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The June day was damp and raw. Afternoon had made an undignified early retreat, dimming the sun, and the cold had driven the starving cattle to huddle in sheltered spots, but there was the cold-proof warmth of joy at Lagoon Valley. Grandma Labosseer of Coolooluk, Bool Bool, had written that within a few days Sylvia would be home for a long holiday. Nearly two years before Sylvia had gone to live with Grandma, who liked the companionship and help of her prettiest granddaughter. Blanche adored her younger sister and had sorely missed her presence. The prospect of reunion filled her with delight. The intervening days were too few for her festival of furbishing and contriving.

"We'd better take to the fowlhouse and give you a clear field," protested Dick, for nowhere in the house was there tolerance of dusty blucher boots.

Upon the glad day Mr and Mrs Mazere took the buggy to meet Sylvia, while Blanche surged into a day's cooking. At the crest of the engagement Allan delivered a supply of oven wood and emptied his jaws of a chunk of quince to announce the approach of Arthur Masters. The cook left her patties and ran out among the winter-bitten shrubs of the back garden to inform the dismounting horseman of Sylvia's arrival.

"Topping!" he laughed down at the girl with the rolling pin. "Have you room for an offsider?" He dismounted and followed her to the kitchen, where Allan was weighing ingredients, Philippa, aged eleven, was beating eggs, and Aubrey was scraping a dish. "Is Sylvia coming home for good?"

"Oh, no. It's nicer for her at Coolooluk, and I understand taking care of mother better."

"Bring Sylvia to the football match on Saturday."

"The horses are too skinny to use for pleasure."

"Old Tarpot's as fat as a whale. I'll lend him to you while Sylvia is here."

"You're very kind, but I don't know if we ought to," murmured Blanche.

Masters could not be prevailed upon to stay. Blanche's commendable affection for her sister and her housewifely demonstration lacked allure. An unaccustomed clouding of purpose had made him ride round by Lagoon Valley and Deep Creek. Blanche passed from his mind as he rode away and pondered again upon Ignez Milford. What on earth could a young girl find to interest her in a book about the subjection of women? He chuckled to think of such dry tack being sprung on the young men who were attracted by her vivacity. She must never be seen in the Mantrap's parlours again. He wanted to ask her to call on him when Healey's affliction overcame him, but was diffident. Ignez had a habit of asking probing questions, and he could not confess to her the lewdness of men regarding girls who broke the conventions.

He arrived at Deep Creek in time for tea. His intention of warning Ignez about the Mantrap's clientele was banished by a new scandal, which she had created by riding for the mail in Healey's saddle. This might have passed had she kept to the bridle track in the underbrush of sour currant and geebungs, or had she maintained a precarious sideways seat, but she had sat gamely astride and galloped along the main road for a mile. She had been seen by half a dozen neighbours, all censorious of this breach of the proprieties. Lizzie Humphreys had gone for the mail on the present day and lingered for a gossip with Mrs Harrap, who lived not far from the Healey mail-box. Peter Harrap, an obscene galoot who worked intermittently for Healey, had been loafing there, and Lizzie was agog with his pronouncements.

"Pete said he could see the lace on Miss Ignez's pants," giggled Lizzie to the whole family.

Only Masters noticed the confusion on the girl's face, which she covered with, "That's one of his flea-brained fibs. I held my skirt down."

"But you should not have been on the main road on a man's saddle. You know what a fellow like that would think."

"He hasn't anything to think with, but what I think of him might some day be a classic," said Ignez with a flash of inspiration beyond her experience.

"What's a classic?" inquired Lizzie.

"Mine's going to be irrefutable in its own backyard."

"Pete said a lot more," continued Lizzie. "All the men was talking about you, an' Pete said if it was his sister done it, he'd have her shut up so she couldn't go astray."

The sharp pain on the girl's face showed Arthur his own wisdom in reference to the Mantrap situation.

Ignez parried the shaft with "And such as that will be able to vote for Federation! I'll ride as I please."

"While you're with me," interposed Mrs Healey, "you must not have all the neighbours talking."

"Fancy having to live in a place where men talk like that! Cockatoos have much more intelligence. If Pete and his like all fell into Deep Creek and never came out, they'd be no loss."

"Lizzie will repeat everything you say, with additions," warned Mrs Healey, as Lizzie took the plates to the kitchen.

Masters summed up judicially. "I think girls ought to use a cross-saddle, but they need to be dressed properly for it. It does no good to run in the teeth of talent like Pete."

"Women have little chance of getting out of the way with their legs in a bag if a horse falls," admitted Healey.

"Someone will have to begin the fashion," said Ignez.

"You had better leave that to the Governor's lady," advised Masters.

His thoughts were on the matter all the way home under the frosty stars. He meditated with pleasure upon giving summary correction to Pete Harrap should opportunity occur. He would lend a horse or anything else to brighten things for Blanche, but the thought of Ignez spread a brightness along the ringing road all the way to Barralong.

Everything was in readiness for Sylvia as the wintry dusk crept across the hollows, and a Tableland wind hissed along the cleared flats. The children had shining red faces from the combined forces of soap, water, and frost. Allan and Philippa lamented the darkness that hid the bundle handkerchief they had flown on a sapling at the front gate. The dining table had such profusion and style as marked the visits of the Member for the district or those of the higher clergy. Mulligan escorted the buggy for the last furlong with a frenzied lullaloo of welcome as the children rushed round the verandas and threw open the flower-garden gate.

"Here I am," cried a laughing girlish voice.

"There'll be a terrible frost tonight," said Mrs Mazere. "I can feel it in all my bones."

"All signs of rain gone again," added Mazere.

