From Strength to Strength

by Sara Henderson

  Charles wouldn’t have a bar of it. He said we now had a one hundred per cent reconditioned vehicle which was the same as new.

  Dick said, ‘No, maybe ninety-eight per cent,’ and that’s what the vehicle became known as, ‘Ninety-eight’.

  One day, when one of our younger, less knowledgeable employees asked why the vehicle was called Ninety-eight, Dick said, ‘Because she was built in 1898.’

  ‘Gee, she’s in good condition!’

  Dick didn’t answer.

  Danielle was only four and a half at this time and, up to that point in her life, had received at least ten bedtime stories every night. However, since living on the station, she had been having trouble getting her quota as Mummy was always cooking. So from bathtime to bedtime, she would be on the prowl for a ‘bedtime story reader’. Uncle Dick was a complete softy where Danielle was concerned, so it didn’t take her long to rope him into this extra duty.

  Every evening she would swing on the back gate waiting for him to wander up the flat from the workshop. She would call to him to hurry as she had to go to bed in two hours, then wait for him to get his clean clothes out of his caravan, walk him to the shower, and stand patiently outside the bathroom door. As soon as he had savoured his first beer she would put the open book on his lap, and then lean back with her hands clasped behind her head to listen.

  I soon found out that Uncle Dick’s version of the accepted fairy tales was vastly different from the printed words. One evening he had to work late on a breakdown and Danielle waited faithfully on the gate, but soon realised if she was to get her quota of stories that night, it would have to be with someone other than Uncle Dick.

  Now I prided myself on being a ‘top of the ladder’ storyteller. I estimated that over the years I must have read around 50,000 stories. However, apparently I wasn’t in Uncle Dick’s league.

  ‘Once upon a time there was a little girl called Red Riding Hood . . .’

  ‘That’s not right!’

  ‘What do you mean “That’s not right”? Of course it is.’

  ‘That’s not the story Uncle Dick told me.’

  ‘Oh, isn’t it? Well suppose you tell me what is right.’

  ‘Once upon “the flip of a dime” there was this slick chick called Big Red, and she had this groovy dude called Wolfgang. He was one mean dude, but he was a great “hoof and prancer”. That’s a dancer,’ she informed me, looking up at my shocked expression with delight. I tucked her into bed and went off to find Uncle Dick.

  I have been asked many times by visitors and new employees why everyone calls Dick ‘Uncle Dick’. Who is he related to? Of course he’s not related to anyone, but when the children were young I told them to call him ‘Uncle Dick’, rather than just ‘Dick’.

  One year it was Dick’s birthday and apart from a cake I was making I did not have anything to give him. I was trying to think of something when I remembered he had asked me to mend a tear in the knee of his white overalls. He was going into Katherine with Charlie in the plane to celebrate his birthday, so as well as mending the tear, I embroidered on the back in big blue block letters ‘Happy Birthday Uncle Dick’.

  He put the overalls on without seeing the message on the back and went off to town. Of course he went on a drinking ‘bender’ for a few days and wandered around Katherine in a very happy state.

  When Charles went to pick him up, Dick remarked what a great town Katherine was—everyone was so friendly, and he was amazed at how many people had known it was his birthday. Charles said he didn’t think it was too amazing considering he had it printed on his back.

  Dick took the overalls off right there at the airport and looked at the advertisement he had been wearing on his back. According to Charles he sat down on the wheel of the plane and laughed and laughed.

  It was the middle of the season and we were very busy. Dick knew there was not enough time to spare for him to go to town and get ‘spaced out’ for four or five days, but he really was feeling the urge of a ‘bender’ coming on—‘skin’s cracking’ is the term he used. So Dick and Charles came to a compromise. On a Friday night Charles gave him two cases of beer and took him about ten miles out into the bush, and said he would pick him up on Sunday afternoon.

  I was horrified by this arrangement. ‘What’s he going to eat?’

  ‘He doesn’t want to eat, he wants to drink.’

  ‘But he can’t go two days without eating.’

  ‘He can, and does go a week without eating.’

  ‘Where will he sleep?’

