He occupied himself as a gentleman should, reading the newspapers at his club and lunching there. He bought a racehorse, met with its trainer and celebrated with champagne each time it won. But, increasingly, he found himself drawn to the business side of the wool trade.

Ezekiel’s banking and legal affairs were in the hands of an agent and a firm of solicitors. But slowly Clancy made contacts with firms who specialised in the production of fine wool from merino sheep who survived the cold winters and shallow soil of properties like Overflow. Firms who would pay extra upfront to ensure they need not risk buying — and losing the finest wool of all — at auction.

Only a few blights marred those years: they had no child, despite the nights he joined Flora in her bed. He had not worried the first year — had even been glad, for doctors advised against marital intimacy when a woman was increasing. But after five years, both were careful not to mention the nursery, waiting in the east wing, nor comment on the children of those with whom they lunched, danced and dined.

Only Ezekiel still demanded, each time his son returned to Overflow, ‘Not breeding yet?’ to be met with a tight-lipped, ‘No.’

The second worry was Maria.

Maria had not returned to town after her visit for their wedding. This distressed Flora too — she had been sincere in wishing for a sister. But she had her friends in the Rose Society, the Orphans Benevolent Society, the Native Australian Improvement Society: women in silk and carriages doing good works over tea and scones, or lobster puffs at luncheons, or champagne suppers to raise funds. Maria had . . .

Work and solitude. She did most of the cooking, cleaning and ironing at Overflow, with help from various stockmen’s wives, none trained in the domestic arts, capable of making a stew but not mixing furniture polish or cleaning the glass chandelier Ezekiel had bought with his first Boer War wool cheque. One of Clancy’s first memories was of it hanging incongruously from the ceiling joists of the hut that had become the kitchen as the house grew room by room. It now hung almost as out of place in the parlour, which was still furnished with the sofa Ezekiel had bought his bride, and the bush chairs and tables he had made himself.

But Maria had her books, Clancy tried to reassure himself. Maria loved books. Clancy himself had taught her to read, for Ezekiel believed reading was a waste of time. Nor did he approve of the books Clancy ordered for his sister — most peculiar books, admittedly, for a woman, on botany, a strange subject called taxonomy, and volumes on plants and flowers that at least were beautiful, and so suitable for a lady’s library.

But at least Ezekiel did not object to them. Mostly he ignored his daughter, this deep disappointment of a woman, accepted only as the background to his domestic comfort.