Daughter of Australia (26 page)

James smiled, waved him off. “Only a drink, mate. My treat.”

That man did him a good deed—saved him from getting his few teeth knocked out. Ghan hurried on his peg leg and stopped them again. “Heard yer lookin' for work.”

“Yeah.” Tom stepped forward. “Know of any?”

“New chap comin' to run the mine outta Coolgardie. American fella. Word is he bought a couple of bush stations an' needs workers—drovers, stockmen, shearers, jackeroos, managers, the works.” Ghan pulled himself up. He wasn't a bum. “Know 'bout it 'cause I brought a load of wood up there. Buildin' everything fresh. Get in there first, yeh could probably pick yer job.”

That young man, James, had that thinking look again, his face intense and alert. “Where'd you say the station is?”

“Up near Leinster. Part of the old Miranda Creek Station.”

“Appreciate the tip.” James reached out a hand. “Did us a good service, sir.”

Ghan puffed out his chest.
Sir, he said.
He shook the hand offered and the shame melted away.
I ain't a bum.

“B
ronson said he'd move into the old manager quarters,” said Tom haltingly. “Keep an eye on you an' the girls.”

Mrs. Shelby's face turned fierce. “Already said I can handle a gun as good as any man.”

“I know. Everybody knows,” appeased Tom. “But if people hear there's not a man here, you might have t'use that gun. Bronson'll stay outta the way; you know that. He'll just sit on his stoop with his gun. More show than anything. Gives the poor bloke a purpose.”

When Tom finished, they waited, the silence expanding uncomfortably across the table. Tom's nerves frizzled. “Course, that's only if we get the job. Long shot for sure, but we'd be kickin' ourselves if we didn't try.”

Mrs. Shelby had aged; the corners of her eyelids drooped. Gray wiry strands lined the roots of the red hair piled and pinned on her head. She shifted her eyes to Tom, to James and then back to Tom. “Why you so desperate for money all of a sudden?”

Tom squirmed in his chair, reddened. “Taxes, Mum. Girls getting' older.” He floundered, “Drought comin'.”

“You're in trouble, aren't you.” It wasn't a question. Mrs. Shelby pulled in her bottom lip, stretching the skin on her chin. A great pleading held her eyes. “What you do, Tommie?”

Tom's mouth fell open. The blush drained and left his face pale.

“Nothing that can't be undone,” James interjected. “We're going to make it right, Mrs. Shelby. But we got to get work. Good work.”

The woman nodded in quick spurts, raised her head and sucked air in through her nose. “Orright. I'll speak with the renters about sharecropping.” Mrs. Shelby pointed to the office, avoiding her son's face. “Tommie, go fetch the books.”

Tom slinked away, the shame turning his gait crooked. “Boy's got no sense.” The weariness grew and sagged her jaws, aging her further. “Is the trouble bad?”

“Yeah.”

“Take care of him, James.” Mrs. Shelby closed her eyes. “Make things right.”

“I will.” James nodded. “Promise.”

 

“Coolgardie!” the conductor shouted above the roar of the steam engine.

“That's us.” James grabbed his pack from the seat.

Through the steam and smoke and wheels still burning from movement, they stepped off the train into a town of metal and looked up into a sky loud and crowded with roaring pistons and distant clangs. Rows of railroad tracks, lined with filthy ore cars, veered in clogged veins from the heart of the station. The smell of soot and oil and coal clung to the air. The clash of train cars coupling and grunting sent the eardrum retreating like a turtle's head in a shell. Miners, blackened and rough, dotted the platform and weaved between the cars. A mix of accents—Italian, Polish, Ukrainian—blurred with Australian slang, guttural and nearly indiscernible.

Two dark-eyed men sat atop a donkey cart, their cheeks swollen with tobacco. They snickered at the new arrivals, pointed to their pressed clothes. Tom hiked his bag up his shoulder in case he needed to hit someone with it. “Feel like a fish outta water about to get gutted.”

James crossed a set of tracks and approached the men. “G'day,” he greeted curtly.

The man to the right spit on the ground, left a red phlegm splotch near James's boot. “Waitin' fer a buggy, sweetie?”

James ignored him. “You work at the mine?”

“Me an' everybody else 'ere.”

“Heard there's a new manager coming in. You know anything about him?”

The threat in their faces left as they took on the look of men who suddenly found themselves a fraction superior with knowledge. They stretched their necks to meet the sought counsel. “ 'Arrington. Yankee bloke. Loaded son of a bitch.”

