“So you think he'll do, Jim?”

“Yes, I certainly do,” Jim answered. He was sitting with his father in the smoking-room at Billabong, his long legs outstretched before the fire, and his great form half-concealed in the depths of an enormous leather armchair. “Of course he'll want guidance; you couldn't expect him to know much about stock yet, though he's certainly picked up a good bit.”

“Yes—so it seems. His great point is his quick eye and his keenness. I haven't found him forget much.”

“No, and he's awfully ashamed if he does. He's a tiger for work, and very quick at picking up the way to tackle any new job. That was one of the things that pleased old Joe about him. I fancy the old chap had suffered at the hands of other new-chums who reckoned they could teach him how to do his work. 'Captin ain't orffered me not one bit of advice,' he told me with relief.”

Mr. Linton laughed.

“Yes, I've had them here like that,” he said. “Full of sublime enthusiasm for reforming Australia and all her ways. I don't say we don't need it, either, but not from a new-chum in his first five minutes.”

“Not much,” agreed Jim. “Well, there's nothing of that sort about old Bob. He just hoes in at anything that's going, and doesn't talk about it. Joe says he must have been reared sensible. He's all right, dad. I've had a lot of men through my hands in the last few years, and you learn to size 'em up pretty quickly.”

David Linton nodded, looking at his big son. Sometimes he had a pang of regret for Jim's lost boyhood, swallowed up in war. Then, when he was privileged to behold him rough-and-tumbling with Wally, singing idiotic choruses with Norah and Tommy, or making himself into what little Babs Archdale ecstatically called “my bucking donkey,” it was borne in upon him that there still was plenty of the boy left in Jim—and that there always would be. Nevertheless, he had great confidence in his judgment; and in this instance it happened to coincide with his own.

The door opened, and Bob Rainham came in, hesitating as he caught sight of the father and son.

“Come in, Bob,” Mr. Linton said. “I was just wishing you would turn up. We've been talking about you. I understand you've made up your mind to get a place of your own.”

“If you don't think I'm insane to tackle it, sir,” Bob answered. “Of course, I know I'm awfully ignorant. But I thought I could probably get hold of a good man, and if I can find a place anywhere in this district, Jim says he'll keep an eye on me. Between the two, I oughtn't to make very hopeless mistakes. And I might as well have my money invested.”

“Quite so. I think you're wise,” the squatter answered. “As it happens, I was in Cunjee yesterday, talking to an agent, and I heard of a little place that might suit you very well—just about the price you ought to pay, and the land's not bad. There's a decent cottage on it—you and Tommy could be very comfortable there. It's four miles from here, so we should feel you hadn't got away from us.”

“That sounds jolly,” said Bob. “I'd be awfully glad to think Tommy was so near to Norah. Is it sheep country, Mr. Linton?”

“So it's to be sheep, is it? Well, I'd advise you to put some young cattle on to some scrub country at the back, but you could certainly run sheep on the cleared paddocks,” Mr. Linton answered. “We could drive over and look at it to-morrow, if you like. The terms are easy; you'd have money over to stock it, or nearly so. And there's plenty to be done in improving the place, if you should buy it; you could easily add a good deal to its value.”

“That's what I'd like,” Bob answered eagerly. “It doesn't take a whole lot of brains to dig drains and cut scrub. I could be doing that while the sheep turn into wool and mutton!”

“So you could; though there's a bit more to be done to sheep than just to watch them turn,” said the squatter, with a twinkle. “I fancy Tommy will be pleased if you get this place.”

“Tommy's mad keen to start,” Bob said. “She says Norah has taught her more than she ever dreamed that her head could contain, and she wants to work it all off on me. I think she has visions of making me kill a bullock, so that she can demonstrate all she knows about corning and spicing and salting beef. I mentioned it would take two of us quite a little while to work through a whole bullock, but she evidently didn't think much of the objection.”

“I'll see you get none fat enough to kill,” grinned Jim. “Norah says Tommy's a great pupil, dad.”

“Oh, they have worked as if they were possessed,” Mr. Linton answered. “I never saw such painfully busy people. But Norah tells me she has had very little to teach Tommy—in fact, I think the teaching has been mutual, and they've simply swapped French and Australian dodges. At all events they and Brownie have lived in each other's pockets, and they all seem very content.”

