ast seemed truly a part of
each other. Lady Bridget O'Hara's soul warmed to that stockman and to
his steed.

He was looking at the windows of the bar-parlour. As soon as he saw the
lady, the cabbage tree hat was raised in a flourish, the horse was
reined in, the man off his saddle and the bridle hitched to a post.

Now the stockman stepped on to the veranda.

'Mrs McKeith--or is it Lady McKeith I should say--I haven't got the
hang of the name if you'll pardon me--Mr McKeith sent me on to say that
he'll be here with the buggy in a minute or two.... I'm Moongarr
Bill.... Glad to welcome you up the Leura, ma'am, though I expect
things seem a bit rough to you straight out from England and not
knowing the Bush.'

Lady Bridget won Moongarr Bill's good favour instantly by the look in
her eyes and the smile with which she answered him.

'I'm from Ireland, Moongarr Bill, and if we Irish know anything we know
a good horse, and that's a beauty you're riding.'

'Out of a Pitsford mare by a Royallieu colt, and there's not a finer
breed in the Never-Never. My word! you've struck it there, ma'am, and
no mistake,' responded the stockman enthusiastically. 'I bought 'im out
of the yard at Breeza Downs--that's Windeatt's run about sixty miles
from Moongarr, and I will say that though it's a sheep-run they've beat
us in the breed of their 'osses.... Got 'im cheap because he'd bucked
young Windeatt off and nearly kicked his brains out, and there wasn't a
man along the Leura that he'd let stop on his back except me and Zack
Duppo--the horse-breaker who first put the tackling on 'im.'

After the interchange of one or two remarks, Lady Bridget had no doubt
of being friends with Moongarr Bill, and Moongarr Bill decided that for
a dashed new-chum woman, Lady Bridget had a remarkable knowledge of
horseflesh.

The quick CLOP-CLOP of a four horse team and a clatter of tin billys
and pannikins--as Lady Bridget presently discovered slung upon the back
rail of an American buggy--sounded up the street.

'There's the Boss,' said Moongarr Bill. 'Look alive, with that
packhorse, Wombo.'

Lady Bridget now perceived behind the stockman a black boy on a young
colt, leading a sturdy flea-bitten grey, laden with a pack bag on
either side. He jumped off as lightly as Moongarr Bill and hitched his
horses also to the veranda posts. Except that he was black as a coal,
save for the whites of his eyes and his gleaming teeth, he seemed a
grotesque unders