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 her own belongings were not there, and turned again to Bob.

“What do you think of it so far?” she asked.

“I think the paper is a promising thing. They will turn it into a daily next summer if we make a good start. Anyway it is a stepping-stone, and we can make it pretty much what we like so long as we boom the district and Benton’s candidature. The committee’s fine, and as they all have work to do and know nothing about running a paper they will not be fussing about the office all the time.”

“And the place?”

Bob shrugged his shoulders. “Well, you’ll see.”

Valerie looked about her, seeing the wharf, the sheds, the steamer, and the uninteresting line of low shops across the street. But the rest of the place blurred off into the pall of smoke that was choking the life out of the little flat town. Even the opposite bank of the river was clouded in a hot mystery. The Wairoa itself, usually a restless stream, dawdled along on the top of the tide, a turgid yellow, carrying charred debris gathered up by its far-off rambling tributaries, and doing nothing that a river should to cool the air or refresh the eye. It was hotter, if anything, on its surface than it was in the sandy town.

Valerie gave little thought just then to the passengers or to the people who met them, though she knew that she and Bob were being stared at. The town already knew him as the editor of the new tri-weekly paper, and it had known for some days that he was to have a woman assistant from Auckland. While this was a matter of real interest in a place that had a population of under two thousand, it was not a matter for astonishment. Nothing was a matter for astonishment in Dargaville. That was the town’s pet pose.