Moya went to bed like one already in a dream. She smiled when she
realised what she was doing; there would be no sleep for her that night.
Yet she went through with the empty form, even to putting out the light
to rest her aching eyes. And in five minutes her troubles ceased for as
many hours; she had passed that pitch of excitement which is another
name for insomnia; she had reached the stage of sheer exhaustion, and
she reaped the recompense.
Spurred feet treading gingerly nevertheless awoke her towards dawn. It
was a bitter awakening. Further sleep was impossible, further rest
intolerable; besides, something must be done at once. It was an ordeal
to face, but sooner or later Theodore must be told, and then--good-bye!
Obviously the sooner the better, since the thing was settled between the
two whom it concerned; and Moya had the temperament which prefers to
precipitate the absolutely inevitable; but temperament for once was not
her lord. It was too hard!
Character came to the rescue. It must be done. And Moya dressed by
candle-light with a craven but a resolute heart.
Meanwhile the cautious footsteps and the low voices died away; and the
girl found a bare verandah, chill and silent as a vault in the twilight
of early morning. A lamp was burning in the dining-room, but the chairs
were pushed back, crusts left, and tea-cups half full. The teapot felt
quite heavy; and Moya took a cup and a bite before going to see whether
Theodore was awake. If not, she must wake him, for she could not wait.
But his room was deserted; his very boots were gone; and the craven
heart leapt, for all its resolution.
Moya returned to the verandah in time to see the new chum, Ives, coming
at a canter through the pines. She cut him off at the barracks, where,
however, he flung himself from the saddle and almost into her arms.
"I beg your pardon, Miss Bethune! Forgotten something as usual, you
see!"
Hurry and worry were behind his smile. Yet Moya had the heart to detain
him.
"Good morning, Mr. Ives. Where's everybody?"
"Gone mustering."
"Not my brother?"
"No; he's gone with the police."
"The police."
"You know, they've gone to follow up some tracks----"
"Oh, yes, I know!" cried Moya.
So Theodore was hand-in-glove with the enemy! Not that the police were
the enemy at all; they were only _his_ enemies; but the fact remained
that Theodore was one of them. Very likely he had already made them a
present of his suspicions; nothing likelier, or more fitting, than the
exposure of her "lover" through her own brother's agency. It will be
seen that her bitterness against one was rapidly embittering Moya's view
of all and sundry. She was not original in that.
"I forgot my water-bag," the jackeroo remarked. "I shall have to gallop
to catch them up."
But he was too polite to move.
"Must you catch them up?" inquired Moya, in flattering dumps: but indeed
it would be deadly at the station all day, and such a day, without a
soul to speak to!
"Well, they won't wait for me, because they told me what to do," said
Ives on reflection.
"And what have you to do?" asked Moya, smiling.
"Go down the fence; it's easiest, you know."
"But what are you all going to do? What does this mustering mean?"
Ives determined in his own mind to blow the odds. He was not only a
gentleman; he was a young man; and Miss Bethune should have all the
information she wanted and he could give. Ives began to appreciate her
attractions, and Rigden's good fortune, for the first time as they
deserved. It would be another place after the marriage. She was a ripper
when you got her to yourself.
Aloud he explained the mustering as though he had the morning to spare.
It meant sweeping up all the sheep in a given paddock, either to count
them out, or to shift them altogether if feed or water was failing where
they were. A big job in any case, but especially so in Big Bushy, which
was by far the largest paddock on Eureka; it was seven miles by seven.
"And do you generally go mustering at a night's notice?"
"No, as a rule we know about it for days before; but last night the
boss--I beg your pardon----"
"What for?" said Moya. "I like to hear him called that."
And she would have liked it, she hardly knew why. But he was not her
boss, and never would be.
"Thanks awfully. Well, then, the boss found a tank lower than he
expected in Butcher-boy, that's the killing-sheep paddock, and it's next
door to Big Bushy, which is stocked with our very best. If the tanks
were low in Butcher-boy, they might be lower still in Big Bushy----"
"Why?" asked Moya, like a good Bethune.
"Oh, I don't know; only the boss seemed to think so; and of course it
wouldn't do to let our best sheep bog. So we've got to shift every hoof
into Westwells, where there's the best water on the run."
Moya said no more. This seemed genuine. Only she was suspicious now of
every move of Rigden's; she could not help it.
"And why must you have a water-bag?" she asked, for asking's sake.
"Oh, we never go without one in this heat. The boss won't let us. So of
course I went and forgot mine. I'm no good in the bush, Miss Bethune!"
"Not even at mustering?" asked sympathetic Moya.
"Why, Miss Bethune, that's the hardest thing of the lot, and it's where
I'm least use. It's my sight," said the young fellow ruefully; "I'm as
blind as a mole. You ought to be able to see sheep at three miles, but I
can't swear to them at three hundred yards."
"That's a drawback," said Moya, looking thoughtfully at the lad.
"It is," sighed he. "Then I haven't a dog, when I do see 'em; altogether
it's no sinecure for me, though they do give me the fence; and--and I'm
afraid I really ought to be making a start, Miss Bethune."
