There is no isolation so weird in its feeling of cut-offness as that of a night camp in the heart of the bush.  The flickering camp-fires draw all that is human and tangible into its charmed circle, and without, all is undefinable darkness and uncertainty.  Yet it was in this night camp among the dark pines, with even the stars shut out, that we learnt that out-bush “Houselessness” need not mean “Homelessness”—­a discovery that destroyed all hope that “this would sicken her a bit.”

As we were only to be out one night, and there was little chance of rain, we had nothing with us but a little tucker, a bluey each, and a couple of mosquito nets.  The simplicity of our camp added intensely to the isolation; and as I stood among the dry rustling leaves, looking up at the dark broad-leaved canopy above us, with my “swag” at my feet, the Maluka called me a “poor homeless little coon.”

A woman with a swag sounds homeless enough to Australian ears, but Dan, with his habit of looking deep into the heart of things, “didn’t exactly see where the homelessness came in.”

We had finished supper, and the Maluka stretching himself luxuriously in the firelight, made a nest in the warm leaves for me to settle down in.  “You’re right, Dan,” he said, after a short silence, “when I come to think of it; I don’t exactly see myself where the homelessness comes in.  A bite and a sup and a faithful dog, and a guidwife by a glowing hearth, and what more is needed to make a home.  Eh, Tiddle’ums?”

Tiddle’ums having for some time given the whole of her heart to the Maluka, nestled closer to him and Dan gave an appreciative chuckle, and pulled Sool’em’s ears.  The conversation promised to suit him exactly.

“Never got farther than the dog myself,” he said.  “Did I Sool’em, old girl?” But Sool’em becoming effusive there was a pause until she could be persuaded that “nobody wanted none of her licking tricks.”  As she subsided Dan went on with his thoughts uninterrupted:  “I’ve seen others at the guidwife business, though, and it didn’t seem too bad, but I never struck it in a camp before.  There was Mrs. Bob now.  You’ve heard me tell of her?  I don’t know how it was, but while she was out at the “Downs” things seemed different.  She never interfered and we went on just the same, but everything seemed different somehow.”

The Maluka suggested that perhaps he had “got farther than the dog” without knowing it, and the idea appearing to Dan, he “reckoned it must have been that.”  But his whimsical mood had slipped away, as it usually did when his thoughts strayed to Mrs. Bob; and he went on earnestly, “She was the right sort if ever there was one.  I know ’em, and she was one of ’em.  When you were all right you told her yarns, and she’d enjoy ’em more’n you would yourself, which is saying something; but when you were off the track a bit you told her other things, and she’d heave you on again.  See her with the sick travellers!” And then he stopped unexpectedly as his voice became thick and husky.