The Girl from Snowy River

by Jackie French

  Chapter 12

  I kept waking up that night, wondering why I was in a blanket on hard ground and not a feather bed, hearing the sugar gliders in the gum blossom above me, the horses whinnying, the possums growling and the dingoes howling — we’d taken over their rocks and creek. Every time I woke I’d think, Did I really do that? and then remember, I really did.

  ‘A hundred pounds each and the brumby of your choice,’ Mr Sampson said the next morning to the riders around the campfire, their legs still stretched out towards the last of the heat. The fire was old coals now, ready to be raked out of existence when they broke camp.

  Flinty was comfortably full of damper and honey, as well as the mutton chops that Mrs Clancy had somehow conjured out of her saddlebags, enough for all of them. There’d also been three wild ducks over the fire for dinner, though Flinty had no idea how Mrs Clancy had caught them, and some sweet fibrous roots baked in wet leaves that she and the Clancys ate but the stockmen ignored.

  Flinty looked automatically over at the brumbies, still subdued in their pen. They know they are prisoners, she thought. Only the white stallion and the grey colt gazed at the humans eye to eye.

  She would love to choose that colt. She could almost feel herself riding him, breaking him. She could see Andy working him too. He’d be a joy to train, a horse with pride like that.

  A horse needs to feel good about himself, Dad always said. Look at the way he carries his head, his tail. A sulky horse will try to slide you off under the next branch, or turn stubborn and head for home. But a horse who knows he’s as good as you — a horse like that will be with you all the way.

  The colt turned, as though he knew she was looking at him. She scrambled to her feet, while the men sipped the last of their tea and Mrs Clancy gathered her billy and saddlebags, and walked over to the horse yard. The brumbies edged away from her. She slowed down so she didn’t spook them. The last thing she needed was to make them break through the barrier now.

  ‘Hello, boy,’ she said. The colt flicked his ears at her. Without thinking she held out a bit of damper. Silly — she knew that as soon as she did it. A wild horse wouldn’t even know that she was holding out food.

  He lifted his head, his nostrils twitching. It seemed he liked the smell of damper.

  ‘It’s good,’ she said softly. ‘The best damper ever made. Don’t you want to try it, boy?’ Words didn’t matter, Dad said. But the horse needs to get used to your voice. A horse heard what you meant to say, reading your face and your movements as well as your tone. What you said had no meaning, but what you meant did.

  ‘Come on. You’re a good boy, aren’t you? A wonderful boy.’ She held her hand still.

  Suddenly, magically, the colt took a step towards her. Flinty stayed motionless, holding out the damper.

  Repentance whinnied a warning and pawed the ground, but the grey colt ignored him. He took another step, and then another.

  She heard hooves behind her. Empress’s grassy breath whiffled over her shoulder. Flinty was glad that the small horse wasn’t limping this morning, merely favouring her hind leg when she stood. Empress reached her head down and nibbled the bit of damper.

  Flinty laughed. She broke the damper in two and fed half to Empress, still keeping one eye on the colt. ‘See? Empress knows she can trust me.’ Or she can trust me now, she thought guiltily, remembering Mr Clancy’s reproach the night before. She’d dreamed of the dead horse last night, the boy holding his head through the dark. When she’d woken the dingoes had been howling. The poor dead horse would have fed them, and the crows and eagles and goannas too. Better than being buried in the ground.

  Now two horses watched her: Empress, butting her shirt in case there was more damper, or lumps of sugar; and the colt, stepping nearer still.

  The grey was now so close she could touch him, but she had to let him take the final step.

  And then he did. His warm lips swept her palm for the damper; he ate it while she touched him lightly on the chin, keeping her body motionless, only her hand moving.

  ‘Your name’s Snow King,’ she whispered. ‘One day you’ll be as white as snow. One day you’ll be a king.’

  All at once the colt jerked away. He tossed his head and cantered over to the others.

  ‘Well,’ said Mr Clancy behind her. Mr Clancy could put a lot of meaning into a single word. This one sounded approving. More than that: amazed.

  ‘He’s beautiful, isn’t he?’ she said, still gazing at the colt.

  ‘He is that.’

  ‘Have you chosen him for yourself? Or does Mr Sampson want him?’ Because of course they would get first choice, as senior riders.

