KALOONA RUN
Power was abroad again before sunrise. Daylight moved over the country,
and he bathed, dressed, and pulled on his boots while butcher birds
called, and small finches bobbed and twittered in the bushes. As he
made an end of his task, the sun rose with menacing countenance. He
went outside, looked which way the breeze was, and next walked down the
track to the stable. He stopped at the door, threw it open, and cried
out loud, "Scandalous Jack! Hullo there!"
At the back of the stable sounded a shuffling, and a small man, with
bristling beard and chipped yellow teeth set in a weather-worn face,
came out of the shadow, broom in hand. He stood in front of Power, and
put his hands together on top of the broom handle, spat carefully,
wiped his hairy mouth and shouted--"Marnin', Guv'nor. You're late."
Power nodded. "I was late back from Surprise last night. I'll be away
after breakfast though. Did they get in the black horse?"
"Aye, they brought him in yesterday. He broke from the mob and showed
Mick his heels for two mile. He's first rate--a bit soft maybe--and
as cranky as ever. Ye must watch him or he'll pelt you this side o'
the flat. Aye, aye, ye may ride above a bit, but I'm telling yer."
Scandalous jerked his head.
"I'll look at him."
"Come on then."
The two men disappeared into the stable. They came to a stall at the
end of a row, and there, tied to a ring in the manger, stood a grand
upstanding horse, black-coated from poll to coronet, which met their
coming with ears laid down and a white flash of teeth. It was an animal
to fill the eye of any man. It stood at sixteen hands to an inch or so
either way, ribbed up as a barrel, with great quarters and shoulders
sloped for speed. Its head was delicate for all its other proportions,
but there was that in the eye to tell a man to go about his business
warily. It showed a fair condition for a first day's stabling.
"Yes, he's pretty right," Power said. He called out to the animal to
stand over, and went to its head, and he had looked it all about before
coming away.
"Mick got off with his lot?" he said.
Scandalous Jack went on speaking at a shout. "Aye, they were away be
four in the marnin'. Mick says he'll be mustered and have the mob at
Ten Mile midday. You're meeting him there, Guv'nor, for the cutting
out, I reckon?" Power nodded his head. "Mick says to-night's camp's
going up lower end of Pelican Pool." Scandalous looked very wise.
"What do you mean?"
"Mick's doin' good work there."
"You're a fool, Scandalous."
"I may be that. Some fools see more than wise men with spectacles. Have
ye heard about the gouger's girl there?"
"What about her?"
"Mick's silly as a snake on her. They say she's a daddy for looks."
"I'm for breakfast," Power said. "Give this horse a look over. I'll
want him in an hour."
Power went to breakfast. It was ready for him in a low bare room,
with fly netting on doors and windows. One door opened on a verandah,
where creepers waged war with the climate. Mrs. Elliott, the cook, and
Maggie, the maid of all other work, had found excuse to wait for him.
He knew the sign of old, and prepared to be discreet. He nodded his
good morning. "Breakfast in?" he asked.
Maggie answered with great good will. "It's been getting cold this ten
minutes."
She was a handsome girl in the early morning, before the heat fagged
her. Mrs. Elliott, in middle life, ample and beaming, busied herself
briskly doing nothing, waiting to take the talk her way. The two women
attacked him together.
"You must eat a good breakfast, Mr. Power. You've a long day before
you. You were very late abed, Mr. Power. You can't burn the candle at
both ends."
"He's always late, Mrs. Elliott, when he comes back from Surprise." The
women shook their heads at each other. "And how was Miss Neville, Mr.
Power?"
"She was very well, thanks. I must get a turkey or a wallaby. I've lost
my appetite for curry and steak half the week, and steak and curry the
other half."
"And me so put about with the breakfast," exclaimed Mrs. Elliott,
twisting her apron. "All men are the same, ungrateful, every man jack
o' them. As soon look for gratitude from calves in a branding yard.
Now I suppose as Miss Neville she'll be turning over a date for the
wedding?"
"You're learning too many secrets, Mrs. Elliott."
"I know more than other folk already."
