An Outback Marriage

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?"