“Are you all talking business, or may we come in?” demanded a cheery voice; and Norah peeped in, with Tommy dimly visible in the background.

“Come in—'twas yourselves we were talking about,” Jim said, rising slowly from the armchair; a process which, Norah was accustomed to say, he accomplished yard by yard. “Sit here, Tommy, and let's hear your views on Australia!”

Tommy shook her head.

“Too soon to ask me—and I've only seen Billabong,” she said, laughing. “Wait until I've kept house for Bob for a while, and faced life without nice soft buffers like Norah and Mrs. Brown!”

“I'm not a nice soft buffer!” said Norah indignantly. “Do I look like one, Jimmy?”

“Brownie certainly fits the description better,” Jim said. “Never mind, old girl, you'll probably grow into one. We'd be awfully proud of you if you got really fat, Norah.”

“Then I hope you'll never have cause for pride,” retorted his sister. “I couldn't ride Bosun if I did, and that would be too awful to think about. Oh, and Tommy's making a great stock-rider, Bob. She declared she could never ride astride, but she's perceiving the error of her ways.”

“I thought I could never stick on without the moral support of the pommels,” said Tommy. “When you arrange yourself among pommels and horns and things on a side-saddle, there seems no real reason why you should ever come off, except of your own free will. But a man's saddle doesn't offer any encouragement to a poor scared new-chum. I pictured myself sliding off it whenever the horse side-stepped. However, somehow, it doesn't happen.”

“And what happens when your steed slews around after a bullock?” asked Jim.

“Indeed, I hardly know,” said Tommy modestly. “I generally shut my eyes, and hold on to the front of the saddle. After a while I open them, and find, to my astonishment, that nothing has occurred, and I'm still there. Then we sail along after Norah, and I hold up my head proudly and look as if that were really the way I have always handled cattle. And she isn't a bit taken in. It's dreadfully difficult to impress Norah.”

Every one laughed, and looked at the new-chum affectionately. This small English girl, so ready to laugh at her own mistakes, had twined herself wonderfully about their hearts. Even Brownie, jealous to the point of prickliness for her adored Norah, and at first inclined to turn up a scornful nose at “Miss Tommy's” pink and white daintiness, had been forced to admit that she “could 'andle things like a workman.” And that was high praise from Brownie.

The telephone bell whirred in the hall, and Jim went out to answer it. In a few minutes they heard his voice.

“Norah, just come here a moment.” He came back presently, leaving Norah at the telephone.

“It's Dr. Anderson,” he said. “They're in trouble in Cunjee—there's a pretty bad outbreak of influenza. Some returned men came up with it, and now it's spreading everywhere, Anderson says. Mrs. Anderson has been nursing in the hospital, but now two of her own kiddies have got it, so she has had to go home, and they're awfully shorthanded. Nurses seem to be scarce everywhere; they could only get one from Melbourne, and she's badly overworked.”

“Norah will go, I suppose,” said David Linton, with a half-sigh—the sigh of a man who has looked forward to peace and security, and finds it again slipping from his grasp.

“Oh, yes, I'm sure she will. They have a certain number of volunteers, not nearly enough.”

“I'm going,” said Tommy, and David Linton nodded at her kindly.

“What about you and me, Jim?” Bob asked.

“Well, Anderson says they have a number of men volunteers. Such a lot of returned fellows about with nothing to do yet. I told him to count on us for anything he wanted, but the need seems chiefly for women.”

“Must they go to-night? It's pretty late,” said Mr. Linton.

“No, not to-night,” Norah answered, entering. “It would be eight o'clock before I could get in, and Dr. Anderson says I'm to get a good sleep and come in early in the morning. Tommy, darling, will you mind if I leave you for a few days?”

“Horribly,” said Tommy drily. “It would be unpardonably rude for a hostess. So I 'm coming too.”

Norah laughed down at her.

“Somehow, I thought you would,” she said. “Well, Jimmy, you'll take us in after breakfast, won't you? We'll have it early.” She perched on the arm of her father's chair, letting her fingers rest for a moment on his close-cropped grey hair. “And I've never asked you if I could go, daddy.”

“No,” said David Linton; “you haven't.” He put his arm gently round her.

