The Medhursts of Mindala: the story of the Development of a Soul

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Zhc Story of tbe Development of a Soul. BY J. M. WATERHOUSE. ~X ' Happy thou art not : For what thou hast not, still thou striv'st to get ; And what thou hast forget'st.' Measure for Measure. LONDON: ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. 1897. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE THE MEDHURSTS OF MINDALA- - - I I RUTH'S RENUNCIATION- - - "14 II. LOST IN THE BUSH - - - - 26 III. IV. ON THE WAY HOME - - - "34 V. THE MOB OF BULLOCKS - - 42 VI ON CHRISTMAS DAY - - - "55 VII. VIII. TENNANT'S SELFISHNESS - - - 62 UNDINE - - - - " 74 THE SHOOTING-PARTY - - - - 89 IX X TIDDLY DISCOVERS HIS RAIN-BONE - - 102 XI THE DIARIES ----- 107 XII XIII, XIV. THE FUTURE MOTHER-IN-LAW - 119 AT THE CONCERT - - - - I30 THE INTERVIEW - I43 WILDING'S RESOLVE - - - - 150 XV, 'NOT EVEN FOR YOU'- - - - 162 XVI, XVII, 'WE MUST NOT THINK OF OURSELVES NOW ' - 1 VI CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE XVIII. 'WILL YOU PROMISE?' - - 1 86 xix. 'good-bye' - - - - - 195 XX. 'SHALL YOU GO BACK AND MARRY HER?' - 204 XXI. MINDALA ONCE MORE - - - - 217 XXII. 'HOW HAS THIS CHANGE COME TO PASS?' - 226 XXIII. CONCLUSION I

Chapter I. The Medhursts Of Mindala

' If you really want to make yourself acquainted with station life in all its departments, Mr. Laurence, before investing your capital in station property, you can't do better than take Pearce's offer, and go with him to Booba-tuckie as " Colonial Experience." They say he's a nigger-driver, but he's a thoroughly competent station-manager, and he can put you in the way of learning the details of the work as well as anyone I know.' This was the opinion of a New South Wales squatter to whom Edward Laurence had brought letters of introduction from a mutual friend in England. From his earliest boyhood Laurence had been fascinated by all he had read and heard of bush life in Australia, but until the previous year he had not seen his way clear to leave England. A great and unexpected stroke of fortune had put into his life the power of going to Australia, or any where else he might choose.

His aunt's husband, Sir Charles Wilding, had left his property to Edward Laurence, the title dying out with himself. Sir Charles Wilding's father had been an evil-living man, standing, however, in great awe of his son. The story ran that he had been implicated in some disgraceful transaction on the turf, which had obliged him to leave England secretly and hurriedly. The precise facts were never known, but his former life prepared such of the public as were interested in his history for a ready belief that he had made England too hot to hold him. For forty years he drew the income from his English estate, then news came of his death. Having collected the necessary proofs of the decease of his father, Sir Charles, the last scion of the family, assumed the title and entered into possession of the estate.

The property was not entailed, and having no children of his own, Sir Charles had left the income arising from rents and other investments to Laurence, who was as dear to him as a son. The extravagance of Sir James Wilding had greatly im poverished the estate, which no longer represented more than five or six hundred per annum, when debts had been paid and tenants' wrongs redressed. The landed estates would, however, recover their original value under careful nursing, and their owner might hope once more to enjoy the privileges of a rich man. Laurence did not wish to await the result of the said nursing : he wished to sell his English property, and to invest his capital in Australia. But he determined to risk no sum, however small, until he could do so independently of advice, acting entirely upon his own judgment.

His acquaintance in Sydney soon found that he was not to be laughed out of his cautious resolves. While he was still undecided whether or not to take the advice of his host, and go to Booba-tuckie as 'Colonial Experience,' Fate settled the question for him. He met the manager's daughter at an evening party in the house of a Sydney magnate, thought her the prettiest girl he had ever seen ; and when she, knowing his story from her father, set herself to decoy him to the station, she found the task easy. When Laurence started for Booba-tuckie, in the company of Mr. Pearce and his daughter, he believed that his greatest desire was to call Annie Pearce his own. Yet, when he had been a year on the station, the fatal words which would end his freedom were still unspoken. He had not regretted following his friend's advice in going to Booba-tuckie, nor had he mistaken his vocation in choosing bush life.