"And that means?"
Mrs. Elliott twirled her apron once more and looked wise. "I'm hinting
nothing. I know where Mick O'Neill goes of a night."
Power tipped himself back in the chair. "What are you cackling over
this morning? I hope your news is fresher than last?"
"What's he running after that gel for?"
"I've not heard of any girl."
"He's a good fer nothing fellow, and the little hussy's no better."
Maggie took up the tale. "They're all stupid on her 'cos she has a few
looks. That's all a man wants."
"They're not all like that, Meg. Mr. Power here, he has more sense.
He took up with Miss Neville, and though she's as nice as may be, her
looks are nothing out of the bag."
Power said something under his breath. He went on with his breakfast,
and the women despaired of him. In the end, out of a full mouth, he
said:--
"You had better see Scandalous Jack. I'm too hungry for talking. He
wanted to tell me a lot this morning."
"That nasty little man! I wouldn't demean myself with him. I told him
half an hour since I'd put a kettle o' water over him if he showed his
ugly face in at the door agen."
The women withdrew routed.
In a little while Power followed them from the room. Standing in the
verandah, he lit a pipe. His swag had gone on in the cook's waggon, and
there remained only a few minutes' office work and he might get away.
The old willingness to be in the saddle took hold of him. His heart was
in the cattle work. The longest day made him more ready for the next. A
good horse, a whip to his hand, the bellow of a mob in his ears--these
things kept his heart evergreen.
Morning had come, the birds had whistled him from bed, the sun had
climbed up; but the glamour of last night had not passed quite away. He
found himself--and little pleased he was at it--he found himself more
than once waking to the day's affairs from dreams of a girl holding up
a lantern at the doorway of a tent by a river.
Mrs. Elliott had forgiven the churlishness of breakfast, and waited
with an ample lunch, secure from sun and flies. He promised to be back
some day or other, took up a dripping water-bag and his whip, and
passed to the stable. The black horse, saddled and waiting, fidgeted by
the door, and Scandalous Jack was taking aggressive charge.
Scandalous thrust up his hard face to shout a warning.
"He'll be shaking yer up, boss, I reckon. He fooled me half an hour
'fore I had the saddle on him."
"Wants a day's work," Power said. He looked over the girths and secured
the water-bag. All he did was gentle and cautious. At the touch of
the wet canvas the black horse snorted, reared up and swung about.
Scandalous, very fond of his corns, retired in a hurry. With voice and
a firm handling Power kept the beast in check. He had completed matters
in a few minutes. Whereupon he coiled the whip on his arm, and drew
together the reins. He went about the mounting with cunning, and when
the moment of moments came, was in the saddle in one movement.
The black horse squealed, and its head went down between its legs as
a stone from a catapult. It came high off the ground, all four feet
together, in a great bucking plunge which tried all Power's skill to
ride. The ground fell away from him and spun about, there came to his
ears a great straining of leather, and he knew a fierce shock as the
brute went to earth. Instinct set him leaning back, with legs fierce
gripping and toes down pointing. Horse and rider went up again, with
a heave tremendous beyond belief, and there was an instant when Power
stared down at emptiness. They were down and up in one breathing, and
away with great bounds that threw them across the yard. A heave, a
thud, a grunt and a swing brought them about, and on the heels of it
they were going up into the air again. Down then and up into space
again, all four feet together, groaning with the effort, while the hot
dust streamed into Power's face. The rally was over in a dozen seconds,
and the horse stood heaving, and Power settled himself in the saddle.
"Rough horse that!" Scandalous shouted from the fence.
"He makes it too hot to last."
"Don't take him cheap on that lay. He'll be rid of yer yet. He'll give
yer all you know one of these days, and I'm taking no odds on who's the
better."
It had just turned eight o'clock when Power began the ride, but
already the sun was powerful, and the birds flagged at their songs.
He journeyed at walking pace, watching the horse carefully the first
few miles. Last traces of early cool were departing. A few threads of
gossamer shimmered among the spikes of the grasses, and blundering
hoofs tore them apart. A few feeding kangaroos sat at late breakfast.
