Читать книгу The Squatter King - A Romance of Bush Life - Edward S Sorenson - Страница 9

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The winter with its frosty mornings and biting winds had come; bleak in particular on the plains and on the clear hills for the horse-boy, who had to have the stock horses in the yard by sunrise; and to Jake, the mailman, riding early and late, hunched in his saddle, with numbed fingers and toes and tingling ears.

The men were preparing for a mustering tour, and on the eve of setting out the captain called Sid from the buggy-shed, where he had been washing wheels and greasing axles.

The captain was standing in front of the office, and as Sid approached he eyed him in his customary studious fashion; his scrutiny, in fact, continued for seconds after the young fellow had come to a standstill. Meanwhile he stroked his beard thoughtfully. Most people liked the captain at sight; though he had a ferocious aspect, there was humour in it; but his silent, meditative stare was disconcerting to new hands.

Sid was about to ask if he wanted him, when the captain said, without lifting his gaze:

"Ride in those boots?"

"Yes." Sid looked down in surprise at his footwear.

"Broken in the soles, aren't they?"

"Yes," he admitted, "they're beginning to go."

"Not safe," said the captain with a shake of his head. "Liable to catch in the stirrup. Better get a new pair."

The captain sold boots—price exorbitant; but at the moment he was doubtless innocent of any thought of personal gain.

Sid, with an eye to economy, said he would get a special pair for riding, and use the old ones for knocking about in the yards and stables.

"Er—think you could ride the outlaw?" the captain asked presently.

The outlaw was the most notorious buck-jumper on Kanillabar. Several of the crack stockmen had tried to break him of his vicious habits, and had given him up.

Sid hesitated. "I'll try if you want me to," he replied.

"Think you could ride him?" the captain repeated. Recollecting that only a decisive answer, one way or the other, would satisfy the old gentleman, he answered in the affirmative. He was quite sure he would be thrown in two seconds, but he could not say no.

The captain took a few slow steps away and back again. "By-an'-bye," he said, shaking his head. "By-an'-bye."

Sid was not disappointed. The captain's next words made him feel highly elated.

"You'll go with the stockmen to-morrow; your wages will be twenty-five bob a week from now."

Sid thanked him for the unexpected rise.

"When you sit the outlaw on a cold morning you'll get thirty," the captain added.

Sid, finished now with cleaning and grooming, went straight across to Ben Bruce, who was sitting on the doorstep washing his clothes in a bucket. The old man was so pleased that he shook hands with him, forgetting that his own hand was wet with soapsuds.

"If you've any clothes to wash, you'd better get busy," he advised him. "We'll be starting early."

Sid got busy at once. He had done his own washing and sewing since he left Morella. He made his clothes last as long as possible, and many a night he and the head stockman sat on their bunks, working with needle and thread. When a garment was no longer wearable, the buttons were cut off and put in a tin, which was the property of both, and the best parts of the fabric were washed and put by for patches. They cut each other's hair, and in other ways were good bush mates.

In the middle of his washing, Berkley Hart, who had missed him from the shed, discovered his whereabouts, and came across at a brisk pace.

"What sort a' caper is this?" he shouted angrily. "Didn't I tell you to wash an' grease that buggy?"

"That's Brumby's work," Sid answered. He spoke with his usual quietness and civility, but it must be confessed that the situation engendered a little thrill of satisfaction.

Berkley stiffened as though an electric battery had been applied to him.

"What do you mean?" he demanded.

"I'm one of the stockmen," said Sid.

"Ho! A stockman, are you? Who said so?"

"The captain."

"He didn't tell me anything about it"—sulkily.

"Didn't he? I thought he would have asked you if you could spare me."

Sid kept on serenely with his washing, but at the gentle rub it came to an abrupt end. Berkley kicked the bucket over and grasped him violently by the shirt collar.

"Cheek me, you pup, will you!" he hissed, lifting him to his feet and shaking him with all his might.

Suddenly Sid's fist shot out, and Berkley hit the ground with the back of his head. He was up again in an instant, and rushed at his late henchman in a blind rage, only to meet a blow that sent him reeling against the wall. So far as weight and strength were concerned, they were well matched. Sid, however, knew how to use his hands, having many a time put the gloves on with Joe Steel, the storekeeper in Wonnaroo, who, in his young days, had been a lightweight pugilist. Berkley had no science at all. He was a bully, and, like all bullies, he was easily cowed.

With diminished fire he shaped up a third time. A hard left in the eye and a right punch in the mouth, promptly sent him back against the wall, and he subsided slowly into a sitting posture.

Ben, who had stood in the doorway, silently watching the contest, now stepped down.

"You'd better shake hands now, an' let bygones be bygones," he advised.

Sid held out his hand, but Berkley got up smartly and walked away, secretly vowing vengeance against "that Warri cub."

