“Hope told a flattering tale.”
Thus endorsed, Jack began to consider himself to be as fine a fellow as
the rest of the world was bent upon making him out to be. He held up his
head as in the old days, when debt and he were strangers, and gave his
opinion with imposing decision upon all matters, pastoral, social, and
political. He was glad now that he had followed M‘Nab’s advice, and
shorn the fat sheep. Their wool told up noticeably in the clip, and he
trusted that in the coming autumn he should be able to top the market
with the first draft of fat sheep from the glorious salt-bush plains
which skirted the lonely Bimbalong.
He received a certain amount of satisfaction from observing how reduced
was the list of stores and necessaries with which he had been entrusted
by M‘Nab. “Why, it’s next to nothing,” said he, as he looked over it;
“one would think we were providing for a cattle station except for next
year’s shearing requirements. If we have only another decent year or
two, the debt will be wiped off, and hey for Europe!” Then, from that
vision of the sea, arose the form—as of a Venus Anadyomene—of Maud
Stangrove. Would she share his pilgrimage? How enchanting the thought!
How divine the companionship! Together would they wander through the
cities of the old world, as through the dream-palaces of his boyish
days. Paris, with her mingled splendours and luxuries. Rome, calm and
majestic, even amid her ruins, as befitted the Mother of Nations.
Venice, with mysterious gondolas still floating adown her sea, which is
“her broad, her narrow streets,” which still, as in old days of regal
pride, and power, and love, is “her black-marble stair.” Switzerland,
with her pure, white-robed, heaven-gazing Alps, receiving their crimson
dawn-blush ere beholding the fresh day-birth of a world. Last of all,
but how far from least, “Merrie England,” the great land of their
fathers—every legendary and historical feature of which had been graven
in his mind from earliest childhood. Bound on such a pilgrimage as this,
“with one fair spirit for his minister,” how cheerfully would he
abandon, for a season, the dull labours and prosaic thoughts with which
his later years had been bedimmed! He thought of Maud’s cultured and
receptive mind; her keen spirit of observation; her unfailing
cheerfulness; and the deep, unselfish tenderness which he had remarked
in her home intercourse. Could he but win this peerless creature to
himself; could he but provide for this diamond of purest ray serene the
costly setting which alone harmonized with its rank among “earth’s
precious things,” he told himself that the sayings of cynics about the
ills of humanity would be meaningless falsehoods.
This, perhaps, slightly exalted conception of the probabilities of
matrimony, combined with the absence of the central figure, around which
such roseate clouds softly circled, tended to abridge Mr. Redgrave’s
metropolitan sojourn. He made the novel discovery that ordinary modern
society was worldly and frivolous—that club _viveurs_ were selfish and
dissipated—that his acquaintances, generally, were destitute of
ennobling aims; and that it behoved any man, whose soul cherished a
lofty purpose, to follow out a sustained plan unswervingly. To this end
he determined, rather ungratefully, considering how powerful a tonic his
visit had proved, to abandon the vain city, and betake himself
incontinently to the majestic desert and to—Maud Stangrove.
He made an abrupt departure, somewhat to the surprise of that very small
section of society which troubled itself with his weal or woe, and
appeared suddenly before M‘Nab, who, in his turn, was surprised also.
Mr. M‘Nab was not only astonished at his employer’s short stay in
Melbourne, but also at his cheerful and animated demeanour.
“The trip has done you a world of good, sir,” he said. “I thought when
you went away that it would take you longer to forget our losses.”
“Well, there’s nothing like change of air, and the knowledge of what
other people are doing, when you are low. If people spent more money in
trains and coaches they would spend less on doctors, I believe. A man
who is shut up with his misery broods over it till, like a shepherd, he
goes mad some day. When I got to town, I found others had suffered even
more heavily, and, of course, that comforted me.”
“And the wool?” inquired M‘Nab.
“Nothing but compliments,” answered Jack. “Never expected to see wool
got up like it on the Warroo, and so on. Mr. Shrood prophesied all kinds
of triumphs and fancy prices next year. I might have had ten thousand
sovereigns to take away in my hat, if I had asked for them. This flood
seems to have done a world of damage, and such a trifle as the loss of
two or three thousand sheep was voted not worth talking about.”
“It was an awful sacrifice—just a throwing to the fishes of two thousand
golden guineas, any way ye look at it,” said, slowly and impressively,
the downright M‘Nab. He could never be led to gloss over any
shortcomings, losses, or failures, holding them as points in the game of
life to be carefully scored, which no player worthy of the name would
omit. “You’re welcome to knock half of it off my wages,” he continued,
“as I shall always believe that I was to blame for want of care. But I
hope we’ll have profits yet that will clear off the score of this and
other losses.”
