An eerie silence hung on the pall of dust. Marty shouted cooee and swung down off his lathered horse. From inside came a wild and most familiar cackle.
Jase came charging out the front door with his smoking gun still in his hand. “Halloo, Cuz! Welcome home!”
Chapter Fifteen
For the Son of an Old Friend
The golden light of evening bathed the mild little rise ahead, gilding the white trunks of the gums and setting the acacia trees aglow. The land stretched its bosom toward infinity untrammeled, for the fences were all down. A pleasant breeze stirred the air, and the flies were finally calling it quits for the day. The perfect hour was upon him, the sedate cap to a most amazing and frightening day.
Marty settled deeper into this wicker armchair and stretched his legs out across his front verandah. They nearly reached the rail. He drew a deep, contented breath. He was master of all this, a pastoral tenant of the Crown. He was home.
Beside him in the upholstered pine chair, Mr. Conlin chuckled. “Wisht I was close enough to see the look on their faces as that blasted mob come over the hill at ’em. Coo, what a sight! You got some fence building to do, lad. I don’t think your cows left you a single section still standing.”
“Not to mention the side verandahs and that breezeway out back. Could’ve lost a lot more. A lot more.”
“Too right, lad. Too right. Eh, here they come.”
Jase and Gimpy Jack came striding in across the churned-up dooryard, Jase with his swagger and Jack with his waddling limp. Jack sat down and leaned back against the verandah post. Jase grabbed a ladderback chair, swung it around and straddled it backward.
He folded his arms across its back. “You missed most of the fun, Cuz. While you were out playing games with cows, we were holding off who-knows-who. And we don’t know who, either. They’re imported, I can tell you that much. Never seen them around here before. Four whites, all with beards, and four blacks.”
“Raiders! Why me?”
“Don’t get too swelled up over it. They’ve been to your pop’s, too. And Cyrus Bickett’s. So you’re not alone. But why they’re pestering local pastoralists nobody knows.” Jase grinned. “Hey, that sounds poetic.”
“If you’re a poet, I’m a brain surgeon. What’s the constable got to say?”
Jason shrugged. “Big district, two men—him and his assistant. Comes out now and then to investigate the cause of our complaints, but what can he do? Never here when anything happens.”
Occasionally, Marty’s brain would work out the perfect solution while he slept or while he was concentrating on other things. But he couldn’t count on it. He surely wished it would surprise him with some answers now, though.
Mr. Conlin stood up and stretched. “You nippers can ride all day and carouse all night, but not this old duffer. Gunner call it a day. Get the plant started north tomorrow and lift that thousand head at your papa’s.”
“You’re welcome to my bed in there, Mr. Conlin. Be comfortable once.”
Mr. Conlin scowled at Marty, but his eyes twinkled. “Ain’t that old! Neh, your haymow will do me just fine.” He dropped down off the porch and strode out across the dooryard, moving with a sprightly snap that belied his age.
Jason pulled the upholstered pine chair closer to Marty, settled into it, and stretched his legs out across the verandah, too. He chewed a couple fingernails as they watched the gold turn to pink to old rose to gray. His voice dropped from enthusiastic to contemplative. “Nice place, Cuz.”
“Ta. Glad you were here.” Marty looked at him. “Why are you here, anyway? Last I knew, you were over at Opalton getting dirt under your fingernails.”
“Got bored. Thought of going up to Anakie, but that place hurts too much. Too many memories.” He sighed and wagged his head. “How long ago was that?”
“Not long enough.”
Jason was nodding. “Pearl, she’s the flashy one, with those curls. You put her on your arm, and when you walk down the street you’re saying, ‘Lookit what I got!’ But Enid, she was flashy inside. No, not flashy. Real. A real light inside. Made you feel special, not just look special.” He studied Marty a moment. “You were pretty warm toward Enid there yourself, weren’t you?”
“Yair.” Marty didn’t want to talk about her. And yet he did.
“Ever put the hard word on her?”
“Enid? Never! She was sweet and innocent. Wouldn’t in a million years think of—you know. I heard you kissed her, though.”
