For a great bill had been proposed, and in twenty days the colony would vote and this time it would vote Yes. Nothing barring a catastrophe could stop it now. True, the very same thing had been declared the year before and the people of New South Wales had decided Federation was not for them. But a year later, with a newer bill—a better bill!—the fears that had sunk the vote a year earlier were appeased. Nothing barring a catastrophe, they said.

And so the hall was full, or if not quite full then certainly half full. Upwards of fifty or sixty men, and some women too, had made the journey on such a dreadful night to hear what the gentlemen from parliament and their own local aldermen had to say. They already knew how they would vote, but it was a thing, was it not, the men from the parliament coming out to your suburb, to your local hall? And on a night like this.

On the dais a row of uncomfortable folding wooden chairs held the by-no-means-slight figures of the mayor, various councillors and aldermen, one or two of the more important local businessmen and the Hon. Alasdair Dunlevy MLA, the only member of the Legislative Assembly to have braved the downpour and made it to the meeting. But one member was better than none, and Mr Dunlevy cut an impressive figure in a black tailcoat and pinstriped trousers, a tall man in a tall black silk hat, powerfully built; a man barely contained by a tightly buttoned silver-and-black-striped waistcoat and a pale grey Ascot tie at his neck. Above the tie was a smooth, clean-shaven face that spurned the whiskers doggedly retained by the more senior members of the Assembly, a face that said it had nothing to hide, that said here is the future and it has no beard!

Alasdair Dunlevy stood at the lectern and surveyed the crowded hall. He knew these men, knew what was in their heads, knew—more importantly—what was in their hearts, understood their fears, their hopes, their prejudices, and this understanding calmed him, it filled him up, it made him powerful. His fingers gripped the lectern’s smooth wooden edges, not to steady himself, but as a man does who sees an opportunity and who seizes it with both hands. The mayor, a man whose name Dunlevy had already forgotten, had spoken—trite platitudes and dry clichés for the most part—as had a councillor and one or two of the notable local businessmen, but it was not until Alasdair began his speech that the men sat forward and nodded their heads and shouted their approval, for he had shown them a vision of what their nation might be: