1933-1938 LUKE

It was amazing how quickly the land mended; within a week little green shoots of grass were poking out of thegluey morass, and within two months the roasted trees were coming into leaf. If the people were tough andresilient, it was because the land gave them no opportunity to be otherwise; those who were faint in heart orlacking a fanatical streak of endurance did not stay long in the Great Northwest. But it would be years before thescars faded. Many coats of bark would have to grow and fall to eucalyptoid tatters before the tree trunks becamewhite or red or grey again, and a certain percentage of the timber would not regenerate at all, but remain deadand dark. And for years disintegrating skeletons would dew the plains, subsiding into the matting of time,gradually covered by dust and marching little hoofs. And straggling out across Drogheda to the west the sharpdeep channels cut by the corners of a makeshift bier in the mud remained, were pointed out by wanderers whoknew the story to more wanderers who did not, until the tale became a part of black-soil plains lore.

Drogheda lost perhaps a fifth of its acreage in the fire, and 25,000 sheep, a mere bagatelle to a station whosesheep tally in the recent good years lay in the neighborhood of 125,000. There was absolutely no point in railingat the malignity of fate, or the wrath of God, however those concerned might choose to regard a natural disaster.

The only thing to do was cut the losses and begin again. In no case was it the first time, and in no case didanyone assume it would be the last. But to see Drogheda's homestead gardens bare and brown in spring hurtbadly. Against drought they could survive thanks to Michael Carson's water tanks, but in a fire nothing survived.

Even the wistaria failed to bloom; when the flames came its tender clusters of buds were just forming, andshriveled. Roses were crisped, pansies were dead, stocks turned to sepia straw, fuchsias in shady spots witheredpast rejuvenation, babies' breath smothered, sweet pea vines were sere and scentless. What had been bled fromthe water tanks during the fire was replaced by the heavy rain that followed hard on it, so everyone on Droghedasacrificed a nebulous spare time to helping old Tom bring the gardens back.

Bob decided to keep on with Paddy's policy of more hands to run Drogheda, and put on three more stockmen;Mary Carson's policy had been to keep no permanent non-Cleary men on her books, preferring to hire extrahands at mustering, lambing and shearing time, but Paddy felt the men worked better knowing they hadpermanent jobs, and it didn't make much difference in the long run. Most stockmen were chronically afflictedwith itchy feet, and never stayed very long anywhere.

The new houses sitting farther back from the creek were inhabited by married men; old Tom had a neat newthree-room cottage under a pepper tree behind the horse yards, and cackled with proprietary glee every time heentered it. Meggie continued to look after some of the inner paddocks, and her mother the books.

Fee had taken over Paddy's task of communicating with Bishop Ralph, and being Fee failed to pass on anyinformation save those items concerned with the running of the station. Meggie longed to snatch his letters, readthem greedily, but Fee gave her no chance to do so, locking them in a steel box the moment she had digestedtheir contents. With Paddy and Stu gone there was just no reaching Fee. As for Meggie, the minute Bishop Ralphhad gone Fee forgot all about her promise. Meggie answered dance and party invitations with polite negatives;aware of it, Fee never remonstrated with her or told her she ought to go. Liam O'Rourke seized any opportunityto drive over; Enoch Davies phoned constantly, so did Connor Carmichael and Alastair MacQueen. But witheach of them Meggie was prooccupied, curt, to the point where they despaired of interesting her.

The summer was very wet, but not in spates protracted enough to cause flooding, only keeping the groundperpetually muddy and the thousand-mile Barwon-Darling flowing deep, wide and strong. When winter camesporadic rain continued; the flying brown sheets were made up of water, not dust. Thus the Depression march offoot-loose men along the track tapered off, for it was hell tramping through the blacksoil plains in a wet season,and with cold added to damp, pneumonia raged among those not able to sleep under warm shelter.

