By Blow and Kiss

CHAPTER VI

The chiefs had met in council, and cast their plans, and outlined their campaign. The council itself was not an impressive affair, although large issues hung on it; in fact, it had a decidedly casual appearance. The boss was there, sitting in his sulky and leaning out, resting heavily on one arm. The manager stood with his foot on the step, and his fingers drumming a tattoo on his knee, and Scottie slowly and carefully whittled tobacco from a flat cake, and hardly raising his eyes from the operation.

They all looked as if they had met by chance, and were lazily passing the time of day. From the shade of her tent, Ess watched them stand so for ten minutes, and wondered why they idled there. The boss was not given to idling, she knew. Too heavy to walk or ride at a rapid pace, he relied on his trotters and his sulky to get him over the ground, and she rarely saw him that he was not tearing off somewhere or sitting with the reins gathered up ready to move on, while the horses gleamed with sweat, and their sides heaved quickly.

But he stood there now for fully ten minutes, and then Ess saw the council break up. Casual it may have looked, but actually it decided the fate of some twenty to thirty thousand sheep, the ownership of Coolongolong station, and – if she had only known it – incidentally, of Ess’s own life.

The tank was almost dry. Only a tiny pool of foul, thick, muddy water remained in the middle of a stretch of clay that ran from dry, cracking cakes round the outside edge to slimy, greasy, sticky mud near the centre. For days now a gang of men had done little else but toil in the gluey mess, black and fouled to the waists and the armpits with hauling out the sheep that were too weak to extricate themselves. A small army of men worked at top pressure cutting down the trees – all the men of the station and extra hands hired in the township. They lived in calico tents that shone white in the glare of the sun, and at nights their fires flickered and danced in the darkness. All day long the ring of the axes and the wail of the sheep went on under the pitiless sun; the dust lifted lazily, and eddied thick under the feet of everything that moved; the mirage danced and quivered out on the plains.

Ess was fascinated with it all – fascinated, and day by day growing more fearful. She was coming to understand better what lay behind all this activity of man and placid indifference of Nature. She could appreciate better what every twenty-four hours meant as she saw the increasing numbers of the sheep that had to be dragged from the mud of the tank, and noted the thinning of the remaining trees, and she began to fear this cruel, relentless sun, and scorching air, and hot, dry barren earth.

The boss was whirling past her tent when he saw her, and pulled his horses down to a fretful walk.

“You’re looking tired, my dear,” he called. “Don’t let the sun get you down, you know. Come over to the station any time. We’re making a move to-morrow, back to the hills. It’s the last ditch you know, but we’ll win through at that, we’ll hope. We’re not beaten yet – not beaten yet,” and he slacked his reins and disappeared in a smother of dust.

Ess sent a scribbled note to Steve that night, asking him to come over, as they would be moving off next day.

Steve had dropped in on their camp-fire circle on several of the past nights. Ess made welcome any of the men who cared to come and sit and chat with her and her uncle, for the old boss’s words stuck in her mind. “Cheer the boys up – it all helps” he had said, so she was doing the little she could to help.

Most of the men were shy and quiet, but she set herself to draw them out, and led them to talk about the sheep, and the weather, and their work – things they knew well, and were interested in, and at home with, and could make talk on.

And Steve came over alone, or with the others, and every time he came she was a little the more glad of his coming.

His wit was so keen and his tongue was so sharp that she enjoyed talking with him, and the play and fencing of words and ideas brightened and livened her, she told herself.

Usually, she had to admit ruefully, she had the worst of the bouts of fence, and only the night before she had again suffered defeat.

They had been arguing over the sentiment of the verses to the refrain of “He travels the fastest who travels alone,” she attacking and he defending it.

“It’s a most abominably selfish creed,” she cried.

“The writer wasn’t concerning himself with the ethics of it – he was merely stating the fact,” he retorted.

“I don’t admit it is a fact,” she said.