“But then I knew that you'd kick me out if I didn't. So that simplifies matters. You'll take care of yourself while I'm away, won't you, dad? No wild rides by yourself into the ranges, or anything of that sort?”

“Certainly not,” said her father. “I'll sit quietly at home, and let Brownie give me nourishment at short intervals.”

“Nothing she'd like better.” Norah laughed. “I don't believe Brownie will really feel that she owns us again until one of us is considerate enough to fall ill and give her a real chance of nursing and feeding us. Then the only thing to do is to forget you ever had a will of your own, and just to open your mouth and be fed like a young magpie, and Brownie's perfectly happy.”

“She won't be happy when she hears of this new plan,” Mr. Linton said. “Poor old soul, I'm sorry she should have any worry, when she has just got you home.”

“Yes; I'm sorry,” Norah answered. “But it can't be helped. I'll go and talk to her now, and arrange things—early breakfast among them.”

“You might make it a shade earlier than you meant to, while you're at it, Nor,” Jim observed. “Then we could turn off the track as we go in to-morrow to let Tommy have a look at the place that has been offered Bob—you know that place of Henderson's, off the main road. Bob can go over the land with us when we're coming back. But once you and Tommy get swallowed up in Cunjee, there's no knowing when we could get you out; and Tommy ought to inspect the house.”

“Oh, I'd love to,” said Tommy enthusiastically. “No mere man can be trusted to buy a house.”

“Don't go to look at it with any large ideas of up-to-date improvements floating in your mind,” Jim warned her. “It's sure to be pretty primitive, and probably there isn't even a bathroom.”

“Don't you worry, Tommy; we'll build you one,” said Mr. Linton.

“I'm not going to worry about anything; there are always washtubs,” spoke Tommy cheerfully—“and thank you, all the same, Mr. Linton. I didn't expect much when I came out to Australia, but I'm getting so much more than I expected that I'm in a state of bewilderment all the time. Someday I feel that I shall come down with a bump, and I shall be thankful if it's only over a bathroom.”

“Distressing picture of the valiant pioneer looking for discomforts and failing to find them,” said Bob, laughing. “It's so difficult to feel really pioneerish in a place where there are taps, and electric light, and motors, and no one appears to wear a red shirt, like every Australian bushman I ever saw on the stage.”

“Did you bring any out with you?” demanded Norah wickedly.

“I didn't. But honest, it was only because I had so many khaki ones, and I thought they'd do. Otherwise I'd certainly have thought that scarlet shirts were part of the ordinary outfit for the Colonies. And if you believed all the things they tell you in outfitting shops, you would bring a gorgeous assortment. We'd have even arrived here with tinware. It was lucky I knew some Australians—they delicately hinted that you really had a shop or two in the principal cities.”

“I've often marvelled at the queer collection people seem to bring out,” said Mr. Linton. “It's not so bad of late years, but ten years ago a jackeroo would arrive here with about a lorry-load of stuff, most of which he could have bought much more cheaply in Melbourne or Sydney—and he'd certainly never use the greater part of it. Apparently a London shop will sell you the same kind of outfit for a Melbourne suburb as if you were going into the wilds of West Africa. They haven't any conscience.”

“They just never learn geography,” said Norah. “And 'the Colonies' to them mean exactly the same thing, no matter in what continent the colony may be. If they can sell pioneers tinware to take out to Melbourne, so much the better for them. Well, I must see Brownie, or there may not be early breakfast for pioneers or any one else.”

Brownie rose to the occasion—there had never been any known occasion to which Brownie did not rise—and the hospital at Cunjee was still grappling with early morning problems next day when the Billabong motor pulled up at the door, after a flying visit to the new home—which Tommy, regarding with the large eye of faith, had declared to be full of boundless possibilities. Dr. Anderson came out to meet the new-comers, Norah and Tommy, neat and workmanlike; Jim, bearing their luggage; and Mr. Linton and Bob sharing a large humper, into which Brownie had packed everything eatable she could find—and Brownie's capacity for finding things eatable at short notice was one of her most astonishing traits. The little doctor, harassed as he was, greeted them with a twinkle.

“You Lintons generally appear bearing your sheaves with you,” he said. “Well, you're very welcome. How many of you do I keep?”

“Tommy and Norah, for certain,” said Mr. Linton. “And as many more of us as you please. Want us all, doctor?”

