My Brilliant Career (17 page)

I was highly delighted with his action, as I would have despised him as a booby had he given in to me, but I did not let my satisfaction appear. I sat as far away from him as possible, and pretended to be in a great huff. For a while he was too fully occupied in making Barney “sit up” to notice me, but after a few minutes he looked round, smiling a most annoying and pleasant smile.

“I'd advise you to straighten out your chin. It is too round and soft to look well screwed up that way,” he said provokingly.

I tried to extinguish him with a look, but it had not the desired effect.

“Now you had better be civil, for I have got the big end of the whip,” he said.

“I reserve to myself the right of behaving as I think fit in my own uncle's buggy. You are an intruder; it is yourself that should be civil.”

I erected my parasol and held it so as to tease Harold. I put it down so that he could not see the horses. He quietly seized my wrist and held it out of his way for a time, and then loosing me said, “Now, behave.”

I flouted it now, so that his ears and eyes were endangered, and he was forced to hold his hat on.

“I'll give you three minutes to behave, or I'll put you out,” he said with mock severity.

“Shure it's me wot's behavin' beautiful,” I replied, continuing my nonsense.

He pulled rein, seized me in one arm, and lifted me lightly to the ground.

“Now, you can walk till you promise to conduct yourself like a Christian!” he said, driving at a walk.

“If you wait till I promise anything, you'll wait till the end of the century. I'm quite capable of walking home.”

“You'll soon get tired of walking in this heat, and your feet will be blistered in a mile with those bits of paper.”

The bits of paper to which he alluded were a pair of thin-soled white canvas slippers—not at all fitted for walking the eight miles on the hard, hot road ahead of me. I walked resolutely on, without deigning a glance at Harold, who had slowed down to a crawling walk.

“Aren't you ready to get up now?” he inquired presently.

I did not reply. At the end of a quarter of a mile he jumped out of the buggy, seized upon me, lifted me in, and laughed, saying, “You're a very slashing little concern, but you are not big enough to do much damage.”

We were about halfway home when Barney gave a tremendous lurch, breaking a trace and some other straps. Mr. Beecham was at the head of the plunging horse in a twinkling. The harness seemed to be scattered everywhere.

“I expect I had better walk on now,” I remarked.

“Walk, be grannied! With two fat, lazy horses to draw you?” returned Mr. Beecham.

Men are clumsy, stupid creatures regarding little things, but in their right place they are wonderful animals. If a buggy was smashed to smithereens, from one of their many mysterious pockets they would produce a knife and some string, and put the wreck into working order in no time.

Harold was as clever in this way as any other man with as much bushman ability as he had, so it was not long ere we were bowling along as merrily as ever.

Just before we came in sight of Caddagat he came to a standstill, jumped to the ground, untied Warrigal, and put the reins in my hand, saying:

“I think you can get home safely from here. Don't be in such a huff—I was afraid something might happen to you if alone. You needn't mention that I came with you unless you like. Good-bye.”

“Good-bye, Mr. Beecham. Thank you for being so officious,” I said by way of a parting shot.

“Old Nick will run away with you for being so ungrateful,” he returned.

“Old Nick will have me anyhow,” I thought to myself as I drove home amid the shadows. The hum of the cicadas was still, and dozens of rabbits, tempted out by the cool of the twilight, scuttled across my path and hid in the ferns.

I wished the harness had not broken, as I feared it would put a clincher on my being allowed out driving alone in future.

Joe Slocombe, the man who acted as groom and rouseabout, was waiting for me at the entrance gate.

“I'm glad you come at last, Miss Sybyller. The missus has been in a dreadful stoo for fear something had happened yuz. She's been runnin' in an' out like a gurrl on the lookout fer her lover, and was torkin' of sendin' me after yuz, but she went to her tea soon as she see the buggy come in sight. I'll put all the parcels on the back veranda, and yuz can go in at woncest or yuz'll be late fer yer tea.”

“Joe, the harness broke and had to be tied up. That is what kept me so late,” I explained.