“Few women will admit the truth of what they don’t like,” he said, and “That is mere instinct,” she answered, “because mostly what they like is good, and the truth is good surely.”

“Sometimes truth is only a point of view,” he said.

“Nonsense – truth is truth, as right is right.”

“Then how do you account for it that I claim this writer’s words as the truth, and you claim them to be untruths? The world judging it might be divided as we are. How can you say which is the truth?”

She could not answer this, so swiftly struck at a side issue. “Badness is worse than untruth, and if the principle is bad, why glorify it in verse?”

“But I say it is true; if you admit the truth, to attack the badness, you’re saying the truth is bad.”

“The truth may be a very bad truth,” she cried triumphantly. “It often is. You are a truth, but you may be very bad. You’ll notice I spare you, and don’t say you are.”

“Thanks. But my badness again is a point of view. Here, as I am, if I marry three wives, I’m very bad; if I’m a Mormon or a Turk, I may still be a good one.”

“We’re leaving the subject,” she said; “I began by saying it was an abominable sentiment. It is.”

“Reiteration isn’t argument,” he returned coolly.

“What authority has he for a statement of the sort?”

“Some writings are on conviction, not authority. This may be one; or it may be from experience.”

“Down to Gehenna or up to the Throne, He travels the fastest, et cetera,” she quoted. “How can that be experience? He hasn’t been to them.”

“Not the physical ones, if there are such, but mental ones possibly. Have you never touched a Gehenna or a Throne?”

“No, I can’t say I have.”

“You will some day,” he said; “every woman does, and unfortunately she usually drags a man or men along with her.”

“But if she drags him there, he travels the faster for it. Therefore the writer is wrong.”

“Cleverly turned,” he admitted. “But I fancy the Throne the writer speaks of is Success. It appears so from the context.”

“You said the writer probably spoke from experience. You admit that he has that, and has travelled fast and far to Success?”

“Decidedly so,” he agreed.

“Then I have you,” she cried, clapping her hands in triumph. “You know that he is married?”

“Yes,” said Steve, grinning at her. “But he travelled his fastest and farthest before he married. You must admit that.”

“I don’t. I don’t know enough of his work or current opinions of it.”

“You know that he made his name and his way to Success before he married?”

“I know you agree with him because it’s an excuse for your own possible wickedness. And I hope you’ll always be forced to travel alone and prove the truth or untruth of your theory.”

Steve dropped the bantering tone he had used throughout, and leaned forward to look hard at her.

“That’s hitting below the belt,” he said, and rose abruptly. “And you’ve missed your best argument. To travel fast and far is not everything; it may be a very little thing compared to a corner in a dark humpy; and the ‘warm hearthstone’ be worth far more than all the ‘high hopes.’”

Then he said good night smoothly, but abruptly, and went. And Ess that night was not a little thoughtful – and sorry.

She was afraid that he might stay away this last night, and because all the time in camp had been so happy for her, she had no wish for him to take away unhappy thoughts of it.

So she scribbled her note, “Come over to-night. Sorry I was rude last night, but remember our compact. E.L.,” and folded it and wrote his name boldly on the back, and gave it to her uncle to read and to carry to Steve. “I was a little unkind last night, uncle,” she said, “and I don’t want to be that.”

When he came over this last night, she smiled at him and asked “Have I apologised enough for my rudeness?” and “The compact is more to me than the rudeness,” he told her.

“Very well,” she said gaily. “Now I’ve an endless string of questions to ask. Uncle here never understands that I don’t know as much about sheep and the rest of it as he does, and he gives the most meagre information. Now you tell me all sorts of wonderful things – not too wonderful, I hope. I always had my doubts about the stories of the foxes biting the tongues out of the live lambs, and not making another mark on them. Is that strictly true, uncle?”

“Too true, unfortunately,” said Scottie. “Ye’ll see plenty o’ them if ye see a lambin’ season here.”

