators by the locals. It was a surprise therefore, when he opened the letter with the Kalgoorlie postmark and read the letter from Father Timothy O’Malley, to realise that the boys mentioned in it, were the same three young miners.
Jack picked up a shovel and turned to walk back to the mullock heap when he heard Reynold draw in a sharp breath. Turning, he saw him bend to pick something up from the ground.
‘Crikey, Jack, look at this fella.’ ‘What is it, Reynold?’
‘That stone you threw, Jack.’ Reynold held a chip of rock up to the sun. ‘When ’e ’it that shovel ’e split up little bit. Look at ’im.’
Jack took the small piece of stone that Reynold handed to him and was shocked to see the pinwheels of vibrant colour flash in the sunlight. ‘Wow Reynold … it’s … it’s…’ He couldn’t get the words out for excitement.
‘Opal, Jack! It’s opal.’ Reynold fell to his knees, searching in the dirt for more. ‘Yahoo!’ He yelled and pounced on the other half of the broken stone.
Harry, seeing his mates’ excited actions, dropped the sieve and, running to where they were, gasping in awe. ‘Is it …? … By heck it is! ’ The three boys linked arms and danced like madmen in the dust.
Chapter Twenty Eight
Bruno was as thrilled for the boys as if he had made a major find himself.
After watching them laboriously sift through the heap with their old hand sieve, he suggested that they needed a bigger, more efficient method’ to separate the fine clay and dust from the rocks more quickly, so they could then hand sort the stone.
They went with him back to his claim where Bruno searched through a rubbish heap that had gathered over time, and containing some old equipment he had discarded after replacing it with newer items. He dragged from the pile of rusty junk, a metal bed frame with a wire base, and some odd pieces of timber.
Transporting the bits back to the nine-mile in the back of his Land Rover he showed them how to set the bed frame up on end at a 45-degree angle, propped on the old scavenged timbers. Although rickety, this now made a sieve six feet by three feet and they could shovel the mullock onto it. The dirt went through the wire, leaving the stones to fall in a pile at the bottom, for sorting later.
‘We said we’d make our fortune, Harry, and we’re on our way.’ Jack was exuberant.
‘You bet, Jack. What d’ya reckon, Reynold … we gonna be rich or what?’
Reynold was too busy shovelling dirt onto the sieve to answer but nodded vigorously, a broad smile on his dark face that was now covered with white powdery dust.
The boys heard the car approach mid-morning. It stopped at the bottom of the slope so they ceased working and stood watching suspiciously, nervous after the experience with the claim jumpers. Jack kept the loaded rifle near at hand, just inside the dugout entrance, and he moved a few feet closer, ready to grab it at the first sign of trouble.
A man, neatly dressed in dark trousers and white short sleeved open-necked shirt, stepped from the vehicle and plonked a brown wide brimmed hat over his dark wavy hair before walking up the slope to where they were standing. He stopped after a few feet and called to them. ‘Is it all right to come on up. Don’t want to get shot at!’
‘Depends, mate. Who are ya and what do ya want?’ Jack glanced to where the rifle was; a little confused by the man’s reference to being shot at.
‘I’m Shaun Logan.’ He made it a practice never to introduce himself as ‘Father’. ‘I’ve got a message for a Jack Ferguson and a Harry Turner … am I at the right mine?’ He knew, of course, who the boys were but waited for their reply.
‘Who’s the message from then?’ Harry asked with hands placed defiantly on his hips.
Shaun Logan respected that a man’s claim was his own territory knowing that it was an accepted thing in the fields that no stranger would just walk on to it without being invited. The priest stood in the sun, impressed by their mature approach to his unannounced arrival.
‘I’ve actually got a letter for both of them.’ He watched their surprised reaction. ‘I’m the local priest here, can I come on up?’
‘A letter? For us?’ Jack looked at Harry then back to the man who said he was a priest.
‘You don’t look like a priest and ya haven’t said who the letter’s from.’
It was Father Logan’s turn to be surprised. He was unaware of the reason they had left Perth as Father O’Malley hadn’t revealed this to him in the letter but had purely asked if he knew of them and, if they were in Coober Pedy, could he please make contact and pass his letter on to them. He therefore couldn’t fathom their reluctance to let him come onto their digging but put it down to the claim jumping episode that must have spooked them more than he thought it had. Even the dog, a blue heeler, stood with its hackles raised, beside one of the boys.
