'Never mind, I couldn't have drunk it,' she said, then as the man came back, 'I am so sorry to give you that trouble, steward. If you like to bring a cloth, I'll wipe it up myself.'
'Well, about Bart,' said the mother, 'what will Bart be like?'
'Oh, Bart,' said Challis, 'I just feel as if we'll rush straight together, and never come undone again. That's the sort of feeling you have when you're twins. I feel I'd like to give him everything and sew his buttons on and let him bully me. You notice the Griffithses here. They're twins, and she does everything he tells her, and he gets everything for her. It's lovely. I hope Bart hasn't forgotten we're twins.'
'And Roly?'
'Roly? I'm not sure of Roly. I can hardly see him at all. I think, p'r'aps, he's like that little boy at our table who wears Eton suits and tries to walk like the boatswain. All I can remember about Roly is one day we were eating water-melon in the paddock, and Roly ate his slice away and away, till there was just a green circle round his head.'
'And Flossie—my little baby Floss?'
'Darling little Flossie, I almost love her best of all. She's got very goldy hair and a teeny little face, and she's as little as Lady Millbourne's little girl. And she likes being carried about, and she can't dress herself, and I shall dress her, and fasten all the dear little buttons, and tie her sashes. And I shall put her to bed myself, nobody else must, and I'll tell her stories and stories. And every day there'll be something new for her out of my box. There are fifteen things for her, mother, not counting what she's to go halves with Roly in. Isn't it a darling little tea-set? I never saw such sweet little cups. And won't she like the little dolls from the Crystal Palace? I'd really like to play with them myself. And the big doll we got in the Rue de Crenelle. I must get on with its frock to-morrow, mother, or it never will be done.'
On, on went the ship through the secret waters. New stars came out on the great night skies, new breezes played in the rigging. On, on, and the long days dropped away, somewhere, somewhere, beyond the edge of the sea. On, on, and the happy eyes saw at last the dear frown of the Australian coast-line.
CHAPTER XIII
The Bush Contingent