FullReads

‘Don’t you mind,’ said Miss Standish, ‘she’ll be all right presently,’ and she handed us the ‘Illustrated Sydney Journal’. This was a great relief,–we bumped our heads over the pictures.

Mrs Baker made Andy go on again, and he told her how the Boss broke down near Mulgatown. Mrs Baker was opposite him and Miss Standish opposite me. Both of them kept their eyes on Andy’s face: he sat, with his hair straight up like a brush as usual, and kept his big innocent grey eyes fixed on Mrs Baker’s face all the time he was speaking. I watched Miss Standish. I thought she was the prettiest girl I’d ever seen; it was a bad case of love at first sight, but she was far and away above me, and the case was hopeless. I began to feel pretty miserable, and to think back into the past: I just heard Andy droning away by my side.

‘So we fixed him up comfortable in the waggonette with the blankets and coats and things,’ Andy was saying, ‘and the squatter started into Mulgatown…. It was about thirty miles, Jack, wasn’t it?’ he asked, turning suddenly to me. He always looked so innocent that there were times when I itched to knock him down.

‘More like thirty-five,’ I said, waking up.

Miss Standish fixed her eyes on me, and I had another look at Wellington and Blucher.

‘They were all very good and kind to the Boss,’ said Andy. ‘They thought a lot of him up there. Everybody was fond of him.’

‘I know it,’ said Mrs Baker. ‘Nobody could help liking him. He was one of the kindest men that ever lived.’

‘Tanner, the publican, couldn’t have been kinder to his own brother,’ said Andy. ‘The local doctor was a decent chap, but he was only a young fellow, and Tanner hadn’t much faith in him, so he wired for an older doctor at Mackintyre, and he even sent out fresh horses to meet the doctor’s buggy. Everything was done that could be done, I assure you, Mrs Baker.’

‘I believe it,’ said Mrs Baker. ‘And you don’t know how it relieves me to hear it. And did the publican do all this at his own expense?’

‘He wouldn’t take a penny, Mrs Baker.’

‘He must have been a good true man. I wish I could thank him.’

‘Oh, Ned thanked him for you,’ said Andy, though without meaning more than he said.

‘I wouldn’t have fancied that Ned would have thought of that,’ said Mrs Baker. ‘When I first heard of my poor husband’s death, I thought perhaps he’d been drinking again–that worried me a bit.’

‘He never touched a drop after he left Solong, I can assure you, Mrs Baker,’ said Andy quickly.

Now I noticed that Miss Standish seemed surprised or puzzled, once or twice, while Andy was speaking, and leaned forward to listen to him; then she leaned back in her chair and clasped her hands behind her head and looked at him, with half-shut eyes, in a way I didn’t like. Once or twice she looked at me as if she was going to ask me a question, but I always looked away quick and stared at Blucher and Wellington, or into the empty fireplace, till I felt that her eyes were off me. Then she asked Andy a question or two, in all innocence I believe now, but it scared him, and at last he watched his chance and winked at her sharp. Then she gave a little gasp and shut up like a steel trap.

The sick child in the bedroom coughed and cried again. Mrs Baker went to it. We three sat like a deaf-and-dumb institution, Andy and I staring all over the place: presently Miss Standish excused herself, and went out of the room after her sister. She looked hard at Andy as she left the room, but he kept his eyes away.

‘Brace up now, Jack,’ whispered Andy to me, ‘the worst is coming.’