When I ask myself how I remained with Bob during this time, I have a simple answer: I was too busy working. Running the stations, there was always work and another work-related crisis around the corner. Work served as a constant distraction from my pain. If I had had nothing to do but sit around and dwell on our problems, things would surely have taken a very different course.
One day Leisha had completed her school lessons early and was accompanying me as my ‘bore run’ offsider. I relished quiet times with Leisha, as her strength and energy made me forget my troubles with Bob.
My heart sank on arrival at the Telegraph Dam. The heat was intense and the glare brought tears to the eyes as it shimmered from the mudflat to the surrounding banks. The flies and native bees hammered us in search of the salty moisture. In the middle of the black pit of steamy mud were two wild horses bogged to their huge fear-stricken eyeballs. As one of them battled to gain a footing, the other would sink down further, almost submerged and struggling to stay alive.
The fence around the dam was still secure, although the top wire showed signs of strain and horse hair. Turning towards Leisha, I noted dark beads of perspiration on her forehead. I knew I would have to choose my words carefully.
‘Love, they are wild horses, they run outback with the mob between Mariana, No. 67 and Davies bores,’ I volunteered gently.
‘We must save them, Mum,’ came Leisha’s anxious reply, anticipating what I was going to suggest.
I could see the tears in her eyes. Leisha didn’t need to be told that if Daddy were here he would shoot them first and then drag out the carcasses. I rummaged through the Toyota, hoping to find a bull strap or car tube that would substitute as a collar. We were out of luck. It was a case of pull them out, pull their heads off, or shoot them. But we’d give them a chance. An eagle circling above let out a cry and somehow, I don’t think he was wishing me luck.
Leisha grabbed one end of the rope and made a noose as she waded in waist-deep mud towards the bogged animals. As the brumbies lashed about violently, she dropped a loop over the one that was closer to her.
Within split seconds of my turning my back to hook the rope to the vehicle, the silence was broken by Leisha’s blood-curdling screams. The distressed animal had a death grip on Leisha’s cheek and was shaking her savagely from side to side like a rag doll. I grabbed a lump of wood and moved in. But before I got to her, Leisha regained her footing in the mud. She gave the animal an almighty punch in the head and it let go.
Leisha’ s tough exterior couldn’t fool me. She was in a lot of pain, her cheek black and covered in blood. At this point I felt like pulling the horse’s bloody head off and wondered why we had bothered at all. With the rope around the brumby’s neck, I hooked on with the vehicle and pulled it towards the bank. No matter how violent I felt towards that horse, I prayed I wouldn’t behead it in my daughter’s presence.
Without any more mishaps, we rescued the other brumby too.
We were fatigued but happy, giving each other muddy hugs of relief. We felt good, between the two of us, for having accomplished a difficult job under trying conditions.
Leisha carried the terrible imprint from her rescue mission for the next six months, until the bite mark eventually faded.
CHAPTER 23
The Court Case
By late 1992, things were looking good for the TB eradication program and I felt some satisfaction over a job well done. I’d updated the station maps, and marked all new fences, paddocks and bores. I now had enough separate paddocks to rotate – I was successfully managing the only million-plus-acre property that was 100 per cent boundary-fenced. I was proud that I’d achieved all this while my entire life seemed to be falling apart.
The police notified Singleton three days prior to the court case that it would be best for Bob to plead guilty, to avoid putting Fiona on the stand. In return, they would charge Bob with indecent assault but not scratch around for more accounts. Singleton put this to us in his motel room. After leaving, I turned around on Bob and said, ‘Is there any more?’
I needed to know for the children’s sake and my own sanity. He then opened up for the first time. He admitted to once rubbing Fiona’s stomach for a few fleeting minutes when she arrived at the Mango Farm after school crying with severe stomach pain. He said that when he was in his Toyota with her, Fiona would never remain seated on the passenger seat, always moving over to squeeze right up by his side. He admitted to one other incident: he had got out of the driver’s seat to close a gate on the station, and when he got back in, Fiona had moved over into his seat, and a touch of madness overcame him. He placed his head on her chest for a few seconds. He said there was no more to tell me.
