man and them girls were strange women, in
the local as well as the Biblical sense of the word, who had come from
Sydney at the end of the shearing-season, and had taken a cottage on the
edge of the scrub on the outskirts of the town. There had been trouble
this week in connection with a row at their establishment, and they had
been fined, warned off by the police, and turned out by their landlord.

"This is a bit too red-hot, Giraffe," said one of the shearers. "Them
----s has made enough out of us coves. They've got plenty of stuff,
don't you fret. Let 'em go to ----! I'm blanked if I give a sprat."

"They ain't got their fares to Sydney," said the Giraffe. "An', what's
more, the little 'un is sick, an' two of them has kids in Sydney."

"How the ---- do you know?"

"Why, one of 'em come to me an' told me all about it."

There was an involuntary guffaw.

"Look here, Bob," said Billy Woods, the rouseabouts' secretary, kindly.
"Don't you make a fool of yourself. You'll have all the chaps laughing
at you. Those girls are only working you for all you're worth. I suppose
one of 'em came crying and whining to you. Don't you bother about 'em.
_You_ don't know 'em; they can pump water at a moment's notice. You
haven't had any experience with women yet, Bob."

"She didn't come whinin' and cryin' to me," said the Giraffe, dropping
his twanging drawl a little. "She looked me straight in the face an'
told me all about it."

"I say, Giraffe," said Box-o'-Tricks, "what have you been doin'? You've
bin down there on the nod. I'm surprised at yer, Giraffe."

"An' he pretends to be so gory soft an' innocent, too," growled the
Bogan. "We know all about you, Giraffe."

"Look here, Giraffe," said Mitchell the shearer. "I'd never have thought
it of you. We all thought you were the only virgin youth west the river;
I always thought you were a moral young man. You mustn't think that
because your conscience is pricking you everyone else's is."

"I ain't had anythin' to do with them," said the Giraffe, drawling
again. "I ain't a cove that goes in for that sort of thing. But other
chaps has, and I think they might as well help 'em out of their fix."

"They're a rotten crowd," said Billy Woods. "You don't know them, Bob.
Don't bother about them-they're not worth it. Put your money in your
pocket. You'll find a better use for it before next shearing."

"Better shout, Giraffe," said Box-o'-Tricks.

Now in spite of the Giraffe's softne