‘No, Walter. They’ve gone away a long time. I hear voices now sometimes, but they’re the Bush Fairies’ voices. I hear them calling Maggie and Wally to come with them.’ She paused again. ‘And sometimes I think I hear them call me. But of course I couldn’t go away without you, Walter. But I’m foolish again. I was going to ask you about the other voices, Mr Ellis. They used to say that it was madness about the fairies; but then, if the fairies hadn’t taken the children, Black Jimmy, or the black trackers with the police, could have tracked and found them at once.’
‘Of course they could, Mrs Head,’ I said.
‘They said that the trackers couldn’t track them because there was rain a few hours after the children were lost. But that was ridiculous. It was only a thunderstorm.’
‘Why!’ I said, ‘I’ve known the blacks to track a man after a week’s heavy rain.’
She had her head between her fingers again, and when she looked up it was in a scared way.
‘Oh, Walter!’ she said, clutching the Boss’s arm; ‘whatever have I been talking about? What must Mr Ellis think of me? Oh! why did you let me talk like that?’
He put his arm round her. Andy nudged me and got up.
‘Where are you going, Mr Ellis?’ she asked hurriedly. ‘You’re not going to-night. Auntie’s made a bed for you in Andy’s room. You mustn’t mind me.’
‘Jack and Andy are going out for a little while,’ said the Boss. ‘They’ll be in to supper. We’ll have a yarn, Maggie.’
‘Be sure you come back to supper, Mr Ellis,’ she said. ‘I really don’t know what you must think of me,—I’ve been talking all the time.’