PETS AND PLAYTHINGS
After her father, Norah’s chief companions were her pets.
These were a numerous and varied band, and required no small amount of
attention. Bobs, of course, came first—no other animal could possibly
approach him in favour. But after Bobs came a long procession,
beginning with Tait, the collie, and ending with the last brood of
fluffy Orpington chicks, or perhaps the newest thing in disabled birds,
picked up, fluttering and helpless, in the yard or orchard. There was
room in Norah’s heart for them all.
Tait was a beauty—a rough-haired collie, with a splendid head, and big,
faithful brown eyes, that spoke more eloquently than many persons’
tongues. He was, like most of the breed, ready to be friends with any
one; but his little mistress was dearest of all, and he worshipped her
with abject devotion. Norah never went anywhere without him; Tait saw
to that. He seemed always on the watch for her coming, and she was
never more than a few yards from the house before the big dog was
silently brushing the grass by her side. His greatest joy was to follow
her on long rides into the bush, putting up an occasional hare and
scurrying after it in the futile way of collies, barking at the
swallows overhead, and keeping pace with Bobs’ long, easy canter.
Puck used to come on these excursions too. He was the only being for
whom it was suspected that Tait felt a mild dislike—an impudent Irish
terrier, full of fun and mischief, yet with a somewhat unfriendly and
suspicious temperament that made him, perhaps, a better guardian for
Norah than the benevolently disposed Tait. Puck had a nasty, inquiring
mind—an unpleasant way of sniffing round the legs of tramps that
generally induced those gentry to find the top rail of a fence a more
calm and more desirable spot than the level of the ground. Indian
hawkers feared him and hated him in equal measure. He could bite, and
occasionally did bite, his victims being always selected with judgment
and discretion, generally vagrants emboldened to insolence by seeing no
men about the kitchen when all hands were out mustering or busy on the
run. When Puck bit, it was with no uncertain tooth. He was suspected of
a desire to taste the blood of every one who went near Norah, though
his cannibalistic propensities were curbed by stern discipline.
Only once had he had anything like a free hand—or a free tooth.
Norah was out riding, a good way from the homestead, when a
particularly unpleasant-looking fellow accosted her, and asked for
money. Norah stared.
“I haven’t got any,” she said. “Anyhow, father doesn’t let us give away
money to travellers—only tucker.”
“Oh, doesn’t he?” the fellow said unpleasantly. “Well, I want money,
not grub.” He laid a compelling hand on Bobs’ bridle as Norah tried to
pass him. “Come,” he said—“that bracelet’ll do!”
It was a pretty little gold watch set in a leather bangle—father’s
birthday present, only a few weeks old. Norah simply laughed—she
scarcely comprehended so amazing a thing as that this man should really
intend to rob her.
“Get out of my way,” she said—“you can’t have that!”
“Can’t I!” He caught her wrist. “Give it quietly now, or I’ll—”
The sentence was not completed. A yellow streak hurled itself though
the air, as Puck, who had been investigating a tussock for lizards,
awoke to the situation. Something like a vice gripped the swagman by
the leg, and he dropped Norah’s wrist and bridle and roared like any
bull. The “something” hung on fiercely, silently, and the victim hopped
and raved and begged for mercy.
Norah had ridden a little way on. She called softly to Puck.
“Here, boy!”
Puck did not relinquish his grip. He looked pleadingly at his little
mistress across the swagman’s trouser-leg. Norah struck her saddle
sharply with her whip.
“Here, sir!—drop it!”
Puck dropped it reluctantly, and came across to Bobs, his head hanging.
The swagman sat down on the ground and nursed his leg.
“That served you right,” Norah said, with judicial severity. “You
hadn’t any business to grab my watch. Now, if you’ll go up to the house
they’ll give you some tucker and a rag for your leg!”
She rode off, whistling to Puck. The swagman gaped and muttered various
remarks. He did not call at the house.
Norah was supposed to manage the fowls, but her management was almost
entirely ornamental, and it is to be feared that the poultry yard would
have fared but poorly had it depended upon her alone. All the fowls
were hers. She said so, and no one contradicted her. Still, whenever
one was wanted for the table, it was ruthlessly slain. And it was black
Billy who fed them night and morning, and Mrs. Brown who gathered the
eggs, and saw that the houses were safely shut against the foxes every
evening. Norah’s chief part in the management lay in looking after the
setting hens. At first she firmly checked the broody instincts by
shutting them callously under boxes despite pecks and loud protests.
