And so she was when she was let work in her own way, but if she was crossed or put upon, or saw anything going wrong, she’d hold up her head and talk as straight as any man I ever saw. She’d a look just like father when he’d made up his mind, only her way was always the right way. What a difference it makes, doesn’t it? And she was so handsome with it. I’ve seen a goodish lot of women since I left the old place, let alone her that’s helped to put me where I am, but I don’t think I ever saw a girl that was a patch on Aileen for looks. She had a wonderful fair skin, and her eyes were large and soft like poor mother’s. When she was a little raised-like you’d see a pink flush come on her cheeks like a peach blossom in September, and her eyes had a bright startled look like a doe kangaroo when she jumps up and looks round. Her teeth were as white and even as a black gin’s. The mouth was something like father’s, and when she shut it up we boys always knew she’d made up her mind, and wasn’t going to be turned from it. But her heart was that good that she was always thinking of others and not of herself. I believe—I know—she’d have died for anyone she loved. She had more sense than all the rest of us put together. I’ve often thought if she’d been the oldest boy instead of me she’d have kept Jim straight, and managed to drive father out of his cross ways—that is, if anyone living could have done it. As for riding, I have never seen anyone that could sit a horse or handle him through rough, thick country like her. She could ride barebacked, or next to it, sitting sideways on nothing but a gunny-bag, and send a young horse flying through scrub and rocks, or down ranges where you’d think a horse could hardly keep his feet. We could all ride a bit out of the common, if it comes to that. Better if we’d learned nothing but how to walk behind a plough, year in year out, like some of the folks in father’s village in England, as he used to tell us about when he was in a good humour. But that’s all as people are reared, I suppose. We’d been used to the outside of a horse ever since we could walk almost, and it came natural to us. Anyhow, I think Aileen was about the best of the lot of us at that, as in everything else.

Well, for a bit all went on pretty well at home. Jim and I worked away steady, got in a tidy bit of crop, and did everything that lay in our way right and regular. We milked the cows in the morning, and brought in a big stack of firewood and chopped as much as would last for a month or two. We mended up the paddock fence, and tidied the garden. The old place hadn’t looked so smart for many a day.