Jason cackled but it wasn’t a mirthful laugh. “Yair, just expressing my opinion to her. I was thinking some of getting married then. I can see now it was a crook idea. Don’t know what I was thinking of. I wasn’t ready for that. Still not. I want to get out and do things. I have places to see yet before I have to tie down to one job and a family and all that.”
“Yair, well, I’m ready.”
It wasn’t a cackle; it was a guffaw, bursting on the quiet air of dusk. “Marty, Cuz, don’t come the raw prawn on me! A bunch of little Frobels running around here? And a school, right? Then we gotta have the ladies’ sewing circle and the afternoon tea. And a church so’s we can have church socials. That’s what marrying is.”
“Unless you’re Indirri,” Gimpy Jack chuckled. “Goonur’s idea of a good time is go off on walkabout and club a wallaby. Now that’s the way it oughta be.” He stood up. “Want me to take first watch?”
Marty would have answered but Jase cut in. “Naw. Go to sleep. I’ll stay up late and come get you before I turn in. Then you wake me up at dawn.”
“Better yet, wake me up at dawn to take a turn,” Marty corrected.
“No, me.” Jason grinned impishly. “We can’t have the big boss cocky here losing sleep.”
“Break it down, Jase! Hooroo, Jack.”
“Hooroo.” Grinning, Jack ambled out across the dooryard. That vivid blue shirt faded into the gathering darkness. He had adopted whitefellers’ dress and work habits and most of the mannerisms. But when he walked away from you, you could see the depths of his aboriginal roots in the way he moved.
Boss cocky indeed. On the other hand, Marty had better start figuring out options and taking responsibility. “Why’s Jack here?”
“We sent you a letter. You must not’ve gotten it. That Albert Samson outta Ilfracombe, that you hired as manager? Your pop decided to pay a surprise visit here while you were gone. Brought Jack along. Asked to see the books and log. Samson wouldn’t let him. Said it was none of his business.”
“He was right, actually.”
“Yair, but he acted funny. Uncle Martin insisted. Samson said he needed a court order to do that, and he wasn’t gunner get one. So your pop pulled his court order outta his holster and set Samson down in the office with Jack sitting on him and went through the log. Paid Samson off with his own check and gave him an hour to get out.”
“It was that bad? Samson had the best of references.”
“He was bleeding you dry, and you weren’t that wet to start with. Anyway, you got Jack now.”
“Not for good. Sooner or later Pop’s gunner need him back again. Gotta hire someone.” Marty wagged his head. “That Casper Mays was a loser, and now this Albert Samson turns out to be a no-hoper. I’m not building much of a record for hiring.”
“You’ll get better with practice. Seven or eight managers from now, you oughta have it down.”
Marty grimaced. The stars were coming out now, winking into their ordained places. “Anybody heard from Luke lately?”
“Luke! Wait’ll I tell you! Up around the sugar field, behind…behind…where’d Luke go?”
“Mossman.”
“That’s it. Apparently Luke found out about some green cane that blew down. So he loaded I forget how many carloads of downed cane and brought it out on the railway to your pop’s siding. Uncle Martin says that wet cane saved that whole mob he was running on his north end.”
“Wacko. The lad lives what he preaches.”
“Don’t he!”
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Silence.
Marty studied the darkness. “Jase, if this drought doesn’t break in a couple months, Pinjarra’s dead. These cows are my last hope of staying afloat. I’m in debt as bad as I can be. Even if rain comes through in time, I might not make it.”
“That’s sorta what your pop thinks from looking at your books. And Samson buried you worse. Really hurt you.”
“I’ll take one big swing around, see who’s available. Won’t spend much time looking. Leave tomorrow, be gone a week.”
“Hire someone who knows how to build fences.”
The next day, still saddle-weary from that overland trek, Marty rode down to Muttaburra to look around. Nothing. He could have gone on south to Longreach. Instead, on impulse he traveled down to Aramac. He didn’t expect to find anything there, and wasn’t disappointed; he continued into Barcaldine. He would have paid his respects to Enid’s parents, but he lost his nerve. Next day he took the train west to Longreach, having talked to only a few people—none of them named Fowkes.
