‘Surely you haven’t forgotten?’ she rebuked him. ‘Dinner at the Huberts’, of course, and then dancing afterwards. Madame Lorenzo is going to sing too. Lord and Lady Catherton will be there, and Mrs Glossop. Yes, I know, she is dreadfully common, but I’m hoping to lure her onto the Committee of the Improvements for Natives.’

And Mr Glossop was one of the wealthiest businessmen in Sydney. Flora’s committee provided training for deserving natives, usually in the households of the committee members and their friends. Rosemere’s under-gardener was a native called Joe, who had proved most reliable.

It was unlikely Mr Glossop would take any into his own employ — like Clancy’s father, who did not even employ native stockmen on his estate. But, hopefully, Mrs Glossop would be sufficiently awed by aristocracy to convince her husband to help fund the training of the poor wretches, at least.

‘I’d forgotten,’ Clancy admitted. ‘And I stank of travel. You always smell of roses,’ he added.

She laughed. ‘Silly. None are blooming yet. I don’t believe you know a rose scent from a violet’s. Or a gardenia’s. How is Maria? And your father?’

‘Well. Maria sends her love. There’s been good rain this winter.’

‘The garden must be lovely then,’ she said absent-mindedly.

There was no garden at Overflow, beyond cabbages and pumpkins. Maria had planted rose cuttings taken from the plenitude Flora had obtained, but the Overflow wallabies were even more determined than Sydney possums, and none had survived more than two or three years. The bush, though, had been rich in clematis and wonga vines, and the small green-headed orchids, as well as the native daisies. The thin-leafed early wattle would be blooming soon too. But he did not think Flora would be interested in wattle.

Flora stood. ‘I’ll send Sydney back in to shave you. I must get ready myself. I hope you like my dress.’

‘I shall adore it.’

‘It’s straight from Paris. They understand my measurements perfectly now — it only needed the lightest of alterations. Sydney really can’t match Paris. A copy always looks just slightly like a copy. I shall have all my gowns made there, I think.’

He smiled at her happiness. It was a joy to give her pleasure, Paris gowns after a girlhood of hand-me-downs from London cousins. And yet Paris gowns were expensive and there would be the ball for her birthday next month . . .

‘How many guests have you asked for your birthday?’ he asked tentatively.

‘We will only be forty-six for dinner, but nearly two hundred for the ball. Henderson has promised to force enough orchids for the ballroom and the weather is still cool enough for lobster aspics. Marcelle does lobster aspic so well. I hope the pineapples arrive in time . . . but I shouldn’t bore you with all this.’

‘I’m not bored,’ he said. The previous week Clancy had found Maria darning the arm of the parlour sofa at Overflow. Maria had just shaken her head when he suggested she buy a new one. Clancy tried to calculate how many bales of wool Flora’s ball might cost. No matter how much Ezekiel had saved before Clancy’s marriage, their expenses now must be matching, if not exceeding, Overflow’s income.