Seven Little Australians | Page 8

and activity to her young, lithe body, would either make a noble, daring,
brilliant woman of her, or else she would be shipwrecked on rocks the
others would never come to, and it would flame up higher and higher
and consume her.
"Be careful of Judy" had been almost the last words of the anxious
mother when, in the light that comes when the world's is going out, she
had seen with terrible clearness the stones and briars in the way of that
particular pair of small, eager feet.
And she had died, and Judy was stumbling right amongst them now,
and her father could not "be careful" of her because he absolutely did
not know how.
As he went up the veranda steps again and through the hall, he was
wishing almost prayerfully she had not been cast in so different a
mould from the others, wishing he could stamp out that strange flame
in her that made him so uneasy at times. He gave a great puff at his
cigar, and sighed profoundly; then he turned on his heel and went off
toward the stables to forget it all.
The man was away, exercising one of the horses in the long paddock;
but there was something stirring in the harness-room, so he went in.
There was a little, dripping wet figure standing over a great bucket, and
dipping something in and out with charming vigour. At the sound of his
footsteps, Baby turned round and lifted a perspiring little face to his.

"I'se washing the kitsies for you, and Flibberty-Gibbet," she said
beamingly.
He took a horrified step forward.
There were two favourite kittens of his, shivering, miserable, up to their
necks in a lather of soapy water; and Flibberty-Gibbet, the beautiful
little fox terrier he had just bought for his wife, chained to a post, also
wet, miserable, and woebegone, also undergoing the cleansing process,
and being scrubbed and swilled till his very reason was tottering.
"They'se SO clean and nicey--no horrid ole fleas 'n them now. AREN't
you glad? You can let Flibberty go on your bed now, and Kitsy
Blackeye is---"
Poor Baby never finished her speech. She had a confused idea of
hearing a little "swear-word" from her father, of being shaken in a most
ungentle fashion and put outside the stable, while the unfortunate
animals were dried and treated with great consideration.
But the worst was yet to come, and the results were so exceedingly bad
that the young Woolcots determined never again to assume virtues that
they had not.
Bunty, of course, desired to help the cause as strongly as the others, and
to that end his first action was to go into his bedroom and perform
startling ablutions with his face, neck, and hands. Then he took his
soap-shiny countenance and red, much bescrubbed hands downstairs,
and sunned himself under his father's very nose, hoping to attract
favourable comment.
But he was bidden irritably "go and play," and saw he would have to
find fresh means of appeasement.
He wandered into the study, with vague thoughts of tidying the tidy
bookshelves; but Pip vas there, surrounded with books and whittling a
stick for a catapult, so he went out again. Then he climbed the stairs
and explored his father's bedroom and dressing-room. In the latter there
was a wide field for his operations. A full-dress uniform was lying
across a chair, and it struck Bunty the gold buttons were looking less
bright than they should, so he spent a harmless quarter of an hour in
polishing them up. Next, he burnished some spurs, which also was
harmless. Then he east about for fresh employment.
There was quite a colony of dusty boots in one corner of the room, and
there was a great bottle of black, treacly looking varnish on the

mantelpiece. Bunty conceived the brilliant idea of cleaning the whole
lot and standing them in a neat row to meet his father's delighted eyes.
He found a handkerchief on the floor, of superfine cambric, though
dirty, poured upon it a liberal allowance of varnish, and attacked the
first pair.
A bright polish rewarded him, for they were patent leather ones; but the
next and the next and the next would not shine, however hard he
rubbed. There was a step on the stair, the firm, well-known step of his
father, and he paused a moment with a look of conscious virtue on his
small shiny face.
But it fled all at once, and a look of horror replaced it. He had stuck the
bottle on a great armchair for convenience, as he was sitting on the
floor, and now he noticed it had fallen on its side and a black, horrid
stream was issuing from its neck.
And it was the chair