'We shall not take possession though till after shearing--_i.e._ in your autumn, though the agreement is signed and everything arranged.
Meanwhile, we shall stay on here, and I am to get a little more Colonial experience. I need it badly, but not perhaps so badly as my father-in-law makes out. He ridiculed the idea of my turning squatter on my own account, unless Gladys was "boss." But, now that we have fixed on the Victorian station, he is a bit more encouraging. He says any fool could make _that_ country pay, referring of course to the rainfall, which just there, in the ranges, is one of the best in Australia. Still, he is right: experience _is_ everything in the Colonies.
'So I am not quite idle. All day I am riding or driving about the "run," seeing after things, and keeping my eyes open. In the evenings Gladdie and I have taken to reading together. This was her doing, not mine, mind; though I won't yield to her in my liking of it. The worst of it is, it's so difficult to know where to begin; _I_ am so painfully ignorant. Can _you_ not help us, dear mother, with some hints? Do!--and when we come home some day (just for a trip) you will find us both such reformed and enlightened members of society!
'But, long before that, _you_ must come out and see _us_. Don't shake your head. _You simply must._ England and Australia are getting nearer and nearer every year. The world's wearing small, like one of those round balls of soap, between the hands of Time--(a gem in the rough this, for Gran to polish and set!) Why, there's a Queensland squatter who for years has gone "home" for the hunting season; while, on the other hand, Australia is becoming _the_ crack place to winter in.
'Now, as you, dear mother, always _do_ winter abroad, why not here as well as anywhere else? You must! You shall! If not next winter, then the following one; and if the Judge cannot bring you, then Gran must.
That reminds me: how are they both? And has Gran been writing anything specially trenchant lately? I'm afraid I don't appreciate very 'cutely--"miss half the 'touches,'" he used to tell me (though I think I have made him a present of a "touch" to-day). But you know how glad we would both be to read some of his things; so _you_ might send one sometimes, dear mother, without him knowing. For we owe him so much!
And, besides what he did for me afterwards, he was always so nice and brotherly with Gladys. I know she thought so at the time, though she doesn't speak about him much now--I can't think why. _You're_ the one she thinks of most, dearest mother; you're her model and her pattern for life!
'The mail-boy has begun to remonstrate. He'll have to gallop the whole way to the "jolly" township, he says, if I am not quick. So I must break off; but I will answer your dear letter more fully next mail, or, better still, Gladdie shall write herself. Till then, good-bye, and dearest love from us both.
'Ever your affectionate son,
'Alfred.
'PS.--Gladys has read the above: so one last word on the sly.
'Oh, mother, if you only saw her at this moment! She is sitting in the veranda--I can just see her through the door. She's in one of those long deck-chairs, with a book, though she seems to have tired of reading. I can't see much of her face, but only the sweep of her cheek, and the lashes of one lid, and her little ear. But I can see she isn't reading--she's threading her way through the pines into space somewhere--perhaps back to Twickenham, who knows? And she's wearing a white dress; you would like it--it's plain. And her cheek is quite brown; you'll remember how it was the day she landed from the launch. But there! I can't describe like Gran, so it's no good trying.
Only I do know this: I simply love her more and more and more, and a million times more for all that has happened. And you, and all of you, and all your friends, would fairly worship her now. You couldn't help it!'
LONDON AND GLASGOW: COLLINS' CLEAR-TYPE PRESS.