NONE of the men saw Ess Lincoln that night. She was dead beat, Scottie
said, and had turned in after some tea and tucker. Next morning they
were all up and away about their work before Ess was up or out, but
after supper that evening Scottie brought her over and introduced her
to the men.
Steve Knight was not there at the time. He had been over to the head
station, and the men were either in their bunks or getting ready for
them when he came in. But if he did not see her, at least he heard
enough of her.
“’Ullo, Steve,” said Jack Ever, as soon as Steve set foot inside the
door. “You’ve missed the ’bus. She was over ’ere to-night, and we was
all interdooced.”
“I’ve missed my supper,” said Steve. “And that’s more important at this
moment. See if you can hook me out some tucker, Blazes, and about a
gallon of tea. I’m dry as the drought itself.”
“Wait till you see ’er,” said Whip Thompson. “You’ll think different.
She’s a bonzer; she’s——”
“Let’s get a wash, Whip,” said Steve, picking up a tin pail and making
for the door, “and then you can sing a song about it.”
“We’re to start cutting the mulga trees for the sheep to-morrow,” he
said when he came back. “I just brought word back to Scottie.”
“Did you go to the ’ouse?” said Jack. “Did you see ’er then?”
“No, Scottie came to the door. He asked me to go in, but I said No, I
wanted some supper.”
“You was both ends an’ the middle of a fool then,” said Jack, warmly.
“You could ’ave seen ’er.”
“I wasn’t hungry to see her,” said Steve, calmly, “and I was hungry for
my supper.” He seated himself and commenced to eat.
“It’s getting near the finish for the sheep down there,” he remarked,
“and there isn’t mulga enough to keep them going long.”
“D’you think we’ll have to camp up in the mulga paddocks?” said Aleck
Gault.
“Good Lord, I ’opes not,” said Jack Ever, in dismay. “We won’t see ’er
till next Sunday if we does.”
“The boss said he’d be coming over here in a day or two,” said Steve;
“I expect we’ll be shoving the sheep back here on the hills when the
mulga gives out.”
“Does the boss know she’s ’ere?” asked Whip Thompson.
“The boss was too busy thinking about his sheep to bother, I expect,”
said Steve.
“I’m goin’ to break in a ’orse for ’er,” said Whip Thompson. “None of
’em would stand a skirt on ’is back, I s’pose.”
“I’d try the Roman if I was you, Whip,” said Aleck Gault.
“He’s quiet, but he’s an ugly brute,” claimed Ned Gunliffe. “You want a
nicer-looking crock for her.”
“She can ride all right—she tole me,” said Darby the Bull.
“I might len’ ’er my ’orse,” said Blazes, reflectively. Now Blazes’
horse was the standing joke of the Ridge. The men swore he’d been
crossed with a sheep and was born too tired to feed himself. But Blazes
thought a lot of his horse, and was most jealous of anyone using it,
although he had little riding to do himself. His offer to lend it made
the men laugh, but it made Steve open his eyes.
“You too, Blazes,” he said. “The whole camp seems to have gone crazy
over this girl.”
“Reckon you’ll go crazy too when you see ’er,” said Jack Ever.
“What’s she like then?” said Steve. “Let’s hear all about her, and then
we may get talking of other things. Now then, Jack—fire ahead.”
“She’s pretty as a pictur in a gilt frame,” said Jack. “She ’as ’ands
like a duchess, and a figure like a green goddess.”
Steve spluttered over his tea. “Didn’t know there was an assortment of
colours in the goddess line, Jack,” he said. “But we’ll let it go at
Greek goddess.”
“I read it in a book somewheres,” said Jack. “One o’ Nat Gould’s, an’
the chap was ravin’ about the gal’s figure.”
“She has a figure that makes you think how well she’d look on a horse,”
said Whip Thompson. “And she carries her head as high, and steps as
dainty, as a thoroughbred.”
“Come on, Darby,” laughed Steve. “You next.”
Darby the Bull pondered. “When I’m drunk—or half drunk—I always see
every woman’s face sort o’ soft an’ sweet an’—an’—happy. I see this gal
like that—an’ I was sober ... I didn’t think,” he finished
reflectively, “a man could ever see one like that—when he’s sober.”
Steve chuckled. “You’re a poet, Darby,” he said, “though you’ll not
believe it. But all this doesn’t tell a man much. Is she short or tall,
dark or fair, young or old? Eh, Aleck, you’ve observing eyes.”