Later, when their mood refused to change, she loved to prepare them
soft nests in boxes, and to imprison them there until they took kindly
to their seclusion. Then it was hard work to wait three weeks until the
first fluffy heads peeped out from the angry mother’s wing, after which
Norah was a blissfully adoring caretaker until the downy balls began to
get ragged, as the first wing and tail feathers showed. Then the chicks
became uninteresting, and were handed over to Black Billy.
Besides her own pets there were Jim’s.
“Mind, they’re in your care,” Jim had said sternly, on the evening
before his departure for school. They were making a tour of the
place—Jim outwardly very cheerful and unconcerned; Norah plunged in
woe. She did not attempt to conceal it. She had taken Jim’s arm, and it
was sufficient proof of his state of mind that he did not shake it off.
Indeed, the indications were that he was glad of the loving little hand
tucked into the bend of his arm.
“Yes, Jim; I’ll look after them.”
“I don’t want you to bother feeding them yourself,” Jim said
magnanimously; “that ’ud be rather too much of a contract for a kid,
wouldn’t it? Only keep an eye on ’em, and round up Billy if he doesn’t
do his work. He’s a terror if he shirks, and unless you watch him like
a cat he’ll never change the water in the tins every morning. Lots of
times I’ve had to do it myself!”
“I’d do it myself sooner’n let them go without, Jim, dear,” said the
small voice, with a suspicion of a choke.
“Don’t you do it,” said Jim; “slang Billy. What’s he here for, I’d like
to know! I only want you to go round ’em every day, and see that
they’re all right.”
So daily Norah used to make her pilgrimage round Jim’s pets. There were
the guinea pigs—a rapidly increasing band, in an enclosure specially
built for them by Jim—a light frame, netted carefully everywhere, and
so constructed that it could be moved from place to place, giving them
a fresh grass run continually. Then there were two young wallabies and
a little brush kangaroo, which lived in a little paddock all their own,
and were as tame as kittens. Norah loved this trio especially, and
always had a game with them on her daily visit. There was a shy
gentleman which Norah called a turloise, because she never could
remember if he were a turtle or a tortoise. He lived in a small
enclosure, with a tiny water hole, and his disposition was extremely
retiring. In private Norah did not feel drawn to this member of her
charge, but she paid him double attention, from an inward feeling of
guilt, and because Jim set a high value upon him.
“He’s such a wise old chap,” Jim would say; “nobody knows what he’s
thinking of!”
In her heart of hearts Norah did not believe that mattered very much.
But when the stables had been visited and Bobs and Sirdar (Jim’s
neglected pony) interviewed; when Tait and Puck had had their breakfast
bones; when wallabies and kangaroo had been inspected (with a critical
eye to their water tins), and the turtle had impassively received a
praiseworthy attempt to draw him out; when the chicks had all been fed,
and the guinea pigs (unlike the leopard) had changed their spot for the
day—there still remained the birds.
The birds were a colony in themselves. There was a big aviary, large
enough for little trees and big shrubs to grow in, where a happy family
lived whose members included several kinds of honey-eaters, Queensland
finches, blackbirds and a dozen other tiny shy things which flitted
quickly from bush to bush all day. They knew Norah and, when she
entered their home, would flutter down and perch on her head and
shoulders, and look inquisitively for the flowers she always brought
them. Sometimes Norah would wear some artificial flowers, by way of a
joke. It was funny to see the little honey-eaters thrusting in their
long beaks again and again in search of the sweet drops they had
learned to expect in flowers, and funnier still to watch the air of
disgust with which they would give up the attempt.
There were doves everywhere—not in cages, for they never tried to
escape. Their soft “coo” murmured drowsily all around. There were
pigeons, too, in a most elaborate pigeon cote—another effort of Jim’s
carpentering skill. These were as tame as the smaller birds, and on
Norah’s appearance would swoop down upon her in a cloud. They had done
so once when she was mounted on Bobs, to the pony’s very great alarm
and disgust. He took to his heels promptly. “I don’t think he stopped
for two miles!” Norah said. Since then, however, Bobs had grown used to
the pigeons fluttering and circling round him. It was a pretty sight to
watch them all together, child and pony half hidden beneath their load
of birds.
