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But he didn't see the dirty blind wall, nor the dingy window, nor the skimpy little bed, nor the greasy wash-stand; he saw the dark blue ridges in the sunlight, the grassy sidings and flats, the creek with clumps of she-oak here and there, the course of the willow-fringed river below, the distant peaks and ranges fading away into a lighter azure, the granite ridge in the middle distance, and the rocky rises, the stringy-bark and the apple-tree flats, the scrubs, and the sunlit plains and all.
"Good-bye," she murmured, half-extending her hand. "I might see you again, some time," I remarked, almost unconsciously, as our fingers met. "I hope so," she faltered. "Good-bye, Jim," said I, slowly releasing her hand. "Good-bye." The word sounded like a breath of evening air, kissing the she-oak foliage.
I watched him depart until the clacking of his horse's hoofs grew faint on the stony hillside and his form disappeared amid the she-oak scrub which crowned the ridge to the westward. He was gone. Such is life. I sat down and buried my face in my apron, too miserable even for tears. Here was another article I ill could spare wrenched from my poorly and sparsely furnished existence.
The tree there resembles our common mountain fir: it is exactly like it in the bark; but it is called by the settlers, the she-oak. I reckon it to be the beef-tree, for it has its appearance when cut up, is hard, and takes a beautiful polish.
They jumped up and climbed the bank, while I perched on the she-oak roots over the water to be out of sight as they passed. Half way to the town I saw them standing in the shelter of an old stone chimney that stood alone. He had his overcoat round her and was sheltering her from the wind...." "Smoke-oh, Joe. The tea's stewing."
At last McClure rose from his seat, and said, "I'll pit awa the fiddle, and bid ye a good nicht. I think I'll be going hame to my mither the morn." He went into his tent. It was high tide, and there was a gentle swish of long low waves lapping the sandy beach. The night wind sighed a soothing lullaby through the spines of the she-oak, and his spirit passed peacefully away with the ebb.
McNab and the soldier felt the sudden pluck of the rope and saw the light swing across the abyss. Then the fury of the waterspout burst with a triumphant scream, the tension ceased, the light was blotted out, and when the column sank, there dangled at the end of the lariat nothing but the drenched and blackened skeleton of the she-oak bough.
After about an hour we come to a swampy plain, covered with tall reed-grass. Grassy plains are an unusual sight in Santo; the wide expanse of yellowish green is surrounded by dark walls of she-oak, in the branches of which hang thousands of flying-foxes. At a dirty pond we fill our kettles with greenish water, for our night camp will be on the mountain slope ahead of us, far from any spring.
The creek oaks have rough barked trunks, like English elms, but are much taller, and higher to the branches and the leaves are reedy; Kendel, the Australian poet, calls them the 'she-oak harps Aeolian'. Those trees are always sigh-sigh-sighing more of a sigh than a sough or the 'whoosh' of gum-trees in the wind. You always hear them sighing, even when you can't feel any wind.
Then, having thoroughly covered herself with sand from beak to tail, she rose, shook herself violently, and stalked away up the bank again, where her companion soon followed her, and I lost sight of the pair as they strode through the thick green of the she-oak trees.
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