The Opal Desert (18 page)

After they finished, he threw the dregs of their cold tea onto the fire and with his boot scraped dirt onto the flame to smother it. ‘Back to work, young lady.' Albert returned to the shaft and Shirley carefully continued to look through the mullock heap. She examined the dust-coated jelly-like lumps of rock, which her father had told her was called rubbish potch. He had also told her that, if she looked hard enough, sometimes these unprepossessing stones held the trapped fire of precious gem opal.

When she thought that she had looked long enough, she returned to her father at the bottom of the shaft. He gave her a small pick and let her chip away at the rock face with it.

‘Listen very carefully to the sound of the metal on the earth,' he told her. ‘If you hear a clinking noise, like you've hit glass, stop and take it slowly. You might just be on to something,' he said.

‘Like opal?' asked Shirley.

‘It could be. The colours will tell us if it's precious opal. No mistaking it,' said her father. ‘You know when you've got gold, there's a nugget shining at you from the pan. But diamonds, even rubies and sapphires, look like very dull and uninteresting little pebbles when you dig them up. Not like opal . . . the moment it's uncovered it's flashing every brilliant colour of the rainbow. Like it's alive. You just have to look.'

‘Like the opal in Mummy's ring?'

‘Just like that.'

‘Is that why we come out here? To find another opal for Mummy?'

‘I doubt we'll ever find another one like that. Perhaps it was beginner's luck. But we can certainly try.'

‘I wish Mummy could have come with us.'

‘When your baby brother is older we'll bring your mother and Geoffrey out here to Lightning Ridge. But now is a special time, just for you and me.'

Shirley nodded. Her father had often gone to Lightning Ridge in the school holidays, but this was the first time that he had brought her to this strange underground world, so far from the bustle of Sydney. She loved having her father all to herself. She loved his stories. He knew so much about the whole world, which was why he was a schoolteacher, she thought. ‘Maybe we can find an opal for baby Geoffrey in here,' said Shirley.

‘Perhaps there's a pretty little stone or two sleeping away in the rock underground that will be a necklace or a ring for you.'

‘Daddy, if we find an opal, do we have to sell it? That's what everyone says.'

Her father sighed. ‘Yes, I know. For some people these are very hard times, but we're not as badly off as some of the fellows around here who've lost their jobs and are doing it tough. Everyone is hoping an opal find will change their fortunes overnight.'

They'd been working through the afternoon in the cool quiet tunnel, and Albert was considering packing up early and getting his gun to shoot a rabbit for dinner.

‘Daddy. Stop. That's one,' cried Shirley and crawled up the drive to its face to tug at her father.

‘What's up, kiddo?'

‘The noise. The clink sound.' The girl began rubbing her hands over the rough surface of the solid clay.

‘I heard it.'

‘Did you? Best we have a good look then.' Albert continued chipping away with his small gouging pick by the soft light of the candle. This time he, too, heard the metallic clink. ‘Bring the candle closer, Shirley, and be careful of the hot wax. It might be just potoch.'

Using feather-light strokes, he began paring away the hard clay. There it was again, the slight grating noise. Using the point of his pick he began gently trying to feel for the size and shape of the rock buried in the clay. Slowly he began prising the egg-sized rock from its nest.

‘You got it,' whispered Shirley. ‘Is it one? Is it an opal?' She held the candle closer to the black lump.

‘Hard to tell. Could be just a black potch nobby.' Her father carefully began to scratch away some of the caked clay surrounding the lump.

‘Crack it open, see what's inside,' said Shirley, barely able to contain her excitement.

‘And break it in half? Let's see here, first.' Her father pulled his snips from his pocket and carefully snipped off a protruding edge.

They stared at the sudden glimpse of colour. Hardly daring to hope, Albert pulled out his handkerchief, spat on it and then rubbed at the surface.

When the film of dirt was cleaned away a bright glittering array of colours winked up at them. They both caught their breath.

‘It's an opal, Daddy! It's so pretty.'

‘Hold it carefully, sweet pea, and let's see if this fellow has any brothers and sisters.'

While Shirley sat and held the stone tightly, her father continued to probe in the clay.