“Well, I really don't; there are a good many men volunteers. But if I might commandeer the car and a driver for a few hours, I should be glad,” the doctor went on. “There are some cases to be brought in from Mardale and Clinthorpe. I heard of them only this morning, on the telephone, and I was wondering how to get them in.”

“We're at your disposal, and you've only to telephone for us or the car whenever you want it,” said Mr. Linton. “How are things this morning?”

“Oh—bad enough. We have several very troublesome cases; people simply won't give in soon enough. My youngsters are very ill, but I'm not really worried about them as long as my wife keeps up. Our biggest trouble is that our cook here went down this morning. She told me she couldn't sleep a wink all night, and when she woke up in the morning her tongue was sticking to the roof of her head!—and certainly she has temperature enough for any strange symptoms. But we feel rather as if the bottom had dropped out of the universe, for none of our volunteers are equal to the job.”

“I can cook,” said Norah and Tommy together.

“Can you?” said the little doctor, staring at them as though the heavens had opened and rained down angels on his head. “Are you sure? You don't look like it!”

“I can guarantee them,” said Mr. Linton, laughing. “Only you'll have to watch Norah, for the spell of the war is heavy upon her, and she'll boil your soup bones thirteen times, and feed you all on haricot beans and lentils if nobody checks her!”

“Dad, you haven't any manners,” said Norah severely. “May I cook, Doctor?”

“You can share the job,” said Dr. Anderson thankfully. “I really think it's more than enough for one of you. This place is getting pretty full. Of course, I've wired to town for a cook, but goodness knows if we'll get one; it's unlikely. Come on, now, and I'll introduce you to Sister.”

Sister proved to be a tall, capable, quiet woman, with war decorations. She greeted the volunteers thankfully, and unhesitatingly pronounced their place to be cooks, rather than nurses.

“I can get girls who will do well enough in the wards,” she said, “where I can direct them. But I can't be in the kitchen too. If you two can carry on without supervision it will be a godsend.”

So the kitchen swallowed up Norah and Tommy, and there they worked during the weeks that followed, while the influenza scourge raged round Victoria. The little cottage-hospital became full almost to bursting-point. Even the rooms for the staff had to be appropriated, and nurses and helpers slept in a cottage close by. Luckily for the cooks, Cunjee now boasted a gas supply and its citizens supplied them with gas-stoves, as Norah said, “in clutches,” so that they worked in comfort. It was hard work, with little time to spare, but the girls had learned method, and they soon mapped out a routine that prevented their ever being rushed or flurried. And they blessed the cold weather that saved constant watching lest supplies should go bad.

From Billabong came daily hampers that greatly relieved their labours. It was a matter of some amazement to the Lintons that Brownie did not volunteer for the hospital, and indeed, it had been the first thought of Brownie herself. But she repressed it firmly, though by no means feeling comfortable. To Murty she confided her views, and was relieved by his approval.

“I know I did ought to go,” she said, almost tearfully. “There's those two blessed lambs in the kitchen, doing wot I'd ought to be doing; and I know Mrs. Archdale 'ud come up an' run things 'ere for me. But wot 'ud 'appen if I did go, I ask you, Murty? Simply they'd take the two blessed lambs out of the kitchen an' put 'em to nursing in the wards, an' next thing you knew they'd both be down with the beastly flu' themselves. They're safer among the pots and pans, Murty. But when the master looks at me I don't feel comferable.”

“Yerra, let him look,” said Murty stoutly. “'Tis the great head ye have on ye; I'd never have thought of it. Don't go worryin', now. Are ye not sendin' them in the heighth of good livin' every day?”

“That's the least I can do,” said Brownie, brightening a little. “Only I'd like to think Miss Norah and Miss Tommy got some of it, and not just them patients, gethered up from goodness knows where.”

“Yerra, Miss Norah wouldn't want to know their addresses before she'd feed 'em,” said the bewildered Murty. But there came a suspicious smell from the kitchen, as of something burning, and Mrs. Brown fled with a swiftness that was surprising, considering her circumference.

