Brumby Plains Read online

  ‘Oh, wow! That’s great!’

  Tess and Darcy Munro were their cousins and their best friends, spending almost every long weekend and school holiday out at the station, and they knew the country almost as well as Sam and George. George punched Sam on the arm in his excitement, and the two wrestled each other to the floor and writhed around energetically till Sarah kicked them outside. That was the trouble with mothers – they just didn’t understand about expressing emotions properly.

  They rambled off, planning activities for the coming weeks.

  Sam looked at George seriously and said: ‘This time we’re going to do it.’

  ‘Do what?’

  Sam frowned at him. ‘The cave. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten about it already.’

  George’s eyes widened. ‘Oh yeah! You can drive the old Landcruiser now, Dad’d let you drive it, so long as we don’t say exactly where we’re going, and we could take torches this time and ropes, and –’

  ‘Shut up, George, somebody’ll hear you! You’re yelling like a loony. We’ll talk to Tess and Darce about it when we see them, so be quiet or we won’t be able to take the Tojo at all.’

  Sam loved going to town, with all the noise and the bustle. It was so different from home. He even liked the crowds. Well, for a while anyway. When the novelty had worn off after a few days, he was fidgety about getting home again, but right now town was exactly where he wanted to be.

  Their cousins Tess and Darcy were close in age to Sam and George. They were twelve, twins, and as different as any two people could be. Tess was small and quick with long black hair which she kept in a single thick plait. Her skin was clear and pale, and her eyes were a deep green. Darcy was fair haired and blue-eyed, with a more tanned complexion than his sister. He was bigger than Tess and inclined to boss her around if he was allowed to get away with it. Tess, being the older twin by twenty minutes, didn’t let him get away with it very often. She might be small, but she was tough.

  Sam and George were walking back to the Munros’ house in Fannie Bay with Tess and Darcy, having spent all their money – including their bus fares – on movies and popcorn. They trudged up the hill beside the Fannie Bay yacht club, where the road hugged the tree-lined cliffs. It was hot and sticky and looked like rain, but George had more important things on his mind.

  ‘… and now that Sam’s allowed to drive the old Landcruiser, we can do that trip up to the cave properly. You know, take torches ’n ropes ’n stuff, and have a really good look at it!’ His voice rose in pitch and volume the more excited he became.

  ‘Shut up, George!’ hissed Sam. ‘Mum ’n Dad’ll hear you from here if you don’t quieten down a bit. We can do it though,’ he added, looking at Tess and Darcy. ‘But we’ll have to go before it gets too wet.’

  ‘Man, that’ll be such an ace trip,’ sighed Darcy. ‘Maybe we can sleep out overnight, and get some wallabies, too.’

  Tess frowned at him and curled her lip. ‘Darce, you’re such a carnivore. All you ever think about is killing animals and eating them. You wouldn’t be allowed to take the gun anyway. Not without Uncle Mac along.’

  ‘It is such a pain having a vegetarian for a sister! I was talking about getting wallabies for the dogs, you dope. Or should they eat vegie burgers too?’

  Darcy and George fell about laughing, and Tess rolled her eyes in disdain and marched ahead of them.

  Sam caught up with her and said a bit sheepishly, ‘Are you really a vegetarian? You don’t eat meat at all anymore?’

  ‘No, I don’t. I don’t think we should kill other living things just to eat them.’

  ‘Man, I’d hate to give up steak, and hamburgers, and roast beef.’ Sam shook his head.

  ‘Oooh, look, Tess! A lovely piece of grass!’ Darcy danced in front of her, hopping backwards and waving a handful of greenery at his sister.

  Just then, a battered white van emerged backwards out of a steep driveway, almost colliding with Darcy. As they stared in amazement the van missed a vehicle parked near the driveway, rolled across the road, and slowly disappeared from sight over the edge of the slope.

  ‘Aaargghh! My van, my van!’ A man raced down the same driveway, arms waving wildly as he darted across the road. He jigged around on the edge of the cliff for a minute, gesticulating and exclaiming and tearing his hair.

  ‘What am I going to do now? This is all I need!’

