‘I’m going to take Rose for a ride outside the yard this afternoon,’ Alice announced suddenly. ‘Out into Summerlea, I think.’
‘Why don’t you go up the fenced laneway, Ali? Much safer. Jeremy, can you go along with her?’ Sam said.
‘If the lady wants my company I’d be honoured,’ said Jeremy gallantly.
‘Yes please.’ Alice nodded. ‘She’ll be less anxious with another horse there.’
‘Bugger. Here I was thinking you were wanting my company.’
Alice ignored Jeremy and went on, ‘She’d hate the laneway, Pa. Too hemmed in.’
‘That’s the whole point,’ Sam growled.
‘Jeremy, could you please ride Snoopy? They’re mates.’ Alice smiled at him hopefully.
Jeremy made a face. ‘Carmen would be better, female company ’n’ all.’
‘They hate each other with a passion. Even through the fence. Carmen wants to be top horse,’ Alice explained patiently to the unperceptive males.
‘Righto, I’ll ride another geriatric. Snoopy’s only a bit more than half dead. He even makes Rita look like a spring chicken. The things I do for you, Alice.’ Jeremy shook his head.
They set out from the yard, the young horse and the old, the small woman and the tall man. Sam and Olive were watching from the window but Alice was entirely tuned in to Rose. All her uncertainty left her as she felt the filly relax and stretch out into a free-flowing walk. Yes, she was happy to be out in the open.
The dusty air seemed to shimmer in the late afternoon sun that was slipping under the cloud bank. Insects hummed and the stillness was oppressive. But Alice was oblivious to everything but her mare. Finally, she and Rose stopped. Alice smiled at Jeremy, acknowledging his existence; silently, he gave her the thumbs-up. She took her water bottle from the little pouch in front of her saddle. The mare shied and turned her head to inspect the movement and unfamiliar sound, so Alice rubbed her neck and showed her the bottle.
‘I just need to get off for a leak,’ Jeremy whispered.
Alice laughed. ‘I’ve never known you to be quiet for so long.’
‘Well, you touchy women put a man on edge, I can tell ya.’ He dismounted and went to find a tree.
Alice took the opportunity to hop off too; her girth needed tightening. She pulled the leather strap up a hole. Rose rested one back leg on the point of the hoof, a sure sign of relaxation.
Something had been pricking the top of Alice’s foot inside her boot, so she took a moment to crouch down and have a look. A splashing stream of urine sounded on the ground close behind her. Unperturbed, she continued with her mission, determined not to look around. But a sudden wetness on the middle of her back sent her leaping forwards in indignation. Rose lifted her head and lurched away, stopping after a few strides to turn back and investigate. Snoopy stood dozing as though nothing had happened. A disgusted Alice spun round to see Jeremy zipping up his fly and pointing her water bottle towards her. With relief, she realised that the spray of liquid hadn’t been warm. Jeremy looked at her face and doubled over with laughter. It was hard for Alice to maintain the angry glare. Nor was there any point: she knew that Jeremy was incorrigible. Suddenly she found herself laughing too.
Chapter 29
‘Sam! Sam! Snake!’ Olive was bellowing from the little three-sided shed behind the house, where she milked the cow each morning.
Jeremy strolled in calmly from the opposite end of the shed. Olive stood on the milking stool pointing wildly at the large snake, which had frozen mid-journey across the dirt floor, tasting the air with its tongue. The milker was shifting anxiously, aware that all wasn’t well but held prisoner by the head bale.
‘It’s a brown!’ Olive screeched. ‘Don’t just stand there!’
Jeremy put one hand on his hip. ‘What a whopper!’ he said admiringly. ‘Yep, he’s a bad bugger alright.’
‘Kill it!’ Olive was almost hysterical by now.
Jeremy shifted his weight onto the other foot. ‘You’re forgetting the magic word, Mrs Day.’
‘Please! Please, Jeremy, kill it!’
‘What will you give me for doing it?’ Jeremy taunted, his eyes twinkling.
