“I really wish I could. No, I do not like it—there is something about it that repels me. You know I’m a Highlander, and am sensitive to impressions.”
“My dear Liz,” and here she came to a dead halt, “you don’t mean me to suppose that you think it is haunted? Why, this is the twentieth century!”
“I did not say it was haunted”—(I dared not voice my fears)—“but I declare that I do not like it, and I wish you’d wait; wait only a couple of days, and I’ll take you to see the Watsons’ bungalow—so sunny, so lived in—always so cheerful, with a lovely garden, and an office for Tom.”
“I’m not sure that that is an advantage!” she exclaimed with a smile. “It is not always agreeable to have a man on the premises for twenty-four hours out of the twenty-four hours!”
“But the Watsons——”
“My dear Liz, if you say another word about the Watsons’ bungalow I shall have a bad attack of the sulks, and go straight to bed!”
It is needless to mention that Tom was delighted with the bungalow selected by his ever-clever little wife, and for the next week our own abode was the resort of tailors, hawkers, butchers, milkmen, furniture-makers, ponies and cows on sale, and troops of servants in quest of places.
Every day Netta went over to the house to inspect, and to give directions, to see how the mallees were laying out the garden and Badminton courts, and the matting people and whitewashers were progressing indoors.
Many hands make light work, and within a week the transformation of the Red Bungalow was astonishing. Within a fortnight it was complete; the stables were again occupied—also the new spick-and-span servants’ quarters; Badminton courts were ready to be played upon; the verandah and porch were gay with palms and plants and parrots, and the drawing-room was the admiration of all Kulu. Netta introduced plants in pots—pots actually dressed up in pongee silk!—to the station ladies; her sofa cushions were frilled, she had quantities of pretty pictures and photos, silver knick-knacks, and gay rugs.
But before Netta had had the usual name-board—“Major Fellowes, A.Q.M.G.”—attached to the gate piers of the Red Bungalow, there had been some demur and remonstrance. My ayah, an old Madrasi, long in my service, had ventured one day, as she held my hair in her hand, “That new missus never taking the old Red Bungalow?”