thickly fringed with trees,
while in the shallower parts a forest of green, feathery reeds bordered
it, swaying and rustling all day, no matter how soft the breeze. The
deeper end had been artificially hollowed out, and a bathing box had
been built, with a springboard jutting out over the water. Under the
raised floor of the bathing box a boat was moored. Norah pulled it out
and dropped down into it, stowing her tin of worms carefully in the
stern. Then she paddled slowly into the deepest part of the lagoon,
baited her line scientifically, and began to fish.

Only eels rewarded her efforts; and while eels are not bad fun to pull
out, Norah regarded them as great waste of time, since no one at
Billabong cared to eat them, and in any case she would not let them
come into the boat--for a good-sized eel can make a boat unpleasantly
slimy in a very short time. So each capture had to be carefully
released at the stern--not a very easy task. Before long Norah's white
blouse showed various marks of conflict; and being by nature a clean
person, she was rather disgusted with things in general. When at length
a large silver eel, on being pulled up, was found to have swallowed the
hook altogether, she fairly lost patience.

"Well, you'll have to keep it," she said, cutting her line; whereupon
the eel dropped back into the water thankfully, and made off as though
he had formed a habit of dining on hooks, and, in fact, preferred them
as an article of diet. "I'm sure you'll have shocking indigestion,"
Norah said, watching the swirl of bubbles.

The boat had drifted some way down the lagoon, and a rustle told Norah
that they were near one of the reedy islands dotted here and there in
the shallows. There was very little foothold on them, but they made
excellent nesting places for the ducks that came to the station each
year. The boat grounded its nose in the soft mud, and Norah jumped up
to push it off. Planting the blade of the oar among the reeds, she
leant her weight upon it and shoved steadily.

The next events happened swiftly. The mud gave way suddenly with a
suck, and the oar promptly slithered, burying itself for half its
length; and Norah, taken altogether by surprise, executed a graceful
header over the bow of the boat. The mud received her softly, and clung
to her with affection; and for a moment, face downward among the reeds,
Norah clawed for support, like a crab suddenly beached. Then, somehow,
she scrambled to a sitt