‘Just kill it! Immediately!’
‘All in good time, Mrs Day, all in good time. I just wanna know what you’ll do for me in return.’
‘Sam! Help! Sam!’
‘Will you cook golden syrup dumplings for dessert?’ Jeremy suggested quickly.
‘Yes! Just kill it!’
‘Every day this week?’
At this point the snake decided it was time to unfreeze and depart, so without waiting for an answer, Jeremy grabbed the snake-whacking wire that hung on a hook near the door and struck hard across the middle of the creature’s length. Olive let out a deafening scream and the snake writhed in the dirt, its back broken. Jeremy hit it again, closer to the head, and it lay jerking fitfully with its final muscle spasms.
‘You are utterly infuriating, Jeremy O’Donnell! You’re very lucky I don’t have a weak heart.’ Olive stepped down and plonked herself onto the stool, panting, her hand on her chest.
Jeremy sniggered as he hooked the limp body of the snake over the end of the wire, waved it at Olive, then headed for the door carrying it in front of him. He stopped and looked back over his shoulder at her. ‘I’ll be looking forward to those dumplings. You might be a cranky old sow, but you sure know how to make A-one dumplings.’ Having said this, he departed.
Olive sat there a little longer, amazed to discover that she was feeling pleased. She scolded herself inwardly. It hadn’t been a compliment – Jeremy had been outrageously insolent. He’d called her an old sow!
But she had to admit to herself that while Jeremy was cocky and disrespectful, he was also resilient. During this latest dry spell, Olive had noticed that everyone’s spirits had remained high, and that must be at least partly because of Jeremy. Nothing seemed to have the power to dampen his everlasting sense of fun. He threw himself into even the tedious drought jobs with energy and enthusiasm, and his arrogant swagger, cheery whistle, ready jokes and tricks kept them all buoyed up despite the unrelenting dry. But Olive had been most struck by Sam’s unusually positive frame of mind. She’d been dreading the onset of the usual brooding silence that characteristically gripped her husband during tough times. Jeremy’s silly antics had succeeded where all Olive’s solicitous concern had failed.
So, later that day, Olive made the golden syrup dumplings for dessert with extra-special care.
It was a depressingly dusty Christmas. In the morning, Jeremy stayed at Redstone to tinker in the shed while the others went to church. But nobody prayed for rain. They had worn out that request. Olive stubbornly cooked up a hot roast turkey and baked vegetables which they dutifully ate despite the hunger-sapping heat of the day. They struggled most with the hot plum pudding, except for Jeremy, who had three helpings.
At last, on Boxing Day, when even Jeremy had concluded that the clouds had forgotten how to rain, the sky suddenly opened. They were just finishing afternoon smoko after yet another day of dreary drought jobs. As usual, the clouds had been building throughout the day, but the Redstoners had gone about their business with little expectation of the sky delivering on its promise. Sam had been putting out molasses in the deregistered truck, which Jeremy had fitted with an old steel thousand-gallon tank for the purpose. Again, Olive had gone with him. Jeremy had noticed that despite his reasonably good spirits, the old man was slowing down. Jeremy and Alice had been erecting a temporary fence around Top Cedar Tree dam to keep the cattle away; over recent weeks, the pair had pulled seven stuck cows out of the boggy sides of this watering point. In their weakened state, the suction of the knee-deep mud was too strong for the miserable bovines.
But now, all at once, while they were quietly sipping their tea, the rain began pounding on the iron roof of the stately old Queenslander. The unmistakable sound filled the four at the table with instantaneous delight and they leapt out of their seat
s. Sam grabbed Alice and waltzed her across the kitchen. Jeremy noticed a flicker of jealousy cross Olive’s joyful face at the sight of them. But it was short-lived, as he grabbed her chubby wrist and put his arm around her, jigging her around the kitchen table. She protested loudly but her pleasure was betrayed by her smile.
The frogs that had long been hiding in the few remaining damp places were suddenly resurrected. The exultant throb of their combined voices pierced through the roar of the rain on the corrugated metal.
