Back to Billabong Part 27

"Quite, I should say. It wouldn't take elaborate plumbing, and the pipes could discharge into an irrigation drain for your vegetable garden. It would save Tommy ever so much work in carrying water, too. There's a fearsome amount of water carried in and out of bedrooms, and I can't see why pipes shouldn't do the work. It need not cost you much--just a shelf across a corner, with an enamelled basin let in."

"Save you buying jugs and basins," said Wally. "Great money-saving idea!"

"Rather," said Bob. "Is there anyone in Cunjee who can plumb?"

"Oh, yes; there's a handy man who can do the whole thing. We'll get Jim to go and see him tomorrow."

They left this job to the handy man, who proved equal to all demands, and went on themselves to higher flights. Kitchen and pantry were already fitted with shelves, but they built in a dresser, and found a spare corner, where they erected a linen press warranted to bring tears of joy to the eye of any housewife. Round the little dining-room and sitting-room they ran a very narrow shelf, just wide enough to carry flowers and ornaments, and they made wide, low window seats in each room. Then, becoming bold by success, they turned to cabinet making, and built into the dining-room a sideboard, which was only a glorified edition of the kitchen dresser, but looked amazingly like walnut, aided by a little stain; and for both sitting-rooms made low cupboards, with tops wide enough to serve as little tables. Even the verandah was furnished with wide shelf tables and a cupboard, and with low and broad seats.

"And it's all done by kindness--and packing cases!" said Jim, surveying the result with admiration.

"Indeed, I'm afraid a lot of your father's good timber has gone into it," said Bob half ruefully. "He was awfully good about it, and the supply of just-what-you-want timber on Billabong seemed inexhaustible."

"No, you really used very little good stuff," David Linton said. "It's chiefly packing cases, truly, Jim. But we had plenty of time to plane it up and make it look decent. Bob ran an electric light into the workshop and we worked every night. I believe it's kept us from getting influenza from sheer boredom, with all you people away."

"They'll soon be home," Jim said cheerfully. "Influenza's dying out, I believe. No fresh cases for three days, and all the patients are getting better. The little Andersons are up and about. By the way, Dad, couldn't we bring those kiddies out to Billabong for a change?"

"Why, of course," his father answered. "Tell Mrs. Anderson to come too, or, if she won't leave her husband, Brownie will be delighted at the chance of getting two children to look after again. Are the cooks quite cheery, Jim?"

"As cheery as possible," Jim answered. "They got off early to-day, and I took them and Sister and the Anderson youngsters out for a run. Did 'em all good. I'm coming home to-night, and they don't want me to-morrow, because they're going to afternoon tea with some one or other. Flighty young things, those cooks! So I can help you carpenters or do any odd jobs."

"We've lots," said Wally, who was putting a finishing coat of dark green enamel to a rod destined as a towel rail for Tommy's room. "Simple jobs, suitable for your understanding. Take care, Jimmy, I've a wet paint brush, and you have a good suit on! I want to put shelves from floor to ceiling of the bathroom, because the walls are rough and unlined, and nothing on earth will make it a beautiful room. So Tommy may as well store there all the things she doesn't want anywhere else. And you can make her a medicine cupboard. I shan't have time to look at any of you unskilled labourers, for I'm going to build her a draining-rack for plates and things over the kitchen sink. And I can tell you, that takes brains!"

"Then it's not your job!" said Jim definitely.

"Isn't it? I'll show you, you old Bond Street fashion plate!" Wally stretched his long form, simply attired in a khaki shirt and dungaree trousers, much be-splashed by paint, and looked scornfully at his neatly dressed friend. "You needn't think, because you come here dressed like the lilies of the field and fresh from motoring girls round the country, that--"

"My hat!" said Jim justly incensed. "And I after cleaning out and whitewashing the hospital fowl-houses all the morning! Young Wally, you need some one to sit on your head." He took off his coat slowly.

"Ten to one," said Wally hastily, "if we had time to look into the matter we'd find you'd whitewashed the fowls as well! These Army Johnnies are so beastly impractical!" He gathered up his brushes and fled, pursued by his chum. Sounds of warfare came faintly from the distance.

"It's a good thing some of us are sane," said Mr. Linton laughing.

"Nearly finished, Bob?"

He was painting a shelf-table, screwed to the wall within a s.p.a.ce at the end of the verandah, which they had completely enclosed with wire mosquito netting. Bob was hanging the door of this open-air room in position, a task requiring judgment, as the floor of the verandah was old and uneven.

"Nearly, sir," he mumbled, his utterance made difficult by the fact of having several screws in his mouth. He worked vigorously for a few moments, and then stood back to survey his job. "This is going to be a great little room--though it's hard just now to imagine that it will ever be warm enough for it."

