Arthur Upfield - No footprints in the bush

A little more than half a mile distant, the silver-grey aeroplane was resting on the wide claypan verge of the plain. Its propeller was turning over slowly. By the machine stood a tall man facing towards a naked aborigine who carried a white-clad form over a shoulder. Bony estimated that the aborigine with his burden was but twenty-five yards from the man standing by the machine. He was staggering with fatigue.

Every one of these thirty or so horses had from early life been accustomed to racing for the yard o’ mornings before the cracking whip of the tailer. This early morning race for the yards they thoroughly enjoyed, and so it was that now they entered into this race with shrilling neighs of joy and snorting nostrils. Very rarely were they given their heads by those who rode them, and now not only were they given their heads, they were urged onwards by yells, shouts, screams, and flailing hats and slapping hands. No man wore spurs: there had not been time to procure them.

They had to cover more than half a mile whilst a man carrying a woman covered less than twenty-five yards and handed her up to the airman now mounting to the cockpit of his machine Their riders, controlled by excitement of the chance, anguish and rage, laid themselves forward and settled down to win a sickening handicap.

The thudding of hooves rose to a dull tattoo. The wind sang in Bony’s ears. The black gelding laid himself low. He became an effortless, well oiled piston.

A bay mare with white forefeet slipped up alongside Bony. Her rider was naked, black. His white teeth were bared in a terrible grin, and on his face was sketched the lust of the chase. The bay mare took him ahead and he shrieked with triumph. His flat feet left the stirrups and rose to feel backward for the rear of the saddle, the mind of the rider temporarily unseated. It appeared that he was about to stand on his horse’s back when the animal suddenly crossed her forefeet. He flew from her back like a slung stone, to roll and roll over and over along the cement hard claypan. The rest thundered past his inert body.

Nevin appeared on Bony’s left side, his red hair streaming behind him, a rifle grasped pistol fashion in his right hand. His eyes were wide open but his mouth was like a trap. Burning Water, mounted on a dapple grey mare, drew alongside Bony to the left side of Nevin, his plumed grey hair beaten flat by the wind, the reins in his teeth, his hands flailing the animal’s withers.

Bony could hear Dr Whyte’s sobbed threats and curses close to his rear the doctor’s plaint being that his mount was only trotting. A chestnut gelding, riderless, swept past the leaders to take the lead, to kick his heels skyward, to pretend fury at the beating of the swinging irons.

He did not seem to be moving at all when that black figure burdened with a limp white-dressed form swiftly drew to the aeroplane’s tail and began to move along the streamlined silver body towards the man in the cockpit waiting to take the burden.

The aborigine who had been wearing the blue shirt when he arrived at the homestead on the truck, now mounted on a stocky bay, passed Bony on his right side like a gust of wind.

He was standing in the stirrups, flailing his horse with a gumtree switch. The shirt tail streamed outward above the empty saddle. He was screaming at the top of his voice and his teeth were snapping like those of a vicious dog. Steadily he drew ahead. He wore no trousers. Bony could see the horse’s ears between the fellow’s spindly legs. He never forgot the picture.

His own horse was running like a machine but could not take the lead from Blue Shirt and Burning Water. They could see, so close now were they, the helmet and upper part of the flying suit on the airman. The aborigine had reached him, was clinging to the fuselage, the girl still lying across his shoulder. The airman was leaning far over the side of the cockpit, placing his arms under the girl’s arms. They could see his face, working with passion, as he urged the black to help him.

The thunder of the oncoming horses was beginning to rumble in his ears. Success or failure, for him, lay in the passing of seconds. Slowly he was lifting Flora McPherson up and up to the edge of the cockpit, the aborigine now pushing from under the limp form, energized by the oncoming avengers.

Blue Shirt still kept the lead. He still was screaming, riding his horse like a man will ride standing with each foot on the broad back of a horse. Burning Water was racing only a head behind, and a length behind came Bony, Dr Whyte, and a lubra riding a roan gelding with the lines of a racehorse.

Bony saw hope and triumph in the doctor’s glaring eyes and pity filled his heart. His own horse appeared to be standing still. The lubra crept up and began to pass him. Her straggly black hair was lying out behind her head, straggly because of the demand for hair with which to make string. She was shrieking as though in the vilest of torment, but she rode hard to saddle and seemed to be but a back-muscle of the animal she rode. Nevin swung wide out from the lead, went away toward the plane, and Bony knew that he had estimated their chances and reckoned them to be poor. Then from behind them andplaneward came the crack of Nevin’s rifle, and beyond the aeroplane’s propeller a bullet spurted dust.

Dr Whyte cursed him. Nevin fired again, and this time they saw the rent in the tail of the machine made by the bullet. The range was too short to miss-hit the girl and those with her, and too long to pick off either the airman or the aborigine hauling and pushing her into the cockpit.

Blue Shirt now was a length ahead of Burning Water, and the chief was yelling at him to ride full tilt into the tail which was the nearest part of the machine to them. Only a strip of Flora’s white dress now was to be seen on the edge of the cockpit, and the aborigine was frantically jumping up to clutch the cockpit edge, ignored by the airman who was busy with the controls. Abruptly the engine roared and the machine quivered and began slowly to move forward.

There was no iron-bound emotional control of the doctor’s features, no icy composure in the face of crisis, no cool calculation in the face of death itself. Training, hereditary reaction to personal danger was now non-existent. Hope had vanished. Triumph had become a mocking devil. His face was fearful to look upon.

Burning Water was yelling to Blue Shirt to ride straight into the tail of the machine which was moving forward with increasing speed. Blue Shirt gained on it, his horse making a mighty effort. Then he funked it when he might have ridden into the tail and smashed it and so have prevented the machine from rising. At the last moment he reined his horse to the side and rode for the aborigine.

The aborigine was now clinging to the edge of the cockpit. He looked back and they saw he was Itcheroo: His feet were jerking upward in vain searching for foothold. The helmeted airman turned to face the black hands clutching the cockpit. They saw the butt of the pistol rise and strike downward with fearful force on the black hands. Itcheroo screamed and let go his hold. He fell to the ground, and became a thing of arms and legs beneath the striking hooves of Blue Shirt’s horse. Over went the horse and down went Blue Shirt in dust.

Nevin had stopped shooting. Burning Water held his horse’s nose level with the aeroplane’s rudder tip. The wind stream from the propeller raised dust which was blinding him, but he kicked his feet out of the stirrups, and hurled himself forward and sideways to the tail which was beginning to leave him behind. His hands struck the surface of the starboardrudderplane just as it lifted from the ground. The engine’s roar increased to mighty volume. For three or four seconds he clung with his finger nails, and then was swept back to lie on the ground in the enveloping dust.