Robin waved her hand to the cheerful pair, and went off round the house—a workmanlike figure in blue shirt and khaki breeches, finished with home-made leggings of khaki cloth. From the first she had discarded skirts for country wear; and fortunately, Mrs. Hurst had put by a stock of breeches belonging to her husband, which her nimble fingers had altered to suit Robin’s requirements. The Jersey cow was waiting near the shed, where a shining bucket was up-ended on a rough bench, beside a three-legged stool. Robin petted her for a moment, and then sat down in the open to milk her—there was no need now to affront Bessy with the indignity of a bail. This done, she fed her, gave breakfast to Daisy, the calf, and to two small pigs that roamed at will in a tiny paddock; and, taking a hoe, went off to the vegetable garden.
Everything was very neat about the Hill Farm house. In front was a rambling old garden, ablaze with flowers. A trimly-cut lawn, shaded on the west by a row of Cootamundra wattles, took up much of the space; and there were winding walks and cool, quiet nooks where rustic seats invited you to sit down and rest, looking down the smooth green slopes towards the creek. Creeping plants and climbing roses made the wide verandas into bowers of scented bloom. Beyond the well-kept back yard came the vegetable garden, the pride of Robin’s heart.
Danny had dug the garden for Robin, refusing any payment. It was, indeed, difficult to exclude Danny from Hill Farm: the fact that he was supposed to be working for his father did not prevent him from appearing at odd moments, not at the house itself, but wherever any job waited that required extra muscle. Thus, Robin would find the cow-yard or pigsty swept and garnished: a heap of wood split and stacked, or a broken fence mended. “Aw, I just gotta spare hour an’ nothin’ to do in it,” Danny would say, bashfully. It was evident that he still looked on the Hursts as his responsibility.
Mrs. Hurst worried over the fact that it was impossible to make him take any money—the mere mention of which threw Danny into painful embarrassment. She consoled herself by knitting him socks, and by keeping on hand a stock of the brown gingerbread that never failed to delight him. Danny regarded himself as the guardian of the family, and would have been content with his position without either gingerbread or socks.
The vegetables stretched in neat rows, and, to Robin’s mind, represented unlimited wealth. The season had been kind to her: rain had come just when it was needed, and everything had flourished amazingly in the rich virgin soil. Long lines of potatoes were in flower: peas, beans, turnips, and all their brethren made a heartsome sight; and there was a little corner Robin loved, where thyme, sage, marjoram and parsley lent their old-world sweetness. Not a weed was to be seen anywhere. Daily the gardener made her way, hoe in hand, up and down each row; and in face of this martial pilgrimage no weed dared lift its head. Robin declared that her motto was, “A hoe in time saves nine.”
Already she had preparations in train for disposing of her crop. Baroin boasted a good greengrocer’s shop, and Robin had made friends with its proprietress, who had agreed to take a weekly supply of vegetables from her as soon as they were ready. Eggs and chickens were to be a side-line. In a netted pen a dozen cockerels fattened in happy ignorance of the advance of Christmas, while three or four broods of fluffy chicks roamed the hillside beside their fussy mothers, and young ducklings swam gaily in the creek. Robin yarded them all carefully every evening, for there were many foxes in the bush, a terror to every country poultry-yard.
The months since the death of her uncle had been, for her mother and herself, a time of absolute happiness. They were busy, but never oppressed with work. The house was much too large for them, but most of the rooms had been shut up, after undergoing a rigorous spring-cleaning. They slept on the veranda, and took most of their meals there; the bathroom served them as dressing-room, so that housework was reduced to its lowest possible terms, since there was no dust and no one to make the place disorderly. Together they worked in the garden, kept everything spick-and-span, and made a joke of each hour’s toil as it came. There was time for play, too: they fished in the creek for trout and blackfish, and took long walks over the hills, where many a rabbit fell to Robin’s gun.
The peaceful, happy life had wrought a great change in Mrs. Hurst. She looked years younger already: there was a new light in her eyes, a new energy in her movements. Colour had returned to her white face, and wrinkles had vanished. Robin was desperately proud of her. “When I make you wear breeches like me and have your hair shingled,” she declared, “everyone will think you’re my young sister!” To which Mrs. Hurst responded that she preferred the dignity of age.
The bell rang just as Robin reached the end of her last row of peas, and she fled to answer it with a haste that proclaimed hunger. When, after washing her hands, she appeared on the veranda, Mrs. Hurst was waiting for her. Robin attacked her porridge and cream ravenously.
“Isn’t it a good thing you brought me up not to take sugar with porridge?” she remarked. “Sugar costs a lot of money, and we can’t possibly grow it ourselves. The girls at school used to think me perfectly mad when I said they turned their porridge into a pudding. Oh, I am hungry, Mummie, and the runner beans are up, and I got three weeds. Small weeds, but healthy. We can have radishes for tea to-night. More, please.”