I swung around on him, angry and frustrated, thinking, How bloody stupid could a person be? Very firmly and quietly, I said, ‘Remember you were supposed to be the adult, for Christ’s sake.’
I did believe him. I believed that that was all that happened. Bob wasn’t a romantic or sexual man, and I took his word for it. And yet, my emotions running amok, I was upset and in tears again. Words could not describe my pain and frustration. I felt sorry for all concerned in this cyclonic mess, but most of all for my children, the innocent victims.
Then came Bob’s day in court, the second most terrible day of our life after losing our son. I parked the Toyota outside the courthouse, asking Leisha, Robby and Kristy to remain there until after the verdict.
To say I was in a distraught state is an understatement; my nerves were truly shredded and I was upset to the point of being sick. Bob showed no emotion whatsoever. We entered the packed courtroom and I noticed many of Bob’s supporters, but also some others who were there simply to gloat. There were also half-a-dozen ringers and contractors up on a cattle-duffing charge.
Balanced on the edge of my seat in the courtroom, I was strung as tight as a good top wire on a fence line. When his turn came, I leaned forward to hear Bob’s words. Without hesitation he stood and spoke in a loud, harsh voice: ‘Guilty, Your Honour’.
The judge set no jail sentence. Bob was landed a fine of $5,000. As he left, he stumbled slightly. Leisha, who had burst out of the car, pushed her way through the crowded courtroom. Taking her father by the hand, she led him away. I slowly rose from my seat. Some low types verbally harassed me. Confused, angry and shaken, I left the court, my heart cut to shreds.
Unable to stand another day of anguish, I needed peace, space and time away from the humiliation. The day after the court case, we left Kilto. I drove the family, including Bob, all over Queensland with no destination in mind, trying to find peace and freedom from the past for us all. Leisha, Kristy and Robby were delighted and cheerful; it was an adventure, with new towns, new motels, all new scenery and beautiful weather.
Bob showed no interest at all. He may as well have been a zombie. He was detaching himself from us, falling into his well-known pit of deep, dark despondency. I drove through Camooweal, Normanton, Atherton, Palm Cove, down through Hughenden, Longreach and as far as Holbrook in New South Wales. Bob might as well have stayed at home.
He took up smoking in the enclosed car, something he never usually did. The children and I suffered, particularly Leisha, who had asthma. Our family holiday soon had the edge of an unhappy ordeal. Bob, somehow full of resentment towards me, would not talk to me. He was still angry at me for wanting him to contest the case. I saw him as being innocent of indecent assault – why had he pleaded guilty? I would not do as he’d told me; I would not accept.
In Holbrook, we met up with a friend who had once been a head stockman. We were all sitting around a park table, talking and managing a laugh over old times, surrounded by rolling green paddocks and vineyards, the air crisp and clean. For a short time I felt the pressure lift from my body. Then I raised my eyes towards Bob’s – they were expressionless and burning black with anger at me. I felt deflated again. Needing to vent his frustration somewhere, he’d settled on me. I tried to understand him, but he wouldn’t let me in. As w
e returned to the station, I kept offering encouragement to the children, to keep them smiling. But my veneer of the tough, coping, outback woman was wearing bloody thin.
CHAPTER 24
Fairfield
The three or four years after the court case seem, looking back, to have been a constant treadmill of work – work on the stations, and work to find a fresh start for Bob. The unrelenting effort took a toll on my health too. After suffering chronic blood loss I had a hysterectomy in Perth, during which I haemorrhaged quite severely. I remember a frenzy of postoperative drama filtered through hazy shadows as I moved in and out of consciousness. Though I recovered, I later began to suffer exhaustion and joint pain, and tested positive for the Ross River virus and another three mosquito-borne viruses. I didn’t regain full health for years after Bob’s court case.
