‘Not that I know of. There’s two chaps with that last flock, one of ’em’s a “new chum.”’
Mr. Jedwood rode down to the flock indicated, and there discovered Mr. Neuchamp in the act of eating a piece of boiled corned mutton, and looking around in an unsatisfied manner, as if anxious for more.
‘You are Mr. Neuchamp, I think, a gentleman introduced by letter to me by my old friend Paul Frankston?’
‘The same,’ said Ernest, putting down his damper and mutton carefully and standing up. ‘I intended to present myself to-morrow morning, after being settled with.’
‘Settled with?’ said Jedwood, in a tone of astonishment. ‘You don’t mean to say you’ve really hired yourself to drive travelling sheep! Not but it’s a sensible thing enough to do; still you’re the first “colonial experience” young fellow that it ever occurred to within my knowledge.’
‘I had reasons for it, which can be better explained by and by,’ answered Ernest. ‘In the meantime, there is a travelling companion of mine whom I should feel obliged if you could employ at Garrandilla. Jack, come here!’
Mr. Jedwood looked keenly at the ingenuous countenance of Mr. Jack Windsor, and then, after suffering his eye to fall approvingly upon his athletic frame, said—
‘There’s always employment at Garrandilla for men that know how to work, and are not afraid to put out their strength. What can you do, young man?’
‘Well, most things,’ answered the Australian, with quiet confidence; ‘fence, split, milk, drive bullocks, stock-keep, plough, make dams, build huts; I’m not particular, till August, then I’m a shearer.’
‘Can you break horses?’ asked the squatter, ‘for I have a lot of colts I want badly to put to work, and I can’t get a decent man to handle them.’