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“It doesn’t make any difference what you feel,” said Biddy. “It’s me that feels it. And Mummy’ll hurt you some day if she doesn’t like you. She hurts Daddy, and she hurts me.”

“Now don’t let me hear any more of that nonsense,” said Ann sternly. “I shan’t stay here if you talk like that.”

“Would you go right away?”

“Yes.”

“Back to England?”

“Perhaps.”

“Well, I won’t say it, ’cos I want you to stay.”

“Biddy, it’s only horrible little girls who talk about their mothers like that.”

“All right. I won’t be horrible. Good night.”

Ann left her, feeling rather appalled. She told herself that children often said foolish things of this sort—“hating” people who had displeased them—that the remarks were forgotten almost as soon as they were uttered; but at the same time she experienced a sense of discomfort. She must not encourage Biddy’s affection. It seemed disloyal to Mrs. Holmes. Yet wasn’t that rather hard on the child? What an annoying little complication. Well, never mind! It would probably vanish in a day or two at most.

Twilight had fallen, but it was not yet dark. A constant bleating from ewes and lambs in the paddocks near the shed filled the air. After the shearing separation, mothers and their young were seeking to find one another. They would probably all be identified correctly in a few hours—no ewe would accept the