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"Does it take long to tune a nose?" asked Tommy, laughing. "Not a nice nose like yours." Norah gave a happy little sigh. "Do you see that glow in the sky? That's the lights of Melbourne. I went to school near Melbourne, but I never loved it much; but somehow, it seems different now. It's all just shouting welcomes. And back of beyond that light is Billabong."
"As for stepping quick and lively, we've both been trained to that pretty thoroughly during the last few years. If you're worse than some of the Sergeant-majors I met when I was training, I'll eat my hat." "I'm told they're 'ard," said Howard. "Well, I s'pose I'd better take yous on, though it's a queer day when the son of Linton of Billabong comes askin' old Joe Howard for a job.
We were camped on the edge of a billabong. Barlas was kneading a damper, Drysdale was tenderly packing coals about the billy to make the water boil, and I was cooking the chops. The hobbled horses were picking the grass and the old-man salt-bush near, and Bimbi, the black boy, was gathering twigs and bark for the fire. That is the order of merit Barlas, Drysdale, myself, the horses and Bimbi.
I guess it would take some of the nonsense out of him. Was he ever young?" "I shouldn't think so," Norah said, laughing "he has such a lofty contempt for anything at all juvenile now. Well, at least he's looking better than when he came, so Billabong is doing him good in one way at any rate, and that is a comfort. But I'm sure he's counting the days until he goes away."
"Not a word out of me noble not even a thank you! Too much of a fine gentleman for Billabong, like his ma before him!" "Young gent don't seem to cotton to Miss Norah," remarked the astute, if new, Maria, who had been listening with all her ears.
We were camped on the edge of a billabong. Barlas was kneading a damper, Drysdale was tenderly packing coals about the billy to make the water boil, and I was cooking the chops. The hobbled horses were picking the grass and the old-man salt-bush near, and Bimbi, the black boy, was gathering twigs and bark for the fire. That is the order of merit Barlas, Drysdale, myself, the horses and Bimbi.
Norah's home was on a big station in the north of Victoria so large that you could almost, in her own phrase, "ride all day and never see any one you didn't want to see"; which was a great advantage in Norah's eyes. Not that Billabong Station ever seemed to the little girl a place that you needed to praise in any way. It occupied so very modest a position as the loveliest part of the world!
Of course, one has no ideas in common with these Bush people. Where the 'Charm of the Bush' comes in is more than I can see I much prefer Town on a Saturday morning to all Billabong and its bullocks. They wanted me to go out one night and fancy! help burn down dead trees; but, really, I jibbed on that. There is no billiard room.
But don't go imaginin' you've learned all there is ter know about farmin' yet." "If there's one thing I'm certain of, it's that," said Bob a trifle grimly. "That's right. I ain't got much of a farm, an' any'ow, it's winter. I on'y showed yous a few of the odd jobs an' wot it is to 'ave to batch fer yerself, not comin' in like a lord to Billabong ter see wot Mrs. Brown's been cookin' for yous.
He and the old nurse-housekeeper of Billabong were sworn allies; though no one could ever quite come up to Jim and Norah in Brownie's heart, Wally had been a close third from the day, long years back, that he had first come to the station, a lonely, dark-eyed little Queenslander.
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