‘She’ll love it,’ said Nancy confidently, trying not to show her joy at a reason — no, a necessity — for more camping trips. ‘I promise I’ll look after her. The bush is her home. You’ll see she has friends there too. Will you come as well?’

‘Yes. Though I’ll probably bring my typewriter.’ She looked slightly warily at Nancy. ‘I’m not sure that what you’re offering is entirely a gift.’

Nancy felt decades of tension begin to seep away. ‘No. Once you love country, once you understand it, you’re bound to it too. You get duties as well as knowledge.’

‘Well, I accept, on Mattie’s behalf too. Or maybe I should say, let’s see how we go.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Nancy. ‘Let’s just see how we go.’

Jed picked up crumbs with her finger and licked them off. She changed the subject carefully. ‘Nancy, was your Gran happy those last years?’

The final chapter of the book? thought Nancy. Perhaps. And perhaps the time to tell it too, especially if Jed was finally going to seriously learn country as she wrote.

Nancy looked at the younger woman in front of her. ‘Yes, I think Gran was happy, mostly, despite the loss of Granddad and Ben. She was the only one except Michael who was sure I was still alive during the war. Said she’d kept herself alive to teach me country. She had her family and the CWA. But do you mean, could she have been happier? Of course.’

‘How?’

‘By having a husband who wasn’t so much older than her, who didn’t leave her a widow so long. By having some of her own people, not just the Sampsons, left in the district. She tried to visit her relatives down on the reservation several times, you know. They wouldn’t let her in, the supervisors. Said she was a bad influence. And being Gran she probably said, “Too right I am a bad influence.” Even Matilda couldn’t get her access.’

Nancy considered. ‘Gran understood sheep as well as anyone I’ve known, but I think she’d have been happier if no sheep or cow had ever set foot around here. She didn’t go droving again, after Granddad died, just camped out with us kids around Overflow. Said she couldn’t bear to see how much white men had mucked up the land beyond our country. Every time there was a dust storm she’d look at it and mutter about ploughs and wheat and cattle feet. She’d probably have liked to have had fifty kids, and five hundred grandchildren, to fill the land again. Didn’t happen. She lost the grandson she adored and knew he had died in agony far away.’