Alice had suffered a summer of losses. A pack of mongrel dingoes were systematically working their way through the calves in the paddocks closer to the national park. They looked and hunted more like dogs than normal dingoes, mauling and injuring the weaker cattle and using them as playthings.
Alice hadn’t been vigilant enough when it came to vermin control since Jeremy had gone. She hadn’t realised quite how effective his occasional baiting and shooting expeditions had been in controlling the dog numbers. Now there was a new generation of pups, and they had developed a taste for the blood of the calves. Alice had begun to bait some of the calf carcases and had even allowed Gyro and his hunting cronies onto Redstone a few times, but she’d left it too late and the numbers of feral animals were now well and truly out of control. The adult dogs were wary of the baits and usually too cunning to be seen by people in a noisy vehicle.
Early one morning towards the end of a particularly unlucky fortnight in late February, Alice returned to her cottage after her usual dawn duties at the yards. It was already steamy and the insects were out in force. She intended to head out to the back country to check the calves again, so she slapped together a cheese sandwich and took an empty water bottle from the windowsill, planning to fill it. But lying in the base of the bottle was a tiny withered frog that must have become trapped inside. With a sorrowful murmur Alice went to shake it out of the window; as she lifted the bottle into the light, she thought she detected a tiny movement. So, more gently, she tipped the frog out onto the palm of her hand. It was yellowish and dry, every tiny rib and vertebra visible through the stretched amphibious skin. However, it wasn’t yet stiff.
Telling herself it was futile, Alice nonetheless put a splash of water in a coffee mug; reaching out the window, she picked a small leaf off the hibiscus and placed it in the cup. Onto this, so that it was half in the water, she sat the limp, wrinkled little amphibian. She put the cup on the sill, grabbed her lunch and was heading back out again when the phone trilled.
‘Alice, is that you?’ It was Sue O’Donnell. She sounded worried.
‘Mrs O’Donnell? Is everything alright?’
‘No, not really, Alice. Jeremy’s ill.’
‘Ill?’ Alice felt a leaden sensation in her chest.
‘He’s conscious again now, but he’s still in Intensive Care in Brisbane. I’ll be heading down later this morning.’
Alice’s throat tightened with panic. ‘What happened?’
‘It’s called acute pancreatitis. He left it too late to go to hospital and his kidneys failed. He nearly died, they said.’ Sue’s voice quavered. ‘They’re afraid of another attack, but at least he’s in the right place. His blood results improved immediately after dialysis but his kidneys may be permanently damaged.’
‘Oh, Mrs O’Donnell . . .’ Alice choked up mid-sentence.
‘I’m so sorry to worry you, darling, but the nurses said this morning that he was saying your name through the night.’
Alice found that she couldn’t speak.
‘Alice? Are you there by yourself? Go and find Beryl.’
At this Alice pulled herself together. ‘No. I’ll be alright. I should go to Brisbane.’
‘Just wait till I get down there and see how the land lies. They said something about transferring him to Emerald if he picks up. I’ll ring you again tonight. I’m so sorry to upset you, darling.’
‘No! I mean, thanks so much for letting me know. If Jeremy wants me, I’ll come.’
‘I knew you’d say that, Alice darling – thank you.’
Alice hung up the phone and stood staring at it, wondering what to do next. After a few minutes, she decided that it was best to carry on as normal until further notice, so she gathered her things and drove out to the back country as planned.
The mob of cows and calves appeared happy enough, feeding outwards from the camp of sally wattle trees where they had spent the night. The air was already stifling, and as she scanned the rest of the paddock through the shimmering haze, Alice spotted the red hide of a cow lying on its side some distance from the others. With a sinking heart, she bumped the ute over the clumps of buffel grass until she was quite close to the cow. The animal remained unmoving apart from the slight rise and fall of her ribcage.
As Alice opened her door, the dogs jumped out; the cow, suddenly aware of their presence, began to heave and struggle, her eyes bulging with terror. Alice commanded the dogs to get back into the ute while she walked around to the back end of the cow. She’d been fully prepared to see a stuck calf, but an even more gruesome sight met her eyes. The front legs of a large calf were protruding from below the cow’s thick tail, but the nose wasn’t showing. The calf’s legs had been chewed down to the bone, and the soft tissue of the cow’s rear had also been cruelly torn by canine teeth. The cow struggled again, thrashing her legs and trying to gain her footing. She lifted her head and scrabbled hopelessly before flopping down onto her side again.
Alice turned away from the bloody mess and retched repeatedly, beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead. Then, steeling herself, she wiped her mouth and turned back to the cow. Alice spoke to her soothingly and, after a few attempts, was able to get down close to the calf without the cow struggling. The unfortunate creature was spent. First Alice had to push the calf back inside the cow and try to feel for its head. It took all of her strength to force the creature’s legs back inside, as the lubricating amniotic fluid had all but gone. She felt around and found the calf’s nose inside, tilted backwards and stuck at the wrong angle; this was the cause of the problem. As Alice pulled on the calf’s nose, the cow writhed and bellowed, and the movement helped Alice to jerk the head around. But she’d detected, even before seeing the nose, that the calf was horribly bloated in death. It was possibly too swollen to come out, but it was worth a try.
