The Runaway Settlers by Elsie Locke Read Free Book Online Page B

rubbing her eyes; everyone else was still fast asleep. He slipped quietly inside and buckled on his sheath-knife; then he took Emma by the hand and set out to explore in the opposite direction.
    In the bush that lined the shore, the bellbirds were singing loudly while two woodpigeons, stuffed fat with fuchsia berries, sat lazily on a branch. A track sloped towards the beach. Emma ran ahead with shouts of joy and danced on the sand. Shells were piled in ridges just beyond the tide—she picked them up by handfuls and flung them far and wide. When she came to the little stream trickling into the sea, she felt it with her bare toes, gasped ‘Ooh!’ and splashed on.
    ‘Ooh!’ she cried again, in a voice high with excitement. ‘Chook! Chook!’
    Two brown birds like overgrown chickens stalked out of the bushes to peck around among the dry seaweed. Emma fussed about trying to catch them, but the wekas did not mind in the least, as they were always a few steps ahead. Jack’s eyes were turned to the harbour, watching the circles where fish had leaped—they would really be worth the catching! He wondered where the boat had gone. Then he heard Emma.
    ‘Ooble, ooble, water bubble; ooble, ooble, water bubble,’ she sang.
    Yes! Water was bubbling, sure enough, right where she was sitting on a green bank above the sand. Jack lifted her down and she stopped singing long enough to say ‘Ooh! Cold!’ and shake out the wet hem of her dress. She reached out her hands again to catch the ‘bubble’—a clear, delicious spring tumbling out into a hollow which someone had smoothed to hold a billy or a pannikin. Sedges reached across the little pool since its makers had left.
    ‘Come, Emma—let’s tell Mother we’ve found fresh water!’
    ‘Ooble, ooble, water bubble,’ sang Emma all the way up the beach.
    They found Mrs Phipps, with her long sandy hair already brushed and twisted into a bun, busy laying an outdoor fire. ‘I can’t test the chimney until everyone is up,’ she said, ‘and if they’re asleep on that hard ground, it’s sleep they need.’
    The day was solid work. Water was carried and a tripod built over the fire. Mr Dyer came early with his pack-bullock, bearing all the remaining bundles, an axe and a spade, and a billy of beautiful fresh milk.
    ‘You must come to me if you’re short of anything you need,’ he said, ‘or to the other cottage—I’ll show the lad where to find it.’
    ‘I’m Jack,’ said the lad promptly.
    ‘I beg your pardon, Jack! I couldn’t sort you all out last night. About the next cottage: that’s where Mrs Parsons lives. She’s my sister. And Charles Parsons shares the farm with me. I don’t doubt we’ll all be good neighbours.’
    ‘We’re much obliged to you, Mr Dyer,’ said Mrs Phipps. ‘I trust we shall be the same.’
    ‘Can I go with Mr Dyer now?’ asked Jack eagerly.
    ‘And no breakfast?’
    ‘I’ll soon be back!’ he promised.
    Mrs Phipps made hot bread-and-milk in the billy, and Jack, true to his word, was home before his sleepy brothers had finished eating.
    It was time to examine the hut. There was a partition at one end which had appeared, in the lamplight, to be the end wall. In that tiny bedroom was a second calico window and two more bunks, made of nothing better than forked stakes driven into the ground to support saplings and a nest of small branches. The sacking which covered them was chewed by the rats, and the mesh was broken in many places.
    The open fireplace took up all one end of the kitchen, with chains and hooks for the billies and iron bars on which to rest the pans. There was no furniture except for boxes and packing-cases. ‘All the quicker for cleaning,’ said Mrs Phipps. She had everyone running in and out until the hut was quite bare and all the litter swept into the fireplace. Dry twigs were piled on top, the fire was lit, the green leaves were thrown on to the blaze to make plenty of smoke. Mrs Phipps and the boys watched keenly