The cub finished his washing, fitted himself with a new pair of boots at the store, and employed the rest of the afternoon in cutting out a fall and plaiting a cracker for his whip, cleaning out the room, and scrubbing the floor. His clothes and what else he needed for the trip were placed ready to roll up in his blankets in the morning. Ben put in a supply of tobacco and matches, whilst some of the other men, especially the blacks, included a pack of cards.

Sid appreciated the change that relieved him of horse-hunting in the greyness of breaking-day. Still, early rising was a requisite virtue on Kanillabar. Most of the sleeping apartments of the white men were arranged on either side of the big dining room. No crockery was used in the hut, tin plates and pannikins taking its place; and Ned Young, the cook, threw these on to the table with a clatter that left no one with an excuse for oversleeping himself. A clangous bell, vigorously rung at front and back, completed the morning din. Sometimes Ned slept late, but he never let the boss know it. On such occasions he rung the bell as soon as he got up, and got the breakfast ready after.

While the frost was yet on the grass the stock horses trotted across the plain on the way to Glenboon. A blackfellow rode in front, the horses followed, and, behind them in pairs and groups rode a dozen musterers.

Only a faint bridle-track led to the sub squattage, winding among the trees like the twistings of a snake. It led them past an aboriginal village, where several naked blackboys amused themselves throwing waddies and toy spears at the passing horses, whilst their adult compatriots loudly remonstrated with them. Two or three were stretched on their backs in hive-shaped gunyahs, chanting a corroboree song for the edification of half a dozen promising juvenile vocalists; some chopping out boomerangs and shields on a log; others paring and smoothing the rough-hewn implements with pieces of broken glass.

A halt was made for lunch on the bank of a midway creek, and it was near sundown when Glenboon was reached. The hut, untenanted, was begrimed and falling to ruin; the walls draped with spiders' webs, the shutters broken, the doors hanging skew-wise on rusty hinges; whilst soiled rags and mouldy scraps of paper bestrewed the earthen floor.

Little was done to improve it beyond the building of a huge log fire, around which the men gathered as the chill night closed in. After tea, songs were sung, the overseer and some of the black stockmen contributing to the gaiety of the evening. Sid could sing well for a lad, and in that impromptu concert he was particularly happy.

Mustering commenced early next day, the men spreading out and meeting again hours later on some well-known camp with the mobs they had collected. The cattle camps were merely clear spots, generally sandy mounds, or small flats dotted with a few trees, where the cattle were gathered into one great mob, and those that were wanted drafted out on horseback. A final drafting through the yards completed the usual day's work. The branding was done in the morning, the fires being lit, and the brands heated before the day had dawned. Then into the saddles again, and off to another part of the wide run for more cattle.

The last herd was rounded up on a spot known as Millawah Camp. Broad, miry pools and deep holes hidden among a wilderness of cane grass and lignum partly surrounded it. The cattle were a wild lot, and the mustering of them from stony ridges and scrubby ranges had been hard on men and horses.

"Now, then, you boys, look alive there!" cried the overseer, as he spurred his foam flecked bay into their midst. Then cries of "Stop that heifer!" "Block the steer!" "Look out for the roan!" "Weaner wanted!" mingled with the deep burring of bulls, the lowing of cows and calves, the cracking of stockwhips, the lusty shouts of leather lunged men, and the ceaseless tramp and clatter of ten thousand hoofs.

Near the finish a red bullock broke out, and Ben endeavoured to wheel it towards the "yard mob." Instead of turning, it charged the horse, horning it in the hind quarters. The horse kicked frantically, then bounded over a fallen tree, and landing with its head down, bucked so furiously that Ben, taken unawares, was quickly unseated.

He lay stunned on the brink of a deep pond. The bullock stood a few paces away, trembling and shaking its head; then, with a savage snort, it rushed forward.

Sid was not far away at the moment; but the huge trunk of the fallen tree lay between them. There was no time to round it, yet it looked like a broken neck to attempt to jump it with a tired horse. Still he rode him full gallop at it.

The game animal groaned with the effort, and though he crashed through a projecting limb and broke the crupper and a girth, he got over safely.

The bullock had dropped on its knees, trying to gore the unconscious man with its curved horns. A cold tremor shot through the rider's frame, his cheeks tingled and his eyes grew hot; then, clenching his teeth, and gripping the reins tightly, he galloped at the brute's neck. Striking it with the chest of his horse, the three floundered into the pool, the water and spray rising yards above them.

Sid was first to the surface, and scrambled out just as Rod Bryne rode up to where Ben lay verging into consciousness.

"Well done, old man!" he cried, breathlessly. "You did that fine. Catch your horse now before he gets away."

While still dripping wet, blue-cold and shivering, he remounted, and went after Ben's horse. By the time he returned Ben had recovered, and save for a few bruises and cuts and a rough shaking, he was not much the worse for his mishap.

"That's the second time you've saved me, old boy," he said, as they rode back to the mob, "an' may I perish if I forget it!"