Page:Kangaroo, 1923.pdf/214

 drift, not to think or strain or make any effort to consciousness whatsoever. That was Jack, sauntering down there in his shirt-sleeves, with his waistcoat open showing his white shirt, his strong neck bare: sauntering with his hands in his pockets beside Somers, at the water's edge. Somers wore a dark flannel jacket, and his necktie hung dark and broke the intimacy of the white shirt-breast.

The two women stood on the cliff, the low, bushy cliff, looking down. Harriet was in a plain dress of dark-coloured purplish-and-brown hand-woven stuff of cotton and silk mixture, with old silver lace round the collar; Victoria in a pale-green knitted dress. So they stood in the morning light, watching the men on the fawn-coloured sand by the sea-fringe, waiting to wave when they looked up.

Jack looked up first. The two women coo-eed and waved. He took his pipe from his mouth and held it high in his hand, in answer. A strange signal. The pale-green wisp of Victoria in the sky was part of his landscape. But the darker figure of Harriet had for some reason a menace to him, up there. He suddenly felt as if he were down below: he suddenly realised a need to bethink himself. He turned to Somers, looking down and saying in his peculiar Australian tone:

"Well, I suppose we'd better be going up."

The curious note of obedience in the manly twang!

Victoria made him put on coat and collar and tie for breakfast.

"Yes, dear, come on. I'll tie your tie for you."

"I suppose a man was born to give in," said he, with laconic good humour and obstinacy. But he was a little uneasy. He realised the need to gather himself together.

"You get like the rest of them," Victoria scolded him in a coaxing tone. "You used to be so smart. And you promised me you'd never go slack like they all are. Didn't you, you bad boy?"

"I forget," said he. But nevertheless the constraint of breakfast pulled him up. Because Harriet really disapproved, and he didn't know what was inside that rose-and-brown-purple cloud of her. The ancient judgment of the Old World. So he gathered himself somewhat together. But he was so far, fern-lost, from the old world.