“I am fully confident that we shall, M‘Nab,” said Jack, hopefully; “and
I have no notion of making my deficit good out of your screw, though it
is manly of you to offer it. You work as hard and do as much as one man
can. Whether things go right or wrong, I shall never blame you, be
assured. I am free to admit that in your place I should not do half as
well. And now, do you want any help for a week or two, for I think I
shall ride down to Juandah?”
“I did not expect you back for a month more,” said M‘Nab, smiling to
himself; “so I had arranged to do without you, you see. I can get on
grandly till we begin to draft the fat sheep for market.”
Thus absolved and conscience-clear, Mr. Redgrave immediately betook
himself to Juandah, where he was received with frank and kindly welcome
by everybody. It was fortunate that he had gone to Melbourne after the
flood-disaster, as he was now able to treat that damaging blow in a much
more light and philosophical fashion than would have been possible to
him without the aid of his metropolitan experiences.
“It was rather a facer,” he admitted to Stangrove, who had delicately
described their grief at seeing the drowned weaners floating past their
windows in scores and hundreds, “but when a fellow has a large operation
in hand he must look at the progress of the whole enterprise, and not
fix his mind upon minor drawbacks. A single vessel doesn’t matter out of
the whole convoy of East Indiamen. The loss of the _Royal George_ had no
perceptible influence on the rest of the British navy. I shall shear
over sixty thousand sheep next year, with luck, and when I sell shall
think no more of those poor devils of weaners than you do of the
blacks—probably mythical—that Red Rob slew during your minority.”
“With luck—with luck—as you say,” said Stangrove, rather absently. “But,
as we agreed before, luck seems necessary to the working out of your
plan, which I admit, at present prices, looks feasible enough. But
suppose we _don’t_ get our fair share of luck this year, what then?
However, we needn’t anticipate evil. Let’s come in and see the ladies.”
“‘So behold you of return,’ as dear old Madame Florac says,” commenced
Maud, looking up from _The Newcomes_. “How truly fortunate you men are,
Mr. Redgrave, that you can get away to some decent abode of mankind
every now and then under the pretence of business! Now we poor,
oppressed women have to give reasons that will bear the most searching
investigation before we are allowed to go anywhere. Men only say vaguely
‘must go—important business,’ and take themselves off.”
“Really, Miss Stangrove, I don’t see but that you, in this nice cool
room, with nothing to do but to read about Ethel and Barnes, that grand
old cat Lady Kew, and the dear old Colonel, are about as well off as any
one I have seen in my travels.”
“That’s all nonsense. We endure life here, of course, but look at the
delightful change of scene, air, life, people, trees, bread and butter,
everything new and fresh that you have had lately. Uniformity is death
to some natures. That is why some unhappy individuals of my sex make
dismal endings and horrid examples of themselves. Some girl marries the
butler, or the stockman, or the music master periodically. Depend upon
it, it is nothing but Nature’s protest against the murderous monotony of
their daily lives.”
“Maud, Maud,” interposed Mrs. Stangrove, “how can you say such dreadful
things? Quite improper, I think. I declare Mr. Redgrave will be shocked
and alarmed if you go on so. Really, my dear!”
Jack mildly combated these extreme and unconventional opinions,
declaring that some of the most discontented, useless, and life-weary
people he had ever seen had enjoyed no end of variety—passed their lives
in sight-seeing—been everywhere—and yet were more utterly _ennuyés_ than
even Miss Stangrove on the banks of the Warroo.
“Well,” said that young lady, “you see they had only been working out
the vanity and vexation of spirit theory, and how dreary a result it was
for the Wise King to come to! But I should like ‘to see the folly of it
too.’ I think manufacturing one’s own vanity and vexation is more
satisfactory than acquiring it second-hand.”
“I wonder if our black friends ever feel bored,” said Jack; “before we
came and gave them iron tomahawks it must have taken a fellow a week to
chop out a ’possum; so I suppose constant employment conduced to
cheerfulness. Still, of late years, food being plentiful, wars
traditionary, and travel impossible, game perhaps a trifle scarcer, a
sense of impatience of the ‘slow, strong hours’ _may_ have crossed their
unused intelligences.”
“It may be, for all we know,” said Mark, who had re-entered and thrown
himself upon a sofa, “at the root of the frantic love for ardent spirits
which all the younger natives have. The men of a generation or two back,
like ‘old man Jack,’ don’t drink. But all the middle-aged and younger
ones, _more particularly those, by comparison, educated_, drink
fearfully hard whenever they get the chance.”
“So do all savages,” said Jack; “likewise smoke furiously. Alcohol and
tobacco seem particularly attractive to their organizations; and they
have no power of moderation. ‘Too much of anything is not good,’ said
the Red Indian, ‘but too much rum is just enough.’ That’s their idea—all
over the world.”