  They ran across after him, and peered down the slope. It was quite thickly timbered with cheese-woods and other large bushes, and the van was resting in amongst them, its descent having been slowed enough by the bushes to bring it to a gentle stop in the aerial roots of a large banyan tree. The man paced up and down for a while, then sat in the gutter muttering and shaking his head.

  They all watched him for a moment, then Tess ventured, ‘Are you okay? Is there anything we can do to help?’

  The man stopped muttering and stared up at them. ‘What could you lot possibly do?’ he exclaimed, and dropped his head on his knees again with a loud thunk.

  ‘Help you pull it out, of course!’ said George.

  Sam looked at George with alarm.

  ‘You’ll need a humungous pinch of fairy dust, me lad,’ said the man, looking at them now with some interest.

  ‘George,’ hissed Sam, ‘we can’t help him!’

  ‘What about that four-wheel drive parked outside your place? It’s got a winch on it,’ said Tess.

  ‘It belongs to someone staying at my house but they’re away for a few days. Besides, I’ve never used a winch.’

  ‘Well, we have, but we can’t drive the car. That is, Sam could, but not in town, because he hasn’t got a licence, so if you just drive it to here, we can pull your van back up with the winch.’ George looked expectantly at the man, who got slowly to his feet and scratched his head.

  ‘Well, why not, why not indeed? What have I got to lose? Cost me an arm and a leg to get anyone else to do it, I expect. Stay right there, and I’ll go and get the keys.’ He crossed back over the road and disappeared up the driveway.

  Sam was absolutely horrified. ‘What are you doing? We can’t pull his car back up! He should get the police or someone to help him. What if the van tips over and he sues us for wrecking it? Or the four-wheel drive could go over the cliff too, or –’

  ‘Sam! We’ve helped Dad do this sort of thing heaps of times. Stop being such a panic merchant. It’ll be fun!’ said George confidently.

  Darcy and Tess agreed. ‘We can give him a hand, Sam. He’s a bit odd, but you probably would be too if your car just went over a cliff. He’s got a funny accent, like Basil in Fawlty Towers. He must be English. Maybe he’s a backpacker,’ added Tess.

  ‘Yeah, what’s the big deal? Don’t you want to help him or something?’ said Darcy.

  Sam gave up and shook his head. He wanted to help the man, of course, but the awful possibilities were crowding in on him. Worry was Sam’s second name.

  ‘We better have a look at it then,’ he said and, with much misgiving, climbed down the slope.

  The van had only rolled a short distance, and even Sam had to admit it would be a fairly simple exercise to drag it back up. They moved some rocks out of the way and wedged a couple of logs behind the back wheels to stop it rolling any further down, in case the banyan’s aerial roots gave way. By the time they climbed back up to the top, the man had reappeared with the four-wheel drive.

  ‘Can you park it with the bullbar against that tree?’ asked Sam, pointing to a gum tree a few metres away. Then Sam and George ran the cable out from the winch drum while Tess and Darcy operated the controls. They hooked the cable onto the van’s front tow hitch, and Sam hopped into the driver’s seat while George clambered back up the slope.

  ‘Okay, guys,’ Sam shouted out of the van’s window. ‘Tess, you work the winch and I’ll steer it up. When I wave, start winding in …’ He checked the gears were in neutral and the hand brake was off. Sam lifted his arm, the winch cable tightened and the van slowly beg
an to move up the slope. The man stood on the edge beside George and Darcy watching with great interest. The winch groaned and clicked, and the van creaked and bounced. As it appeared over the crest of the slope, the man started to dance around again, this time with exclamations of satisfaction and a touch of disbelief.

  ‘Well, I’ll be! Who would’ve thought it? Marvellous! Absolutely marvellous! You kids are amazing!’

  They unhooked the van and wound the cable back onto the drum.

  George grinned at Sam. ‘See! I told you it’d be a cinch!’

  The man rushed up to them and pumped Sam’s hand up and down vigorously. He shook everyone’s hand, and then said, ‘You had all better come up and have a drink. Oh – and allow me to introduce myself. Charles Rowntree at your service.’

