“No,” responded that individual briefly: a true Australian-Cockney answer, impossible to spell. A sort of _neow_ sound. “Does anybody take them?” “Neow. We take no garbage.” “Then what do I do with them?” “Do what you like with ’em.” And he marched off with the can. It was not rudeness. It was a kind of colonial humour. After this Somers surveyed the cans and garbage of the next lot, under the bushes and everywhere, with colonial hopelessness. But he began at once to pick up rags and cans from his own grass. The house was very pretty, and beautifully built. But it showed all signs of the eleven children. On the verandah at the side, on either side of the “visitors” door, was a bed: one a huge family iron bedstead with an indescribably rusty, saggy wire mattress, the other a single iron bedstead with the wire mattress all burst and so mended with a criss-cross of ropes. These beds were screened from the sea-wind by sacks, old pieces of awful carpeting, and pieces of linoleum tacked to the side of the verandah. The same happened on the third side of the house: two more rope-mended iron bedsteads, and a nailed up lot of unspeakable rags to screen from the wind. The house had three little bedrooms, one opening from each of the side verandahs, and one from the big central room. Each contained two saggy single beds. That was five people. Remained seven, with the father and mother. Three children must have gone into the huge bed by the side entrance door, and the other four must have been sprinkled over the other three outside, rope-mended beds. The bungalow contained only the big room with five doors: one on each side the fire-place, opening into the inner bedroom and the kitchen respectively, and on each of the other three sides a door opening on to the verandah. From the kitchen opened a little pantry and a zinc-floored cubby hole fitted with the inevitable Australian douche and a little sink-hole to carry off the water. This was the bathroom. There it was, all compact and nice, two outer bedrooms on the wings, and for the central block, the big room in front, the bedroom and kitchen at the back. The kitchen door opened on to the bit of grass at the back, near the shed. It was a well-built little place, amazing in a world of wood and tin shacks. But Somers would not have liked to live in it with a thirteen-people family. There were eleven white breakfast cups, of which nine had smashed handles and broad tin substitutes quite cannily put on. There were two saucers only. And all the rest to match: seven large brown teapots, of which five had broken spouts: not one whole dish or basin of any sort, except a sauce boat. And rats! _Torestin_ was a clean and ratless spot compared with _Coo-ee_. For the house was called _Coo-ee_, to fetch the rats in, Jack said.