. . . and we'll meet now and then

Ned Barron is a part aboriginal rural reporter in Queensland, Australia, roaming the west picking up and publishing stories of the west. He also is half-owner with his sister of a huge cattle property where he works when he needs a break from writing. He particularly abhors the mining companies with their rights to enter properties and drill and their despoiling of the rural lands before departing to dig other mines. On one trip he finds that the Barnett Mining Company has booked all the beds in one small town because the owner of the big company, Laura Barnett, is visiting, to he writes a satirical story of her and her company. They sue, with determination, and Ned's in big trouble. As well he's trying to trace a beauteous doctor who was at his property and with whom he's fallen in love. She moves through the country areas as a locum. He's visited by Laura Barnett herself one morning and she asks him to come and work for her. She inherited the big company five years ago and now at 25, is ready to control the company and run it her way, especially in the matter of drilling, None of the company directors listen to her, treating her as a child. Ned refuses him until she entices him with the prospect of achieving in the mining industry what he's been preaching for year. She's beautiful and he joins her in Perth against his better judgment. He's to play the role of Laura's toyboy until it's time to reveal himself as her tough offsider. Problems emerge immediately as Laura falls in love with him. He's attracted, but he has the doctor to search out. He begins his plans to protect her and achieves most of them, antagonising the industry in general. Despite his attraction to Laura, he's ready to go home to find the doctor but Laura isn't ready to give him up yet . . .

Part-aboriginal rural reporter and cattleman,Ned Barron travels Queensland and New South Wales in Australia writing stories of the problems and achievements of the West. He wages an endless fight against the mining companies and their drilling gangs and invasion of properties as well as their failure to restore the mines when they leave. One night he writes a satirical article about the Coal Queen, Laura Barnett, who inherited the giant Barnett Mining when she was 21 and lives a life of wealth and privilege. She's touring Queensland and Ned can't get a bed and snipes at her in print. Barnett Mines sues him and his organisation and mean to crush them, he's told. But he's met and fallen in love with a locum doctor who also tours the West and is bent on finding her again. Things are getting serious with the law case when Laura Barnett appears at his door, wanting to cancel everything and offering him a job as her personal assistant. He declines until she points out that he's preached for years about the wrongs of the industry and now's his chance to do something from the inside. He agrees and goes to Perth with Laura, moving into her mansion and being the toyboy, until it's time to act. Problems . . . Laura falls in love with him and wants to marry him but Ned has his loved doctor to find. Laura never gives up but, together they begin to make the changes in her company that she wants. She never has been in control of the giant conglomeration. He fixes just about all the problems that he planned to and tells Laurie that he'll soon go home. She's beautiful and sweet and he's strongly tempted to stay but he has an obsession with Dr. Sally Lancaster and must go. But Laura isn't ready to yield him up just yet . . .

Roland Humphries lives in Queensland, Australia, not far from where he grew up and trained as a daily journalist. He continued that career in newspaper and in radio, working through Australia and Papua/New Guinea, sometimes in battle zones when Indonesia was fighting for West Papua. He spent a short time in the State Government and then retired to write e-books. He's written 23 so far. He's married with three children.