Alice drove the ute closer to the anguished creature and took from the toolbox the wire strainers, usually used for tensioning the barbed wire when fencing. She attached one end of them to the bullbar and the other to the front feet of the calf. As Alice pulled back and forth on the ratchet lever, the chain became tight and the cow began to bellow again. The calf’s nose was now protruding, puffy with fluid. Alice continued to work the handle until the handle became too stiff and the calf would budge no further.
She unhooked the strainers and tied a rope securely around the calf’s bloody hocks. The other end of it she tied to the bullbar of the ute. She climbed in and, as gently as she could, began to reverse, inch by inch. The cow writhed again in agony and was almost dragged bodily herself, but the calf stayed put. With another shuddering bellow the cow began to scrabble again with her feet in the dirt.
This was the final straw for Alice. She’d been keen to save the cow, a young, square-framed Brahman of a very nice type. According to the year number of her brand this was only her second calf. But now she’d suffered enough. Her chances of recovery weren’t good, even if Alice had been able to extract the calf. She’d most probably have calving paralysis and be almost certain to develop septicaemia, the bites from the wild dogs adding to the likelihood of infection.
Alice knew what she must do. She’d faced this kind of scenario many times before, but until this year, there’d always been someone else with whom she could share all the grisly discoveries. Now she had to handle it alone. She gritted her teeth and unzipped the rifle case. The subtle noise of the zip was enough to send Darcy leaping from the ute and scooting away to a clump of shrubs a few hundred metres away.
Alice tried to focus on a tuft of hair above the cow’s eyes to avoid looking at the eyes themselves, so mournful and pleading. The single shot rang out across the paddock and echoed in the hills of the nearby national park. The animal’s suffering was at an end. It was a task that Alice despised at the best of times, but today she had no emotional reserve. She dropped to the ground and sat, rifle across her lap, crying bitterly. The discovery of the unlucky cow had been the final, fatal thrust on the floodgates that had been creaking and groaning for several days.
All at once, through her misery, her grandfather’s most frequent prayer rang in her mind, as clearly as though he’d spoken it into her ear: ‘Thy will be done.’
How many times over the years had she heard the old man say it, even in the face of great adversity? Alice tried to repeat it, to simply accept and survive, but her lips wouldn’t form the words. She couldn’t do without Jeremy. She no longer wanted to protect herself from him, because nothing could be worse than being without him. Redstone, everything she’d ever wanted, paled into insignificance beside the loss of him.
‘Give him another chance,’ she sobbed. ‘Give me another chance. I swear I’ll try harder not to judge people.’
The dogs were pressed against her, distressed by her uncharacteristic outburst. Darcy had even overcome his fear of the gun to creep close and rest his big ugly head on her foot. Alice wiped her eyes and nose on her sleeve, reassured her dogs and was calm. Feeling a little foolish, she climbed back into the ute and finished her checking run.
When Alice returned that evening, Beryl was sitting at the table on the little veranda of the cottage. She looked as though she’d been patiently waiting there for some time, working industriously on her patchwork.
‘Hello, dear,’ she greeted Alice gently, putting her sewing aside on the table, beside a bunch of garden flowers she’d arranged in a vase. She examined Alice’s face closely. ‘Thought they might brighten things up a bit.’ Beryl motioned towards the vase, but Alice wasn’t listening. She wanted only the news that Beryl must be bearing.
‘Mrs Sawtell, have you heard . . .’
‘Yes, dear, Sue rang and Jeremy seems to be out of danger. They’re sending him back in a day or two.’
‘To Emerald?’
‘No, to Sue’s. His kidneys are coming good. He should recover quite well provided he stays away from the drink from now on.’
‘Oh.’ Alice sank into a chair. ‘Thank God.’
‘Yes.’ Beryl nodded knowingly. ‘He’s a very lucky young man, by all accounts. Saved by an iron constitution and nothing else. He needs to take a leaf out of your Walter’s book and try his hand at some clean living. Can I make you a cuppa?’
‘No thanks, Mrs Sawtell, I’ve got a few more jobs to do yet.’ Alice stood up again.
‘Well, there’s some dinner in the fridge for you. Just zap it in the microwave for a minute or two and it’ll be ready to go.’ She smiled sympathetically at Alice.
‘Thank you, Mrs Sawtell, for everything you do for me.’ Alice gave the surprised old woman an impulsive hug and kiss before skipping lightly down the stairs and heading for the yards.
Just on dark, Alice came back into the cottage and sank down onto a kitchen chair. The coffee cup on the windowsill caught her eye. She stood up again and peeped in doubtfully, then exclaimed out loud in amazement at the sight of an apparently healthy, tiny green tree frog, his soft throat pulsing and his large glossy eyes looking back at her. Alice’s skin tingled with goose bumps and she was filled with awe. Life. Such a fragile, fleeting thing.
Her sudden appearance having disturbed the tiny creature, he leapt onto the rim of the mug and poised there gracefully, turning his head to regard his rescuer for a moment, before launching himself into the night and the sheltering leaves of the hibiscus. Alice smiled to herself. She knew exactly what she had to do.