Stuck out on Tabletop - redo

Stuck out on Tabletop

There was an old, redundant but serviceable hut that stood on Diamond Hill above the coal mine. It had been the mine office in its heyday and no doubt it could tell a tale or two, but it now it was vacant and forlorn. Mick, the bulldozer driver asked me if he could haul it out to the Glencoe Run to use as a hunting camp, his words, but in reality it would be more of a retreat. The sheeprun bounded the forest and Mick had already formed an access track onto Tabletop for the runholders in a sort of quid pro quo arrangement.

I helped Mick to level up the hut in a pleasant clearing among Kanuka trees overlooking the bush-clad Shepherd’s Creek. Mick had chosen the site well. Tabletop was a flat, tussock covered, swampy hill area of perhaps one hundred hectares, which is now under cultivation, but back in the day it was wild quite remote. Beyond was several thousand hectares of indigenous scrubland, mainly Kanuka with broadleaves in the gulleys. There were wild sheep, pigs and deer living there, the targets for Mick’s proposed hunting expeditions.

Mick and Merv spent time setting the hut, like a hunting lodge in their way of it, ferrying in old couches, a table and a sink to make it posh. They made some beds by stringing rabbit netting across frames of Kanuka poles, and covered the netting with fern and tussock to provide a little more comfort. Using a chainsaw, they cut a hole in a side wall to build a fireplace which had a roofing iron chimney. The open fire was to provide heat and doubled as a cooking fire.

It’s a tradition among hunters to be out at Easter hunting stags because it’s the mating season for deer, the time the stags advertise themselves by roaring! The idea behind it all is to bag a trophy head. But I’ve never seen a stag with a really good trophy head in the area, which is something to do locally with minerals in their diet. And anyway, who wants a stuffed deer’s head sporting huge antlers on their lounge wall? Bloody dust catchers if you ask me! Glassy eyes staring down at you in reproach! As far as Mick and his cronies were concerned, the Easter break involved more drinking and fry-ups than hunting, a bonding time for mates!

Mick and Merv pestered me to go with them that first Easter, but I could only spend the Saturday and Sunday nights with them because I had to be back for fire duty on Easter Monday. Besides, they were going through a sherry drinking phase and on the Monday after the previous weekend I had seen Mick’s purple face! Not a pretty sight and his fumes was would’ve knocked out an elephant! Sherry didn’t appeal to me one bit! But anyway, under a certain amount of duress, I went with them.

As arranged, Mick picked me up at the top of Saddle Road where I left my vehicle, because it wasn’t four-wheel drive. He was always changing vehicles and this time he had an old Willys Jeep, just like on M.A.S.H! Grinning from ear to ear, he drove up the track as fast as he dared, putting the vehicle through its paces, and waffling on as if it was a brand new Rolls Royce! He told me that so far they had been far too busy to go hunting. I noticed the purple complexion had returned.

‘Merv’s not here just now.’ Mick announced when we arrived at the hut. ‘He’ll turn up later.’

Sam had a brew ready for us and I introduced them to the gourmet delight of spreading sweetened condensed milk onto cabin bread – don’t knock it until you try it! Later, we heard the unholy roar that was Merv approaching. He was driving a big, ugly, square, four-wheel drive Dodge truck that had been modified using a cutting torch and welder. Merv had a touch of polio when he was young so couldn’t laugh properly but his shoulders were going up and down signifying he enjoyed our surprise! His Dodge was apparently a powerful machine with a non-standard engine. Petrol heads!

Sam suggested that we should wait for dark and use Mick’s Jeep to spotlight for deer on the bush edge flanking Tabletop. Give it a tryout. It was an excuse for a fry-up of bacon, eggs and chips, with peas for our health, plus of course, a generous portion of sherry from a half gallon flagon. I’m a bit like the Queen and can sit on a drink for hours! When darkness settled in, we set off in the Jeep, but soon we hit a swampy patch and although Mick revved the guts out of the Jeep, we became bogged! Mick tried the back and forth rocking thing but only succeeded in digging himself down deeper. So we tried pushing! There was only room for Merv and me at the back, because we were careful of the spray from the rear wheels, so Sam lent a shoulder to the driver’s side door. Inadvertently-on-purpose, Mick turned the wheel which generated a powerful shower of black, slimy mud, aimed directly at Sam! He had a perfect black stripe from head to foot! In the moonlight his eyes shone white and his mouth formed an O like Al Jolson singing Mammy! Now that was funny! Mind you, Sam didn’t see the funny side.

Merv was puffed up and all arms and legs in excitement about bringing his Dodge to the rescue! But a deep, narrow ditch was his undoing! To get to us, he had to bounce over it and thinking the large wheels would waggle through the ditch, he didn’t hesitate, but the front bumper caught on the edge of the ditch as the big beast flopped into the ditch, bellied and it too was stuck! Mick and I trudged back to bring the dozer. With nothing much to do while waiting, Merv strolled across to meet us and even though it was moonlight, Mick had difficulty seeing the track, so Merv marched in front flashing a torch. Trickster Mick kept the revs up, so poor old Merv had to walk quicker that was comfortable for him, forcing to jog and arse-up! I watched Mick, he was gripping his pipe between his teeth and grinning from ear to ear at Merv’s misfortune! Merv would find a way to get him back, no worries!

After the vehicles were safely parked around the hut and the idea of spotlighting shelved, and the three took to the sherry – they had several flagons of the stuff to wade through! They were too preoccupied yarning to notice my eight-ounce glass hadn’t lowered and I went to sleep stretched out on a comfy couch.

