As the HQ platoon walked back to their bivouac area Sgt Peter Bronsky found himself walking beside Kate O’Brien, the Intelligence Corporal. Peter had known her for two years but until now had never taken much notice of her. Girls did not interest him much. He thought them silly creatures who just made life complicated.
This view had been reinforced by all the emotional upheavals they seemed to have caused his friend Graham over the last few years. ‘Poor Graham,’ he thought. ‘There was Glenda, then that bitch Deslie, and golden-haired Jennifer in the Navy Cadets, and Moira, and that horrible Caroline, and Margaret, and Ailsa, and Rowena and God only knows how many others!’ It seemed to Peter that Graham fell in love at the wink of an eye; and with the most desperate earnestness and passionate intensity.
‘Well, not me!’ Peter vowed. ‘Give me sensible things to think about; like radios and computers. Time enough for girls when I get older.’
Peter was very keen on electronics. It was why he had been Signals Corporal the previous year; and was HQ Sgt this year. The thought made him glance at the present Sig Cpl, Allison Broadfoot. ‘She’s just an “airhead”. She’s not interested in radios at all. It’s just as well I’m here. She doesn’t have a clue really!’ he told himself.
Peter was aware that Graham was attracted to Allison; and he did concede she was pretty- he was not that blind to girls.
‘In fact all the corporals in HQ are pretty,’ Peter considered. Then he grinned. ‘Except Bert Lacey!’ Bert was the ‘Q’ Cpl. Peter wasn’t that way inclined. ‘Kellie Jones is the most attractive,’ he decided. Kellie was a Year 11 and in the same class at school. She had lovely long legs and a delightfully prominent bosom. But she was a bit of a tart- or so it was rumoured. Peter didn’t approve of that.
‘And Kate is pretty too,’ Peter noticed. He glanced sideways at her. She met his eyes and smiled. Peter smiled back and felt himself blush hot. ‘Yes she is!’
The shock of realising just how attractive Kate was put Peter into a bit of emotional turmoil. In spite of his attitudes to girls he found himself glancing at her. As they walked he studied her covertly and he liked what he saw: silken black hair; sparkling hazel eyes- more green than brown- beautiful smooth skin. He had never seriously looked at Kate before. Now he found his eyes straying to her continually. When he realized what he was doing he snorted in exasperation and turned his back to concentrate on putting up the ‘hutchie’ he was to share with Graham.
But erecting a hutchie took minimal mental effort. It was just two plastic sheets- ‘Shelters Individual’- clipped together with press-studs and tied between two trees the right distance apart. The four corners were then pegged down with thin wire tent pegs to make an ‘A’ shaped tent. Peter found his gaze wandering back to Kate.
Even with her dressed in the relatively shapeless camouflage uniform he noted hints of the well rounded figure within. Kate was ‘just right’ Peter decided. She was neither fat nor thin. Her legs were trim. She had a well shaped bum and narrow waist and was pleasantly rounded up top. Her hands and wrists were slim and she moved gracefully.
Kate looked up from pushing in a tent peg and met Peter’s gaze. Again she smiled. Peter looked away in embarrassed confusion. ‘I shouldn’t be looking at the girls,’ he chided himself. ‘It’s my job to supervise them.’
Feeling annoyed with himself Peter stood up and looked around. The HQ group were setting up camp among a stand of small trees about fifty paces from where the officers were camped. Nearest to the vehicle track along the top of ‘Sandy Ridge’ were the two ‘Queys’: Costigan and Bert Lacey. The other members of HQ were grouped with the girls about 25 metres away and with their hutchies aligned so as to give them privacy. The girls were on the side furthest from the centre. The males were scattered with no real pattern to them except that the Costigan and Bert Lacey had a second hutchie as their ‘Q’ Store and the medics would maintain an extra hutchie as the Company Aid Post- the CAP.
Peter studied the medics. His gaze lighted on the fat bum of Marcia Denton. She had her back to him and was bending over so that all Peter could see were two massive legs and a huge backside. The cloth of her trousers strained at its seams. ‘Like a bloody elephant!’ he thought. He quickly shifted his gaze onto a black haired girl who was crawling out of that hutchie: Leah Allan. ‘Now there is an attractive and desirable girl!’ he thought. Leah was another classmate and had the reputation around the school of being a real ‘goer’:- warm and willing. ‘She certainly looks like she has a smouldering fire behind those black eyes,’ Peter mused.
His eyes wandered back to Kate. Kate was sharing a hutchie with Allison. They were about 15 paces to one side of his shelter. Again their eyes met; and again she smiled. Peter managed to smile back; then bent down to hide his confusion by hauling his gear into the hutchie.