The homestead moved behind the trees, and he and the beast he rode were
all that passed across the plain.
He grew contented at once now he had made a beginning of the day's
work. As another man forgets his ill-humours in the counting-house, or
the library, or his mistress's bower, so Power turned for distraction
to his saddle and his whip. A bushman's heart was his birthright;
a bushman's cunning was the legacy of fiery summer afternoons on
horseback, and frosty winter dawns spent abroad. In the dreariest
page of Nature he found reading. His eye was quick to read the riddle
of the ways. The fall of a hill, the sweep of a dry creek bed, a few
patterings of passage in the dust--these answered most questions he
asked. In that country was no better judge of where to come up with a
mob of cattle, nor one, be it night or day, who rode straighter to a
point. He passed over the plain sitting easy in the saddle, pipe in
mouth, whip on arm, his head fallen forward, as a man sits asleep. But
his eyes peered abroad, and his brain was active. He rode to muster as
the knight of old rode to the tourney.
His way led by a short cut through the ranges. The trysting place
lay just beyond. At a few miles end, he was entering a pass of
magnificence. The ranges lifted up on either hand, with mighty boulders
resting about their sides, and difficult caves--home of bat and
wallaby--opening dark mouths. The way took him below stunted trees, and
over brittle fallen boughs, and across stones which slipped beneath
the horse's feet. A second gully crossed the head of the pass, and
escapes led into the hills. Here was an old watch-ground of the blacks.
The difficult part of the journey had come. Power left the saddle for
the ground. The path turned left-handed, to clamber over a multitude
of rocks to easier country. In the rains a waterfall swirled this way.
Here and again here a pool of clear water was lodged in a basin of
rock, and above one such pool Nature had scooped a shelter in the hill.
Past tribes of men had left rude paintings on the wall. With snorts and
steadying cries the journey was done, and man and beast came out into a
wide timbered prospect.
It was a fair spot to hap on in that desolate country, with a good
gathering of trees about a dry creek bed, and one or two late birds
twittering in them, and a muster of insects going about their day's
work over the hot ground. There were grateful patches of shade. This
was Ten Mile. At noon O'Neill had vowed to be at hand with the mob.
Power looked at the sun and guessed at ten o'clock. He turned over
whether to go farther; but a wait in the shade was better argument
than a ride in the open. He took the saddle from the black horse, and
tethered the beast in a cool place, and he himself lay down at hand for
a pipe and his thoughts. Presently a thread of smoke curled into the
hot air, driving away disappointed the flies which came in their hosts
a-visiting.
It was pleasant work lying here in the shade with nothing to disturb a
fellow for an hour or two until the cattle came along, and the sunshine
heat finding a way into the shadow to make a man drowsy. It was good to
lie flat on one's back, blinking at the sunbeams through the leaves. It
was good, too, to suck at a pipe and watch the blue smoke go up. And
again it was good listening to the twitter of a few birds, and--opening
eyes--to see insects examining the ins and outs of the tree trunks.
It brought memories of other such lazy hours, snatched between a hard
morning and a hard afternoon. Give a man good health and work, and
there was little else he wanted to bring content.
How the smell of the scrub lingered this morning. Ordinarily the sun
drove it early away. If he lived too long and became an old blind man,
he would get someone to lead him to a patch of scrub at early morning
that he might sharpen memory there.
It must be hot in the open. The sunlight was burning him wherever a
break in the boughs let it through. He was a lucky chap to own this
great stretch of country, and every head of cattle on it, to have good
horses to ride, and to be his own master. No doubt there were unlucky
devils who never had these good things. A man knew little enough of
other men when all was said and done, and cared little enough for their
troubles either, if truth be told.
Yet things were a shade out of tune to-day, pretend as he might; put
the feeling by as he would. Presently he sat up. With an oath, he
knocked out his empty pipe on a stone. He whipped himself for a fool.
He was a man with a mind of his own, he was in love with another woman;
and a girl twenty years old, who had not spoken a dozen words to him,
was taking up his thoughts all day. Ah! but she was the most perfect
thing he had known.
