"Has a man held you in his arms? Have you ever been kissed into kindness? What are you laughing at? Don't laugh, I say!"
"Of course a girl's been kissed. I don't think ever was a time I wasn't kissed. Why a girl would go dummy with only an old dog as mate, and a kangaroo or two, and maybe an old goanna to watch. What are you frowning for? My lips aren't kissed away."
"The jewel that takes long getting is highest priced. Let's go back to fishing. You have told me enough.... No, I can't fish to-night. We might be a hundred miles away from anyone down here. Sooner or later you will go away; but I shall never ride past the Pool again without remembering you. I shall come here every year, when the castor-oil tree flowers, for it was flowering when first I saw Molly Gregory standing in the doorway of her tent, holding a lantern above her head.... Isn't it still? The night is too close.... Molly, why are you so beautiful? Don't you know the night is in love with you? That's why the fishes are jumping. Don't you know the kangaroo and his mate are stooping to drink down there, that they may share the same pool with you? Molly, a man and a girl are only young once. It is all over in a few quick years. All life to live in that time. A world to see.... Molly, wake up. Don't look into your lap. Your rich body is spoiling. The bush is jealous of beauty, and would claw the fairest works with her lean fingers. Molly, wake up and live."
"Aw, talk, talk, and who is the better for it in the end? I can go back to the humpy more miserable, if that is what you want. Mr. King comes with his grand tales, and drives off in the buggy, leaving a girl to cry her eyes out in a room of bags. I hate the bush. I would spit it out of my mouth, as Dad spits the suckings of his pipe out at the door. What does the bush give you? Just gives you nothing. Never a man or a girl to speak to. Just wash up, wash up, wash up. And carry the water from the creek. And bail up the goats when you've got them. And a ride to the store as a treat. And make your Johnny cake half the week, because you haven't the heart to make bread, or haven't built the oven. And no schooling. And not a church to go to, even if you did want to. And just the clothes to wear as nobody will take in town. And growl, growl, growl all day from everyone round. And if you have a few looks, there's nobody to tell you what they think of them. Oh, you don't know how sick I am of it. I fall dreaming sometimes, and think some man comes and takes me right away. And then Mum gets on to me for mooning. I'll get married some day to a looney boundary rider, and live in a hut all me life, and have a pack of children, and grow as skinny as the best of them. If I have daddy looks then I'll sell them to the first man who'll pay me. The first man to take me away can have me, and he can drop me when he's tired."
"Don't talk like that. Don't dare to talk like that. You and I will fall out, girl, if there's much of that spoken."
"Turning parson, Mr. Power?... Listen, there's Mum. Hallo! What is it?"
A voice came through the dark. "Mick O'Neill's round for half-an-hour. Aren't yer coming in? You'll go ratty moonin' there all night."
"Coming!"
The spell was broken. Power forsook fairyland for everyday. Moll Gregory and he walked towards the house through the close night. The spikes of the grasses bent under their feet, and insects voyaging through the dark brushed their faces. Gregory stood in the doorway of the hut, fingering his dirty beard and talking to O'Neill. "Hullo, Moll, got company?" he cried. "Why, it's Mr. Power. Come right in. There's always a seat inside here waiting for Mr. Power."
"Hullo, boss," O'Neill said, "I thought you were down at Surprise."