“How perfectly horrible,” she said. “But I wanted to ask about this drive. How do you do it? Do you men walk behind or ride?”

“We ride, thank Heaven,” said Steve, fervently. “I tell you my legs are aching to get a grip on a saddle again. This sheep work doesn’t suit me, and I’m sick of the sight and sound and stench of the brutes. Give me a good horse on the hillsides, and the cattle charging to – er – billy-oh, and there’s something in it.”

“Never mind the cattle now,” she said; “tell me about the sheep. Can I help drive them?”

“I’ll lend you my stockwhip,” said Steve. “All you have to do is ride behind the mob and crack the whip. And it’s so easy to crack a stockwhip.”

“Now I know you’re fibbing,” she said accusingly. “Because uncle warned me, one day I had his, that I might cut my head off with it. Didn’t you, uncle?”

“Maybe no cut it off a’thegither,” said Scottie, “but ye can gie yersel’ a nasty bit slash wi’t.”

“Then I’ll cut you a long pole, and you can prod them in the ribs, and punch them up with it,” said Steve.

“Why prod them and crack whips at them?” asked Ess. “Is there any need to hurry them?”

“Need enough,” said Steve. “See here…” He dropped on one knee and picked up a stick, and scratched lines in the sand: “Here’s the camp, here’s the line of the hills, and here’s the valley leading to the Ridge. The hills in the back of the Ridge have the most feed left, and have some fairly level patches, so we’re pushing the sheep for there. You know how far it is to the valley leading to the Ridge, and you know there’s no water between here and there. And the sheep are weak enough now, and they’re getting weaker every day, and the longer they take to get there, the more will die on the road. So you see there is some need to hurry them. You’ll see some mighty unpleasant and apparently cruel work this next day or two, and I don’t know but what your uncle is making up his mind to send you to the station till it’s over.”

He glanced at Scottie as he spoke, but Ess spoke quickly.

“Uncle is going to do nothing of the sort,” she said. “I want to go right through this thing and see everything. I’m not going to be chased away when I don’t want to go.”

“We’ll let you do one day,” said Scottie, “and then you’ll mebbe go on ahead. I’ll likely be sending Blazes back to the Ridge then.”

“What time do we start, uncle?”

“We’ll be off at the first glint o’ licht,” said Scottie. “You can get some breakfast from the cook after we’re gone, an’ he’ll tak down the tent and pack it.”

“May I ride then? But who’ll drive the buggy back?”

“I can ride back after we make camp and bring it on,” said Steve; “we won’t move very far each day.”

“That’ll do,” said Scottie.

Steve had been sitting fastening a new cracker to his whip, and when he had finished Ess took it and tried to handle and crack it, he putting her grip right and showing how to hold and swing it, and the two of them laughing and playing like children with a toy. Steve praised her quickness in learning, and she was pleased out of all proportion at the praise. And when he left her that night she said: “I’m sorry we’re done with Mulga Camp. I’ve been so happy.”

It was still dark next morning when Ess heard the shouts and whip crackings, and bleating of the disturbed sheep, and when she emerged from her tent soon after light there was nothing to be seen of them but a heavy dun bank of dust on the horizon. She hurried over to the tent and cart where Blazes was busy packing up. “We’re completely left behind, Blazes,” she called. “Do let’s hurry and catch them. They’re ever so far away.”

“’Tain’t so fur, miss,” said Blazes; “you sit down an’ eat these chops, and we’ll soon be off after ’em, and catchin’ ’em.”

Ess ate her breakfast and helped Blazes to pack and take down her tent, then watched him take the horses down to water, and let him help her to the saddle. They trotted off over the broad track of the innumerable pointed dots of the sheep’s footprints, and as they came near to the dust Blazes swung well out on the flank of it. “We’ll dodge as much o’ that as we can,” he said; “it’s too like breathin’ solid sand to ride behind it.”

“But don’t the men have to ride behind it and in it?” asked Ess.