Olive recovered quickly from her brief episode of elation and went to do the washing-up. Jeremy, Alice and Sam went out to stand on the veranda. Cracks in the ground had been transformed into miniature river systems that merged and broke their banks. The water had formed a shallow coffee-coloured sea, the surface of which was punctured by the fast-falling drops. The tangy scent of the rain on the earth flowed over and around the small group on the veranda. The falling water had banished the oppressive humidity and for the first time in weeks they felt cool. They revelled in the feeling of the tiny icy droplets that were bouncing onto them from the wooden veranda railing. As they gazed at the wall of falling water, Jeremy shouted over the din, ‘Told ya it wasn’t far off!’
‘It’s almost worth having the dry, for the feeling you get when it rains!’ Alice spoke much louder than usual, but Jeremy still had to lean in close to hear her over the deafening roar. He was caught off guard by a sudden wave of emotion brought on by their close proximity. Powerless against the urge, he threw his arms around her in a crushing embrace. Briefly she hugged him back, while Sam looked out at the rain and pretended not to notice. Even when Alice extricated herself from Jeremy’s arms, she let him take the liberty of holding her hand as they stood side by side. Sam turned towards them and they all grinned madly at one another. The rain had set in, and with it the kind of temporary insanity that affects all people on the land when a drought breaks.
In the week that followed, they had more storms and two days of continuous heavy rain. They also lost a few cows. As had happened in other years, after hanging on during months of dry, for a few unfortunate animals the sudden change in weather was the final straw. At first the rain brought only mud and pools of water. Then, like magic, an emerald-coloured film spread over the land. It was as though a semi-transparent green veil had been laid gently over the red dirt. The dormant landscape had been awoken. The sun came out again and the land exploded with growth.
The cattle cropped the rich sweet grass shoots; the manure ran from the animals like greenish treacle, their starved stomachs unable to process the too-rich feed. Within a fortnight of the first rain, the stunted calves visibly began to pick up, their dull roughened coats beginning to shine. The flocks of budgies returned and commandeered bushes and trees across the station, the mad chattering of their extended families jubilant. Dusk was a symphony of amphibious song, the trilling of cane toads carrying on the still evening air.
Then there were the insects. Having been strangely absent for the first half of the summer, they now made up for lost time, arriving in their millions. There was no point staying up after dark, as the unscreened house would rapidly fill with swarming winged things, drawn by the most insignificant of lights. Even the bluish glow of the computer screen was enough to lure the multitudes. Large green frogs also emerged from their daytime hidey holes to lurk close to the lights, the buzzing banquet an irresistible attraction.
For some weeks after the rainy period it was too wet to muster or fence. The yards remained a muddy bog and the road into Redstone was impassable for anything larger than a four-wheel drive, so carting cattle was out of the question. Alice knew that this was the time of year when they usually sold their first load of bullocks, but after weathering the extended dry, the older cattle weren’t ready for the meatworks. Her grandfather now planned to try to offload some later, before the April bush run, to make room for the new ones they’d be bringing in from the national park.
Alice was concerned that due to their age once they’d reached the required weight, the bullocks wouldn’t bring the price Sam had been hoping for. The meatworks would penalise Redstone heavily for the extra teeth the hefty beasts would have cut by April. The bank wouldn’t be pleased, and neither would her grandmother. But the hold on mustering, as well as the abundance of feed and water in the paddocks, meant that for a short while everyone had more time on their hands. Jeremy began to restore an old Willy Jeep that had been rusting untouched in the shed for decades. It kept him happy for hours, and sometimes he was so engrossed that he forgot mealtimes and Alice had to go and get him.
For her part, Alice was able to work with the horses again. She wormed them all and took the opportunity to trim their feet while they were soft from the wet ground. She ran Benji’s Arab colt in from Brigalow and put him in the night paddock near the yards so that she could spend a little time handling him each day. He was very touchy at first, with a tendency to rear at the slightest provocation, and had a high star-gazing head carriage. But once she’d earned his respect, he decided almost overnight that it was simply easier to toe the line. Like most males he responded well to lavish praise and was soon eating out of her hand.