Conscience got the better of him. He spent forty minutes in Longreach, arguing with himself on the railway platform. He rode the train back to Barcaldine, much to the conductor’s amusement.
Ash Street. He paused there a minute, at the storefront where the strike headquarters had been. Strikes were still a fact of life throughout the country, but not around Barcaldine anymore. The attention had shifted to other places and other workers’ causes. He recalled walking with Pearl up this street, and her fearful amazement at the torchlight parades.
Oak Street. Pearl had described for him in massive detail the great fire that had leveled blocks of Oak Street along the railroad here. No signs of it remained. Everything was built up again and bustling. Progress. Barcaldine considered itself the leading edge of progress in the outback. Ask any city councilman.
He had stalled as much as he could. Reluctantly, he rode over to the Fowkeses’ cottage and knocked. No one home. With immense relief he continued upstreet to the Commercial and turned his horse into the hotel’s paddock.
Although transients and widowers formed the bulk of its clientele, the Commercial Hotel at the beginning of the dinner hour also entertained a few locals, and for good reason. They served the best two-shilling plate of roast beef in the district. Marty bought his dinner—roast beef and dark gravy, potatoes with onions, carrots and yeast rolls—and sat down in a corner to partake of food a good sight better than boiled kangaroo and damper.
A hand pressed his shoulder. Vivid vest and all, Ross Sheldon stood beside him. “Marty! Heard you were in town.”
Marty grabbed the napkin in his lap and stood up. He waved a hand. “Welcome to join me.”
To Marty’s mild surprise, the pastoralist accepted his invitation. Sheldon made some sort of signal to someone elsewhere and sat down in the chair across. “Go ahead and eat before it gets cold. I’ve had dinner, but I’ll keep you company.”
Marty sat down again and started in on the potatoes. “Town’s looking good. New buildings, some fresh faces.” He saw now what the signal had been. Sheldon’s station manager brought his boss a cup of coffee and, like a butler, silently left. Pastoral tenant of the Crown or not, Marty would never order his people around as if they were slaves, like Sheldon did.
“No flies on this town. Despite the fact that the rail line moved on to Longreach, we’ve held our own as a progressive community. Next Member from Barcoo will come out of here, perhaps one day the governor.”
“Maybe so.” Marty finished his potatoes. Politics was one thing he certainly did not want to discuss. Let Pop argue Sheldon down. Marty hated to.
“I hear your father’s considering standing for public office. You have a similar ambition?”
“Naw, not for a few years yet. Actually, Pop isn’t all that warm to it either, but he sees some good he can do, he says. Me, I have my hands full with the run.”
“Ah, yes. I heard you bought some cattle. Julia Creek?”
Marty nodded and started his carrots.
Sheldon wagged his head gravely. “Tick country up there. Heavily infested. I don’t think I’d want to bring any animals in from the Cloncurry district. Too sickly. Tick-blown.”
“These are clean. I checked them over. Drought wore them down a little, but it’s the same for everybody’s stock. A good rainy season and they’ll be fat and saucy.”
“You’re inexperienced. You actually trust your own judgment that much? Your ability to make the right decisions about an essentially worthless run?”
Marty felt his neck hairs prickle. “I been working on a station my whole life, and I have the best man in the business to ask advice of. Besides, Pinjarra is as good as any in the district. Good buildings. Good pasture once the rains come. Fences need work.”
“So you raise cattle at a loss to send to the boiling-down works. Is that what you want with your life?”
Marty was ready for the onions. He paused. “Yair. This is what I want with my life. Like Pop. He sweats out the drought and ticks and red water; sometimes he makes a profit and sometimes he doesn’t. He sticks with it because there’s no better life than the life of a pastoralist. I want the same thing—to have my own run, prove myself, start a family, and take a place in the district where I can do some good for people, too, when my time comes.”
The evening sun came pouring through the window into Marty’s eyes. It set Mr. Sheldon’s brocade vest ablaze.
