-dressed and well to do, and as she passed with some other
girls he dropped his stick out in front of her and spoke to her. She
laughed and ran back to the shop when we'd gone on a little further and
spoke to him for a second or two as she passed him. It was after that she
was well dressed and I saw her out with him once or twice and--and--I
began to think of Mary. You see, I knew how hard the life was and how
wearying it is to have to slave and half-starve all the time, and then
Mary wanted money so to send home to help them. And when the girls talked
at work they spoke of lots of things we never heard of in the bush and
gradually I got to know what made me sick at heart.

"I was nearly mad when I thought of that about Mary, my sister Mary who
was so good and so kind. I hated myself for dreaming of such a thing but
it grew and grew on me and at last I couldn't rest till I found out. I
didn't think it was so but it began to seem just possible, a wild
possibility that I must satisfy to myself, the more I couldn't find her.
I somehow felt she was in Brisbane somewhere and I learnt how easily one
slips down to the bottom when one starts slipping and has no friends. So
I used to go on Queen Street at night and look for her there. But I never
saw her. I wanted to ask about her but I couldn't bear to. I thought of
asking the Salvation Army people but when I went one night I couldn't.

"At last one night when we'd been working late at the shop, till eleven,
as we did very often in busy times without getting any overtime pay
though they turned us off as they pleased when work got slack, I saw a
girl coming that I thought I'd ask. She was painted up and powdered and
had flaring clothes but she looked kind. It was a quiet street where I
met her and before I had time to change my mind she got to me and I
stopped and asked her. I told her I'd lost my sister and did she know
anything of her. She didn't laugh at me or say anything rude but talked
nice and said she didn't think so and I mustn't think about that but if I
liked she'd find out. I told her the name but she said that wasn't any
good because girls always changed their name and she looked like crying
when she said this. I had a photograph of Mary's that I always carried
with me to show anybody who might have seen her without knowing her and
the girl said if I'd trust her with it for a week she'd find Mary if she
was in Brisbane and meet me. So I lent it to her. And we were ju