The Bark Cutters (26 page)

Ahead, Anthony was walking up about forty head. To Sarah's right Colin chased a steer who was leading horse and rider a merry chase, refusing to join the main herd. She turned the mob towards the fence and waited as they crossed over the damaged section back into Wangallon. Six kilometres lay ahead of them, a good half day's travelling with cows and calves, but the animals needed to be moved down to the creek and onto some wheat stubble. Here with a supplement of molasses they would retain some condition, at least until they began feeding out hay if rain didn't come soon.

Colin appeared from the tree-line, galloping after the steer that was finally heading towards the main herd. He rode hard on the beast's flank, his horse shadowing every turn the steer tried to make, both animals rubbing against the other at full speed. With a final surge he manoeuvred the beast into the herd and, with a satisfied smirk, rode past Sarah.

‘Get 'em moving, will yah. We don't wanna be 'ere all day,' he called out to her as he broke into a trot, cracking his stockwhip pointedly beside her as he rode past.

Blaze reared at the sound of the whip and took off at a gallop. Unable to look back, with the noise of the muster fast disappearing, Sarah gripped the muscled flanks harder with her legs. Adrenalin surging, she held her body low, arms aching with the strain.

Anthony saw Blaze moments before the horse hit the tree-line. It was all he could do to bash through the moving cattle and call out her name. Reaching the timberline, he heard the crashing of sticks ahead and without hesitation held fast to Warrigal's neck and galloped in after Sarah.

As the terrain grew rougher, Blaze stumbled into one of many potholes. Sarah's hat caught in the branches of a dead sapling, her
hair tumbling loose from its ribbon. Blaze sprang over the cracked ground and Sarah hung on grimly, knowing that Blaze would tire eventually.

Anthony saw the cloud of dust before he caught sight of Sarah. He reached the road leading to the boundary gate between Wangallon and West Wangallon, cursing under his breath. Ahead, he could see Blaze tiring.

Lifting her eyes away from the sweat-woven hair of Blaze's neck, Sarah saw with dread that the high boundary gate was closed. ‘Whoa, fella, steady down!' But Blaze kept charging, the foam from his mouth flying back to splatter her cheeks. ‘Shit, Blaze!'

‘Sarah, pull him up. Now! You won't make it!' Warrigal was almost level with Blaze. Anthony stretched his arm towards her.

The gate was only metres away and Blaze was no jumper. Sarah sat up, leaned backwards, and pulled tight on the reins, her stirrups digging hard into the horse's flank. Blaze swerved violently, but the movement was too late. Unable to hold on, a rush of air hit her face and body as Sarah was flung out of the saddle, straight over the horse and onto hard-baked earth. A sickening crunch sounded.

Anthony was beside her in seconds, talking to her, his hands on her face and torso examining her for injuries. Raising a hand, Sarah touched the side of her jaw. Anthony's hand covered hers immediately, his fingers probing the injured tissue.

‘Ouch!'

She looked past him where he squatted, his hair plastered to his head from sweat, his hat gripped tightly in his hand.

‘Sarah, are you okay?'

Staggering in circles, Blaze glared in pain. The right nostril was hidden beneath a bulbous mass of bleeding flesh. The sweat-encrusted shoulder was crisscrossed with deep gashes. Blood streamed from the lacerations. In some places, the thick hide was
torn so deeply that the contour of white muscle protruded clearly. As the horse whinnied in pain, Sarah dropped her eyes to its right leg. It was broken. She looked straight through the pained expression on Anthony's face to the death mask of the horse, which should have belonged to Cameron, and screamed.

‘Sarah, get a hold of yourself,' Anthony murmured. ‘Anything broken?'

‘No.' Struggling into a sitting position, she shook her head, ridding herself of an image of her brother being dragged through the scrub, his arms and legs thrashing hopelessly amidst grass and fallen timber. It had taken Anthony two days to find Cameron's injured horse all those years ago. No-one else thought about the horse, but Anthony had been determined to find the poor animal and put him down.

