The boys are all but spent, their shirts clinging wetly to their chests, their necks and faces shiny with perspiration. They sit on the apple crates she’s put out for them and gulp gratefully at the hot, sweet tea in silence. After a while Jack notices that Jessica isn’t yacking away like she usually does. Without looking up from his mug he says, ‘Cat got your tongue then, Tea Leaf?’ Billy glances up at Jessica, and his eyes grow wide with surprise. ‘Shit, what happened to yer neck?’
‘Nothing. It’s nothing,’ she mumbles.
‘It’s bloody tar! There’s flamin’ tar running down yer neck!’
Jack now looks up. ‘Hell, what’s happened?’ he exclaims.
But by this time Billy has put down his tin mug. Jumping to his feet, he reaches down and pulls at Jessica’s hat.
‘Ouch!’ she yells. Billy has lifted her hat and her blonde hair sticks to the rim, glued to it by the tar. ‘Who’s done this?’ he demands.
‘Ouch, Billy, let go!’ Jessica yells again as Billy tries to unglue her hat by pulling still further, but more gently, finally yanking it free.
Jessica snatches at the hat and with both hands plants it firmly back on her head, then she pushes Billy away. ‘Leave off, will ya, I’m all right!’
‘No you bloody ain’t,’ Jack says. ‘What happened, Jessie?’
‘It’s none of your business,’ Jessica says, trying to sound tough.
‘Like hell it’s not,’ Billy exclaims. ‘Who’s done this to you, Tea Leaf? You tell me and I’ll fix the bastards.’
‘It was an accident,’ is all Jessica will say.
‘It’s the tar boys, isn’t it?’ Billy keeps at her. Jessica turns away to hide her tears just as the hooter sounds to call the tar boys back to sweep the board.
Jack looks down at Jessica and wipes his hand across his mouth. ‘Jessie, I’m taking you over to the big house to get you fixed up. Fetch my horse and yours too, we’ll ride over now.’
‘No, please!’ She looks anxiously back at the shearing shed. ‘I’ve gotta get back,’ Jessica says, knowing that her being out of the shed is bound to come to the notice of Mike Malloy, especially if Jack’s also missing. She’ll be dismissed and Joe will be disgraced. ‘Please, Jack, I don’t want no trouble, it can wait. I’ll be right.
I’ve gotta go now.’
‘No, hang on!’ Jack grabs her wrist. ‘There’s benzine at the homestead, it should take the tar off. Maybe we should try the engine gas-oil here?’
‘Please Jack! I’ll lose me job!’ Jessica begs.
‘Let her go, Jack,’ Billy says, ‘her hair ain’t gunna get any worse if we wait till the day ends. She’s right, Mike Malloy’ll be out to find her if she doesn’t get back.
Don’t you worry, Tea Leaf, I’ll sort out the lads later.’ Jessica sees that Jack doesn’t like Billy taking over like this. ‘Billy’s right, Jack,’ she says urgently. ‘Please, I’m late, Jack, it’s me job!’
Jack looks a bit miffed. ‘Well, you get the horses ready as soon as we break, right?’
he says crossly, sitting back on his apple crate and picking up his mug again. ‘But wait on a moment, if you go in there like this Mike Malloy will see the stuff all over your shoulders,’ he points to her, ‘the tar running down.’
Jessica looks more panic-stricken than ever. ‘I’ll cover it up.’
Jack grabs her by the hand. ‘Come with me.’ Inside the dark little shed which houses the donkey engine Jack takes up a gallon can of paraffin. He soaks a bit of rough hessian in it and begins to scrub the tar from Jessica’s neck and her collar and over her shoulders. Jessica tries not to wince at the smell and the scrubbing, and finally Jack stops. ‘There, that’s better! If Mike Malloy asks where you’ve been tell him I kept you back.’
Jessica nods and runs back to the shed. Her scalp itches from the tar and her skin burns where the paraffin has removed the tar from her neck and shoulders. When she returns to the shed the foreman is nowhere to be seen and she breathes a sigh of relief.
Towards the end of the afternoon she manages to get away for a few minutes to find the stable boy and tell him to saddle Jack’s horse and her own and to bring them round ready for when work ends.
The boys watch her all afternoon, giggling each time she passes one of them. At last the hooter for the end of the day goes and Billy, who has stopped shearing five minutes before to clean and oil his clippers, jumps from his station and walks down the board. He grabs a tar pot and stick and then collars all six boys and marches them out of the shed.
The other shearers watch, confused. It’s a tar boy’s job to do the last sweep and clean up. First in, last out, the lowest works the longest is the rule. The donkey engine comes to a stop, then the wool press does the same and the shed has suddenly quietened down.
‘What’s up, Billy?’ one of the shearers calls, but Billy doesn’t answer, roughly pushing the boys ahead of him. The shearers look at each other and then at Jack, who’s grabbed hold of Jessica so she doesn’t run for her horse. ‘A spot of bother with the tars,’ Jack says. ‘They’ll be back in a while, Billy’s just sorting it out.’ He is holding the shears and, spying a bit of Jessica’s tar-covered hair sticking out from under her hat, snips it off and puts it into his pocket.
The men are not happy. Billy and Jack are the youngest shearers in the shed and have no right to be taking such liberties when the boys are needed. But they let it go and turn back to the oiling of their clippers and their preparations to leave. Perhaps they wonder why Jessica is standing with Jack, and not among the tar boys, but minding your own business is the first rule of any shearing shed and Jack is still the boss’s son. Jessica is shaking like a leaf and Jack is right to hold her. She’s near to panic and she’d have scarpered, running for her horse to get home.