Bob was worried, and began to talk of foot rot among the sheep if. it kept up; merinos couldn't take muchmoisture in the ground without developing diseased hoofs. The shearing had been almost impossible, for shearerswould not touch soaked wool, and unless the mud dried before lambing many offspring would die in the soddenearth and the cold.

The phone jangled its two longs, one short for Drogheda; Fee answered and turned.

"Bob, the AMLAND for you.""Hullo, Jimmy, Bob here . . . . Yeah, righto. . . . Oh, good! References all in order? . . . Righto, send him out tosee me .... Righto, if he's that good you can tellhim he's probably got the job, but I still want to see him formyself; don't like pigs in pokes and don't trust references . . . . Righto, thanks. Hooroo."Bob sat down again. "New stockman coming, a good bloke according to Jimmy. Been working out on the WestQueensland plains around Longreach and Charlville. Was a drover, too. Good references and all aboveboard.

Can sit anything with four legs and a tail, used to break horses. Was a shearer before that, gun shearer too,Jimmy says, over two fifty a day. That's what makes me a bit suspicious. Why would a gun shearer want to workfor stockman's wages? Not too often a gun shearer will give up the bo)i for a saddle. Be handy paddockcrutching,though, eh?" With the passing of the years Bob's accent grew more drawling and Australian but hissentences shorter in compensation. He was creeping up toward thirty, and much to Meggie's disappointmentshowed no sign of being smitten with any of the eligible girls he met at the few festivities decency forced them toattend. For one thing he was painfully shy, and for another he seemed utterly wrapped in the land, apparentlypreferring to love it without distraction. Jack and Hughie grew more and more like him; indeed, they could havepassed for triplets as they sat together on one of the hard marble benches, the closest to comfortable houseboundrelaxa tion they could get. They seemed actually to prefer camping out in the paddocks, and when sleeping athome stretched out on the floors of their bedrooms, frightened that beds might soften them. The sun, the windand the dryness had weathered their fair, freckled skins to a sort of mottled mahogany, in which their blue eyesshone pale and tranquil, with the deep creases beside them speaking of gazing into far distances and silver-beigegrass. It was almost impossible to tell what age they were, or which was the oldest and which the youngest. Eachhad Paddy's Roman nose and kind homely face, but better bodies than Paddy's, which had been stooped andarm-elongated from so many years shearing. They had developed the spare, easy beauty of horsemen instead.

Yet for women and comfort and pleasure they did not pine.

"Is the new man married?" asked Fee, drawing neat lines with a ruler and a red-inked pen.

"Dunno, didn't ask. Know tomorrow when he comes.""How is he getting here?""Jimmy's driving him out; got to see about those old wethers in Tankstand." "Well, let's hope he stays awhile. Ifhe's not married he'll be off again in a few weeks, I suppose. Wretched people, stockmen," said Fee. Jims andPatsy were boarding at Riverview, vowing they wouldn't stay at school a minute longer than the fourteen years ofage which was legal. They burned for the day when they would be out in the paddocks with Bob, Jack andHughie, when Drogheda could run on family again and the outsiders would be welcome to come and go asfrequently as they pleased. Sharing the family passion for reading didn't endear Riverview to them at all; a bookcould be carried in a saddlebag or a jacket pocket and read with far more pleasure in the noonday shade of awilga than in a Jesuit classroom. It had been a hard transition for them, boarding school. The big-windowedclassrooms, the spacious green playing fields, the wealth of gardens and facilities meant nothing to them, nor didSydney with its museums, concert halls and art galleries. They chummed up with the sons of other graziers andspent their leisure hours longing for home, or boasting about the size and splendor of Drogheda to awed butbelieving ears; anyone west of Burren Junction had heard of mighty Drogheda.

Several weeks passed before Meggie saw the new stockman. His name had been duly entered in the books,Luke O'neill, and he was already talked about in the big house far more than stockmen usually were. For onething, he had refused to bunk in the jackaroos" barracks but had taken up residence in the last empty house uponthe creek. For another, he had introduced himself to Mrs. Smith, and was in that lady's good books, though shedidn't usually care for stockmen. Meggie was quite curious about him long before she met him.