‘How long has this one been in the ground, Daddy?'

‘Millions of years. Ever since the dinosaurs.'

The two of them lost track of time as Albert exposed a channel across the mine face where, in a deeper pocket, nestled four more nobbies, which Shirley called ‘opal eggs'.

‘Are there any more, Daddy?'

‘Not in this little nest, sweet pea. But there could be a patch of opal in this area, if it's good bearing dirt. But first we need to know just what we have in these little treasures. Don't get too excited. They might not all have opal,' he cautioned.

‘Can we go up?' asked Shirley. ‘We can see better.'

‘Now, you know the rules. No jumping around, no squealing, and absolutely no telling. This is our secret. All right, let's clean up and call it a day.' Carefully he wrapped the nobbies in a rag and put them in his pocket. Together they packed the loose clay into the bucket, climbed the shaft and Albert hauled the bucket to the top, tipping the clay onto their growing heap. By now the sun was low on the horizon.

‘Are you still going to hunt something for dinner, Daddy?'

‘I don't think so. We'll just open a tin of soup, make a damper and put a couple of spuds in the fire. Sound all right to you?'

‘Yep. I could eat a horse,' replied Shirley. Then she lowered her voice and whispered to her father, ‘I'm excited.'

After securing the sheet of iron across the entrance to the shaft, they casually sauntered back through the trees to the tents that made up the rough camp of the makeshift community. A couple of fires were burning. Some people moved about, others sat contemplatively in front of their flickering campfires. The smell of woodsmoke mingled with the scent of billy tea.

Albert exchanged a nod or a subdued, murmured greeting with some of the other miners. Most of the men were friendly enough but, while the claims were close together, in this camp it was every man for himself.

Albert, called the Professor by the locals, had chosen to sink his claim further away from the main camp. He'd first come out to the opal fields of Lightning Ridge as a young man with an interest in geology and palaeontology not long after the Great War had ended, and had been intrigued by the landscape, the history and the wondrous black opal. He was bitten by the opal bug and had registered a claim, which he visited as often as he could in the school holidays. At first his wife had come with him, but she had quickly lost interest in the harshness of the opal fields and had stopped coming altogether as soon as they started a family. It was clear to Albert now that his six-year-old daughter regarded her first visit to the opal fields as a big adventure.

As they neared their small tent, Albert said, ‘Let's get the fire going, Shirley. Start dinner and get settled. You know the drill.'

Shirley was about to open her mouth to ask about the rocks nestled in her father's deep pocket in his baggy work pants, but Albert put his finger to his lips, so she nodded and, adopting her father's weary and casual demeanour, set about her chores.

After their dinner had been eaten from enamel plates by the fire and they'd cleaned up, her father sat down to enjoy a smoke by the dying embers. In the gathering darkness other figures could be seen moving about as men settled into the swags under their bough-and-canvas shelters and, at the bottom of the rise, a lantern shone from the primitive shack where Mr and Mrs MacKenzie lived. Even though she was getting tired, Shirley was finding it hard to control her impatience to discuss the excitement of the day. Albert tapped out his pipe on his boot, stowed his leather tobacco pouch back into his pocket and gave her a slight nod. They retreated into their small tent. It held two narrow camp stretchers, a tin trunk that they used for storage and a table where their kerosene lantern stood. Her father lit its wick and adjusted the flame inside the smoky chimney.

‘Close the flap of the tent, sweet pea,' he said.

Sitting side by side, Albert spread the opal nobbies onto a rough army blanket. One by one he washed the stones in their old billy can and then carefully snipped and rubbed back a small portion of each. Together they slowly turned them over, examining them in the pale yellow light of the lamp.

Neither spoke, for Albert had again cautioned Shirley, but they were both mesmerised by the extraordinary brilliance of the stones that glittered with blazing red, gold and green fire.

‘It's like they have a light inside them,' whispered Shirley.

‘They're extremely good opal,' agreed her father quietly. ‘Very good. We'll have our work cut out for us now. A lot of digging to do before we go back to school.'

‘Do we have to go back to school? Can't we stay here? If we find lots more opal, we'll be rich and then you won't have to work anymore.'

