'There's the Boss,' said Moongarr Bill. 'Look alive, with that packhorse, Wombo.'
Lady Bridget now perceived behind the stockman a black boy on a young colt, leading a sturdy flea-bitten grey, laden with a pack bag on either side. He jumped off as lightly as Moongarr Bill and hitched his horses also to the veranda posts. Except that he was black as a coal, save for the whites of his eyes and his gleaming teeth, he seemed a grotesque understudy of the stockman—moleskins, not too clean and rubbed and frayed in places, fastened up with a strap; faded Crimean shirt exposing a wealed and tattooed breast; old felt hat—not a cabbage tree—with a pipe stuck in its greasy band; an ancient red silk handkerchief with ragged edges, where whip crackers had been torn off, round his neck, and a short axe slipped among a few old pouches into the strap at his waist. He jumped on to the veranda, clicked his teeth in an admiring ejaculation as he gazed at Lady Bridget.
'My word! BUJERI feller White Mary you! ... new feller Mithsis belonging to Boss. My word!' Then as McKeith drew up his horses in front of the hotel, Wombo and Moongarr Bill sprang to the heads of wheelers and leaders.
It seemed to Bridget that there was a change in her husband even since he had left her. He looked more determined, more practical, wholly absorbed in the unsentimental business of the moment. He had changed into looser, more workmanlike rig—was belted, pouched, carried his whip grandly, handled his reins with a royal air of command, as if he were now thoroughly at home in his own dominions, had already asserted his authority—which she found presently to be the case—and intended the rest of the world to knock under to him. There flashed on Lady Bridget an absurd idea of having been married by proxy—like the little princesses of history—and of being now received into her lord's country by the monarch in person. Her face was rippling all over with laughter when he joined her in the veranda.
'What! Another delicious black boy! He looks like a Christy Minstrel. I thought you hated blacks, Colin.'
'So I do. You've got to have 'em though for stock boys, and I keep my heel on the lot at Moongarr. Wombo and Cudgee aren't bad chaps so long as they are kept clear of their tribe. How do you like the new buggy, my lady? A dandy go-cart, eh?'
He looked as pleased as a child with a new toy carriage. The buggy was quite a smart bush turn-out—comfortable seats in front—a varnished cover, now lying back; a well behind, filled with luggage; a narrow back seat whence Cudgee—a smaller edition of Wombo—sprang down. Cudgee, too, stared at Lady Bridget and clicked his teeth in admiration, exclaiming:
'Hullo! New feller Mithsis.'
Afterwards, Lady Bridget remembered the greetings and wondered why the black boys had said: 'New feller Mithsis!' Who had been the old feller Mithsis? she asked herself.
McKeith sternly quashed the black boys' ebullition and told them to mind their own business. Bridget agreed that the buggy was first rate and became enthusiastic over the horses, four fairly matched and powerful roans.