A Changing Land (18 page)

Matt drove away from Wangallon Homestead to the refrain of barking dogs. In the rear-view mirror he watched the Scottish ring-in walk slowly up the back path to the house, his head continuing to swivel from side to side. The boy didn't miss a trick during their morning tour and asked questions of him to the point of exhaustion. Matt continued on past the two orange trees, the remains of the once impressive orchard and the site of an old timber hut that some old Chinese man by the name of Lee lived in eons ago. Jim Macken was not at all what he'd imagined. The boy was tall, broad shouldered and clearly had a bit of nous behind that freckled face. However, he was certainly missing one thing. He didn't have the presence of a Gordon. He blended in with the rest of the population like a soldier ant. Strange that. Dodgy breeding, he concluded. The only thing that would make Jim stand out in a crowd was money, which was clearly why the boy had flown halfway around the world.

Matt was aware of the stipulation in Angus's will regarding the
time frame for Jim to be told of his inheritance. Angus had hoped Sarah and Anthony would be married and have consolidated their working relationship on the property before Jim's arrival. Up ahead, two emus crossed the dirt road, their long necks lengthening as they moved from a stately walk to a disturbed trot. They ducked through a stand of box trees and disappeared quickly from view. Matt accelerated, turned the radio up and twisted the knob until a Glen Campbell number came on. He listened to the lyrics for some time until his thoughts took him back to the days after Angus's return from hospital after nearly being killed by a rogue bullock.

They were sitting on the front verandah of Wangallon Homestead, Angus sprawled in an old squatter's chair, his left leg flung out over one of the extendable arms. Matt was smoking, flicking his ash into an ancient-looking brass spittoon, occasionally looking over his shoulder towards the oldest of the bedrooms that led out onto the verandah. Old houses gave him the creeps. He cradled a glass of beer in his injured hand, his mind still coming to terms with what Angus was telling him. The old patriarch had hand-picked Anthony from a short list of possible jackeroos years earlier and his judgement was rewarded with the lad having risen through the ranks to become manager. Angus explained that back then Anthony's selection was about finding a suitable marriage partner for Sarah. Angus knew the girl's strengths and figured that with Sarah and her brother, Cameron, living on Wangallon the place would go on for at least a couple of generations. Fate, however, had interceded and the boy had died.

Angus poured himself another shot of straight whisky and drained the glass. He offered Matt a highly coveted management role on Wangallon.

‘I've done my homework, Matt. The Carlyons speak extremely highly of you, as they would after twenty-eight years' service – they were sorry to see you go.'

Matt stretched out his injured hand, recalling how once he could pretty much do anything: Now his ability was limited to stock work, and more managerial at that.

‘I knew your father, Matt, honest as the day was long and I trusted him. My solicitor, Frank Michaels, agrees with my decision.'

At the word solicitor Matt straightened his back. He never had taken to men with soft hands who wore suits for a living. He took a gulp of beer.

‘After I've gone I need you to watch over the young ones.'

Matt opened his mouth, stifled a belch. Angus quieted him with a shake of his head.

‘I need the property safeguarded against the vagaries of youth. There is no one else equipped for the role. My own son is tied to a woman with Alzheimer's, among other problems.' Angus sloshed amber fluid into his glass from a silver-topped decanter. ‘Too weak anyway. Never had the gumption. Do you accept?'

Matt struggled to comprehend what was being offered as Angus topped up Matt's beer glass from a long neck.

‘As I said, the need may never arise. It will never be yours, though if you watch over her, monitor those who are left to run her after I'm gone, you will be handsomely rewarded.'

Matt felt the stirrings of a cramp in his buggered hand.

