I Can Jump Puddles, page 17
‘A solid pan, this . . .’ he said. ‘I picked it up near Mildura.’
He took some liver wrapped in newspaper from his tucker bag and frowned at it for a moment. ‘Liver is the worst meat in the world to spoil your pan,’ he said, pursing his lips so that his black moustache jutted forward contemplatively. ‘It sticks like a plaster.’
Like all swagmen, he was preoccupied with the weather. He was always studying the sky and speculating as to whether it was going to rain. He did not carry a tent in his swag, just the usual two blue blankets rolled round a few tattered garments and two or three tobacco tins containing his possessions.
‘A hundred and sixty points of rain fell on me one night near Elmore,’ he told me. ‘It was too bloody dark to move and I sat there with me back to a post just thinkin’. Next morning there was mud everywhere and I had to plough through it. There won’t be any rain tonight; it’s too cold. She’s comin’ up, though. Might strike here tomorrow afternoon.’
I told him he could sleep in the chaff house.
‘What about your old man?’ he asked.
‘He’s all right,’ I assured him. ‘He’ll make you a mattress out of straw.’
‘That was him I was talking to this afternoon, was it?’
‘Yes.’
‘He struck me as a good bloke. He rigs himself out flash but he talked to me just like I’m talking to you.’
‘Well, that’s right, isn’t it?’
‘Course it’s right. I think I will sleep in your chaff house,’ he added. ‘I been on a bender and I’m crook in the guts.’ He frowned at the pan in which the liver was sizzling. ‘I had terrible nightmares all night last night; dreamt I was on the track and the rain was comin’ down hell for leather. Me billy had a hole in it and I couldn’t make tea. Hell! I woke up sweatin’.’
Another swagman came walking down the road while we were talking. He was a short, thick-set man with a beard and his swag was long and thin. His tucker bag hung loosely in front of him and he walked with a heavy, deliberate tread.
The Fiddler looked up sharply and watched him approach. I could see by his expression that he did not want this man to stop and I wondered why.
The newcomer walked over to the fire and dropped his swag at his feet.
‘Goodday,’ he said.
‘Goodday,’ said The Fiddler. ‘Where you makin’?’
‘Adelaide.’
‘There’s a long lead ahead of you.’
‘Yes. Got a smoke on you?’
‘I’m on the butts. You can have a butt if you want it.’
‘That’ll do.’ The man took the butt The Fiddler handed him, placed it delicately between his pursed lips and lit it with a glowing stick he took from the fire.
‘Did you come through Turalla?’ he asked The Fiddler.
‘Yes. I lobbed here this afternoon.’
‘What’s the butcher and baker like there?’
‘The baker is all right, plenty of stale buns, but the butcher’s no good. He wouldn’t give you a burnt match. He’ll shove you on the Douglas for a flap of mutton.’
‘Did you go to the back of the pub?’
‘Yes. Got the butt of a roast there. The cook’s all right – a big woman. You could line off bricks with her nose. Ask her. Dodge her offsider. He’s a little bloke; wants a drink for anything he gets you.’
‘Any Johns there?’
‘No, but look out for the John at Balunga – that’s further on – he’s crook. He’ll dwell on you if you go on the grog.’
‘I’m only holding a deener, so to hell with him!’
‘You’ll be all right further north,’ said The Fiddler. ‘I see they’ve had rain up there so every cocky’ll be in at the pubs. You’ll get a guts full there.’
He cut a thick slice of bread from a loaf Mother had given him, divided the liver and placed one of the pieces on the bread which he handed to the man.
‘Here, get that into you.’
‘Thanks,’ said the man. He munched at it for a while then asked, ‘You don’t happen to have a needle and thread on you, do ya?’
‘No,’ said The Fiddler.
The man looked at a split in the knee of his trousers.
‘A pin?’
‘No.’
‘My boots are crook, too. What do they pay for harvesting round here?’
‘Seven bob a day.’
‘That’s right,’ said the man sourly. ‘Seven bob a day and they pay you off on Saturday so they won’t have to feed you on Sunday. Have you got another butt on you?’ he added.
