The Pipeline

Chapter 1

Craig and John Oliver lived on a large cattle and agricultural property that was located on the southern side of the mighty river that formed their rear boundary. Craig was the older of the siblings by several years, and one evening, after Craig had just entered his teens while at the dinner table, Craig asked his father, "what is gelignite"? His father almost choked on the home grown, or maybe it was the neighbour's piece of steak on which he was chewing. "What makes you ask that" his father questioned, trying to disguise emphasis or emotion. "Well" Craig replied in a very cautious attempt to cover his interest as he knew that his question had caused some emotional disturbance to his father, and really not knowing if he should divulge the fact that they had discovered two timber boxes of 'Gelignite' or 'Jellynite' as John had called it, hidden in the back in the old unused storage shed that was some distance from the farm house and the machinery sheds.

His father Neil knew immediately that the boys had unwittingly come across the stash of explosives that he had completely forgotten about, explosives that a previous acquaintance had left years before, and Neil suspected had been 'mysteriously acquired' from a quarry or mining company, but had not bothered to ask about, as he really did not want, or need to know. "Did you boys find the boxes with Gelignite written on the side", the gelignite that he had meant to dispose of years ago when the acquaintance never returned. "Yes" Replied Craig, "What is it"? His father stopped eating and looked at him, "It is an explosive that the quarries and mining companies use to blast rocks, and...... it is very......... very dangerous stuff" his father replied in a very stern voice. "How does it work" Craig asked, intrigued as to why his father would be storing such materials on the farm. "Well", his father replied with some trepidation as he was not quite sure how much to tell them, 'better they know' he thought, 'forewarned to the extreme danger'. Neil added "The boxes with the explosive, the Gelignite, needs to have a detonator inserted into it, the detonator has a fuse just like a fire cracker and needs to be lit so when the detonator explodes, this then makes the gelignite explode". He paused, looked directly at the boys and continued "I do not want you going near that stuff, do you both hear me" he raised his voice slightly and spoke with a stern tone and serious expression, "it is extremely dangerous, do I make myself clear". Both of the boys nodded in unison as their father was not one to be defied, but both inwardly knowing that they would be back to that shed as soon as they could, to try out this stuff called 'Gelignite' or 'Jellynite'.

After dinner the boys had moved into the living room to watch a bit of television, their mother Iris queried their father immediately with a high level of concern about "this dangerous so called gelignite explosive and what was it doing there in the first place"? He explained "that it had been left there many years earlier by an acquaintance, and that he had meant to dispose of it into the river some years later when it had not been collected, and had no idea where the owner was". He apologized for completely forgetting about it. The farm and all the work that was required to be done every day, just to keep the farm running, always took precedence, and yes he admitted, it had been foolish to forget about something as important as that. "I will attend to it as soon as I can" he said, as his mind turned immediately to thoughts of the very important task of repairing the pump that simply could not wait as the cattle would almost certainly perish without water. The thoughts of other jobs around the farm continued to set precedence and eventually the importance of 'that' discussion had once again, been forgotten.

The boy's first experience with the explosive came after they had located the detonators in another box, hidden away in another part of the shed and they 'mostly Craig' decided to 'very carefully' remove a single detonator with fuse and a single stick of Gelignite. Craig decided to try their first explosion in the river as it was quite a distance from the house, and most likely was the safest place as they did not want to start a fire. It had been some years passed that the boys had started a fire with fire crackers and that event had not gone down well with their father, and the punishment had not been forgotten, They had also learnt that throwing the larger fire crackers into the waterhole at the river would sometimes stun the fish, the fish would surface and be easily collected, so it was a different way of going fishing, lazy but effective.