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Page 133

| from the pasture land, a long building with a bank of yellow flowers growing in front and the stockmen's quarters farther back from it. Her heart raced when she saw a garden filled with vegetables and farm animals grazing within a fence close beside a barn, and even more cattle grazing midst the sheep in the distance. |

| Ashton had thought of everything! |

| And she had been wrong about Crispin and Rufus. No one could be more loyal than they! They had labored hard to get the sheep station ready. |

| Ashton was lost to her sight, having gone with Crispin to survey the property and to meet with Rufus. Sasha rode up to the house and dismounted. Not taking her eyes off the small, hipped-roof dwelling with two windows like eyes on either side of the doorway, she looped her reins around a post. Ashton had forewarned her somewhat about the sort of house that she would be living in. He had said that the only good building timber came from the cabbage-tree palms, which were straight and easy to work with. The wall slats were cut from mimosa saplingsthe ''golden tree" of the Australian summer. The roof was reed thatch, gathered from the tidal marshes. |

| Her stomach quivering strangely with excitement, she moved up the front steps onto a porch, then on inside the house shadowed with dusk. There was just enough light left for her to find a candle and matches. Lighting the candle, she held the candleholder up and began moving it slowly around so that she could take in everything about the house. Although it was small and crude, she could not help but be proud of it, because it was hers! |

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