“Not quite unanimously, Miss Ethie. It was like this: Mr Cooper and Mr Harry waited for you, and your father waited for Mr Broadbent. It comes to the same thing in the end, you know.”
“Yes,” said Etheldene, “and it’s funny.”
“What did you come for, Bill? Your horse looks a bit jaded.”
“To invite you all to the hunt. Findlayson’s compliments, and all that genteel nonsense; and come as many as can. Why, the kangaroos, drat ’em, are eating us up. What with them and the dingoes we’ve been having fine times, I can tell ye!”
“Well, it seems to me, Bill, your master is always in trouble. Last year it was the blacks, the year before he was visited by bushrangers, wasn’t he?”
“Ye-es. Fact is we’re a bit too far north, and a little too much out west, and so everything gets at us like.”
“And when is the hunt?”
“Soon’s we can gather.”
“I’m going for one,” said Etheldene.
“What you, Miss?” said Hurricane Bill. “You’re most too young, ain’t ye?”