When the past is reviewed, and the clear sad lamp of experience sheds
its soft gleam upon the devious track, then are all apparent the
scarce shunned precipices, the hidden pitfalls, the bones of long
dead victims. Then can we measure the tender patience with which our
guardian angel warned or wooed into safety.
Here, where we loitered all heedless, flower-crowned, and wine-flushed,
languished the serpent syren, heavenly fair, but deadliest of all.
We had been surely sped. But an idle impulse, the tone of a passing
melody, led to change of purpose, of route, and we stood scatheless
anon, having tripped lightly among deaths as sudden and shattering as
the lighted explosive.
At the diverging roads, where dumb and scornful sat the sphinx of our
destiny, while we lightly glanced at the path whence none return, save
in such guise that death were dearer, why did our heedless footsteps
cling all instinctively to the narrow, the thrice blessed way?
And yet again, in the dark hour when we should have been watchful as
the mariner on an unknown shore, who casts the lead over every foot of
the passage through which his barque seems so easily gliding, how was
our careless pride brought low, how sudden was the sorrow, how dreary
the bondage, till we were ransomed from the dungeon of the pitiless
one. From what endless weeping would not, alas, a dim knowledge and
recognition of the _first false step_ have saved us!
Such a false step Mr. Neuchamp was nigh upon adopting, with all its
train of evil consequences. At the mid-day _table d’hôte_ at the Royal
Hotel, sufficiently welcome to him after the weary main, sat a florid,
good-looking, smiling, middle-aged man, evidently a gentleman, and
not less surely connected with the country division. He happened,
apparently by chance, to be seated next to Ernest, who was immediately
attracted by his bonhomie, his humorous epigrammatic talk, joined to
the outward signs and tokens of the man of the world.
‘You have not been very long in this part of the country?’ said the
agreeable stranger.
Ernest slightly coloured as he replied, ‘I certainly have not;
but I confess I don’t see why I should be _affiché_ as a new and
inexperienced traveller. You and I are dressed much alike, after
all,’ added he, glancing at the other’s well-cut travelling suit of
rough tweed and the black hat which hung beside his own upon the pegs
provided for lunch-consuming visitors.
‘True, quite true,’ agreed his new acquaintance; ‘and it is not,
perhaps, good manners to remark upon a gentleman as a species of
foreign novelty. I remember a few years since chafing at it myself. But
my heart warms to an Englishman of a certain sort. And we Australians
learn to know the Britisher by all manner of slight signs, including a
fresh complexion. I really believe, if you will pardon my rudeness in
guessing, that you come from near my own county?’
Ernest explained the locality of Neuchampstead, upon which the affable
stranger rose and shook him violently with both hands, exclaiming, ‘I
could have sworn it. Our people have been friends for ages. I come
from just over the border. You’ve heard of the Selmores, of Saleham?’
mentioning county people well known by name to Ernest.
‘Now this is very delightful,’ said his new friend, after all
explanations had been made, ‘and I shall take charge of you without any
scruple. You had better change your quarters to the New Holland Club.
I can have you admitted as an honorary member without a day’s delay. I
am a member; but I came here to-day to meet a friend, and have done so
most unexpectedly, eh, my dear Neuchamp?’
So irresistible was Mr. Selmore, that Ernest felt absolutely carried
away by the stream of his decided manner, his good stories, his
pleasant sarcasms, his foreign reminiscences, and his racy description
of Australian bush-life (he owned several stations, it would seem,
himself). So it was natural that after a bottle of hock, of a rare
vintage, ordered in honour of their auspicious meeting, that he should
confide to Mr. Selmore his plans of life, his leading ideas, and the
amount of capital which he was free to invest in some description of
landed property.
After they had compressed more droll, confidential, and semi-practical
talk into a couple of hours than would have served for a week on
board ship, Mr. Selmore proposed a stroll down the street towards the
public gardens, which he thought his young friend would find novel and
interesting.
As they lounged down the principal street Ernest was struck with
the change in the appearance of the crowd which thronged one side
of the footway, between the bisecting cross-streets. The hard and
anxious faces of the world’s workers which had filled the pavement in
the morning had vanished, and in their stead were the flowerets of
fashion, the gilded youth of the land, the butterflies of society, the
fair faces of daintily attired girls, the unworn features of those
ornamental human types which comprise no toilers, whatever may be the
proportion of spinsters.