Angus leant towards him. ‘The thing is, Sarah's smart but she's a woman. Eventually there will be a fifth generation of Gordons and she'll have her hands busy with anklebiters. In my opinion, in a good fifty per cent of cases it's the men who should be rearing the young'uns.' Angus took a good slurp of whisky and belched. ‘Never affected the breeding numbers of the emus doing it that way. What was I saying? Oh yes, Anthony's morally strong; probably
got too much of a dose in that regard. But, and it's a big but, he's not a Gordon.' He curled his fist into the palm of his hand for emphasis. ‘He doesn't have the attachment to the property that a Gordon does and I doubt he could comprehend it.' He picked his nose. ‘How could he? One grandfather worked on the Snowy Mountains Hydro-Electric Scheme among other jobs, the other was a second-generation grazier from Western Victoria. He was a superb card player – always the sign of a wasted life – who lost his fortune in the fifties and then promptly shot himself. As the younger of two brothers the Monaro family property wasn't large enough to sustain all of them. Anthony was the one who had to leave. So –' Angus positioned his backside more comfortably in the hard canvas of the squatter's chair – ‘although Wangallon is the only job he's ever had and I know Anthony loves the place, I doubt he'd do anything to protect it; at least not the way I want it protected. I'll bet my dodgy prostate on that. If anything he'll always lean towards his moral convictions and put business first, not the land. And therein lies the quandary for Anthony, Matt. You can't have one without the other. I don't want the drive for the almighty dollar to destroy what my family's built. I want Sarah's children to inherit the property in its entirety. The boy's always had an ego. All I'm saying is keep Anthony in check.'

‘Ah, that's fairly loose,' Matt replied.

‘Loose? In my day loose was a woman on war rations in dark lipstick and too much perfume. Stand them opposite a Yankee officer holding a packet of silk stockings, and that's loose.'

Matt figured that was about all the instruction he was going to receive.

Angus proceeded to explain how he would be paid monthly in his employ as head stockman, but that a separate bank account would also be set up in Matt's name. ‘Call my solicitor if and when the time comes, Matt, and remember, if there are any problems you are employed with the mandate to protect Wangallon.'

Matt looked at his injured fingers. In the years to come it was possible his hand would be useless. He was a bush man. He couldn't end up in an old man's hospice, broke and sitting with a bunch of buggered old bastards in God's waiting room. ‘Sarah, you mean?' Matt confirmed.

‘Yes, Sarah and one other, Matt. You see my granddaughter has a half-brother, and a Gordon can't be turned aside. Frankly I'm at odds with bringing the boy into the fold although I would like to die knowing that I have done the right thing by him. And the acknowledgement of his existence will go some way to purging the mistakes of the past.'

‘Mistakes?'

Angus waved a bony finger. ‘Some things are best buried with a generation's passing. In this case, mine.'

Matt pulled up outside his house. His acceptance of this job was borne out of both financial need and intrigue; besides, who wouldn't have agreed with Angus Gordon? He merely needed to abide by the solicitor's instructions. Basically he was required to keep an eye on things and make sure they headed in the right direction. So far this current dry spell had been the first test. Quite frankly, being a little more adamant and putting Anthony offside didn't bother him in the slightest. His best interests were served by protecting Wangallon and Sarah. Besides which he figured he could hardly be fired. Matt pushed his hat back off his forehead and scratched at an itch that was part imagination and part a need for action. Then the thought came to him. If he was being paid to ensure Wangallon ran smoothly by watching over the current custodians, was anyone watching him?

Despite his avowed avoidance of all things spiritual, Matt looked up into the winter washed blue of the sky. This is just plain
stupid, he reprimanded himself. He needed to call Toby Williams and confirm the mustering of the first herd of cattle for the stock route. Ahead a willy-willy of dust spiralled upwards from the road, carrying dust and bits of spindly blow-away grass. The wind had risen and changed direction. It was heading towards Wangallon Homestead.

Angus watched his father as Hamish continued writing the day's activities in the station ledger. He'd been standing quietly for some minutes and the very act of not disturbing the scratching noise of ink on paper had made him desperate to move. He concentrated instead on a strip of light as it squeezed its way through the gap in the burgundy curtains. The sliver gradually decreased in intensity and the nearby kerosene lamp overcame the weakening daylight. Having only been in front of his father's wide desk previously, this perspective revealed a new world. He imagined Jasperson receiving his orders here, discussions regarding staff being made and money being counted. It was, Angus decided, a far better side of the desk to be on. Across the room a wall of books, stacked row upon row, reached to the ceiling. There was a wooden ladder with which to reach those books most out of reach, and an old armchair made of used wooden packing cases and covered with a dull red material. His mother hated that chair. She called it an old ugly thing. However
there were some things that Angus knew his father would not let go of. There was the armchair, a chest of drawers in his bedroom made from packing cases with sawn off cotton reels for handles, and there was the memory of his brother Charlie, Angus's uncle. These three things, like the founding of Wangallon itself, had come before Angus and his dear mother, Claire. In fact there had been a whole other family before them, of which only his half-brother, Luke, remained as proof that they had ever existed. Angus dropped his eyes to the tin chest sitting next to the battered armchair, its padlock tempting him with a tarnished keyhole grin.

