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here.’
    ‘No one would drink from it,’ Georgina insisted.
    ‘If they were parched?’ His voice probed.
    ‘These days everyone knows the law of survival.’ Georgina knew she was babbling but she knew, too, that she had to. She had to stop—or at least defer—something that seemed very likely to happen, and happen to her.
    ‘You always carry a sheet of plastic,’ she cried, and it was very like a cry for help.
    ‘Go on,’ he advised.
    ‘You dig in the soil, and you ... Oh, everyone knows.’
    ‘Yes,’ he nodded, ‘even you. But I still think a pure pool of water would be more satisfactory.’
    ‘Of course it would be if you needed it, but you wouldn’t need it here. You could go to the anabranch of the river.’
    ‘In a fever for water you could miss the river. Indeed, it has been done. Anyway in the Dry the anabranch could be reduced to a few feet, or it might not even be there at all. Only a pool of water could stand between you and death, only it still would be death, a worse death if it’s left like this. So, Brown, we do what human decency demands. We remove the danger. Attend to this carcase at once.’ His face was grim.
    ‘Me?’ she asked faintly.
    ‘I’m not looking at anyone else.'
    ‘W-what do you want done with it?’
    ‘Well, I can tell you I don’t want it stuffed for dinner.' Again Georgina’s stomach heaved.
    ‘No, I want it removed and buried.’
    ‘I have no spade,’ she pointed out.
    ‘You can bury it in a cleft and place some shrubs and roots on top. Now get to it, man.’
    ‘It’s very large,’ Georgina said faintly.
    '‘But not much weight any more,’ Roper replied cheerfully.
    Georgina swallowed. ‘Can I come back later? With precision work like mine I have to preserve my hands. I’d need to wear gloves.'
    ‘I have gloves,’ he offered.
    ‘They’d be too large.’
    ‘You can tie them on with some of the marker ribbons if you like, but what I would like is some action, Brown. While you’re considering it you could have got it done. Now, get to it.'
    ‘Yes,’ Georgina said.
    She took a step forward. If only, she thought miserably, the poor beast had bogged himself some months before he had. It wouldn’t have been so bad just handling bones; bad enough, but—but this!
    Another step. Another revulsion.
    Another step ... then a heave she simply could not stop. She ran into the bush, and there she stood until the attack was over. She would try again, she told herself. There simply couldn’t be anything left inside her.
    She went wretchedly back until she reached the water-hole, then she stopped. It was empty.
    ‘Yes, I’ve done it.’ Roper came and stood beside her. ‘If anyone poisons himself where I’ve put it, then he deserves his bad luck.’
    ‘Thank you, sir.’
    ‘It wasn’t a pleasant job, and I don’t blame you for throwing up, but good lord, boy, you have to think of others. Keep that in mind next time.’
    Next time! Georgina vowed she would be away from this place by then.
    ‘We’ll get back now. I could do with a hot scour after that and then a long, strong tot of rum. How about you?’
    ‘I think I'll stay at home, sir.’
    ‘I rather think so, too. You haven’t done so well today, have you, so why should I waste a rum on you or your cold? Or is it nausea now? Are you prone to illness?’ He looked hard at her. ‘Even if you are, you can still drive back, Brown. I’ll sit behind, I don’t want to start you heaving again with any odour I have accumulated.’
    ‘No, sir,’ she said tonelessly.
    They did not speak on the return journey. Several times Roper indicated the direction, but that was all.
    When they got to the hut and Georgina climbed out of the jeep and Roper took her place, Roper asked: ‘Brown, just why did you come out here?’
    ‘To—to Roper’s?’ she asked.
    ‘Yes, Brown.’
    ‘I answered your advertisement.’
    ‘Yes, but why?’ he insisted.
    ‘I knew I’d like it—I liked where I was, so I knew I