‘No, I’m hanging on to these,’ said The Fiddler. ‘There’s a dance on at Turalla tonight. You’ll get plenty of butts round the door in the morning. I reckon you’d better get movin’ or she’ll be dark before you strike Turalla.’
‘Yes,’ said the man slowly, ‘I suppose I’d better.’ He rose to his feet. ‘Straight on?’ he asked swinging his swag on to his shoulder in one movement.
‘Don’t take the first turn, take the second. It’s about two miles.’
When he had gone I said to The Fiddler, ‘Wasn’t that fellow any good?’
‘He was humping a cigarette swag,’ explained The Fiddler. ‘We all dodge blokes with a swag like that. They never have anything. They bot on you for the lot. If that fellow joined up with you, you’d take all the skin off him draggin’ him. Now show me where this chaff house is.’
I took him up to the chaff house where Father, having seen me talking to him, had already thrown in some armfuls of clean straw.
The Fiddler looked at it for a few moments in silence then he said, ‘You don’t know how lucky you are.’
‘It’s good to be lucky, isn’t it?’ I said, liking him a lot.
‘Yes,’ he said.
I stood watching him unroll his swag.
‘S’elp me!’ he exclaimed looking around at me. ‘You hang round like a drover’s dog. Hadn’t you better go in and have tea?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I’d better. Goodnight, Mr Fiddler.’
‘Goodnight,’ he said gruffly.
A fortnight later he was burnt to death in his campfire eight miles from our place.
The man who told Father about it said, ‘He’d been on the metho for a couple of days, they say. He rolled into the fire in the night – you know how it’d be. I was sayin’ to Alec Simpson on my way down here, I said to him, “It was his breath that caught fire, that’s what it was.” He musta been fair fill of metho. Once his breath caught fire the flame would go curling down through his guts like a fuse. By the living Harry, he’d burn! I was just sayin’ it to Alec Simpson – Alec bought my chestnut mare, you know. I was just sayin’ before I came down here that that’s how he went all right and Alec said, “By hell, I think you’re right!” ’
Father was silent a moment then said, ‘Well, that’s the end of The Fiddler, poor beggar; he’s dead and gone now.’
ost men patronised me when they spoke to me, their usual attitude towards children. When other adults were listening it pleased them to be able to raise a laugh at my expense, not because they wished to hurt me but because my ingenuousness tempted them to play on it.
‘Been riding any buckjumpers lately, Alan?’ they would ask, a question I considered a serious one since I did not see myself as they did.
‘No,’ I would say. ‘I will be soon, though.’
This was considered by the one questioning me as worthy of a laugh and he would look towards his companions to include them in his mirth.
‘Didya get that? He’s going to ride buckjumpers next week.’
Some men were abrupt and curt with me, regarding all children as uninteresting and incapable of being able to contribute anything of value to a conversation. Confronted with such men I could find no common level to communicate with them and I was silent and awkward in their company.
On the other hand I discovered that swagmen and bushmen, being lonely men, were often awkward and unsure of themselves when a child spoke to them but when they were met with an uncritical friendliness they were eager to continue the conversation.
One old bushman I knew was like that. His name was Peter McLeod and he was a teamster who carted posts from deep in the bush forty miles below our place. Each week he came out with his laden waggon, spent Sunday with his wife, then returned again, striding beside his team or standing upright in the empty wagon whistling some Scotch air.
When I called out, ‘Goodday, Mr McLeod,’ he would stop and talk to me as if I were a man.
‘Looks like rain,’ he’d say, and I’d say it did too.
‘What’s the bush like where you go, Mr McLeod?’ I asked him one day.
‘As thick as the hairs on a dog,’ he answered, then added, as if the remark were a communication with himself, ‘Yes, she’s thick all right. By hell, she’s thick!’
He was a tall man with a shining black beard and legs that seemed longer than they should have been. His head bobbed when he walked and his big arms hung down a little in front of him. Father said he unfolded like a three-foot rule but Father liked him and told me he was an honest man and could fight like a tiger cat.
