Dave had looked to Adam for support, but he’d been staring down at the table, his cheeks stained red. From anger or embarrassment, Dave hadn’t been sure. Dave knew he hated the way his father spoke to his mum. Last time he’d tried to talk to Adam about it during the harvest after his father had yelled at Carlene for not having tea on the table at the allotted time, his brother hadn’t responded. Perhaps it had been because he was tired. Or, after this latest confrontation, maybe not. Maybe he agreed, although how Dave couldn’t fathom.
He hadn’t been able to stay in the house another minute and Carlene had followed him out and said, ‘Don’t worry about it, Dave. He doesn’t mean it.’
But Dave was worried. His sense of what was right and what wasn’t had always been strong, even as a little boy. He’d never tolerated bullies or little boys pulling girls’ pigtails. What his father had done that night was both bullying and mean. He’d done it before and Dave was sure he’d do it again.
His mother was right, however. If they didn’t start pulling together it could mean that the business might be lost. They’d learned about succession planning at ag college and he knew how important it was, but it looked like Sam wasn’t going to be entertaining that route anytime soon.
Dave had been home for two years now. He’d arrived back on Wind Valley Farm in the December after he’d finished ag college. Harvest had already started and both Dean and Adam were already working at home and being paid a meagre wage. Dean handled the seeding and Adam ran around behind him.
Dave hadn’t been sure where he fitted in, so he did what he thought was right—improve the farm, which included the stock. Both brothers seemed happy to leave the sheep and cattle to Dave as they much preferred the cool air-conditioned cabs of the tractor and header. The yards weren’t much fun in the middle of summer or in the winter when the freezing, dry wind howled around the hills and into the valley.
The animal work hadn’t bothered Dave—he liked anything to do with farming. It didn’t matter what job he was given or how hard or easy it was. As long as he was outside and had his hands in the soil, he was happy. It showed. He’d been awarded the Graduate of Excellence award at his graduation. Only his mum had been there to see that. Everyone else had been busy with the harvest.
By the time the harvest had finished in 1988, Dave had completed the drenching program, weaned the calves and started to change the water system so it was more reliable than waiting for water to siphon down from tank to tank to tank, and then into the troughs in the paddocks. More often than not, he’d been out checking the animals and paddocks and found troughs near empty and, in forty-plus heat, that wasn’t an option.
Maybe he should have asked his dad’s approval before buying a solar pump worth two thousand dollars, but they could afford it and it had been hard to track down. His dad had been keeping crazy hours, working sometimes eighteen hours a day to beat the summer storms, which usually arrived in January.
Peace of mind when it came to water, in Dave’s opinion, was a no brainer.
He’d rerun the wires of the more rundown fences and cleaned out the sheep feeders ready for the hand-feeding, which would start once the sheep had finished on the stubbles. He’d spent hours walking the land of Wind Valley Farm, working out where soils changed and marking where soil tests would be best taken from. He’d revelled in the clear air, open spaces and creating a strong and viable farming enterprise. Flocks of galahs and white cockatoos had kept him company, as had his kelpie, Jip.
At first, when the harvest had finished, his father, Dean and Adam had been full of praise for him. His brothers could now have January off, which meant a potential holiday to the beach. All the stock work had already been finished. And Dave had done it all single-handedly. There was nothing left to do at all, other than normal stock checks.
But then his father had gone into the office and seen the invoices for the pumps and soil tests. ‘You’ve made management decisions without speaking to me,’ his father had said with suppressed anger. ‘This is my farm. I’m in charge. Not you. Not your brothers. Me. I’ve worked hard to get here and just because you’ve got some fancy piece of paper saying you think you’re shit hot doesn’t give you any right to come in here and take over. You have to start at the bottom and work your way up.’
Dave didn’t disagree with him—he knew a farmer needed to know how to do every job on a farm and, of course, the youngest son coming home from ag college wasn’t going to be given the best jobs.
‘Never ask a man to do a job you wouldn’t do yourself,’ his grandfather had told him.
But even understanding his father’s way of thinking, surely Sam could see what he’d done, the improvements he’d made. Now there was never any chance of the stock running out of water. The fences were in tip-top condition and everyone knew what fertiliser was needed for the soil. These changes he’d made—small as they were—weren’t they beneficial for everyone?
From then on, their relationship had never been the same and every time Sam was able to give out a crappy job, it was Dave who got it. At first, Dean and Adam had been supportive of Dave, offering to do some of the jobs and standing up to their father. Their help, however, had only made their lives difficult.
‘Stay out of it,’ Sam had told the two brothers. ‘I’ll get who I want to do what I want.’
As time had gone
