‘Good. Bout time, you’ll be a boss cocky soon. Mr McCleod.’ Said his name like he used to. Owner of a winner.
Lew looked at a jug of water and a glass on the bedside table. ‘You want anything? Right for smokes? Tobacco? I can bring you whisky if you want. Brandy.’
Painter shook his head and waited. ‘Got a spare set of lungs? Another heart? Liver? They all fucked son.’
‘Cut it out.’
‘Tell me who won the Melbourne Cup?’
‘Evening Peal won the Cup; Redcraze second. Dunno who third. Little Georgie Podmore the hoop.’
‘Evening Peal,’ Painter wheezed. Both hands came around onto the Bible.
‘First mare since Rainbird.’
‘I would’ve backed Redcraze myself.’
‘Top weight but, ten stone three.’
‘That old truck of yours got more rattles than a millionaire’s baby son.’
Lew laughed. ‘It did.’
‘One of the headlights didn’t work neither since that little grey roo broke it. Blind in one eye.’ Painter was looking towards where the curtain was moving from the motion of the fan. ‘Good soup, her tail.’
Lew watched his feet.
‘I give it away son,’ Painter coughed. ‘Our truck. The old Ford.’
‘That’s all right mate.’
Painter nodded as if confirming what he had known about Lewis McCleod all his life. ‘Give it away to a blackfella. Looked like he needed it more than me.’
‘Yeah mate. Good.’
‘You eat yet?’ Painter’s eyes opened wide and he looked to where they would bring food.
‘No.’
They watched the light easing out of the day from a north-facing window.
The lights came on in the corridor outside the room. Someone was pushing a trolley and Lew smelled reheated mutton and gravy and potatoes, cabbage. One of the other men in the room had turned on his bedside light and a radio was softly playing, Don’t Let the Stars Get in Your Eyes.
Painter sighed. He tried to say something else but his voice faded on the words. He remained silent for a very long time then. The sound of his breathing.
‘How many pro fights you have, Painter?’ Lew whispered. ‘You old charcoal burner you?’
No reply. It was like he had fallen asleep. One tattooed hand on the back of the Bible. Thin, skinned knuckles healing over and his knee still propped up. His eyes in shadow and bottom lip jutting.
Lew stood and leaned forward. He couldn’t see properly. His hands felt about on Painter’s face. Felt the broken nose and cheeks and mouth. All still now. Held his hand. Hand like a broken foot, he would say. Don’t sorry me mate. It was like to become paperbark, his face, his voice, such familiar words, all still. Gone.
Rain on the windscreen of the truck and he sat back in his chair. Leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees, looked down and said, ‘Painter.’ Said it again.
Then he closed his eyes and shook his head. The radio was still playing.
CHAPTER 63
The big homestead kitchen was filled with the smell of baking. Jimmy had his back to the door as she quietly let herself in. He had a radio turned up loud and was singing in Chinese to the Perry Como song. Don’t Let the Stars Get in Your Eyes.
The border collie bitch Dee was lying in a kindling box. Jimmy had emptied the box and folded an old horse blanket into the bottom of it. She was curled head to tail and did not look up as Clara entered the kitchen. Her tail gave tight wags and a wave of shivers came over her at the sound of the door. The yonga Gwen was lying on a seagrass mat, also near the fireplace. She had grown and no longer wore a straw hat. When she saw Clara, she stood, leaned forward onto her front feet and then manoeuvred her two large back feet and tail to move closer as she sat quietly and gently at the long table. Jimmy still had his back to her and continued singing.
Gwen scratched at the pocket of Clara’s trousers. That was where she kept the barley sugars she would feed to the horses. Clara fondled the top of Gwen’s head and behind her ears. Let her sniff her open hand while looking at the dog. ‘Dee,’ she whispered. ‘Come on now honey, who is the good girl now?’
Dee did not look up but her tail moved a little faster.
‘Dee the good girl.’ Clara, pursed lips, whistled softly to her. Dee raised her head and opened and closed her mouth. Her wet eyes darted left and right and then back to Clara.
Jimmy remained oblivious, kneading bread, singing.
‘Jimmy,’ she said and cleared her throat.
Dee half-stood and lowered her head, licked her nose and lowered her chin onto the floor.
‘Jimmy.’ Louder.
He spun around, bread dough in his hands. ‘Ayo tahi suci, holy shit Miss Clara you give me heart attack isn’t it.’ He turned the radio off.
Dee had curled up again in the box, but her head was up, eyes glancing and her tail wagged properly.
Jimmy came to the table and stood before her. His flour-covered fingers on the table top. ‘I am so pleased. Miss Clara,’ he said. ‘You come down here again.’
‘I had to come, didn’t I Jimmy?’
‘Yes Miss Clara.’
He fed her with bread and butter and jam. Sweet tea. ‘Miss Clara,’ he said again as he served her. Slicing the steaming bread. ‘Tastes good isn’t it?’