"Dick, you're a man, and Allan so tall I hardly know him! Philippa's curls below her waist already, and Aubrey—how you all have changed!" The youthful soprano tones ran on. Blanche came last with a comprehensive hug to express her satisfaction. Mazere and Dick unharnessed old Suck-Suck. Mrs Mazere was busy with her parcels. They clattered into the dining-room where a fire of logs sang in the open white hearth, and the Reverend Mull, so named for the latest curate, was making his toilet on the rug.

"We want to see you in the light," said Allan boisterously, as Sylvia went to the fire, beating her hands together and complaining of the stinging cold. She was used to admiration and met their delight with happy laughter. Blanche unbuttoned the coat with its fashionable fur collar and removed a hat of velvet to disclose a picture that brought tears of joy and adoration to her eyes. Blanche was tall and inclined to bend forward from the waist; years might add angularity. Sylvia was petite and slender with a profusion of golden hair inclining to chestnut, an oval face with a daintily classical profile, and, over all, an expression of vivacious sweetness and happiness.

"You'd never think Blanche and Sylvia were sisters," was how Allan expressed it. "Blanche is so tall—and—and Sylvia is just lovely!"

Dick brought in Sylvia's luggage, half a dozen pieces. "I bet the porter expected a tip for this."

"The porters didn't get a chance. Some man in the carriage always took it all."

"It's nice to be a young girl," Mrs Mazere sighed. "When you're old no one will rush to carry your luggage."

"That was Malcolm Oswald who helped you at Goulburn," remarked Mazere.

"Yes," said Sylvia, and began to talk of the droughty aspect of the country, which, she said, was much worse than at Bool Bool.

At last Blanche was alone with her pet as they toasted themselves and exchanged confidences before the magnificent coals of the waning drawing-room fire. Blanche was excited by this elegant young lady. Two years ago her hands, like Blanche's, had shown the results of rough usage in sun and frost. Now they were enviably ladylike.

They retired to their bedroom. A kangaroo hide was the only covering on the boards. There was a much-tinkered bedstead, which had been procured for half a crown, a little chest of drawers and a tiny looking glass, all second-hand. The room contained about ten shillings worth of furniture. Packing cases, papered and painted, did duty in various capacities. There were a few photographs in home-made frames as ornaments. Sylvia held the kerosene lamp to one of these.

"Arthur Masters!"

"He came this afternoon and offered to lend us his buggy horse."

"That shows he's dead nuts on you."

"He's just a friend."

"A platonic one—I know them," laughed Sylvia. "Like one of those jam puffs, squashy inside. Let's get to bed quickly, or I'll freeze. It's much colder here than at Coolooluk. It's this terrible wind."

When they were cuddled together for warmth Sylvia continued, "Couldn't we go to the football match on Saturday?"

"The horses are so poor. I don't like to use them for pleasure."

"You said Arthur would lend his."

"Father mightn't let us accept."

"Does he object to Arthur? Is it serious, or have you just got him on a string for practice?"

"That would be wicked! Poor Arthur!" Blanche's tone betrayed her.

"He only has an Oswald's Ridges farm, hasn't he? How did he start coming here? We usen't to know the Finnegans or Barralong people before I went to Grandma."

"Father sold him a couple of heifers and as it was tea-time he was invited to stay. After that he kept coming. He talks about organizing a co-operative dairy for the district."

"You mean like that one that used to be near the church, where the manager got drunk and left the pigs to die in the heat?"

"No!" Blanche's voice was scornful. "Arthur never touches a drop. He'd start something efficient."

"He'd need to...Dear me, isn't the house terribly poor! It makes me want to cry."

"I slaved to make it nice for you."

"I can see you did. I mean the things that you can't help."

"There's such a terrible drought."

"It's poor land, that's the trouble. Supposing I got married, then you could live with me. Things are better up the country. Father just the same—nothing thriving?"

"No one could thrive in this drought?"

"Yes, but uncle says he's a bad manager. Wouldn't you hate to settle down to one of these awful little cockatoo farms, rearing a few fowls and poddy calves, and dragging in a cowyard?"

"A woman is never let into the Masters cowyard or dairy."

"I see I'll have to be nice to my brother Arthur."

"I'm only showing it's not the places, it's the people."

"Poor places make poor people, Grandma says. Poor mother, complaining day and night as usual, I suppose?"

"Well, you're so pretty you ought to marry a prince, I'm sure. It'd be a pity to waste yourself on Oswald's Ridges."

"Malcolm Oswald said he might go to the football match."

"Is he in love with you?"

"I only met him on the train, silly! But he seems like all the men. The football match would be an outing."

"Arthur was just dying for an excuse to come for us."

"Tell me about Ignez Milford."

"She's supposed to be very clever, but no good in the house."

"Isn't she? In a letter to Grandma, Mother said she never saw a girl so quick, and that she makes her own frocks and riding habits already and can bake splendid bread if she sets her mind to it."

"Yes, but she thinks her mind's above such tame-hen work. She's not a bit womanly."

"What's she look like?"

"Some think she's wonderful, and others call her quite plain. She has a different kind of face, but you like to watch it. She says the terriblest things straight out to men as well as to women, but I don't think she would go astray with men—she's not fast that way."

"Is she really so clever at the piano?"

"She plays that dull stuff without a tune. Father says he would as soon have the tune the old cow died of."

"And her name—no one knows how to pronounce it. Where did she get it?"

"That's a good sign of what she's like. Ignez is merely foreign for Agnes."

"Agnes is a horrible name. No wonder she wants to change it."

"People call it Ignez, like it's spelt, and that's worse, like a lizard of some sort. She has always to be telling them to call it Eenyez, or Eenyeth is the tony Castilian way, she says. I'll ask her to stay here while you're home. It'll make more fun."

"That'll be topping. Let's go to the football match, but I'm sleepy now."