The outward eye of Moya was still fixed upon him, but what it really saw
was herself upon that lonely verandah all day long--waiting for the next
nice development--and waiting alone.
"I have excellent eyes," she observed at length.
"To say the least!" cried her cavalier.
"I meant for practical purposes," rejoined Moya, with severity. "I'm
sure that I could see sheep at three miles."
"I shouldn't wonder," said he enviously.
"And I see you have a spare horse in the yard."
"Yes, in case of accidents."
"And I know you have a lady's saddle."
"It was got for you."
Moya winced, but her desire was undiminished.
"I mean to be the accident, Mr. Ives," said she.
"And come mustering?" he cried. "And be my--my----"
"The very eyes of you," said Moya, nodding. "I shall be ready in three
minutes!"
And she left him staring, and bereft of breath, but flushed as much with
pleasure as with the rosy glow of the Riverina sunrise which fell upon
him even as she spoke; she was on the verandah before he recovered his
self-possession.
"Your horse'll be ready in two!" he bawled, and rushed to make good his
word. Moya had to remind him of the water-bag after all.
First and last she had not delayed him so very long, and the red blob of
a sun was but clear of the horizon when they obtained their first
unimpeded view of it. This was when they looked back from the gate
leading into Butcher-boy: the homestead pines still ran deep into the
red, and an ink-pot would still have yielded their hue.
In Butcher-boy, which was three miles across, there was nothing for them
to do but to ride after their shadows and to talk as they rode, neck
and neck, along the fluted yellow ribbon miscalled a road, between tufts
of sea-green saltbush and faraway clumps of trees.
"I wish I wasn't such a duffer in the bush," said Ives, resolved to make
the most of the first lady he had met for months. "The rum thing is that
I'm frightfully keen on the life."
"Are you really?" queried Moya, and she was interested on her own
account, for what might have been.
"Honestly," said Ives, "though I begin to see it isn't the life for me.
The whole thing appeals to one, somehow; getting up in the middle of the
night (though it was an awful bore), running up the horses (though I
can't even crack a stock-whip), and just now the station trees against
the sunrise. It's so open and fresh and free, and unlike everything
else; it gets at me to the core; but, of course, they don't give me my
rations for that."
"Should you really like to spend all your days here?"
"No; but I shouldn't be surprised if I were to spend half my nights here
for the term of my natural life! I shall come back to these paddocks in
my dreams. I can't tell why, but I feel it in my bones; it's the light,
the smell, the extraordinary sense of space, and all the little things
as well. The dust and scuttle of the sheep when two or three are
gathered together; it's really beastly, but I shall smell it and hear it
till I die."
Moya glanced sidelong at her companion, and all was enthusiasm behind
the dusty spectacles. There was something in this new chum after all.
Moya wondered what.
"You're not going to stick to it, then?"
Ives laughed.
"I'm afraid it won't stick to me. I can't see sheep, I'm no real good
with horses, and I couldn't even keep the station books; the owner said
my education had been sadly neglected (one for Rugby, that was!) when he
was up here the other day. It's only through Mr. Rigden's good-nature
that I'm hanging on, and because--I--can't--tear myself away."
"And what do you think of doing eventually?"
"Oh, I don't know. I shall go home again, I suppose; I only came out for
the voyage. After that, goodness knows; I was no real use at school
either."
Insensibly the rocking-chair canter of the bush horses had lapsed into
the equally easy amble which is well-nigh their one alternative; and the
shadows were shortening, and the back of the neck and the ears were
beginning to burn. The jackeroo was sweeping the horizon for pure
inexplicable delight in its dirty greens and yellows; but had quite
forgotten that he ought already to have been scouring it for sheep.
"And so the boss is good-natured, is he?" said Moya, she could not have
told herself why; for she would not have admitted that it could afford
her any further satisfaction to hear his praises.
"Good-natured?" cried the jackeroo. "He's all that and much more;
there's not a grander or a straighter chap in Riverina, and we all swear
by him; but--well, he is the boss, and let's you know it."
A masterful man; and Moya had wanted her master all these years! She
asked no more questions, and they rode a space in silence, Ives glancing
sidelong in his turn, and in his heart congratulating Rigden more and
more.
"By Jove," he cried at last, "I think I shall have to get you to use
your influence on my behalf!"
"For what?" asked Moya, wincing again.
"Another chance! They mustn't give me the sack just yet--I must be here
when you come. It's the one thing we need--a lady. It's the one thing
_he_ needs to make him as nearly perfect as it's comfortable for other
people for a man to be. And I simply must be here to see."
"Let's canter," said Moya. The blood came rushing to his face.
"I apologise," he cried. "It was horrid cheek of me, I know!"
Moya's reassuring smile was all kindly, and not all forced; indeed, the
tears were very close to the surface, and she could not trust herself to
say much.
"Not cheek at all," was what she did say, with vigour. "Only--you'll
change your mind."
With that her eyes glistened for an instant; and young Ives loved her
himself. But neither of them was sorry when another gate grew large
above the horses' ears, with posts and wires dwindling into perspective
on either side to mark the eastern frontier of Big Bushy.