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Updated: June 18, 2025
"By George!" he said to those near him, "she IS a goer, a regular goer"; and after much careful thought wired an inane suggestion about waiting until after the Wet. Darwin laughed outright, and an emphatic: "Wife determined, coming Tuesday's train," from the Maluka was followed by a complete breakdown at the Katherine.
When we arrived at the five-mile in the morning we found Mac "packed up" and ready for the start, and, passing the reins to him, the Maluka said, "You know the road best "; and Mac, being what he called a "bit of a Jehu," we set off in great style across country, apparently missing trees by a hair's breadth, and bumping over the ant-hills, boulders, and broken boughs that lay half-hidden in the long grass.
Preferring to be "the interested onlooker" myself this time, when we went to the telegraph office it was the Maluka who wired: "Wife coming, secure buggy", and in an incredibly short space of time the answer was back: "No buggy obtainable." Darwin looked interested. "Mac hasn't wasted much time in making inquiries," it said.
But when I found myself face to face with over six feet of brawny quizzing, wrathful-looking Scotchman, all my courage slipped away, and edging closer to the Maluka, I held out my hand to the bushman, murmuring lamely: "How do you do?" Instantly a change came over the rugged, bearded face.
The boss did understand, and rode across to the Warlochs alone, to find a man as shy and reticent as a bushman can be, and full of dread lest the woman at the homestead would insist on visiting him. "You see, that's why he wouldn't come on," the mate said. "He couldn't bear the thought of a woman doing things for him "; and the Maluka explained that the missus understood all that.
At midnight the Maluka left the Quarters, and going back just before the dawn to relieve the Dandy, found the sick man lying quietly-restful, with one arm thrown lightly across his brow. He had spoken in his sleep a short while before the Dandy said as the Maluka bent over him with a cup of warm milk, but the cup was returned to the table untasted.
In the morning there was a free fight in camp between the staff and some of the camp lubras, the rejected, led by Jimmy's lubra another Nellie declaring the Maluka had meant two different lubras each day. Again there was much ear-splitting argument, but finally a compromise was agreed on. Two lubras were to sit down permanently, while as many as wished might help with the washing and watering.
The simplicity of our camp added intensely to the isolation; and as I stood among the dry rustling leaves, looking up at the dark broad-leaved canopy above us, with my "swag" at my feet, the Maluka called me a "poor homeless little coon."
Before a week was out the Maluka and Cheon had won each other's undying regard because of their treatment of the missus. With the nearest doctor three hundred miles away in Darwin, and held there by hospital routine, the Maluka decided on bed and feeding-up as the safest course, and Cheon came out in a new character.
And then these travellers, too, passed out of our camp to become, with the man from Beyanst, just pleasant memories. "She'll find mere men unsatisfying after this," the Maluka said in farewell, and a mere man coming in from the north-west before sundown, greeted the Maluka with: "Thought you married a towny," as he pointed with eloquent forefinger at our supper circle.
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