‘There’s none round here could beat him at his best,’ he said. ‘He’d lock horns with anyone after a few beers. He’s a tough, hard man with a soft heart but when he hits a man, the man stays hit.’
Peter hadn’t gone to church for twenty years. Father said, ‘then he went to vote against the Presbyterians joining up with the Methodists.’
Once a Mission came to Turalla and Peter, after a week of heavy drinking, decided to become converted but he backed out like a frightened horse when he found they expected him to knock off drinking and smoking.
‘I’ve been drinking and smoking to the Glory of God for forty years,’ he told Father, ‘and I’ll keep on for the Glory of God.’
‘That about sums up how he stands with God,’ Father said. ‘I don’t think he bothers much about Him when he’s carting posts.’
The bush Peter described to me seemed a magical place where kangaroos hopped quietly through the trees and possums chirred at night. It was the thought of an untouched bush that appealed to me. Peter called it ‘maiden bush’ – bush that had never known an axe.
But it was so far away. It took Peter two and a half days to reach the post-splitters’ camp and he slept beside his waggon for a week.
‘I wish I were you,’ I told him.
It was September and I was on holidays, the school being closed for a week. I had followed Peter’s team in my chair, wanting to see his five horses drink from the trough.
He carried a bucket to the two shafters and I sat in my chair and watched him.
‘Why’s that?’ he asked.
‘Then I could see the maiden bush,’ I told him.
‘Hold up!’ he sang out to the horse who was nosing the bucket he was lifting to her. She began drinking with a sucking noise.
‘I’ll take you there,’ he said, ‘I want a good bloke to help me. Yes, I’ll take you any time you like.’
‘Will you?’ I asked, unable to hide my excitement.
‘’Course I will,’ he said. ‘You ask your old man if you can come.’
‘When are you going?’
‘I leave at five tomorrow morning from the house. You get down there at five and I’ll take you.’
‘All right, Mr McLeod,’ I said. ‘Thank you, Mr McLeod. I’ll be there at five.’
I didn’t want to discuss it further. I set off for home as fast as my arms would take me.
When I told Father and Mother that Mr McLeod said he would take me to the bush, Father looked surprised and Mother asked, ‘Are you sure he meant it, Alan?’
‘Yes, yes,’ I said quickly. ‘He wants me to help him. We’re good mates. He said we were once. He told me to ask Dad if I could go.’
‘What did he say to you?’ asked Father.
‘He told me to be down at his place at five in the morning if you let me go.’
Mother looked questioningly at Father and he answered her glance.
‘Yes, I know, but it’ll all pay off in the end.’
‘It’s not the trip so much,’ she said. ‘It’s the drink and the bad language. You know what it’s like when men are shut up in the bush.’
‘There’ll be grog and bad language all right,’ Father agreed. ‘Make no mistake about that. But that won’t hurt him. It’s the kid who never sees men grogging up who takes to it when he grows up. Swearing’s the same – the kid who never hears bad language swears like a trooper when he’s a man.’
Mother looked at me and smiled. ‘So you’re going to leave us, are you?’ she said.
‘Only a week,’ I said, feeling guilty. ‘I’ll tell you all about it when I come home.’
‘Did Mr McLeod mention anything about tucker?’ she asked.
‘No,’ I said.
‘What have you got in the house?’ Father looked at Mother.
‘I’ve got that round of corned beef for tonight’s tea.’
‘Toss it into a bag with a couple of loaves of bread. That’ll do him. Peter’ll have tea.’
‘I’ve got to leave here at four,’ I said. ‘I mustn’t be late.’
‘I’ll wake you,’ Mother promised.
‘Help Peter as much as you can, son,’ said Father. ‘Show him the breed holds good. Light his campfire for him while he feeds the horses. There’s lots of jobs you can do.’
‘I’ll work,’ I said. ‘My word, I will!’
