Page 170 - A Little Bush Maid

set," as she phrased it, the fish were ready, and in Norah’s opinion no meal
ever tasted half so good.

After it was over, Billy the indispensable removed the plates and washed

up, and Norah and her father sat by the fire and "yarned" in the cool dusk.
Not for long, for soon the little girl began to feel sleepy after the full day in
the open air, and the prospect of the comfortable stretcher in her tent was

very tempting. She brushed her hair outside in the moonlight, because a
small tent is not the place in which to wield a hairbrush; then she slipped

into bed, and her father came and tucked her up before tying the flap
securely enough to keep out possible intruders in the shape of "bears" and
’possums. Norah lay watching the flickering firelight for a little while,

thinking there was nothing so glorious as the open-air feeling, and the night
scents of the bush; then she fell asleep.

"Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!!"

A cheeky jackass on a gum tree bough fairly roared with laughter, and
Norah woke up with a violent start. The sunlight was streaming across her

bed. For a moment she was puzzled, wondering where she was; then the
walls of the tent caught her eye, and she laughed at herself, and then lay
still in the very pleasure of the dewy morning and the wonderful freshness

of the air. For there is a delight in awaking after a night in the open that the
finest house in the world cannot give.

Presently the flap of the tent was parted and Mr. Linton peeped in.

"Hallo!" he said, smiling, "did the old jackass wake you? T found him as
good as an alarum clock myself. How about a swim?"

"Oh--rather!" said Norah, tumbling out of bed. She slipped on a jacket and
shoes, and presently joined her father, and they threaded their way through

the scrub until they came to a part of the creek where a beach, flat and
sandy, and shelving down to a fairly deep hole, offered glorious bathing.

Mr. Linton left Norah here, and himself went a few yards farther up, round
a bend in the creek.