“Yes, but it’s all over now, and you’ve got the collar and I haven’t got anything.”
Every evening they met and talked over the events of the day. They had been in Sydney a month, and were enraptured with all they saw. They had quite run out of a stock of adjectives. Everything was lovely, or beautiful, or great or grand! They had gone to the beaches and gathered great bags of shells. They had dipped in the surf and shouted with glee as the big white-topped waves dashed over them. They had gone to the garden and gallery, and Zoo and picture shows over and over again, and could go through the whole programme cheerfully again, till Mother remonstrated with Uncle.
“You are spoiling them. Let them stay in and play in the garden,” she said.
But Uncle only smiled. He knew the months of loneliness those little girls had put in in the country, and was determined to give them a feast of enjoyment.
“I think Mosman must be the dearest place in all the world,” Mollie would say, as she gazed at the pretty homes nestling in their well-kept gardens.
Their cottage was only about five minutes’ walk from the ferry, and when nothing better was on they would race down the hill and watch the boats come in and go out, and talk and wonder about all the people. They became quite familiar little figures on the Mosman wharf—the five of them together—as they sat and criticised and compared notes.
They grew quite familiar with the postboy, and told him all about Teddy, and made him wish he was a country mailman.
“It’s a wonder you don’t ride round with your letters,” said Eileen.
“Ride round? I’d like to see a horse climbing these steps and hills. It’d have to be a different horse to any I’ve ever seen,” answered the post-boy.
“Oh, yes, of course!” said Eileen. “I’d forgotten that. You see, up where we live there’s no hills or steps. It’s all as flat as—as the verandah here.”