“Got a station around here?”

The men laughed. The left one spit. The tobacco landed on the foot of the donkey, who shuffled and kicked it away.

“What's so funny?” Tom asked.

“Yeah. He's got a station. More like a country. Over three million acres, they say.”

The other man, not to be outdone, leaned in and added, “Bloke's got a hundred thousand head of cattle on hold. Got horses, too. Bringin' 'em in from Middle East somewheres.”

“Sawdi 'Rabia!” chimed the other man.

“They hiring?”

The man shrugged his shoulders, his help burned out.

“Know where we can catch a ride?” Tom asked.

“Ask at McKellar's pub. Usually get a hitch there.”

“Thanks.” James tipped his hat and the men went back to stretching, chewing and spitting, watching the metal bang across metal.

“Think he was jokin' about three million acres?” Tom asked.

“Guess we'll find out.”

 

The driver of the old dray swayed in his seat from drink, singing a mix of three songs tied into one. He pulled the gray packhorse to a stop on a lone road, one side wired waist high with a fence that went on as far as the eye could see. “This 'ere the start of the property,” he said. “Hole in the fence give yeh a shortcut to the house. Far as I can take yeh.”

Tom and James stepped out to the red earth. Spinifex dotted the landscape, rose like hairy moles on sunburned skin. They climbed through the fence and walked ahead, stayed focused on the direction of the sun. After an hour, they passed a rusty windmill. Tom paused, stared up at the still blades. “Think that drunk had any idea where he was sendin' us?”

James laughed, wiped the dust and sweat from his forehead. “Nope.”

“Christ, we're screwed.” They stopped then, looked around, every inch of land the same. “We're bloody lost.” Tom chuckled.

“We're dead, mate.”

“We'll be shriveled like raisins.” Tears streamed down Tom's cheeks with tired, thirsty roars of laughter.

James pulled out a canteen, drank through a spread smile, then handed it to Tom. “So much for clean clothes, eh?”

Tom examined his shirt littered with dirty, red handprints. “I'm a bloody mess.” Then he scanned James. “How the hell you keep so clean?”

James clicked his tongue. “I'm a gentleman.”

Tom shoved him in the shoulder, leaving a picture of his palm near the collar. James ignored him and perked, his eyes squinting into the distance. “Looks like a car.” He pointed to a small dust cloud that moved in a parallel line. “Must be the place.”

They moved quickly, keeping their eyes locked on the trail of dust so as not to lose it. From the horizon, buildings slowly emerged over the level ground like sprouted seeds. First an old whitewashed barn. Then a dented windmill, its shadow pointing east. Another barn popped up followed by a twenty-stall shearing shed, a ringed stable, three water towers. Beyond that, the big house loomed with fresh yellow brick and a gleaming iron roof. A screened verandah edged its girth, mounted by a metal bullnose that stuck out like lips.

James and Tom patted down their shirts and pants, wiped faces with clean handkerchiefs. A workman straddled the peak of a new roof, the stable big enough to hold thirty horses. James hollered up to him, “Looking for Mr. Harrington!”

The man pointed his hammer, spoke between nails held in his teeth, “Jist got back.”

Dropping their packs behind the barn, they headed to the drive, past the new Ford, its chrome covered in dust. The front door of the house opened. A man stepped out, yelled behind him, “Just tell them to get it here!” the American accent quick and direct.

The man wore beige riding pants and a starched white shirt opened far down at the collar and rolled up at the sleeves. He paused on the steps, lit a cigarette, his cheekbones prominent as he breathed in the tobacco before noticing the two men. A smile rose to his face and he clapped in drawn applause, the new cigarette hanging easily and expertly from his lips under a thin mustache. “It's about time! I was expecting you two days ago.”

Tom shot James a furtive glance from the side, raised his eyebrows with the unwarranted familiarity. “Train schedule was off,” he offered tentatively.

“Not surprised.” The American stepped up in high black boots, the foot dirtied to the ankle, the calf still shiny with polish. “Of course, it takes so long to get to the telegraph office, it's hard to know what to expect from one day to the next.” He looked them over and laughed. “You're filthy. You walk here?”

“Got a ride from Coolgardie,” Tom explained. “Bloke dropped us off a little short.”

“Should have taken the train to Gwalia. Would have saved you hours. Didn't you get the directions?” he asked sharply.