‘Don’t be silly,’ he told himself; aware that his heart had begun beating rapidly.
But when they sat in a group to prepare their evening meal Peter found himself beside Kate. He wasn’t sure if she moved or if he had, but it happened. The cadets had two 5 man 24 hour Ration Packs for their food. This had to be shared out and was Peter’s responsibility. He made them sit in a circle on their packs, or on the ground, and the plastic packets were passed around. Each cadet took their share. Those who wanted to heat the food, or to make coffee or tea, lit Hexamine stoves.
The uneven number in HQ was solved by SSgt Costigan going off to eat with the ‘Control Group’. Peter shrugged. He didn’t care. He didn’t particularly like Costigan. So that Graham would not miss out on food while he was moving from platoon to platoon organizing work parties to dig latrines Peter made sure one meal was left for him.
Then Peter got a shock. Kate passed him a tin of peaches and as she did their eyes met and their fingers touched. Peter felt himself tingle with a sensation like a mild electric shock. Another smile from her left him churning inside. And she spoke to him! ‘She actually wants to talk to me!’ he thought. He found it hard to believe. He responded shyly at first, then with more confidence.
‘Does she like me?’ he wondered. It was a new sensation altogether and left him feeling both worried and breathless. He realized with some amazement that he wanted her to like him; that he hoped she did. After the meal he made a special point of cleaning his teeth carefully. ‘I wouldn’t want to put her off with bad breath if she talks to me again.’
Darkness set in. The evening was cool and dry. The clear, starry sky promised a further drop in temperature. A Night Navigation Exercise was the first training activity. In preparation Peter filled his waterbottles from a plastic jerrycan, checked his torch and pulled on his field jacket. He then began to hurry the others to complete their preparations. Over at the big tree he could see Graham assembling the company for a briefing and he didn’t want HQ to be late.
“Come on HQ! Form up in two ranks,” Peter ordered. “Hurry up Cadet Denton. Leave that! You can pack it up later!”
Denton mumbled under her breath and grumpily joined the others. Peter called them to attention and marched them over to the spot indicated by Graham. Peter halted them and then fell them out, to sit in a line at the left end of the company. In the darkness sergeants shouted, lost cadets called out, people milled around, torches flashed.
“Silence!”
The CSM’s voice cut through the hubbub. The noise ceased.
“Now sit behind your section commanders in straight lines and don’t talk. Section commanders and platoon sergeants, check that all your people are here.”
Graham waited until the cadets were all seated and silent; then checked with each Pl Sgt in turn. Using a pencil torch he looked at his watch, then said, “Cpl Doyle, go and tell the OC we are ready - and don’t grumble or I’ll find you a latrine to dig.”
Doyle hurried off. Graham faced the company. “Which reminds me, there are only two latrines dug so far. One for boys over there,” he said. To point the direction he shone the beam of his large torch on a stand of ironbarks on the north side of the ridge; “And one for girls. It is over there beyond Two Platoon.” He swung the torch the other way. “We will dig two more tomorrow; and I will be looking for ‘volunteers’.”
This brought a smile to Peter’s lips and a chuckle from the troops. Graham let them talk quietly until the OC and the other officers arrived. Capt Conkey took over. He reminded the cadets of the topography, the boundaries and the safety rules. Then he got them all to check they had what they needed.
“Map, matches, waterbottle, spare meal. NCOs make sure you have a radio, compass, protractor, torch, notebook, pencil. OK. CUOs and sergeants go to Lt Maclaren. Corporals come out to me.”
There was a surge of movement, accompanied by a babble of talk. Graham moved to keep the cadets under control now that their leaders were gone. As CSM he would be with the OC. He called firmly, “Calm down you mob! Lance corporals keep your sections under control. You can talk quietly. Sit down Cadet Arthur.”
“But sir, I forgot me waterbottle,” the cadet whined.
Graham replied in an exasperated voice, “Go and get it. Don’t run! You know the safety rules. We don’t want any accidents in the dark.”
Peter joined the CUOs and sergeants. They and the officers would form the checkpoints. Lt Maclaren, the unit 2ic, a tall, sandy-haired man with a moustache, stood beside a lantern. He handed each a photocopy map which showed the checkpoints and the route each of the 15 sections would follow. On another photocopy were listed the checkpoints, each named after a letter, with its Grid Reference and the name of the staff allotted to it. Another table listed the sequence of checkpoints that each section should go through.