Alice suspected that she’d merely reawakened in him the memory of some early lessons learned at the capable hands of her father. Benji had painted the sketchy outline of a masterpiece, and she was now faced with the delicate task of finishing it, true to his style. In some strange way, working with the colt seemed to begin healing the wound Alice had been carrying since the loss of her enigmatic father.
The dog, Darcy, had finally begun to grow into his head. He was still ugly, but now that his proportions were sorting themselves out he was less awkward looking and he had an air of patient wisdom about him. He began to shyly approach Alice and even follow her at a polite distance over to the yards. Perhaps he’d sensed that the time was right. Alice couldn’t help but develop a fondness for the harmless creature with his wounded-looking amber eyes. She finally forgave him for being the unknown Benji’s dog.
Before long he’d started to come with Alice and the Bennet sisters when she rode out from the yards on Rose. At first he was too timid to do anything other than trot along behind her, doing his best to be inconspicuous. When they came across cattle in the paddocks, Alice gave practice tasks to the bitches, instructing them to gather the mob, move them or block them. Darcy would watch longingly (or so Alice imagined), stock still, but every fibre in his body alert. One day, to the extreme mortification of the Bennets, Alice took only Darcy for the afternoon expedition. On reaching the first little mob of cattle, Darcy began to work. And from that day onwards, he never stopped.
Chapter 30
Valentine’s Day came around again. While working on the Jeep, Jeremy had been giving it a lot of thought. Should he or shouldn’t he? His pride had taken quite a dent the year before when he’d chosen Alice as his valentine and been unexpectedly turned down. He wasn’t sure that he wanted to put himself through that again. He asked himself why he was even still thinking about Alice when there were any number of other, willing potential partners for the evening.
A few days before the fourteenth he decided he definitely wouldn’t ask her, and was immensely relieved by the resolution. But somehow he didn’t get around to making any alternative arrangements. No worries, he told himself, he’d just show up at the pub, same as last year. He’d have girls throwing themselves at him as usual, even the ones who had come with other partners.
But on the afternoon of Valentine’s Day, Jeremy found himself experiencing a sense of déjà-vu. Alice came rushing into the shed where he was tinkering to tell him that Carmen had cut her hind legs badly; Alice thought she must have been fighting other horses through the barbed-wire fence. Despite the seriousness of her tidings, Jeremy was temporarily distracted by how lovely she looked. Her hair was escaping loose from a low ponytail and her clothing was spattered with mud and blood, but her smooth skin and fit little form were glowing with health. In the r
elative darkness of the shed her agitated eyes seemed luminous.
Seeming frustrated by his lack of response, Alice grabbed Jeremy by both arms and looked up into his face. ‘Come on! I need some help. She won’t stand still for me!’
Jeremy smiled down at her stupidly and received a thump in the chest in return. She jogged to the old broken refrigerator that they used as mouse proof storage in the shed, and rummaged around for bandages and antiseptic.
‘We’ll need to give her a tetanus shot,’ she muttered, then, turning to Jeremy, added, ‘Get a tetanus needle from the fridge inside, please!’
Once the wounds had been cleaned, Jeremy and Alice were relieved to find that although messy, they weren’t very deep. They threw some lime powder onto the cuts and gave Carmen her needle. After being stubborn and difficult with Alice she behaved like a lady for Jeremy. He was tickled pink over this and explained that it was just his way with women. They let her out into the grassy holding yard where they would be able to keep an eye on her over the next few days. The pair stood shoulder to shoulder watching the big grey mare walk tentatively away.
Then, to his horror, Jeremy heard himself asking Alice if she knew what the date was. She gave him a wary sidelong look and didn’t reply. Yes, she had noted the date, he saw. There was no backing out now.
‘Are you busy tonight, Ali?’
‘Jeremy, I—’
‘Look, if another fella’s taking you out I’ll just—’
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