Gifted with the necessary perceptions and faculties, he soon mastered mechanical difficulties, and before a twelvemonth was ended, Mr. Pearce admitted him to be a decided acquisition. Mr. and Mrs. Pearce were sometimes uneasy because he did not formally propose to Annie ; but, though he was not a sensitive man, Mr. Pearce did not dare to speak to Laurence on the subject. In the long summer evenings, after sunset, Laurence and Annie usually rode together, the work and the worst heat being over. One January afternoon, near the hour when the black boy usually arrived with the horses, one of the station hands came to Laurence's quarters with the mails, which had just arrived. Laurence lit his favourite pipe, selected one letter from the rest, and lay down on his bed to read it. The handwriting was his mother's — the monthly letter was his greatest pleasure.

His face softened, his eyes grew moist as he opened the envelope, but as he began to read his fingers tightened on the paper, the healthy colour faded from his face, he scarcely drew his breath till he reached the last word. For a little while he laid the letter on one side, smoking absently and staring at the opposite wall, with eyes a little distended and luminous, as if from some internal pain. At the end of half an hour, during which he had seen life under a variety of new aspects, he took up the letter again, to re-read the strange and unpalatable information it contained. 'The hardest part of my task is yet to be written. It is cruel that I must be the one to write bad news to you. I i — cannot hope to soften the blow. When Sir Charles Wilding succeeded to the title and the estate, he believed that he had received full and sufficient proof of his father's death.

Sir James, however, still lives, and now lays claim to the property. Under these circumstances, your uncle's will goes for nothing ; he, not having inherited the property, had not the power to make you his heir. My boy ! my poor boy ! This will be a sad blow to you, as it is to us all. Sir James Wilding is a very old man, half imbecile I am told. He was discovered by a clergyman in an almshouse. Hitherto he has been under the impression that his eldest son was still alive and in possession of the estate, and for many reasons was unwilling to disturb him. Having ascer tained that your uncle was childless, he had returned to England to educate another son, born of a marriage with some woman in the Australian Colonies, and to bring forward this heir when he had been made presentable. His courage proving unequal to the ordeal of facing his elder son, he contented himself with sending the boy to school on his arrival in England.

Three months later Sir James disappeared ; no trace of him was left, until the Rev. Bernard Compline discovered him in a ward of a pauper hospital. He is now installed in the old country house where you have spent so many happy holidays, and you, my poor boy, are left bare of all but your own fine character, which I know will support you under this cruel reverse.' Once again Laurence laid down the letter ; his pipe had gone out — he laid that down, too. A rap, sharp and decisive, sounded upon his window. Pulling himself together with a violent effort, he opened his door and looked out. Annie Pearce, dewy-eyed, bloomy cheeked, and sparkling with the charm of perfect health and seventeen years, stood raising her riding-whip to knock again at the window. ' What's the matter with you ?' she cried, in a slightly nasal tone. ' I've been waiting nearly twenty minutes for our ride ; the horses have been ready this half-hour.' ' I am very sorry,' he said. ' I have had bad news, and I did not notice the time.

Yes, I will tell you all about it as we go.' He looked pale and dazed, and was still silent when they had ridden a mile from the house. Then he began to speak, telling her the story in the fewest and plainest words. ' You will fight this horrid old claimant, of course ?' she said. ' It would be quite useless. No sane lawyer would carry such a case into court. There is no doubt of Sir James Wilding's identity with the old man who claims the estate.' ' But you might force him to spend his money. I would make him spend a pretty penny before I had done with him.' ' I should find no satisfaction in such a course, even if I could go to law. The estate never was mine ; it was, and is, his property. The only thing left for me to do is to efface myself quietly.' ' It seems to me very poor-spirited, not to strike a single blow.