Since she kept the chestnut mare and the black gelding in the stables rather than the stockyards and was mostlyobliged to start out later of a morning than the men, she would often go long periods of time without running intoany of the hired people. But she finally met Luke O'neill late one afternoon as the summer sun was flaring redlyover the trees and the long shadows crept toward the gentle oblivion of night. She was coming back fromBorehead to the ford across the creek, he was coming in from southeast and farther out, also on a course for theford.

The sun was in his eyes, so she saw him before he saw her, and he was riding a big mean bay with a black maneand tail and black points; she knew the animal well because it was her job to rotate the work horses, and she hadwondered why this particular beast was not so much in evidence these days. None of the men cared for it, neverrode it if they could help. Apparently the new stockman didn't mind it at all, which certainly indicated he couldride, for it was a notorious earlymorning bucker and had a habit of snapping at its rider's head the moment hedismounted.

It was hard to tell a man's height when he was on horseback, for Australian stockmen used small Englishsaddles minus the high cantle and horn of the American saddle, and rode with their knees bent, sitting veryupright. The new man seemed tall, but sometimes height was all in the trunk, the legs disproportionately short, soMeggiie reserved judgment. However, unlike most stockmen he preferred a white shirt and white moleskins togrey flannel and grey twill; somewhat of a dandy, she decided, amused. Good luck to him, if he didn't mind thebother of so much washing and ironing.

"G'day, Missus!" he called as they converged, doffing his battered old grey felt hat and replacing it rakishly onthe back of his head. Laughing blue eyes looked at Meggie in undisguised admiration as she drew alongside.

"Well, you're certainly not the Missus, so you've got to be the daughter," he said. "I'm Luke O'neill."Meggie muttered something but wouldn't look at him again, so confused and angry she couldn't think of anyappropriately light conversation. Oh, it wasn't fair! How dare someone else have eyes and face like Father Ralph!

Not the way he looked at her: the mirth was something of his own and he had no love burning for her there; fromthe first moment of seeing Father Ralph kneeling in the dust of the Gilly station yard Meggie had seen love in hiseyes. To look into his eyes and not see him! It was a cruel joke, a punishment.

Unaware of the thoughts his companion harbored, Luke O'neill kept his wicked bay beside Meggie's demuremare as they splashed through the creek, still running strong from so much rain. She was a beauty, all right! Thathair! What was simply carrots on the male Clearys was something else again on this little sprig. If only shewould look up, give him a better chance to see that face! Just then she did, with such a look on it that his browscame together, puzzled; not as if she hated him, exactly, but as if she was trying to see something and couldn't, orhad seen something and wished she hadn't. Or whatever. It seemed to upset her, anyway. Luke was not used tobeing weighed in a feminine balance and found wanting. Caught naturally in a deli- cious trap of sunset-gold hairand soft eyes, his interest only fed on her displeasure and disappointment. Still she was watching him, pinkmouth fallen slightly open, a silky dew of sweat on her upper lip and forehead because it was so hot, her reddish-gold brows arched in seeking wonderment. He grinned to reveal Father Ralph's big white teeth; yet it was notFather Ralph's smile. "Do you know you look exactly like a baby, all oh! and ah!?"She looked away. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stare. You reminded me of someone, that's all.""Stare all you like. It's better than looking at the top of your head, pretty though that might be. Who do I remindyou of?" "No one important. It's just strange, seeing someone familiar and yet terribly unfamiliar.""What's your name, little Miss Cleary?""Meggie.""Meggie . . . It hasn't got enough dignity, it doesn't suit you a bit. I'd rather you were called something likeBelinda or Madeline, but if Meggie's the best you've got to offer, I'll go for it. What's the Meggie stand for-Margaret?""No, Meghann.""Ah, now that's more like! I'll call you Meghann.""No, you won't!" she snapped. "I detest it!"But he only laughed. "You've had too much of your own way, little Miss Meghann. If I want to call youEustacia Sophronia Augusta, I will, you know." They had reached the stockyards; he slipped off his bay, aiminga punch at its snapping head which rocked it into submission, and stood, obviously waiting for her to offer himher hands so he could help her down. But she touched the chestnut mare with her heels and walked on up thetrack. "Don't you put the dainty lady with the common old stockmen?" he called after her.

