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‘Doctor’s coming, George,’ called Mrs Willmott from the hall. ‘Have you settled him yet?’

‘No,’ she said.

‘Then do it, George. Or is he too heavy? Shall I help you, or perhaps call one of the men?’

‘No,’ said Georgina a second time, thinking that if anything could be worse, then that would be worse. She began unbuttoning his shirt.

He was a heavyweight, but as he was beyond resistance she got the shirt successfully off. Like all the men up here he wore either shirt or singlet, never both. Shirt off, the mighty Roper lay bare-chested. She looked around for pyjamas. She found the trousers and was searching for the jacket when he said very distinctly from his pillows: ‘I only wear one half.’

Georgina jumped. It was the last thing she had expected. So he wasn’t ‘out’ as she had thought! She picked the pants up and crossed to him.

‘The doctor’s on his way,’ she said.

He nodded.

‘Perhaps—-perhaps you can put these on.’ She held them out to him, but he did not take them.

‘The cord,’ he said expressionlessly, ‘ties in the front.’

‘Of course.’ She turned the garment round, and there was a moment’s silence.

‘Tell Willy to make me a cup of tea,’ Roper groaned, ‘my head’s giving me hell. I could do with a stiff drink, but if the doctor’s coming ’

‘Yes.’ Georgina hurried out at once.

She brought the tea back the moment Mrs Willmott made it, but did not give it to him. The man appeared to have fallen asleep. Perhaps while he was asleep she could—yes, perhaps she could

‘Not to worry.’ His eyes were still closed, but he must have seen her through those blue slits of his, ‘I’ve already changed into the appropriate pants.’

‘You’ve ’ her voice faltered.

‘If you don’t believe me, look. Anyway, there’s all my outdoor clobber on the floor to prove it.’ There was, she saw.

‘You shouldn’t have,’ she protested weakly.

‘All the same you’re glad I did, aren’t you, George?’ The slits were wider now. ‘I can see we’ll have to have a talk together, Brown. You can’t expect to stay on an outback station and not face up to a few home truths. Like always bathing in a basin, for example. How do I know that, George? Because the damn tank’s shower connection has been turned off since before you came, and it’s still turned off, yet you always look well scrubbed. Like ’

But Larry Roper never finished. Whatever had happened to him when he fell now caught up with him at full strength. He gave a little moan and lost consciousness.

‘Mrs Willmott!’ called Georgina in concern.

But she also called in vast relief.

Not
long afterwards Georgina heard the whirr of a small craft over the homestead, but at once the sound diminished.

‘The doctor will be looking for an airstrip,’ explained Mrs Willmott, who had come in at Georgina’s call and now watched their patient from the other side of the bed.

Georgina knew by this time that it was not always the same strip, because when Roper had surprised her by arriving too early that first time, he had landed his craft further north on a neighbouring property. That it had been his enemy’s property had not mattered since only the Brydens and not Craig had been there, so the mighty Roper had been able to avail himself without any unpleasant encounter.

‘The men have marked one of our southern paddocks for the doctor,’ Mrs Willmott went on. ‘It only had a few beasts grazing and it didn’t take long to move them out.’

‘Marked?’ Windmill Junction had had no strip at all, you had had to travel overland from another field to get to it, so Georgina was puzzled by this. Did they paint guide lines, the way lanes were painted on roads?

‘They mark it with upturned white plastic buckets,’ said Mrs Willmott, ‘it’s the quickest way. There’s a car going out for the doctor now.’

Within five minutes the Flying Doctor was coming through the door, a young man with the deep-set eyes of one who frequently looks into distance. He greeted: ‘Hullo, Willy,’ and gave Georgina a friendly salute.

‘Mr Larry’s geo,’ Mrs Willmott introduced, and Georgina, modestly about to deny this rank, saw that it didn’t matter anyway, and just nodded back to the doctor instead.

‘What have we here?’ said the doctor, looking down at the sickbed. ‘First time I’ve ever been called to the mighty Roper.’ He leaned over the patient.

‘He means Mr Roper,’ explained Mrs Willmott unnecessarily to Georgina. She added: ‘Mr Larry’s got on so well both with what his father left him and what he’s made for himself that he’s right at the top now. “Mighty Roper” isn’t meant to be—well ’

‘Derogatory?’ helped Georgina.

‘Yes. It isn’t meant like that at all. Is he concussed, Doctor?’