Mr. Neuchamp, whose sensitive organisation was still more highly
attuned by the voyage, gazed with much interest upon this novel
presentment. Again he could not help asking himself, ‘Have I really
left Britain? Is this a colony, or a magically sliced-off section of
London life? The swells are identical to the turn of a moustache, or
the set of a collar. That girl’s bonnet has not been two months from
Paris, for I saw the fellow of it, which had only that day arrived, on
Cousin Amy’s head the week I left home. Allah is great! Have I come to
reform these people? However, this is only the city. All cities are
alike, except, perhaps, Tangiers and Philadelphia. Wait till I get
fairly into the bush!’
Thus, looking with pleased eyes and wondering mind, Mr. Neuchamp hardly
noticed that his companion, as he swaggered easily along, seemed to
know and be known of every one. He, however, did not care to stop to
speak to his numerous friends. As they passed on, some of them, Ernest
commenced to observe, regarded Mr. Selmore and himself with an amused
expression. Keenly alive to colonial criticism, though proposing to
pour so many vials of the British article upon the heads of these
unsuspecting Arcadians, he noted more closely the manner and bearing
of the still undiminished number of the ‘friends of his friend’ whom
they encountered. It might have been fancy, but he thought that he saw
a keen glance, in some instances not altogether of mirth, bestowed upon
himself.
They had reached a side street, along which they passed, when three
young men, irreproachably attired for the ante-prandial stroll, blocked
the way.
‘Where are you off to in such a hurry, you old humbug?’ said a tall
handsome man imperiously. ‘You _can’t_ have any business at this time
of day.’
‘Not so sure of that,’ chimed in another of the party. ‘_I see you’ve
got your black hat with you_, Selmore.’
Mr. Selmore looked straight into the speaker’s eyes for a moment, and
then gravely taking off the upper covering referred to, stroked it,
looked at it, and replaced it upon his head.
‘Yes!’ he said, ‘Evelyn, I have; I prefer them, even in this confounded
weather. They make a fellow look like a gentleman if it’s in him, and
not like a man going to a dog-fight, like that white abomination you
have on.’
The trio laughed more heartily and continuously at this rejoinder than
Ernest thought the wit justified, to the enjoyment of which Mr. Selmore
abandoned them without ceremony, merely remarking to Ernest, though
good fellows, they were awfully dissipated, and he could not recommend
them as friends.
Before quitting the business part of the city, where the handsome
massive stone buildings gave an Italian air to the narrow streets,
Ernest’s roving eye happened to light on the name of ‘Frankston,’
legended upon a conspicuously bright brass plate.
‘Ha!’ said he, ‘I remember something about that name. Is he a
merchant—do you know him?’
‘Yes,’ said Mr. Selmore indifferently, ‘he is a merchant, and a
tolerably sharp man of business too. Takes station accounts; but I
forget, you don’t quite understand our phrases yet. He would be called
more a private banker where you and I hail from. Why do you ask?’
‘Merely because I happen to have a letter of introduction to him from a
man I met abroad once, and I shall deliver it to-morrow.’
Mr. Selmore did not look sympathetic at this announcement, but he said
little in contravention of his young friend’s resolve.
‘You must keep your weather eye open, if he gets you out to that pretty
place of his, Neuchamp, or you will find yourself saddled with a big
station and a tight mortgage before you can look round you.’
Ernest had more than once thought himself extremely fortunate in
meeting with Mr. Selmore at so early a period of his colonial career.
Now he was confirmed in that opinion.
‘My dear sir, I shall be more than cautious in any dealings with
him, I assure you,’ he said warmly. ‘Are these the public gardens?
How different from anything I have seen before, and how surpassingly
beautiful!’
They roamed long amid the glories of that semi-tropical park, rich with
the spoils of the Orient and many a fairy isle of the Great South Sea.
