The Vintage and the Gleaning (6 page)

It is dusk and the crows are scuttling shadows. I take one last look at the mound of stones and start walking home. I wipe my hands on my jeans and when I look at my hands I see that they are bleeding.

Thursday, Spit doesn't show.

One of the boys drops in the heat. It is the quiet one and we hear him go down, his shovel falling against the wire, scraping against the wire as it falls and the whole line sounding and the thud of his body on the dirt.

In the next row the other boy goes to jump the vines.

Don't be stupid, says Wallace. He's not going anywhere, is he?

We go and look at the boy.

Anything broken? Wallace asks him.

The boy has come to and he is trying to sit up but he can't. His eyes are dazed. Wallace picks him up and carries him to the ute. He lays the boy on the tray and pours water over his head. The boy looks around wildly and keeps trying to raise his head but he can't.

You just lie there, says Wallace. It'll pass.

He hands the boy the water bottle and the boy takes it and tries to drink, the water spilling everywhere, the boy finding it hard to hold the bottle to his mouth. He turns his head and vomits and the puke runs down the tray.

He needs something stronger than that, says Roy.

The boy closes his eyes, shivering, his face gone white.

Take him down Poachers, says Roy. Be nice and cool in there. Get him out of this heat.

Yeah, give him a minute, says Wallace.

We stand watching the boy until he opens his eyes. He stares at us and closes them again. Wallace takes him by the shoulders and hauls him up, leaning him against the back of the cabin. The boy wavers, trying to steady himself.

You still dizzy? Wallace asks him.

The boy nods weakly and Wallace hands him the water bottle and he drinks again.

He's all right, says Wallace. He slides the boy down the tray and helps him stand up. The boy staggers, Wallace holding onto him. He eases the boy into the ute.

If you're going to throw up again do it out the window, Wallace says to him.

The boy sits slumped against the door.

Brandy, says Roy, as Wallace walks around to the driver's side. That'll set him right.

We watch them leave and go back to our rows.

After a while Wallace's ute passes us on the road, then comes back.

Told Boss, did you? asks Roy.

Wallace nods.

I am finishing Wallace's row. Wallace gets his shovel and works the row with me. Roy has stopped and is standing looking out at the road, waiting for us to catch up. The other boy is still going.

What'd Boss say? asks Roy.

He's worried isn't he, says Wallace. Going up to the house later. Talk to the mother.

Roy hawks and spits.

Reckon he'll come back?

Wallace reaches into some tangled vines, mumbling.

Roy spits again and rubs the spit into the dirt.

I don't reckon he'll come back, he says.

Wallace shrugs, pulling at the vines with both hands.

He was a good worker, I say.

Yeah, says Wallace, yanking hard. Good worker but he worked too hard, didn't he? We got one of them works too hard, other one doesn't work at all.

He tilts his head at the other boy.

Yeah but so what, says the boy. At least I don't faint.

Wallace is trying to tear the vines apart but they won't budge. He swears and takes out his knife.

Course you don't, says Wallace. Take it too bloody easy, don't you. At least your mate gave it a go.

Wallace cuts the vines and pulls out foliage, throwing it into the row. He takes off his hat and wipes his brow and his glasses and his knife.

Yeah, but I never fainted, says the boy. Fainting's for women.

Wallace puts his hat and glasses back on and looks at his knife. He folds it and puts it back in his pocket. He looks over at the boy, pushing his glasses against his face.

That's what you reckon is it? he says. Shows how much you've seen of life, boy.

I stick my shovel into the ground and lean against it. It is a hot day, still hot.

It's a pity about the boy, I say.

Yeah, says Wallace, picking up his shovel. I know.

It is hot all day long and nobody asks about the funeral.

After knockoff Roy parks the ute outside The Imperial.

What you parking here for? I ask.

Having a drink, says Roy, pulling up the handbrake. What'd you think I'm doing?

Yeah, I say. But here?

Roy takes off his hat and tilts the rear-view mirror to look at himself. He licks his fingers and combs his hair back with both hands.

It's a pub, isn't it? says Roy, looking at himself. It's a pub, serves drinks. He feels his stubble with his thumb.

