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In another moment the car light was off, but, having seen, Georgina went back to their own car for her long wait.

She stretched out when she got in the back seat, then closed her eyes. With luck she would shorten her waiting hours with sleep. But

‘Are your two left feet troubling you, Brown?’ asked a voice, and blinking her eyes open again, Georgina saw that Roper was opening the door of the car. ‘I was returning from the repair job,’ he said, ‘and thought that as I was as near as the Fortescues’ gate I would come further and see how you enjoyed yourselves.’

‘How did you find me? I mean find your car?’ There must be over fifty vehicles parked, Georgina thought.

‘I saw you in my headlights, so I promptly followed you.’ If he had seen her, he must have seen Joanne, too, Georgina thought. ‘I’ve left my car outside the parking paddock, but I’m not stopping. I’ve had a gruelling day. A successful one, though, we got the trailer back on its many wheels again with no cattle mishaps. Listen.’ He held up his hand. ‘Isn’t that our song?’ he grinned.

Across from the barn echoed Irving Berlin’s
Always.

I'm all for always. Are you?
In her mind Georgina heard him say that again.

All at once, and Georgina longed desperately for seclusion, a tear was trickling down her cheek. Thank heaven at least for the dark, she thought, but in case he did see that tear in the glint of a star or when the moon escaped a cloud, Georgina mumbled: ‘I think I’ve gone and got a cold.’

She felt as she had felt on the safari, longing ... yearning ... to be Georgina, not George.

‘In that case you can come home with me and do all the usual things, rum, lemon and aspirin. Can’t have our best geo down with the wog.’

‘I’m the only geo,’ she pointed out.

‘So you have to be the best, don’t you?’ He was opening the car door. ‘I’ll find Pat and tell him to bring our lady back in due course.’

‘No. Please don’t bother. I’ll be all right.’

‘In your own bed you will. What’s wrong with you, Brown? You needn’t worry about your stepsister, she would be quite self-reliant, I’m sure. Anyway, Pat knows he has to get himself and her back.’

‘Yes, but ’

There was a moment’s silence, then Roper said clearly: ‘If you think I may be leaving Joanne in the company of someone I don’t approve of, then perish your concern. Joanne is a very beautiful girl, and if someone else realises that then I can scarcely object. Now wait here.’

He was not gone long. He came back, said: ‘All’s well,’ and held open the door for Georgina to transfer to his other car, still parked on the drive.

‘So you found Pat?’ asked Georgina.

‘In the arms of his Jenny, yes.’

‘Did you find ’

‘Joanne? No. But the message will be passed on. Now stop talking, give your throat a rest. When we get back it’s a double rum for you.’

‘No, sir,’ she protested.

‘Afraid, Brown?’

‘Afraid?’

‘That you’ll talk?’ he said.

‘But you just told me not to talk.’

‘There is talk,’ Larry Roper replied, ‘and talk.’ He concentrated on weaving between other party-going cars that had only got as far as the drive. But once out of the Fortescue gate he pressed down on the accelerator, and they were back at Roper’s in less than the hour it had taken them to go to the party.

Much to Georgina’s relief Roper drove straight to the hut; she had not looked forward to sitting in the homestead lounge while Roper administered the promised double rum. The telltale light might have found that tear mark on her face, for tears generally showed, and men don’t cry.

Then she saw that Roper was coming into the hut behind her. He lit the lamp—no searching light there—then he said: ‘Instead of that rum, George, how about a cuppa?’

‘Oh yes, yes!’ Georgina nearly fell over herself with relief and eagerness.

They drank very leisurely with the door open, and the warm herby, minty air stealing in. They spoke very little.

‘After we check our finds, George,’ Roper said, I’ll be going south for several weeks, making dead sure my claims are waterproof. Anything you’d like me to bring back for you? I’ll be going by car, so I’ll have room.’

Across the table Georgina looked at Larry Roper and wondered what he would say if suddenly she blurted:

‘Yes, something pink, please, that’s for an ingénue. Or should it be blue because men like it?’

What was he waiting for her to answer? A bottle of aftershave? A plug of tobacco?

‘No, nothing, Mr Roper, nothing at all. I—I have everything.’

‘Everything, George?’ he questioned.

Somewhere -far away a dog howled, a yellow dog that must have evaded the dingo fence and was now in forbidden land.

And that’s where I’m straying, thought Georgina, I’m getting too close to forbidden land. But oh, how I wish

‘You wish what, George?’ Good heavens, had she said that “I wish” aloud?

