"I do, when you think what a wreck you have made of all the hopes and plans that that poor dear man has been building with it."

"He will build some more, and better ones, by and bye, I hope."

"Not he. Men don't do that so easily at his age."

"Oh, yes," she persisted, imploringly, "I think he will, indeed. He did it very easily with me."

"For an exceedingly good reason--because he loved you from the first.

Oh, you ungrateful little monkey, it's to be hoped you'll die an ugly old maid!"

"That would be better than being the wife for years and years of a man I did not love."

"Rubbish. As if one could have everything all at once in this world. You girls think of nothing but yourselves. You don't take into account that it might be worth while to make somebody else happy."

"How could I make him happy unless I loved him, Beatrice?"

"Oh, don't talk about it. You have pleased yourself, I suppose, and he must do the best he can. He is terribly miserable as he is, poor fellow; but I daresay he'll get over it."

"Is he miserable _now_?" inquired Rachel anxiously. "Have you seen him lately?"

"I saw him yesterday, and he told me that his life had no value for him now that he had lost you, and that he should never live in his house unless you were the mistress of it. I shouldn't imagine he felt particularly jolly under those circ.u.mstances. However, it is no use worrying ourselves on his account," the little woman added cheerfully, seeing tears in her cousin's gentle eyes.

"But I am so sorry for him!"

"That won't help him much, my dear. And if _you_ are happy, I suppose that is all we need care about."

"Oh, no, Beatrice!"

"We haven't time to fret over other people's troubles," Mrs. Reade proceeded, in what Rachel thought an exceedingly heartless manner; "life is too short."

"But, Beatrice----"

"Now, I can't talk about Mr. Kingston any more. I have all my packing to do yet, and I must run away and see after it. Good-bye, dearest child.

Mind you write often. I wish you were going with me--I can't bear to leave you behind."

Rachel flung her arms round her small cousin with characteristic fervour.

"When do you think you will come home again?" she inquired tremulously, almost in a whisper.

"I can't say, dear, exactly."

"Before Christmas, won't you?"

"I think so; it will all depend on circ.u.mstances."

"Oh, _do_ be back by Christmas," Rachel pleaded, with an almost tragic eagerness. "It would be dreadful if Christmas came and you were so far away!"

"Am I so necessary to the festivities of the season?" laughed Mrs.

Reade, much touched and flattered. "Well, I'll see what I can do.

Suppose I try and bring Lucilla and the children back, and make a regular family gathering of it?"

"Oh, if you _could_!" sighed Rachel.

All the terrors of her time of trial would be gone, she thought, if she could have these two faithful cousins beside her.

So Mrs. Reade went off by the morning train, tolerably easy in her mind.

She took her big husband with her, "to keep him," as she said, "out of mischief;" and she stayed away much longer than she had intended to do.

She was delighted with Adelonga, and with her sister's companionship.

Ned, also, while being kept in order, enjoyed himself excessively; and as long as he was "good" in the matter of his besetting sin, his lady and mistress liked him to enjoy himself. There were plenty of bush gaieties in the shape of sporting meetings and b.a.l.l.s, and the time slipped away rapidly, as time at Adelonga usually did.

A dance at the Digbys' gave Mrs. Reade the desired opportunity for making the acquaintance of Mr. Dalrymple's people, and she learned a few facts with respect to that gentleman which, while considerably aggravating her alarm, tended to modify and dignify the impressions of him that her mother had given her.

Lucilla showed her a fine photograph of his powerful, melancholy, highbred face, and she was quite overcome by it.

"Oh, dear me!" she said to herself, with a sort of angry dismay, "it is no wonder that Rachel was infatuated. If _I_ had had attentions from that man--little as I am given to falling in love--I think I should have been as bad as she."

When Christmas came the sisters were still at Adelonga. Lucilla could not leave home, and persuaded Beatrice not to leave her. They contented themselves with sending pretty presents and many loving messages and excuses to their relatives in Melbourne, and plunged into a series of festive entertainments that lasted for several weeks.

Then suddenly, as she was dressing for a ball, Mrs. Reade was startled to receive a letter from her mother, begging her to return to town at once, as Rachel was very ill.

CHAPTER XII.

"THE GROUND-WHIRL OF THE PERISHED LEAVES OF HOPE."

Mrs. Reade lost no time in obeying her mother's summons. In two days she was back in Melbourne, and having given ten minutes to the inspection of her domestic affairs, and refreshed herself with tea and bread and b.u.t.ter, she went on to Toorak in the carriage that had brought her from the station, without even waiting to change her travelling-dress.

At Toorak she found things in a most discouraging and deplorable condition--as they never would have been, she told herself, had she remained in town.

Mrs. Hardy, who met her in the hall, and took her to her own room for elaborate explanations, was herself a most puzzling and unsatisfactory feature in the case, for she made it evident to her daughter's keen perception that something more had happened than was accounted for in her rather disconnected narrative, and that she did not intend to disclose what it was.

There was a touch of nervous recklessness and defiance in the way she spoke of Rachel's illness--as if the poor child had crowned a systematic series of misdemeanours by falling ill on purpose--and of her hearty regret that she had ever had anything to do with such a perverse and ungrateful girl, which conveyed to Mrs. Reade the impression that her cousin had in some way been persecuted, or had at any rate, been subjected to more heroic treatment than her own judgment and advice had sanctioned.

Under such circ.u.mstances it was, perhaps, natural that her mother should be somewhat reserved, since to be fully confidential would be to confess that she had made mistakes; but this sudden reversal of old habits, occurring at this important crisis in the family fortunes, was a serious aggravation of the already sufficient difficulties that the little woman had to deal with.

What complicated her task still further was the discovery that Mr.

Kingston was again a frequent visitor at the house, and a strong suspicion that he was cognisant of those unauthorised measures--whatever they were--which she was not to hear of. The only thing she could hope for was that Rachel would make a clean breast of all her secrets.

"And if she trusts me, I will stand her friend against them all,"

declared the baffled conspirator to herself, as she sat and listened to her mother's tangled story.

It appeared that Rachel's first signs of illness had become apparent very soon after the Reades had left town. She began to fade in colour and to fail in appet.i.te, and grew nervous, flighty, and restless; and, upon investigation, it was discovered that she had lost the habit of sleeping as a healthy girl should sleep at night.

The family doctor was called in, who, amongst other remedies prescribed a return to horse exercise, which, since the breaking-off of her engagement, had been abandoned; and Mr. Kingston thereupon begged so earnestly that she would ride Black Agnes again, that she reluctantly consented to do so to please him.