“As you can see, each checkpoint is called a letter,” Lt McLaren explained. “Next to it is the Grid Reference and the names of who is at each one. The diagram shows the sequence of checkpoints each section should pass through. Take No 1 Section as an example. It will start here at Checkpoint ‘A’, which is where Lt Standish will be. One Section will then go to Checkpoint ‘L’, then to ‘M’, ‘D’, ‘N’, ‘C’, ‘B’ and back to ‘A’. That is seven ‘legs’ in all. Each leg is between 400 and 500 metres, so the total distance is about three point five kilometres.”
Lt Maclaren paused and looked at the group. “Now, when a section turns up, check that they have arrived at the correct checkpoint. If not, send them back to the previous one on a Back Bearing. Remind them not to follow other groups as they all go different ways and the routes zig zag all over the place.”
“When they arrive, note who they are and tell them where to go next. The corporal is to calculate the Magnetic Bearing from the Grid Reference you give them. You are to check their calculations. Do not let them leave until you are happy they are going the right way. And note down the bearing they march on. That way, if they get lost, we at least know where they were last seen, and which way they went.”
Lt Maclaren paused again. “And keep the lights to a minimum. Not like last year when half the checkpoints had cosy little fires! The dozy corporals didn’t need to use their compasses at all. Heavens, even ‘Dimbo’ Doyle nearly made it around!”
This caused a ripple of laughter. Cpl David ‘Dimbo’ Doyle had got spectacularly lost on a weekend exercise the previous year- luckily ending up in a place where help was urgently needed. He had not been promoted and was now a section commander in the senior platoon.
‘The OC should have sacked the silly bugger,’ Peter thought sourly.
Lt Maclaren went on, “So the sections can use a shielded torch to do their calculations and map work, but they are not to use them while they are actually walking along. If you see them doing it yell out. Also, make sure it is a cadet who has the compass, not the corporal; and a different cadet on every leg. The aim of this exercise is to teach the cadets how to use a compass at night. The corporal should know how. Alright, just check you know where the safety vehicles will be. They are marked on the map. Now, any questions? None? Good! Do your radio checks and off you go.”
All the Officers, CUOs and NCOs had small hand-held radios. They now began calling in turn. After answering the radio checks as Call Sign ‘Hotel’ (Headquarters) Peter began walking with CUO Sheila Sherry, the Year 12 girl who was 1 Pl Commander, Stephen, who was her sergeant, Sgt Crane and Cpl Rankin. As he walked Peter hitched his basic webbing around to settle it more comfortably on his shoulders and hips. It had been a month since he had last worn it and he found it heavy and uncomfortable.
As he walked Peter thought about Kate. Those thoughts also made him feel uncomfortable. He could feel a definite pain around the heart which he recognised as yearning; and, more worrying, the distinct stirrings of desire. He knew he should not be having such thoughts. ‘I’m a sergeant and she’s only a corporal,’ he told himself. ‘No fraternizing across the rank levels the OC says. And it’s my job to maintain discipline.’
The group were walking along a vehicle track- two wheel tracks in the dry grass. This led them, after 500 paces, to a gravel road which ran north from the Flinders Highway and on to the Canning River and beyond. At the junction with the Canning Road Crane and Rankin stopped. The junction was Checkpoint ‘B’. The others turned left and walked south. After a hundred paces the Canning Road dipped across the head of a small gully. On the south side the road ran along the crest of a wide, sandy ridge.
This was nicknamed ‘Bare Ridge’ as it was almost devoid of trees and the grass was always cropped so short by the cattle that the sand showed through. Fifty metres further along Stephen and CUO Sherry turned off to the left and angled down a tiny spur which terminated in a small jumble of rocks a hundred metres away. The rocks were Checkpoint ‘C’.
As they parted Stephen turned. “Will you be OK on your own?” he asked.
“Of course!” Peter replied. “I’m on the road aren’t I? And I’ve got a radio. Besides, I’m not like you. I don’t need anyone to hold my hand because I’m scared of the dark!”
Stephen and CUO Sherry both hooted derision and they all laughed. At a couple of checkpoints- all on roads- there was only one staff member- a male (in case undesirables came driving along). All the other checkpoints, which were in the bush, had two people at them. No girl was on her own.
“Don’t get lost you two,” Peter quipped. Stephen laughed and CUO Sherry snorted. They angled away into the darkness, the murmur of their voices growing fainter. Peter walked on alone. He was happy and relaxed. Although he had the feeling he was the only living thing in the area he knew that there were three other checkpoints within easy hailing distance.