  ‘Under a tree, it doesn’t matter, he just has to get this bender over with and he’ll be alright for another six weeks. Don’t worry, he’ll be fine.’

  Of course this didn’t stop me worrying.

  Sunday, about lunchtime, we had visitors—a delightful girl called Lyn Collins, who was our district nurse, plus a new recruit. Lyn was stationed in Timber Creek and drove around the district, about a two-hundred mile radius, tending to the medical needs of everyone in the area. The new recruit was a fully qualified nurse, but was green to the Outback, fresh from Melbourne. When they arrived, she was very upset. Lyn sat her down and I gave them a cup of tea.

  ‘I had my head down sorting out medical cards . . .’ began Lyn.

  ‘When suddenly this thing . . .’ put in the new recruit.

  ‘You said it was a man,’ said Lyn patiently.

  ‘Thing, man, whatever, came staggering out of the bushes and across the road in front of the car. I nearly hit him! I had to swerve to miss him.’

  ‘I can vouch for the swerve, my entire file of cards is on the floor of the car.’

  ‘What else could I do? He was naked!’

  ‘Oh you found Uncle Dick!’ I said, happy to know he had survived.

  ‘See, I told you Sara would have an explanation,’ put in Lyn.

  ‘Uncle Dick? Uncle Dick?’ The girl’s voice got higher and higher. ‘That’s your uncle?’

  ‘No, he’s our mechanic, everyone just calls him Uncle Dick.’

  ‘But he was naked! What’s he doing running around the bush naked?’

  ‘He was probably going down to the river to wash,’ I offered lamely. No doubt there were many reasons why Dick was staggering around the bush naked, but I didn’t know them, and didn’t want to know them.

  ‘Why does he go ten miles to wash in the river?’

  ‘No, no, he’s out there camping, a break away from the workshop. A few beers and a lot of fishing.’

  ‘I would say a lot of beers and nothing else.’

  This was her first Outback patrol. What a start. Two months later, Lyn arrived at Bullo alone.

  ‘Where’s your driver?’

  ‘Gone back to Melbourne. Uncle Dick and the Bullo road tipped the scale, I think.’

  On one occasion it was necessary for the whole family to be away from the station for five days. This left Uncle Dick alone, which in itself was not a problem, as he could take care of everything. The problem was five days’ supply of beer. If we gave it all to him when we left, he would drink the lot the first day and then there would be no end of trouble.

  It was only safe to give him a day’s supply at a time. I finally hit upon the scheme of hiding each day’s ration in a different place and at 5.30 Dick was to be by the phone and I would call and say where it was.

  Before we left, Marlee hid the five days’ supply. The first night the static was so bad on the radio phone that Dick could not hear me. So I gave the operator the message to pass on.

  ‘Is this a joke of some kind?’ she asked.

  I assured her I was serious and that Uncle Dick was very serious. So she passed it on.

  ‘Uncle Dick, the beer is in a plastic bag hanging in the deep end of the swimming pool attached to the skimmer box.’ There was a pause and she said to me. ‘He’s going to see if he can find it.’ Another pause. ‘He’s got it! Is that it?’

  ‘Yes, till same time, same station, tomorrow evening.’

  ‘Okay.�
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  It was the talk of the VJY switchboard and by 5.30 the next evening they had a competition going: ‘Guess where Uncle Dick’s beer is!’

  ‘Where is it?’ was the eager greeting when I asked for the station.

  ‘Under the white marker on the airstrip, third from the gate.’

  ‘Oh, no one guessed that!’ She was disappointed. ‘I said it was in the toilet cistern.’

  ‘Good heavens, that’s the first place he’d look!’ I couldn’t believe I was having this conversation.

  Everyone on the switchboard was sad when it was the last day. They’d been having such fun.

  In 1987, my first year in control, I decided Uncle Dick should have a small reward for all his years of hard work. He had always wanted to go on a cruise ship for a holiday, so I booked him on the Fairstar for a Pacific cruise. We planned it with military precision. We had to get him past all his favourite haunts, or watering holes, and onto the ship in time, or it would sail without him. I enlisted the help of friends all the way from Bullo River to Circular Quay.

