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Pat Ritter. Books


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Re: Pat Ritter. Books

Postby patritter » Sat Sep 16, 2017 11:22 pm

'The Drover' - Page 80:

After breakfast the next morning Harry saddled his horse to ride with Mick in search of tracks near water holes and look at the lie of the land. It was mainly rocky country with some Mitchell grass on the flats with gidgee, mulga and gum trees.
‘Can I come too Daddy?’ Claire dragged on her father’s trousers. ‘I’ll be good – I’m almost eight year old and can ride Paddy real good – can I – can I?’ She pleaded.
‘Not this time Bub. See those goats – the little ones, you muster them.’ This was a job for the men and long days in the saddle were the order of the day. Harry thought it would be fun for his daughter to chase the small kid goats.
Earlier that morning he’d sighted a small mob of goats led by a Billy and a few nannies with kid goats. She’d have fun mustering them, Harry pictured in his minds eye.
Before he left camp he went to say good-bye to Rose.
‘How’re you feeling love?’ He whispered beside her ear and gave her a peek on the cheek. She looked awful to Harry who had never seen his wife look this way in all of their days since they’d met. She must be feeling it hard, he thought as he drew away from her.
‘How the bloody hell do you think I feel – losing my one and only son, out here in the heat and flies and you taking off for the day and leaving me to suffer alone. How do you think I feel?’ She exploded.
‘We’ve got to find these horses and I don’t know how long it’s going to take. It’s a big place and today we want to go and have a look around the water holes. We shouldn’t be too long.’ He tried to explain.
‘Go on – get out of here, go and look for your precious horses and leave me alone.’ Rose exploded. Harry thought about staying but declined because he had a job to do and Mick couldn’t do it by himself.
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Re: Pat Ritter. Books

Postby patritter » Sun Sep 17, 2017 8:43 pm

'The Drover' - Page 81:

‘See you when I get back.’ He finished and walked away.
Taking sufficient food and water for their day’s ride Mick and Harry rode away from the camp toward the northern end of the property.
‘We’ll head north because it’ll give us a better view of the land from up there on top of the hill.’ Harry instructed.
The two men rode silently until Mick joked, ‘remember when we were young and broke those dozen horses in for the old man. Boy, did they buck. We took them saddle and all into the swamp and let them buck themselves out first.’
‘Hope we don’t have to do it here. It took us a month of Sundays to get our gear clean. It was fun back in those days. We’re a bit older and wiser don’t you think?’ Harry replied.
‘Yeah, but it was fun.’ Mick remembered and had a small chuckle.
They continued until the sun was high in the sky.
‘What about we have a break for lunch.’ Harry beckoned.
They let their horses’ lose while Harry built a fire and soon had the quart pot boiling for their tea. Each sat on a log discussing how they were going to muster the brumbies.

Back at the camp Claire pestered her mother to let her ride Paddy to muster kid goats.
‘No – I’ve already lost one child. I’m not losing another.’ Her mother growled.
Claire didn’t want to upset her mother and didn’t know why she was angry most of the time. She tried to play with Louise but Louise wanted to play in the back of the truck.
She didn’t want to play Cowboys and Indians or hide and seek or any other game away from the camp.
Claire wanted to be with her father. She wanted to grow up exactly like him, tough, hard worker, great father and a good provider for the family. She dreamed of one day herself becoming a drover, having sheep or cattle on the road taking them from place to place.
Claire decided to visit her Aunt Liz at her truck.
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Re: Pat Ritter. Books

Postby patritter » Mon Sep 18, 2017 10:24 pm

'The Drover' - Page 82:

‘Aunt Liz,’ Claire directed the question at her aunt, ‘do you know why Mummy is so angry all of the time. I can’t do anything to please her.’
‘She’s sad child. You’ve got to be patient with her for awhile and she will get better.’
‘How long will it take?’
‘I don’t know – but until she is back to her old self again we’re all got to be kind to her.’
‘Thank you Aunt Liz. I will be kind to her.’
Claire returned to the camp and saw her mother lying on a shearers stretcher reading a book, ‘can I do anything for you Mummy?’ Claire asked her mother.
‘Just get out of my sight – go and play but leave me alone.’ She scorned.
Claire’s face screwed into a mystified shape wondering why her mother was so cruel and angry with her. She didn’t do anything to hurt her. She went away from the camp to sit under a mulga bush to keep out of the way.