Jim lived a moving existence in those days, flying between Billabong and Cunjee in the car, bringing supplies, always on hand for a job if wanted, and insisting that on their daily “time off” Norah and Tommy should come out for a spin into the country. Sometimes they managed to take Sister, too, or some of the other helpers. The car never went out with any empty seats. Presently they were recovering patients to be given fresh air or taken home; white-faced mothers, longing to be back to the house and children left in the care of “dad,” and whatever kindly neighbours might drop in; or “dads” themselves, much bewildered at the amazing illness that had left them feeling as if neither their legs nor their heads belonged to them. Occasionally, after dropping one of these convalescents, Jim would find jobs waiting to his hand about the bush homestead; cows to milk, a fence to be mended, wood waiting to be chopped. He used to do them vigorously, while in the house “mum” fussed over her restored man and tried to keep him from going out to run the farm immediately. There were generally two or three astonished children to show him where tools were kept—milk buckets, being always up-ended on a fence post, needed no introduction, and the pump, for a sluice afterwards, was not hard of discovery. The big Rolls-Royce used to purr gently away through the bush paddock afterwards, often with a bewildered “mum” looking amazedly at the tall young man who drove it.

Meanwhile Bob Rainham, left alone with his host, set about the business of his new farm in earnest, since there seemed nothing else for him to do; and David Linton, possibly glad of the occupation, threw himself into the work. The farm was bought on terms that seemed to Bob very easy—he did not know that Mr. Linton stood security for his payments—and then began the task of stocking it and of planning just what was best to do with each paddock. The house, left bare and clean by the last owners, was in good repair, save that the dingy white painting of the exterior, and the varnished pine walls and ceilings within were depressing and shabby. Mr. Linton decided that his house-warming present to Tommy should be a coat of paint for her mansion, and soon it looked new—dark red, with a gleaming white roof, while the rooms were painted in pretty fresh colours. “Won't Tommy get a shock!” chuckled Bob gleefully. The dinginess of the house had not escaped him on the morning that they had made their first inspection, but Tommy, who loved freshness and colours, had made no sign. Had you probed the matter, Tommy would probably have remarked, with some annoyance, that it was not her job to begin by grumbling.

Wally came hurtling back from Queensland at the first hint of the influenza outbreak, and was considerably depressed at finding his twin souls, Jim and Norah, engaged in jobs that for once he could not share. Therefore he, too, fell back on the new farm, and found Bob knitting his brow one evening over the question of furniture.

“I don't want to buy much,” he said. “Tommy doesn't, either; we talked it over. We'd rather do with next to nothing, and buy decent stuff by degrees if we get on well. Tommy says she doesn't want footling little gimcracky tables and whatnots and things, nor dressing-tables full of drawers that won't pull out. But I've been looking at the cheap stuff in Cunjee, and, my word, it's nasty! Still, I can't afford good things now, and Tommy wouldn't like it if I tried to get 'em. Tommy's death on the simple life.”

“How are you on tools?” queried Wally.

“Using tools? Pretty fair,” admitted Bob. “I took up carpentering at school; it was always a bit of a hobby of mine. I'm no cabinet-maker, if that's what you mean.”

“You don't need to be,” Wally answered. “Up where I come from—we were pretty far back in Queensland—we hardly ever saw real furniture, the stuff you buy in shops. It was all made out of packing-cases and odd bits of wood. Jolly decent, too; you paint 'em up to match the rooms, or stain 'em dark colours, and the girls put sort of petticoats round some of the things.”

“We began that way,” said David Linton, with a half-sigh. “There was surprisingly little proper furniture in our first house, and we were very comfortable.”

“Couldn't we begin, sir?” asked Wally eagerly. “This wet weather looks like setting in. Bob can't do much on the farm. If we could get out a few odd lengths of timber and some old packing cases from the township—”

“Heavens, you don't need to do that!” exclaimed their host. “The place is full of both; packing-cases have been arriving at Billabong since Jim was a baby, and very few of them have gone away again. There's plenty of timber knocking about, too. We'll go over to the farm if you like, Bob, and plan out measurements.”

“I think it's a splendid idea, thanks, sir,” said Bob slowly. “Only I don't quite see why I should bother you—”

“Oh, don't talk rubbish!” said David Linton, getting up. “I believe I'm glad of the job—the place seems queer without Jim and Norah.”

“My word!” said Wally. “Let's all turn carpenters, and give Tommy the surprise of her life!”