“Tall, or tallish,” said Aleck Gault. “Slender, dark, brown eyes, age
about 20, very pretty.”
“That’s better,” said Steve. “Can you add to it, Ned?”
“A lady,” said Ned, quietly, “speech, manners, and dress of a lady.”
Blazes pounded the table. “You ’ark to me, Steve, an’ I’ll tell ye.
Them an’ their river or Creek godses, an’ walk like a ’orse, an’ a face
like when you’ve got the rats, an’ speech o’ a lady. She didn’t make no
speech. Jus’ said ’how d’ye do,’ an’ chatted pleasant like. She don’t
walk—she floats, just as gentle as a chip in a puddle. She ’as eyes as
big as a bullock’s, an’ a pleadin’ look in ’em like you see in a
sheep’s when its throat’s cut. ’Er ’air’s black as the bottom o’ an old
billy-can, an’ shiny as a sweatin’ nigger. She ’as a voice like the low
notes o’ a tin whistle, an’ a skin as clear as the white o’ a
hard-boiled egg an’ as soft as well-dressed kangaroo hide. She’s a
beauty from the tip o’ ’er shoe-string to the button on ’er ’at. When
she’s speakin’ to you, you feels you wants to go to church, an’ give
your money to the poor. Th’ only thing as beats me,” he finished
reflectively, “is ’ow she come to ’ave Scottie Mackellar for a uncle.”
“Thanks, Blazey,” said Steve, his voice bubbling with laughter. “Now I
know exactly what she does look like. And for the peace of all our
minds, I hope she won’t stay long on Thunder Ridge. I must tell her so
when I see her.”
“You go gentle, Steve,” said Jack Ever. “Don’t you go hintin’ that to
’er. We all ’opes she stays years an’ is ’appy as long as she’s ’ere.”
“You all seem to have fallen up to the neck in love with her already,”
said Steve, commencing to pull off his boots. “I suppose I’ll have to
do ditto to be in company with you.”
Jack Ever was sitting up in bed smoking. He took the pipe from his
mouth and fixed his eyes on an empty corner of the room.
“Mebbe we’re in love wi’ her, meanin’ nothin’ disrespec’ful by the
word. Mebbe there’s some o’ us ’ere will get to love ’er real, an’ hope
for ’er to love ’im. I reckon the rest will wish ’im luck if that
’appens—long as he plays a straight game. But God ’elp the man as tries
to fool ’er.”
The other men were carefully avoiding his eyes, but Steve Knight knew
as well as if he had been addressed by name that the warning was spoken
to him.
There were grunts of acquiescence from some of them.
“That’s right—no foolin’,” said Whip Thompson. “Straight game,”
murmured Blazes, and Darby the Bull growled a “That’s right.”
“Shut it, you fools,” said Aleck Gault from his bunk. “There’s nobody
here that doesn’t know how to treat a decent girl decent when he meets
her.”
“I should think Scottie Mackellar knows enough to look out for his
niece, if she doesn’t herself,” said Steve Knight, smoothly. “But if
she wants to play the fool d’you think she won’t do it in spite of all
you self-appointed wet-nurses?” He dropped his sarcastic smoothness,
and his voice took a more savage ring. “And if these elaborate warnings
are aimed my way, you can go to the devil with them. I’ve grown out of
Sunday Schools, and I’ve pleased myself for a long time back how I
behave myself.”
He blew out the light and flung himself angrily on his bunk.
Next morning, when the men were saddling up in the paddock after
breakfast, Ess Lincoln came out to wish them good morning.
“It’s too bad we haven’t got that horse ready for you, Miss Lincoln,”
said Aleck Gault. “You might have ridden part way with us. This is the
best time of the day for a canter. It’s hot later.”
“I’m takin’ Diamond down wi’ me, Miss,” Whip said. “And I’m going to
put a blanket round my waist and mount ’im when we get down on the
flat. I’ll have ’im broken to it in a day or two so you can ride ’im.
’E’s a good ’orse.”
“Thanks so much, Whip,” said Ess. “It doesn’t matter about this
morning, really, because I have such a lot to do to get the house to my
liking. My boxes came up yesterday, and I have to unpack and put the
place tidy.”
“Sure you won’t be lonesome, Ess?” said Scottie. “I might drive you
down in the buggy if you like.”