Surely you can make him give you compensation ?' ' For spending several hundred pounds of his money ? Don't let us speak of the matter; you don't fully under stand.' ' Don't say a word to father, if you have really made up your mind to let the money go,' said Annie, secretly resolving to attack Laurence again, by-and-by, on the subject of giving up the property without resistance. ' I must tell him, Annie. Although I have never asked you in so many words to be my wife, you and your father have known for some time that I intended to do so. Feel ing quite sure that he will not give you to me under these changed circumstances, it becomes an imperative duty to explain to him my altered position.' ' You can't mean to be such a fool !' Annie cried, with flushed cheeks and flaming eyes. ' Tell father, so that he may refuse his consent to our engagement !

But perhaps you wish to back out ?' 'Would you marry me, Annie?' Laurence asked, riding closer to her, and speaking anxiously. 'You may have to wait for several years before I can offer you a home. And we should have to live very quietly, even if I should succeed in getting a manager's billet' ' Oh, don't talk like that !' she said impatiently. ' You would get appointed manager of a large station, if you play your cards well, and you would be as much your own master as if you owned the place. But,' she added, with a sudden change of mood, 'you seem to have made very sure of me.' She glanced at him coquettishly ; he thought she had never looked so pretty. ' Dear girl !' said Laurence tenderly, and while he spoke the words he felt them sincerely, ' you have always been so frank and candid with me, so much too proud to descend to pretence, that I have felt as sure of you as you have been of me.

I had promised myself the pleasure of putting on this dear little finger such a diamond ring as I heard you wishing for the other day. Now everything is changed, I hardly realize my position.' ' If you are obstinate about speaking to father, I can tell you beforehand what he will say,' sighed Annie. ' He will tell you to clear out, and he will not be over-polite in his manner.' ' I shan't wait to be told twice, you may depend upon it. But you have not answered my question. Do you care enough for me, dear, to marry me without better prospects than those we have spoken of?' She sighed and hesitated. ' I care enough for you,' she began ; and for a few seconds her words were stopped by Laurence's kiss, as in a sudden transport he clasped his arms round her and drew her head close to his shoulder. 'But,' she went on, with another sigh, as she slowly released herself, 'if you really care for me, you will not give up this money so tamely.' ' Annie, my darling, not another word about that !' he entreated. ' Well, then,' she said, brightening, ' let us look at the matter from a common-sense point of view.

Here am I, young, considered pretty, surrounded by young men, who are all, more or less, my admirers, often on such bad terms with father that I would marry anyone to get away from home ; and you poor, and perhaps hundreds of miles away, not allowed to visit me, nor to write, with no prospect of being able to take me away for years. Is it likely that an engagement between us could come to anything ? Any promise on either side would be a drag, and make me feel wretched and wicked, if I found by-and-by that I could like someone else who was in a better position. If we must part, let it be now.' She met his eyes with a tearful look, but she spoke bravely, even cheerfully. ' You are right, Annie,' he said with an effort ; ' but some how it is harder than I expected. You are a cynical little monkey for seventeen, but I like your honesty.' ' I was afraid you might despise me for looking ahead,' she said. ' Bear with father for my sake, won't you ?

You have never seen him really angry, as he will be when you tell him. If I were you, I should sneak off without saying a word, and leave a letter to explain.' ' I should not care to do that,' said Laurence, laughing ; but his heart was heavy. He did not appear at the dinner-table that evening ; he sent in to excuse himself on the plea of a bad headache. Annie looked pale and downcast when she took her usual seat without speaking to or looking at anyone. Regardless of the presence of two or three young men at the dinner table, her parents joked her about being unable to endure one evening's separation from Laurence, until, to their amaze ment, she burst into tears and rushed out of the room. ' Is this a lovers' quarrel ?' asked Mr. Pearce, staring at the door through which his daughter had vanished. ' I am sure I don't know,' said Mrs. Pearce helplessly. ' She has quite upset me.