The heat of the day came into the spot of his choosing, the sun climbed
into the sky, and he judged the hour towards noon. He rose to his feet,
pushed a handkerchief about his face, and grew busy gathering sticks on
a square of barren ground.
There came through the timber, after many minutes, a far-off murmur,
such as might travel from a distant surge of the sea, or from a heavy
wind moving in a hollow. It was vague, and many would have been at
pains to pick it up; but the horse lifted ears to it, and Power came
out of his brown study. It arrived as a murmur; but the passing minutes
gave it volume. It was strangely exciting. Power knew it from the
beginning. It was the roar of a mob of cattle driven against their will.
Presently the sound turned to broken bellowing, and into the tumult
entered the snapping of boughs, the bang of whips, and the fierce
voices of men. Power stood up. The mob must round the foot of a hill
before coming into view. He laid a hand on the horse's bridle and
waited for them.
They came in a little while--one or two as a beginning, afterwards
the body of them. They dawdled forward, picking at the grass tufts,
horning one another, and lifting heads to bellow. They showed to the
eye a hardy, good-coloured mob of store cattle, the big part of them
six-year bullocks, more ready for a doze by a waterhole than for this
journey in the sun with men hanging at their houghs. They counted two
hundred maybe, and three white stockmen and a couple of blackfellows
handled them, turning them on the flanks, and hunting them forward in
the rear. They were a suspicion nervous, and gave Power a wide berth;
but the noon heat made them easy handling. By the time they were round
the foot of the hill, a stockman, pulling about his horse, rid himself
of their company and cantered across. The man pulled up a big chestnut
animal a few yards from Power, and showed a happy, handsome face under
a big brimmed hat. He was a good figure of a man, riding his horse with
a swagger. He had wide kneepads to his saddle, and long rusty spurs at
his heels, a shirt wide open at the neck, and in his hand a whip. His
skin was brown. Sitting there, he looked a hardy fellow, one to put a
good day's work behind him.
He had pulled his horse up from the canter. "Day, Mr. Power."
"Good day, Mick. They came along all right?"
"Yes, boss. A strong lot. Good travellers. An' quiet enough too. We'll
make Morning Springs Wednesday certain."
Power nodded his head. "Did you cut those few out?"
"All bar a half-dozen. We can fix 'em at the camp to-night. There's
a roan bull to be dropped. I don't know how he came with this lot. I
didn't see him when we picked 'em up. He wants watching. He's cranky in
the head." So speaking, the man leaned over and pointed his whip at a
beast on the outside of the mob. "I suppose we're making camp here for
an hour or two."
"My oath, yes. I'll get a fire going."
Mick O'Neill turned his horse about and put it to the canter. Again he
made a figure becoming his name as the daddy stockman for a hundred
miles about. Power filled a quart pot at the water-bag, and built and
lit a fire. The flames rushed to embrace the hot wood. Others of the
company arrived with filled quart pots and pushed them into the flames.
The blackfellows held the cattle until they had drawn out and dropped
to their knees. The horses were unsaddled and unbitted. The quart pots
came from the fire. The tea was made. The sticks were trodden into the
sand, and the company took themselves into the shade, to sprawl there,
one eye waiting for the cattle, one hand waiting for the flies.
They kept to camp through the heat of the day, and little was spoken
the while. They smoked and stared up through a lattice of leaves at
the lofty sky. The fierceness of the sun was spent when Power gave the
signal by sitting up. The horses were saddled, the men found their
seats--there was galloping of hoofs, a banging of whips, and the mob
flowed on the journey over the plain.
It was half-past six in the evening and the sun was down on the western
sky, when the mob splashed into the shallows at the lower end of
Pelican Pool. Cleanskin Joe, the lean rusty cook, who had spent a busy
life darkening the doorways of most hotels in Queensland and New South
Wales, had arrived there early in the morning, steering a two-horse
buckboard loaded up with swags, camp furniture and tucker bags.