Hamish poured brandy from a crystal decanter into a glass and checked his fob watch. ‘How is it possible that –'

Jasperson gave his customary three knocks on the study door and waited for Hamish's voice to enter. ‘My apologies, Boss, there was a problem …'

Hamish waved away the explanation. ‘Are you listening, Angus?'

Angus nodded, clamping his lips together in his best impression of concentration. It was a look that required much practising and having recently discovered the effectiveness of it he now realised he would have to be careful not to overuse it. Still, it was terribly hard to listen to his father when he could be with Luke, shooting wild ducks.

‘This, then, is the area of concern.'

Jasperson and Angus looked squarely at the map spread out on the desk, the curling corners of which were held in place by large polished rocks. Wangallon's boundary was marked by black ink with various paddocks outlined and named in his father's tight handwriting. Their newest acquisition, now known simply as West Wangallon, hung like a small branch off a mighty tree. The purchase of the block had only been completed eight months ago, yet already the extension on the bore drain had been completed, it was fully stocked and a one-room timber hut had been built for
the new boundary rider. His father's thick finger drifted to the far corner of the western boundary in the direction of the big river.

‘This area here.' His forefinger encircled the area.

‘It's not ours.' Angus clamped his mouth shut. He knew that the Crawford family had owned their land before even Wangallon existed, although it was difficult to believe such things, for having been read the Bible by his mother he was of the firm opinion that Wangallon had been created on the eighth day. His father cleared his throat, ran his fingers along the length of his moustache. Angus had never known him to look any different; he remained sun-blackened, with thick lines radiating from his violet eyes, lines that grew deep on occasion like the cracks that appeared in the black soil of their land when the rain was long in coming.

‘Crawford tried to poach some of our men earlier in the year. And then at Christmas there were other problems. They cut off our water and they have some of our stock. In any case as you can see our boundary runs here to Crawford Corner where the two properties adjoin. The river runs away from us and this part of Wangallon,' he tapped the map with his forefinger, ‘is left to depend on the bore drain for stock-watering purposes. Crawford knows this.'

Jasperson pointed at the map. ‘Crawford didn't extend the bore drain on his side of the river, so of course when it gets dry –'

‘He steals our water,' Angus said triumphantly.

‘Exactly. You're coming to an age, Angus, where you need to have a grasp of how things work in the bush. In the years to come when I'm not around, you'll have to listen to the advice of others. Listen –' he tapped his son's chest, the action sending Angus backwards – ‘However, when you are in charge of Wangallon, you make the final decision.'

Angus rubbed his chest as his father rolled up the large map and secured it with a piece of thin red ribbon.

‘There is only one simple rule to remember. Look after Wangallon, protect her at all costs and she in return will look after you.'

Angus stood back as the bulky frame of his father removed a long key from his trouser pocket. The creak of metal was the only indication that the chest had been opened, for Angus could not see past his father. Seconds later the creak sounded again and the map had been replaced with a thick book, the Wangallon station ledger.

‘You can go now, Angus. Jasperson and I have business to discuss. If you see that brother of yours, send him to me.'

Angus raced out onto the verandah. One of the maids was rushing away, crying, a man's chuckle reverberating with the encroaching dusk. There was a crunch of gravel and Luke appeared. He gave the straggly youth Angus recognised a sound shove, sending him sprawling to the ground, and was astride the prone body in an instant, his fist raised. The sharp intake of female breath broke his momentum. Both Angus and Luke followed the noise to where Margaret watched.

‘Luke,' Angus spluttered. Margaret stepped back into the shadows.