‘It’s a lovely night,’ Peter thought, breathing deeply and relishing the experience. Up on the open crestline he had a glorious view in three directions. He could see a vast distance. From horizon to horizon millions of stars twinkled brilliantly. In spite of a gentle cool breeze the exertion of walking made him perspire. The most obvious sound he could hear was the scrunching of his boots on the sandy road surface but as he moved further along the ridge he became aware of vehicle noises from the highway.
Then Peter realised he could see the vehicles. The flicker of a car’s headlights came into view from behind the trees on the low ridge which ran parallel to Bare Ridge. This ridge went south from the camp to the highway. The car came into view about a kilometre away. It raced across the lower end of the gentle, open valley between the two ridges, to vanish behind the lower end of Bare Ridge. A few seconds later it reappeared on his right front. Peter watched it cross the kilometre of open ground before it ran onto the long concrete bridge which spanned the Bunyip River.
Peter stared in the starlight at the dark area that indicated the trees along the banks of the Bunyip. He liked the Bunyip River. It is a big river, similar to the Burdekin. From one tree-lined bank to the other is about 500 metres of open, sandy river bed, interspersed in places by ‘islands’ of trees and clumps of rocks.
The car, its headlights cutting a swathe through the night, raced off the far end of the bridge. It went up a long, rolling hill to vanish over the crest. In the far distance the lights of Charters Towers could just be seen. They provided a cheery, beckoning glow. The only other lights visible were at a couple of farmhouses.
Dark shapes loomed up beside the road- beef cattle. Peter ignored them and kept walking. The beasts suddenly snorted and fled off down the slope with a flurry of hooves. Peter was momentarily alarmed but was used to cattle and knew that, unless there was an angry old bull, he had nothing to fear. They were frightened of humans.
He walked on until he reached a large tree which stood alone beside the road. It was a Burdekin Plum tree, its thick mass of leaves forming a dark blob against the stars. This was his checkpoint. He radioed Capt Conkey (Call Sign ‘Sunray’) to report he was in position; then took off his webbing, had a drink of water, and sat down to wait.
For over half an hour Peter sat there alone, occupied by his thoughts. It was something of a relief when he at last heard the murmur of approaching voices, then the dull thudding and scuff of boots. A section appeared as black shapes in the night. They reached the road about twenty metres away and stood in a group talking.
“Over here,” Peter called. They moved towards him. “What section is that?” he asked.
“Number Two, Cpl Ward Sergeant.”
“OK. Sit down.” Peter turned on his pencil torch, crossed off 2 Sect on his control sheet; then gave Cpl Ward the next Grid Reference he had to head for. Cpl Ward sat and pulled out his notebpook and map. As he did his section 2ic, Lance Corporal Wendy Werribee, took out a torch and knelt to help him by shining the beam on his map. While doing this Wendy leaned on Cpl Ward’s shoulder. The section commander seemed not to notice this as he plotted the position on the map, ruled a pencil line from one check point to the other, measured the angle with a protractor; and converted it from a ‘Grid Bearing’ to ‘Magnetic’.
Peter watched, checking to see that he made no errors. But seeing the way Wendy was leaning on Lofty Ward, obviously pressing her breasts against his shoulder got Peter thinking. Part of him thought he should tell her not to do that but the other half was just jealous. ‘I wish a girl would do that to me,’ he thought, adding ‘Kate’ to the idea. But he said nothing, merely noting that it confirmed some of the rumours that had been circulating for some time about Lofty and his busty 2ic.
When Cpl Ward had completed his calculations he held them up for Peter to check. Peter then wrote down the bearing on the control sheet.
“That is correct Cpl Ward. Now, calculate the distance in paces and get going.”
There were more voices and another section arrived. It was No 4 Sect., Cpl Barbara Brassington. Peter made them sit on the other side of the tree. As soon as he was sure Cpl Ward was ready he sent 2 Section on its way and then sat next to Barbara. He didn’t particularly like her. To his mind she was a bit too pushy and aggressive; and she had joined the cadets with a reputation for being a bit of a tart.
‘She is very capable though,’ he conceded as he watched her deftly plot the bearing on her map. ‘And she is attractive- but not as attractive as Kate.’
4 Section tramped off into the night. Peter stood and stretched. It had been a long day and he was tired. The sound of a train attracted his attention. From where he stood he could not see it as the curve of the crest hid it from view. ‘It will cross the rail bridge,’ he thought. He had a sudden desire to watch that so he walked quickly across the road and stood on the highest point to look South West. That rail bridge had been the scene of the most dramatic event of his life and he often thought of it.