  He flew into Kununurra in a charter four-seater and the pilot, a friend, promised to put him safely on the jet to Darwin. Another long-suffering friend sat at the airport for two hours and slowed down the drinking so he was able to walk onto the jet to Sydney. I made sure the flight was direct as we had, over the years, lost him on many a flight during fuelling.

  He arrived in Sydney, having been constantly drinking in flight. Nicky Whorrod, our abattoir manager in the seventies, had courageously accepted the unenviable task of getting Uncle Dick onto the Fairstar. He did it and when he called to say Uncle Dick had sailed with the ship, he said the last two days had not been too bad. But he let slip that he had taken a week off work—no doubt to recover.

  Nicky said the first day he kept him busy buying clothes for the cruise and that night was heavy drinking and reminiscing, so he slept late. The next morning Nick took him shopping again but that was soon exhausted and it was into the nearest bar for more solid drinking. He got him home about midnight and a friend and Nicky got him to bed, but he said the next morning was the hardest. Dick wanted to go straight off to the nearest pub for more of ‘the hair of the dog’ and wasn’t the least bit interested in sailing time. But somehow Nick got him on board and kept him there until the gangplank was hauled ashore.

  Nick was pleased to hear the cruise lasted for two weeks. He needed that amount of time to get himself in the right frame of mind to do it all over again, in reverse. He was also pleased to hear that I had arranged for another friend to help him get Dick off the ship and onto the jet to Darwin.

  It must have been some cruise. It would be safe to say Dick did not draw a sober breath the whole two weeks, but by all accounts he had a marvellous time and met some wonderful people. We received regular ship-to-shore phone calls at about ten dollars per minute just to talk about the weather, postcards from every port saying he was jumping ship and one letter saying he was jumping overboard! But he did arrive back in Sydney, he and the Fairstar, I would say, a little worse for wear.

  Nick and Peter Roberts went to meet the ship and no Dick! Not in his cabin, not anywhere. They finally had to admit he had slipped the noose.

  About three days later I received a phone call.

  ‘This is the business office of the Fairstar.’ I waited. ‘I’m trying to locate a Mr Wicks, can you help me?’

  I wanted to say ‘So are we lady, so are we,’ but instead I said, ‘Dick does work for me, and he’s on his way back to the station from Sydney. Can I take a message?’

  ‘Well, he left his false teeth in his cabin and we’re wondering where to send them.’

  I gave her our postal address. Ten days later we had Dick’s teeth, but that’s all. As we looked at them in the little box I said to Marlee, ‘Maybe that’s all we’ll ever see of Dick again.’

  After two weeks I was really starting to worry. No reverse charge calls, no bank managers calling for funds, nothing of the usual routine. I called our local police to see if they could help. They ran a check on the gaols and hospitals in Sydney, but that was all they could do. The problem was, he could have been anywhere in Australia, if he was still alive.

  About one month to the day, Bluey Lewis our stock inspector from Timber Creek called.

  ‘Guess who just rolled up at our front door?’ he said.

  ‘Uncle Dick.’

  ‘Yeah, boy is he a mess. Annie made him stay downstairs till he cleaned up. He’s certainly been through the mill. He came in on the bus. No luggage, no money, lost his passport, dressed in just a pair of Stubbies, thongs and a singlet. Lost his glasses and teeth.’

  ‘His teeth were mailed to me. He left them on the ship.’

  ‘That should make him happy, says he can’t eat. He’s pretty crook, so I’ll give him a few days rest and then drive him in, okay?’

  ‘Thank you, Blue.’

  A few days later a very battered Uncle Dick gingerly stepped out of the Toyota, glad to be home. Blue was right, he had suffered. But according to Dick it was worth it, although he hasn’t mentioned going on a cruise again.

  Dick and his teeth were reunited and another pair of glasses was ordered from Mr Sloley in Darwin. This is a yearly event as he loses his glasses every holiday.

  The very first time I called I was told, ‘Oh goodness, I couldn’t supply a pair of prescription glasses without testing his eyes.’