“The harness broke!” he exclaimed. “How the doose is that! Broke here in the trace, and that strap! Well, I'll be hanged! I thought them straps couldn't break only onder a tremenjous strain. The boss is so dashed partickler too. I believe he'll sool me off the place; and I looked at that harness only yesterday. I can't make out how it come to break so simple. The boss will rise the devil of a shine, and say you might have been killed.”

This put a different complexion on things. I knew Joe Slocombe could mend the harness with little trouble, as it was because he was what Uncle Jay-Jay termed a “handy divil” at saddlery that he was retained at Caddagat. I said carelessly, “If you mend the harness at once, Joe, Uncle Julius need not be bothered about it. As it happened, there is no harm done, and I won't mention the matter.”

“Thank you, miss,” he said eagerly. “I'll mend it at once.”

Now that I had that piece of business so luckily disposed of,
I did not feel the least nervous about meeting Grannie. I took the mail in my arms and entered the dining room, chirping pleasantly: “Grannie, I'm such a good mail-boy. I have heaps of letters, and did not forget one of your commissions.”

“I don't want to hear that now,” she said, drawing her dear old mouth into a straight line, which told me I was not going to palm things off as easily as I thought. “I want a reason for your conduct this afternoon.”

“Explain what, Grannie?” I inquired.

“None of that pretense! Not only have you been most outrageously insulting to Mr. Hawden when I sent him with you, but you also deliberately and wilfully disobeyed me.”

Uncle Julius listened attentively, and Hawden looked at me with such a leer of triumph that my fingers tingled to smack his ears.

Turning to my grandmother, I said distinctly and cuttingly, “Grannie, I did not intentionally disobey you. Disobedience never entered my head. I hate that thing. His presence was detestable to me. When he got out at the gate I could not resist the impulse to drive off and leave him there. He looked such a complete jackdaw that you would have laughed yourself to see him.”

“Dear, oh dear! You wicked hussy, what will become of you!” And Grannie shook her head, trying to look stern, and hiding a smile in her serviette.

“Your manners are not improving, Sybylla. I fear you must be incorrigible,” said Aunt Helen.

When Uncle Jay-Jay heard the whole particulars of the affair, he lay back in his chair and laughed fit to kill himself.

“You ought to be ashamed to always encourage her in her tomboyish ways, Julius. It grieves me to see she makes no effort to acquire a ladylike demeanor,” said Grannie.

Mr. Hawden had come off second-best, so he arose from his half-finished meal and stamped out, banging the door after him, and muttering something about “a disgustingly spoilt and petted tomboy,” “a hideous barbarian,” and so forth.

Uncle Jay-Jay related that story to everyone, dwelling with great delight upon the fact that Frank Hawden was forced to walk four miles in the heat and dust.

When alone I confessed to Aunt Helen that Harold had accompanied me to within a short distance of home. She did not smile as usual, but looked very grave, and, drawing me in front of her, said, “Sybylla, do you know what you are doing? Do you love Harry Beecham? Do you mean to marry him?”

“Aunt Helen, what a question to ask! I never dreamt of such a thing. He has never spoken a word of love to me. Marriage! I am sure he does not for an instant think of me in that light. I'm not seventeen.”

“Yes, you are young, but some people's age cannot be reckoned by years. I am glad to see you have developed a certain amount of half-real and half-assumed youthfulness lately, but when the novelty of your present life wears away, your old mature nature will be there, so it is of no use feigning childishness. Harold Beecham is not given to speech—action with him is the same thing. Can you look at me straight, Sybylla, and say that Harold has not extended you something more than common politeness?”

Had Aunt Helen put that question to me a day before, I would have blushed and felt guilty. But today not so. The words of the jackeroo the night before had struck home. “A hideous barbarian,” he had called me, and it seemed to me he had spoken the truth. My life had been so pleasant lately that I had overlooked this fact, but now it returned to sting with redoubled bitterness. I had no lovable qualities to win for me the love of my fellows, which I so much desired.