After our driving trip, Bob continued to descend into his zombie-like state. His body would go through the motions – he would drive around the bores on Kilto, start and check engines, look at the solar pumps and inspect the cattle, and then, if all was well, return to Kimberley Downs – but his mind was elsewhere. Increasingly he sat on the homestead veranda for hours on end, saying nothing. Even the children were having trouble trying to get his attention. Once, when I asked him why he was unhappy, he slammed down his pannikin with such ferocity that the table jumped and the condiments rattled. I watched him storm off, feeling stupid for having asked. It was obvious, wasn’t it? He was in deep pain. I couldn’t help seeing my growing independence as hammering further nails into his sense of helplessness. When our TB eradication program was coming to a successful end, and I told the company secretary in a phone call that I preferred mustering up the last stray bulls with the buggy and truck rather than destroy them, Bob shouted wildly, ‘Shoot them, shoot them.’ The secretary told Bob we would do it my way. He told Bob in no uncertain terms: ‘Sheryl is still the manager.’
I did not know if it was me the woman, his wife, his children’s mother, or me the station manager and owner – once his eager young apprentice but no longer – that he needed to vent his anger upon. I walked away, shed my silent tears, but ultimately remained in a state of total bewilderment. I more than anyone else understood the suffering his body was going through, yet surely in a life filled with pain there comes a time when one must accept help gracefully?
I often wondered where it would end. Just before the court case, Bob had pronounced his wish to leave the children and me and disappear by himself into Queensland. I made the decision to sell the Mercedes and bought a new Toyota tray-back for him and put a canopy on the back, outfitting it with long-range fuel and water tanks in case he was going to go off for a long journey. Over the last couple of years I’d had a constant feeling that the responsibility of a wife and family was becoming too much for Bob, that the pressure was smothering him. He had always called himself a ‘bagman’. He was a loner, and I felt he would be happier with just himself and a swag, so to speak. At first I was frightened he might have planned to shoot himself in the middle of the outback. I tried to shut out those dreadful thoughts. And anyway, he never took the trip.
I was always looking for a fresh start. At one point I suggested buying Kimberley Downs for ourselves, but he responded with a scornful, loud, ‘What?’ Then he stared at me hard, with that dark unreadable look I was growing to hate so much. I’d managed the property for seven years now. Was that what he resented? My success? Unable to find any more words, he ended up completely ignoring me, sitting on the veranda drinking a pannikin of tea, rolling one cigarette after the other, gazing toward the horizon. At this point I didn’t really have a marriage; it was more a silent battlefield, with pot shots exploding every now and then.
It seemed long ago now, but I had loved the man I’d worked with on Oobagooma Station, and deep down I still loved that man: that kind and gentle cattleman who had made me feel so safe. I was not ready to give up on our marriage yet. I could still see a future for the children and myself with Bob. But I needed to get him to come out from under that black cloak that was smothering him to death.
Life on an outback station can’t be overtaken by domestic drama. The real world was always ready to raise its head, in one way or another. We had a scare when a python took up residence in our bathroom, announcing its presence by whacking me while I took a shower. Another time, when we were beset by a shrieking flock of cockatoos, I excited Robby by taking out a shotgun.
‘You gunna shoot them, Mum?’ he asked, full of enthusiasm and looking for adventure.
I had to disappoint him. ‘No, Mummy doesn’t shoot birds, I only want to scare them away.’
Robby had both hands firmly over his ears as I fired into the air and away from the trees. There was instant silence from the cockies as they lifted high, circled the homestead and landed above us again.
‘There,’ I said to Robby, ‘I never shot one.’
At that moment a cockatoo landed with wings folded right between Robby’s feet, dead. Thinking of it now, that bird was far too stiff to be freshly shot. Too hard, too dead, no pellet marks. My stockmen were sitting at the smoko table only a few feet behind me. I’d like to know which one of them threw the dead bird!
