"Well, I'm a Queenslander," said Wally bluntly, "and we're supposed to know about heat there. And I do think to-day is beastly hot--look at my collar, it's like a concertina! Sydney heat is hot, and Brisbane heat is hotter, but Victorian heat has a hotness all of its own!" Whereat everybody laughed, and the discussion was adjourned for lunch.

It was a merry meal; and if the fare was no better than that of most township hotels, the spirits of the party were too high to trouble about such trifles as tough meat, watery puddings, and weary b.u.t.ter that bore out Wally's remarks about the heat by threatening to float away on a sea of its own oil. Everything was rose colour in Norah's estimation that day. She sat by Jim and beamed across the table at her father and Wally. Even Cecil found himself at times included in the beam, and took it meekly, for the happy face was infectious, while the frank delight of the boys in having her with them again was to a certain extent educational to the outsider. There was no lack of manliness in Jim's strong, handsome face. If he found it worth his while, Cecil reflected, to make such a fuss over a child, it might be possible that she was not altogether a person to be snubbed. So he was unusually affable to his small cousin, and lunch pa.s.sed off very successfully.

Afterwards there was shopping to be done. A long list of groceries had been made out by Mrs. Brown, who professed herself far too busy with Christmas preparations to come in person, and had laid the responsibility on Norah, not without misgivings. It was, perhaps, fortunate that the storekeepers were able to rise to the contents of the list unaided, for Norah was scarcely in a condition to grapple with problems relating to anything so ordinary as groceries, and found it indeed difficult to read out her list coherently, with Jim standing sentinel in the doorway and Wally wandering about the shop sampling all he could find, from biscuits to brooms. On one occasion, when making a special effort to preserve her dignity, she came to the item "flaked oatmeal," and asked the shopman in rather frigid tones for "floked atemeal," which had a paralysing effect on the unoffending storekeeper, while Wally retired to the shelter of a pile of saucepans, and shrieked. Thus the business of necessary purchases pa.s.sed off cheerfully; and then what Norah termed the more interesting shops--saddlers' and stationers'--were visited, with a view to Christmas.

Finally Jim brought the buggy from the hotel, and they picked up their lighter parcels.

"Surely that's all?" Jim inquired, as Norah and Wally came out of the fruiterer's laden with bags of a.s.sorted sizes, which they dumped thankfully into the buggy, with the immediate result that a bag of peaches burst, and had to be rescued from all over the floor. "Nor., you'll not have a penny left, and we'll all be violently ill if we eat half you've bought. Come on home."

"Brownie's laid in large stocks of medicine, she says," Norah answered, tranquilly, climbing into the buggy. "So you needn't worry, need you?

But we've truly finished now, Jim, I think. Ready, Wally?"

"Quite," said Wally cheerfully. "I've put these peaches in with the neatsfoot oil, and it seems a beautiful arrangement!" He hopped up nimbly. "Right oh, Jimmy, and pray remember I am nervous!"

"I will," Jim grinned. He laid the whip on the ponies' backs, and they shot forward with a bound, unused to such liberties. They went down the main street of Cunjee in a whirl of dust, and turned over the bridge spanning the river, where the ponies promptly rose on their hind legs at the sight of Dr. Anderson's motor, and betrayed a rooted disinclination to come down from that unusual alt.i.tude. Jim handled them steadily, and presently they were induced to face the snorting horror, wherein the doctor sat, waving his hand and calling cheery Christmas greetings as they shot past, to which the three responded enthusiastically. Cunjee sank into the distance behind them.

The miles flew past. On the metalled road the rubbered tyres spun silently, and only the flying hoofs clattered and soon they had left the made road and turned on to the hard-beaten track that led to Billabong, where progress was even smoother. The tongues flew almost as swiftly as the wheels. The hot sun sank gradually, and the evening breeze sprang up. It was a time for quick questions and answers. Norah wanted details of the term just over, the sports, the prize-giving, and had to laugh over messages from those of Jim's boy friends whom she knew; and Jim had a hundred things to ask about home--the cattle, the fishing, his horses, his dogs, "Brownie," and the prospects of fun ahead. They roared over her ducking and subsequent encounter with Cecil, and chaffed her unmercifully.

"Such a mud-lark!" said Wally, with glee. "And that prim young man! Oh, Norah, you are a dream! I'd have given something to see your face."

"I was altogether worth seeing," Norah remarked modestly. "When I caught sight of myself in a gla.s.s I really didn't wonder at Cecil." But Jim glowered and referred to the absent Cecil as a "silly a.s.s."

They turned in at last at the homestead gate, and the ponies fairly flew up the long paddock, something in the spirits of their drivers communicating itself to them. The house was not visible until the track had pa.s.sed through a thick belt of trees, and as they came to this Jim fell silent, looking keenly ahead. Then the red roof came into view and the boy drew a long breath.

"There's the old place," he said. "My word, I am glad to be home!"

Under the dust-rug Norah slipped her hand on to his knee.

"It's just lovely to have you--both of you." she added. "You're glad, too, aren't you, Wally?"

"I could sing!" said Wally.

"Once," said Jim, "you could. But for some years--"

"Beast!" said Wally. "If you weren't driving--"

"And you weren't nervous--!" grinned his chum.