  A little while later they sat in the shade of Charles’s verandah. Both vehicles were back where they belonged, with a couple of bricks behind the wheels of the van. Charles handed round cold cans of soft drink, and then sat down with a beer for himself. He was a tall, wiry sort of fellow, with a big beaky nose, a chin which tried to meet his nose halfway, and bushy eyebrows that leapt all over his forehead punctuating his sentences. His long brown hair was tied back in a ponytail, he wore an old white T-shirt, and his hairy brown legs stuck out of a pair of dilapidated green shorts. On his feet were a pair of sandshoes with no laces.

  ‘So how do four kids strolling up the street know how to use a winch? Teach it in school these days, do they?’

  George answered with his usual rush of words. ‘We don’t live in town, we live out on a station. At least Sam and I do. Tess and Darcy, they’re our cousins, they live here in Fannie Bay but they come out to the station a lot, so they know how to do all sorts of stuff, like us. We’re just in town to do the Christmas shopping, and to buy stores for the wet season, and to take take Tess and Darce back out with us ’cause their parents are away for a few weeks.’ He paused for breath, and Sam kicked him under the table.

  ‘And where is your station?’ asked Charles, looking interested. ‘I go out bush a bit, you know.’

  ‘It’s about two hundred kilometres east of Darwin, near the Arnhem Land border, and it’s called Brumby Plains and we own it ourselves,’ answered George, flashing Sam a dirty look.

  At this information, Charles’s eyes seemed to narrow for a moment, as if he was trying to remember something, and his hand stopped halfway to his drink. He quickly regained his composure and said brightly, ‘I don’t think I’ve heard of that one before. Have you been there long?’

  Sam got in before George could open his mouth. ‘Yeah, a long time. It’s a buffalo station.’

  ‘Buffalo! Those big dangerous things with the sharp horns? I don’t think I’d fancy tangling with them. And do many people live out there? Or is it just a family concern?’ Charles looked at George, who leapt right in. He wasn’t going to let Sam tell him who he could or couldn’t talk to.

  ‘There’s more people in the dry season, when we’re busy, but right now there’s only Mum, Dad, Sam and me, and Old Jock the Fencer. He’s looking after things while we’re in town. In the dry season there’s about ten people out there, because of all the mustering and the other work.’

  Tess glanced at Sam. She’d noticed the odd look on Charles’s face too, at the mention of the station name. Feeling a little uneasy, she interrupted George to change the direction of the conversation.

  ‘What do you do, Charles? You’re from England, aren’t you?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, I am. From a little town in Kent, called Westerham. And what do I do? I garden, and I sell things at the markets.’

  ‘At the markets?’ said Darcy. ‘What kind of things do you sell?’

  ‘Ah, that depends on what you wish to buy … time in a bottle, cabbages and kings, sealing wax, the promise of things to come – you know, the usual stuff. Actually, I make and sell bonsais. Tiny little trees in tiny little pots.’ He leaned over conspiratorially, and muttered, ‘The mugs’ll buy anything, Guv, if it’s ’andled right, like. Pitch ’em a line about organically grown, wholemeal, environmentally friendly an’ they knock yer door down ter give yer their dosh.’ He winked and straightened up.

  Tess and Sam glanced at each other. This guy was definitely a weirdo. Darcy and George looked astonished for a moment and then grinned at him.

  ‘Is that what all those are?’ Darcy pointed at the rows of pot plants in a shade house behind them.

  ‘That’s right. I get them from all over the place – they’re all native species – and I go out bush collecting them. Do you have any interesting trees at Brumby Plains?’

  George rushed in again. ‘We’ve got heaps of great stuff out there. Our mum’s always going off and finding new trees and looking them up in books and stuff. She reckons there’s probably species up on the Escarpment that no one’s ever found before,’ he announced proudly.

  ‘The Escarpment!’ Charles looked very interested. ‘Does your property run onto the Escarpment? I’ve heard there are lots of fascinating things up there, rare animals, unusual plants and birds …?’

  Darcy was sick of George hogging the limelight. ‘It’s just the best place!’ he said. ‘Heaps of wildlife and plants and rock paintings and stuff. We even found some spear points once, and Sam found a grinding stone beside a waterhole. You’d probably find mobs of little trees out there too.’