As the palms and strangely formed forest trees waved in the breeze
fresh from a thousand leagues of ocean foam, as the blue waters glanced
and sparkled through the clustering foliage, while they sat under giant
pines and looked over the sea-wall and at the white-winged sailing
boats flitting over the wavelets of the ocean-lake which men call the
harbour of Sydney, Mr. Neuchamp freely acknowledged his wonder and his
admiration. Stronger than ever was his faith in the destiny of a people
with whom he was fixed in determination henceforth to cast in his lot.
Mr. Selmore had obtained his consent to dine with him at a well-known
_café_, and thither, after visiting the baths, as the short twilight
was deepening into night, they wended their way.
Upon entering the room the appearance of an extremely well-arranged
dinner service was pleasant enough to view, after the somewhat less
ornamental garniture of the table of a clipper-ship.
Ernest was introduced to two other friends of Mr. Selmore, also of
the pastoral persuasion, and who looked as if town visiting was the
exception in their rule of life.
The dinner passed off very pleasantly. The _menu_ was well chosen,
the cooking more than respectable, the wines unimpeachable. Ernest
was sober from habit and principle. It would have been vain to have
made the attempt to induce him to exceed. Still, with all reasonable
moderation, it must be confessed that a man takes a more hopeful view
of life after a good dinner, more especially in the days of joyous
youth.
Mr. Selmore’s friends were up-country dwellers, and it appeared that
they were, in some sort, neighbours of his when at home. Much of the
conversation insensibly took the direction of stock-farming, and Mr.
Neuchamp found himself listening to tales of crossing flooded rivers
with droves bound for a high market, or of tens of thousands of sheep
bought and sold in a day, or the wonderful price of wool, while
intermingled were descriptions of feats of horsemanship varied with an
occasional encounter with wild blacks.
In the midst of all this, Mr. Neuchamp’s ardour kindled to such a pitch
that he could not forbear asking one of the last arrived strangers
whether there was not any station for sale in their district that would
be suitable for him.
One of the pastorals looked at the other in astonishment, when they
both looked reproachfully at Mr. Selmore.
‘You don’t mean to say,’ at length broke out the older man, whose
assiduity to the bottle had been unabated, ‘that you haven’t told our
young friend here that Gammon Downs is for sale, ’pon my soul it’s too
bad!’
‘Why, it’s the very place in the whole blessed colony,’ said the other,
‘for a new arrival—good water, good sheep, a nice handy little run, and
the best house in the district.’
Mr. Neuchamp was so struck with the expressive and interrogatory looks
of the two bush residents, that he bent a searching look upon Mr.
Selmore, as if he had in some mysterious way been ill-treated by the
withholding of confidence.
‘Well,’ at length spoke out that gentleman, with an air of manly
frankness, ‘_you_ know me too well to think that I should propose to
sell one of my own runs to a friend, comparatively inexperienced, of
course, though well up in English farming, on the very first day I had
met him. There _are_ people, of course, who would do this, and more—but
Hartley Selmore is not one of that sort.’
‘But it does seem a shame,’ said the grizzled squatter, filling his
glass, ‘that if you have one of the best runs in the country, that
you should refuse to sell it to this gentleman merely because he is a
personal friend.’
‘Thank you,’ said Ernest warmly, ‘you have interpreted my sentiments
admirably. If this estate, or station, would be so suitable, why should
we not come to terms about it like any one else?’
‘So remarkably cheap too,’ said the other man; ‘but I suppose Selmore
wants a lot of cash down.’
‘I have only five thousand pounds,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, ‘and perhaps
your property is far above that limit.’
‘It _is_ less than I thought of taking,’ said Mr. Selmore thoughtfully;
‘but, yes; I don’t mind arranging for bills, at one and two years,
which, of course, if you bought, could be easily paid out of the
profits of the station. But pass the claret, we won’t talk any more
shop to-night. Just so far that my friends, who live near my place, are
going up the day after to-morrow. They will be glad of your company,
and will show you the wonders of the bush, including Gammon Downs. You
can then, my dear Neuchamp, judge for yourself.’
This plan appearing to Ernest to combine the utmost liberality on the
part of the vendor with special advantages to the purchaser, who could
have abundant time to examine and deliberate about his investment, was
promptly acceded to.