Yeah, I say. But Imperial? I don't mind Imperial nights. Friday night. Saturday night. But afternoons?

Roy is looking at his fingernails.

Afternoons Imperial, I say. Mob of ratbags.

Roy is studying his face in the mirror, turning it this way and that. I watch men going into the pub.

Well nobody's forcing you, says Roy.

When I get out of the ute, Roy is still sitting looking at himself.

I walk down to the river and along the bank out to Spit's fishing spot. Twigs and leaves crackle under my boots. Skinks dart before me and butterflies dance. I pick up a stick and pound it against the ground as I walk.

I find the spot all right, but no sign of Spit. The ashes of a dead campfire sit in a shallow hole, rocks set around them. I scoop some up and rub them between my fingers. They are still warm and smell of urine. I cooee but nobody comes and nobody calls back.

Across the river cormorants line a dead branch fallen across the shallows. They are unmoving, their black wings outstretched, drying in the fading sun. I pick up a stone and shy it across the river. It skims the surface, jumping six times in a curve, water beading and flashing from out of the brown murk. The cormorants watch without interest.

Squatting down on my heels, I rummage through the brittle groundcover, the bark warped, the leaves bleached and pitted. There are hooks and lengths of line, the hooks bent out of shape, some new, some tarnished, some rusted through. I pick one out and snap it between my fingers. It is Spit's spot and has been for some time.

I go and sit on the roots of an old rivergum, leaning down to wash the ash off my hand. Resting my back between the buttresses of the trunk, I stretch out my legs, waiting.

A pelican comes down and hits the water in front of me, its wake rippling and churning. It holds its beak up and flaps its wings and rises from the water, shaking itself. It glides away up the river.

By the time I leave, the sun is setting red behind the rivergums. It looks as though the sky is burning up. And in the water the water is burning too.

Going back through town I see Spit's ute parked outside Poachers. Inside it is empty except for Ted Matthews sitting watching the television and Spit at the bar talking to Liz.

I thought you was fishing, I say to Spit.

I was, says Spit.

Liz pours me a lemon squash.

Roy Thompson said you was fishing, I say. I just been down the river looking for you.

Yeah? says Spit.

Spit hands Liz his empty pot and lights a cigarette. He is leaning with his elbow on the bar.

I'm in the doghouse at home, he says.

Liz hands him the pot back full and he drains it and slides it back to her.

It'll blow over, won't it? I say.

Yeah, I suppose, says Spit.

Noise comes from the television. The greyhounds are on. Light flickers over Ted Matthews' face. Liz puts another pot down on the counter.

It always blows over, doesn't it? I say.

Yeah, says Spit. Eventually.

Spit fiddles around in the pocket of his jeans and takes out his wallet. He hands Liz a note and she opens the cash register and puts change on the bar towel. Spit grinds his cigarette into an ashtray and lights another one. He picks up his glass and turns around, leaning his back against the counter.

How was the fishing? I ask him.

Piss-poor, says Spit.

Friday, Spit doesn't show but the boys do, both of them.

Wallace is pleased. He is trying not to let on but you can tell Wallace is pleased.

Whaddya doing coming in today for, he says to the one who'd dropped. You should have taken the day off. Take it easy. Build your model airplane.

I'm all right, says the boy.

Yeah, well, don't work yourself too hard today, says Wallace.

Just take it slow, all right. Smithy'll pick up the slack.

Wallace gets the jerry can from the back of the ute. He tells the boys to hold out their hands.

Not like that, says Wallace. Like this.

He shows them, cupping his hands.

Wallace pours turps onto the boys' hands.

Rub it in, he says.

The boys rub their hands together.

That'll toughen them up, he says. Put some calluses on them.

He shows the boys his hands.

What about the old-fashioned way, says Roy.

Wallace laughs.

I still reckon the old-fashioned way's better, says Roy.

They want to do that it's their business, says Wallace, pushing his glasses against his face. Nothing to do with me.

He watches the boys rubbing the turps into their hands and gives each of them a shovel. They run their hands up and down the shafts, making them shine.

