Product of the Plains

New Zealand Illustrated Magazine, Volume 01, Issue 9, 1 June 1900, Page 58

Product of the Plains

§=£7 jtmw By Keron Hale.

"WT'S as bad as the siege of Troy !" Nora il drummed her heel on an over-turned J bucket, and glared at the stable-roof, fl where a speckled hen caclded derisively. Woolcot Chillingford, who was pulling gorse-prickles out of his hands, nodded approval. " 'Tis so ! And the fair Helen evidently doesn't mean to capitulate. Well, 'A man's a fool who tries by force of skill, etc.,' " he jerked up a stone which struck the 'roof afoot too 3oon, and rattled back down the corrugated iron. ""Where's the skill?" inquired Nora pertinently. "There she's gone.. I'm not going after her any more. If she scratches up the rest of the seeds I hope Auntie will cook her, that's all." "I hope so," assented Woolcot gravely; " Jove, it's hot ! You must lead an awfully lazy life here, Norie." 11 Life 1" Nora bounced up and upset the

Illustrated by W. A. B (wring.

bucket. "Existence, you mean! Stagnation ! Dry rot ! Woolcot, I'd sell my soul to get away from here, and ' "Buy a slang dictionary with the proceeds," but Woolcot pushed back his straw hat and stared at her, puzzled. This halfftedged product of the Canterbury Plains had shocked him many times since he first drifted into her life, but he never got seasoned. " What do you want to do ?" he asked at last. " Make money, of course ! Work ! Go out into the world— and live ! " "A new woman! Horrible! No, my dear cousin, that's a man's destiny. You must stay at home and potter after flowers -—and fowls." "You enjoyed pottering after that hen just now, didn't you ?" sarcastically ; " but that's all stuff. There's no corn in this Egypt. It's choked with mortgage and— fat-hen. I must get grist for the mill some-

where. We're getting poorer every day, Woolcot, and I'm getting more ignorant and — and dreadfully freckled and — " Woolcot lit his pipe, gazing at her scrutinizingly. She was a tall slip of a girl, with keen grey eyes and dark hair tumbling over her shoulders. Her faded pink frock clung round her unformed figure, and she was fighting angrily with her hot tears. "Don't be a little donkey, Norie," he said kindly, " and don't kick against all the pricks at once. [Stronger folk than you have found the unwisdom of that You ought to be happy enough here." " Oh, ought I ? That's all you know ! These beastly plains give me the horrors ! Tussock to right of me — tussock to left of me — " " Tussock on the brain," suggested Woolcot, " don't get blue, Norie. The fairy prince will come some day in purple and fine linen." " He'd find dungarees a jolly sight more useful here ! And he wouldn't come unless he yearned to mend fences and yard sheep." Norie rubbed her eyes vigorously, and turned homewards. Woolcot followed slowly. " Perhaps not," he said, absently ; " don't wait dinner for me, Norie, I'm going over to Dinoorie. Harrison's horse-breaker got awfully smashed yesterday handling a young one, and he may want me to hunt him up another in town. Here, don't pinch like that, you young vixen ! What's up ?" Norie was gripping his arm, and her pale face was ablaze. " I'll break in Mr Harrison's horses for him." Woolcot propped himself against the stable gate and whistled. " Ton my life, Norie, you are — " " Don't !" cried Norie, desperately. " 1 don't care what I am. I'd be a circus rider or a — a pickpocket if it paid. And I can ride, Woolcot, if I can't do anything else." "Yes,!' unwillingly, "you can. I should not care to tackle the horse that bested you." :