“They do, but we don’t,” said Blazes; “so we ain’t goin’ to.”

“What are those men doing with the carts?” asked Ess, pointing to one or two carts that zigzagged back and forth across the plain in the rear of the sheep.

“Pickin’ up skins,” said Blazes, briefly. They passed one or two of those ghastly red heaps, with the busy crows already at work, and Ess shuddered in spite of herself.

Through the dust she could see the horsemen looming dimly, and hear the clamour of cracking whips and barking dogs, and the scuffling rushes of the driven sheep. More horsemen were strung along the length of the sides of the moving droves, the whips snapping and lashing at the laggards.

As Blazes and Ess passed along the line they heard a hail and saw a dim figure waving through the haze. “How d’you like it, Miss Lincoln?” called Steve Knight, pushing his way out to them. His horse was wading knee deep in a slow-moving river of dirty grey backs, and carefully picking his way so as not to tread on the sheep that crowded under his hoofs.

“Seems to me that veil of yours is a useful idea,” commented Steve, as he emerged beside them, and tried to spit the dust from his lips. His face was coated and grimed thick, and nobody could have told the colour of his clothes, his hat, or even of his horse, for the clinging red layer.

“Aren’t you dreadfully thirsty?” asked Ess. “I know I am, in spite of my veil, and I’ve only just caught up, and have kept fairly clear of the dust.”

Steve made a grimace. “I’m thirsty – I believe you,” he said, “but the day’s hardly begun, and it’s early to bother about thirst yet. But you’d best push ahead and catch Blazes up. He’ll go ahead to where we’ll halt to-night, and he might scratch a cup of tea for you. I must be shovin’ ’em on. Wouldn’t care to take the whip and have a smack at ’em, would you?”

She shook her head. “Poor brutes,” she said.

He laughed. “The sheep or the men?” he asked.

“Both,” she said. “I’m sorry for you both.”

“All in the day’s work,” he said, and turned to the sheep again. “Get well out from the dust,” he shouted to her, “and canter till you’re clear.”

The spot selected for the night’s camp was by an old well, nearly a mile wide of the line of march the sheep were taking to the hills.

The well was almost dry, and would provide barely enough water for the horses and men, and when Blazes got up the first bucketful, he looked at it ruefully.

“Seems ter me we won’t need to put no tea in that,” he remarked; “pretty near thick enough an’ black enough as it is.”

Ess inspected it gravely. “I should rather say it will need a lot of tea in it, to kill the taste it looks like having,” she said.

Ess and Blazes were acting advance guard, and none of the others had arrived, although, far off on the horizon, they could see the dust cloud that heralded the coming of the sheep. Blazes had brought a load of wood from the last camp – there was not a stick or a chip or twig in sight on the glaring, sun-scorched plain round the well – and immediately got to work preparing a meal for the riders, who would arrive later on. Ess insisted on helping him, although he tried to protest. “I dunno wot your uncle would say to see you stabbin’ round wi’ that knife,” he urged. “Choppin’ up sheep carcases ain’t no work for a girl.”

“There are some parts of the world – and even of Australia, Blazes – where they’d tell you that, and all sorts of cooking, was a woman’s work, and decidedly not a man’s.”

“Mebbe,” said Blazes. “But ’tain’t the way ’ere, an’ I don’t see it’s right. I can easy manage myself. I’d ’ave brought my ’elper along, but knowin’ how stiff the sheep was, I knew they’d be glad of ’im there to give a ’and, so I said as I’d do without ’im. But I didn’t think you’d go messin’ yourself up like this.”

By the time the vanguard of the sheep was abreast of them out on the plain, the first of the meal was ready for the men, who began to canter out from the moving dust cloud towards them, and for the next hour they were fed in relays, and pile after pile of chops and pot after pot of tea vanished rapidly.

Ess’s face was scorching and her knees trembling under her when her uncle and Steve Knight rode up.

