‘Yes,’ said Jed with utter certainty. She did not know what heaven was, but whatever it might be, Maxi would be there, possibly with a half-chewed pig’s ear she had saved to give the family she loved, when they finally came to join her. She wanted to tell Sam that Maxi had saved Mattie’s life. But she couldn’t now, not when Mattie might hear, remember today with even more terror than those few seconds in the water must have caused her.

How far had she been swept before Maxi grabbed her? Not far, thought Jed, or Maxi could not have dragged her back. Nor would Maxi ever have let her puppy get far away.

Jed rested her face briefly in Maxi’s damp fur, which still smelled wonderfully of dog.

Mattie cuddled closer to her. ‘Can Maxi have a grave next to Uncle Andy’s?’

Jed was about to say that dogs were not allowed in graveyards when Sam said, ‘Of course.’

And it was ‘of course’. The graveyard was on Drinkwater land; the church was gone; and no one would notice a newly dug grave with the name of a dog above it — or, if they did, no one would object. And besides, that was where Matilda was buried, and Tommy and Auntie Love and her little daughter, and Clancy the elder, and Nancy’s gran, his Rose. Only Nancy’s brother was not buried there, but somewhere unknown in the jungles of Burma.

Now Maxi would rest there too.

Chapter 33

Chapter 33

To waterproof boots

8oz fat (horse is best, otherwise mutton), 8oz beeswax. Melt together. Store. Apply each morning. This polish will also stop dust from drying boots until they crack.

OVERFLOW, 1881

CLANCY

Three graves already sat on the side of the hill behind the hen run: two stockmen, both ex-convicts, and the wife of one of the men, the child she had been giving birth to in her arms. Clancy dug only one more, for he would not let Clementine lie by herself either, nor Flora rest alone in the land where she had remained a stranger.

The wind muttered above him. The sky wept red, a dust cloud blown in from out west with a mocking version of rain, red drops that held the dust but which evaporated before they hit the ground. The light was strange and glowing coppery-brown.

No one helped. He did not want help. The guilt was his. It might have been possible to find a position in Sydney, with the family of one of the boys he’d known at school. Not a good position, not worthy of Rosemere nor able to keep up anything like a gentleman’s estate. But a comfortable cottage, friendship, sanity. His wife could at least have had those.