Page:In bad company and other stories.djvu/287

 in North Devon for all the good I am likely to do. I could have taken a farm there, and—well—probably have managed to pay the rent. I have bought a farm here, become a free-holder—that most enviable position, at least in England—and now when I've got it I don't know what to do with it. Old Polyblock's sheep eat right up to my boundary, and beyond it too. I gather there's not much to be done with three hundred and twenty acres in a dry season. My wheat is prematurely yellow; my potatoes won't come up! I must fence my farm in; that will cost—at six shillings a rod—let me see—how much? (Sits down on log and begins to cipher in pocket-book.)

(who has ridden closely up in the meantime, and is watching him, coughs slightly). Don't let me interrupt you, but you seem absorbed in thought. Is it about the value of the tree, or some other abstruse calculation?

(jumps up hastily). Oh, my dearest Dulcie! neither, that is, both—really I hardly know what I am about at present. I was working to distract my mind. I suppose it's always right to cut down a tree?

. Nonsense! About the worst thing you could do. Sinful waste of time. Do you suppose father made his money in that way? The pencil and pocket-book look more like it. We say in Australia that a man's head ought to be good enough to save his hands. Are your birth, breeding, and education only equal to a pound a week? Because you can buy a man's work for that—all the year round.

. But I thought all the early colonists worked with their hands, tended their sheep, drove bullocks and all that—the books say so.

. Nonsense! The people who know, don't write books—very seldom at least. The people who write books, don't know. That's the English of it. But I came through the township and I've brought your post. Here's a letter and a newspaper.

. Heaven be thanked and my Guardian Angel! That's you, my dearest Dulcie. Oh, that I had you always to be near me—to protect me from the ways of this wicked Australian world!

. H—m! You want some one, I do believe. I might consider over the contract, but my tender—ahem!—wouldn't be accepted at present. Father's going on like an