‘I’ll be Colorado,’ she said. ‘You sing Charity’s bit!’ And with joy they passed the miles crooning and country-rocking along the road. At last, having had enough of Colorado and Charity, Tara tried to eject the tape . . . but the button wouldn’t budge. Next she twiddled the volume knob. That too was stuck.
‘I can’t switch it off,’ she said over the top of Charity’s crooning voice.
‘Serious?’ Elsie jabbed the buttons just as Colorado called Charity his honky-tonk baby. The girls glanced at each other and with renewed vigour began to sing again.
At last, after they’d heard the album another three times, a sign appeared, rising out of the landscape like an alien arrival. It was advertising a hotel thirty kilometres on. Then came a sign advertising Bernie’s takeaway café. Then an ad for the RSL. And within twenty minutes, just before lunchtime, the girls rolled into Bourke, flanked by the brown-snake River Darling, ‘Building Fences’ blaring from the speakers as if they were trying to mimic a carload of doof-doof teenagers on a cruise through town.
The road took them into a frying-pan-hot concrete car park. Elsie cut the engine and at last Colorado and Charity were silenced. They set themselves up outside the air-conditioned cool of the IGA entrance, plonking Marbles next to the guitar case again. Their busking backdrop was a window slathered with notices advertising local babysitters, missing dogs and bowls tournaments. Their stage was a footpath beside a plastic horse that gave children wonky rides for two dollars, along with a plug-in point for their amp, and a row of what Tara described as ‘mating shopping trolleys’.
It was a Tuesday; Elsie noticed a few mumsie types about, so after setting up their hungry-dog sign, she chose the songs she knew would tug at the passing women. She began calling up another era with her voice, evoking memories of girlhood in the women, before the men, the kids, the domestics had stolen their wild-souls away. Elsie had been to enough pub gigs in Sydney to see what music spoke to older women. She watched as an Aboriginal mum towing three kids ambled by, no life in her step. Another woman, rushed and red in the face, bustled past, her shopping bags hanging listlessly on the crook of her arm.
She hoisted her guitar in front of her and began to play from her soul. Soon a crowd had gathered. Just a few songs in, not only did Elsie and Tara have cash and coins lining the bottom of the guitar case, but Marbles also had earned bags of dog tucker and a few tins for just lying there in his old-man dead-dog pose. Tara had got a lot of comments about her bucket and duster drum kit and one fan even delivered to her a new metal bucket bought from the supermarket to expand it.
‘You are really good. I mean really good, like you should be on Australian Idol, or somethin’,’ said one woman, leaning on her trolley, not wanting to go home. ‘Play us another. Do you know any Slim Dusty?’
Elsie repositioned her pick and was about to coax the guitar to life again when she spotted a police car rolling towards them, sun blaring off the white bonnet.
‘Ahh, sorry,’ she said, casting a quick glance at Tara, ‘we’ve gotta get back to our parents.’
Within seconds, the girls had tipped groceries into the buckets, slammed the guitar in the case along with the money and walked as calmly as possible away from the supermarket, urging a very dozy Marbles to hurry up. The old dog panted and padded his way behind them, his eyes dull, his tail drooping.
‘Get yourself in that there ute before he stops,’ muttered Tara.
Elsie looked down at her boots as she trotted around to the driver’s side and began to snigger.
‘What?’ Tara asked, irritated, slamming the gear in the tray.
‘You just said, that there.’
‘What’s so funny about that?’
‘That there dog,’ Elsie said in her best Nashville accent, pointing to Marbles. ‘That there sheriff.’
‘That there idiot,’ Tara said, a smirk back on her face as they watched the cop pass without even really noticing them.
‘C’mon, where’s that there money?’ Tara asked. ‘Let’s go get some takeaway.’
‘Uh-uh. No way. No grease for you. We’re getting healthy food. It’s cheaper than takeaway anyway.’
Later, with a new Esky on the back of the ute filled with rice cakes, dried fruit, fresh fruit, nuts, celery, yoghurt drinks, honey and water, the girls drove on down the main street.
