will face fire, and flood, hunger, and even death itself, to help the
frail or weak ones who come into his life; although he'll strive to the
utmost to keep the Unknown Woman out of his environments particularly
when those environments are a hundred miles from anywhere."

The opposition looked incredulous. "Hunger and death!" it said.
"Fiddlesticks!" It would just serve them right if she went; and the men
folk pointed out that this was, now, hardly flattering to the missus.

The Maluka passed the interruption by without comment. "The Unknown Woman
is brimful of possibilities to a bushman," he went on; "for although she
MAY be all womanly strength and tenderness, she may also be anything,
from a weak timid fool to a self-righteous shrew, bristling with virtue
and indignation. Still," he added earnestly, as the opposition began to
murmur, "when a woman does come into our lives, whatever type she may be,
she lacks nothing in the way of chivalry, and it rests with herself
whether she remains an outsider or becomes just One of Us. Just One of
Us," he repeated, unconsciously pleading hard for the bushman and his
greatest need--"not a goddess on a pedestal, but just a comrade to share
our joys and sorrows with."

The opposition wavered. "If it wasn't for those telegrams," it said. But
Darwin, seeing the telegrams in a new light, took up the cudgels for the
bushmen.

"Poor beggars," it said, "you can't blame them. When you come to think of
it, the Unknown Woman is brimful of possibilities." Even then, at the
Katherine, the possibilities of the Unknown Woman were being tersely
summed up by the Wag.