"Certainly not!" she answered without turning. Oh, it wasn't fair! Even on his own two feet he was like FatherRalph; as tall, as broad in the shoulders and narrow in the hips, and with something of the same grace, thoughdifferently employed. Father Ralph moved like a dancer, Luke O'neill like an athlete. His hair was as thick andblack and curling, his eyes as blue, his nose as fine and straight, his mouth as well cut.

And yet he was no more like Father Ralph than-than than a ghost gum, so tall and pale and splendid, was like ablue gum, also tall and pale and splendid.

After that chance meeting Meggie kept her ears open for opinions and gossip about Luke O'neill. Bob and theboys were pleased with his work and seemed to get along well with him; apparently he hadn't a lazy bone in hisbody, according to Bob. Even Fee brought his name up in conversation one evening by remarking that he was avery handsome man.

"Does he remind you of anyone?" Meggie asked idly, flat on her stomach on the carpet reading a book.

Fee considered the question for a moment. "Well, I suppose he's a bit like Father de Bricassart. The same build,the same coloring. But it isn't a striking likeness; they're too different as men. "Meggie, I wish you'd sit in a chairlike a lady to read! Just because you're in jodhpurs you don't have to forget modesty entirely." "Pooh!" saidMeggie. "As if anyone notices!"And so it went. There was a likeness, but the men behind the faces were so unalike only Meggie was plaguedby it, for she was in love with one of them and resented finding the other attractive. In the kitchen she found hewas a prime favorite, and also discovered how he could afford the luxury of wearing white shirts and whitebreeches into the paddocks; Mrs. Smith washed and ironed them for him, succumbing to his ready, beguilingcharm. "Och, what a fine Irishman he is and all!" Minnie sighed ecstatically. "He's an Australian," said Meggieprovocatively. "Born here, maybe, Miss Meggie darlin', but wit' a name like O'neill now, he's as Irish as Paddy'spigs, not meanin' any disrespect to yer sainted father, Miss Meggie, may he rest in peace and sing wit' the angels.

Mr. Luke not Irish, and him wit' that black hair, thim blue eyes? In the old days the O'neills was the kings ofIreland." "I thought the O'Connors were," said Meggie slyly. Minnie's round little eyes twinkled. "Ah, well now,Miss Meggie, 'twas a big country and all.""Go on! It's about the size of Drogheda! And anyway, O'neill is an Orange name; you can't fool me.""It is that. But it's a great Irish name and it existed before there were Orangemen ever thought of. It is a namefrom Ulster parts, so it's logical there'd have to be a few of thim Orange, isn't it now? But there was the O'neill ofClandeboy and the O'neill Mor back when, Miss Meggie darlin'." Meggie gave up the battle; Minnie had longsince lost any militant Fenian tendencies she might once have possessed, and could pronounce the word"Orange" without having a stroke.

About a week later she ran into Luke O'neill again, down by the creek. She suspected he had lain in wait forher, but she didn't know what to do about it if he had.

"Good afternoon, Meghann.""Good afternoon," said she, looking straight between the chestnut mare's ears.

"There's a woolshed ball at Braich y Pwll next Saturday night. Will you come with me?""Thank you for asking me, but I can't dance. There wouldn't be any point." "I'll teach you how to dance in twoflicks of a dead lamb's tail, so that's no obstacle. Since I'll be taking the squatter's sister, do you think Bob mightlet me borrow the old Rolls, if not the new one?" "I said I wouldn't go!" she said, teeth clenched. "You said youcouldn't dance, I said I'd teach you. You never said you wouldn't go with me if you could dance, so I assumed itwas the dancing you objected to, not me. Are you going to bark out?" Exasperated, she glared at him fiercely, buthe only laughed at her.

