Arthur Upfield: Sands of Windee

Up out of thehole an ant carried a piece of blue glass, which reflected the light strongly whilst it was still deep in the shadow. The insect brought it up to the west slope of the rampart and laid it there before hurrying round for a sun-warmed stone. Bony picked it up with the point of his knife and examined it closely on the palm of his hand.

It was flattened on one side, and faceted accurately on the other. It was not glass. It was a cut sapphire.

An Inspection

WINDEE STATION had grown from quite a small beginning. Many years before the Great War Jeffrey Stanton had bought out a selector holding a Government lease of a hundred thousand acres, of which most was wild hill-country. On that block he ran cattle because his predecessor had run sheep and the dingoes killed most of them. They paid ten shillings a scalp for wild dogs in those days, and Stanton made more money out of the pest than he did from his stock.

The range of hills on which his small property was situated ran almost north and south. The great plain to the west was leased by two brothers and the plain to the east was held chiefly by a pastoral company with offices in Adelaide. Drought and overstocking ruined the brothers on the west of him, and Stanton bought them out with borrowed money. The season changed. He struck several good cattle-markets, and eventually repaid the borrowed money and found himself sole owner of six hundred thousand acres. When the Adelaidecompany went into liquidation, Stanton again borrowed money and acquired the eastern property, adding a further seven hundred thousand acres to his holding.

At the time of Bony’s introduction to Windee, Stanton possessed thirteen hundred thousand acres of land, seventy thousand sheep, and no cattle. He owned, too, a sheep stud-farm in Victoria, an enormous amount of property in Adelaide, and most of the shares in an important shipping line.

Despite his wealth, however, he had never been to any Australian city other than Adelaide, and had taken but one short trip to England, which had occurred after the death of his wife in the Year of the Peace. During this trip he had decided to inaugurate a custom he had practised ever since. On the liner he had been struck by the scrupulous cleanliness enforced by the captain’s bi-weekly inspections. It came to him that the captain of a ship must know every little cabin and corner in it, whereas he, Stanton, could not remember how many horse saddles, or how many drays, buggies and buckboards he had on Windee.

Home once more, he placed a man in sole charge of all the plant at the homestead, at the out-station called Nullawil, and in use at the several boundary-riders’ huts. The holder of this position, which was anything but a sinecure, had to possess a fair knowledge of the saddlery and carpentering trades. The name of the present holder was Bates.

Every Saturday morning Bates called at the office at about ten o’clock. Jeffrey Stanton, accompanied by his bookkeeper and Bates, then made a round of inspection. This was why Bates entered the office at ten in the morning of the Saturday following Bony’s examination of the blackfellows’ sign.

“Ready for inspection, Jeff?” he asked casually, leaning back against the open door. Stanton, who had just finished talking over the telephone with his overseer at Nullawil, rose from his private desk and was followed by the bookkeeper, who snatched up notebook and pencil.

A casual examination of these three men would have decided one that Mr Roberts, the bookkeeper, was the owner, Bates a station tradesman, as indeed he was, and Stanton anything. The bookkeeper had been at Windee four years, and immediately Stanton learned that he had held a commission during the war he began the custom he had kept up ever afterwards of invariably addressing him as “Mister” Roberts. Roberts had insisted on returning the courtesy although Stanton had fumed and fussed. However, since Roberts knew all about the office work of a great sheep-station, and Stanton knew nothing of clerical work but all about sheep, they compromised; and, as a battalion well run by a temperamentally balanced commanding officer and adjutant, the work on Windee went ahead smoothly.

The first place to be inspected was the men’s kitchen. On their entrance they found the cook examining very carefully a whole carcass of mutton, killed the previous evening. He was a small man, the cook, pale of face, the paleness accentuated by a full black moustache. Taking no notice of the inspecting party, he dragged the carcass along the table nearer the window, where he continued his examination even more carefully.

“What’s the matter, Alf?” inquired Jeffrey Stanton.

Alf looked up as though for the first time noticing his employer. He spoke with a trace of the Cockney.

“Oh, nothing much,” he said acidly. “I was just wondering whether that there was a dead Goanna or a skinned cat.”

“Looks like a sheep to me,” Stanton stated.

“A sheep! Not it. Thatain’tno sheep,” Alf snarled. “Think I can’t tell a sheep when I see one? A sheep! Ifthem’s the sort of sheep we’re breeding nowadays, Gawd ’elpOrstralia!”

“It’s a sheep all right. But on the poor side,” Stanton admitted.

“I should say hit is!” Alf danced with rage, but he went on coolly enough: “Now you don’t expect me to cook that for real men with guts, do you?”

“No, damme, I don’t!” Stanton suddenly roared. To Mr Roberts he snapped: “Note-inquire into supply of killing-sheep.” Then to Alf: “Heave that out to the dogs. Draw tinned meat from the store. Anything else?”

“Nope. But Iain’tchuckin ’ this art to thedawgs. I’ll make stew of it. But it’s the second carcass I’ve ’ad like that this week.”

“Yes, yes,” Stanton said more softly. “I suppose it’s because young Jeff is away. I’ll see what I can do.”

In the men’s quarters they found one of the hands reading a novel on his bunk, his set task for the day having been already accomplished. Stanton gave him a good-natured nod, and glanced over the building before leaving for the cart and harness sheds.

As an object lesson to the general mass of Australian squatters and farmers, Windee Station was probably supreme. Not a piece of harness, not a cart or a machine, was ever found in the open. The saving in general upkeep was treble the wage given to Bates. Every item of harness and saddlery was oiled and clean, the three trucks appeared as though they were seldom used, as also did the two powerful motor-cycles requisitioned when important work in far-off paddocks had to be done quickly. The trade shops, situated in one building, were ever a revelation to the visitor. Everything required on Windee was constructed from raw material brought by motor-truck from Broken Hill, a hundred and fifty miles distant.

On Windee there was plenty but no waste. On most stations and farms the waste and neglect are scandalous. In consequence profits are small and wages are kept down to the minimum demanded by law. Jeffrey Stanton raged and blasphemed if he saw a shovel lying unused in the sun, but he paid his men fifty per cent higher wages than those given by the great mass of station-owners and laid down by law as the minimum. For this he was unpopular in his own class-but he was a millionaire. He expected good service for his high wages, and saw that he got it.

The inspecting party eventually arrived at the blacksmith’s shop. Here the blacksmith and two off-siderswere welding and fitting dray tyres. It was work that could not be interrupted, and, after nodding to the smith, Stanton looked casually about and was on the point of leaving, when he saw in a corner a heavy cast-iron object that in shape and size was very similar to the case holding a four-point-nine howitzer shell.