‘Now what?’ Tara asked. ‘They reckon Bourke has one of the highest crime rates in the world, so you’re not suggesting we camp down by the Darling with our vegan fare?’
‘Nope. I have a plan. Follow me.’
‘Follow you! I have to follow you. You’re driving.’
Elsie drove back the way they had come and pulled up outside the large shopfront of Clarkson Rural Merchandise Store. The girls stepped inside and were met by an entire wall of colourful cowgirl and work boots. The sight of the boots stole Elsie’s breath away. A short while later at the counter she sat two brand-new swags on the floor, along with an assortment of camp-cooking gear, a pair of white cowgirl hats, a pile of clothes and some new Ariats. From within the change room Tara called out, ‘Else?’
Elsie put down the fishing rod she had been looking at and went over to the wooden louvred change-room doors. The assistant, busy on a phone call at the front counter, glanced up. Out stepped Tara in Wrangler big-girl jeans with a touch of bling and silver-and-white stitching swirling on the pockets and a pretty verdant green work shirt that set her deep red hair off beautifully.
‘What do you think?’ Tara asked.
The sales assistant gave her the thumbs-up and went on with her conversation, while Elsie’s face opened in a smile.
‘Perfect,’ said Elsie. ‘You look amazing. And try these?’
She handed her some work boots, a pair of thongs and some pretty blue horsey-girl boardshorts, along with a singlet top of navy blue.
‘Just one small problem,’ Tara whispered as she was about to try on the other clothes. ‘How do we pay?’
Elsie winked. ‘Watch this.’ With her own collection of clothing, Elsie went to the counter and retrieved her wallet from the back pocket of her cut-offs. There she pulled out her Clarkson company card. It was the one she and her mother had charged all her father’s rural products on whenever they were in Rington. There had been no need for it in Sydney, but now, the girls were shopping up big.
‘Mum’s sick,’ Elsie said to the saleswoman, ‘so she asked me to do the Christmas shopping this year. Dad and my brother are going to love their new swags. They are so into fishing trips,’ she added, grabbing up the lines she had been looking at earlier and thrusting them forwards. The woman bipped the items with a handheld scanner.
‘Nothing like getting it done all in one hit.’
Tara was standing behind her with an armful of clothes including work socks and Bonds underpants.
‘Our sisters will love these too,’ Tara said, thrusting the items on the counter, smiling angelically to the woman. ‘And if you don’t mind, I like these shorts so can I get them now and keep them on? Save having to change.’ Tara swivelled and displayed her round denim-clad backside. ‘Do you mind bipping my bottom?’ The woman smiled and obliged. At the last moment Tara grabbed up an OUTBACK magazine and put it on the pile. It too was added to the bill.
The woman then took up Elsie’s Clarkson card, scanned it, pressed a few buttons on her computer and within moments Elsie was signing an itemised account and thanking the shop assistant with her perfect private-school smile and demeanour. There was no trace of redneck runaway cowgirl in her now.
As they repacked the ute and settled Marbles down on a new hessian-covered dog bed, tag still attached, Tara looked doubtfully at Elsie. ‘They’ll know where we are when they get the bill,’ she said.
Elsie shrugged as she opened some sunscreen and slathered it on her shoulders. ‘Dad gets an end-of-month invoice. He’s always behind on paying bills at Christmas time and even then, he hasn’t time to do book work till after harvest so he won’t look.’
/> Tara got in the ute, the seat feeling hot under her bare thighs, and started flicking through the magazine absently.
‘And how will they know where we are if we don’t even know where we’re going?’
‘Where are we going?’
Elsie shrugged. She started the engine. ‘I have another plan. It’ll put them off the scent,’ Elsie said with sudden conviction.
She drove less than a hundred metres down the street and pulled over beside a bedraggled-looking phone box. Elsie picked up the sticky receiver and was surprised to hear a dial tone. She dropped coins in and punched the metal buttons.
She pictured the Grassmore Estate phone ringing in the vast hallway on the spindle-legged oak table. The twin phone ringing too in her father’s farm office. Tears ambushed her as she heard her mother’s voice on the answering machine, but only for a moment.
