On the Wallaby

The troopship Nestor rolled gently on a light swell as it bore northward beyond Capricorn carrying its cargo of optimism and adventure toward the battlefields of Europe.

On deck, Bill Bloxham handed the dog-eared, sepia photograph back to his new mate. He placed a cigarette paper between his lips, spilt some tobacco into his palm, and rubbed it thoughtfully between his hands. "I had my picture painted once," he said.

"Yeah? When was that?" Davey Williams stretched contentedly as they sat in the sun, their backs against a bulkhead.

"Must have been about twenty years ago. 'Ninety-six, I think it was. Bloke named McCubbin was the artist."

"Twenty years! Cut it out, Bill—you can't be much more than twenty now."

"That's right. I was just a baby. McCubbin heard a story about Dad that tickled his sense of humour and asked him to pose for a painting. Mum wanted to go along and watch so we all got into it. I've never seen the painting myself."

"It must have been a good yarn."

"It was. It started about five years before I was born when Dad was a young bloke himself, back when there wasn't much work about . . ."

Joe Bloxham ran and the breath rasped in his throat. His long legs, strong from eighteen months spent tramping the wallaby track, burned with the strain of that run but his anguish kept him moving when his reason told him he was too late. Clouds of grey-brown smoke obscured the afternoon sun and so filtered its light that the whole landscape was bathed in a pale orange glow. Ahead of him the bushfire raced on, lashed by the westerly wind.

Joe—tall, lean, toughened—coughed and fought for air through the water-moistened shirt he had tied around his mouth; he cursed as occasionally an ember blew onto his bare back.

Unwillingly he slowed to a long-striding walk, striving vainly to reach Bairnsdale ahead of the fire. All around him the bush was charred and burning and, as far as he could see in the smoky light, nothing lived. The rutted wagon-road, a saffron ribbon through the murk, indicated his route as it curved toward the town. He cut across the bend, swearing as his feet were seared through the soles of his Bluchers, paper-thin after thousands of miles on country roads.

Running again to escape the torment as quickly as possible he tried to shut the pain from his mind. His clothes smouldered as he brushed past glowing scrub but he didn't notice. The swag, his long-time burden, bounced unheeded on his shoulder and his billycans' rattle was a demon's laugh mocking his headlong flight.

Almost twenty-two, Joe had lost his job at Cornish's Hardware Store early in the 'nineties and for months had searched Sydney and the suburbs for another position. It was useless. With thousands of unemployed workers on the streets he had too little to offer an employer and was passed over for the few vacancies he found.

As his mother was forced to draw more heavily on her small legacy they realised that the money would soon run out. They would eventually be evicted because of unpaid rent.

It's best if I leave, Mum," he had said. Aunt Emma is right – let the lease go and you move in with her. If we keep going the way we are now neither of us will have enough to live on."

"I don't like it, Joe. You feel grown up but you're still really only a boy. Your father wouldn't have let you go while there was money left."

"If he were still alive and working I could stay. I'll be all right, honest. Don't worry."

Again, as he had done then, he swallowed a lump in his throat at the thought of his mother—partly for the sadness of leaving her and partly for the guilt he had felt. His lips had spoken of regret but inside he had longed for adventure and he remembered the joy of it.

It had been exciting. He had wanted to go and try his luck in the country. Well he had tried and there had had been plenty of luck, but most of it had been bad.

Old Mr Cornish had helped him to get started, letting him have a tent at cost price; it had been torn during delivery to the store but a patch made it usable. He had given Joe a sheet of old canvas, too, to cover his bed roll and make a tucker bag. Joe fashioned some billy cans from two bully beef tins, by fitting them with wire handles. Mr Cornish had told him to get two sizes so that one could be carried inside the other to save space.

Early one morning, his tucker bag bulging with his mother's food, and the two pound notes she had slipped in without his knowledge, he had turned his back to the sun and set off.

The days were cheerful enough at first and he had travelled westward through the mountains. He did odd jobs when he could get them in exchange for food so that he could conserve his supplies as long as possible. Down on the western plains he wandered from farm to farm, from station to station, asking for work; but there were too many others and too few jobs. Out here, he discovered, his city skills were useless.

Autumn had passed into winter as he walked. His optimism plummeted when grey skies and wet days chilled his body and sapped his strength. Mile after interminable mile dragged beneath his boots as he trudged along. He no longer bothered to smile as he asked for work. The months were a patchwork of rejection and despair, each a re-statement of earlier failure. He stopped hoping. He plodded on.

