The Court at Ballarook was over, and Gavan Blake turned his horses'
heads in a direction he had never taken before--along the road to
Kuryong. As he drove along, his thoughts were anything but pleasant.
Behind him always stalked the grim spectre of detection and arrest;
and, even should a lucky windfall help to pay his debts, he could
not save the money either to buy a practice in Sydney or to maintain
himself while he was building one up. He thought of the pitiful
smallness of his chances at Tarrong, and then of Ellen Harriott.
What should he do about her? Well, sufficient unto the day was
the evil thereof. He would play for his own hand throughout. With
which reflection he drove into the Kuryong yard.
When he drove up, the family had gathered round the fire in the
quaint, old-fashioned, low-ceiled sitting-room; for the evenings
were still chilly. The children were gravely and quietly sharpening
terrific-looking knives on small stones; the old lady had some
needlework; while Mary and Ellen and Poss and Binjie talked about
horses, that being practically the only subject open to the two
boys.
After a time Mrs. Gordon said, "Won't you sing something?" and Mary
sat down to the piano and sang to them. Such singing no one there
had ever heard before. Her deep contralto voice was powerful,
flexible, and obviously well-trained; besides which she had the great
natural gift of putting "feeling" into her singing. The children
sat spellbound. The station-hands and house-servants, who had been
playing the concertina and yarning on the wood-heap at the back of
the kitchen, stole down to the corner of the house to listen; in
the stillness that wonderful voice floated out into the night. So
it chanced that Gavan Blake, arriving, heard the singing, stole
softly to the door, and looked in, listening for a while, before
anyone saw him.
The picture he saw was for ever photographed on his mind. He saw
the quiet comfort and luxury--for after Tarrong it was luxury to
him--of the station drawing-room; caught the scent of the flowers
and the glorious tones of that beautiful voice; and, as he watched
the sweet face of the singer, and listened to the words of the song,
a sudden fierce determination rose in his mind. He would devote
all his energies to winning Mary Grant for his wife; combative
and self-confident as he was by nature, he felt no dismay at the
difficulties in his way. He had been on a borderline long enough.
Here was his chance to rise at a bound, and he determined to succeed
if success were humanly possible.
As the song came to an end, he walked into the drawing-room and
shook hands all round, Mary being particularly warm in her welcome.
"You are very late," said the old lady. "Was there much of a Court
at Ballarook?"