Thirst was slaked from a canvas water bag, then cigarettes rolled.

  A lone wilga tree stood nearby; Father Ralph indicated it with his cigarette.

  "That's the spot to sleep," he said, unstrapping his blanket and picking up his saddle.

  Frank followed him to the tree, commonly held the most beautiful in this part of

Australia. Its leaves were dense and a pale lime green, its shape almost perfectly rounded.

The foliage grew so close to the ground that sheep could reach it easily, the result being

that every wilga bottom was mown as straight as a topiary hedge. If the rain began they

would have more shelter under it than any other tree, for Australian trees were generally

thinner of foliage than the trees of wetter lands.

  "You're not happy, Frank, are you?" Father Ralph asked, lying down with a sigh and

rolling another smoke.

  From his position a couple of feet away Frank turned to look at him suspiciously. "What's happy?"

  "At the moment, your father and brothers. But not you, not your mother, and not your

sister. Don't you like Australia?"

  "Not this bit of it. I want to go to Sydney. I might have a chance there to mak something of myself."

  "Sydney, eh? It's a den of iniquity." Father Ralph was smiling. "I don't care! Out here

I'm stuck the same way I was in New Zealand; I can't get away from him."

  "Him?"

  But Frank had not meant to say it, and would say no more. He lay looking up at the

leaves.

  "How old are you, Frank?" "Twenty-two." "Oh, yes! Have you ever been away from your people?"

  No.

  "Have you even been to a dance, had a girlfriend?" "No." Frank refused to give him his title.

  "Then he'll not hold you much longer."

  "He'll hold me until I die."

  Father Ralph yawned, and composed himself for sleep. "Good night," he said. In the

morning the clouds were lower, but the rain held off all day and they got the second

paddock cleared. A slight ridge ran clear across Drogheda from northeast to southwest; it was in these paddocks the stock were concentrated, where they had higher ground to seek if the water rose above the escarpments of the creek and the Barwon.

  The rain began almost on nightfall, as Frank and the priest hurried at a fast trot toward

the creek ford below the head stockman's house. "No use worrying about blowing them now!"