The line went dead, and Martyr replaced the instrument and reached for his wide-brimmed felt. On leaving the office at the side of the house he faced across a two-acre space to the men’s quarters. Backed by a line of pepper trees to his right stood the store, the machinery and motor sheds, the harness room, the stable for the nighthorse, and beyond this line of buildings were the stock and drafting yards, the well and windmill, and the pumping house. The hands were waiting at the motor shed for orders.

There were seven men… five white and two black. The aborigines were flashily dressed, the white men content with cotton shirts and skin-tight trousers which had been boiled and boiled untilall the original colour had gone with the suds.

The overseer called a name, and one of the aborigines came to him and was told to ride a paddock fence fifteen miles in length. The other aborigine he sent to see that sheep had not huddled into a paddock corner. A Swede, who had been unable to conquer his accent despite forty years in Australia, he sent to oil and grease a windmill, and a short, grey-eyed, tough little man namedWitlow he despatched to see if cattle were watering regularly at a creek water-hole. Carney, young, alert, blond, smiling, was sent to White Dam to note the depth of water again. There was leftMacLennon, dour, black-moustached, dark-eyed and with aprognathous jaw. A good man with machinery.

“Want you to look-see over Johnson’s Well, Mac. You’ll have to take the portable pump to lower the water in the shaft. Get the well pump out and inspect. Have a go at the mill, too. Make a note of everything that needs replacement. The truck will be coming out tomorrow.”

“Just as well. The ruddy Lake won’t last much longer by the look of her, Mr Martyr.”

“And send a light down the well before you go down.”

“Oh, she’ll be all right.”

“That’s what the feller said up onBelar,” Martyr coldly remindedMacLennon. “That well is still all right, Mac, but the feller who went down without testing five years ago has been dead five years. You’d better take Lester to give a hand. Use the ton truck. I’ll tell Lester to draw your lunches.”