As he poured her a cup of tea, he frowned and spoke to her. ‘That Pearl,’ Jimmy said, ‘she is close to having baby foal?’
Clara looked at him. ‘Why do you say that, Jimmy?’
He began to butter yet another slice of bread. ‘Her puki come down, getting big and…dropping. Drooping? She close I think.’
‘Her backside, in behind?’ Clara asked. ‘She is springing?’
He nodded. ‘Yes puki bouncing up and down when she walk and water coming out not piss. Y’know?’
Clara stood and brushed crumbs off her lap. ‘I had better get to her,’ she said.
Jimmy clapped his hands. ‘Your father, Mr John he…’
She turned and pointed. ‘I will not speak of him Jimmy. Understand? Not now. We will not speak of him now.’
‘Yes Miss Clara.’
‘You hear me?’
‘Yes Miss Clara.’
Dee sat up in the box and watched her as she closed the door.
Clara walked out of the homestead kitchen and made her way towards the stables. Tom raised his head as she neared and gave his soft sound of recognition. She walked to him and held his head and spoke to him. The horse took her in with his nostrils, wide-breathing her smell deep into his lungs.
‘Now where is our darling Pearl?’ she whispered.
Clara crossed the yard and entered the stall and saw Pearl standing in a corner, her sides bulging; looking sad and distracted. She was facing Clara and looked up when she came in. Stamped a front foot as a fly landed on her shoulder, a muscle shivered. Clara walked to her and held her. Pearl too smelled her and then flicked her head at the fly, which had landed on her rump.
‘You the big fat girl, come on now let’s have a look at you honey,’ Clara cooed and took hold of Pearl’s tail and pulled her around. Pearl’s water had already broken and the feet of a foal were showing. Clara scuffed a boot across the hard clay and sawdust.
‘Hold on darling girl,’ she said and walked out of the box and found a stack of wheat-straw bales. She carried one back into the box, broke it open and spread the straw over the ground. Repeated this five more times and when she had finished, placed a hand on Pearl’s neck, fingers in her mane. ‘Go on now.’
Pearl pawed at the straw, sniffed it, circled twice and knelt, waited and then slowly allowed her weight onto her near side, gave a great sigh and rolled over onto her off side. Clara stood back and watched Pearl’s belly contract; more fluid accompanied the foal’s head as it emerged. It was covered in a gauze-like shroud.
Pearl continued to push, her back off leg lifting with each effort. Clara saw the flushed udder and two black nipples swaying with each contraction. Pearl’s breathing rasped as she pushed. She waited, rested and began to get up, knelt, her head going down with her nose touching the ground, blowing air out her nostrils and then, accepting her situation, she lay back down and continued to push. She struggled and the foal’s neck and shoulders came out further with wet sucking sounds, it was close now, and then with a final muscular push the seemingly enormous black body of the newborn slid out of her. A gush of uterine fluid washed out over the foal and he was in the world.
Almost immediately he began to throw his head and neck while Pearl’s nostrils distended and she looked back at her foal with savage eyes, as wild and profound an animal as Clara had ever seen.
She watched the foal’s efforts for a moment and then stepped forward, to clear the white membrane off his head. Both mother and baby seemed to rest. Pause, and think. Some time passed like this. They were both exhausted.
‘Oh, the good girl,’ Clara said and she felt a shiver run up the back of her neck and across her shoulders.
The mare swung her head around again to smell her newborn and began to position her front feet under herself to stand. Careful, aware of the foal, she rose to her feet and turned to lick off the remaining gauze and blood and matter. As she licked him, the foal suddenly put out a long front leg, started and put out another. His little head swaying and he twitched and all the time Pearl was patiently cleaning him and urging him to rise. His neck becoming stronger, eyes brightening as he listened to his mother’s feet moving in the straw. Shook his little head. Alive. Gathered his legs under him and stood, staggered, swayed and tumbled over backwards.
Clara laughed at this most tender of sights, put her hand to her mouth as if to weep; she had no idea how much time had passed. A moment or two, five, fifteen minutes. A newborn standing, staggering, falling and desperate somehow to keep trying. Pearl came to her foal, some of the white shroud and afterbirth still swinging from her vulva. Made an ancient throat and belly noise of recognition. Using her nose and face, she lifted and gently urged him to stand. The foal seemed to nod and steady. He swayed and found his feet. And, after a moment, began to search for her teats beneath her front shoulder. Pearl guided him as he kept smelling along her belly until he found her milk. He somehow knew to bend his head, turn it slightly, open his mouth and begin to suckle.
Tears were streaming down Clara’s face and she was laughing.
CHAPTER 64
It was early evening when Lew parked the Land Rover in a dry creek bed about half a mile from Daybreak Springs.
A pack on his back, he carried the twelve gauge Remington shotgun in one hand and the Lee Enfield rifle in the other. Long shadows across the land as he made his way to the scrub-covered crest above the waterfall. It was the location he had found and prepared the previous week. He lifted the scrub from the hollow and lay down. Took off his hat. Studied the country stretching out below him. Hollows and lees, flat rocks on which to stand. Approach tracks to the water and the places animals and birds came to drink.
