Page 62 - A Little Bush Maid

"Right as rain; not one of the black-faced beauties singed. Tt was a pretty
close thing, you know," Jim said reminiscently. "The fire was just up to

Norah as she got the last sheep up the hill; there was a hole burnt in the leg
of her riding skirt. She told me afterwards she made up her mind she was

going to die down in that beastly hole."

"My word, you must have been jolly proud of her!" Wally exclaimed.

"Such a kid, too!"

"T guess we were pretty proud," Jim said quietly. "All the people about
made no end of a fuss about her, but Norah never seemed to think a
pennyworth about it. Fact is, her only thought at first was that Dad would

think she had broken her promise to him. She looked up at him in the first
few minutes, with her poor, swollen old eyes. ’T didn’t forget my promise,

Dad, dear,’ she said. ’T never touched the fire--only chased your silly old
sheep!’"

"Was that the end of the fire?" Harry asked.

"Well, nearly. Of course we had to watch the burning logs and stumps for a
few days, until all danger of more fires was over, and if there’d been a high
wind in that time we might have had trouble. Luckily there wasn’t any wind

at all, and three days after there came a heavy fall of rain, which made
everything safe. We lost about two hundred and fifty acres of grass, but in

no time the paddock was green again, and the fire only did it good in the
long run. We reckoned ourselves uncommonly lucky over the whole thing,
though if Norah hadn’t saved the Shropshires we’d have had to sing a

different tune. Dad said he’d never shut up so much money in one small
paddock again!"

Jim bobbed his float up and down despairingly.

"This is the most fishless creek!" he said. "Well, the only thing left to tell
you is where the swagman came in."

"Oh, by Jove," Harry said, "T forgot the swaggie."