Life certainly wouldn’t be dull after the Mabo case in 1993, when the High Court of Australia ruled that native title was recognised at common law. There was a lot of disquiet in the Kimberley, with pastoralists and graziers fearing widespread Aboriginal land claims. I got caught up in the post-Mabo environment when, seeking another fresh start for Bob and the family, I bought Fairfield Station. Fairfield was a neighbouring cattle station in the hands of liquidators, a half-million-acre cattle run that had fascinated me since as far back as 1969, when I’d visited the property with my first husband, Chuck. There was something about it I’d loved at first sight – a small house in a beautiful valley surrounded by mountain ranges, and beyond them some lovely plains.
With some trepidation I invited Bob to look over the property. Instead he suggested, offhandedly, that I do it myself. I was looking for a way to give him direction in life, as had happened when I’d bought Kilto. Gruff though he was, Bob was also showing his total faith in me. Strange though it may sound, that faith had survived and prospered during our turmoil. I was a woman, but this hard, silent cattleman trusted me with his life.
I put down a $40,000 deposit on Fairfield, planning to turn the property into a steer depot with an eye on the market for shipping steers to Asia. Almost immediately, I heard of three Aboriginal land claims on the property. This did not leave me jumping with jubilation, I have to say. Naturally I was trying to distinguish ‘land claim’ from ‘land grab’. Most rural landholders saw them as one and the same. A lot of station people were sceptical, and I was too: an older indigenous friend had told me he was going to claim land at a certain place on Meeda Station. ‘That good place for picnic, Missus,’ he innocently said. Both he and I knew he had no connection with that particular area. Was he testing me? I didn’t know. It may have been a joke.
I called Elders, the selling agent, and made it clear that we still wished to purchase Fairfield. Bob and I would attempt to sort through these land claims with the people ourselves. To my relief, he was showing signs of interest and enthusiasm again.
But this wilted when the land claims began to get bogged down in arguments among competing tribes, and we didn’t know if the sale would proceed smoothly or be held up forever in a land claim court. More and more, Bob was asking if it was all worth it.
The dispute was resolved in an astonishing way: I told two Aboriginal elders that if I could not buy Fairfield Station, I would move the family away from the Kimberley and find a property somewhere else. They went off to get all the tribal leaders together, and the result of their meeting was that they all suddenly withdrew their claims to Fairfield, leaving the property ready for us to take possession. I felt enormous appreciation and gratitude towards these people. They must have wanted us to stay in the country. Heartbreakingly, though, Bo
b couldn’t bring the same commitment and generosity to the venture.
I clearly remember one of our last nights on Kimberley Downs, in September 1993. Bob had already moved across to Fairfield ahead of us. The children and I were sitting quietly on the homestead veranda one evening, all deep in thought. Robby wondered if Bull Pup’s grave on Homestead Hill would be all right after we’d gone. Kristy hoped she had all her horse gear, which seemed to be her only worry. Leisha sat quietly while I shed a private tear.
I gazed towards the white corrugated-iron huts beyond the stables thinking that only six years ago these were Aboriginal camps. Alma and Jack had lived there. This time of the evening, children would have been playing, their happy laughter echoing through the valley, entwined with the playful barking of the camp dogs. I could almost sense the misty haze and aroma of the many camp fires as the women cooked for the stockmen. As the beautiful blues and pinks blended in the evening sky, I saw the dark silhouette of the wheel where the Aboriginal boys once turned out tough greenhide ropes.
Near the wheel was the old schoolhouse, renamed the ‘honeymoon quarters’ after Sandy and Craig were married and made it their home. Next to it was the cook house with the palms and beautiful shade trees I’d planted – so open to the elements but we all loved it.
Later, as I showered and looked for little pythons, I smiled and thought of the many delights they brought to our lives. I tried to ignore the large holes behind the toilet and laundry and throughout the homestead, battle scars from my many encounters with less friendly reptiles.
Lying in bed I remembered when Kimberley Downs carried 20,000 head of cattle with hardly a decent fence. Now there were working bores that my windmill men had resurrected to keep the water up to the cattle, and a workshop with Kimberley Downs painted boldly on the roof.
Diamonds and Dust Page 25