  ‘Sampson’s not taking a horse — he’s in partnership with Miss Matilda in this. I was going to take the colt. But the wife says I should give him up to you.’ He chewed a bit of grass thoughtfully. ‘Usually right about things, the wife.’

  ‘Why? The colt’s the most valuable horse here,’ she added frankly.

  ‘And he came up to you. That means something. But a colt like that needs training. Oh, I could break him in fast. Sell him fast too. He’ll be a racer, like his dad. But the wife says he deserves better than that. Says he deserves to be broken in slowly, kindly. Think you can do that?’

  Hope rose in her, incredulous. Did he really mean it? ‘Yes. My brother can train him too,’ she said quickly, in case Mr Clancy thought that a girl wouldn’t be good enough. ‘Andy’ll be back by the end of summer. Dad taught us well.’

  ‘Did your dad teach you not to take your horse at full gallop down a strange hill?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Flinty honestly.

  ‘Well. Long as you remember it. Long as you never do that to another horse again.’ He bent and plucked another stem of grass, bit off its soft end, then stuck the harder bit in his mouth, slowly chewing the rest. They watched the colt together. At last he said, ‘Give me ten pounds for him.’

  ‘He’s worth much more than that.’

  ‘I know it. But me and the lad and the wife have made three hundred pounds the last two days, and part of that’s due to you. Oh, you could have ruined it all, all right. We could have lost the whole bunch of them. But we didn’t. You brought them home, and that’s what matters. Our lad can buy his own place now, up the river past Drinkwater, next to his cousins’ place. Wouldn’t do for me, but that’s what he wants. So I say, ten pounds.’ He held out a hand of grime and leather.

  Flinty put hers in his. ‘Deal.’

  Chapter 13

  Mrs Clancy’s recipe for damper:

  Put some ash in the bottom of a mug and cover it with water to let it settle. Then mix the water from the top with the flour and more water till it sticks into a ball. Roll the ball in wet green grass or a tussock, then shovel out the coals of your fire, put it in the hole and rake the coals back over it. Wait till the shadows move one and a half fists when your arm is held out right in front of you, then retrieve it. (You can leave it longer but the crust will be tougher.) Mrs Clancy says you roll it in green grass before putting it into the coals so you can eat the crust — it isn’t hard and ashy.

  The men moved the stallion and the rest of the brumbies in a mob down to Drinkwater the next day, leaving her and Sandy and their horses and the colt. Sandy had accepted an extra five pounds instead of a brumby to be broken in.

  The mob moved quietly up the ridge towards the track, still cowed by the crack of the whips, the stockmen riding slowly around them to keep them together. Even Repentance seemed to have accepted that his time in the mountains was over. Perhaps, thought Flinty, he remembered that no dingoes would threaten his foals in the Drinkwater paddocks, that there’d always be good feed in the trough when it was dry or cold. Only Snow King showed distress, anguished at being left alone, running along the edge of the pen, whinnying and rolling his eyes.

  The Clancys were the last to leave.

  ‘You all right here?’ asked Mrs Clancy, as Flinty helped her pack her swag. She nodded at Sandy.

&n
bsp; Flinty glanced over at Sandy. He was reinforcing a smaller yard for Snow King with wattle saplings. He moved awkwardly today, even more hunched over. She wondered if his wound hurt him. Dad had always said his scars ached after a long day, or a night in his swag on the hard ground. ‘Sandy was my brother’s best friend.’

  Mrs Clancy nodded, accepting it.

  ‘Might call in one day, see what you’ve made of the colt,’ said Mr Clancy.

  ‘You’ll be welcome,’ said Flinty, meaning it. She wasn’t sure Mum would have invited a native woman to her dining-room table, and Dad had talked of ‘half-castes’ a bit like he’d talked about dingoes after the lambs. But once you got over the shock of the colour of her skin Mrs Clancy was just like Mrs Mack, only better in the saddle and at conjuring up food on the road.

  ‘Yes. Well,’ said Mr Clancy. ‘It was a grand ride you did, girl. Just don’t do another, eh?’ He raised his hand in farewell and squeezed his horse up. It cantered easily up the mountainside after the brumby mob, his wife’s and son’s horses on either side.