The doctor nodded. ‘Yes, but he’s coming out of it. Slowly, but he’s on the way back.’

‘Will you take him to the Base with you?’

‘No. Although I’m not actually concerned about him, I might be if I were rash enough to move him at this juncture. If he stays here, and by that I mean if he’s kept from riding around and doing the hundred and one things he always does—in short if he stays put as he is now—he’ll be all right.’

‘For how long?’ Mrs Willmott asked.

‘A day and a night should do the trick. Even half of that, knowing Roper, will help.’

‘Too late,’ Mrs Willmott sighed, then, seeing the doctor’s surprised face, she explained herself.

‘The party’s on tonight, the barn-dance. He won’t be able to go?’

‘He most certainly won’t. I won’t be denying him much, but I decidedly won’t be recommending dancing. Just give him a look-in now and then, then if either of you can be spared to sit beside him, that would help. I’ll leave a sedative, but it’s not all that important. I know Larry, he s as strong as one of his bulls.’ He grinned, then looked persuasively at Mrs Willmott.

‘Do you still make those pumpkin scones?’

‘Of course. You can watch Mr Larry, can’t you, George?’

Georgina said she could, and when they had gone she found herself a chair and drew it up by the side of the bed.

The colour was stealing back into Roper’s cheeks. Very slowly, as the doctor had said, he was on his way back to consciousness.

Across at the barn she could hear a piano being moved in; she knew it was a piano because every now and then an onlooker decided to press a key. It seemed as though the festive arrangements were still proceeding, „and Georgina wondered whether this was because it was too late to cancel them or because out here a party was a party and only flood, fire or famine could intervene.

She heard the doctor leave in the car for his plane again, and later the throb of the plane engine as he left for the Base. Mrs Willmott came in soon after with a cup of tea for her.

‘He’s looking better, George.’ Willy stood regarding Roper.

‘Yes,’ Georgina said woodenly.

‘As soon as he gets his senses he’ll be wanting to get up. I know Mr Larry.’

‘But the doctor said '

‘Exactly. And I depend on you, George, to make Mr Larry see sense, do as he’s told. Poor boy’—now she was looking at Georgina instead of Roper—‘you’ve worked hard with those decorations, it’s too hard for you to be deprived like this.’

‘Deprived?’ asked Georgina gladly, for this was wonderful. Now she need make no excuses about tonight, tell no lies; it seemed she was simply expected
not
to be there.

‘Yes, George. I’m afraid it will have to be you who’s left to watch him. Bedrooms are definitely not the place for cattlemen. Talk about bulls in china shops! Then I,’ apologetically, ‘have to manage the supper.’

Georgina smiled. ‘Mrs Willmott, I don’t mind, I assure you.’

‘You know I don’t think you do, George, you’re a kind lad. We must have another barn-dance and it must be especially for you, George; I do want you to begin to mingle. Oh, Mr Roper is coming round nicely. I’m sure I saw one eyelid flick just then. Finished your tea, George? Then I’ll take out the cup.’

For another ten minutes Georgina sat on. If Mrs Willmott had been right about the eyelid-flicking, she did not see it. Yet every time she turned away, to change her position or to glance through the window, to take up a book, put it down—she was sharply aware that something had moved. An eyelid?

Mrs Willmott brought in a tray of dinner, and later she took the depleted dishes out again. Over in the barn a violin began to tune up. Shadows crept over the windowsill, but they were soon pushed out by the lights of cars, jeeps, waggons and trucks. The partygoers were arriving.

Mrs Willmott came in again, in blue crepe covered with a large apron.

‘Poor George! I suppose I should say poor Mr Roper, too, but what you don’t know about you can’t miss, can you, and he appears not to know. Yes, he’s taking his time coming round all right, almost as if he intended it, and yet he looks quite healthy and pink.’

Georgina considered the mighty Roper looked healthy, but not pink; more a leather brown. But she did agree secretly that Roper looked as though he were doing things to his own design, not anyone else’s, which after all would be typical of the man.

‘I’ll go then, George,’ said Mrs Willmott. ‘If you don t see me for a spell you’ll know I’m run off my feet.’ Her cheerful voice betrayed her satisfaction at being so necessary as she went out.

Georgina sat on, and presently the last light of the last arrival flashed off and the room’s darkness was undisturbed again.