Tom rolled his eyes and shrugged his shoulders.

“Oh, well.” He smirked. “Half my orders get lost out here, sucked up in this bloody desert.” He nodded then, pleasantly. “We'll get you settled in a bit.” Then, letting the cigarette rest loosely in the side of his mouth, he stuck out a hand. “Alexander Harrington. Call me Alex.”

James reached out and shook the man's hand, their grips firm. “James O'Reilly.” He cocked his head to Tom. “Thomas Shelby.” Tom stuck out his hand and leaned forward in nearly a bow, caught himself and stepped back with a manly puff of his chest.

“I'm surprised.” Alex squinted, studied the new arrivals intently and sucked in a long drag. “When Mitchell told me about you, I pictured a couple of sunburned roughens. Seem young to be station managers.”

Tom choked, shuffled his feet and opened his mouth to set the record straight when James stepped up. “You kind of surprised us, too,” he said casually. “Seem young to own a station this size. No disrespect.”

“None taken.” The man put one hand in his pocket and grinned. “I'm relieved actually. You'll bring some energy to this place.”

Alex dropped the simmering butt, used his boot to cover it with dust. “Position pays six thousand a year with a five-hundred-dollar advance. Divide it any way you want.”

Tom's mouth fell open. James shot him a look and Tom clapped it shut.

“I know the base is a little less than you made before,” Alex added. “But there's bonuses if we make our numbers and, if you work hard, you'll be bringing in a heck of a lot more than you were in New South Wales. I'm a firm believer in incentives.” Alex clapped his hands once and rubbed his palms together. “Let me take you around and get you acquainted.” And then as an afterthought, “You need to clean up first? Get something to eat?”

“Ate on the way,” James answered easily. “Might as well get started.” He stepped in front of Tom, his face still naked with bewilderment.

“Good.” Alex clapped again. “Pick your horse.”

Once saddled, the three riders trotted past the two-story homestead, the steel roof pearly and blinding. French doors leading out to the verandah lined every few feet. Fruit trees, new and recently planted, hung limp and thin as willows in the sun. A wiry rosebush tried to grasp its stems to the side of the house, but besides that the vegetation was slim.

“I had the old house leveled,” Alex explained. “Everything's new—the barns, the water towers—everything. Once we get settled, we'll work on the landscape. There's a lot to do.”

Alex kicked his horse. He was a good rider, strong and postured. The men rounded a corner to a wide riding arena. A cluster of Aboriginal men, odd and uncomfortable in Western clothes, leaned against the fence posts; a few sat crisscross on the dirt.

Alex pulled his horse to a stop. “I've got twelve Aboriginal stockmen, hand-me-downs from the last station that was here. Live about five miles that way in a bunch of shacks, like a shantytown. I've only been out there once. Would have cleared them all out, but the neighbors tell me they'd stick around regardless, sleep under the sky as easily as they would under a roof.”

Leaning back in the saddle, Alex raised a long leg up and bent his knee, rested his elbow against it. “Can't understand a word they say, can't even make out if it's English. But heard they make good stockmen, as long as they're led and directed, that is. Cheap, too. Seem happy enough working for sugar, tea, meat and tobacco.” He looked at James, then Tom, then back at James. “But you're the ones that got to manage. If they're not pulling their weight, they're out.”

A couple of white men lingered past the ring—one sinewy, his neck tight and stringy; the other a bit taller but with short, stubby arms. “Who are they?” Tom asked.

Alex shrugged indifferently. “Beecher and Russell. Roustabouts that I hired from another station. Quiet, seem harmless enough. Take orders but aren't thinkers. I needed someone to take care of the horses right away.” He scratched his neck. “Keep them or fire them, it's up to you.”

Five horses centered the arena, their muscles slick and defined as they stepped within the perimeter. “Beauties,” Tom said. “You planning to breed them?”

“That's the plan. Should get some good racers out of them.”

“Got some wild ones out there, too,” Tom noted.

“Stallion's a beast. Won't let anyone near him. Have to bring someone in to break him.” Alex clicked his tongue, put the horse in motion again, rode between James and Tom over the flat, low-lying country. “Property is three million acres,” he announced.

Without looking, James knew Tom was gripping the reins with white knuckles and probably sweating through his shirt. “How much stock do you have?” James asked.

“Ten thousand sheep right now. The bullocks are coming in a few months. You'll need to meet the drover halfway. Bringing them from up north—hundred and fifty thousand head.”