He departed at the close of the evening to the hotel, at which place
he had decided to stay, notwithstanding the tempting offer of a club
bedroom. Ernest Neuchamp was not minded to give up his habits of
observation, and for the exercise of his pursuit he deemed the hostelry
of the period more favourable than any modern club.
Human nature is so constituted that a project feasible, favourable,
and merely needing the very smallest propulsion into action over
night wears a changed aspect with the dawn. As Mr. Neuchamp regained
his suspended senses in a hot and mosquito-raided upper chamber in
the Royal, the idea of becoming at a plunge the proprietor of Gammon
Downs showed less alluring than over the joyous claret-illumined board
of yester eve. What if the name (given by the rude pioneers, it had
been explained to him from some nonsensical circumstance) should be
only too correct a designation for a delusive investment? What if Mr.
Selmore were a little _too_ obliging, confidential, and considerate
for a true and generous vendor? What if his companions, who certainly
appreciated the claret, were likely from friendship or interest to
be leagued against the stranger? It behoved him to be careful. The
slender resources of Neuchampstead had been strained to their utmost to
supplement his younger brother’s portion. Were this lost he could never
regain his position. And though with the recklessness of a sanguine
temperament, he would, without much regret, have addressed himself to
the task of carving out a fortune with his own right hand in this land
of promise, still he fully recognised the vast difference between a
capital even of moderate amount and none at all.
Throwing on a few clothes hastily, he strolled off towards the baths,
and after a leisurely swim in the cool translucent wave, he found
his appetite for breakfast improved and his mental vision obviously
cleared. He arrived at divers and various wise resolutions; and one of
them was to call upon Mr. Frankston, the merchant. Two heads are better
than one, decided Mr. Neuchamp sapiently, and Granville said that this
old gentleman’s head was an exceedingly good one, nearly, but not
quite, as good as his heart.
Discovering with some difficulty the precise street, almost a lane,
where he had suddenly descried the well-remembered name, he walked into
this office about half-past ten o’clock, and inquired for the head
of the house. The clerk civilly motioned him to a chair, telling him
that Mr. Frankston was engaged, but would not probably be long, as the
gentleman with him was Captain Carryall, in an awful hurry to put to
sea.
In rather less than five minutes the door opened suddenly, emitting
a loud burst of laughter, and a tall sun-tanned man in a frock-coat,
whose bold bright eyes were dancing again with fun and covert enjoyment
of an apparently very keen jest.
As more than one anxious-looking person had passed into the outer
office, Ernest walked in, and found himself in the presence of a
stoutish old gentleman, with a high-coloured, clean-shaved countenance,
who was chuckling with great relish, and subsiding from an exhausting
fit of merriment. His white waistcoat predominated much over his
clothing generally, giving that colour, with the aid of a spotless
domain of shirt-collar and shirt-front, an unfair advantage over his
sad-coloured suit of gray tweed.
‘Good-morning to you, sir,—won’t you take a chair,’ said the old
gentleman with much civility. ‘Very rude to be laughing in the face of
a visitor. But that Captain Carryall told me the best story I’ve heard
for ages. Picked it up at the islands last cruise. Awful fellow! You’d
excuse me, I’m sure, if you knew him. How can I be of use to you, my
dear sir?’
This last query belonged evidently to another region than the one into
which the sea-captain, with his _cœur-de-lion_ face, had allured him.
So Ernest produced his card, and a note ‘from their mutual friend, Mr.
Granville, he believed.’ The old merchant glanced at the signature, and
without another look hurled himself out of his armchair, and seizing
Mr. Neuchamp’s hand, wrung it with affectionate earnestness.
‘My dear sir—my dear fellow,’ gasped he; ‘I’d have given a hundred
pounds if our friend could have been here, and heard that yarn of
Charley Carryall’s. Now, attend to me while I tell you what you’ve got
to do. You’ll have enough to amuse yourself till five o’clock, and then
you’re to come here with your trunk. The carriage will call punctually
at that hour, and you’re to come out with me to my little place, on
the South Head Road, and confer upon me the very great obligation of
staying with me till you go up the country—if you do go. Now, isn’t
that settled?’
‘I am very sorry,’ stammered Ernest; ‘it is so extremely kind of you;
but I have more than half promised to go up the country to-morrow to
look at a station with a view to buying it.’
