Marcella thought ten pounds—­she really did not know.  But he laughed at that and, taking her along to his bank, gave her fifty pounds.  It seemed a lot of money to her, but he waved her thanks away, telling her a long tale about catching fresh-water oysters in the creek near his homestead.  He seemed frightened of the traffic, frightened of the people.

“I’ll be very glad to get back,” he said, as they stood outside the bank watching the street cars clang by.  “I’ve lived in the back blocks so long that houses suffocate me and people all look like monstrosities.  I’m glad to have seen you, though.  I was very fond of Rose, as a boy.”

But he asked no questions about her or Andrew.  He simply took for granted all that Marcella said, and was immensely interested in his sheep and his garden.  He had recently imported a Chinese gardener who was going to do wonderful things.

“I ought to take you somewhere to get lunch,” he said doubtfully, looking at the crowds of people and then at his watch.  “There’s a train in one hour that will let me catch a connection at midnight.”

“Then I’ll take you to the station,” said Marcella promptly, and added on impulse, “I’m a bit sorry I’m not coming with you, though.  I’d have liked to see my cousins—­”

“I don’t suppose you’d like them much.  They are nothing like Rose.  I married an Australian, you know, and the girls are like her.  They have had very little schooling.  They are good girls, very good girls, but just a little hard,” he sighed a little, and Marcella felt a quick pang of regret for his loneliness.  Obvious though it was that he did not want her, she wished, for a moment, she could have gone with him to cheer his solitude.

“But Ah Sing makes all the difference to me,” he added hopefully.  “He’s growing strawberries, and next week, I hope, we shall see the asparagus peep through.”

So she left him on the platform to dream of his sheep and Ah Sing his only friend, while she dreamed of what next week would bring.

She felt it was almost impossible to wait to tell Louis the good news; she wished she had arranged to meet him in the city; she wished all sorts of things as she wandered, solitary, round the streets, feeling very unsteady on her feet after so long on a buoyant floor, and expecting the pavement to rock and sway at every step.  She went into the Post Office and despatched letters home.  As she was going down the street again rather aimlessly she caught sight of Mrs. Hetherington and Mr. Peters coming out of a restaurant, and was reminded forcibly of Jimmy who would be alone in the drizzling rain on board.

Buying a great box of chocolates, a basket of peaches and a clockwork train she hurried back to the ship, feeling very wealthy.