Free Fear Drive My Feet by Peter Ryan Page A

clean, strong receptacle holding two or three gallons. It was a
common thing every morning to see the women come up from the creek bearing two or
three of them across their shoulders, the tops neatly stoppered with a wad of green
banana-leaf. Smaller lengths were used for cooking purposes. Food was packed tightly
into them, and they were placed on the fire for the contents to bake. When the food
was cooked, the charred bamboo was broken away from the outside. An even more ingenious
use of bamboo was in the irrigation conduits that were sometimes seen bringing water
round parched hillsides from a spring to a flourishing patch of taro, often over
distances of many hundreds of yards.
    We drank and moved on, through the little rushing creek and out of the bush, to a
steep kunai spur. Native fashion, the track followed the crest of the ridge – the
shortest way, perhaps, but certainly the steepest – and led us to a forest-covered
mountain. It was hard going, and the sweat soaked our clothes and dripped off our
faces as we struggled uphill. But we did not mind, for the higher we went, the cooler
the air would become, and the fewer the mosquitoes.
    By midday we had reached a small hamlet called Badibo, where we halted to boil the
billy. The local natives gave us a pineapple, which, with the tea, comprised our
lunch. We bought some fine bananas, too, and the natives assured us that they had
plenty of food.
    ‘We are getting near the promised land now,’ said Les. ‘Just over this hill is Gain,
the first village of the Wain country. The people there can grow almost any fruit
or vegetable.’
    It took an hour and a half to reach the top of the next ‘hill’. The track, wide enough
only for single file, climbed through thick forest all the way. The trees had been
cleared slightly at the summit, and it was possible to look across the plain we had
left behind, to the Markham. At the distant edge of the plain the great stream gleamed
dully in the afternoon sun. On the south bank, where the hills came close to the
water’s edge, was the kunai spur of Kirkland’s outlined against the dark background
of the jungle. Through the binoculars we thought we could see a faint plume of smoke
above the place where we knew the camp to be.
    ‘Well,’ I said, ‘we’re a long way from home now, if anything happens.’
    We began the short descent of the other side of the hill to Gain, thinking enviously
of Tom Lega and his five men at Kirkland’s, mosquito-ridden and unhealthy as the
place was.
    Apparently the news of our coming had been sent ahead from Bivoro or Munkip, for
the luluai, tultul, and doctor-boy of Gain stepped forward to salute us as we stopped
in front of the house-kiap, and the village had a scrupulously neat look, which was
usually lacking when a surprise call was paid.
    The Wain country was to be my home for many months, and I grew to love it all. It
contains many beautiful sights, but I have always had a specially soft spot in my
heart for Gain village, possibly because of the contrast with the hot, flat, mosquito-ridden
Markham. The house-kiap, a little apart from the village, was set in a grassy clearing
on the hillside, whence one looked across the deep valley of the Upper Busu River
towards tiers of blue mountains rising ever higher as they receded into the distance.
The Busu, a considerable stream even here, flowed into the Huon Gulf not many miles
from Lae as a large muddy river. The hills, dotted here and there with gardens, were
every conceivable shade of blue. Drifting smoke from some of the gardens indicated
that the owners were clearing new ground. As Les had said, the natives grew abundant
and varied crops in the rich red-brown soil – we were to see that this country was
as productive as it was beautiful. The luluai shouted to the women that we wished
to buy food for the police and some fruit and vegetables for ourselves. The food
had obviously been gathered in anticipation of our visit, for within a few