Cleanskin Joe had built his fireplace, had put his Johnnie-cake in the
ashes, had talked half the day with Jackie the black horse-tailer,
coming after him with spare horses. Now, with his stew simmering, he
cast a hundred glances into the distance for the tardy cattle. His
eyes, once quick to meet an emergency, were bleared a trifle from that
constant darkening of doors. But finally they and his ears could not be
deceived, and he peered into the camp oven and turned the contents with
a long-handled ladle.
Now all the world knows that cooks from sheep stations give you grilled
chops and curry and stew the round of the year, and cooks on cattle
stations serve grilled steak and curry and stew until you turn aside in
sorrow; but Cleanskin Joe was a man of resource, and every breakfast he
chopped up rissoles, rolling them on the back of the buckboard where
had gathered the grime of ten years' honest service. Because of this,
and because too many whiskies had cured him of a love of water, either
for inside or outer use, he had won his name of Cleanskin Joe.
He was a man of history.
Once upon a time Cleanskin Joe and the Honourable So-and-so, both out
at elbows with the world just then, had found a copper show a round
forty miles from the nearest hotel. They woke up one morning on bowing
terms with wealth. They had broken a new lode going any percentage you
like of ore. They stared at it without a word to say.
The Honourable So-and-so had a vision. He saw dogs and women and wine.
And Cleanskin Joe saw the price of a whisky.
And Mr. So-and-so saw horses and cards and more wine.
And Cleanskin Joe saw the price of another whisky.
And Mr. So-and-so saw freedom from the Jews, and green tables and yet
more wine.
And Cleanskin Joe saw prices of endless whiskies.
Then said Mr. So-and-so, "Our one chance, old man, is to miss the
hotel." Cleanskin Joe wagged his head. Said Mr. So-and-so, "We must cut
the waggon road to miss it by a dozen miles."
They drove their road over rise and down dip, plying the tools with
right good will because of that vision. One night Mr. So-and-so would
say--"How about direction, dear fellow? Are we enough to the right?"
And next night it was Cleanskin Joe. "I reckon we're safe to miss that
blankey place now, holdin' left as we're doing."
But who shall win when Fate plays hide-and-seek? On the hottest day of
the hottest summer in man's memory, they drove the road into a clearing
of the bush where the doors of the Drink-me-Dry Hotel leaned open to
meet them.
. . . . . . .
Cleanskin Joe blinked his eyes through the smoke when Power cantered
up. "Evening, boss. I was lookin' for yer an hour since. What time do
yer want tucker ready?"
"Half an hour will finish us. There's a bit of cutting out to do. What
about a drop of tea?"
"Right on the spot. Take care. It's durned hot."
Power drank the tea, and urged his horse about. The bullocks straggled
from the pool where they had been drinking. Power had given orders to
keep the horses from water, and the cattle were rounded up on the way
from the shallows.
Presently the mob was bunched. First there came a time of talking and
shaking of heads. At the end of it, Power and O'Neill worked a way into
the jumble of animals, looking this way and that for the half dozen
cows, and keeping a wide eye for accidents. The beasts gave them fair
roadway, backing over here and there with snorting and a sweep of the
head. "Here we are," Power said.
He leaned a little forward and with a nice movement dropped his whip on
to the quarters of a red cow. On the instant the black horse answered
the signal. Power gave the reins to its neck and sat back with waiting
whip. Not far away O'Neill followed ready for what might come. The
black horse moved to the red cow's shoulder, and steered her with a
pretty cunning to the outside of the mob, nor lost place a single time,
though she twisted, turned and propped with skill. It was a game of
trick and shift to liven the eye of any man. She came presently to
the outermost circle, bellowing with nervousness and hurry. The black
horse was at her shoulder goading her farther into the open. She lost
her head and trotted a few paces from the mob, and that moment turned
the scales against her. As the black horse got into his stride, Power
let out his whip, and O'Neill came up behind with a hurry of hoofs.
They fell upon her with a scramble of blows. She bellowed, threw up her
head, tried to swing back to the mob, slipped, heard the bang of whips
about her ears, and took to her heels across the plain, with both men
at her tail. She showed them her heels for a quarter of a mile. "She's
right!" Power cried out.
