She joined him presently in the corridor, fresh and dainty. They were rushing along again between miles of grey fencing. Ploughs were already busy in the paddocks, where flocks of white cockatoos settled on the newly-turned brown earth in search of grubs. Past trim dairy farms, with the herds slowly stringing away from the sheds after milking; by little townships, where the air was blue with the smoke of a hundred breakfast fires; by creek and gully, towering hill and stretching plain, the express roared. People in the carriages were beginning to wake up; heads, more or less in undress appearance, peeped from the doors of the sleepers, and voices were heard demanding the conductor and hot water. The summons to breakfast came presently, to Dick's great joy, for the keen air had made him hungry, and when they came back from the meal they found that their beds had disappeared, and the sleepers once more bore the air of an ordinary compartment.
"We're in the hills now," Mrs. Lester said, glancing out. "Come to the doorway, Dickie; this is the loveliest bit of any railway journey I know."
They went along the corridor to the big doorway. The door was open, and through it they could see that the train was rushing through hills, steadily mounting all the time. The gum trees that clothed everything with green waved feathery heads quite close to them, and, far as the eye could see, golden wattle blazed through the scrub. Up and up they went. White roads led away through the hill slopes; now and then could be seen an early motorist spinning along in the joy of their perfect surface. Then came the very summit of the climb, and the train ran into a trim little station, gay with flowers, perched on top of the highest hill.
"Mount Lofty," said Mrs. Lester.
"My word, what jolly houses!" was Dick's comment.
They looked from the doorway down into the green heart of the scrub. Here and there, half buried in the trees, were the homes to which happy people of Adelaide fly when the summer heat lies scorching on the plains; red houses, with terraced lawns and gardens ablaze with blossoms; grey houses, with roses climbing over high trellises. They perched on terraces cut out of the sides of the hills, or nestled in nooks in the gullies, their gardens gleaming like jewels in the dull green of the eucalyptus. The curve of a road showed here and there, white level, diving down into some unseen hollow. Dew yet hung on the gum trees, and little wreaths of mist floated upwards from the gullies; the bush scents filled the air. Everywhere birds sang and twittered in the branches; everywhere the gold of the wattle gleamed through the dull green of the scrub. Then the train moved on, slipping quietly down, each moment revealing some new turn of beauty; until at last the plains opened out below, and they could see Adelaide lying just where the land seemed to end, and the blue rim of the sea widened, with the smoke of the steamer making a long trail across the water.
"Wonder if that's our boat?" Dick said. "No, it can't be, because it's coming the wrong way—amn't I stupid! Oh, mother, isn't it all jolly!" He pranced gaily back to the sleeper, to lend a hand in collecting their hand baggage. They were running now through trim, flat suburbs, and presently, with a grinding of the brakes, they stopped in a big station—Adelaide at last.
A helpful porter—brought them, as a kind of offering, by their friend the conductor—collected their luggage and put them on a train bound for Port Adelaide; a place of grimy wharfs and dusty streets, where, after some search, they discovered their boat, the Moondarra, spic and span in her dingy surroundings. Dick's heart bounded as he followed his mother up the gangway. He had never before been on anything but a Bay paddle steamer; to him, even the seven-thousand ton inter-State boat seemed a mighty ship, and he longed to explore her from stem to stern. It was with a feeling of disappointment that he learned they were not to sail until the evening.
"It's really hardly worth your while to remain on board," an officer told Mrs. Lester. "We've a rush lot of cargo coming at the last moment, and the ship won't be comfortable before six o'clock—nothing but noise and dust. I should advise you to go up to Adelaide for the day. Why not have a run in the hills? Is your luggage on board?"
"It is on the wharf," Mrs. Lester said, glancing towards a laden truck in charge of a porter.