  The gully was empty. Emptier than when they’d arrived, as the horses had eaten most of the grass, and half emptied the waterholes along the creek too. The bush smelled of horse and wood smoke. Empress grazed a little way off, still favouring her hind leg. Flinty added more wood to the fire, then went to join Sandy at Snow King’s yard.

  It still seemed impossible that the colt was really hers. One day he’d accept her as his leader, just as he’d obeyed his father. A girl, able to command so much strength and beauty.

  Sandy leaned against the fence, watching the colt. The young horse still paced around, his sides sweaty as he whinnied at the departing mob. He’ll try to break through the yard at any sudden noise, thought Flinty. Hurt himself, perhaps, against the rails. What must it be like for him to be so suddenly alone, after a life surrounded by his clan? Even worse than your brothers going off to war, your mum and dad dying. At least she still had Joey and Kirsty, and Andy when he came back, and a home she loved.

  The colt had lost everything. All he had was her.

  ‘He’s beautiful,’ said Sandy. ‘I’m glad he’s yours,’ he added.

  She smiled at him, grateful. Sandy had not said a word about her almost ruining the round-up, or being embarrassed when they’d discovered she was a girl. He didn’t say, ‘Be careful how you handle him,’ either. Sandy knew who she was and accepted it. Like the Clancys accepted each other, in a way, she thought.

  ‘Are you all right?’ she asked.

  His face closed up again. ‘Why shouldn’t I be?’ He looked at the frantic colt, not at Flinty, unconsciously straightening his body.

  ‘I just thought maybe…’ She stopped and said instead, ‘What are you going to do with your hundred and five pounds?’

  ‘Put it in the bank.’

  ‘What then?’

  He shrugged. ‘Get a place of my own one day. I’ve applied for one of the new Soldier Settler blocks. Batlow, maybe, or down the Murrumbidgee. But I’ll need money to set it up properly. Some of the blokes taking them up haven’t tuppence in their pockets.’

  Batlow. The Murrumbidgee. Her heart lurched a little at the thought of the valley with no Sandy in it. Even when he’d been away at the war she’d known somehow that he’d be back. But of course he’d want a place of his own. There wasn’t much flat land in the valley, and that was all farmed already. The Mullinses and the Colours all had sons who’d take over their family farms in turn, just like Johnno would take over the Macks’.

  She forced herself to smile. ‘Sheep farm?’

  He gave an almost grin. ‘Not in that country. Orchard, more like. And horses too. Saved most of my pay in the army. I’m not far off what I need now.’

  ‘Andy told me he spent all his pay. Said he didn’t see any point saving when tomorrow his body might be feeding the soil of some French farm.’

  Sandy plucked a head of grass and began to chew it, his eyes still on the horse. ‘I reckon saving my pay was a sort of promise I’d get home. All of us dreamed of different things, I suppose.’

  ‘What things did you think about?’

  A pause. ‘Mum’s pikelets mostly.’ He pushed himself off the fence, stretching till he stood upright. ‘And strawberry jam. Not plum. They used to give it to us in France, before they sent us over the top. I’ll never eat plum jam again.’

  Flinty felt a stab of disappointment. What had she expected — that he’d say he’d dreamed of her? And now he’d finally talked about the war, but only to complain about the jam.

  She looked at him, standing there, watching the colt, not her. ‘You’d better be heading back if you’re going to be home by dark.’

  He turned, surprised. ‘I can’t leave you by yourself.’

  ‘What could happen to me?’

  He shrugged. ‘Swaggies, maybe.’ There were some strange types around these days, not just the old-time swaggies who’d been decades on the road, cadging meat and flour and a night in the shed in return for chopping wood. The old-style swaggies were a bit gone in the head sometimes, muttering to themselves, which was why Mum had had a strict rule that none be allowed in the house.

  There were new swaggies now, men who couldn’t settle after the war, maybe had come home to find parents or wife or job gone, and no home to settle into.

  ‘Swaggies stick to the roads, where there’re farms they can beg a bit of food. And Kirsty and Joey will be worried,’ she added. ‘You can let them know I’m safe. It’s going to take me longer than I thought to get home, with Snow King. I need to get him used to me before I can get a halter on him and teach him to lead. I don’t think I should ride Empress back either, not yet awhile. I’ll have to walk and lead them both.’