‘Bloody hell, Sarah, you could have really hurt yourself!' Anthony placed both his hands under her armpits, pulling her to her feet. She looked scared and it was possible there were a few ribs broken, but otherwise she appeared all right. ‘Gawd, you've gotta learn to be more careful.' He brushed dirt from her shoulders and back, pushed strands of sweaty hair back from her forehead. ‘When you're here, I'm responsible for you.'

‘Responsible!' Sarah squinted at him. ‘I didn't ask for a watchdog.'

‘Not that a watchdog would make any difference. Why did you persist in riding Blaze when I told you not to?'

Sarah hung her head.

‘Look, all I'm saying is that your grandfather doesn't get out as much as he used to. So if something happens to you, I'm responsible.'

She would have rather kicked him in the ankle than agree. From the scrub, the crackle of undergrowth sounded sharply. Blaze was hobbling away from them. She watched Anthony call Warrigal, his friend standing in the hoof marks of Blaze, snorting
the air at the side of the dirt road. Once in the saddle, Anthony pulled his rifle from its holster and loaded it, before riding off.

Two kilometres from the homestead, with the temperature creeping up steadily, Sarah walked to the nearest belah tree and, having checked for snakes and goannas, collapsed. Her hair, plastered with sweat to the back of her neck, stuck with the same persistence as her pale blue cotton shirt. From the corner of her eye she was able to make out the pieces of horseflesh caught in the rough wood of the gatepost. If she walked towards the fence, she would see blood drying on the ground. Already clusters of flies could be seen buzzing around the spot.

Leaning back against the bark, willing her body to cool down, Sarah tried not to recall words spoken by her father years ago. One of the jackeroos had carelessly run over a favourite dog, and the animal, suffering from severe internal injuries, had no chance of making the hour trip to the closest vet. While listening to her parents arguing in the kitchen of West Wangallon, Sarah and her brother had stared out the window to where old Joe lay collapsed in pain, only his mournful eyes suggesting life, as he waited for his master to appear.

‘I'll have to put him down, Sue. If I leave it to that boy, I couldn't be satisfied he would do the job properly.'

Sarah had watched Cameron take the rifle, following their father who carried the wounded dog. Even now she still heard the soft murmurings of a hard man, heard the whimpering responses of his dog. Within minutes, Cameron was striding up the cement path and rounding the corner of the house as a lone shot echoed.

Sarah closed her eyes, sucking in the sounds of a settling bush, the heat forming a blue haze. Pain throbbed in her hip, ribs and ankle, and there was a burning sensation in her cheek. Her ears picked up small rustles, a movement in the foliage. In her mind she relived the wild gallop through the scrub, saw herself
falling and Blaze's proud neck swerving violently to sideswipe the boundary gate. She vomited into the dirt.

Colin. It was Colin that cracked the whip, Sarah suddenly remembered. He'd been with them at the stables listening to Anthony's advice, not to ride Blaze, not to use a whip near him as the young colt was definitely flighty.

A rifle shot sounded. Birds scrambled frantically from branches. Sarah stood and walked stiffly to the boundary gate, trying not to stare at the flesh and hair on the fence post. The road swam ahead. Blaze, the last horse associated with Cameron she thought sadly as she opened the gate. She should have listened to Anthony. She should not have ridden her brother's horse. It was just like the day of the accident when she had pushed her brother to go for a ride, except this time it hadn't been her fault.

Behind her the familiar clip-clop of Warrigal carried across the hard-packed earth of the road.

‘Hop up.' Anthony pulled Warrigal to a halt and held out his arm.

‘Colin did it. He cracked the whip on purpose.'

‘He hardly would have done it on purpose. Now hop up.'

‘But he did.'

‘Sarah, hop up.'

‘I'll walk.'

‘What, two kilometres?'

‘It'll do me good.'

‘Sarah, please don't argue with me. There's four hundred head of your cattle that still have to be walked to the corner paddock and it's nearing mid-morning already. It's a slow enough journey with calves but once it starts to get hot, you know how hard they are to move.'

Sarah looked ahead down the dirt road, already a blur of heat shimmering across the country. Her face stung and her ribs ached.

