Davey felt himself grow hot and red.
Jess laughed delightedly.
"Oh you look so funny, Davey!" she cried. "Mick doesn't look like that when I kiss him."
Jess was only a kid, Davey told himself, and because she had brothers and kissed them, thought she could kiss other boys. Yet her gay little peck at his cheek had not displeased him. He wondered whether Deirdre and the Schoolmaster had seen it.
Davey got out of the cart to swing open the long gate. He left it open for the Schoolmaster. Mrs. Cameron came into the yard.
Jess jumped out of the cart and ran to her.
"Mother says, Mrs. Cameron dear," she cried, "would you please give her the recipe for making cough-mixture with gum leaves. And she sends her love and hopes you are well—as she is—and our black cow has a calf, and I found thirteen eggs in a nest in the creek paddock, and Mick killed a snake, five-foot long, under the verandah on Sunday."
Mrs. Cameron smiled and kissed her. Jess snuggled affectionately against her.
"The Schoolmaster's bringing Deirdre," Davey said.
Mrs. Cameron's eyes flew along the track to the other cart that was coming slowly up the hillside.