Free Fresh Fields by Peter Kocan Page B

wasn’t a case of being arrogant. Clem was the least arrogant person the youth had ever met. It was just that if you honed and practised particular skills every day of your life, and took a pride in them, you were entitled to expect that they would serve you well. The other thing was that he never panicked.
    The youth began to wish he could smoke thin hand-rolled cigarettes the way Clem did. And wear spurs. Those two things seemed to him the height of “panache.” Panache was what Grace Kelly had, according to the article in the magazine. She wore her clothes and jewels with “a panache envied the world over.” It was a lovely word, though the youth wasn’t sure how it should be pronounced. He said it in his mind as “pan-at-chee.” Yes, Clem had “pan-
at
-chee.”
    So did Gladys. Gladys was like the female version of him, with a similar way of looking and speaking, a similar way of doing things with a light, expert touch. Her “pan-at-chee” was summed up for the youth in the way she’d looked that day she was hanging tea-towels on the line and the breeze was blowing them, and blowing her yellow flowery apron, and moulding her blue cotton dress to her body in a way that showed how strong and shapely she was, even at her age.
    It was nice in the evenings at the Curreys’ place. After the meal the youth would help wash and dry the dishes and put them away. Then they’d sit around the kitchen for an hour or so, with the fire going in the big old stove and the radio on quietly in the background. Gladys would knit and Clem would fiddle with some bit of mechanism that needed taking apart, or maybe he’d sew a bit of saddle gear or something. The kettle would be simmering and Gladys and Clem would chat quietly. Now and then they’d bring the youth into the conversation by explaining something—like how Dave Dawson, who ran the general store in Burrawah, was the son of Charlie Dawson, whose brother Stan hadn’t been the full quid. So the thing about it was that you never mentioned old Stan in front of Dave Dawson, because he was sensitive about having an uncle who was a bit off.
    â€œMind you, though,” said Gladys, “old Stan was the only one o’ the Dawsons that anybody ever liked.”
    After they’d had enough tea the youth would say goodnight and go over to the shearers’ quarters. Being outside in the cold air would brace him and he would not want to go to bed just then, so he’d wrap a blanket round his shoulders and sit on the verandah and look at the night sky. Dolly would come and put her head on his knee and get some patting. Then she’d lie beside his chair and keep him company till he went inside.
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    THE DAYS were cold but mostly fine, with an occasional whooshing surge of rain across the landscape. The sky was full of great tumbling banks of cloud, and the sun kept coming out from behind them to light up the land in flashes of gold.
    The work they’d been doing—feeding, milking, repairing odds and ends, getting firewood—was what Clem called “pottering.”
    â€œBit of a holiday for us,” he’d say, “seein’ as we’re just potterin’.” Or he would get up from breakfast and walk across to the door with his spurs jingling, put his hat on at the angle he liked and drawl: “Ah well, we might go and do a bit o’ potterin’, if ya like.”
    One day Clem wanted to ride out to one of the furthest paddocks to check on the sheep. The paddocks all had names, and this one was called “Pies.” At breakfast Clem had said to Gladys that he wanted to “see the sheep in Pies” and the youth had got a mental picture of rows of enormous meat pies made out of the Dunkeld flock.
    They rode away from the house, past the shearing shed and along the ridge to the first gate, which led to the far reaches of the property. They had their overcoats on, and