"You're spoiled rotten, young Meghann; it's time you didn't get all your own way.""I'm not spoiled!""Go on, tell me another! The only girl, all those brothers to run round after you, all this land and money, a poshhouse, servants? I know the Catholic Church owns it, but the Clearys aren't short of a penny either." That was thebig difference between them! she thought triumphantly; it had been eluding her since she met him. Father Ralphwould never have fallen for outward trappings, but this man lacked his sensitivity; he had no inbuilt antennae totell him what lay beneath the surface. He rode through life without an idea in his head about its complexity or itspain.

Flabbergasted, Bob handed over the keys to the new Rolls without a murmur; he had stared at Luke for amoment without speaking, then grinned. "I never thought of Meggie going to a dance, but take her, Luke, andwelcome! I daresay she'd like it, the poor little beggar. She never gets out much. We ought to think of taking her,but somehow we never do." "Why don't you and Jack and Hughie come, too?" Luke asked, apparently not averseto company.

Bob shook his head, horrified. "No, thanks. We're not too keen on dances." Meggie wore her ashes-of-rosesdress, not having anything else to wear; it hadn't occurred to her to use some of the stockpiling pounds FatherRalph put in the bank in her name to have dresses made for parties and balls. Until now she had managed torefuse invitations, for men like Enoch Davies and Alastair MacQueen were easy to discourage with a firm no.

They didn't have Luke O'neill's gall.

But as she stared at herself in the mirror she thought she just might go into Gilly next week when Mum madeher usual trip, visit old Gert and have her make up a few new frocks.

For she hated wearing this dress; if she had owned one other even remotely suitable, it would have been off in asecond. Other times, a different black-haired man; it was so tied up with love and dreams, tears and loneli-ness,that to wear it for such a one as Luke O'neill seemed a desecration. She had grown used to hiding what she felt,to appearing always calm and outwardly happy. Self-control was growing around her thicker than bark on a tree,and sometimes in the night she would think of her mother, and shiver. Would she end up like Mum, cut off fromall feeling? Was this how it began for Mum back in the days when there was Frank's father? And what on earthwould Mum do, what would she say if she knew Meggie had learned the truth about Frank? Oh, that scene in thepresbytery! It seemed like yesterday, Daddy and Frank facing each other, and Ralph holding her so hard he hurt.

Shouting those awful things. Everything had fallen into place. Meggie thought she must always have known,once she did. She had grown up enough to realize there was more to getting babies than she used to think; somesort of physical contact absolutely forbidden between any but a married couple. What disgrace and humiliationpoor Mum must have gone through over Frank. No wonder she was the way she was. If it happened to her,Meggie thought, she would want to die. In books only the lowest, cheapest girls had babies outside of marriage;yet Mum wasn't cheap, could never have been cheap. With all her heart Meggie wished Mum could talk to herabout it, or that she her-self had the courage to bring up the subject. Perhaps in some small way she might havebeen able to help. But Mum wasn't the sort of person one could approach, nor would Mum do the approaching.

Meggie sighed at herself in the mirror, and hoped nothing like that ever happened to her. Yet she was young; attimes like this, staring at herself in the ashes-of-roses dress, she wanted to feel, wanted emotion to blow over herlike a strong hot wind. She didn't want to plod like a little automaton for the rest of her life, she wanted changeand vitality and love. Love, and a husband, and babies. What was the use of hungering after a man she couldnever have? He didn't want her, he never would want her. He said he loved her, but not as a husband would loveher. Because he was married to the Church. Did all men do that, love some inanimate thing more than they couldlove a woman? No, surely not all men. The difficult ones, perhaps, the complex ones with their seas of doubtsand objections, rationalities. But there had to be simpler men, men who could surely love a woman before allelse. Men like Luke O'neill, for instance. "I think you're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen," said Luke as hestarted the Rolls.