I would have given her a little pot of that strawberry jam that her aunt sent up, if I had known she was out of sorts.' A pot of jam, or some similar indulgence, represented Mrs. Pearce's notion of spiritual consolation. ' I think I'd better take some to her now, with a saucer of cream, and find out what's the matter.' But neither strawberry jam nor the offer of any other delicacy could comfort Annie's sad heart ; nor could she be induced to mention the cause of her trouble. ' I am tired,' was all she would say. ' Tired, Annie Pearce ! It's the first time in your life, then. Don't think you can stuff tne with such rubbish. Come, old girl, something's gone wrong with you and Laurence. You'll be better when you get it out.' ' You will understand soon enough, ma. We've had no quarrel,' Annie said between her sobs. ' I can't tell you anything to-night.

I'm not a baby to be comforted with jam? Her words sounded ungrateful, but not the tone in which they were spoken. She kissed her mother affectionately, gently pushing her out of the room at the same time. Poor Mrs. Pearce went away, feeling bewildered by the discovery that her daughter had started upon a separate existence, that her own child was surrounded by an impassable encircling barrier of experience. After a brief but unpleasant interview with Mr. Pearce in the morning, Laurence left Booba-tuckie, without asking to see Annie again, a proceeding which confirmed her suspicion that he had never cared for her. ' That closes one chapter of my life,' he thought sadly, as he rode away from Booba-tuckie on the fine iron-gray hunter which he had bought some months previously. His plans were vague, their only clear feature being a resolve to obtain employment without loss of time.

He knew the owner of Balfour Station, two days' journey on horseback from Booba-tuckie, and though his chances of finding a billet under him were slight, he knew that Mr. Grant was a genial, kind-hearted man, who would do his utmost to help a friend in time of need. The day of his departure was intensely, breathlessly hot ; the sun glared relentlessly from the fierce blue sky, the immense horizon seemed to enclose a larger world than the one represented by Booba-tuckie, for the country was bare of trees, and sparsely clothed with salt and blue-bush, the grass having been burnt up long ago in the summer heat. As he rode across country he reviewed his own conduct during the past year. ' It was well for Annie and for me,' he thought, ' that I should lose this money. A man is what he shows himself to be under a test.

I have come out badly enough under the money test. It is to be hoped that a little wholesome poverty may bring out better stuff' He preferred pushing straight on, camping at night under the stars, to looking for tracks which would have led him to the various head stations on runs which he would have to cross during his journey. He knew the direction in which Balfour lay with regard to Booba-tuckie; the country between was not only new to him, but newly opened up. He was not likely to be obstructed by fences, and he believed himself to be a sufficiently good bushman to find his way. He made a picturesque figure as he rode across the pathless desert, mounted on his iron-gray horse, his swag before him on the saddle, holsters improvised from a wheat sack behind, a water-bag hanging from his horse's neck, and a quart pot fastened to the saddle's side.

His lithe, tall, muscular figure looked to advantage in breeches and boots ; his slender brown face, sweeping dark moustache and short pointed beard, were half hidden under a soft felt wide awake. At dusk he encamped in a pleasant spot, and almost forgot the loss of his money and his self-disgust in the delicious sense of well-being and liberty under the starry sky, with the air cool and moist with a heavy dew. The second day was hotter and more oppressive than the first, though the sky was cloudy. A coming storm was making the air horrible by over charging the atmosphere with electricity and withdrawing every breath of air. The stillness became deadly as the day wore on towards noon. Fortunately, as he thought, he was leaving the salt-bush country and entering the mallee scrub. At two o'clock he halted under the shade of a clump of mallee, deciding to travel on after dark.

At the same hour on the following afternoon he reached some good grass country. He knew that he was at no great distance from Balfour, yet, being unwilling to risk arriving inconveniently late at night if he pushed on, made up his mind to camp for the present, and to start again at four o'clock in the morning. Dismounting, he took off his saddle and packs, hobbled his horse, and let him go free to graze. He lay down in the deepest shade he could find. The shade would pass away in an hour or two, and the sun would pour his scorch ing rays into the leafy recess among the trees, but, mean time, it was a welcome shelter. The horse, free from his burdens, shook himself, snorted gratefully, rolled on the ground with many odd grunts and squeals, then rose and prudently cropped the grass without further delay.