Mother didn’t have to wake me. I heard the creak of a board in the passage floor as she came out of her bedroom. I jumped out of bed and lit the candle. It was dark and cold and for some reason I felt depressed.
When I joined her she had lit the fire in the stove and was preparing my breakfast.
I hurried into Mary’s room and woke her up. ‘Don’t forget to feed the birds, will you, Mary?’ I said. ‘Let Pat out for a fly about five. The possum’s got plenty of green leaves but you’ll have to give him bread. You’ll have to change all the water today because I forgot, and the parrot loves thistles. There’s one growing behind the stable.’
‘All right,’ she promised sleepily. ‘What time is it?’
‘A quarter to four.’
‘Oo, dear!’ she exclaimed.
Mother had scrambled me an egg and I began eating it with unnecessary haste.
‘Don’t gulp your food down like that, Alan,’ she said.
‘There is plenty of time. Did you wash yourself properly?’
‘Yes.’
‘Behind the ears?’
‘Yes, all round my neck.’
‘I’ve put some things in this little bag for you. Don’t forget to clean your teeth with salt every morning. The brush is in the bag. And I’ve put in those old trousers of yours. Are your boots clean?’
‘I think so.’
She looked down at them. ‘No, they’re not. Take them off and I’ll black them.’
She broke a piece off a stick of blacking and mixed it with water in a saucer. I stood fidgeting while she rubbed the black liquid over my boots, impatient to be gone. She brushed them till they shone and helped me put them on.
‘I’ve taught you how to tie a bow,’ she said. ‘Why will you knot your laces?’
She carried the two sugar bags out to the buggy shed where I kept my chair and struck a match while I stacked them on the footboard and tied my crutches to the side.
The darkness had a bite of frost in it and I could hear a willy wagtail whistling from the old redgum. I had never been up so early before and I was excited with this new day that was still unspoilt by people, still silent with sleep.
‘No one in the world is up yet, are they?’ I said.
‘No, you’re the first up in the world,’ Mother said. ‘Be a good boy, won’t you?’
‘Yes,’ I promised her.
She opened the gate and I passed through almost at top speed.
‘Not so fast,’ she called after me in the dark.
Beneath the trees the darkness was like a wall and I slowed down. I could see the tops of the trees against the sky and I knew the shape of each of them. I knew where the holes in the road were and where it was better to cross the road and travel on the wrong side to avoid bad patches.
It was good to be alone and free to do as I wished. No grown-up was guiding me now. Everything I did was a direction from myself. I wanted it to be a long way to Peter McLeod’s, but I wanted to get there quickly.
Once I had left the lane and passed on to the main road I could go faster and my arms were beginning to ache by the time I reached Peter’s gate.
As I came down the track towards his house I could hear the iron shoes of the horses striking the cobblestoned floor of the stable. Though Peter and the horses were hidden in darkness I could see them with eyes created by sound. Tug chains clinked to impatient stamping, grains of chaff were snorted from nostrils and the stable door clattered as a horse bumped it passing out. Peter’s voice yelled commands, a dog yelped and roosters began crowing from the fowlyard.
Peter was yoking up the horses when I pulled up in front of the stable. It was still dark and for a moment he did not recognise me. He dropped the trace chain he was holding and stepped over to the chair, peering down at me.
‘It’s you, Alan. Strike me! what are you do— Cripes, you’re not coming with me, are you?’
‘You asked me,’ I replied uncertainly, suddenly afraid I had misunderstood him and he had not meant me to come.
‘’Course I asked you. I’ve been waiting here for you for hours.’
‘It’s not five yet,’ I said.
‘No, that’s right,’ he muttered, suddenly thoughtful.
‘Your old man said you could come, did he?’
‘Yes,’ I assured him. ‘So did Mum. I’ve got my tucker. Here it is.’ I lifted the bag to show him.
He suddenly grinned at me through his beard, ‘I’ll hop into that tonight,’ then changed his tone. ‘Come on. Shove your cart in the shed. We’ve got to be on the road at five.’ His face became serious again. ‘Are you sure your old man said you could come?’