“Making myself useful, you see, uncle,” she called gaily, and Scottie Mackellar looked at her dubiously.

“So I see, lass,” he said, “but I doubt if it’s wise for you to be workin’ in that sun.”

“It’s all right,” she assured him. “Blazes rigged a sort of shelter with the tent, and I’ve kept under that mostly, and helped manufacture chops. But now I’m coming to have some tea with you, if Blazes will let me spell off.”

They sat round the cook cart, from the top of which Blazes had rigged the tent as an awning, and ate their meal in the roughest sort of picnic fashion. Ess had a box to sit on, but the two men simply squatted tailor-wise with a plate between their knees.

“Lord, but that’s good,” said Steve Knight, sipping at the hot tea, and blowing it impatiently. “Worst of hot tea is it’s so tantalising. A man wants to lift the billy to his head and swallow a quart of it right down, instead of taking dainty little sips at it like a lady at an afternoon tea party.”

“I’m sure the ladies would feel flattered at the comparison,” laughed Ess, “if they could see you holding a black tin billy-can with both hands, and gulping out of it, and blowing on the tea like a grampus between gulps.”

“If the ladies had been bucketing about in a red-hot sun on a red-hot saddle, over red-hot sand all day, I’m thinking they’d gulp too,” retorted Steve.

“And the poor sheep have the same sun and sand, and nothing to drink,” said Ess, pityingly.

“Poor sheep!” snorted Steve. “Silly staggering blighters. Here we’re working ourselves to death just to persuade them to hurry up to their chance of salvation in the hills, and they go crawling along, and standing up to look at you, and trying to run the wrong way, while we sling whip-cracks and cusses at ’em till our arms, lips, and language are stiff.”

Scottie Mackellar had been munching at his bread and meat, and swallowing his hot tea in silence. “How are they making out, uncle?” she asked him.

“No’ very good,” said Scottie. “They’re beginnin’ tae drop in droves, an’ they’re too weak tae more than crawl. We’re keepin’ them on the move through the nicht.”

“Forced marching, you see,” said Steve; “it’s do or die with them now. If we can get them into the hills by to-morrow night we may pull them through; if not – ” he broke off and shrugged his shoulders.

“Are ye going back for that buggy to-night?” asked Scottie.

“Yes,” said Steve, “I’ll start inside half an hour.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry I didn’t drive it instead of riding to-day,” said Ess, in dismay. “You must be dead tired, and will have little enough rest to-night, as it is.”

“Hutt!” said Steve, lightly. “I’ll be glad of a straight-on-end canter, after dodging about like a cat on hot bricks all day. And the drive back here in the buggy will be a rest enough from the saddle, and I’ll get an hour or two’s sleep when I get here.”

“I wish – I wish I might ride over and drive back with you,” said Ess. “Do you think I might, uncle?”

“Please yersel’, lass. If it’s no tirin’ ye too much.”

“Good,” said Steve, enthusiastically. “The sun’s down now, and it’ll be a bit cooler. I’ll get the horses, and we’ll start right off.”

“I don’t quite see how you know your way,” said Ess, a quarter of an hour after they had started, and had settled down to a long, steady canter.

Steve laughed. “Look down,” he said; “don’t you see the sheep tracks?”

“I don’t,” she confessed; “it’s too dark to see anything but a blur of sand.”

“Look up, then,” he answered; “the stars aren’t blurred anyway, and they point the way. I wish they weren’t so confoundedly bright. A bank of thick black cloud would mean a lot to me just now.”

“You’re thinking of rain?” said Ess.

“Does one think of anything else these days?” he said. “And now, to-night, rain would mean more to me than ever it did.”

“Why more than yesterday?” she asked.

“Wait till we’re driving back and I can talk in comfort, and I’ll tell you,” he said, and thereafter they rode in silence, the shuffling hoof-beats in the sand and the creak of saddlery the only sounds that broke the stillness.