A man would soon wonder how it's done,
The stock so soon decreases!
A. B. PATERSON
"Where are you off to, Norah?"
"To feed the chickens."
"May I come with you, my pretty maid?"
"Delighted!" said Norah. "Here's a load for you."
"Even to stagger under thy kerosene tin were ever a joy!" responded Wally, seizing the can of feed as he spoke—the kerosene tin of the bush, that serves so many purposes, from bucket to cooking stove, and may end its days as a flower pot, or, flattened out, as roofing iron. "Anyhow, you oughtn't to carry this thing, Norah; it's too heavy. Why will you be such a goat?"
Under this direct query, put plaintively, Norah had the grace to look abashed.
"Well, I don't, as a rule," she said. "It's really Billy's job to carry it for me, but Jim has been coming with me since he came home, so of course young Billy's got out of hand. And Jim's gone across with Dad to see old Derrimut, so I had no one. I looked for you and couldn't find you. And I asked Cecil politely to accompany me, but he put his eyebrows up, and said fowls didn't interest him. Oh, Wally, don't you think it's terribly hard to find subjects that do interest Cecil?"
"Hard!" said Wally expressively. "Well, it beats me, anyhow. But then Cecil regards me with scorn and contumely, and, to tell you the truth, Nor., when I see him coming I quiver like—like a blancmange! He's so awfully superior!"
"You know, I'm sure he's not enjoying himself," Norah went on; "and it really worries us, 'cause we hate to think of anyone being here and not having a good time. But he does keep his nose so in the air, doesn't he?"
"Beats me how you're so nice to him," Wally averred. "My word, it would do that lad good to have a year or two at our school! I guess it would take some of the nonsense out of him. Was he ever young?"
"I shouldn't think so," Norah said, laughing—"he has such a lofty contempt for anything at all juvenile now. Well, at least he's looking better than when he came, so Billabong is doing him good in one way at any rate, and that is a comfort. But I'm sure he's counting the days until he goes away."
"Well, so am I," said Wally, cheerfully. "So at least there are two of us, and I should think there were several more. It's pleasant to find even one subject on which one can be a twin-soul with Cecil. Norah"—solemnly—"I have counted eleven different pairs of socks on that Johnny since I came, and each was more brilliant than the last!"
"I don't doubt it," Norah laughed. "They're the admiration of the laundry here, and even the men stopped and looked at them as they were hanging on the line last week. Dave Boone was much interested in that green pair with the gold stripes, and asked Sarah what football club they belonged to!"
"Great Scott!" said Wally explosively. "Can you imagine Cecil playing football?"
"I can't—I wish I could," Norah answered. "Well, never mind Cecil—he's a tiring subject. Tell me what you think of my chicks."
Norah's special fowl yard was a grassy run divided into two parts, with small houses and wire-netted enclosures in each. At present one was devoted to a couple of mothers with clutches of ten and twelve chickens—all white Orpingtons. The mothers were stately, comfortable dames, and the chicks, round little creamy balls, very tame and fascinating. They came quite close to Norah as she stooped to feed them, and one chick, bolder than his brethren, even stood on the back of her hand. Wally admired without stint, and proceeded to discharge the practical duty of rinsing out the water tins and filling them afresh.
In the other yard a number of older chickens grew and prospered; these also were all white, of the Leghorn breed, and Norah was immensely proud of them. She sat down on the end of a box and pointed out their varied beauties.
"I should have more—lots more," she said, dolefully. "But I've had horrible trouble with pigs. Why anybody keeps pigs at all I can't imagine!"
"They're handy when preserved," Wally remarked. "But what did they do to you?"
"I had a lot of hens sitting this year," said the owner of the yard—"sitting on lovely eggs, too, Wally! Some I got from Cunjee, and some from Westwood, and two special sittings from Melbourne. I was going to be awfully rich! You couldn't imagine all I'd planned with the immense sums I was going to make."
"There's a proverb," said Wally, sententiously, "about counting your chickens."
"You're quite the twelfth person who's mentioned that," Norah said, with some asperity. "Anyhow, I never counted them; I only became rich in a vague way, and it was very comforting. I'm glad I had that comfort, for it was all I had."
"Norah, you thrill my very soul with awful fears," Wally gasped. "Tell me the worst!"
"Donkey!" said Norah, unsympathetically. "Well, they were set. I fixed up the boxes myself, and lined them so beautifully that when they were ready, and the eggs in, it was all I could do to prevent myself sitting on them!"