Grabbing the youth by the scruff of his neck Luke jerked him towards the verandah. The face before him was of no remarkable feature, except for the line of boils which ran down one cheek. The boy looked at him and gave a sly grin.

‘I'm McKenzie.' The youth made a show of dusting himself down. ‘I'm employed by –'

‘Mr Gordon,' Luke interrupted impatiently, ‘considering no one else would likely show at this hour of night without an invitation.' The boy's accent was Scottish, reason enough for his father to employ him. ‘I've not seen you before.' Angus joined Luke, clutching at the string of dropped ducks.

‘I'm with Jasperson.'

Luke's mouth curled downwards with distaste. ‘Don't make the mistake of thinking the blacks on Wangallon are easy picking.' He would have said more except for Angus. The boy stood very close; the ducks at his feet, his hands shoved in his pockets.

‘Apologies, Luke. McKenzie didn't know that one was taken.' Jasperson gave a short amused chortle through spindly yellow teeth.

‘Careful, McKenzie,' Luke warned. ‘My father has no time for troublemakers.'

‘Nor I,' Jasperson mounted his horse. ‘Half of these blacks should be culled.'

‘Who would do your work for you then?' Luke retaliated as the two men turned their horses into the darkening night.

‘Who would you be friends with?' Jasperson mocked. Only the crunch of hoofs on the gravel and the creak of oiled leather marked the men's leaving.

‘You don't like Jasperson, do you, Luke?' Angus asked. There was a smear of blood on Luke's cheek and the sickly sweet smell of death mingled with the sharp tang of cordite and the staleness of sweat. Angus poked a finger at one of the lifeless birds.

‘Luke?' Hamish was standing in the doorway, his frame blocking all but a few stray streaks of light from the hall behind him. ‘Come inside.' Angus bolted around the corner of the house.

Depositing the ducks and rifle on the verandah, Luke brushed his hands on his shirt front and followed his father into the study.

The room was musty and hot as Luke sprawled in the packing-case armchair. Hamish offered brandy, swigging his own down quickly. ‘Must you start a fight on my front lawn?'

Luke picked at the dried ducks' blood under his fingernails. ‘You have a bad habit of choosing debauched employees.'

Hamish let out a deep belly laugh. ‘And how is your whore?'

Luke flicked a ball of blood onto the floor. ‘I'm not married,' he challenged.

They stared at each other. ‘I'll be wanting to drive 1500 head south to market in two months. The feed's cutting out so it would be best to leave a little earlier while the cattle are strong.'

‘I'll be wanting news of my inheritance before I go,' Luke countered, lifting his brandy glass towards the light as if a connoisseur.

Hamish screwed his bushy eyebrows together.

‘The emporium,' Luke reminded him. ‘I expect it to be left to me.'

Hamish laced his fingers together. ‘And what would you be wanting with that? You have Wangallon and you're boss drover.'

‘
You
have Wangallon now and Angus will have it in the future. What do I get?' He threw the contents of the glass down his throat. ‘It's the only thing that will truly be mine.'

Hamish frowned. ‘What in God's name do you think I've been doing out here for the last fifty-plus years? You will be running Wangallon after I'm dead, in trust until Angus is old enough to take over.'

‘I see,' Luke stood. ‘It's a fine plan, father, and probably a good offer for an elder son who's a few years off fifty.'

‘Sit, sit. I've a problem with a neighbour. Crawford has stock of ours.'

‘You're not accusing them of theft?' Luke queried. ‘Things have been quiet for some years now. Let's keep it that way.'

Hamish's eyes gleamed. ‘No, no. I intend to make another offer for Crawford Corner. It's a large tract of land with good grass coverage and a mix of mainly black to light soils.'

‘I thought we were consolidating?'

‘I thought you wanted to be a shopkeeper,' Hamish retaliated. ‘The purchasing of the property would enable the rotation of our
stock. You know well enough that overstocking is damaging our fragile soils. I'm not of a mind to be forced to decrease stocking rates and lose productivity.'

Luke cared little for neighbours, good, bad or indifferent. ‘Well, it sounds like you've made up your mind. You know where to find me.'

Hamish took a sip of his drink. ‘Under a tree I presume'.