The Shiralee by D'Arcy Niland

Author:D'Arcy Niland [Niland, D'Arcy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781742285528
Publisher: Penguin Group Australia
Published: 2009-07-24T14:00:00+00:00

That was the only signature. Macauley read the letter through again, feeling the impact of loathing and vindictiveness in the words. He looked at the postmark on the envelope. The letter had been posted four months ago, two months after he had taken Buster. But it may have been written sooner, written to relieve a heart flooded with hatred and humiliation, set aside in a drawer for its acrimony to mature, nursed in a handbag like a malevolent vial. Until it was finally sent to its victim.

Slowly he crumpled the paper and rolled it into a ball between his palms. He felt the cold creep round his ankles and into his fingers. He heard the slight querulous whimpering of the child in fugitive sleep. The dark came down, sifting into the room.

‘Hey, Mac!’ Polka called from the cookhouse. ‘Come on, mate, and feed your face.’

Macauley went over. He flipped the paper ball into the fire with a grimace of bitter contempt. There was a storm in his head. Polka was all for talking about the set-to, but Macauley told him tersely to put a sock in it. Polka looked taken aback for a moment, but affably agreed, saying he knew a lot more tunes. He chattered away, aware of Macauley’s inner turmoil, and doing his best to crust it over with levity. But even his good humour was blunted by Macauley’s moody silence and laconic replies; and in a little while his enthusiastic crusade dwindled to a few simple platitudes about rain and wool and the state of the country.

He went outside, and came back five minutes later, rubbing his hands and scrooging his shoulders. ‘By cripes,’ he remarked with a shiver in his voice, ‘a man’ll want all the feathers on the bed tonight.’

He stood on the hob with his back to the fire, watching Macauley rolling a cigarette.

‘Are you fair dinkum about pushin’ off tomorrow, Mac?’

‘You heard me tell him,’ Macauley said, without looking up.

‘Yeah, I know – but I mean, with the kid and that …’ Macauley seemed to be reflecting and Polka went on, ‘I reckon you ought to stick it out. What could Wigley do? He’s not that hard, anyway, not underneath.’

‘I’ll eat grass first,’ Macauley said.

Polka looked glum. He rolled himself a match-thin cigarette, a racehorse, and tucked the ends in thoughtfully.

‘Well, it’s tough luck, that’s all I can say. But nobody’s fault.’

‘It’s somebody’s fault,’ Macauley said.

‘Aw, crimey, Mac, nobody can help gettin’ crook. I know how you feel, but what can you do? Like that mate of mine, Hinchey. He was always doin’ somethin’ or gettin’ crook at the wrong time and that. I coulda kicked him in the ask-no-questions a dozen times a day, but it wouldn’t have done any good.’

Macauley stood up. ‘I need wood. All I can get. See what you can rake together for me, will you, Polka?’

He walked back to the hut in a ferment of antagonism. He took a tomahawk from his swag, stuck the handle through his belt, and carried the kerosene-box table round to the room with the fireplace.

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