On top of a hill Harry and Mick had a bird’s eye view of most of the property. Each looked from this site to see any horses. Far in the distance on the flat Harry pointed, ‘there they are, look at them gallop, must be a hundred or so.’
‘Yeah, look at the big black leading them. It’d be the stallion of the mob. They’re heading toward those two hills in among the mulga.’ Mick shared with Harry.
‘Okay, from here, our camp is south about a couple of miles, they’re gone in a north-westerly direction, it’d be about two mile from our camp. What’d think?’ Harry asked Mick.
‘Yeah, you’re probably right. We’ll need to get back; at least we know where they are. What say we move our camp up towards those hills and get closer so we can keep an eye on them to see where they go and what they’ll do.’ Mick replied.
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Re: Pat Ritter. Books

Postby patritter » Tue Sep 19, 2017 10:53 pm

'The Drover' - Page 83:

Both men agreed and decided to return to camp and move it closer to their quarry the next day.

The sun was almost below the horizon when the men returned to camp. Liz had dinner waiting; the children had eaten, bathed in the nearby lagoon whilst Rose remained on her bed.
‘Thanks Liz, that is delicious. We at least know where they are. In the morning we’ll move camp to their water hole.’ Harry told Liz.
‘Do you think Rose will be up to it?’ Liz’s face frowned knowing her sister-in-law was behaving unusual. Although she’d never lost a child, particularly a boy, she didn’t know why Rose was acting this way.
‘I’ll have a word with her tonight and see if she can move on.’ Harry said.
Later that night before Harry retired to bed Rose was reading a Mills & Boon book by the dim light of a kerosene lamp.
‘Can you put the book down for a minute so I can tell you what we’re doing tomorrow?’ He asked Rose in a quiet and gentle voice.
She closed the book, ‘so what are we doing tomorrow, what’s so urgent?’ Rose said in a sarcastic voice.
‘We saw the mob today but it’s too far from here to ride, muster and yard them. I want to move camp closer to where they are.’ Harry explained.
‘I don’t care what you do Harry, move the camp, do what you want but leave me out of it. All I want is to be left alone to read my books.’
‘What about the children?’ He whispered.
‘What about them. Liz is there, she’s doing a fine job looking after them. I didn’t have to do anything today only read my book and sleep. She made sure they bathed, ate their dinner and put them to bed.’ Rose said with glee.
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Re: Pat Ritter. Books

Postby patritter » Wed Sep 20, 2017 11:11 pm

'The Drover' - Page 84:

‘When are you going to bathe?’ Harry asked sternly, emphasising the you.
‘I don’t know if I’ll ever wash again. I’m happy to sleep, read and relax. I want to go to sleep now – leave me alone.’ Rose blew the flame of the lamp out, turned over, and closed her eyes.
Harry went to the lagoon, bathed and returned to bed but decided to sleep in a swag underneath the truck to give Rose room and time to recover. How long would it take, he pondered.

