LITMIR.BIZ

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so I had to do it from books and articles.’ His face set for a minute; the memory of the denied study tour still

      galled him.

      ‘So you know what they call you?’ she said, a little embarrassed. His brothers made open fun of him, calling him the runt, the shakings of the bag and the loser. He was smaller than the rest of them; they were all tall, solid and tanned, with dark hair. Lennie was slight, but fit and well built, with ginger hair and freckles. The resentment of his brothers did not stem from any inherent dislike of him, but his apparent aversion to the dirty aspect of farm work alienated him from them most of the time. His modern views on farming and conservation seemed to them to be romantic idealism.

      He peered at her, his bright green eyes dancing behind his glasses, the spectacles another difference from his siblings.

      ‘Of course I know,’ he said. ‘They would be delighted if I left and went to work in the town full time, instead of just writing a few articles or painting the occasional picture. I’m out of place here, and I don’t hate the old man and he talks to me, which is definitely against the grain.’

      She looked at him and saw a pout of resentment clouding his face. ‘That’s terrible,’ she said sympathetically, ‘How can they hate him, after all the success he has given them? I think he is a lovely old man.’

      Lennie laughed again as he resumed his work. ‘Oh, he can be an old tyrant at times, believe me, particularly when he gets on one of his hobby horses. But then I remember the good things about him, and there are plenty of them to remember after all, and I forgive him his little quirks. He has earned the right to have them at his age, and he has suffered some tough times in his life with the war and the early days here on the farm. Anyhow, I hope he lets them break the place up the way they want him to, so they can do their own farming as they see fit, they need to learn the hard way that the land has its limits.’

      ‘When that happens, as it ultimately will, I’ll cash out most of my share and move on. I’ll get a small plot surveyed off down by the creek and that way I’ll have somewhere to come back to and dream in my old age. They can have the rest. It’s the bush I love more than the farming,’ he admitted, suddenly honest with both her and himself. He tapped her nose playfully. ‘But let’s get back to me skiting about my knowledge of bulk grain handling.’

      ‘Sorry,’ she laughed, ‘Please go on skiting, I’m really interested.’

      ‘Well this year we will handle about twenty per cent of the crop in bulk. We don’t have the equipment to go higher, and the slow thinking wheat board can’t process it in bulk yet anyway. We will be able to collect the grain direct from the harvesters in the paddock, and pump it straight into bulk bins on the backs of the trucks. We don’t even need to stop the harvester; we just cruise along beside the machine with the truck and auger the grain straight in. Then we take it directly to the railway siding and dump it through a grate into a pit, or at least we will next year when they should be able to process it in bulk.

      ‘From there it can be pumped onto a bulk train, or stored in giant concrete versions of this temporary silo here. If there is a bottleneck at the siding, we can store the grain in one of these temporary units, or in some more permanent models I intend to build before next harvest. This also allows us to sit on grain if the price is down, but that’s another story.’ He finished tying the weld mesh together and stood back, reaching again for the jug of cordial.

      ‘The real blessing, of course,’ he said, wiping his mouth,

      ‘is that we can get the crop off and under cover or sold in about a third of the time, limiting the risk of loss from those babies.’ He pointed to the bank of dark clouds along the horizon. She smiled at him warmly; again surprised at how relaxed she felt in his company, how she longed to touch his hand. ‘Why do they call you a loser?’ she said, colouring because she feared he would read her feelings and move to force the relationship over that hidden line again. ‘It looks like your ideas will make them a fortune.’

      ‘True,’ he said immodestly, indulging in a bit of self- righteousness. ‘At the moment they are pleasantly tolerant of me, they even say nice things about my university degree and my arty nature. But it’s a passing fad I fear, they just don’t want me to cut out before the job is done.’

      The sound of a baby crying carried across the courtyard.

      ‘There goes Jenny,’ she said, ‘I’ll see you with the milk in the morning, thanks for the talk.’ Lennie was the official farm dairyman, butcher and deliveryman.

      ‘Thank you for the drink, and for just being you,’ he said softly. She smiled radiantly and touched his hand, risking a little encouragement to balance her earlier rebuff of his advances. She waved and ran to her cottage.

      He continued to work quietly until his father hobbled slowly across the courtyard on his walking stick. The old man still carried himself with the dignity of his years and experience, withered and worn as he was. He had been driven mercilessly by his own father, and felt that he treated his own offspring well by comparison, but received little recognition in return. He had served with the army in France during the First World War, the bitterness of that experience somehow adding to his abrupt, intolerant nature.

      The courtyard sat amid the collection of houses and outbuildings, the place looked almost like a small village. There were three weatherboard cottages apart from Ken’s large brick house and the main homestead, a building that had been added to over the years but still retained its splendour. Unlike the other building, the homestead was constructed of stone and the iron roof was painted a deep red. A neat garden of flowers, vegetables and fruit trees surrounded the house and a large aviary at the rear housed a wide collection of local bird life. The other married sons had chosen to build homes some distance away, to retain some independence and space.

      Derwent Byrne and Veronica occupied the largest of the cottages, Alan Hale another, and the third was usually empty. At the moment, however, it housed a Dutch couple and their five children, temporary workers for the harvest.

      The outbuildings consisted of a disused shearing shed and a dairy shed both left over from the same era and several large machinery sheds. The usual assortment of slaughterhouses and fowl coops were present, along with a collection of windmills to pump water from the underground wells to supply the houses. The history of the farm could almost be gleaned from the collection of buildings as the changes from cattle and sheep through dairying and now to grain growing were in evidence.

      The old man looked affectionately at his favourite son.

      ‘Ken wants you to go with Derwent and Willie to load the grain from the new paddock over near Brinkley’s place,’ he said, patting his son on the back. ‘He says it’s a record yield over there this year.’ Lennie looked at the old man, studying the fallen face with its patchwork of sunspots and the sad grey eyes that had grown watery with age, hoping that his own life would not end in unhappiness and the ingratitude of his offspring.

      ‘No problem, Dad, I’m pretty much done here for now. We will have the first bulk stuff coming off in the next few days when we start to harvest the big paddock down near Brinkley’s, on this side of the creek.’

      ‘Is all the gear ready then?’ the old man asked, grinning at his son. ‘Sure is,’ Lennie said, returning the grin. ‘We have one set of bulk handling gear ready to go. From harvester, trucks, augers and silo, as you see here.’ He pointed to the mesh enclosure.

      ‘Good,’ the old man said. ‘Your smart-arsed brothers may well sit up and take notice when they see your plans in action. I’ll ask Norma to cut you some sandwiches in case you are late tonight. And son,’ he looked closely at Lennie, ‘I’m proud of you, boy. The others ploughed headlong into this grain- growing thing against my better judgment. I still think they’re trying to avoid the dirty work of dairying and tending stock, but I think you can make it work.’ Lennie nodded, bathing in the praise, gripping his father’s shoulder

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