They flung themselves at the work with energy. A visit to the new house, and a careful study of each room, revealed unsuspected possibilities to Bob, whose English brain, “brought up,” as Wally said, “on a stodgy diet of bedroom suites,” had failed to grasp what might be done by handy people with a soul above mere fashion in the matter of furniture. They came back with a notebook bulging with measurements and heads seething with ideas. First, they dealt with the bedrooms, and made for each a set of long shelves and a dressing-table-cupboard—the latter a noble piece of furniture, which was merely a packing-case, smoothed, planed and fitted with shelves; the whole to be completed with a seemly petticoat when Tommy should be able to detach her mind from influenza patients. They made her, too, a little work-table, which was simply a wide, low shelf, at which she could write or sew—planned to catch a good light from her window, so that as she sat near it, she could see the line of willows that marked the creek and the rolling plains that ended in the ranges behind Billabong. Tommy's room was painted in pale green; and when they had stained all these exciting additions dark green, Bob heaved a great sigh, and yearned audibly for the swift recovery of the influenza patients, so that Tommy could return and behold her new possessions.

“We could make washstands,” said Mr. Linton, when they had fitted out the two remaining bedrooms. “But washstands are depressing things, and would take up a good deal of space in these little rooms. You have a good water supply, Bob; why not have built-in basins with taps, and lay on water through the bedrooms?”

Bob whistled.

“My aunt! Is that really possible?”

“Quite, I should say. It wouldn't take elaborate plumbing, and the pipes could discharge into an irrigation drain for your vegetable garden. It would save Tommy ever so much work in carrying water, too. There's a fearsome amount of water carried in and out of bedrooms, and I can't see why pipes shouldn't do the work. It need not cost you much—just a shelf across a corner, with an enamelled basin let in.”

“Save you buying jugs and basins,” said Wally. “Great money-saving idea!”

“Rather,” said Bob. “Is there anyone in Cunjee who can plumb?”

“Oh, yes; there's a handy man who can do the whole thing. We'll get Jim to go and see him tomorrow.”

They left this job to the handy man, who proved equal to all demands, and went on themselves to higher flights. Kitchen and pantry were already fitted with shelves, but they built in a dresser, and found a spare corner, where they erected a linen press warranted to bring tears of joy to the eye of any housewife. Round the little dining-room and sitting-room they ran a very narrow shelf, just wide enough to carry flowers and ornaments, and they made wide, low window seats in each room. Then, becoming bold by success, they turned to cabinet making, and built into the dining-room a sideboard, which was only a glorified edition of the kitchen dresser, but looked amazingly like walnut, aided by a little stain; and for both sitting-rooms made low cupboards, with tops wide enough to serve as little tables. Even the verandah was furnished with wide shelf tables and a cupboard, and with low and broad seats.

“And it's all done by kindness—and packing cases!” said Jim, surveying the result with admiration.

“Indeed, I'm afraid a lot of your father's good timber has gone into it,” said Bob half ruefully. “He was awfully good about it, and the supply of just-what-you-want timber on Billabong seemed inexhaustible.”

“No, you really used very little good stuff,” David Linton said. “It's chiefly packing cases, truly, Jim. But we had plenty of time to plane it up and make it look decent. Bob ran an electric light into the workshop and we worked every night. I believe it's kept us from getting influenza from sheer boredom, with all you people away.”

“They'll soon be home,” Jim said cheerfully. “Influenza's dying out, I believe. No fresh cases for three days, and all the patients are getting better. The little Andersons are up and about. By the way, Dad, couldn't we bring those kiddies out to Billabong for a change?”

“Why, of course,” his father answered. “Tell Mrs. Anderson to come too, or, if she won't leave her husband, Brownie will be delighted at the chance of getting two children to look after again. Are the cooks quite cheery, Jim?”

“As cheery as possible,” Jim answered. “They got off early to-day, and I took them and Sister and the Anderson youngsters out for a run. Did 'em all good. I'm coming home to-night, and they don't want me to-morrow, because they're going to afternoon tea with some one or other. Flighty young things, those cooks! So I can help you carpenters or do any odd jobs.”

