A Town like Alice

really like that, is it?"
    "It's a fair cow," said somebody. "It's a fair cow up here. No kidding, lady. It's two unmarried girls for fifty men in Willstown. A fellow hasn't got a chance of marrying up here."
    Somebody else explained to her, "You see, Miss Paget, if a girl's a normal girl and got her head screwed on right-say, like it might be you-you wouldn't stay here. Soon as you were old enough to go away from home you'd be off to some place where you could get a job and make your own living, not have to depend on your folks all the time. My word, you would. The only girls that stay in Willstown are the ones who are a bit stupid and couldn't make out in any other place, or else ones who feel they've got to stay and look after the old folks."
    Somebody else said, "That kind take the old folks with them down to the city. Like Elsie Freeman."
    Jean laughed. "You mean, that if you stay in Willstown you'll finish up by marrying a girl who's not so hot."
    They looked over their shoulders, embarrassed. "Well, a fellow wants to look around a bit…"
    "Who's going to run the stations if you all go down to the cities, looking round a bit?" Jean said.
    "That's the manager's headache," said Pete. "I've got headaches of my own."
    That evening shortly before tea a utility drove up, a battered old Chevrolet with a cab front and an open, truck-like body behind. It was driven by a man of about fifty with lean, sensitive features. Beside him sat a brown girl of twenty or twenty-five with a smooth skin and a serene face; she was not pure native, but probably a quarter white. She wore a bright red dress, and she carried a kitten, which was evidently a great amusement and interest to her. They passed into the hotel, the man carrying their bags; evidently they were staying for the night. At teatime Jean saw them in the dining-room sitting with the men at the other table, but they were keeping very much to themselves.
    Jean asked Mrs Connor who they were, after tea. "That's Eddie Page," she said. "He's manager of a station called Carlisle about a hundred miles out. The lubra's his wife; they've come in to buy stores."
    "Real wife?" asked Jean.
    "Oh yes, he married her properly. One of the Bush Brothers was round that way last year, Brother Copeland, and he married them. They come in here from time to time. I must say, she never makes any trouble. She can't read or write, of course, and she doesn't speak much. Always got a kitten or a puppy along with her; that's what she likes."
    The picture of the man's sensitive, intelligent face came incongruously into Jean's mind. "I wonder what made him do that?"
    Mrs Connor shrugged her shoulders. "Got lonely, I suppose."
    That night, when Jean went up to her bedroom, she saw a figure standing by the rail of the balcony that overlooked the backyard. There were two bedrooms only that opened on that balcony, her own and Annie's. In the dim light as she was going in, at her window she said, "Goodnight, Annie."
    The girl came towards her. "I been feeling awful bad," she muttered. "Mind if I ask you something, Miss Paget?"
    Jean stopped. "Of course, Annie. What's the matter?"
    "Do you know how to get rid of a baby, Miss Paget?"
    Jean had been prepared for that one by the morning's conversation; a deep pity for the child welled up in her. "I'm terribly sorry, Annie, but I don't. I don't think it's a very good thing to do, you know."
    "I went up to Sister Douglas and she said that's what's the matter with me. Pa'll beat the daylights out of me when he hears."
    Jean took her hand, and drew her into the bedroom. "Come in here and tell me about it."
    Annie said, "I know there's things you can do like eating something or riding on a horse or something like that. I thought perhaps you might have had to do it, and you'd know."
    "I've never had to do it, Annie. I don't know. Why don't you ask him to marry you and have it normally?"
    The girl said, "I don't know how you'd tell which one it was. They'd all say it was one of the others, wouldn't they?"
    It was a problem that Jean had never had to face. "I suppose they would."
    "I think I'll ask my sister Bessie. She might know. She had two kids afore getting married."
    It did not look as if Bessie's knowledge had been very useful to her. Jean asked, "Wouldn't the Sister do anything to help you? "
    "All she did was call me a wicked girl. That don't help much. Suppose I am a wicked girl. There's nothing else to do in a crook place like this."
    Jean did what she