“Your ambitions are noble. Not practical, but noble. I was once idealistic, like you. But times were easier then. A new run could succeed then. Times have changed.” He dropped his voice a notch. “How about saving yourself a lot of grief? I need an overseer for a little run I picked up down on the river. Five hundred pounds a year plus expenses, for starters.”
Marty stared. “Thought you doubted my ability to make decisions.”
“Not at all; just testing your own confidence in yourself, and I find it refreshingly firm.”
His mind sifted frantically through a thick pile of thoughts. He decided he’d analyze Sheldon’s motives later. For now, he knew the final answer. “Thank you for considering me, Mr. Sheldon, but no thanks. I’ll stay with what I have.”
Sheldon looked at him a moment, his face expressionless. “Tell you what, lad. When you discover that it takes money as well as guts to succeed, and your dreams go crook on you, you come to me. The offer will still be open. And I’ll try to help recover some of your losses. Least I can do for the son of an old friend. I have to go now, if you’ll excuse me.”
“Yair, surely.” Marty stood up and extended his hand. “I appreciate your interest, sir. Thank you.”
“Have a safe trip home, lad.” Sheldon shook hands and strode away, out the door.
Marty sat down and absently popped an onion into his mouth. Son of an old friend? Old acquaintance, more like it. Old associate, maybe. But not an old friend. Pop didn’t really enjoy Sheldon’s company any more than Marty did; but when it comes to business, you put aside personal feelings. Help recover some of your losses. That was assuming a great deal, and none of the assumptions very positive. Why did Marty find himself bristling at what was obviously a neighborly offer, however clumsily it was presented?
He finished his dinner, dawdled over an extra cup of tea, and went out to do what he had to do—and hated to. The Fowkeses were home now, and they received him graciously. He sipped their tea, nibbled at a scone, made small talk, got the latest news and returned to the hotel, relieved that was over.
So Pearl was still down at Anakie and doing very well. Good. What puzzled Marty was why Pearl wasn’t in Brisbane or Sydney by now, living in high society.
He spent two days more in Barcaldine and one in Longreach without finding a satisfactory candidate to manage Pinjarra. He spent part of one fruitless day trying to get a loan extension. Cyril Grosvenor, his banker, had once been so friendly with Pop and him both. But in these days of economic chaos, he had become very cold and distant.
Ma
rty almost took the train down to Anakie, just to look up Pearl for old times’ sake. No. They needed him at home, especially if this raider nuisance hadn’t let up. He stopped by Constable Edding’s office to describe the latest incident. He received in return a litany of complaint from the man: how Brisbane had transferred him out here to the far side of forever, when all he wanted was a promotion to some more responsible position in town. Marty listened politely, signed his complaint and left. He saddled up very early in the morning and headed north.
Chapter Sixteen
The Politics of Ticks
If Marty’s backside never met a saddle again, it wouldn’t be too soon for him. Except for the those brief train rides when his horse rode in the open stockcar in back, he’d been wearing holes in his saddle since before Cloncurry. He rode into his home dooryard late in the afternoon, weary of body and spirit.
“Uncle Marty!” Little Bohra came running across the dusty yard, and three months of weariness fled without a whisper.
Marty reached down and grabbed both tiny hands. He swung the lad up onto the front of his saddle. “You been a good boy while I was gone?”
The dark, blond-streaked head nodded vigorously.
“Think your mum would agree with you?” Marty aimed his horse for the barn, though it probably wasn’t necessary.
The little brown shoulders shrugged.
Indirri stepped out of the barn door into the sun. He grinned and lifted Bohra off the saddle. “Him need fresh horse. Bohra bring him, one minute. See Jase, eh?”
What now? Marty walked off to the house, quietly looking forward to the day when Goonur could convince Indirri to master the use of pronouns.
Jase came down off the verandah step without so much as a hello. “The stock you brought down from Julia Creek was clean, right?”
“Yair.”
And your pop’s thousand head should be, too.”
“What’s up?”
Power of Pinjarra Page 17