An Outback Marriage

She had pictured him saying all sorts of endearing things, and

making all sorts of loving protestations; and now it had come to

this--she had been asked as if it were merely a matter of avoiding

scandal. It was too great a shock. She lay silently crying, while

Hugh, his castles in the air having crumbled around him, was trying

in a dazed way to frame a letter to Mr. Grant.

His thoughts were anything but pleasant. What a fool he had been,

talking to her like that! Making it look as if he had only proposed

to her because he ought to protect her good name! Why hadn't

he spoken to her before--in the tree, on the ride home, any other

time? Why hadn't he spoken differently? To him the refusal seemed

the end of all things. He thought of asking Mr. Grant to give him

the management of the most out-back place he had, so that he could go

away and bury himself. He even thought of resigning his position

altogether and going to the goldfields. Red Mick and his delinquencies

seemed but small matters now; and, after what had passed, he must,

of course, see that Miss Grant was not dragged into the business.

So he sat down and began to write.

The letter took a good deal of thinking over. It had got about the

station that Red Mick had at last been caught in flagrante delicto;

the house-cook had told the cook at the men's hut, and he had told

the mailman, who stopped on the road to tell the teamsters ploughing

along with their huge waggons to Kiley's Crossing; they told the

publican at Kiley's, and he told everybody he saw. The children

made a sort of play out of it, the eldest boy personating Red Mick,

while two of the younger ones hid in a fallen tree, and were routed

out by Thomas Carlyle. The station-hands were all excitement; the

prospect of a big law-case was a real godsend to them. To drop the

matter would be equivalent to a confession of defeat, but, after

what had passed, Hugh had no option. So he told Mr. Grant that, on

thinking it over, he did not consider it advisable to go on with

the case against Red Mick; Miss Grant would have to go into the

box to give evidence, which would be very unpleasant for her.

Poor Hugh! He was too honourable to give any false reason, and too

shy to tell the whole truth. If he had said that there was no hope

of a conviction, it would have been all right. But consideration

for the feelings of anyone, even his own daughter, was to Billy the

Bully quite incomprehensible, and he wrote back, on a letter-card,

"Go on with the prosecution."