  Sandy considered. ‘All right. I’ll come back here tomorrow,’ he said at last. ‘You can ride back on Mum’s Sally. I’ll bring Toby or Sam to give us a hand leading the colt too.’

  She nodded, grateful, but suddenly wishing she hadn’t asked him to go home. One more night wouldn’t matter much to Joey and Kirsty. Had Sandy thought she didn’t trust him alone with her, as Mrs Clancy had hinted? Maybe if it was just them and the horses in the darkness, with the stars and the calls of the dingoes, he might talk to her again, joke with her like he’d done before he and Jeff marched off to Goulburn, to Sydney, to the war. Maybe he might even want to kiss her…

  Get over it, Flinty, she told herself. When Sandy had kissed her last time she’d been in her blue dress, her hair down with a ribbon in it, not in dusty trousers and a shirt, smelling of perspiration and horse and smoke. If he hadn’t wanted to kiss her on the railway platform he certainly wouldn’t want to kiss her now.

  She wondered what French women were like. He must have met nurses too, English, or even Australian and American. Clean, with soft hands, women who wore lace dresses when they weren’t on duty. The nurses in the war posters all looked so fresh and beautiful. She bet they even had lace on their petticoats.

  He must have met someone else, even if he wasn’t getting letters from her. That was why he was saving so hard for a farm. A farmer needed a wife, and sons to inherit what he’d built.

  Suddenly she wondered what Sandy would say if she told him she’d met a soldier from another war, a ghost from the future. Sandy was maybe the one person who’d believe her. She wondered if Nicholas would seem more real, or less, if someone else knew her secret. She was about to speak, just as Sandy turned. ‘I’ll get more firewood for tonight. You’ll need to build the fire up to keep the dingoes away.’

  He loped off into the trees.

  He’d probably have laughed. No, Sandy wouldn’t laugh at her. He’d have worried that she was going batty, up on the mountain. Or demanded he meet this stranger who claimed he was from the future. She had a sudden vision of Mr Mack and all his sons descending on the Rock, interrogating Nicholas. No, she couldn’t do that to Nicholas. Besides, Nicholas was hers. She didn’t want to share him. She turned back to the colt, fished some damper out of her
pocket and leaned on the stockyard rail, the damper in her hand, and waited.

  A creaky-door sound echoed in the branches above her, and then another. A mob of black cockatoos passing through. Snow King’s ears flickered as the big birds landed, one after another, in the trees around, and then began to rip off the bark to get to the grubs below. Had they been waiting till the men and horses left? She supposed so. Far off she could hear Sandy whistle as he collected firewood.

  Snow King was calmer now, or perhaps just anxious for company, even that of a human. She watched as he stepped closer to her.

  ‘Hello,’ she said softly. ‘You’re mine now. Did you know that? And I’m yours, because you are the most beautiful horse I’ve ever seen. I’m going to break you in, then Andy will train you. You’ll like Andy. He’s got gentle hands, like Dad’s. He’ll train you to be a racehorse. You’ll like that too — everyone cheering you and the other horses far behind as you beat them all.’

  Snow King whinnied, softly, not the desperate cry of before. She nodded, understanding as clearly as if he had used words. ‘Don’t you worry. When the races are over you’ll come back up the mountains, to your home paddocks again. When you get old that’s where you’ll live forever, with your mares and your foals.’

  The colt took one more step towards her. She could feel his warm breath before he took the damper. Once again it seemed a miracle, a gift from the mountains as well as the horse in front of her. She stroked his neck, and this time he allowed it.

  ‘Are you lonely now the others have gone, boy?’ she whispered. ‘I know all about lonely. But you’ll have Empress with you. You’ll like Empress. You’ve got me too. I promise you won’t be lonely again.’

  Chapter 14

  27 November 1919

  Dear Diary,

  It was as though when the brumbies finally vanished over the hill Snow King decided I was his mob leader. I’ve never felt that with a horse before — Empress knew all about humans before I began to train her. But I am the first human Snow King has ever known. All that beauty and power — and yet he lets me lead him, tell him what to do. I’ll never ever forget that moment, the rich smell of him. Even the clouds seemed to dance in the sky.