“We've lots,” said Wally, who was putting a finishing coat of dark green enamel to a rod destined as a towel rail for Tommy's room. “Simple jobs, suitable for your understanding. Take care, Jimmy, I've a wet paint brush, and you have a good suit on! I want to put shelves from floor to ceiling of the bathroom, because the walls are rough and unlined, and nothing on earth will make it a beautiful room. So Tommy may as well store there all the things she doesn't want anywhere else. And you can make her a medicine cupboard. I shan't have time to look at any of you unskilled labourers, for I'm going to build her a draining-rack for plates and things over the kitchen sink. And I can tell you, that takes brains!”

“Then it's not your job!” said Jim definitely.

“Isn't it? I'll show you, you old Bond Street fashion plate!” Wally stretched his long form, simply attired in a khaki shirt and dungaree trousers, much be-splashed by paint, and looked scornfully at his neatly dressed friend. “You needn't think, because you come here dressed like the lilies of the field and fresh from motoring girls round the country, that—”

“My hat!” said Jim justly incensed. “And I after cleaning out and whitewashing the hospital fowl-houses all the morning! Young Wally, you need some one to sit on your head.” He took off his coat slowly.

“Ten to one,” said Wally hastily, “if we had time to look into the matter we'd find you'd whitewashed the fowls as well! These Army Johnnies are so beastly impractical!” He gathered up his brushes and fled, pursued by his chum. Sounds of warfare came faintly from the distance.

“It's a good thing some of us are sane,” said Mr. Linton laughing. “Nearly finished, Bob?”

He was painting a shelf-table, screwed to the wall within a space at the end of the verandah, which they had completely enclosed with wire mosquito netting. Bob was hanging the door of this open-air room in position, a task requiring judgment, as the floor of the verandah was old and uneven.

“Nearly, sir,” he mumbled, his utterance made difficult by the fact of having several screws in his mouth. He worked vigorously for a few moments, and then stood back to survey his job. “This is going to be a great little room—though it's hard just now to imagine that it will ever be warm enough for it.”

“Just you wait a few months until we get a touch of hot weather, and the mosquitoes come out!” said David Linton. “Then you and Tommy will thankfully entrench yourselves in here at dusk, and listen to the singing hordes dashing themselves against the netting in the effort to get at you!”

“That's the kind of thing they used to tell me on the Nauru,” Bob said laughing; “but I didn't quite expect it from you, Mr. Linton!”

The squatter chuckled.

“Well, indeed, it's no great exaggeration in some years,” he said. “They can be bad enough for anything, though it isn't always they are. But an open-air room is never amiss, for if there aren't mosquitoes a lamp will attract myriads of other insects on a hot night. That looks all right, Bob; you've managed that door very well.”

“First rate!” said Jim and Wally approvingly, returning arm in arm.

“You're great judges!” David Linton rejoined, looking at the pair. “Have you returned to work, may I ask, or are you still imitating the lilies of the field?”

“Jim is; he couldn't help it,” said Wally. “But I have been studying that oak tree out in the front, Mr. Linton. It seems to me that a seat built round it would be very comforting to weary bones on warm evenings—”

Bob gathered up his tools with decision in each movement.

“Wally has come to that state of mind in which he can't look at anything on the place without wanting to build something out of a packing case in it, or round it, or on top of it!” he said. “When the sheep come I'll have to keep you from them, or you'll be building shelves round them!”

“Why, you're nearly as bad yourself!” grinned Wally.

“I know I am, and that's why I've got to stop. I'm going to leave nice little chisels and spokeshaves and smoothing planes, and mend up the pigsty; it needs it badly, and so does the cow-shed. And then I've got to think of ploughing, and cutting that drain across the flat, and generally earning my living.”

“Don't you worry,” said David Linton. “You couldn't have done much outside in this wet weather, and at least your house is half-furnished. And we'll help you through with the other things.”

“You're all just bricks,” said Bob, his fair skin flushing—“only I begin to feel as if I were fed with a spoon. I can't always expect to have my work done for me.”

“You haven't shown much wish to leave it for anyone else,” Jim said drily. “Neither you nor Tommy strikes this district as a loafer. Just stop talking bosh, old man, and think what Tommy's going to say to her mansion.”

“Say?” queried Mr. Linton. “Why, she'll point out to us all the places where she wants shelves!”

“Shelves?” yelled the three as one man.

“Yes, certainly. There was never a woman born who had enough. Don't lose sight of your tools, Bob, for you'll go on putting up shelves as long as you've an inch of wall to put them on. Come along, boys, and we'll go home.”