Page:Outlawandlawmak00praegoog.djvu/44

32 answered Mr. Trant. "He runs down to Sydney, and he is rather a card there, I can tell you. I shouldn't wonder though if he were in Leichardt's Town a good deal this winter."

"It is going to be a very gay winter, isn't it?" put in Lady Horace. "The Prince is really coming, and there will be the new Governor, and we shall have a lot of balls. Elsie and I are going to have a good time—just like the old times, before I married."

She got up as she spoke, and went into the parlour. The night was warm, as March nights are, and there floated in the fragrance of the stephanotis, which twined one of the verandah posts. Elsie sauntered into the verandah. Lady Horace was going to follow her, but when she saw that Hallett had come out of the dining-room, evidently with that intention, leaving Lord Horace and Mr. Trant, she drew back and let Hallett pass her.

Elsie had gathered a spray of the stephanotis, and was stroking her lip with one of the waxen flowers.

"How do you like Mr. Trant?" asked Hallett, abruptly.

"I don't like him at all," she answered. "I hate a man who calls me 'Miss,' and looks at me in that fashion."

"I am sorry that Edith asked him to Tunimba."

"Why did she do that?"

"She said we had been unneighbourly, and that she had heard Mr. Blake was a very charming man, and that for his sake we were bound to be civil to his partner. You know Edith rather likes to play the part of great lady of the district."

"She does it very nicely. She is so amiable and proper, and well-dressed, and well-read, and all the rest. She always says the right thing when she is in society. Do you know, I think Mrs. Jem Hallett is rather wasted as the wife of a Luya squatter."

"I see you don't like Edith. But never mind. You will come over, won't you, and leave the jam to take care of itself for another week?"

"I will come on one condition."