‘I wish,’ blurted Georgina, ‘I was in bed. I think I feel a little worse. If you don’t mind going, Mr Roper ’

‘I’m gone,’ he nodded sympathetically. ‘Lie in tomorrow. I’ll even come down myself to see that you’ve done so.’ Which means, groaned Georgina, getting into the bed she had said she needed but now did not want any more, that I’ll have to be up well before that, because

But it was Joanne who came down, and by that time Georgina was up, ‘basin’ed’ and breakfasted.

Joanne came in and sat down at the table.

‘Pour me some coffee,’ she groaned, ‘I’m still a little out of this world after last night.’

‘Did Pat bring you home?’

‘Yes.’ Joanne made a face.

‘I saw you—with Craig. You had no trouble finding him?’

‘My dear George, we simply gravitated to each other,’ Joanne said airily.

‘So it appeared.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘I saw you in a car light.’

‘Oh!’

‘Mr Roper’s car light,’ Georgina said significantly.

Joanne looked up quickly. She did not seem pleased now.

‘Mr Roper is going to the city,’ Georgina said at once. She had no wish to start any post-mortems, and her tactics succeeded.

‘Is he now?’ Joanne said, and she sounded interested.

‘Yes, after we get back from our safari this week. It won’t be a long one, really only to—well ’

‘Well, what?’

‘To look around.’

‘You’ve just looked.’ Joanne sounded accusing.

‘Yes, but findings have to be authenticated.'

‘Findings of what?’

Sorry she had started this, Georgina mumbled, ‘Nickel.’ Then she said: ‘As it’s not a long trip perhaps you’d like to come too?’

‘As chaperone?’ inquired Joanne.

‘Hardly. Shouldn’t that be my role?'

‘I don’t know. Don’t ask me just now.'

‘But would you care to come?’ Georgina persisted.

‘No.’

‘It’s wonderful country.’

‘I see enough of it here.’

‘Joanne! ’

‘Well, that’s how I feel, George. I feel sixty in this place.

It’s so quiet, so dull. I mean, it was until ’ she broke off.

‘Joanne, don’t do anything you’ll be sorry about.'

‘Oh, I won’t,’ Joanne smiled.

‘And you won’t come?’

‘You know, George, I think I’ll be finding a lot to occupy me back here. And now tell me about this trip. It’s a checkup, isn’t it?’

‘I never said so.’

‘But you’re going over the same territory, so it must be.’

‘Well—yes.’

‘Then it must be something big! ’

‘Let’s say promising,’ Georgina hedged.

‘And Roper—and Larry is making absolutely sure. Yes, that would be like him.’ Joanne’s bottom lip had thrust out; she did not look so pretty now.

‘I’m going out in my car for a Cook’s,’ she announced. ‘Cook’s?’ echoed Georgina.

‘Cook’s tour, silly. At least that’s what I told Larry. He said to take you along in case I felt bushed, but you aren’t coming, are you?’

‘Aren’t I?’

‘No, because I won’t be on a Cook’s, I’m meeting Craig. Now, George dear, I’m so sorry you refused, but since you insist ... perhaps next time. See you again.’

Before Georgina could utter a word, Joanne was gone. Georgina watched her from the door of the hut, then came slowly back into the room.

Several
times that week Georgina saw Joanne’s mini-car buzzing down the long pepper-bordered drive to the Roper gates and the north-south road up which she had travelled with Craig, and where Joanne now ostensibly conducted her Cook’s tours. Georgina’s heart could have gone out to Larry Roper in sympathy for what was being done to him, had she not been unsure whether he did not know already. She could not imagine anything escaping that astute man. And yet, she reasoned, I’ve scored one over him myself. If she had, then feasibly Joanne had, too. Poor Larry Roper, she thought.

There was no day set yet for the departure of the second checking expedition; something had cropped up on the pastoral side of Roper’s that needed the boss’s immediate attention. One evening Joanne came down to the hut wearing a thunderous expression, and Georgina found out the reason for her bad temper. Whereas Larry Roper had accepted Joanne’s sweet excuses for not looking at rocks, it now appeared he had insisted she accompany the posse that was leaving the next day to overland a mob of the cattle.

‘But why?’ asked Georgina, puzzled.

‘He said I’d better get an idea of what life was really like up here.’

Georgina flinched at that, but hid it. She said, brightly: ‘I should have thought you would have been pleased at such a statement. It seems a very good sign.’

‘The only signs I like are those other signs, George, signs with dollars written all over them, the signs of the miracle nickel. Everyone knows that beef is down in value now.’