With the warmth of the returning Spring he felt his cheerfulness beginning to rise as he made his way northward toward Coonabarabran. He was becoming more experienced in the ways of the track and had learned to trap a rabbit or sometimes catch a fish. Old Barney O'Brien, a veteran swagman he met by the Castlereagh had taught him a great deal.

"Rabbits is easy," he said. All you need is a walnut, a tree and a lump of wood."

"You're kidding.

"Straight up, said Barney. "You find a burrow near a tree, put the walnut in front of it and hide behind the tree. When the rabbit comes out to get the walnut he'll pick it up in his mouth and try to break it. Now the walnut's so big that he'll shut his eyes with the effort and that's when you run out and belt him with the lump of wood." He paused to pull on his pipe. "O' course, there's no walnuts out here so I suppose we'll have to do it the other way."

The other way was to plait a strong noose from horse hair and set a snare, anchored to a peg, beside the warren. Since the rabbits could easily chew through the noose if they were left for more than a few minutes it was necessary to stay close enough to keep an eye on the snare. Joe's results, once he was back on his own, weren't as good as Barney's but he caught an occasional rabbit and always ate with thanks for this chance friendship.

Leaving the Warrumbungles behind he had made his way toward Dubbo where he found work in the Royal Hotel, cleaning, carrying and sometimes serving behind the bar. Joe was enjoying himself and his self esteem, battered by a thousand refusals, began to return. He celebrated his first payday by buying a new shirt and a pair of moleskin trousers. He needed new boots too but they'd have to wait until next week.

He whistled as he worked and life was suddenly good. The sun shone, he had fairly warm accommodation in the hayloft behind the hotel and there was money in his pocket. He began to believe in the future again.

That was when, while carrying a try of drinks, he had collided with John Parker, a wealthy squatter, and drenched him with beer. Parker was enraged. Although it was partly his own fault he demanded Joe's dismissal.

Dejected, Joe had headed south where rumour told of work to be had, but the rumours were wrong. Through Parkes and Narrandera he trudged—a city boy in a country setting his doubts began anew and he longed for home. "What am I doing here?" was a thought that came often and he would have to remind himself why he had left. The adventure had ended – now there was only weariness.

Summer came and went without relief and in the autumn he had found a week's work digging onions for a farmer named Redman at Deniliquin. He ate well while he was there but when he asked for his pay Redman pointed to the harvest and said, "There's your pay. Take a bag of onions."

Joe's stomach sank. "You promised me fifty shillings. I need money, not onions."

"That's your problem, son, not mine. It's onions or nothing."

"You're going to pay, you bastard!" Joe clenched his fists and started forward but Redman whistled his dogs, a pair of vicious blue cattle dogs. They advanced on Joe, snarling.

"Damn you, Redman," he swore, his voice breaking with despair.

Defeated, he put as many onions as he could carry in a hessian sack and left. For the next five days he lived on nothing else, eating raw onions, fried onions, onion soup or onions baked in the embers of a campfire. This was his bleakest experience and for the first time he understood why many swagmen had taken their own lives.

October found him in Albury, where he again crossed trails with Barney.

"Try Bairnsdale, Joe. They're putting on men at the new brick works. You might be lucky."

"What about you, Barney? Don't you want to give it a go?"

"I'm a bit old for that sort of work, son. I'm going north. A man can't starve in Queensland."

So they had separated and Joe had come south to yet another disaster. Bushfire!

Struggling on he crested a low hill and there in front of him lay the town. Cleared paddocks on the western side had saved it from the worst of the fire but the houses to the south were in danger. A line of men with shovels and chaff bags were already fighting to save their homes, well-constructed on this side of town. Their women, working rapidly, kept them supplied with wet bags.

Joe dropped his swag near the women, slipped into his shirt for whatever protection it might afford, and snatched up a bag as he moved into the line. The men who saw him come spared him only a curious glance or a nod as he commenced to work. There was no time to chatter.

Hours passed. No one was sure how long they had been there but, strong countrymen though they were, their arms and backs ached from the continual pounding as they followed the fire along the town's perimeter. Doggedly they held the flames, fighting them to a halt, while the women extinguished the spot fires ahead of the main blaze, fed by wind-borne bundles of burning eucalyptus leaves.

Eventually a firebreak had been formed where the men had worked but, just when the town seemed to be safe, a huge fireball was hurled forward to drop at the door of an old barn behind the hotel. The dry wood ignited like tinder and the whole front wall was soon alight. From inside could be heard the scream of a frightened horse.

"Sultan!" shouted one of the men as they raced toward the barn. "Sultan's trapped in his stall."