Laurence refreshed himself with a draught of water, and a morsel of johnnycake, and lay down to rest with his head on the saddle. When he awoke he felt very ill. For some moments he was unable to stir, and when at last he struggled up by clinging to a young sapling, he was too dizzy and sick to realize either the time of day or what had happened to him. By slow degrees his consciousness returned, and he knew that he must have been sunstruck as he lay asleep, and that he must have lain in a stupor during the whole afternoon and night. The chill air and dew of dawn revived him, but he could not yet walk. Angry with his own helplessness, he let himself slip down on the now cool sand of the desert to wait till Nature should choose to come to his assistance. In the course of the next hour he was able to crawl to the water-bag and drink.

As his strength returned his brain grew clearer, and he remembered his horse. Holding by the trees, he staggered feebly forth to search, but the horse was not in sight. Again he was compelled to wait, again a draught of water restored his energy. At ten o'clock he set off in search of the missing animal, his strength returning with the need for exertion. He soon discovered the horse's tracks, though the marks were faint, owing to the hardness of the soil, and in his weak and dazed condition difficult to trace. He felt sure, however, that the horse was making back in search of water to Booba-tuckie, where he had been bred. The line w-hich he had taken for his journey across country lay at right angles to Booba-tuckie. He thought his best plan would be to take the bridle and to make a beeline to the borders of Booba-tuckie run, for, the horse having so many hours' advantage of him, it seemed absurd to follow his track.

There was a dam of water on the very edge of the run ; it was probable that the horse would be found at that spot, which lay within a possible distance for walking. Re luctantly he left his saddle, swag and pack, and taking the bridle and water-bag, cut across country in pursuit. Storm-clouds gathered all the afternoon, hiding the sun. 'No rain,' thought Laurence, as he toiled on through the stifling atmosphere of the scrub. ' Plenty of thunder and wind, but never a drop of rain. I suppose I am going all right, but I'll be hanged if I know where the sun is !' His watch had stopped during his hours of insensibility, so that he could only guess at the time. He walked on bravely, yet he was scarcely able to form thoughts ; his head was dizzy, his limbs burning, aching, and trembling. More than once he reflected that he might, like many another, perish and leave his bones in the desert.

Yet the conviction was so strongly upon him that the loss of his money had saved him from the consequences of an ill-advised marriage, that he declared to himself he would rather die where he was than live his life out with a woman with whom he had not a thought in common. His clearness of vision did not lead him to review Annie's character with bitterness ; he only despised his own folly in having been for the time enslaved to a pretty face and coaxing, coquettish ways. Yet he gave a sigh to the memory of those arts and ways that had been so charming to him in those bygone days of folly. At last he began to think he must be near the spot where he hoped to find his horse, and to the boundary-rider's hut, two miles inside the border of Booba-tuckie. As he came out of the scrub on another patch of grass, he caught sight of the tracks of a horse, and began to hope that his tramp was indeed at an end.

He looked at the hoof-marks again and again ; they were travelling in the opposite direction to what he expected. Raising his eyes to survey his surround ings, he espied something white lying beside two dark objects. He went nearer. A swag, a saddle, and a pack. They were his own ! For six hours he had been travelling in a circle. He knew this was not an infrequent occurrence among bushmen when the sun is hidden during the whole of the day behind thick clouds, yet he felt unable to do battle against the feeling of despair which overcame him.

Chapter II. Ruth's Renunciation

Dr. Medhurst's house, a wooden but picturesque structure, stood on a rise overlooking the town of Broken Hill. Below, every sign of human habitation was hidden by a dense cloud of red dust, crowned by plumes of smoke carry ing poisoned fumes from the mine chimneys to the dwellers in the town. In one of the bedrooms facing south the Doctor's eldest daughter, Ruth, sat at her writing-table beside the window. She was looking absently at the hurrying, ragged, red dust-clouds which came powdering through the window, and lay on the dainty appointments of the little chamber. She was trying to persuade an awkward line of verse to become musical in sound and metrical in propor tion. The dust world gradually vanished from her vision, the poetical difficulty was overcome, the pen for some time ran smoothly.