When you got some calluses there, I'll give you a go with the mattock, says Wallace. Put some muscle on you.

He looks at the boys for a moment.

Righteo, he says and goes into the vines.

Boss comes up to see how the boy is going.

Glutton for punishment, isn't he, Wallace, he says.

I'll keep an eye on him, says Wallace.

Boss leans over the vines.

You're a glutton for punishment, aren't you, he says to the boy.

I'm all right, says the boy.

Boss folds his arms and rests his chest against the tops of the vines, looking at the boy.

You were pushing yourself too hard, he says. No point in that.

He smiles at the boy and stands up straight, wiping off his jumper.

No point pushing yourself, is there Wallace? he says. Not if you're going to knock yourself around.

That's right, says Wallace.

He is chopping at a knot. Wood chips fly about and he grunts as he works.

I mean, these vines aren't going anywhere, are they? Boss says to the boy. It's not a competition. Not a race.

He picks at his jumper.

You make sure he takes it easy today, he says to Wallace.

Yeah, I got my eye on him, says Wallace.

He brings his shovel down hard and the knot splits off, scudding across the ground.

Best put some tar on that, says Boss.

Righteo, says Wallace.

Boss heads off down the row and then turns and comes back.

You mind if Iris borrows someone for the afternoon? he asks Wallace.

Yeah, no worries, says Wallace.

Boss looks up at the sky.

Just a bit of garden work I think today, he says.

Wallace squats down to look at the vine. He rubs the raw white gash with his fingers.

I'll send someone up, he says.

Good-o, says Boss.

Boss leaves.

Wallace stands up and points at the boy, the other one.

That's you, Yap-yap, he says.

Roy laughs.

Wallace is grinning. He looks at the boy.

He's going to love working for Iris, says Roy.

What'd you mean? asks the boy, stopping his work and looking up.

Roy and Wallace look at each other over the rows and then they both look at the boy.

By gee boy, you're in for it today, says Wallace. There's no fooling Iris. No getting away with things like you do down here. Not with Iris.

The boy says something.

You'll see, says Wallace.

He's going to love Iris, says Roy.

Wallace laughs and goes back to work. Roy spits and pulls up his shovel.

I'll go, I say. Makes no difference to me.

After lunch I walk to the cellar through paddocks and lanes. The sun is strong and high and the land suffers. Paddocks are littered with the bones of livestock, the grass grazed short, scorched or gone to clay. Solitary eucalypts stand dead, dry and enormous, their fallen branches split and hollowed. Flocks of filthy, daggy sheep press together underneath the scrapes of shade, their fleece gone the colour of the earth. I feel their heat and there is the stench of damp, dirty lanolin. Rams jostle through the mob, dipping their horns at me, giving deepthroated warnings.

Flies find me. They swarm and I walk with one hand waving, slapping my neck. I catch one and look at it dead between my fingers, its body bloated and tinted blue in the sunlight. I flick it away. Rabbits bolt before me. My shadow bobs.

Lanes rough with rock, glutted with long grass, soft and loamy beneath their crusts, bearing the deep indents of tractor tyres, crumbling beneath my feet. Vineyards back onto them, the vines crawling wild over the fences and webbing the lanes in a crazed tangle, leaves tiered to the ground.

Brief canopies of trees cast a scattered shade, sunlight glancing through the still shadows. Their bark is thick and scarred and they creak in the heat. The deafening screech of cicadas. I break a branch from a stringy-bark and peel it to its pale wood, pummelling the bald stick against the ground as I go.

Dogs bark as I pass. Quartz juts from the earth and sparkles. A single birdcall sounds across dead open spaces. A motorcycle comes towards me down a rolling paddock, lined by a high deer fence. The farmer, Dan Patterson, waves as he recognises me and turns back to the doe pen. The stags graze in the open. One of them raises its head to look at me, chewing its cud. It is young, bay-pointed, strips of velvet hanging from its hard naked antlers.

Farmhouses in the distance. Crops of blanched wheat and barley. Orchards of towering cherry trees, glossy-leaved citrus, walnuts, olives, vines, always the vines, some disbudded in neat rows, others still wild with summer growth.