A Changing Land(97)
Bullet gave a low whine.
‘I’ll tell you all about it later. Now you stay here boy,’ she cautioned. Bullet slid beneath the bottom steel railing and took up his front seat position between Whisky, Moses and Rust. They were itching to get into the yards although they were trained sufficiently to know that unless they were called by name, the cattle yards were off limits. Sarah marvelled at the dogs’ resolve. Climbing over the rails into the next yard, she waved as she approached Matt and Jack. They were standing at an aluminium table, checking the digital readout on the monitor attached to the portable scales. If Matt was surprised by her unexpected return, he didn’t show it. Nor did he mention Anthony’s absence.
‘G’day Sarah. Nice day for it.’
‘Tops,’ Sarah answered. There was a biting southerly ripping into their faces.
Jack reattached the leads to the battery. ‘Hi Sarah. Is that better, Matt?’
Sarah looked over Matt’s shoulder. ‘Hi Jack.’ The monitor showed minus five. ‘It’s out 5 kgs,’ Matt answered. ‘How much do you weigh, Sarah? Jack here put on 3 kgs from the two meat pies he scoffed down.’
‘About 62 plus a stale mutton and tomato sauce sandwich.’
‘Tasty,’ Jack grinned.
Matt cleared the monitor to zero, walked over to the race and opened the side panel. On the ground inside sat the heavy metal scales. ‘Hop on.’
Once she was standing in the centre of the scales Matt checked the monitor. ‘Spot on 62 kgs. Seems to be weighing okay now. Do you want to do the pencilling, Sarah?’
‘Sure.’ Sarah slammed shut the side gate and cleared the monitor to zero again, looking down at the clipboard on the dusty table. There were forty-four steers already weighed, a handful of which were bordering on being a bit low for the feedlots specifications. KA International’s current market was for milk to two tooth steers weighing between 400 and 510 kilograms a head. ‘What do you think, Matt? Knock out the ones under 415 kgs?’
Matt finished rolling a cigarette and lit it. ‘Reckon so. I’ve banged the tails of anything below 415 kg so far. There are a few that are poor. A couple of mad buggers and the rest are just bad doers. I spoke to Edward Truss this morning. He’s happy to book in another road train load at the same price in ten days’ time if you’re interested.’
‘I’m interested if the cents per kilogram go up.’
‘Same price.’ Matt took a healthy drag on his cigarette and gave a rare look that Sarah knew was his excuse for a smile. ‘Won’t do any better in this market. Anything that’s not sold over the next few weeks can be left till late spring. It’s a pity we can’t hang onto all of them, but if it doesn’t rain we won’t get the turn off from the oats.’
‘Sounds like a plan,’ Sarah answered, although she would try and bargain with Edward anyway.
‘Well let’s get to it. Truss will be here this afternoon to have a look.’
Sarah could barely push the reset button on the monitor her hands were so cold, however twenty minutes later she was in her shirtsleeves, harbouring a cold sweat. Jack spent the afternoon in the forcing yard pushing the steers into the race. Once the race was full and the sliding gate was pushed up hard behind them, it was Sarah’s turn to prod the next beast onto the scales. Another sliding gate was pushed behind the scales and the beast was contained just long enough to be weighed.
‘480 kgs,’ Sarah called, writing the weight down.
‘Righto,’ Matt answered. He opened the sliding gate at the front wide enough for the steer to stick his head through, then slammed it shut before lifting the head bail under the steer’s chin to keep his head up. The beast snorted, grunted and sprayed Matt with mucus as his mouth was prised open for his teeth to be checked. ‘He’s a baby,’ Matt called. ‘Milk tooth.’
Sarah put a tick beside the weight, wrote milk in the corresponding column while Matt read out the steer’s ear-tag number, which was also written down. She waited until the beast had been set free to join those steers already processed, then reset the monitor and prodded the next animal up the race.
By the time Edward Truss arrived a little after 3 pm they were nearly finished.
‘Sarah, Matt, Jack.’ They all shook hands.
Edward Truss was a short skinny man with knock-knees and teeth on him like a Moreton Bay shark. He was also known for his penchant for size 16-plus women. It was a strange phenomenon, yet women loved him. He had already meandered through three marriages, two de facto relationships and a string of one-nighters, most of which were consummated in Brisbane. In that regard he was quite fussy and rarely paraded his affections locally. Don’t shit in your own backyard, had been his advice on first meeting Jack. Ever since, Matt made a point of leaving a roll of toilet paper on the top step leading into the jackeroo’s cottage if word got out that Jack was playing up.