The last of the cows was cut out as dusk began to settle. There
remained only a few minutes to dark. "There's that bull yet," Power
said. He sat on a heaving horse, and lifted his hat from his head. The
men pushed a passage into the mob again. The herd was showing rather
nervous, and took handling to hold together. The roan bull met their
coming with a bellow and a shake of the head. But the black horse stood
to his shoulder, and the journey to the outside began. All the way the
bull showed little liking for the hustling, but his efforts to trick
the enemy availed him nothing, and he found himself of a sudden on
the outside of the mob, and a black horse urging him farther into the
open. In a flash he turned very ugly. It was the turn of a hair whether
he rushed or not. There was no waiting to add up chances, a wasted
moment meant his loss into the mob. Power brought his whip down, and
a long broad mark curled up in the smoking hair. The bull roared and
dropped his head. He was coming this time with no two meanings. Power
swept up the reins to pull the horse aside. Ill luck was at his back.
He found himself jammed in a press of cattle. He shook his feet clear
of the stirrups. He made ready with the whip again. He cut into the
bull again, and he felt the horse go beneath him, and himself falling
back into a huddle of bellowing beasts. With all his might he pulled
the horse clear of the horns. Horse and bull and he came down in a
scurry on the ground. He rolled clear of the saddle. He scrambled on to
a knee. He spat the dust from his mouth. And then the mob at his back
split, and O'Neill rode up in a fury, a whip waiting in his hand. The
bull was on its knees, jerking to its feet. A hurry of blows fell about
its face. It stumbled, slipped, and sprawled on its back. The whip
stopped falling, and a man jumped from his horse to the ground. With
great quickness he caught up the bull's tail, and thrust a foot into
a hollow of its hip. Thus he held it on the ground without any great
effort. There was shouting as the men called to each other.
"Are yer orl right?"
"Think so."
"Can you get clear?"
"Aye!"
On the words followed a scramble of hoofs and a heave as the black
horse gained his haunches. Power was on his feet, and had thrown a leg
across the saddle. Another scramble, another heave gave the horse its
legs and Power a seat a-top of it. Power swung it to one hand with rein
and spurs, and leant far from the saddle towards the horse standing by.
"Let go when you can!" he cried out. "I have your horse!"
The man on the ground sprang clear of the bull. He clapped both hands
on the arch of the saddle, and vaulted into the seat. Shaken, and
with lost breath, the bull found its feet, but it had not thrown the
sweat from its eyes before the whips fell on it with a cruel fury. Its
courage was no more. It took to its heels across the plain.
"Close go that," O'Neill said. "Are you hurt any?"
"No, I fell clear. You got me out of a hole. I'll do as much for you
some day."
"All in a day's work," O'Neill said. "'Struth! I reckon it's time for a
pipe."
Quite suddenly the night stepped into the shoes of day. Darkness
arrived in a hurry, and the stars pushed themselves out of the sky.
The camp was chosen, the first watch was set. The horses, hobbled and
with bells about their necks, moved musically into the shadows, the
little company found the way to the cook's fire. There was stew in the
camp oven, and a ladle at hand. A pile of tin dishes was on the ground.
The Johnnie-cake waited on a box, and the earth lay spread for a
table. There is many a worse roof than the sky offers, and many a more
restless bed than a mattress of grasses.
Supper ended, and there came the hour when pipes are pulled out. Power
went out of the firelight presently, and listened to the mob getting
to camp for the night. There was a little bellowing from over there,
and now and then sounds of scurry, but nothing to cause unquiet. He
came back to O'Neill. "I'm going across to Gregory's for a while," he
said. "He was talking about a copper show of his. I'll be back for my
watch. I don't think you will have any trouble. Good night." He thought
O'Neill looked up over-quickly. "I don't think you will have any
trouble," he repeated. "Would you sooner I stayed? I will if you like."
"There's no need, boss," said the other indifferently. "I didn't know
you knew them over there." The man began whistling.
"So long, then."
"So long, boss."