"Great shooting here," said Mr. Warner—"or would be if it were not for the blacks. Any amount of teal and musk duck and wild geese. But the blacks fairly live in the swamp when the birds are here."
"Do they shoot them?" Dick asked.
"Oh, no—they're not allowed guns. But they're very useful with spears and throwing sticks; our blacks are fairly uncivilised, you see. Later on I suppose they'll lose all their old darts and become utterly useless; that's what has happened in the eastern states."
"Do you find them faithful?" asked Mr. Lester.
"Well—sometimes. You never can tell. A woman or a boy may have every appearance of being thoroughly settled down, and of responding to training, and then some fine morning you find one 'gone bush'—back to the tribe. Possibly you never see that one again; possibly he or she will turn up six months later, quite prepared to go back to work. On the other hand, we have a few who have been for years with us. Children are their best tie; if they once become attached to your youngsters they're much less likely to go."
He talked on, telling stories of the blacks and of the wild life of the early days, leaning back in his seat with one careless hand on the wheel, while the car seemed to find its own way along the noiseless sandy track. The scattered farms that spread out a few miles from the township gave place to wide plains, partly covered with scrub, where only an occasional house was to be seen; and the road grew more and more lonely. At first they had met buggies, bullock wagons, and one or two other motors, but after a time they seemed to be the only people on the plain, and it was almost a relief when they met a "sun-downer" slouching along under a heavy swag, his felt hat pulled low over his eyes, and a battered quart pot in his hand. The sun sank lower and lower, and a keen breeze made the travellers glad to put on heavier coats. It was almost dusk when they emerged from a dense belt of gum trees and saw ahead of them a fence, stretching apparently for miles east and west, and a gate that stood open, held by a solemn black boy. Mr. Warner nodded to him, and they swept through. The track curved round a plantation of pines, and they saw a homestead so large that it looked like a village. White-painted roofs gleamed among the trees, and scattered buildings fringed the main block until there seemed no end to them, while the tall, spidery outlines of windmills towered above the green. The deep emerald of a lucerne paddock stretched down to a little creek.
"I didn't know you could grow lucerne here," remarked Mr. Lester. "In fact, I had a vague idea that nothing but sand and mulga really flourished in the West. But your place doesn't suggest that!"
"You can do a heap with irrigation," his host answered. "Between the windmills and a hydraulic ram down at the creek I can get as much water as I want; and with water you can grow anything in this climate. I'll show you all the place to-morrow."
He gave a long coo-ee, bringing the car more slowly round a fence that bordered a great garden. There seemed a dense crowd waiting for them: Mrs. Warner first, her kind face alight with welcome. Merle beside her; close at hand the twinses, struggling against control; and then a few white faces amidst a mass of black ones, all striving to have a good look at the new arrivals. The car came to a standstill, and suddenly Bobby hurtled through the throng and flung himself at the step.
"Hallo, Dick! Oh, I's so glad you came!"