‘Your mother wouldn't agree to that and neither do I! Everyone has to go to school. It's how the world runs. If you don't get an education and look after yourself and your family, you can't expect everyone else to help you out. Now, let's get to bed. We have to start digging above that ledge tomorrow.'

‘I'll say a special thank you in my prayers tonight,' said Shirley.

‘That's a good girl. And don't forget your mother and little brother. Sleep tight.'

Anyone watching from across the field might have observed the silhouette of a man hunched over in the lamplight, head bowed, seemingly studying what he held in his hands, turning something over and over.

Several days later, they went into town in Albert's old truck to top up their supplies. The Ridge seemed as busy as it had been on their earlier visit. Men standing outside the Imperial Hotel watched these arrivals from the diggings.

Mrs Campbell at the small general store greeted Shirley and her father warmly. ‘How're you two doing? Still enjoying yourselves, eh? Not too bored, love?'

‘Not at all, thank you,' said Shirley. ‘I help my father.'

‘She's a hard worker. Good company, too,' said Albert.

‘So you don't get lonely. Long days working down a shaft with little to show for it, eh?'

‘My father tells me stories and teaches me things,' said Shirley rather primly in an effort to be polite but not divulge any information.

‘Well, bless you. Help yourself to a couple of lollies from the big jar on the counter. And what do you need, Mr Mason?'

After Albert had loaded their flour, dried milk, sugar and potatoes into the truck, he and Shirley wandered a little way along the dusty street of ramshackle buildings made of rough corrugated iron and wood, that made up Lightning Ridge. A man, pushing a wheelbarrow with his possessions tied up in a sugar bag and a pickaxe and tools lying on top of it, trudged past them.

Past the end of Morilla Street, Albert caught sight of his old friend Ahmed with two of his camels.

‘Come and meet a special friend of mine,' he said to his daughter.

Albert had first met Ahmed years before when the Afghan cameleer had made one of his infrequent visits to the Ridge, using his camels to transport goods to the scattered mining districts during the dry season.

‘Hello, Ahmed,' called Albert. ‘How are Afra and Malika?' He patted one of the camels. ‘This is my daughter, Shirley.'

Ahmed's leathery face broke into a large smile. ‘Missy, how you be? We are good, good. And you, sir, how are you?'

‘Very well, thank you. Where have you been? What have you seen?' said Albert with a smile. It was always their greeting.

‘I have seen many moons over the desert. There is a promising new field in Queensland. Only a few men, but it is far from water.'

‘Are there opals out there?'

‘Yes, but it is not a place for you and your fine daughter. How goes your luck?'

‘We like Lightning Ridge, don't we, Shirley, but maybe we might move further away one day. Perhaps Opal Lake. I hear that there's been some good finds there.'

‘It is even more remote than White Cliffs. A very poetic place. Perhaps that would be beneficial. But are you planning to return to the city and to work? Especially if there are troubled times ahead in the world.'

‘Yes, I have to get back to my school and to the rest of my family. This is just a short holiday for Shirley and me, but you are right about the troubles. I hope they won't affect us in Australia.'

‘They are a long way from here. Perhaps there will be a war in Europe. Let us pray that is not so. Now, I must go fetch the water cans we are carrying to the dusty opal men.'

‘What happened to your other camels?' asked Albert, remembering that previously Ahmed had had six or eight camels linked together by their mulgawood nose pegs.

‘Things are changing. The days of cameleers are fading, like my eyes.' The Afghan smiled. ‘So I released my old friends into the wild and they will make their own way in the desert.'

‘What will happen to you?' asked Albert, suddenly seeing a bleak future for the old man frequently shunned by people in the community.

Ahmed shrugged. ‘Only Allah knows. I have no means to return to my country.'

‘Ahmed, if you found an opal you could go home,' said Shirley, thinking that if they found more opals she could give one to Ahmed.

‘Thank you, little missy, for your generous thoughts, but I have come to love this desert where the sky and the billabong are my mosque. This is my land, now,' he said. ‘
Ensha Allah, salam aleikom
.' He inclined his head and, tucking the end of his ragged turban under his chin, he smiled at Shirley and Albert. Then, clicking his tongue, he and his camels walked away.