"You'll never get him out of there, Mac," said another. Even if you got inside you'd never be able to lead him through those flames."

The horse continued to neigh and kick in terror and Joe, almost without thinking, wrapped a chaff bag about his head and shoulders and charged into the barn.

He yelped as he felt the flame on his exposed skin and with a mighty leap burst through what was left of the door.

Inside the horse reared and plunged in one of the stalls and Joe, realising he would not be able to control him if he set him free in the barn, left him there. He tried desperately to kick the old boards from the back of the barn and his stomach knotted convulsively as he realised he was fighting for his own life as well as that of the horse.

In spite of their age the boards held fast and his kicks became more desperate as the roof began to sag. He looked around in near panic and, with relief, saw a crowbar in the corner. Seizing it he inserted its tongue between wallboard and upright and heaved with all his strength. There was a mighty crack as the board came loose. it was grasped by willing hands and torn away from the outside as Joe moved onto the next. After three more panels had been removed more helpers made the crowbar unnecessary and he ran the few paces back to the horse.

"Steady feller. It's all right" He was talking for himself more than Sultan who still reared in fright. As he opened the stall to let him out the horse crashed past him knocking him to the ground. His head struck the hard earth and he lost consciousness.

When Joe opened his eyes he discovered they were sore. He didn't worry about that – his headache was much more demanding and his skin was a mass of burns. The big man who had raised the alarm for Sultan was pacing the room. Another man, a doctor, bent over the bed dressing his injuries.

"He's awake, Mac."

The big man stopped pacing. "Take it easy, son," he said. "That was a brave thing you did today. Is there anything I can get you?"

Joe shook his head and immediately regretted doing so as pain stabbed through it. "No. Thanks. Just sleep."

"Fair enough. we'll talk in the morning. I'm Andrew McGregor – Mac to you – and I own this hotel. You won't have anything to worry about for some time.

Bill Bloxham lit another cigarette and flicked the match over the rail into the ocean. "That's about it, I suppose. The McGregors found him a home and gave him a job in the pub. He took to it like a thirsty horse to a trough. All that time on the track had taught him a lot about people and he was a pretty popular bar man—especially after the word got around about how he saved Sultan.

"He fell in love with the boss's daughter and they were married. Grandma Bloxham came to Bairnsdale for the wedding and is still there. I turned up a year later."

"Sounds like a fairy story, doesn't it," Said Davey. "He got a job, he got a girl, and they all lived happily ever after."

"Yeah, it worked out pretty well in the finish."

"You said this McCubbin feller thought it was funny and that's why he painted the picture. I must have missed something."

"Well, no. I didn't tell you that part. See, Dad was a city boy and even though he'd been on the wallaby for eighteen months he wasn't country smart."

"Takes longer than that, I reckon."

"Yeah. Anyway he was only a few miles out of Bairnsdale and stopped to make camp. He pitched his tent and lit a fire to boil the billy without even clearing a space around it. When he went to get his tucker bag from near the tent the westerly took over and before he knew what was happening the scrub was ablaze. He tried to put it out but the wind was too strong and the fire got away from him. He couldn't do much by himself so he tried to give the alarm."

"You can't outrun a bushfire, Bill."

"Not a chance. Anyway that's the story McCubbin heard. Dad was responsible for the fire that finally got him a job. He'd been drinking one night and let the cat out of the bag to a couple of mates. It wasn't long before the whole town knew. It didn't matter by then because he had made a lot of friends and, apart from Grandpa's barn, no real damage had been done."

"Is he still at the pub?"

"No. When the war broke out and I decided to join the army he came with me. He put his age back and we signed up on the same day."

"Where is he now?"

"Well, you can't work in a pub all that time without learning how to handle men so it wasn't long before he got some stripes. That's him over there by the rail.

"Hey, Sarge," he called. "Come here. I want you to meet a mate of mine."

"On the wallaby track" was an Australian term used to describe the life of those people who are called tramps in England or hobos in the United States. They were the swagmen. They were commonplace during times of unemployment including the Depression of 1896.

My own father was forced to walk the wallaby track during the Great Depression of 1929. Rather than do nothing, he pushed a wheelbarrow across the Blue Mountains to prospect for gold.

He was the Davey Williams (his Christian names) described in my introduction to On the Wallaby Track. Bill Bloxham, who set the scene for the story, was his mate during World War I. They were inseparable until Bill was killed in France. Dad kept a photograph of the two of them on a bedside table until he died almost forty years later. In my mind's eye I can still see Bill's face looking out from that photograph.