‘Hullo, Brown,’ Larry Roper said.

‘Oh!’ Georgina had not expected this, and she started. She pretended she had not jumped by saying practically: ‘So you’re with us again.’

‘How hospital-like you sound, Brown.’ He made a face in the dark, she could just see it. ‘ “So you’re with us again”. Why don’t you add: “How are we now? Did we have a good rest? Are we going to try very hard to get well? Are we going to eat our tea?” '

‘I’m sorry, sir.’

He looked rueful. ‘No,
I
am sorry. I was only teasing, of course. I suppose you were expecting the orthodox recovery. A slow flickering of the eyelids then a confused: “Where am I? Who are you?” ’

‘Well, yes,’ Georgina half-laughed.

‘But I know where I am and who you are. In fact I’ve been listening for the last hour. For instance, I know the party’s on but that you’re not going—instead you’re nursing me.’

‘Watching you,’ Georgina corrected.

‘A pity.’

‘A pity that I’m watching and not nursing? But the doctor didn’t seem to think you needed a nurse. Anyway, I’m not a nurse. I mean’... hastily ... ‘a male nurse.’

‘No, you’re not.’ A pause. ‘But I really meant it was a pity you weren’t in the barn.’

‘Why, sir?’ she asked.

‘Why? Because there’s nothing, just nothing like a barn party ... unless, of course, it’s a barn wedding.’ His eyes gleamed.

‘That’s something I wouldn’t have thought would interest you, Mr Roper.’

‘No? But I think I told you I was considering coming out of the shell again.’

‘Interesting,’ Georgina murmured. ‘What caused the desire to return to life?’

‘You, as a matter of fact,’ he said calmly.

‘Me!’ For a moment Georgina’s heart lurched. Surely he didn’t... surely he hadn’t...

He cut in at once, and suavely. He said: ‘Mrs Willmott’s chatter about bringing you out of yourself took me back to my own green years. I envied you your youth, so I decided to do something about it for myself before I was left behind.’

‘Oh,’ said Georgina with relief. For a few moments she had thought he had seen Georgina in her, not George.

Across from the barn wafted the opening waltz. Only a piano, a fiddle and an accordion, but the night lent a magic to the music and the notes crept in almost unbearably sweet.

Out here, thought Georgina, the music would always be yesterday’s, as this music was now; there were too many intervening miles for latest hits. But Irving Berlin’s
Always
fitted her mood perfectly. She followed the words with quiet lips. ‘I’ll be loving you always. She wondered what Larry would say if she told him that that was why she was here now, why she was living a lie, that it was because she loved this inland so much and so completely, that she must now love it for ever. For always.

‘Mr Roper ’ she said spontaneously.

‘Yes, George?’ he mocked her tone.

‘Are you comfortable?’ Georgina said instead.

About midnight the party broke up. It was early by city standards, but every car, jeep, waggon and truck had miles to travel home.

Mrs Willmott tiptoed in, flushed, triumphant, regretful and dog-tired all at the same time.

‘How is he, George?’

‘Quite good. We talked for a while, but I think he’s gone off now.’ He hadn’t spoken for an hour, but then neither had she. The music had weaved between them and there had been no need for words.

‘That’s splendid, George. Now you go to bed, boy. No, not down at the hut, here in the homestead. It s my turn to watch.’

‘No, Mrs Willmott,’ she protested.

‘But, George, I’d like you in the house in case.’

‘I meant I’m not leaving the room. I’m staying. Yes, I mean that, Mrs Willmott. You’ve been run off your feet— in your own words—and I’ve only been sitting here.’

It took a little persuasion, but Georgina could see the longing for rest in Mrs Willmott’s face. She renewed her efforts, and presently the housekeeper said: ‘For an hour only, then, just to give my legs a rest.’

She brought Georgina more tea, gave Roper an estimating look and agreed that he seemed fine, told Georgina to call her, then went out wearily.

Georgina closed the door after her and came back to the chair. She saw the lights of the barn go off, then the lights of the mess. She listened and heard Roper’s steady breathing, and after a watching hour she slumped in the chair and drifted to sleep herself.

She awoke to the first lemon-grey rays of morning and to a man’s bright blue eyes. The man was on the bed but not in the bed; he was sitting on it. He was also fully dressed.

As Georgina blinked at him he said: ‘Sugar, Brown?’ and she saw that he had brought in a tray.