“I suggest that we have exhausted the subject,” mildly interposed Mrs.
Stangrove, “and as it is getting cool we might all go for a drive in the
break with Mark and the young horses. Can you take us, my dear?”
This was voted a first-rate suggestion. The evening, comparatively cool
only, was approaching. So the ladies apparelled themselves suitably, and
as Mark let the half-broken team out, without fear of stone or stump,
along the glorious, level, sandy out-station track, the rushing air
refreshed their senses, jaded by the long, breezeless midsummer day. It
was twilight deepening into night as they returned, a very cheerful and
animated party. Maud, with the changeful mood of her sex, declared
herself again reconciled to existence, and even conscious of pleasurable
anticipation as regarded tea.
Jack was catechised after that refection upon the balls,
archery-parties, picnics, races, &c., to which he had been on his late
visit to town. Maud sang a new song or two which she had managed to get
up, buried alive as she assumed herself to be, and John Redgrave was
more deeply enthralled than ever.
Stangrove asked him to stay a fortnight or so with them, if he could
spare the time; and Jack declared it would be most uncomplimentary to
M‘Nab’s management, and the fencing system generally, to suppose that a
proprietor was pinned to his homestead like a mere shepherding squatter.
So he gratefully accepted the invitation and the opportunity. In spite
of the weather—and even the presence of the beloved object cannot render
the month of January a pleasant one in Lower Riverina—the days passed in
a dreamily luxurious tropical fashion. Jack had an early enjoyable swim
in the capacious Warroo, now rippling over sand-bars and pebbles, as if
it had never risen with death upon its angry tide. Then the breakfast in
the cool darkened room, before the great and resistless glare of the day
commenced, was very pleasant. After that period, and until the sun was
down, I am free to confess that all the _dramatis personæ_ might as well
have been in Madras or Bombay. Outside the heat was awful, and the first
effect on leaving the shelter of the cottage after ten o’clock a.m., was
as if one had suddenly encountered the outer current of a blast furnace.
Mark was out on the run, as a matter of course, pretty nearly all day
and every day. There were never-ending duties among the sheep, cattle,
and horses which did not permit him to make any philosophical
reflections upon the heat of the weather. He simply put it out of the
question, as he had done from boyhood. Consequently he did not feel it
half as much as those who tried by every means to evade it.
Jack did not feel himself called upon to offer to join his host in these
daily expeditions. He occasionally, of course, volunteered when his
assistance was likely to be useful. But generally he lounged about the
house, and made himself generally useful by reading aloud to the ladies,
irrigating Mrs. Stangrove’s flower-garden, practising duets with Maud,
and generally raising Miss Stangrove from that desolate and vacuous
condition into which she had been in danger of falling before his
opportune arrival. The riding and the driving parties were of course not
abandoned. There was always some period arbitrarily defined as the cool
of the evening, when such exercise, even walking by the Warroo under the
sighing river-oaks, was suitable and satisfactory. He and Mark had long
arguments about all kinds of subjects, in which the ladies now and then
took part. Nothing could have been more generally agreeable than the
whole thing. But the days wore on, and Jack felt that he had no decent
excuse for staying longer; he therefore prepared to depart. He had not
seen his way either, much as he longed for an opportunity, to put that
very tremendous and momentous question to Maud, to which he had sworn to
himself that he _would_ receive a definitive answer before quitting
Juandah. Truth to tell, their intimacy had not advanced so quickly as he
had hoped. He saw, or thought he saw, that Maud liked his society. But
she was so frank and unembarrassed that he mistrusted the existence of
any deeper sentiment. He was not altogether without knowledge of the
ways of womenkind; and he knew that this frank recognition of the
pleasantness of his society was by no means a good sign. He did not feel
inclined to ask any girl, obviously non-sympathetic, to marry him,
trusting to the unlikeliness of her seeing any decenter sort of fellow
in these wilds, and to her acknowledged distaste for life on the Warroo.
“No, hang it,” he said to himself, “that would be hardly generous. I’ll
wait till she shows some sign that she really cares for me—loves me, I
mean. If she doesn’t, John Redgrave is not the man to ask her. If she
does, she can’t hide it, nor can any woman that ever lived. I know so
much of the alphabet.”
Thus hardening his heart temporarily and strategically, Mr. Jack
finished copying the last galop, put a finishing touch to the grand
arterial system of irrigation borrowed from Ah Sing, which he had
engineered for the benefit of Mr. Redgrave’s roses and japonicas, gave
Mark Stangrove a real good day’s work at the branding-yard, showed him a
new dodge for leg-roping which elicited the admiration of the stockmen,
and went on his way, accompanied for a mile or two by his host.