Her heart beat strongly, her pale face flushed with the effort to secure her fast-flowing thoughts before some interruption from the outer world should put them to flight. Her round of household duties being almost ceaseless, she hoarded her few spare moments with eager anxiety to make each yield her its full value. On reaching the foot of the page, her pen seemed to stop of its own accord, and with a curious accompanying shock, as if from the sudden cessation of bodily motion. She knew that the thoughts embodied in her verses lay rounded and complete before her. With burning eyes and cheeks, she read and re-read the lines, not yet looking for faults, but thrilled by the sense that poetry had flowed through her. The sound of hoofs and wheels turning in at the side entrance reached her through the thin walls, recalling her to the fact that it was four o'clock, the hour when her father liked to find a cup of tea awaiting him after his dusty rounds among patients.

Dr. Medhurst was in the drawing-room talking eagerly to his wife when Ruth went in with the tea. ' I really think this is too good a chance to be lost,' he was saying, with great earnestness, and an evident desire that Mrs. Medhurst should agree with him. Dr. Medhurst was short and stout, with gray-streaked, fair hair, florid and blue-eyed. Mrs. Medhurst was tall, graceful, and youthful-looking, despite the deeply-graven lines of suffering in her face. She, too, was fair and blue eyed, but her eyes were dark and her skin sallow. Ruth bore a certain resemblance to both her parents, but the combination of their features produced a widely-different result. She was taller than her mother, larger-framed and more robust-looking ; her eyes were of a doubtful colour, by courtesy described as brown, by her brothers and sisters called yellow-green ; but whatever name might be given to their colour, they were beautiful eyes, meltingly-soft, lustrous, and long-lashed.

Her hair was also of an uncertain hue, her eyebrows were finely drawn and black, her complexion was pale but clear, her features were fairly well shaped, her movements exquisitely graceful, and the poise of her head was superb. Mrs. Medhurst raised her eyes from her work and smiled. ' We know nothing of the management of a grazing-farm,' she said. ' Pooh ! my dear ; what can there be to learn ? You let the animals run till they are fat, you draught off the best and send them to the nearest market as prime — and so on all through the year,' answered the Doctor, whose stock of information was running low. 'Prince, the agent, tells me I shall never again have such a chance ; the easiest managed place imaginable. Nothing to do but to see that the fences are in repair, and to sit down and enjoy the profits as they come in.' ' Why did the last people leave such an abode of bliss ?' asked Mrs. Medhurst, laughing. ' Prince says they are muddlers — do no good anywhere.

You should hear him describe the place ! You would long to start at once. An Indian bungalow, surrounded by a flower-garden and orchard, standing on the shore of a lake — a backwater of the Wampi.' ' The picture is attractive,' said Ruth, pouring out the tea. 'The lake would be attractive to the children, I have no doubt,' said Mrs. Medhurst dryly. ' Oh, they could easily be kept out of the way,' said Dr. Medhurst, with cheerful optimism. He was not going to be put out of conceit with his new plan. ' But to return to my first consideration, Laura, it is one of the healthiest spots in the world — so much I know for certain — and in going there to live you will have the very best possible chance to recover your health.' Ruth's eyes shone with wistful, urgent entreaty. ' Oh, mother, what does anything else matter, if that is only possible ?' Mrs. Medhurst smiled and sighed. ' I should indeed be thankful to be well again • but we must first know how we are to live when we get there.' ' I must be off now,' said the Doctor. ' I will see Prince this afternoon, and ask him to come round for an hour in the evening to talk the plan over with us.' ' Don't you really like the prospect of going to Mindala, mother ?' Ruth asked, when her father had driven away from the house. ' I am only afraid of being too easily persuaded by fair promises,' answered her mother. 'We may be preparing very painful experiences for ourselves if we undertake work of which we are ignorant.' ' We ought to risk everything to make you well,' said Ruth resolutely. ' I don't know what work there can be which I cannot do.' ' Oh, indeed !