"Just you wait a few months until we get a touch of hot weather, and the mosquitoes come out!" said David Linton. "Then you and Tommy will thankfully entrench yourselves in here at dusk, and listen to the singing hordes dashing themselves against the netting in the effort to get at you!"

"That's the kind of thing they used to tell me on the Nauru," Bob said laughing; "but I didn't quite expect it from you, Mr. Linton!"

The squatter chuckled.

"Well, indeed, it's no great exaggeration in some years," he said. "They can be bad enough for anything, though it isn't always they are. But an open-air room is never amiss, for if there aren't mosquitoes a lamp will attract myriads of other insects on a hot night. That looks all right, Bob; you've managed that door very well."

"First rate!" said Jim and Wally approvingly, returning arm in arm.

"You're great judges!" David Linton rejoined, looking at the pair. "Have you returned to work, may I ask, or are you still imitating the lilies of the field?"

"Jim is; he couldn't help it," said Wally. "But I have been studying that oak tree out in the front, Mr. Linton. It seems to me that a seat built round it would be very comforting to weary bones on warm evenings--"

Bob gathered up his tools with decision in each movement.

"Wally has come to that state of mind in which he can't look at anything on the place without wanting to build something out of a packing case in it, or round it, or on top of it!" he said. "When the sheep come I'll have to keep you from them, or you'll be building shelves round them!"

"Why, you're nearly as bad yourself!" grinned Wally.

"I know I am, and that's why I've got to stop. I'm going to leave nice little chisels and spokeshaves and smoothing planes, and mend up the pigsty; it needs it badly, and so does the cow-shed. And then I've got to think of ploughing, and cutting that drain across the flat, and generally earning my living."

"Don't you worry," said David Linton. "You couldn't have done much outside in this wet weather, and at least your house is half-furnished.

And we'll help you through with the other things."

"You're all just bricks," said Bob, his fair skin flushing--"only I begin to feel as if I were fed with a spoon. I can't always expect to have my work done for me."

"You haven't shown much wish to leave it for anyone else," Jim said drily. "Neither you nor Tommy strikes this district as a loafer. Just stop talking bosh, old man, and think what Tommy's going to say to her mansion."

"Say?" queried Mr. Linton. "Why, she'll point out to us all the places where she wants shelves!"

"Shelves?" yelled the three as one man.

"Yes, certainly. There was never a woman born who had enough. Don't lose sight of your tools, Bob, for you'll go on putting up shelves as long as you've an inch of wall to put them on. Come along, boys, and we'll go home."

CHAPTER XIII

THE HOME ON THE CREEK

"I think it's the loveliest home that ever was!" said Tommy solemnly.

"Well, indeed, it takes some beating," Wally agreed.

"Creek Cottage"--the name was of Tommy's choosing--was ready for occupation, and they had just finished a tour of it. There was nothing in it that was not fresh and bright and dainty--like Tommy herself.

The rooms were small, but they had good windows, where the crisp, short curtains were not allowed to obscure the view. There were fresh mattings and linoleums on the floors, and the home-made furniture now boasted, where necessary, curtains of chintz or cretonne, that matched its colouring. Norah and Tommy had spent cheery hours over those draperies.

The curtains for Tommy's "suite" had been Norah's gift--of dark-green linen, embroidered in dull blue silks; and in the corner there was a little sofa with cushions of the same. Tommy had purred--was, in fact, still purring--over that home-made furniture, and declared it superior to any that money could buy. She had also suggested new ideas for shelves.

They had not troubled furniture shops much. Save for a few comfortable arm-chairs, there was nothing solid and heavy in the house; but it was all pleasant and home-like, and the little rooms, bright with books and pictures and flowers, had about them the touch of welcome and restfulness that makes the difference between a home and a mere house.

The kitchen was Tommy's especial pride--it was cool and spotless, with fresh-painted walls and ceilings, and shining white tiles round the white sink--over which Wally's draining-rack sat in glory. Dazzling tin-ware decorated the walls, and the dresser held fresh and pretty china. For weeks it had been a point of honour for no one to visit Cunjee without bringing Tommy a gift for the kitchen--meat fork, a set of skewers, a tin pepper castor; offerings wrapped in many coverings of tissue paper, and presented with great solemnity, generally at dinner.

The last parcel had been from Mr. Linton, and had eclipsed all the others--an alarum clock, warranted to drive the soundest sleeper from her bed. Bob declared it specially designed to ensure his getting fed at something approaching a reasonable hour.

A wide verandah ran round the whole house, and rush lounges and deck chairs stood about invitingly--Tommy had insisted that there should be plenty of seating accommodation on the verandah for all the Linton party, since they filled the little rooms to an alarming extent.

Near where they stood the drawing-room opened out by a French window.

Something caught Tommy's eye, and she dived into the room--to return, laughing with new treasure-trove--a sink brush and saucepan-scrubber, tied up with blue ribbon.

"Your doing?" she asked, brandishing them.