‘Hi, Mum. It’s Elsie. Just letting you know Tara and I are in Sydney. We’re safe and well. We both have jobs. We’re earning good summer-holiday money. I’ll call you before school starts.’ Then she hung up.
When she clambered in behind the steering wheel and hauled the door shut, she was shaking. She scanned the scene. The weedy street. The vandalised buildings. This was a far cry from her Sydney school in its leafy waterside suburb. So dark was her mood that it took her a while to notice Tara beside her bouncing up and down.
‘Look!’ Tara finally said, jabbing a finger at the magazine. ‘Look! It’s a sign.’
Elsie frowned and leaned over Marbles to see.
‘There’s an ad here for staff for Newlands Pastoral Company in the Territory. They’re getting new crews together for the new year. In particular for a cleanskin muster on one of their stations.’
‘A what?’
‘Cleanskins. I read about it once. It’s the unbranded cattle that they hunt out of the scrub and then muster up. With choppers and that. Y’know?’
‘Where is it?’
‘I dunno. Somewhere up in the Territory, out past Isa somewhere.’
Elsie grabbed the magazine from her. She took in the information, admiring the photo of a young man and woman in stockyard company shirts, holding horses outside a cattle yard. ‘It says initial application by email. We don’t have a computer.’
‘We can find an online centre.’
Elsie looked doubtful.
‘There’s a number?’ Tara pushed excitedly. ‘Give them a ring now.’
‘Why me?’ Elsie asked. ‘Why not you?’
Tara pursed her lips and folded her arms. ‘Else, just face it, your boarding-school voice is better than my bogan tones.’
Elsie flashed her a look, grabbing for the ute door handle. ‘Some day soon, Tara, you’ll have to drop this inferiority complex.’
‘What inferiority complex, oh great one?’ she replied cheekily.
‘You always joke your way through everything.’
‘No, I don’t. It’s about floating over the top of life, so that nothing can get you down,’ she lied.
But Elsie was already back in the phone booth, dialling the number. Her absence was short.
‘Busy. Answering machine.’ She got back into the driver’s seat.
‘Did you leave a message?’
‘Nope. Let’s just find an internet place. We’ll send an application.’
‘Na. Too sensible,’ Tara said. ‘Let’s just call ’em when we get there.’
‘Serious?’
Tara nodded. ‘Have guitar, can pay for travel. Let’s just drive! Cleanskin Cowgirls . . . we’re on our way!’
‘And the boys? Shall we call them now?’
‘Oh, yes, good idea!’
They jumped out together and rang the roadhouse, praying one of the twins would answer. In the end no one did.
‘They must be out in the paddock,’ said Elsie, not sure if she was relieved or disappointed. She felt odd about Zac. She supposed it was her own fault. Sleeping with someone and immediately skipping town was definitely awkward.
When they were back in the ute, she turned to Tara, who looked downcast at having missed Amos. ‘Which way?’ she yelled over the music.
Tara glanced about. ‘Signs . . . we need to follow the signs,’ she said as Elsie inched along the road, waiting.
‘Well? Have you received one yet?’
‘Received what?’
‘A sign.’
Tara began to smile. ‘No, dummy! I mean we need to find an actual sign.’
‘Oh! I thought you meant a funny-shaped cloud, or a feather, or a rainbow.’
Both girls fell about in fits of laughter, excitement building within them again with a sense of adventure. Now they had a destination, they also had an inner compass to guide them: there would be no going back.
Twenty-one
The clunking old ute limped into Mt Isa, spluttering past great mining stacks that rose into a wavering heat-vapoured sky. Giant yellow trucks trawled upwards on zig-zagging roads cut in the faces of huge shale hillocks. Colorado and Charity were still blaring, but the girls had learned to shut out their sound. Tara gazed up at the mine in wonder and looked at the tiny workers on the huge site. She saw humans as ants busily destroying planet earth to ironically build bigger and better homes.