The long pool where they had swum was in darkness. He waited for a while and prepared a firing position. Laid the rifle out, sighted it, opened the bolt, and pushed a magazine into place with an oiled click. Closed the bolt, sliding the brass round into the breach. The .303 was loaded. He made sure the safety catch was off and it was ready.
Lew sat with his back to a gimlet tree and watched the sun setting in the west. A dark red semi-circle and black land for as far as you could see. The air was becoming cold and clean as the desert night closed over him. He leaned forward and touched the rifle. There was a slight dew on the breech block and it felt cold. Thought, I will not think of you old man.
Great black shoulders the boulders. He could hear the scurries of the night creatures. Rock wallabies, woylies. Birds flew to their night perch. And the stars were as if God was showing off. Painter had said would you look at them? Babies hiding in an old woman’s hair.
He knew the dingo would come tomorrow. Lay down in the dirt hollow and pulled a thin blanket over his shoulder, thought about Clara. Her smile and approval. How her mouth felt as she kissed him.
CHAPTER 65
The den was warm and dry and the dingo bitch had whelped in the sand. Eaten the placenta and had begun to suckle the three pups that remained alive.
She had taken the three stillborn and left them near the entrance to the den. Carried them gently as she would a live mewling pup, by the tiny scruff. Laid them out, little curled feet and closed eyes: for the black crows. As a gift to the hated black waahdong dog crows who had followed her all her life. This was an offering and her kind would be in them now as they ever shadowed her and her offspring. The rotation of their black wings as they flapped away with her dead pups in their triumphant mouths. Dark shapes in the blue sky.
She had denned near the water below the cave. White gum and paperbark. Tall reeds and spear grass. The comings and goings of zebra finch. Wallaby come down from the rocks to water and once a mob of swift, hard-eyed desert kangaroo come in slowly too. Big sandy boomers overlooking their clan, the dangerous wide-shouldered fighters. Lifted chins.
The young red dog had gone to hunt. He stayed away for a day and a half and returned as the sun was setting. He carried the partial gut and spine of a young rock wallaby; laid it at the entrance to the cave and retreated to watch and listen to the world from the place they had found for her to give birth. He knew he would mate with her soon. He had, as she had taught him, begun to cut large circling tracks from where they were. To stop and wait. To listen and smell the country. Notice what had changed. To allow the hunt to come and to be there when it came. To distrust everything and at the killing, to act and take what was needed to be taken. She had showed him and he had begun to grow with confidence in such instruction. His ears were forward and his mouth open, panting as he watched the world. The burnt whiskers had grown back and he had become a strong and beautiful male dog.
She lay and sighed. Panted as the pups found her teats and bunted at them. The milk came down and flushed through her. Helpless, an arched throat, she looked away as they fed. Courage to feed your young like this. There were more than enough teats now with only three pups. They would be fat. Already they were warm and round and hungry.
She heard a shot coming from a long way off. The red dog hunted in that direction. Two more.
CHAPTER 66
It was early morning when Lew saw the dingo coming down the slope of a rock-filled gully. He saw the liquid working of the dog’s shoulders beneath the red fur, how his back feet and tail slowed and balanced his descent, his long tongue, yellow eyes and moving ears. Lew watched as he paused and waited, looked about and raised his nose. How cautious he was,
his ability in this land. There was a beautiful silence about him as he made his way down to the water.
When the .303 took him, he lifted both front feet off the ground and spun. Fell over. Got up and tried to run, staggered sideways and fell down again. Cried out at his awful wound.
Lew saw his courage. Blood spurting from his mouth almost like fire. Back legs working, tail out. Old burns along his back. Shot through the chest yet still trying to run.
Lew knew now the direction of the cave where the bitch would have whelped. Where she and the pups would be. The red dingo, trying to get back to her as he died. What else would he do?
CHAPTER 67
The youngster had not come back for a week. She had fed on the remainder of the carcass he had brought to the cave but soon she would have to hunt.
Her three blue-eyed pups sat in the sun and looked at the blinding immensity of the world. Then they began to squeal and whine for milk. Rolled over into their furred selves and pretended to bite. The bitch stepped over them and walked to a flat piece of ground below the den with a good view of the country beneath.
The three mottled pups began to bumble towards the presence of their mother. She looked to where the young red dog would bring meat and lay down and presented her belly to her whelp. The pups ran to bury themselves into her teats.
She opened and closed her mouth a few times but her eyes did not leave the country below them. The hunting country. The ancient lines of her coming to be here and she lay, and knew. Allowed her head back, throat exposed, content with this moment.
She looked up as the light was blocked and his darkness, like a cloud, moved over them.
She did not see the features of the young man. She had not heard him, smelled him. She did not hear the shots.
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