“Mary’s betrayer would have come forward long ago if he intended to get money by blackmail,” she countered.
“But the possibility remains. Again, one day Ralph will marry. It might be Kate, or Sir Walter Thorley’s daughter. Think of the recriminations that would occur then. Can’t you see that absolute frankness now would be better for the lad, and better for us?”
“The past lies buried twenty years deep, John. Ralph is safe. I made him my baby. Do not ask me to put him from me.”
The man gave the sigh of the vanquished. Rising to his feet, he said:
“All right! Have it your own way. I hope it may be for the best.”
“I am sure it will, John,” she murmured. And then, by way of final dismissal of the subject, she changed it. “Who is it working among the orange-trees? Is he a new hand?”
The squatter paused in his walk along the veranda to say:
“Yes. I put him on this morning. I thought I knew him at first, but he says he has been all his life in Queensland. He answers to the name of William Clair.”
Mrs Thornton leaned back in her chair, her eyes closed as though relieved from great strain. And about her firm mouth was the ghost of a smile.
Chapter Three
The Homecoming
THE HOMESTEAD of Barrakee Station was set, white-walled and red-roofed, in an oasis of brilliant green lawns and orange groves, the whole surrounded by a thick windbreak of ten-foot waving bamboo. The bottom extremity of the gardens was separated from the river by a dry billabong, some fifty-odd yards in width.
At thatpoint of the river were moored the station boats used chiefly to transport travellers to the farther side, as well as to provide anyone belonging to the station with recreation on the river.
To the south of the homestead, and close to it, were the offices, the barracks used by the bookkeeper and the jackeroos, the store, and the shops. Facing the offices and divided from them by a large clear space were the tennis-courts and the croquet-lawn.
The essential factor, which made Barrakee homestead one of the show places in the western division of New South Wales, was the limitless supply of water from the river. Mrs Thornton ruled the homestead; her husband reigned over the vast run, the thirty or forty employees, and the fifty to sixty thousand sheep. Neither interfered, by a single suggestion, in the domain of the other. Both were united in the one purpose of leaving Ralph Thornton a great inheritance.
At a quarter past three, one of the junior hands, who had been stationed on the staging supporting the great receiving tanks, observed through field-glasses the approach of the Barrakee high-powered car. He signalled its appearance by firing a shotgun.
Thornton and his wife were outside the garden gates which opened to the clear ground in front of the offices to receive their son. The car drew up close by with a noiseless application of brakes, and from it sprang a dark handsome boy dressed in grey tweed of most fashionable cut. He was followed more circumspectly by a young woman dressed in white.
“Mother!” ejaculated Ralph Thornton, clasping the small mistress of the homestead in his arms.
“Ralph! Oh, Ralph, I am glad you are here,” she said, looking up with proud, wistful eyes.
For a moment he held her, more like a lover than a son and, during that moment, it flashed into her mind that if he had known his maternal parentage he would not have held her thus. How glad she was that she had been firm in her insistence that the knowledge must be withheld.
“You must be tired, Katie,” the squatter said gently to the girl. “It’s been a hot day.”
“Has it, Uncle?” Her voice was sweetly allied to her fresh beauty. “I’ve been too excited meeting Ralph to notice it. Don’t you think he has grown?”
“I haven’t had much chance to notice anything yet,” he replied, with twinkling eyes.
“Notice now, Dad,” the young man commanded, his face flushed with happiness, reaching for his foster-father’s hand. “Ideclare, both you and the Little Lady look younger than ever. And as for Kate-she just takes a fellow’s breath away!” Then, seeing the bookkeeper hovering behind, he exclaimed, going to him: “Hallo, Mortimore, how are you?”
“I do not look nor do I feel any younger, Mr Ralph,” the bookkeeper countered. “When I first saw you, ten years ago, you were make-believing you were playing the piano on the office typewriter. And now! It seems but yesterday.”
“That is all it is, too. You are mistaken about the ten years,” the young man said, with a happy smile. Then, returning to his mother, he took her on his right arm and caught the squatter on his left, the last, in turn attaching Kate Flinders; and so aligned, the reunited family slowly returned to the house.
From Brewarrina to Wentworth and from Ivanhoe to Tibooburra the two women of Barrakee were famous. From the squatter and his manager to the boundary-rider and thesundowner, Mrs Thornton was known as the “Little Lady”. Her unvarying kindness to all travellers, from swagman to Governor-General, was a by-word. The example on which she patterned herself was Napoleon Bonaparte. Her gifts were bestowed with discretion, and her judgements were scrupulously just, but always tempered with mercy.
Katherine Flinders, her orphan niece, was about Ralph’s age. Her lithe, graceful figure was the admiration of all, and once seen on a horse was a picture to live in memory. The easiest way to purchase a ticket to the nearest hospital was to speakslightingly of either-together referred to as the “Women of Barrakee”.
A combined light lunch and afternoon tea was set out on the broad veranda, where they found Martha applying the final touches. Her great face was irradiated, though not beautified, by a gigantic smile. She stood beside the table while the small party mounted the veranda steps, her figure encased by a voluminous blue dressing-gown belted at the waist by a leather strap stolen from a bridle. Her poor feet were concealed by highly polished elastic-sided brown riding-boots. Truly on this occasion she was superb.
The whites of her eyes were conspicuous. The wide grin of genuine welcome revealed many gaps in the yellowing teeth. Her greying hair was scanty. She was nearly overcome with excitement.
“Well, Martha! Not dead yet?” greeted Ralph gravely, holding out his hand. She took it in her left, her right being pressed to her vast bosom.
“Oh, Misther Ralph!” she articulated with difficulty, “Poor Martha no die till she look on you once more.”
“That’s right,” he said with a friendly smile. “I shall be very much annoyed,” he added, “if you die now.”
The squatter and his wife were content with a cup of tea, whilst their “children” ate a long-delayed lunch. Anticipating the boy’s lightest wish, the Little Lady hovered at his side, her eyes sparkling with happiness, her small finely-moulded features flushed. She and her husband were content to listen to his description of the holiday spent in New Zealand and of his last term at college.
As a collegiate product he was perfect. His speech and manners were without reproach. There was, however, inherent in him a grace of movement which no school or university could have given him. Of medium height and weight, he sat his chair with the ease of one born on the back of a horse. His dark, almost beautiful face was animated by a keen and receptive mind; the fervid enthusiasm of the mystic rather than the unveiled frankness of the practically-minded manwas reflected from his eyes.
He was to both his adopted parents a revelation. Six months previously he had left them, still a college boy, to return to college. He had come back to them a man, frankly adult. The youthful boastfulness had given place to grave self-assurance-too grave, perhaps, in one still in the years of youth. Never once did he mention football, cricket, or rowing, his previous enthusiasms. If superficial, his knowledge of politics, of the arts, and of the lives of the great, was extensive. The heart of the Little Lady overflowed with pride and exultation: her husband was admittedly astonished by the lad’s mental and physical growth in six short months.