" That settles it, thoa ! I'll go over now aud see Mr Harrison." " Hold on ! You won't do anything of the sort. Don't be a silly infant, Norio." " Don't be a beast, Wooleot ! I will, I tell yon ! Think of getting on a proper horse again, and the jumps !" " And Aunt Julio !" Nora's face foil. " Oh, bother ! never mind. I'll fix her. Thero slio is in the onion bed." " She'll fix you, you mean," retorted Wooleot, grimly, "and I hope " but Nora had already descended on Aunt Julio like a hawk on its prey. She bore the bowildered old lady off to her bedroom, pushed her into a chair, tossed her big hat and neckerchief on the floor aud prepared for the attack. " Auntie, listen ! I'm going to try and make some money, and then we can buy those sheep of Irwin's, and we'll get rich, and have a good time— and you're not to say no; do you hoar? You mustn't." " Oh, my dear ! Oh, Nora, you'll bo the death of me ! What do you want mo to say?" " Poor old Auntie ! Did it loso its breath then! Never mind; wait till I toll you." Norie gazed round the moagro room for inspiration, but found it not. She sought it in the tumble-down woolshcd, blistering in the hot sun outside, in the muddy duck pond, and the yellow lines of gorso fencos running to futurity.' But none of them suggested the best way to tell a dignified old English lady that her niece desired to become a horse-breaker. " I'll spring it on her," decided Norie ; " that always upsets her, and then she can't argue. Auntie, Mr Harrison has lost his horse-breaker, and I want to take his placo. Wait a minute. I can do it. I've any amount of nerve and perfect hands. Sounds like a marriage advertisement, doesn't it? Mr H arrison said I was a regular crack the day I stuck to Boomerang after ho bucked him off. Don't you remember ? I'm going over this afternoon to ask him to. take me." "I said I'd fix her," she told Wooleot later ; " she was a bit obstreperous afc first.

Said I'd get hurt, and when I explained i that that was impossible " l " How on earth did you manage that ?" 1 " Never you mind. Then she said it was s a dreadful thing for a. young lady to do, and 1 Mrs Harrison had never called on her and— ( oh, heaps of things ! But she had to give < in, poor old thing. Woolcot, I should have 1 made a better lawyer than you ever will." « Woolcot was helping her lay the dinner . table, and to him suddenly came the notion that Norie really meant to do this thing. " I tell you what it is," he said, putting the forks upside down in his agitation, " you —you want sitting on a bit, Norie, and if I wasn't sure that Harrison will do it more effectually than I could, I wouldn't let you go." " There ! I knew you wouldn't back me up! Woolcot, you shan't come with me. Besides, there's only l Moa Bones,' so you couldn't ride, anyhow." Norie had dubbed their only steed by that name, because she said he had " moa bones than flesh," which was Woolcot's first intimation of the deteriorating influence of flat country. He had three passable legs and a bad temper, and Norie loved him dearly. "Don't go jumping tussocks," advised Woolcot, shutting the yard gate behind the pair that afternoon, " he'll fall clown if you do." " Wait till you see me training thoroughbreds for the Grand National ! Woolcot, I am glad I learnt to ride in the past ages. Wish me luck, old boy. This may be better than ; selling my soul for a mess of pottage." v Selling your life, more like," muttered Woolcot, leaning his arms on the unpainted gate, and watching the slight figure on the knock-kneed old horse jogging across the paddock. The days when Mirimar had been a land overflowing with milk and honey and fine horse flesh were as a tale that is told ; but to the last scion of the old house the book of Life was still unread and its story unrevealed. Norie's way lay straight towards the hills, sharp-cut in their blue strength against the paler sky. The plain stretched forward for

many inilos, melting into whito haze, where it met the mountains, and it held the great hush of a deserted land. Moa Bones hopped silently along the tussock road, and Norio began to think. She was the fabled Knight of old in search of Eldorado. She was Don Quixote on Kosiaaute— not a bad simile, that. She was a rather frightened and very desperate little girl going to wrest fortune out of the hands of a Fate that had proved too strong for those whom sho had loved. She was beginning to feel very sorry for herself by the time tho long gum plantations to her left burst out into an eruption of nix hurdles and a white gale. Then she pullod up Moa Bones with a jerk and fervently hoped that Mr Harrison would bo away. But within tho gates was the barking of numberless dogs, much dust— and Frank Harrison himself. So Norio kicked Moa Bones into some semblance of Hvlinons, aud taking her fate in both hands rode forward to meet the master of Dinooi ie. The sunset was behind her as sho returned a little later, but its golden glow was everywhere, and the grey lino of Hea-fog on the horizon shut her into a world of her own— a world holding the sleepy bleat of sheep and tho distant murmur of tho river. A few tired sea-gulls flapped slowly homewards, showing white against tho darkening sky, and Norie dropped tho reins. "I'd like to sing a —an oratorio," she said, " the whole world seems listening for it." Then Moa Bones stumbled badly, so she deferred her raptures until after tea, when Wooleot began to ask questions. " No, Wool, I'm not going to tell you all about it. He's a brick, an out-and-out brick— and a Sir Galahad." She pulled a few weeds out o£ the gravel path absently, and Woolcot stared at her in tho dim light. " Great Scott ! What did he say, Norie ?" "Lots of things. He— he— " Norio i skipped the first part of the conversation, ' "he said I could try for a week, and sec how I got on. There are only a few foals to handle, and Bates will do the lounging. It 3 will be harder work in the autumn when the r colts come down from the hill-station, but