‘All right.' Wincing as Anthony helped her onto Warrigal, she gave a weak thank you. Gradually Anthony increased Warrigal's pace, his voice urging his horse onwards. Too tired to grasp the flanks without stirrups, Sarah slipped from side to side.

‘Sarah you're moving around back there so much, old Warrigal doesn't know if he's at a rodeo or a disco.' His hand reached around, pulling her tight to his back, ensuring she was safe. She gasped at the jolt. ‘Put your arms around my waist. It'll be more comfortable.'

Quietly obedient she slipped her arms about him and turned her head so that the side of her face rested against his shoulder blade. He was right, the position eased her aches.

‘Tell you what, Sarah, you did a good job with the cattle this morning. We had a mad steer that came in from the back paddock on the eastern boundary last year and he chased your grandfather and me around the yards like a demon. I was ready to shoot the bugger, but your grandfather wouldn't have a bar of it. By the time we scrambled out of the yards, I was pleased to see the last of him. Maybe one of our lucky neighbours has him now. I should have branded an H on him for homeless.'

‘You don't have to talk for my benefit,' Sarah said quietly.

It was difficult having Sarah so close to him; with every step old Warrigal took he could feel her slight body against his, the soft curves of her body melding into him. He shook his head to clear his thoughts.

‘It was Colin's fault. He did it on purpose. It was no accident he came straight past me and cracked his whip.'

‘I'll have a word to him.'

By the time they reached the main house, Colin was leaning nonchalantly on the bonnet of his four-wheel drive, a gangly leg cocked up on the front tyre. Anthony gave him a brief nod. The boy should have stayed with the cattle instead of returning to wait for them.

‘Have a buster then?' Colin drawled, flipping a box of matches between the fingers of his right hand. ‘Well, Anthony tried to tell you Blaze was too fresh. What happened then? Is he lame?'

‘Dead. He's down near the box trees we poisoned a few months ago.'

‘Pity.' He pulled a match free from the pack, chewing softly on the end of it. ‘Horse just needed someone with a bit of ability. Waste of a good horse.'

Anthony gave Colin a frown of disapproval. ‘You'll have to get a rope and drag the old fella to the tip after we've finished moving the cattle.'

‘Well, I thought I should come back, you know, just in case there was a problem, which there was.'

Swinging her leg over Warrigal's back, Sarah reluctantly slid down to the ground, her ribs jarring as she touched earth again. ‘That was pretty helpful of you cracking that whip, Colin.'

‘What ya talking about?'

‘You rode past and cracked the whip right near Blaze. No wonder he bolted.'

‘Is that right?' Anthony intervened.

‘Not that I'm aware of, boss. Sure didn't do it intentional like.'

‘Fair enough.'

‘Fair enough,' Sarah retorted. That'd be right, she thought angrily. Now he was taking the word of this scruffy-looking kid.

‘Real pity about Blaze. He was your brother's horse, wasn't he?'

Anthony looked from Colin to Sarah. He could feel the tension radiating from her.

‘You coming, boss?' Colin grinned, walking to his beat-up Land Cruiser. ‘Want me to hook up the horse float so ya nag doesn't have to walk all the way back to the mob?'

‘Sounds good. I'll meet you down at the stables in five and, Colin …'

‘Yeah, boss?'

‘Don't leave a mustering job like that again. The cattle will be camped by now and it will take us another hour to get them moving.'

‘Yes, boss.'
Bloody city slickers,
he mumbled.

‘You be okay?' Anthony asked Sarah. The gravel rash on the side of her face was an angry red.

‘Sure,' Sarah called over her shoulder as she walked up the back path. Next on her list of great things to do today was informing her grandfather that Blaze was dead.

‘Don't be pissed off, please, Sarah. Colin means well.'

‘Right, so he scares Blaze, I fall off and now the horse is dead. Oh he means well all right, just not in the way you think,' she called out before slamming the back door.

‘Shit! Looks like I'm in the doghouse.'

Warrigal whinnied as if in agreement.