“No, uncle, thanks. I’ll be all right. I’ll have cook here to look
after me, and perhaps if I’ve time and he’s not too busy, he’ll show me
how he makes that cake—the brownie, you know, cook.”
“Course I will, Miss,” said Blazes, eagerly. “I’ll be makin’ it this
afternoon, an’ you can come over any time.”
“All right,” said Scottie; “I’ll leave you to look after her, Blazes.”
“She’ll be all right,” said Blazes, importantly. “You leave me to see
to that.”
“Blazes was saying he’d lend you old Shuffle-foot, his horse, Miss
Lincoln,” said Ned Gunliffe. “He’d easy stand the skirt, and you might
come with us after all.”
“No, no, Miss,” said Blazes, hastily. “I didn’t think when I spoke o’
that. He’d be sure to make a terrible bobbery if you mounted ’im with a
skirt. Far better stop ’ere to-day, Miss.”
“All right, cook, but thank you for thinking of lending him all the
same,” said Ess. “Where’s the other man—the one I haven’t seen except
in the distance—Steve Knight, wasn’t it?” asked Ess as the men mounted,
and Scottie placed his foot in the stirrup.
“They tell me he finished his breakfast first and went straight off,”
said Scottie. “I don’t know what his hurry was, but he’s the sort o’
chap that does unexpected things.”
He swung himself into the saddle and gathered the reins up. “We’ll be
back soon after sundown,” he said, “Ye’ll see him then most like.”
The others found Steve waiting for them at the dingo fence of the back
paddock. He was sitting smoking, and as the others came near he opened
the gate to let them through, closed it behind them, and joined them
without any remark.
He rode beside Aleck Gault as they jogged along across the dusty flat,
and when he pulled up to light his pipe again Gault pulled up and
waited for him.
“What made you swallow breakfast and clear in such a hurry this
morning, Steve?” said Gault as they moved on again.
Steve laughed shortly. “I hardly know,” he said; “or rather, it was
because I didn’t want to meet that girl this morning, and I guessed she
might come out. I hardly know why I didn’t want to see her though.”
“She was out,” said Aleck Gault, “to wish us good morning. But you
can’t well avoid her always, Steve, and anyhow, why should you?”
“It was those cursed fools talking last night that upset me,”
said Steve, “although I’m a fool to let it. I know I’m no
stained-glass-window saint, Aleck, but I don’t quite see that
everyone should jump to the conclusion that I can’t behave as
anything but a blackguard to a girl. What sort of girl is she
really?”
“You’ll like her, Steve,” said Aleck Gault, quietly.
“I hope not,” said Steve, shortly. “For her sake and my own. If I liked
her I’d want to be seeing her and talking to her, and I’d do it as
often as I wanted, in spite of that mammying lot. And they’d be hanging
about and consulting with each other as to whether I was ‘playing
straight’ or ‘fooling her,’ as they put it. Pah!” he finished with an
expression of disgust.
“For two pins,” he went on presently, “I’d go right in and make myself
infernally agreeable and worry the lives out of the lot of them.”
“That might be all right for you,” said Gault.
“But it wouldn’t do the girl much good to be having her name bandied
round as one of your girls.”
“There you are,” said Steve, with an angry oath. “You’re as bad as the
rest. I mustn’t speak to a girl, because it’ll smirch her reputation.
To blazes with her. I don’t care if I never see her.” He put his hand
on Gault’s knee as they rode side by side. “Look here, old mate, you
know me, and you know if she’s a pretty girl and a smart girl, and all
that, I’m bound to get making the pace with her and making violent love
to her, just for the fun of it. I can’t help it somehow. So if this
thing is going to be the dash nuisance it threatens to be, I’m going to
get my cheque and clear out. Would you come with me again?”
“I’ll come with you, Steve,” said Gault. “But wait till you’ve seen her
before you say anything.”
Steve threw back his head and laughed out. “Sounds funny, doesn’t it,
Aleck, lad? Fly-by-Night running away from a girl he’s never seen.
There’s some men I know—and girls too, for that matter—would think that
something of a joke. But things might be worse, old owl. Here’s a
bright summer morn, as the songs say, we’ve a good meal inside us, good
horses below us, and a long day before us. So blow the girl, old son.
Though I’m getting most fierce curious about her, and that’s a bad
sign, isn’t it?”
Which was something very near what Ess had said to her uncle about him,
if you remember.
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