We were to assist them the following week. The barn was
illuminated by fat-lamps, which made the spiders in the rafters uneasy and
disturbed the slumbers of a few fowls that for months had insisted on
roosting on the cross-beam.
Mrs. Maloney was arguing with Anderson. She was claiming to have husked
two cobs to his one, when the dogs started barking savagely. Dad crawled
from beneath a heap of husks and went out. The night was dark. He bade
the dogs "Lie down." They barked louder. "Damn you--lie down!" he roared.
They shut up. Then a voice from the darkness said:
"Is that you, Mr. Rudd?"
Dad failed to recognise it, and went to the fence where the visitor was.
He remained there talking for fully half-an-hour. Then he returned, and
said it was young Donovan.
"DONOVAN! MICK Donovan?" exclaimed Anderson. And Mother and Mrs. Maloney
and Joe echoed "MICK Donovan?" They WERE surprised.
"He's none too welcome," said Anderson, thinking of his horses and cows.
Mother agreed with him, while Mrs. Maloney repeated over and over again
that she was always under the impression that Mick Donovan was in gaol
along with his bad old father.
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