Compliments were quite out of Meggie's ken; she gave him a startled sidelong glance and said nothing.

"Isn't this nice?" Luke asked, apparently not upset at her lack of enthusiasm. "Just turn a key and press a buttonon the dashboard and the car starts. No cranking a handle, no hoping the darned donk catches before a man'sexhausted. This is the life, Meghann, no doubt about it." "You won't leave me alone, will you?" she asked.

"Good Lord, no! You've come with me, haven't you? That means you're mine all night long, and I don't intendgiving anyone else a chance." "How old are you, Luke?""Thirty. How old are you?""Almost twenty-three.""As much as that, eh? You look like a baby.""I'm not a baby.""Oho! Have you ever been in love, then?""Once.""Is that all? At twenty-three? Good Lord! I'd been in and out of love a dozen times by your age.""I daresay I might have been, too, but I meet very few people to fall in love with on Drogheda. You're the firststockman I remember who said more than a shy hello.""Well, if you won't go to dances because you can't dance, you're on the outside looking in right there, aren'tyou? Never mind, we'll fix that up in no time. By the end of the evening you'll be dancing, and in a few weekswe'll have you a champion." He glanced at her quickly. "But you can't tell me some of the squatters off otherstations haven't tried to get you to come to the odd dance with them. Stockmen I can understand, you're a cutabove the usual stockman's inclinations, but some of the sheep cockies must have given you the glad eye.""If I'm a cut above stockmen, why did you ask me?" she parried. "Oh, I've got all the cheek in the world." Hegrinned. "Come on now, don't change the subject. There must be a few blokes around Gilly who've asked." "Afew," she admitted. "But I've really never wanted to go. You pushed me into it.""Then the rest of them are sillier than pet snakes," he said. "I know a good thing when I see it."She wasn't too sure that she cared for the way he talked, but the trouble with Luke was that he was a hard manto put down. Everyone came to a woolshed dance, from squatters' sons and daughters to stockmen and theirwives if any, maidservants, governesses, town dwellers of all ages and sexes. For instance, these were occasionswhen female schoolteachers got the opportunity to fraternize with the stock-and-station-agent apprentices, thebank johnnies and the real bushies off the stations.

The grand manners reserved for more formal affairs were not in evidence at all. Old Mickey O'Brien came outfrom Gilly to play the fiddle, and there was always someone on hand to man the piano accordion or the buttonaccordion, taking turns to spell each other as Mickey's accompanists while the old violinist sat on a barrel or awool bale for hours playing without a rest, his pendulous lower lip drooling because hehad no patience withswallowing; it interfered with his tempo, But it was not the sort of dancing Meggie had seen at Mary Carson'sbirthday party. This was energetic round-dancing: barn dances, jigs, polkas, quadrilles, reels, mazurkas, SirRoger de Coverleys, with no more than a passing touching of the partner's hands, or a wild swirling in rougharms. There was no sense of intimacy, no dreaminess. Everyone seemed to view the proceedings as a simpledissipation of frustrations; romantic intrigues were furthered better outside, well away from the noise and bustle.

Meggie soon discovered she was much envied her big handsome escort. He was the target of almost as manyseductive or languishing looks as Father Ralph used to be, and more blatantly so. As Father Ralph used to be.

Used to be. How terrible to have to think of him in the very remotest of all past tenses. True to his word, Lukeleft her alone only so long as it took him to visit the Men's. Enoch Davies and Liam O'Rourke were there, andeager to fill his place alongside her. He gave them no opportunity whatsoever, and Meggie herself seemed toodazed to understand that she was quite within her rights to accept invitations to dance from men other than herescort. Though she didn't hear the comments, Luke did, secretly laughing. What a damned cheek the fellow had,an ordinary stockman, stealing her from under their noses! Disapproval meant nothing to Luke. They had hadtheir chances; if they hadn't made the most of them, hard luck.