"There'd be wigs on the green," finished Norah, cheerfully. "I'll drive, if it would be any convenience to either of you."

"We'll postpone it," said Jim. "There's Brownie at the gate, bless her old heart!"

They shot up the last furlong of the drive. At the big gate of the yard--very few people, not even bishops, go to the front gate of a Bush homestead--Brownie stood, her broad face beaming. As they pulled up, Murty O'Toole came forward to take the horses--a marked compliment from Murty, who, like most head stockmen, was a free and independent soul.

Jim went over the wheel with a bound, and seized Brownie's hand.

"How are you, Brownie, dear?"

"The size of him!" said she. "The shoulders. No wonder they 'ad you for captin of the football eleven, then, my dear!" The boys grinned widely.

"If not eleven, then it's four," said Brownie placidly. "Strange, I can't never remember which, an' it don't sinnerfy, any'ow. Welkim 'ome--an' you too, Master Wally."

"How are you, Murty?" Jim shook hands with the stockman, while Wally bowed low over Brownie's hand.

"I've lived for this moment," he said, fervently. "Brownie, you grow younger every time I go away!"

"Naturally!" said Norah from the buggy.

"Be silent, minx!" said Wally, over his shoulder. "Who are you to break in on a heart-to-heart talk, anyhow? At this present moment, Mrs.

Brown, you look seventeen!"

"Get along with you, now, do!" said the delighted Brownie. "You're no better than you was, I'm afraid, Master Wally--alwuz ready for your joke!"

"Joke!" exclaimed he, indignantly. "Any one who'd make a joke of you, Brownie, would rob a church. Jim might, but I--"

"Perish the idea!" said Jim, tipping the orator's hat over his eyes.

"Come and take things out of the buggy."

Across the yard came Mr. Linton, surrounded by a mixed a.s.semblage of dogs. Puck and the collie had already hurled themselves upon Jim in a delirium of joy. Cecil strolled after his uncle, looking slightly amused at the scene by the gate.

"We're quite a family," Mr. Linton said. "I begin to feel like Mr.

Pickwick at a Christmas gathering! Do you think Billabong will stand the crowd, Mrs. Brown?"

"It looks to me, sir," said Mrs. Brown contentedly, "as if Billabong's goin' to 'ave the time of its life!"

CHAPTER VII

JIM UNPACKS

Holler-days Were made for boys to holler!

Jim's room was a rather vast place, with two long windows opening upon the balcony, two exceedingly plain iron bedsteads in different corners, and in the midst a wide, vacant s.p.a.ce, where a punching-ball was fixed whenever the owner was at home. There was a very shabby old leather armchair by one window, and near the other an even shabbier leather couch, very wide and solid. Jim used to declare that they were the most comfortable in the house, and nothing would have induced him to have them altered in any way.

One wall held a medley of various articles: Jim's rifle, the sporting gun his father had given him when he was fifteen, a revolver that had been through two wars, and a cavalry sword his grandfather had carried, together with an a.s.sortment of native weapons from various countries--a.s.segais, spears, boomerangs, throwing sticks, sjamboks and South Sea Island clubs and shields. A special nail held Jim's own stockwhip, to which Norah always attended after he had gone away, lest the supple thong should become harsh through disuse. Then there were weapons of peace--hockey sticks, rackets, cricket-bats--the latter an a.s.sortment of all Jim had used, from the tiny one he had begun with at the age of eight to the full sized beauty that had split honourably in an inter-State school match the preceding summer.

All over the other walls were plainly framed photographs. Mr. Linton and Norah were there, in many positions, with and without horses; then there were pictures of all the favourite horses and ponies and dogs on the place, and a big enlargement of Billabong house itself. The others were school photographs, mostly football and cricket teams, tennis fours, the school crew, and some large groups at the yearly sports. In nearly all you could find Jim himself--if you looked closely enough. Jim loathed being photographed, and always retired as far out of sight in a group as his inches would permit.

The room held many of Jim's own manufactured ideas--his "contraptions,"

Brownie used to call them. There was a telephone he had rigged up when he was twelve, communicating with Norah's room by the balcony; and outside was a sort of fire escape, by which he could--and generally did--descend without using the stairs. There were various pieces of bush carpentry--a table, a candlestick and a book-case of his own construction, which in Norah's eyes were better than beautiful. There was an arrangement by which he could open his door or his windows without getting out of bed--which was ingenious, but quaint, since Jim was never known to shut his windows, and very rarely his door.

Altogether it was an interesting room, and very typical of Jim.

At present it resembled a maelstrom, for Wally and Jim were unpacking.

Brownie, putting in her head, described it as "a perfick shambles," and affected great horror at the havoc occasioned by having boys in the house--beaming all the while in a manner calculated to destroy the effect of any lecture. Norah, perched on the end of the sofa, which was the only free spot in the room, looked on at the operations with deep interest. Occasionally, when some special parcel was unearthed, one of the boys diverted her attention laboriously, since it was near Christmas-time, which is ever a season of mysteries. The parcel stowed away hastily in a cupboard, Norah was permitted to gaze once more, unrestricted.

"What's that, Jim?" she asked, catching a glimpse of silver in the recesses of a suitcase.