"I know," Wally nodded. "And then the hens wouldn't sit, would they? They never do, when you make the nests especially tempting. I had an old Cochin once who used to sit quite happily for six months at a time on a clod and a bit of stone, expecting to hatch out a half-acre allotment and a town hall; but if you put her on twelve beautiful eggs she simply wouldn't look at them! Makes you vow you'll give up keeping hens at all."
"It would," Norah said. "Only mine didn't do that."
"Oh!" said Wally, a little blankly. "What did they do, then?"
"Sat—"
"And ate the eggs—I know," Wally burst in. "My old brute used to eat one a day if you got her to sit. I remember once it was a race between her and the eggs, and I used to haunt the nest, wondering would she get 'em all eaten before they hatched. They beat her by one—one poor chick came out. The shock was too much for the old hen, and she deserted it, and I poddied it in a box for a week, and called it Moses, and it would eat out of my hand, and then it died!" He gasped for breath, and Norah gazed with undisguised admiration at the orator.
"So I know how you'd feel," Wally finished.
"I might—but my hens weren't cannibals. They didn't eat any."
"You had luck," said the unabashed Wally. "Well, what happened?"
"They sat quite nicely—"
"And the eggs were addled, weren't they? It's always the way with half these swagger sittings you buy from dealers. They—"
"Oh, Wally, I WISH you wouldn't be so intelligent!" said Norah, with not unnatural heat. "How am I ever going to tell you?"
"Why, I thought you were telling me as hard as ever you could!" Wally responded, visibly indignant "Well, fire away; I won't speak another word!"
"I don't think you could help it," Norah laughed. "However, I'd eight hens sitting, and I really do believe that they understood their responsibilities, for they set as if they were glued, except when they came off for necessary exercise and refreshment. Even then, they never gave me any of the usual bother about refusing to go back into the right box, or scratching the eggs out. They behaved like perfect ladies—I might have known it was too bright to last!" She heaved a sigh.
"I know you're working up to some horrible tragedy, and I'm sure I won't be able to bear it!" said her hearer, much agitated. "Tell me the worst!"
"So they sat—"
"You said that before!"
"Well, they sat before—and after," said Norah, unmoved. "Two of them brought their eggs out, beautiful clutches, twelve in one and thirteen in the other. Such luck! I used to be like the old woman who pinched herself and asked, 'Be this I?' They all lived in a fox-proof yard—fence eight feet high with wire-netting on top. I wasn't leaving anything to chance about those chicks."
"Was it cholera? Or pip?"
"Neither," said Norah. "They were the very healthiest, all of them. The chickens grew and flourished, and when they were about a week old, the other six hens were all about to bring out theirs within two days. Oh, Wally, I was so excited! I used to go down to the yard about a dozen times a day, just to gloat!"
"Never gloat too soon," said Wally. "It's a hideous risk!"
"I'm never going to gloat again at all, I think," said Norah, mournfully. The recital of her woes was painful. "So I went down one morning, and found them all happy and peaceful; the six old ladies sitting in their boxes, and the two proud mammas with their chicks, scratching round the yard and chasing grasshoppers. It was," said Norah, in the approved manner of story-tellers, "a fair and joyous scene!"
"'Specially for the grasshoppers!" commented her hearer. "And then—?"
"Then I went out for a ride with Dad, and I didn't get back until late in the afternoon. I let Bobs go, and ran down to the fowl yard without waiting to change my habit." Norah paused. "I really don't know that I can bring myself to tell you any more!"
"If you don't," said Wally, indignantly, "there'll certainly be bloodshed. Go on at once—
"Am I a man on human plan
Designed, or am I not, Matilda?"
"H'm," said Norah. "Well, I'm not Matilda, anyway! However, I opened the gate of the yard. And then I stood there and just gaped at what I saw."
"Dogs?"
"Our dogs are decently trained," Norah said, much offended. "No, it wasn't dogs—it was pigs!"
"Whew-w!" whistled Wally.
"Pigs. They had burrowed in right under the fence; there was a great big hole there. And they'd eaten every chicken, and every egg in the yard. My lovely boxes were all knocked over, and the nests torn to bits, and there wasn't so much as an eggshell left. The poor old hens were just demented—they were going round and round the yard, clucking and calling, and altogether like mad things. And in the middle of it all, fat and happy and snoring—three pigs!"
"What did you do?" Wally felt that this case was beyond the reach of ordinary words of sympathy.