The rail bridge was nearly two kilometres away, south beyond the highway. On the previous year’s annual camp the unit had done a ‘Commando’ type exercise to raid the bridge. After the bridge over the Burdekin at Macrossan this was the largest bridge in the area; a massive steel girder construction nearly a kilometre long. Peter had been the leader of a patrol which had infiltrated the defences to do a ‘close reconnaissance’ of the bridge and to note the deployment of the defending cadet units. He was particularly proud of that patrol. It had taken a day and a night and covered 20km. They had avoided several patrols of defenders and he had been able to make detailed field sketches and sketch maps.
While his patrol had done this the unit had been hiding in the close country at the junction of the Canning River and the Bunyip, two kilometres north of the highway bridge. At the end of the patrol Peter had helped the Intelligence Section make a large sand model of the rail bridge and the surrounding area. This had been used to brief the section and platoon commanders during the OC’s ‘Orders Group’ before the raid.
‘Kate was a cadet in the Intelligence Section then,’ Peter remembered. ‘She was on that patrol. How come I never noticed her then?’
By then the train was rumbling onto the far end of the rail bridge, the sounds a loud roar even where he stood, nearly three kilometres away. ‘It’s the ‘Inlander’ on its way from Mount Isa to Townsville,’ he decided, seeing the lighted windows of passenger carriages. As he watched the train Peter’s thoughts turned back to the raid. The Heatley Cadet unit from Townsville and St Michaels from Broadsound had been the defenders. They had saturated the area with a dozen patrols, as well as platoons at each end of the bridge. The exercise had taken two days and two nights. Peter had led a raiding party along the bed of the river on the second night but they had been seen and driven off.
‘In fact the only Cairns patrol to reach its objective was Graham’s,’ he mused. Out of 6 raiding parties his was a good effort. ‘And Graham’s was the only patrol on the far side of the river.’ Peter had heard that it was largely because of his handling of that patrol that Graham had earned himself the step in rank over the other corporals to be CSM. Peter didn’t mind. He thought Graham was just right for the job. ‘Graham is a real soldier,’ he thought.
As he stood there watching the flicker of the train’s headlights as it travelled through the tunnel of steel girders Peter experienced an even more intense flashback: running along that bridge in the dark, his heart filled with dread. He had stopped a cadet from committing suicide but had been knocked off the bridge. For several agonizing minutes he had dangled by the fingers of one hand from a cross girder. Below had been fifty metres of thin air before the sand of the river bed. His screams had been drowned by the roar of a passing train. It had been Graham who had saved him. Those minutes of terror often returned to him in nightmares and even as he watched he shivered with apprehension.
With a conscious effort Peter thrust the memories aside and focused on the ‘raid’. ‘It was a good exercise,’ he mused. ‘I hope this year’s is just as interesting. Ah! Here comes another section.’
Peter quickly walked back to his checkpoint. It was HQ. As soon as he realised that Peter’s heart quickened. His eyes sought out Kate in the darkness. When he knelt to use his torch on the map Kate crouched on his left. She was so close their arms touched. The other three corporals in HQ also sat down but Peter barely noticed them. All he was aware of was the touch of Kate’s skin.
The HQ corporals were taking it in turn to navigate. It was Kellie Jones’ turn so the others watched and chatted while Kellie worked out the bearing. Peter noted that Kate kept lightly pressing against his arm. ‘Is she doing that deliberately- or is it just accidental?’ he wondered. He decided it must be intentional. ‘She could easily move away if she wanted to.’
Peter turned to look at Kate. Even in the dim reflected glow from the pencil torch she looked lovely. He felt his emotions catch in his throat and squeeze his chest. He was close enough to smell her and the fragrance made his senses swim. Their eyes met.
She smiled.
‘She likes me!’ Peter’s heart leapt and bounded. He didn’t dare to hope. He looked away, hoping that the others hadn’t noticed; and that he wasn’t sweating or smelling too much.
Another patrol arrived and the spell was broken. It was 6 Section; Roger’s. Peter reluctantly left Kate’s side and moved over to them. A shiver ran down him.
“G’day Roger. You lot lost yet?” he said.
“Bite your bum!” Roger snorted indignantly. “More to the point, are you in the right place?”
They both laughed. “Where do I go next?” Roger asked.
By the time Peter had given Roger the information the HQ patrol was ready to leave. Peter felt an urge to speak to Kate but could not think of any excuse to do so. He watched them walk off into the darkness with a pang of such intensity it surprised him. It was like a physical pain.
‘I’m in love!’ he told himself with astonishment. ‘And it hurts!’