On the other side of the road beneath the huffing chimneys in a haze of pollution were playgrounds and parks for the mine workers’ children. It was weird that no one seemed to mind the kids playing in toxic pollution. Tara realised this mining game, for all families, was not just about money and carving out a life. It was also a culture that some loved — humans just did what they did without much thought. She wished her species would slow down. Would notice.
As they neared the town centre, she had to drag her thoughts to the here and now. Looking from her petrol-station map to the street signs, Tara began searching for the address of the Newlands Pastoral Company office. The girls both squealed when they found it. It was a large low white building tucked between a bakery and a dress shop. The signage on the front was clean and corporate compared to the homespun bakery. After a wonky park by Elsie, they got out, uncrumpled themselves as much as possible, tied Marbles to a post in the shade and stepped into the air-conditioned office. A neat woman behind the desk smiled at them.
‘Be with you in a moment,’ she said in a friendly but businesslike tone above the shrill ring of the phone. Her call gave the girls time to take in their surroundings. Even the lush pot plants seemed easy with their perfection, and the stunning aerial photos of the NP Co stations made the sheer size and grandness of this multi-million-dollar shareholder operation clear.
Tara picked up one of the brochures from a classy glass-top table. It showed NP Co’s industry training programs. Elsie looked through a newsletter that reported staff stockhorse competitions, fishing competitions, get-togethers for fundraisers, Indigenous celebrations, social events and professional development. More photos of station crew in uniform shirts of blue with logos, big hats and glossy horses: young kids on a path to a rewarding life. Most of them even had ties on, along with big Akubra hats and polished boots. Elsie was getting excited. Some of the brochures were on the same regenerative agricultural techniques she’d been studying at boarding school. Tara too could feel the bright energy of the place.
Then the woman was off the phone and Elsie was tumbling out an awkward question about the job ad and waving the magazine at her. The woman pursed her lips.
‘I’m sorry, girls. We don’t take drop-ins,’ she said, ‘particularly ones with no résumés, no ID and no proof of age.’ She had looked them up and down, not in a judgemental way; she had obviously seen all kinds and nothing surprised her. ‘We have a formal screening process and the positions in that ad have been filled.’
Elsie’s and Tara’s bodies slumped when the woman said this. She looked at them again.
‘Our ute was broken into at Bourke,’ Elsie said, opening up the palms of her hands and widening her eyes in an expression of hopelessness and distress. ‘All our ge
ar, our wallets, our everything was stolen.’
‘Even our working dogs,’ Tara added, casting Elsie a quick glance.
‘Kelpies,’ said Elsie.
‘Of course they didn’t steal the old one.’ Tara gestured to Marbles outside the glass window, who was lying on his side in his dead-dog pose.
‘Mongrels,’ Elsie said.
‘The thieves,’ Tara added. ‘Not the dogs. They were excellent dogs.’
The woman sat looking at the girls, smelling a rat, but feeling for both of them. What an odd pair, she thought. One was all fairy princess in her brand-new Wranglers and the other, the pretty big one, was unreadable — she held a secret under all that weight. She sighed. Vera Cushing had seen ’em all. From the local applicants who thought they could ride a horse, until they were actually on the job and the skilled Aboriginal elder stockmen showed them otherwise, to the private-school city girls who had read a few outback romance novels and thought a stint in ‘the bush’ would be fun, having no idea that station work was skilled and complex. But Vera knew that within every person who walked through that door was potential. The company was a good one, and they relied on her to read people like books. And there was something about these two that touched her. She decided to string them out a bit. To test them.
‘The stations are winding up for Christmas, so they’re down to skeleton staff. The new intake isn’t until the end of January.’
‘We’re happy to work right through Christmas,’ Tara said quickly.
‘Our families know we’re on our gap year. They don’t need us home or expect us for Christmas even,’ Elsie added.
Vera looked at the extremely pretty girl’s crystal-blue eyes and the pure face of the redhead. They were runaways. Casually Vera glanced at her watch.
‘It’s my lunch break now. Come to the takeaway with me. It’s just across the road. You can both sit down and have a sandwich with me and then . . .’ Vera inclined her head a little, like a slightly cross but kindly aunt, ‘you can tell me the truth.’
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