untwisted the reins from a side-bar, she cried:

"An' as for them two, Harry, shpill them in the first creek you come
to, an' God be good to you! It's all they're fit for, the low
blaggards, to insult an honest woman alone in the bush in a place like
this."

"All right, Mrs Mac," said Harry, cheerfully. "Good night, Mrs
Mac."

"Good night, Harry, an' God go with ye, for the creeks are risen
after last night's storm." And Harry drove on and left her to think
over it.

She thought over it in a way that would have been unexpected to Harry,
and would have made him uneasy, for he was really good-natured. She
sat down on a stool by the fire, and presently, after thinking over it
a bit, two big, lonely tears rolled down the lonely woman's fair, fat,
blonde cheeks in the firelight.

"An' to think of Old Jack," she said. "The very last man in the
world I'd dreamed of turning on me. But--but I always thought Old
Jack was goin' a bit ratty, an' maybe I was a bit hard on him. God
forgive us all!"

Had Harry Chatswood seen her then he would have been sorry he did it.
Swagmen and broken-hearted new chums had met worse women than Mother
Mac.

But she pulled herself together, got up and bustled round. She put on