After Mr. Neuchamp had sufficiently admired the grassy wilderness, thoughts arose respecting dinner, and also a feeling of wonder where everybody was. The station appeared to be minding itself. The cook was absent, though recent indications of his presence were visible in the kitchen. Charley Banks was away and Jack Windsor, probably at Mildool; also Piambook, whose open countenance and dazzling teeth would have been better than nothing. Where was Mrs. Windsor, _née_ Walton? He had rather looked forward to having a talk with her under new conditions of life. She could not be at Mildool, as there was no shelter for a decent woman there. What in the name of wonder had become of them all? There were no Indians in this country, or he might have turned his thoughts in the direction of Blackfeet or Comanches, the ‘wolf Apaché and the cannibal Navajo.’ Not even a Mormon settlement handy enough to organise a ‘mountain-meadows massacre’! He never thought Rainbar so lonely before. He went into the cottage, and in a leisurely way unpacked his portmanteau in the snug bedroom which he had so long inhabited—where he had so often, before the rain came, lain down in sorrow and arisen in despair. What a tiny wooden box it seemed! Yet he had thought it comfortable, even luxurious. Like those of many other distinguished travellers and heroes long absent from the scene of early conflict or youthful habitation, the eyes of Mr. Neuchamp had altered their focus. After three months’ familiarity with the lodging of clubs and villas, the neat but necessarily contracted apartments of his bush cottage appeared like cupboards, or even akin to a watch-box which he had once dwelt in at Garrandilla. However, he knew by former experience that a week or two of station life would restore his vision, his appetite, and his contentment with the district. Further than that he did not go. At the present price of cattle, it was not likely that he would need ever again to spend as many months consecutively at Rainbar as he had devoted to that desirable but isolated abode before the ‘drought broke up.’ Having had ample time for comparison and appropriate reflections, he was at length set free from the apprehension that he was the sole inhabitant of Rainbar by the appearance of old Johnny, the cook, who expressed great delight and satisfaction at seeing him, and, explaining his absence by the statement that he had taken a walk of five miles down the river in order to buy a bag of potatoes from a dray loaded with those rare esculents, proceeded to place him in possession of facts. ‘Every one about the place was away mustering at Mildool,’ he said, ‘including Mr. Banks, both the blackfellows, Jack Windsor, and even Mrs. Windsor, who, finding that there was an unoccupied hut formerly belonging to a dairyman at Mildool, had joined the mustering party. He (Johnny) hadn’t had a soul to talk to for three weeks since the muster began, and was as miserable as a bandicoot.’