The canaries had a cage to themselves—a very smart one, with every
device for making canary life endurable in captivity. Certainly Norah’s
birds seemed happy enough, and the sweet songs of the canaries were
delightful. I think they were Norah’s favourites amongst her feathered
flock.
Finally there were two talkative members—Fudge the parrot, and old
Caesar, a very fine white cockatoo. Fudge had been caught young, and
his education had been of a liberal order. An apt pupil, he had picked
up various items of knowledge, and had blended them into a whole that
was scarcely harmonious. Bits of slang learned from Jim and the
stockmen were mingled with fragments of hymns warbled by Mrs. Brown and
sharp curt orders delivered to dogs. A French swag-man, who had hurt
his foot and been obliged to camp for a few days at the homestead,
supplied Fudge with several Parisian remarks that were very effective.
Every member of the household had tried to teach him to whistle some
special tune. Unfortunately, the lessons had been delivered at the same
time, and the result was the most amazing jumble of melody, which Fudge
delivered with an air of deepest satisfaction. As Jim said, “You never
know if he’s whistling ‘God Save the King,’ ‘Pop Goes the Weasel,’ or
‘The Wearin’ o’ the Green,’ but it doesn’t make any difference to
Fudge’s enjoyment!”
Caesar was a giant among cockatoos, and had a full sense of his own
importance.
He had been shot when very young, some stray pellets having found their
way into his wing. Norah had found him fluttering helplessly along the
ground, and had picked him up, sustaining a severe peck in doing so. It
was, however, the first and last peck he ever gave Norah. From that
moment he seemed to recognize her as a friend, and to adopt her as an
intimate—marks of esteem he accorded to very few others. Norah had
handed him to Jim on arriving at the house, a change which the bird
resented by a savage attack on Jim’s thumb. Jim was no hero—at the age
of eleven, he dropped the cockatoo like a hot coal. “Great Caesar!” he
exclaimed, sucking his thumb, and Caesar he was christened in that
moment.
After his recovery, which was a long and tedious process, Caesar showed
no inclination to leave the homestead. He used to strut about the back
yard, and frequent the kitchen door, very much after the fashion of a
house-dog. He was, indeed, as valuable as a watch-dog, for the
appearance of any stranger was the signal for a volley of shrieks and
chatter, sufficient to alarm any household. However, Caesar’s liberty
had to be restricted, for he became somewhat of a menace to all he did
not choose to care for, and his attacks on the ankles were no joking
matter.
To the dogs he was a constant terror. He hated all alike, and would “go
for” big Tait as readily as for cheerful little Puck, and not a dog on
the place would face him. So at last a stand and a chain were bought
for Caesar, and on his perch he lived in solitary splendour, while his
enemies took good care to keep beyond his reach. Norah he always loved,
and those whom he had managed to bite—their number was large—used to
experience thrills on seeing the little girl hold him close to her face
while he rubbed his beak up and down her cheek. He tolerated black
Billy, who fed him, and was respectful to Mr. Linton; but he worshipped
Mrs. Brown, the cook, and her appearance at the kitchen door, which he
could see from his stand, caused an instant outbreak of cheers and
chatter, varied by touching appeals to “scratch Cocky.” His chief foe
was Mrs. Brown’s big yellow cat, who not only dared to share the adored
one’s affections, but was openly aggressive at times, and loved to
steal the cockatoo’s food.
Caesar, on his perch, apparently wrapped in dreamless slumber, would in
reality be watching the stealthy movements of Tim, the cat, who would
come scouting through the grass towards the tin of food. Just out of
reach, Tim would lie down and feign sleep as deep as Caesar’s, though
every muscle in his body was tense with readiness for the sudden
spring. So they would remain, perhaps many minutes. Tim’s patience
never gave out. Sometimes Caesar’s would, and he would open his eyes
and flap round on his perch, shouting much bad bird language at the
retreating Tim. But more often both remained motionless until the cat
sprang suddenly at the food tin. More often than not he was too quick
for Caesar, and would drag the tin beyond reach of the chain before the
bird could defend it, in which case the wrath of the defeated was awful
to behold. But sometimes Caesar managed to anticipate the leap, and Tim
did not readily forget those distressful moments when the cockatoo had
him by the fur with beak and claw. He would escape, showing several
patches where his coat had been torn, and remained in a state of
dejection for two or three days, during which battles were
discontinued. It took Caesar almost as long to recover from the wild
state of triumph into which his rare victories threw him.