"Couldn't do anything. I chased the beasts out of the yard, and threw everything I could find at them—but you can't hurt a pig. And Dad was horrid—advised me to have them killed, so that at least we could have eggs and bacon!" Norah laughed, in spite of her woebegone tone.
"And he calls himself a father!" said Wally, solemnly.
"Oh, he wasn't really horrid," Norah answered. "He wrote off to town and bought me a very swagger pair of Plymouth Rocks—just beauties. They cost three guineas!"
"Three guineas!" said the awestruck youth. "What awful waste! Where are they, Norah? Show me them at once!"
"Can't," Norah responded, sadly.
"You don't mean—?"
"Oh, I've had a terrible year with fowls," said the dejected poultry keeper. "Those Plymouth Rocks came just before the Cunjee show, and Dad entered them for me, 'cause the dealer had told him they would beat anything there. And I think they would have—only just after he sold Dad mine, a Cunjee man bought a pair for five guineas. He showed his, too!" Norah sighed.
"Oh!" said Wally.
"So I got second. However, they were very lovely, and so tame. I was truly fond of Peter."
"Why Peter?"
"Oh, Peter means a Rock," said Norah. "I heard it in a sermon. He was a beautiful bird. I think he was too beautiful to live, 'cause he became ill—I don't know what it was, but he pined away. I used to nurse him ever so; for the last two days of his poor young life I fed him every hour with brandy and strong soup out of the spout of the invalid feeder. Brownie was quite annoyed when she found I'd used it for him," said Norah, reflectively.
"But he was an invalid, wasn't he?" asked Wally.
"Of course he was—and it's an invalid feeder. I don't see what it's for, if not for the sick. But it didn't do him any good. I went out about ten o'clock one night and wrapped him in hot flannel, and he was rattling inside his poor chest; and in the morning I went out at five and he was dead!"
"Poor old Nor.!"
"So I tied a bit of black stuff on the gate and went back to bed," said Norah, pensively.
Wally grinned. "And what became of Mrs. Peter?"
"Oh, Mrs. Peter was a lovely hen," Norah said, "and very healthy. She never seemed to feel any of Peter's delicacy. He was a very refined bird. There was another show coming on at Mulgoa, and I found among the other fowls another Mr. Peter, and it struck me I would have a try for the prize. Mrs. Peter was so good that I felt I'd get it unless the five-guinea Plymouth Rock man came up. So I fed up the new Peter and had them looking very well the day before the show. And then—"
"Yes?" said Wally, as she paused.
"Then a new dog of Burton's killed Mrs. Peter," said Norah, "so I gave up showing poultry!"
"I should think you did," said the sympathetic auditor. "What did your father say?"
"He was very nice; and very angry with the dog; but he didn't buy me any more valuable fowls—and I expect that was just as well," said Norah, laughing. "I don't seem to have luck when it comes to keeping poultry. Jim says it's management, but then Jim never kept any himself. And it does make a difference to your views if you keep them yourself."
"It does," Wally agreed. "I used to lose ever so many in Queensland, but then things are really rough on fowls up there—climate and snakes and lots of odd things, including crocodiles! When I came down to school I left a lot of hens, and twelve eggs under one old lady hen, who should have hatched 'em out a few days after I left. And the whole lot went wandering and found some poison my brother had put out for a cat!" Wally wiped his eyes elaborately.
"And died?"
"It was suicide, I think," said Wally, nodding. "But I always had comfort about that lot, because I still have hopes that those twelve eggs hadn't hatched."
"I don't see what that has to do with it," Norah said, plainly puzzled.
"Why, don't you understand? If they hatched I must have lost them along with the others; but if they didn't hatch, I didn't lose so many, for, not having them to lose, I couldn't very well lose them, could I? Q.E.D.!" finished Wally, triumphantly. "That's Philosophy!"
"You're a credit to your teachers, old man," said a new voice; and Jim made his appearance behind the fence, over which he proceeded to climb laboriously.
"Yes, I'm a nice boy," said modest Mr. Meadows. "Sometimes I think you don't appreciate me—"
"Perish the thought!" said Jim, solemnly.
"But I always feel that honest worth will tell in the end," finished Wally. "Jim, you great, uncivilized rogue, unhand me!" There was a strenuous interlude, during which the Leghorn chicks fled shrieking to the farthest corner of their domain. Finally Jim stepped unwittingly, in the joy of battle, into the kerosene tin, which was fortunately empty, and a truce was made while he scraped from a once immaculate brown leather legging the remains of the Leghorns' breakfast.