it's good pay, and I don't mind the work. Oh, we talked it over in quite a business-like way, I can tell you." " Great Scott !" murmured "Woolcot again. " Young New Zealand's going it ! I didn't think Harrison was so soft." " Don't be stupid !" cried Norie, pulling out a dandelion with a jerk that showered gravel all over "Woolcot ; "I'm not the first. Look at Miss Keene. She breaks in all her horses, and rides them at shows and gets prizes. And I broke in Molly Magee three years ago." "There's a vast difference in handling your own horses and handling Harrison's," said Woolcot, sententiously. " There is ! I get paid for the latter. Good-night. I won't talk to you any more. You're as cross as Mrs Harrison !" Woolcot lit his pipe, wondering much how Harrison would explain this matter to his mother, and when he met with the master of Dinoorie the following morning he realised that between two women a man's will may often come to the ground. " I couldn't help it," said Harrison, slashing at nodding cocksfoot with his riding whip. " She— your cousin was so. set on it, and I'd sooner" have her to mouth my horses and ride 'em over fences than any one I know. But it's not the proper thing for her to do— and I shouldn't have said yes." Woolcot grinned. "I don't suppo&e you had much choice, 00 man. Norie has a will of her own." "Well, she has, and she has pluck too — and to see her on that old moke after the horses she rode when your uncle was alive ! 1 had to give in. But I won't put her on the worst brutes, and I can't help what my mother says." So, tne gods arranged the matter which Norie considered already settled, and Moa Bones, the only one not consulted, carried heroTer the four miles to Dinoorie every day. In the still, sickly heat of the breathless summer mornings when the dazzling haze .made the far-off mountains reel, through the dust of the howling Nor'-wester, when

Moa Bones stumbled wearily, and the flying shingle stung her face as she rode into the teeth of it — she put down her head and endured. There was glorious recompense in fighting with a "young one" round the high-railed stockyard in the crisp frosty mornings with the lust of conquest in her heart. But when the skies wept ceaselessly and the yard was churned into slippery mud her work was still to do — and she did it. Later, the Dinoorie horses became famed in the land, and there were whispers of a dark horse training for the National. Harrison had put up a stiff course, and to Norie came the joy of taking Tau over for the first time. Harrison tightened the bit and put her up. He was decidedly anxious and ventured to give unappreciated advice. "Don't race him at the sod wall," he said, imploringly. " I wish you'd wait till to-morrow. Horses always go mad in a wind." Tau belied his name. He was not " easy to ride." Harrison kicked his cob into a trot alongside the big bay colt and swore inwardly at the rising wind and several other things. Norie gave the colt a rousing gallop round the paddock, and then turned him on to the course. She went at the hurdle, double topped with gorse, in fine style, hands down, lips set, and determination in her grave eyes. He flew it magnificently, took the water jump in his stride, then his head went up, and Harrison bucketed his fat cob across the paddock, and the big bay tore past. " He's making for the stock yard, and the gate's shut. Oh, Good Heavens!" Norie saw that the gate was shut as the high, fence whizzed closer and closer, and she called herself several names for not allowing Harrison to put on a curb. " lie must have the bit in his teeth. It's like pulling at a thunder-bolt. Oh, there'll be a joyful smash in two minutes." She jerked the left rein in both strong small hands. " Gome round, you beggar. There will be an end to the National if he tries to jump at this pace."

There was a scant hundred yards to the gate now.

" He won't try it alone," thought Norie, and dropping the reins, she gathered up her habit and jumped. Tail swerved, turned off the gate and galloped down the fence, while

Frank Harrison, in a state of high pressure, arrived to find a little blue heap in the middle of a gorse bush.

"It was soft falling," said Norie, as he picked her up, " but uncommonly prickly. Do you think Tau's likely to hurt himself ?"

" Confound the horse! Are you hurt ?" That sudden acrobatic feat had given Harrison a clearer insight into several things, and he did not even turn to look at Tau.