‘By signs I really meant,' Georgina took a breath and finished, ‘matrimonial signs.’

Joanne looked sulkily away and did not comment.

‘Will you come, too, George?’ she appealed.

‘I haven’t been instructed. I’m an employee, remember.’

‘Well, come anyway,’ said Joanne, still sulky. ‘I don’t want any of those clods getting the wrong idea about me.’

‘Which clods? What wrong idea?’

‘The stockmen. A female in their midst could start a lot of things, especially one like me.’ Joanne said it quite matter-of-factly; she always had been fully aware of her looks.

‘But it wouldn’t happen with Mr Roper there, too. I mean, they would know.’

‘Know what?’

‘That you—that he ’ Georgina faltered.

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, George, stop harping on that. Just see to it that you come, too.’

‘What good would I be? Another man?’

‘Just come. I might need you,’ retorted Joanne.

‘But if Mr Roper doesn’t require me ’

But Mr Roper, an hour later, told Georgina he would require her. "

‘I was hoping to get away on our geo business, Brown, but this other has cropped up. I’m taking Joanne, too, tomorrow, for several reasons. Firstly, I want her to know what makes things tick up here.’

‘Yes,’ said Georgina rather faintly, for she had a hollow feeling inside of her, ‘I think that’s very wise.’

‘Secondly ’ He broke off abruptly and was silent for a moment. Then he asked sharply: ‘Where does your stepsister go when she buzzes off in her car every day?’ Georgina hesitated. ‘She—looks around.’

‘Evidently she doesn’t register much of what she sees from what she relates when she gets back. That fellow she met at the dance ’

‘What fellow?’

'Oh, don’t give me that, Brown, you know the one I mean.’

‘Well, yes, I do know,’ she admitted.

‘Is he still around?’

‘How should I know?’

He did not answer, but Georgina, who had lowered her eyes, could feel his eyes boring into her. She could not look up; she did not dare to. So he
is
aware of Craig, she thought miserably, and he’s unhappy because—well, because he loves Joanne. He must do to be concerned like this, otherwise he wouldn’t bother.

‘She’ll be better with us,' Roper said shortly.

‘And you’ll take her, too, on the geo check?’ Georgina asked quite calmly, and she wondered how she did so. Not there, she was thinking intently, never there, not in that wonderland where the two of us, no one else, once looked up and saw the Min-Min Lights.

‘No!’ he came in quite forcibly, and this time she did look at him. But he glanced away at once, saying: ‘A check is a check. No third person is needed there.’

‘Even one who’s going to be ’

His eyes narrowed. ‘Yes, Brown?’

... Even one who is going to be connected with it? with its riches? marry into it? were Georgina’s thoughts, but she did not speak them.

'I'm sure you’re right, sir,' she said instead. She changed the subject adroitly. ‘What is it that’s cropped up on the cattle side? I mean, if it’s not secret.'

‘You can’t be secret about four legs and two horns,’ he grinned. ‘It’s simple, really. We are, as you know, right now the victims of a situation that’s affecting all the beef farmers.’

‘The beef slump?'

‘Yes. The beasts that are ready to road train south are naturally accounted for, but the way nature is there are many more
not
ready.'

‘What do you mean?' she queried.

‘The adolescents, the mothers-to-be, the new mothers with their progeny. For they do multiply, Brown, a habit with property cattle.' A wry laugh. ‘We've too many young to keep here until they can grow up and be taken off our hands. A paddock, after all, is exhaustible.'

‘Are all cattle stations facing this situation?'

‘Since the American and Japanese markets have faded out, yes. But not all are as affected as Roper’s, because things have got to the stage where in most places new calves are being knocked on the head as soon as they are born. It has become a sad but necessary precaution when sales are down and overstocking a monstrous certainty. I haven't done that.' His face firmed. ‘I never will. But I still can’t keep them all here until they're ready for a shrunken, indifferent and even non-existent market. There wouldn’t be any fodder left on the place. So we're droving them out, Brown. The gang that goes tomorrow will be relieved in ten days. In another ten days they, too, will step down. I’ve prepared a roster. You see, under the existing law,' he explained ‘unless you can find a sympathetic farmer with more grass than he wants, which is very unlikely, the herd has to be moved each day, but not more than six miles. At night, if you haven’t found a good Samaritan willing to let you use his fields, or a public yard, you have to fence them in. Well' ... a shrug ... ‘it isn't all that hard. We carry wire and sledgehammers and can nm up an enclosure by the time a billy boils.'