  I patiently explained Dick was never in town and on the few occasions he did make Darwin, he was in no condition to keep appointments. In the meantime, he needed glasses to do his job. Dick gave me an old prescription for the lenses in his lost glasses and said that he could see much better with Charlie’s glasses. With this information, Mr Sloley was able to send a pair of glasses that suited Dick perfectly, and every year since then, the strength has been increased in line with the verbal report.

  A few years back when I called to order the yearly glasses, I was told Mr Sloley had retired. I immediately thought, Oh dear, I will have to explain this all over again! I took a deep breath.

  ‘My name is Mrs Henderson, and I need a pair of glasses for an employee of mine, a Mr Wicks.’

  The voice on the other end interrupted.

  ‘Oh, hullo Mrs Henderson. Has Mr Wicks been on holidays again?’

  ‘Why yes, but how . . .?’

  ‘Oh, Mr Sloley left special instructions in regard to Mr Wicks. Now, we just have to strengthen them a tad, don’t we? Any particular style?’

  Uncle Dick has now been at Bullo River with us on and off for eighteen years. His loyalty, love and friendship are shared by all the family, and he has been an integral part of Bullo’s growth and its struggle to survive. Without that extra effort and concern of Uncle Dick’s, I doubt that we would have scraped through.

  I have told him many times over the last five years that both of us will have to die in the field, the amount of work we still have to complete. He has picked out his resting place under a four-hundred-year-old bottle tree.

  ‘You won’t find me sitting in an old men’s home bludging for my tucker and waiting to die. I’ll do a fair day’s work till the the day I drop!’

  And he will.

  CHAPTER 17

  1981-1986

  It was New Year’s Eve 1981. Charles had left for America in early December to visit his mother. All the staff had left and we were down to Uncle Dick and Stumpy, the stock camp cook. Under Charles’s direction New Year had always been a serious official event. We all had to prepare resolutions, and he would expect us to take those commitments seriously and achieve them over the coming year. Of course he would only conduct the proceedings, never participate in them. And if we couldn’t find enough things wrong with ourselves, he would cheerfully supply each of us with a long list. Especially me!

  This year we were at a bit of a loss with all the military procedure missing, so we decided, ‘What the hell, let’s do something different, why don’t we just have a party? So, New Year’s Eve
found us busily cooking and preparing for our party. All except Danielle.

  ‘Where’s Danielle?’ I had noticed she was a bit quiet the day before and now she was not joining us in the cooking. I found her in her room and she was not a well girl.

  I called Wal Tracey, our doctor in Darwin, and put Danielle on the line so he could ask all the questions needed for a diagnosis. She felt sick, wanted to vomit, had a dull pain in her right side. Wal asked to speak to me.

  ‘I think she has appendicitis. If you carry out a little test, we can be sure.’

  With the phone in one hand, and Danielle flat on the floor, I had to run my finger out from her belly button three inches, down about the same, and when I reached this spot, press firmly with the tips of my fingers, hold a few seconds and then lift quickly.

  ‘What did she do?’

  ‘Elevated about ten inches off the floor.’

  ‘Get her here, pronto.’

  The charter plane landed within the hour. She was so bad by then she couldn’t even bear the seat belt across her tummy. We flew into Kununurra and just made the jet to Darwin. The ambulance met us at the airport and she was rushed to the hospital and straight into the examination room. Wal had organised for the surgeon to be waiting. He took only a few moments to arrange for immediate surgery.

  For New Year Danielle was in recovery and I was sitting in the hall outside the operating theatre thinking she was still in there. When the nurse took Danielle back to her room from recovery and I wasn’t there, she immediately organised a search of the hospital. A nurse found me wringing my hands outside the operating theatre. I was in a worse state than Danielle. Back with her in her room, she managed to calm me down. I must say, she came through the whole thing marvellously. I was a total wreck.

  I finally went back to the hotel at around three a.m. and people were still partying. I collapsed on the bed and the next thing I remember was being woken by the phone. It was morning, and it was the girls worried about Danielle. I told them Danielle was now fine, but I was a mess. Knowing their mother, they said they could well understand that.