‘And get sold yourself,’ interjected Mr. Frankston. ‘Not just yet, if
you’ll be my boy for a year or two. Whose desirable property is it?’
‘It belongs to a Mr. Selmore, whom I met at the Royal Hotel,’ answered
Ernest, ‘who was very kind, and gave me some very good advice.’
‘Ha! ha! ha!’ shouted the old boy, becoming very purple in the face;
‘knew it was him—Gammon Downs, eh! Wonderful man, take in his own
father if he was hard up, and suffer his venerable grandsire and maiden
aunts to invest their last penny in a sour grass country, with fluky
sheep, Cumberland and scab given in. Hanged if he wouldn’t, and go to
church immediately afterwards. Most remarkable man, Hartley Selmore!’
Mr. Neuchamp wondered how Mr. Frankston knew the name of Mr. Selmore’s
valuable estate, and how he had ever made any money, if he did nothing
but laugh. Indeed, it seemed to be his chief occupation in life,
judging from his conduct since they had met.
‘Then you would not advise me to invest just at present?’ inquired he.
‘Not unless you wish to be in the possession of a small, _very_ small
amount of experience, and not one solitary copper at the end of twelve
months,’ said Mr. Frankston, with great decision. ‘This is a bad time
to buy, stock are falling. Don’t begin at all till you see your way. If
you meet Selmore tell him you’ve changed your mind for the present, and
will write and let him know when it is convenient for you to inspect
Gammon Downs. Five, sharp! old man;’ and with a paternal glance in his
quick twinkling eye, Mr. Frankston made an affirmative nod to his chief
clerk, who then and there entered, and a farewell one to Ernest, who
after he left the portals stood for a moment like a man in a dream.
‘This is certainly a most remarkable country,’ he soliloquised; ‘with
their outward resemblance to Englishmen, there must be some strange
mental divergence not easily fathomed. I remember Granville telling me
that this old buffer was a better father to him than his own had ever
been, or some such strong expression; therefore I will at once decide
to act upon his advice; Selmore and his winning way, notwithstanding.
One must take up a position firmly or not at all. So I shall elect to
stand or fall by this apoplectic old white-waistcoated guardian angel,
as he proposes to be.’
‘My dear Neuchamp,’ said a cheery voice, while a cheery hand smote
him familiarly on the back, ‘you look absorbed in contemplation.
This is the wrong country for that. Action, sir, action is the word
in Australia. Now, do you know what I was doing when I ran against
you?—actually going down to Bliss’s livery stables to see if I could
pick you out a decent hack. Burstall and Scouter are going to start
early to-morrow, and of course you’ll want a hack that won’t frighten
you after coming from the old country. With luck you’ll be under the
verandah at Gammon Downs on the afternoon of the fourth day.’
Ernest braced himself together, and fixing his eyes upon the somewhat
shifting orbs of his agreeable friend, said with studied calmness—
‘I shall be extremely sorry, my dear sir, to put you or your friends to
any inconvenience on my account, but I have changed my mind, and do not
think of leaving Sydney for a month or two.’
He was conscious of a stern, half-angry, searching gaze, which seemed
to drag out of his countenance every word of the conversation with Mr.
Frankston, before Mr. Selmore said grandly, ‘I am sorry to hear that
you have so suddenly altered your plans. I had written to the overseer
at Gammon Downs to have everything in readiness to receive you, and
Burstall and Scouter will, I know, be put out at losing the pleasure of
your company. But of course if you have made other arrangements—only I
am afraid that if you don’t feel disposed to name a day for visiting
Gammon Downs I may possibly dispose of it privately, and as the subject
has cropped up (not at my initiation, you are aware), I do honestly
think that no place in the country would have suited you half as well.’
Ernest felt sorely tempted to say that in a fortnight or three weeks he
would be able to go up, but he remembered Mr. Frankston’s suggestion,
and rather coldly answered that he would write and inform Mr. Selmore
when it would be convenient for him to inspect Gammon Downs. The
inevitable smile, which was worn in all weathers upon the face of
Hartley Selmore, had so little real sincerity about it after this
statement, that when he had received a warm parting grasp, Ernest felt
strongly convinced that he had fitted the right arrow to the string.