  ‘And birds, you said? What kind of birds do you get there? The usual corellas and galahs and parrots, I expect?’ Charles’s eyebrows waggled at them and he smiled encouragingly.

  ‘Oh, much better than that. There’s hundreds of different kinds. Dad says it’s a really excellent place for birds because there’s so much different country in the one area. Flood plains, grassy ridges, rocky escarpment – and there’s always some water somewhere, so the birds mob up there at the end of the dry season. We’ve even had ornithologists come out and study them sometimes,’ answered George excitedly. He loved telling people things, and responded to interest in his home with relish. Sam, on the other hand, wasn’t so sure. He felt uneasy about the conversation and wanted George to stop, but George was in full flight.

  ‘… and we’ve even got a really rare bird on our place,’ he was saying, ‘that some bloke from the university was looking for a few months ago, called a branded fruit dove. It lives right up on the Escarpment, and we’ve seen it heaps of times. Sam and I had to show the university bloke where to look for it,’ he finished proudly.

  ‘A banded fruit dove, eh? I can’t say I’ve heard of that one before, but there you are. It sounds like a truly remarkable place you have. Well, time for me to get on with things. I have to be ready for my customers at the markets tomorrow, you know. Thank you again for all your help.’ And with that he fished in his pocket and extracted a twenty-dollar note which he handed to Sam, who tried to refuse it.

  Charles wouldn’t hear of it. ‘No no, I absolutely insist! You people have saved me a lot of bother and expense, and this is the least I can do. Now, goodbye, and perhaps I’ll see you at the markets.’

  As they made their way home, Sam got stuck into George. ‘Man, you’re such a motor mouth! Why didn’t you tell him how much money we’ve got in the bank and the PIN number as well? Didn’t you notice how he kind of stopped and looked funny when he heard the name of the station? I reckon he’s a bit suss.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Tess, ‘I thought so too. I mean, he’s kind of nice and funny and everything, but he was asking a lot of questions about the place, especially about the birds …’

  ‘That’s right!’ Sam looked stunned. ‘He said the right name! George called it a branded fruit dove, and when Charles said it, he used the right name, and then he said he’d never heard of it!’

  Darcy wasn’t convinced. ‘That doesn’t mean anything. Most birds are called a banded something or other. He probably thought George just said it wrong, or maybe he didn’t hear him properly. I reckon he’s an ace guy. And anyone who grows plants for a living would have to
be okay.’

  ‘Yeah, right, Darce,’ said Sam. ‘Those drug growers in South America are really nice blokes. They wouldn’t hurt a fly!’

  The next morning was Saturday, Parap markets day, and the cousins were up and out of the house before any adults could hobble them with a change of plans. The markets were already crowded by 8 am, with locals and tourists alike seeking breakfast before the heat of the day pressed too heavily. Sam and George wanted to buy their mother something unusual for Christmas, but first they were hungry.

  George closed his eyes and sniffed loudly, his hands holding on to his stomach. ‘I want whatever that smell is!’

  ‘Yeah, well, just remember how your bum felt after the last hot curry you had here,’ smirked Darcy dodging his cousin’s punches.

  They sat at a table under big spreading trees and gorged on the market food – Thai curries, Indonesian satays, Laotian or Malaysian or Vietnamese delicacies, washed down with fresh fruit drinks. The stalls filled the little park in the centre of the shopping village, spilling out over the footpaths and onto the roads where cars crept by looking for parking spots. Exotic smells from open-air grills and woks and cooking pots wafted into the humid morning air, mingling with the competing scents of fruit, flowers and incense. People seemed to waft around as well, lulled by the holiday atmosphere into a kind of pleasant daze. No one seemed to be in a hurry. Even the stallholders were relaxed, chatting amiably with everyone and not appearing terribly worried whether they made a sale or not.

  ‘If you guys have finished stuffing your faces, let’s go and look for Aunty Sarah’s present, because I want to go home for a swim.’ Tess stood up, tossing the remains of her meal into a bin. ‘What do you want to get her?’

  ‘I don’t know. Something different,’ said Sam, looking at George.