Читать книгу Pelican Pool. A Novel онлайн

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"Take care!" Maud called out.

"Er?"

"Take care."

A growl was her thanks. In course of time the old man had scrambled down the steps and across the creek.

"So much for our friend, John King," said Power.

At Surprise Valley the rule is early to bed. First chop the wood and milk the goats. Then soothe or slap the baby to sleep. After tea, a seat in the doorway and a smoke. After a smoke, an exchange of maledictions on the weather. The lamps in the tents begin to go out by nine o'clock. The frustrated moths and flying ants betake themselves elsewhere, and the mosquito sings a solo requiem in the dark. On cool nights and nights of breezes, the people of Surprise put out lights at even an earlier hour, for sleep is likely to prove kinder mistress. To-night already three parts of Surprise were sleeping. To be true, Mr. Wells was thinking of a last pipe; and Mr. Horrington, whisky bottle at elbow, was cogitating a nightcap. Also, a light burned yet in the latest rigged tent. Mr. Pericles Smith—travelling schoolmaster, arrived here on his rounds—after chopping the firewood, hunting the goats away, putting the kettle off the boil, and performing sundry other exercises, was snatching a few moments with the help of a candle at his monumental work on the aboriginal languages of Australia. Nowhere else lights pierced the walls. The moon fell over high land and low land, upon house and tent, and steeped in romance the dreary prospects of the day. The Man in the Moon looked down on a fairy city.