‘Father O’Malley wrote to me and asked me to give you this.’ He waved an envelope in the air.
‘Father O’Malley? He wrote us a letter? Better come on up then. That alright with you, Harry?’
‘Yeah,’ the boy with the dog said and reached down and touched its head. ‘Sit, Anna … sit.’ The dog obeyed instantly, without taking its eyes from the priest.
He walked up to them. ‘Which of you is Jack and which one’s Harry?’ He smiled warmly. ‘I guess you must be Reynold.’ He held out a hand that Reynold took shyly before moving off a few feet and staring at the ground.
After talking with the man for a few minutes the boys relaxed under his friendly, matter-of-fact manner, the small gold crosses on his collar the only clue to his being a priest. Nearing midday it was fiercely hot in the sun, a time when the boys normally moved underground to work, so they invited the priest to join them in their makeshift abode. Reynold stayed outside shovelling dirt against the sieve.
The boys asked their visitor what Father O’Malley had written in the letter to him. Shaun Logan explained that the letter from Kalgoorlie had surprised him. He told them he knew of their presence on the fields and that, indeed, the whole town knew of them. This statement astonished the boys who just shook their heads in disbelief. ‘The note from Father O’Malley,’ he said, ‘purely asked if I knew of you and if I could pass on the letter.’
They spent some time telling him that Father O’Malley had helped them get to Coober Pedy by taking them to Mt Margaret Mission and some highlights of their trip with Warri and Tom Cooper but they omitted any reference to being wanted by the police in Western Australia.
As he was leaving, the priest told them that they could call on him any time if they needed help or just to have a yarn so they asked him was there any way he could find out how uncle Warri was as they were worried about him.
Reynold stayed digging while Jack and Harry walked with the priest to his car. ‘See ya,’ he said and drove off down the rutted track. They returned to the dugout anxious to read the letter addressed to them from Father O’Malley. Reynold didn’t seem interested so Jack tore the envelope open and began to read aloud.
My dear Jack and Harry,
It will be by the Grace of God if this gets to you as it is a remote chance sending it via Father Logan but I thought there might be a possibility he has heard of you and can deliver this letter.<
br />
If you are reading this I hope you are in good health and keeping out of harm’s way. I only know what I have heard about Coober Pedy but knowing the hardships of mining in and around Kalgoorlie and understanding that conditions are far worse where you are, I am most concerned for you both and for Reynold.
‘Gee,’ Harry said. ‘He uses big words. Must be because he’s a priest.’ ‘More likely ’cause he’s old, Harry.’ Jack continued reading.
Thank you for writing your letters and I have, reluctantly I must admit, kept my promise not to tell your parents where you are but this secret is painful for me and I hope and pray you will let them know soon.
I am most impressed with your achievements to date and with your trip but Paddy says he knew all the time you would get to Coober Pedy and has no doubts that you will make your fortunes!!! He is a man of great optimism if not stability and a dear friend despite his misgivings.
‘There he goes again, Jack. I can’t understand most of that.’
‘Harry!’ Jack was getting annoyed at the interruptions as he was finding it hard to read the letter anyway. ‘Shut up.’ He held it out to Harry. ‘Here then … you bloody read it.’
‘Sorry, mate,’ Harry giggled. ‘Go on.’
He stopped over last night and sends his regards to you both. He is still the same jovial man without a care in the world but I sense he misses you a lot.
I took the liberty of inquiring about Warrinidding by contacting the manager at Anna Creek station and am pleased to tell you he is well recovered and back at Warburton. Tell Reynold the news.
I am looking forward to receiving more correspondence from you and Mrs Lacey has also asked about you.
Sincerely your friend, Timothy O’Malley.
The next couple of weeks proved to be a tedious time for the three boys. Because of the intense Coober Pedy heat that baked them, the wind that blew constantly, peppering them with sand and white powdery dust, and the flies that never ceased exploring their eyes, mouths and noses, they decided to work outside from early morning to around eleven o’clock in the morning. After then they retreated to the dugout where they could escape from the heat, wind and dust but unfortunately not from the persistent black bushflies that followed them even underground.