Up at sunrise the next morning to greet the sun, I spotted six deer in a clearing on the other side of Shepherd’s Creek, I considered rousing the guys but when I left the hut the air was thick and putrid so decided to let them fester in it. The sun glinted on the dew and golden on the soft tussock. The morning stillness was filled with whiffs from the Kanuka foliage as I sat there on a rock warming my back in the sun watching the deer peacefully but warily grazing. I didn’t stay long, I had to be back at headquarters to take the weather readings at nine o’clock and relay the figures by radio.

The Old-timer

The Old-timer

Old Jimmy Grant was a council worker who cleaned the gutters and drains alongside roads in our part of the world. He used a specially-shaped broom with a hoe on the other end to sweep the gutters clean, a shovel to pick up the rubbish and leaves, and his own horse pulled the council dray. With practiced ease he shovelled his sweepings into the dray.  I was seven or eight the first time I caught up with him as I dawdled on my way home from school, and as any boy would, I walked behind the dray holding onto the rear corner of it watching Jimmy work.  I’m not sure that old Jimmy even noticed me the first few times and I can’t remember how often I was towed by that rickety dray, or what routine Jimmy had, but it seemed to me that he cleaned along our road one day a week. Anyway, after a few times, Jimmy did notice me and he asked me if I wanted to sit up on the dray. I didn’t need to be asked twice, so I shinnied up the spokes of the front wheel and with a puffed out chest, rode all the way home.

Dad happened to be at the gate and smiled when he saw me atop the dray, he strolled over for a yarn with Jimmy. Usually I would have hung around to earwig, but I must have been hungry or needing a pee, so I left them to it! I found out soon enough what the conversation was about! The pair hadn’t met before, but Dad’s life-long interest in horses had him taking a shine to Jimmy’s half-draft horse straight off. He was called ‘Darkie’. Dad apparently had a half-pie ulterior motive; we had a four acre paddock that he wanted it cultivated in preparation for a crop of spuds. The underlying outcome though, was that from their encounter that day, the pair became rest-of-life friends.

Come the next Saturday, Jimmy arrived with Darkie to pull the single-furrow plough that Dad had borrowed from a farmer mate. I spent the day leading the horse, except when they made the complicated manoeuvre to turn around at the end of each furrow. I thought I was the main man leading Darkie, but I’m sure Jimmy and Darkie had it well-covered! A month later they came again, this time with a grubber to further break up the soil. According to the conversation, there had been several frosts so the soil seemed to break up fairly well. After another fortnight they were back with leaf harrows to finally till the soil. My job was to stand on any clods, or bash them with a stick. Or was that a ruse to keep me out of the way?    

Planting the spuds took a while, but Dad didn’t want them to come right all at once anyway. We used baling twine tied to sticks to keep the rows straight and I hefted two cream cans, one with the seed spuds and the other with blood and bone powder. Dad handled the shovel and held the hole open, while I threw in a spud and a handful of blood and bone manure. First crops of spuds are always best-croppers, he told me, and come autumn, we dug them by hand and bagged them into wheat sacks as we went. The big ones were for the table and the small ones to be sold for seed. I went with Dad to Jimmy’s place to deliver half a dozen bags, as payment for the cultivation work he had done.

I remember the address to this day! Number one Domain Terrace! Jimmy lived with his two sisters, Elizabeth and Mary. Mary had difficulty walking because she was a polio survivor. Of the three siblings, none had ever married. Inside, their house was as old-fashioned as they were, the first thing I noticed was that they still used a coal range for cooking. It was as black and shiny as a brand new one! I think the weekly painting with Imp Black, the same stuff my mother used on our fire grate, kept it that way. Their sitting room was wood-panelled to about five feet up the wall and was highly polished, but very dark. In the centre of the ceiling was a lampshade two or three feet in diameter, it had a kerosene lamp that could be adjusted up or down by pulleys and counterweight. The room smelt faintly of wood-smoke and kerosene, with a hint of lavender. The elderly people spoke with refined manners and they obviously cared for one another.

I wasn’t privy to whatever arrangements Dad made with Jimmy, but he must have retired or been replaced by the council, because I no longer saw him on the road, instead, he arrived at our house twice a week to work in our fairly extensive garden. We kept forty hens, and every now and then he would slaughter two and prepare them for cooking, one of them he took home with him wrapped in newspaper. Every second Sunday morning, I would accompany Dad to Jimmy and his sister’s place just to visit and to take Saturday morning’s Press. They liked to read the death notices and spoke in dulcet tones about the likely cause of death of people they knew.

Our number two milk truck was a 1936 Austin 10 and my Dad had me driving it as soon as my feet could touch the pedals. Once he was happy with my ability, he used to send me off on my own to Jimmy’s with the newspaper, where we shared a cup of tea and a buttered water biscuit. It became my ritual for the couple of years or so. Sometimes my mother would send some vegetables or eggs because Jimmy had become too unwell to bike all the way to our house to help in the garden.

A small stream passed through their property and on spring Sundays we all used sit among the daffodils on the bank to watch for the first ducklings and count them. Through the summer we watched their progress, but eels took their toll. They enjoyed feeding the ducks and the eels as well, usually first thing in the morning and still I remember the day Elizabeth warned Mary, the one who had suffered polio, that the banks could be slippery with morning dew and to be careful when she feed the ducks. The very next day Mary must have missed Elizabeth so went out in search for her. She found her face down in the stream! Poor Elizabeth didn’t survive.

I didn’t get to go to the funeral, my parents thought it best that I didn’t miss school. Sadly I never saw Jimmy or Mary again. I have no idea on whose authority, but they were moved to an elderly person’s hospice somewhere in the city and my parents were never told where they were.