"Have you ever had ya balls tarred Chummy?", said Athel as we were driving along.
"No, why d'ya ask?"
"Cause that's what we do with first-time Rousies."
"Not this time Athel.", said Don. "I told you already to leave him alone mate!"
Athel Cook was not a pleasant character. He seemed to take an instant dislike to me. As we were driving along, Bony leaned across and whispered, "Take no notice of Athel. He's a fucking yobo."
He must have had quite good ears cause he said to Boney, "What's that ya fucking say Boney?"
"Nothing mate.", said Boney, with a giggle.
Athel leaned across and twisted Boneys' ear and Boney, small as he was, got really pissed at him.
"Keep ya fucking hands to ya self Athel or I'll fucking jab you one mate."
"You and who's fucking army?", said Athel.
"Just fucking try it again ya fucking yobo and I'll show ya!", said Boney.
"Come on you blokes. Ya worse than a pack of mongrel shed dogs!", said Don.
"Yeah, that's right. You tell 'em Freeman.", said Gundy.
"Give us another light Chummy.", said Gundy with a twisted grin.
The rest of the drive to the shed was done in silence as we sped along the dirt track road at 70 miles an hour. Half an hour later we pulled off the main Rankin Springs road and turned into the cockys property. Boney jumped out and opened the gate. Once it was closed again, we drove up a narrow, windy bush track and stopped in front of a big, old, somewhat dilapidated shearing shed.
There was another 2 shearers cars parked out front and the yards were chock-a-block full of unshorn sheep.
When we got inside the shed, Don introduced me to all the shearers and rousies and Boney filled me in on the board-boys job. Gundy was a really fair dinkum bloke even though he was a chronic drunk. I stood around and talked and joked with him as we waited for the bell to ring at 7:30.
In a 4-stand shearing shed there are usually 4 shearers and 1 board-boy, a wool-dresser and a rousie to help skirt the fleeces, a wool-presser who's job it is to press the wool into large bales and sometimes a penner-uppa, his job is to keep the pens full. The contractors job is to grind up the combs and cutters, count the sheep out of each shearers outside pen at the end of the run, which is 2 hours and make sure everything runs smoothly between the shed-hands and the farm-hands.
"Will you teach me to shear Gundy?", I asked.
"Oh I might do Chummy. Lets see how ya go at roust-a-bouting first mate. Maybe ya won't like the shearing sheds."
"I already like 'em and when I can shear I'll be working for miself. That's what I wanna do."
"Alright Chummy. Look out mate, the bells about to go."
The bell rang right on 7:30 and all 4 shearers went through the pen gate to grab their first sheep. Gundy was the last to finish and when he let his sheep go down the shute he straightened up and I noticed the look of pain on his face. As I moved the fleece from in front of him, he said, "Jesus Chummy, it's gonna be another hard day for me today."
The board-boys job, which I was doing, could be pretty hard at times. I had to pick up the fleeces from 4 shearers and keep the shearing board swept clean of dags and loose pieces of wool. At the end of my fist day I was pretty tired from running about so much but I knew, more than ever now, that I was going to learn shearing no matter what it took.
The shearers were always in a good mood on the way home from the sheds. They laughed and joked about the days work and talked about the first cold beer they were going to have at Giltraps hotel when we hit town.
All the blokes from the shed drank at George Giltraps hotel that evening. George Giltrap was a big man. He had short-ish hair that was combed straight back with a touch of hair oil on it. His face was always pain-ridden from the amount of beer he drank. It was easy for him to drink cause he owned a hotel. Sometimes he would start drinking at 5 in the morning and at 12 O'clock at night he would be still going strong. Although he was a heavy drinker, he was not lazy. He always did his job behind the bar. He was a tall man with wide shoulders who always had a fag hanging out of the corner of his mouth as he pulled the beer. When the ash on the fag got too long he would simply turn to the side and blow down the cigarette. The ash would fly forwards and land on the floor.