"Serve you right," said Wally, adjusting his tie, which had mysteriously appeared under his right ear. "Norah and I were talking beautifully, and you hadn't any business to come poke your nose in, if you couldn't behave, had he Nor.?" Whereat Norah and Jim grinned cheerfully at each other, and Wally collapsed, remarking with indignation that you couldn't hope to get justice for either of the Linton twins when it came to dealing with the other.
"We're not twins!" said Norah.
"No," said her guest, "I think you're worse!" Withdrawing, he sat in melancholy isolation on a hen coop, and gave himself up, very appropriately, to brooding.
"Well, I'm sorry if I broke up the party," Jim said, relinquishing the task of polishing his leggings with marshmallow leaves and looking at its streaked surface disconsolately. Jim might—and did—scorn coats and waistcoats in the summer, and revel in soft shirts and felt hats; but his riding equipment was a different matter, and from Garryowen's bit and irons to his own boots, all had to be in apple pie order. "Norah, may I have your hanky to rub this up? No? You haven't one! Well, I'm surprised at you!" He rubbed it, quite ineffectually, with the crown of his hat, and still looked pained. "Never mind, I'll get hold of some tan stuff when I go in. What I came to say when you attacked me, young Wally—"
"When I attacked you! I like that!" spluttered the justly indignant Wally.
"Didn't you? I thought you did," grinned Jim. "My mistake, I suppose. Well, anyhow, when you attacked Norah—quiet, Wally, bother you; how can a fellow get a word out?—what I came to mention was that Dad wants us."
"Oh!" said Norah, gathering herself up. "Why didn't you say so before?"
"Too busy, and you and Wal. do prattle so. Anyhow, he's not in a tearing hurry, 'cause he said he was going to have an hour at his income-tax—and you know what that means."
"Solitude is always best for Dad when he's income-taxing," said Norah. "It has the most horrible effect on his usual serenity. My dear old Hermit used to help him, of course; but now—well, no wonder he's starting early! How's Derrimut, Jimmy?"
"Going on splendidly; Dad and I are quite proud of ourselves as vets.," said her brother. "We made quite a good job of the old chap; I believe he'll hardly have a blemish. By George, you should have seen Cecil at that operation! He had one rope to hold and he was scared to death."
"So was I," said Wally, grinning. "I was always as timid as a rabbit."
"You!" said Jim, laughing. "Well, you held three ropes, anyway, and I didn't notice that you looked pale."
"My face won't let me," said his chum. "But I FELT pale!"
"Well Cecil looked and felt it," Jim said. "Of course, you don't exactly blame a town chap for not taking to that sort of thing like a duck to water. Still, there's a limit—and I'll swear Norah would have made a fuss. As far as that goes, Dad says he's known our grandmother, in the early days, have to help at a much worse job for a beast than fixing up old Derry's leg. Lots of women had to. They wouldn't like it, of course, but they certainly wouldn't have made it harder for the man they were helping by putting on frills!"
"Well, you'd hate to have to get a woman to do a job like that."
"Of course you would. You'd never do it unless it came to a question of saving a beast or easing its pain. But if it did come to the point, a decent woman with backbone would lend a hand, just as she'd help if it was the man himself that was hurt. At least, most Australian women would, or most of those in the country, at any rate. I'd disown Norah if she didn't."
"I should hope so!" said Norah, quietly.
"At the same time, I've not the remotest intention of employing you as a vet., old woman," said Jim, untying her hair ribbons in a brotherly fashion. "Quite enough for you to act in that capacity for that rum beggar, Lal Chunder—who's departed, by the way, leaving you his blessing and a jolly little brass tray. The blessing was rather unintelligible, but there's no doubt about the tray."
"Bother!" said Norah, vexedly. "Silly man! I don't want him to give me presents—and that wound of his ought certainly to have been looked after for a few days."
"He said he was going to travel with Ram Das—and old Ram'll see that he ties it up, I expect," said Jim, with unconcern. "I wouldn't bother, old first-aid; it looked tip-top when you dressed it before breakfast."
"I'd have given him rag for it, anyway," said Norah, still troubled.
"He can always tear half a yard or so off that turban of his," Jim said. "Don't go out of your way to meet worry, my girl—it'll always come quickly enough to meet you. Which is philosophy quite equal to Wally's!" He sighed. "Here's trouble coming to meet us now, that's certain!"
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