Breaking daylight the next morning, work needed to be completed before the heat of the midday sun burned through.
After breakfast Harry loaded the horses and dogs onto his truck and waited for Mick and Liz to follow him to make a new camp.
‘We’ll head this way.’ He called out to Mick and waved him to follow. Harry manoeuvred his truck across gullies, around mulga bushes and onto gibber country. Gibber country is rocky and rough stones or rocks. It’s tough on animals also on machinery.
Heading toward the mountains he’d pointed out to Mick the previous day, he came upon an oasis in the desert. It was a great place to make camp. A huge ravine reached up to the top of a small mountain. At the base of the ravine was a large waterhole.
‘This is the place they’ve been watering Mick.’ He called out to his brother when he stopped the truck away from the ravine.
Amongst the trees, out of sight of the ravine, they made a camp combining both trucks covered with a huge green tarpaulin swung between them used to camouflage their camp from the brumby horses.
‘We couldn’t have got a better spot,’ Harry shared with his brother over the camp fire, ‘from the tracks at the waterhole there must be hundreds of them watering each day.’
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Re: Pat Ritter. Books

Postby patritter » Thu Sep 21, 2017 11:14 pm

'The Drover' - Page 85:

‘Yeah, it sure looks that way. What about around sunset we set up a position near the water hole upwind so they don’t smell us, and work out how to trap them.’ Mick asked his brother.
‘Great - it feels good to be trapping brumbies again. It takes me back to our childhood.’ Harry’s thoughts immediately returned to his youth when he and his brother Mick trapped brumbies to get a quid and now they were doing the same. They were only teenagers at the time and now each married with a family. Nothing much had changed between the two brothers. They always worked well together.
Near to sunset the two brothers placed themselves high above the ravine to get a bird’s eye view of the brumbies coming into water.
‘Have a look at the black stallion?’ Harry pointed and whispered to his brother.
‘He’s going to cause us trouble – you know. We might have to shoot him so we can keep the mob together.’ Mick whispered back to Harry.
‘We’ll see what happens before we shoot him – if he’s trouble, yes, but wait until we work out a plan before we do it.’ Harry replied in a quiet voice.
Both men returned to the camp and discussed how they were going to trap the brumbies.
‘If we build a set of yards and made a wing on each side we can trap a few at a time, quieten them to use as coaches for the rest.’ Harry explained.
‘How many do you think we’d want to trap first?’ Mick asked.
‘Probably about ten – if we trap the stallion in with the ten, then that’d be the trick. Where he goes the others follow.’ Both men agreed.
Early the following day they worked out how many posts and rails they’d need to cut from local timber to make a yard large and strong enough to hold ten horses especially the black stallion. With an axe each they selected sufficient posts after falling trees of a good size.
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Re: Pat Ritter. Books

Postby patritter » Fri Sep 22, 2017 10:56 pm

'The Drover' - Page 96:

Using strong rope they towed the posts to near the water hole and started digging post holes with a crowbar and shovel to form an enclosure to trap the horses. When they had sufficient posts in the ground it was time to cut rails and fasten them to the posts. Between each post were four rails, one on top and bottom and two in between. These were wired to each post using a cobb & co twitch to hold them in place. A slip rail was used as a gate to stop any trapped animal from escape.
The trap was set.
Near sunset Harry and Mick readied their horses waiting for the mob to come into the water. Harry’s eyes scanned the bush to see horses, lead by the black stallion, followed by other horses.
At one point the black stallion was about to enter the trap – stopped and raised his head as if to listen for anything unusual. The thirst was too much not to lure him to the waterhole. Others followed.
When most of the horses had their heads down drinking at the lagoon Harry quickly spurred his horse toward the opening in the yard. He needed to be quick because if the black stallion heard or seen him approach he would race out of the yard and they’d bid the mob goodbye.
Harry was quick because he knew his horse. Fast galloping from the bush behind which he was hiding, he spurred his horse toward the opening in the yard – he leaped from his horse, grab the slip rail and fasten it to the post to stop the mob.
Mick stayed back so if Harry failed to fasten the slip rail in time he would try and hold them from breaking away and force them back into the yard.
It was split second timing. Harry saw out of the corner of his eye, the black stallion stop drinking from the waterhole, he knew he had little time to complete his task. In an instance the black stallion turned toward Harry – stalled, wind blasting from the nostrils, lifted both front hooves and reared on his hind legs; whinnied to the others to alarm them of danger.
TO PURCHASE THIS BOOK CLICK HERE: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/95766
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