Show Your Card

I was working for Jack Daymond, a farmer, who farmed livestock, potatoes and vines. I s’pose he had over two hundred cattle. The spuds and the grapes grew in lines. Oh gawd! Jack had me slaving ‘til sunset, keeping his farm spick and span. Jack kept his eyes on the produce, while I was his cleaning up man. And that meant me days were all busy, spraying and killing off weeds, grubbing out hundreds of tussocks, before the darn thing set its seeds. Sometimes old Jack was a good bloke, he’d jump in with a fine helping hand, and we’d spend our day in the paddock, destroying the weeds on his land. We were digging out plenty of thistles, in the north paddock up near the creek, and we worked like a couple of Trojans clearing what should have taken a week. Then a voice loudly filled up the air. And it was quite menacing too. A bloke in a suit was striding to us, declaring his strong point of view. “Mr. Daymond, I am here to warn you, that I represent government’s need. It appears that with government water, that your quota you far did exceed.” “I’m here to check your irrigation, and make sure you’re not being unfair.” Jack Daymond replied “Do what you must, but don’t go in that paddock up there.” The bloke in the suit became snaky, standing over poor Jack with a leer, “Don’t tell me where I can or can’t go, See this card that I am holding here.” “This card is a reminder to you, I have authority over your land. I am allowed to go wherever I wish, have I made myself clear?  Do you understand?' Jack looked down at the card in his hand, and knew there’s no sense to rebound, so Jack nodded politely and joined me, grubbing thistles from out of the ground. It appeared that Jack had been beaten, and in silence he’s taking it hard, between thistles he gazed to the paddock, at the bloke who had shown him the card. But then a grin formed on his face, we heard yelling like never before, for the bloke in the suit he was sprinting, and it’s something we cannot ignore. Jack beat me on reaching the fence. With the bloke in the suit in full flight, and hot in pursuit was Jack’s Jersey bull, with a look that was all sheer delight. As the bloke in the suit got beside us, with the bull behind him by a yard, Old Jack cupped his hands and yelled out - “Your card! Your card! Show him your card!”