" Twisted my foot a bit, I think. It will be all right to-morrow." She limped for-

ward as Taut came round the paddock at half pace, and caught him at the gato. " You might have brokon your nock ! What in the world made you do it?" asked Harrison, because he know that foar had no part in her composition. "If I hadn't he might have brokon his. Now you're going to win the National, aren't you, old boy ?" She was very confident as blio hopped across the yard with one hand twisted in his mane. But the little demon fear had eaton up all the confidence on that day above all other days, when Woolcot took her into the saddling paddock at Rioeartou, and hlio saw hitherto undreamed of marvels. Woolcot thanked his stars piously when they ran across Frank Harrison, for Norio had already driven him to the verge of distraction. "Take her to see Tau, will you?" ho said, handing her over unceremoniously, " she wants to know the name and age of every horse in the paddock, and slio's nearly had her brains kicked out twice." The spring sun-light flickered on many strange and beautiful things, on tho impatient horses, quivering and glancing in their finely-strung strength, on tho gorgoous silk-clad jockeys, the eager-faced, shifting crowd, and the long dazzling lines ■of ironroofed stables. Out on the course were the densely-packed human fence, important policeman chasing small dogs and inevitable children, and tho clerk of the course in his red coat. Norio envied Tau'e jockey furiously as he rode out of the gate and sent the horse past the judge's box in the preliminary. " It's perfectly awful to have someone else riding him," she said piteously. Harrison glanced at her. This was a, new Norie, but he understood her, for the absorbing love of horses dwelt in him also. The rousing music of the band melted into the hum of the moving crowd. Then silence fell with the fall of the starter's flag.

None, on the steps of the Grandstand, with Harrison's field-glasßes in her hands, and placid Aunt Julie just behind her, saw

the green, yellow and pink jackets shuffling and changing like a pack of cards. The nine horses swept over the first few fences like a mighty wave, and None, in her heart, was riding all she knew. "Woolcot came up as the field flew the Stand Double for the second time. "There's not much in it yet," he said, tapping his stick against the steps. " They'll be toppling over directly, I expect. Tan is going uncommonly strong, Harrison. He ought to have a say— "bar accidents." Norie dropped the glasses with a cr^ of anger and despair. " Look at that wretched jockey! Mr Harrison,. didn't you tell him not to hang on to Tail's head at his fences ? Oh, I wish I was up myself ! That donkey will spoil the whole thing ! Be quiet, "Woolcot ! So he will !" She spoke of one of the best- known amateurs in Canterbury, and Woolcot much desired to shake her. "You'll have everjone staring at you," he cried sharply, and such distinction did not appeal to his sensibilities. " What's the matter now ? It isn't Tail." For a nebulous crowd was forming on the far side of the course, and a riderless horse bolted into the pine plantation beyond it. "I— l can't stay," cried Norie, nearly in tears ; " there are two more down ! I'll go of my head if he wins, and if he doesn't— it wlil be a thousand times worse. Oh, they're coming ! Take mo away from all these people, "Wool !" "Hurry then, for, goodness sake," said Woolcot, wratnfully. "I don't want to miss the finish. It's a jolly good thing you don't come to races every day. Jove, it's going to be a close " but Norie had

already dived into the ladies' room at the side of the stand, chased by the thunder of hoofs and the sound of prolonged cheering. Then Aunt Julie came round the corner to iind the door shut, and Woolcot walking gloomily up and down outside "Does she know?" asked Aunt Julie with a yasp. Woolcot shook his head. " She's afraid to come out, and I didn't like to shout through the key-hole. I wish you'd go and stir her up. Tell her to come and have some afternoon tea. She revels in cream sandwiches." "Woolcot is an arrant donkey." ISTorie was telling Frank Harrison half-an-hour later. " Tea — and cream sandwiches when our stable's gone down! I'd sooner have had prussic acid. And it was all that jockey's fault ! I believe Tau lost a length at every fence. I wish you would let me see that Mr Milnes directly. I'd give him a few hints." Harrison laughed. "I have no doubt you could. But I'd much sooner you talked to me " And thus it came about that Woolcot, returning from the saddling-paddock, saw the tall figure in the long coat with field glasses slang across it, and the smaller one with the redfeathered hat, walking slowly up and down under the pines by the outside totalisator. The band thumped cheerfully on the lawn, and the starter led* but a new field to fates unknown, but those two saw riot nor heard. Woolcot rubbed his chin thoughtfully, then he laughed, because he foresaw that Mrs Harrison probably would call on Aunt Julie in the future.