I returned Aunt Helen a gaze as steady as her own, and said bitterly: “Aunt Helen, I can truly say he has never, and will
never extend to me more than common politeness. Neither will any other man. Surely you know enough of masculine human nature to see there is no danger of a man losing his heart to a plain woman like me. Love in fancy and song is a pretty myth, embracing unity of souls, congeniality of tastes, and suchlike commodities. In workaday reality it is the lowest of passions, which is set alight by the most artistic nose and mouth, and it matters not if its object is vile, low, or brainless to idiocy, so long as it has these attributes.”

“Sybylla, Sybylla,” said Auntie sadly, as if to herself. “In the first flush of girlhood, and so bitter. Why is this?”

“Because I have been cursed with the power of seeing, thinking and, worse than all, feeling, and branded with the stinging affliction of ugliness,” I replied.

“Now, Sybylla, you are going to think of yourself again. Something has put you out. Be sensible for once in a way. What you have said of men's love may be true in a sense, but it is not always so, and Harry is not that kind of man. I have known him all his life, and understand him, and feel sure he loves you truly. Tell me plainly, do you intend to accept him?”

“Intend to accept him!” I echoed. “I haven't once thought of such a possibility. I never mean to marry anyone.”

“Don't you care for Harold? Just a little? Think.”

“How could I care for him?”

“For many, many reasons. He is young, and very kind and gentle. He is one of the biggest and finest-looking men you could find. He is a man whom no one could despise, for he has nothing despicable about him. But, best of all, he is true, and that, I think, is the bedrock of all virtues.”

“But he is so conceited,” I remarked.

“That does not make him any the less lovable. I know another young person very conceited, and it does not prevent me from loving her dearly.” Here Aunt Helen smiled affectionately at me. “What you complain of in Harold will wear off presently—life has been very easy for him so far, you see.”

“But, Auntie, I'm sure he thinks he could have any girl for the asking.”

“Well, he has a great number to choose from, for they all like him.”

“Yes, just for his money,” I said scornfully. “But I'll surprise him if he thinks he can get me for the asking.”

“Sybylla, never flirt. To play with a man's heart, I think, is one of the most horribly unwomanly actions our sex can be guilty of.”

“I would scorn to flirt with any man,” I returned with vigor. “Play with a man's heart! You'd really think they had such a thing, Aunt Helen, to hear you talk. Hurt their vanity for a few days is the most a woman could do with any of them. I am sick of this preach, preach about playing with men's hearts. It is an old fable which should have been abolished long ago. It does not matter how a woman is played with.”

“Sybylla, you talk at random. The shortcomings of men are no excuse for you to be unwomanly,” said Aunt Helen.

The Prince of Wales's birthday up the country was celebrated as usual thereaway by the annual horse races on the Wyambeet course, about fourteen miles from Caddagat.

The holding of these races was an elderly institution, and was followed at night by a servants' ball given by one of the squatters. Last year it had been Beecham's ball, the year before Bossier's, and this year it was to take place in the woolshed of James Grant of Yabtree. Our two girls, the gardener, and Joe Slocombe the groom were to be present, as also were all the other employees about. Nearly everyone in the district—masters and men—attended the races. We were going, Frank Hawden volunteering to stay and mind the house.

We started at nine o'clock. Grannie and Uncle Boss sat in the front seat of the buggy, and Aunt Helen and I occupied the back. Uncle always drove at a good round gallop. His idea was to have good horses, not donkeys, and not to spare them, as there were plenty more to be had any day. On this morning he went off at his usual pace. Grannie urged as remonstrance that the dust was fearful when going at that rate. I clapped my hands and exclaimed, “Go it, Mr. Bossier! Well done, Uncle Jay-Jay! Hurrah for Clancy!”

Uncle first said he was glad to see I had the spirit of an Australian, and then threatened to put my nose above my chin if I failed to behave properly. Grannie remarked that I might have the spirit of an Australian, but I had by no means the manners of a lady; while Aunt Helen ventured a wish that I might expend all my superfluous spirits on the way, so that I would be
enabled to deport myself with a little decorum when we arrived at the racecourse.