The last dance was a waltz. Luke took Meggie's hand and put his arm about her waist, drew her against him. Hewas an excellent dancer. To her surprise she found she didn't need to do anything more than follow where hepropelled her. And it was a most extraordinary sen-sation to be held so against a man, to feel the muscles of hischest and thighs, to absorb his body warmth. Her brief contacts with Father Ralph had been so intense she hadnot had time to perceive discrete things, and she had honestly thought that what she felt in his arms she wouldnever feel in anyone else's. Yet though this was quite different, it was exciting; her pulse rate had gone up, andshe knew he sensed it by the way he turned her suddenly, gripped her more closely, put his cheek on her hair. Asthe Rolls purred home, making light of the bumpy track and sometimes no track at all, they didn't speak verymuch. Braich y Pwll was seventy miles from Drogheda, across paddocks with never a house to be seen all theway, no lights of someone's home, no intrusion of humanity. The ridge which cut across Drogheda was not morethan a hundred feet higher than the rest of the land, but out on the black-soil plains to reach the crest of it waslike being on top of an Alp to a Swiss. Luke stopped the car, got out and came round to open Meggie's door. Shestepped down beside him, trembling a little; was he going to spoil everything by trying to kiss her? It was soquiet, so far from anyone!

There was a decaying dogleg wooden fence wandering off to one side, and holding her elbow lightly to makesure she didn't stumble in her frivolous shoes, Luke helped Meggie across the uneven ground, the rabbit holes.

Gripping the fence tightly and looking out over the plains, she was speechless; first from terror, then, her panicdying as he made no move to touch her, from wonder.

Almost as clearly as the sun could, the moon's still pale light picked out vast sweeping stretches of distance, thegrass shimmering and rippling like a restless sigh, silver and white and grey. Leaves on trees sparkled suddenlylike points of fire when the wind turned their glossy tops upward, and great yawning gulfs of shadows spreadunder timber stands as mysteriously as mouths of the underworld. Lifting her head, she tried to count the starsand could not; as delicate as drops of dew on a wheeling spider's web the pinpoints flared, went out, flared, wentout, in a rhythm as timeless as God. They seemed to hang over her like a net, so beautiful, so very silent, sowatchful and searching of the soul, like jewel eyes of insects turned brilliant in a spotlight, blind as to expressionand infinite as to seeing power. The only sounds were the wind hot in the grass, hissing trees, an occasional clankfrom the cooling Rolls, and a sleepy bird somewhere close complaining because they had broken its rest; the solesmell the fragrant, indefinable scent of the bush.

Luke turned his back on the night, pulled out his tobacco pouch and booklet of rice papers, and began to rollhimself a cigarette. "Were you born out here, Meghann?" he asked, rubbing the strands of leaf back and forth inhis palm, lazily.

"No, I was born in New Zealand. We came to Drogheda thirteen years ago." He slipped the shaped tendrils intotheir paper sheath, twiddled it expertly between thumb and forefinger, then licked it shut, poked a few wispsback inside the tube with a match end, struck the match and lit up. "You enjoyed yourself tonight, didn't you?""Oh, yes!""I'd like to take you to all the dances.""Thank you."He fell silent again, smoking quietly and looking back across the roof of the Rolls at the stand of timber wherethe irate bird still twittered querulously. When only a small remnant of the tube sputtered between his stainedfingers he dropped it on the ground and screwed his boot heel viciously down upon it until he was sure it wasout. No one kills a cigarette as dead as an Australian bushman.

Sighing, Meggie turned from the moon vista, and he helped her to the car. He was far too wise to kiss her at thisearly stage, because he intended to marry her if he could; let her want to be kissed, first. But there were otherdances, as the summer wore on and wore itself down in bloody, dusty spen............