The bar-room at Giltraps was an L-shaped room with a pool table in the far corner. The bar was always well-stocked with shorts and liqueurs of all types. Giltraps was commonly known around town as the Blood House. It got its name from the amount of fights that took place in the bar. The fights at Giltraps were usually amongst the Abbos' or, in a lot of cases, a feud between the white fellas' and the black fellas'. There were many stories floating around town about those brawls. A lot of the local people were not too keen on drinking at Giltraps in case they got pulled into one of the evenings fights.
"Isn't Giltraps a rough house Gundy?", I said as we walked up the front steps.
"She sure is Chummy but it's not as boring as those other two places mate."
Giltraps was packed, as we entered.
"Who's buying the first round?", said Gundy as we pushed our way to the bar.
"The first ones are on me.", said Don Freeman. "What'll you have men?"
Once the orders were taken by Don, he called Giltrap over, who was busily drinking in 3 different schools.
"What'll you have Freeman?", said Giltrap. Don gave the order.
Drinking booze was a part of the shearers world. It seemed to go with the job. Shearers lose gallons of sweat everyday so they put it back in of an evening as fast as they can.
We all sat or stood around for the next three hours bullshitting and making jokes, taking the piss out of each other and generally having a good old time.
The wool-presser at our shed was called Roy James. Roy James was a big, rough bloke who no one put shit on. He was about 6 foot 4 and weighted about 280 pounds, with not an ounce of fat anywhere on his body. Roy was a good bloke who had a big heart although he was not overburdened with brains. His hair was swept straight back and covered in lanolin from picking up big armfuls of wool. He had a big cauliflower ear and an nose that had been broken too numerous a-times to remember. His good ear had a lobe missing. The jagged line that was left resembled a half-moon shape. He usually wore a blue singlet, stubby shorts and a pair of elastic-sided McWilliams riding boots, the flat-heeled type.
As the evening progressed and every one got drunker, I found myself wondering what had happened to Roys' ear. So, in a lull in the conversation I said to Roy, "Hey Roy, what happened to your ear lobe mate?"
A few people standing around must of heard me ask the question because the bar suddenly went very quiet. Roy casually downed his beer, the glass not too visible in his huge, calloused hand.
"What did you say Chummy?", he said.
He wort of turned sideways to glare at me.
"I was just wondering what happened to ya ear lobe Roy."
As he stared down at me he said,
"I've killed bigger men than you for asking much less than that."
"Alright Roy, I didn't mean to be disrespectful to ya but what did happen to your earlobe?"
"I was in a fight at the hotel in Bourke. A little bloke was taking the piss out of me and as we struggled on the barroom floor he bit the end off mi ear and then spat it out!"
"Why didn't ya git it sewn back on?", I said with great interest.
"Cause when the bloke spat it out on the floor, the publicans' Jack Russell ran over and grabbed it and swallowed it."
"Fucking hell Roy, did that hurt?"
"I was too drunk to feel a thing but I felt it next morning after I'd sobered up! Who's round is it?" he said as the tension in the room started to dissipate.
Roy walked out to go to the toilet and while he was out, Freeman said, "I never knew that's what happened to his ear."
Gundy said, "You've got more guts than anyone else in this barroom Chummy. There isn't a man alive in Lake Cargelligo who's had the balls to ask Big Roy about his ear and he's been coming to the lake each shearing season for years now." Everyone started to laugh as they joked with me.
"It's not that I've got guts, " I said to Gundy, "I knew there must have been quite a story behind his ear 'cause it caught my attention so much so that I couldn't help but ask."
George Giltrap came around the bar to where we were all in a group and he said to me, "Here Chummy, have a middy. It's on the house mate. That's the best bit a fun I've had for ages."
The bar erupted in raucous laughter but as soon as Roy entered the room everything settled down to its' normal volume.
By the end of the evening everyone was well and truly full. I, myself, was feeling a bit of an effect from the beers I'd had. I went back down to Twitcheys' hotel for a shower and a good rest.
