The Foot of Time: A Novel of Australia and the South Seas: (1933)

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64 THE FOOT OF TIME
Burne looked up sharply. "No father. Come
now, that's bad; very bad, that it is. Look! 111
father you—father and mother, too."
It was at this juncture that Clare came forward.
"Let me introduce my mother to you, Mr.—
Mr.?"
"Burnes' my name, Mr. Swinton. William Burne,
of Orange. Came out here from Devonshire, in
the Old Country, nigh forty years agone. Now
Edith, she's Australian, born and bred, and . "
He turned to Clare. "An honour to meet you,
Mam. I thank the good God that brought your
son to us this blessed day. Praise be!"
Mrs. Swinton greeted him with quiet dignity, a
slight fear clutching at her heart. Another curious
intuition of impending danger—rocks ahead.
"Won't you join us at lunch?" she invited him.
"You'll have it with us, Mam," bellowed Burne.
"Mother," he called to his wife. "The—Mr. Swinton
and his Ma will eat with us." Turning again
to Mrs. Swinton, he said: "The missus and me
won't take any refusal, Mam."
Edith appeared, affecting a serviceable bathing
cloak. The life-saving local branch had administered
stimulants, and she appeared little the worse
for her ordeal, other than a slight addition to her
naturally pale complexion.
And so the five of them sat down by the side
of their cars and ate, or tried to eat, the overgenerous
lunch provided—a lunch grown, almost
to the plates, on the three hundred acres estate of
William Burne, J.P., of Orange.
.
THE FOOT OF TIME 65
Clare, somehow, felt a trifle out of it, though
Bruce totally prevented that from quite happening,
but he looked so often at Edith—and Edith at him.
The girl spoke well, with a cultured Sydney
'Varsity accent. The idiosyncrasies of Edinburgh,
Cambridge, Melbourne, Sydney, etc., are very
subtle, but they are there. After it was all
over, they left for the West, but Clare knew
that Bruce wanted Edith in their car. She didn't
know how she knew it, but it was patent to a
mother's eyes. The families kept, however, to
their own cars, travelling as near together as traffic
conditions allowed. Over the Fig Tree Bridge,
where they bid au revoir to Sydney Harbour (that
glorious stretch of water was still Sydney Harbour,
so many miles from the Heads) , a harbour, a haven
of beauty, and a joy forever. And so on through
Parramatta, to Penrith, and Emu Plains, of evil
repute in the centuries which have come, and which
have well gone, to the Blue Mountains, rising
abruptly, like the hand of a London peeler holding
back the traffic.
At Hazelbrook, where the cottage now did duty
as an occasional, but only occasional, week-end
home, they alighted to say good-bye and make
arrangements for an early meeting at Orange.
Afterwards Clare and her son turned off the
main Western Road to "View Cottage," while the
other car sped on, at great pace, to Katoomba,
where the night was to be spent before continuing
to Orange the following morning.
At parting, Edith held out her hand to Bruce.