Partners of the out-Trail by Harold Bindloss

Jim had a shooting-punt built, and now and then when the tide served at night, paddled up the creeks and shot a goose or duck, although he did not use a big punt-gun. He liked to pick out his birds and not throw a pound of shot into a flock. In the meantime, he pushed on the draining of the marsh, and although he spent anxious hours counting the cost, resolved to hold out until the job was done. As a rule, he was preoccupied and quiet, and Evelyn often found him dull. His talk about dykes and sluices did not amuse her.

By and by he found it needful to engage some drain-cutters, and one afternoon Jake, taking Carrie with him, started for a village on the other side of the bay. It was a long way round the sands and when they were near the village the car stopped and Jake found a valve had broken. He engaged the men he wanted and afterwards resolved to leave the car and walk back across the sands. The few cottages were very small and their occupants had no room for strangers, but the bay got narrow near its mouth and the distance across the sands was scarcely three miles. Jake did not expect to find much water in the channels, and when he had borrowed a pair of fishermen's waders for Carrie, and they had got a meal at a cottage, they set off.