"Buck up, chaps!" he chuckled encouraging! "They're not all snorters, you
know. You might have the luck to strike one of the "ministering angel
variety."
But the Sanguine Scot had been thinking rapidly, and with characteristic
hopefulness, felt he had the bull by the horns. "We'll just have to
block her, chaps; that's all," he said. "A wire or two should do it";
and, inviting the Dandy "to come and lend a hand," led the way to the
telegraph office; and presently there quivered into Darwin the first hint
that a missus was not wanted at the Elsey.
"Would advise leaving wife behind till homestead can be repaired," it
said; and, still confident of success, Mac felt that "ought to do the
trick." "If it doesn't," he added, "we'll give her something stronger."
We in Darwin, having exhausted the sight-seeing resources of the little
town, were wishing "something interesting would happen," when the message
was handed to the Maluka.
"This may do as a stopgap," he said, opening it, adding as he read it,
"It looks brimful of possibilities for interested onlookers, seeing it
advises leaving the wife behind." The Maluka spoke from experience,
having been himself an interested onlooker "down south," when it had been
suggested there that the wife should be left behind while he spied out
the land; for although the Maluka knew most of the Territory, he had not
yet been to the Elsey Cattle Station.
Preferring to be "the interested onlooker" myself this time, when we went
to the telegraph office it was the Maluka who wired: "Wife coming, secure
buggy", and in an incredibly short space of time the answer was back:
"No buggy obtainable."
Darwin looked interested. "Mac hasn't wasted much time in making
inquiries," it said.
"Or in apologies or explanations," the Maluka added shortly, and sent in
reply: "Wife can ride, secure suitable mount."
But the Sanguine Scot's fighting blood was up, and almost immediately the
wire rapped out: "No side-saddle obtainable. Stock horses all flash"; and
the onlookers stared in astonishment.
"Mac's in deadly earnest this time," they said, and the Maluka, with a
quiet "So am I," went back to the telegraph.
Now, in the Territory everybody knows everybody else, but particularly
the telegraph people; and it often happens that when telegrams of general
interest are passing through, they are accompanied by confidential
asides - little scraps of harmless gossip not intended for the
departmental books; therefore it was whispered in the tail of the last
message that the Katherine was watching the fight with interest was
inclined to "reckon the missus a goer," and that public sympathy was with
the stockman - the Katherine had its women-folk and was thankful; but the
Katherine knew that although a woman in a settlement only rules her
husband's home, the wife of a station-manager holds the peace and comfort
of the stockmen in the hollow of her hand.
