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a heart after all. I’m glad.”
    “Now don’t you go endowing me with anything like that. You’ll be bitterly disappointed.”
    “I know,” I replied.
    “You’re hardhearted. You wouldn’t help anyone.
    But you think the boy will be useful. That’s it, eh? “
     
    That’s it,” he agreed.
    “All right. Have it the way you want it. It’s the result that counts.
    Poor little Jemmy! He’ll be a happy boy tonight. “
    I felt close to Stirling after that. I even liked his way of pretending that he had acted from practical rather than sentimental reasons.
    The rest of the journey was uneventful; and it was forty-five days after we had left Tilbury that we came to Melbourne.
    It was late afternoon when we arrived and by the time we had disembarked, dusk was upon us.
    I shall never forget standing there on the wharf with our bags around and Jemmy beside us in the ragged clothes which were all he had. This was my new home. I wondered what Jemmy was thinking. His dark eyes were enormous in his pale tragic young face. I reassured him and in comforting him, comforted myself.
    A woman was coming towards us and I knew immediately that she was Adelaide—the one who should have come to England to fetch me.
    Adelaide was plainly dressed in a cape and a hat without trimming, which was tied under her chin with a ribbon for the wind was high. I was a little disappointed; she had none of the unusual looks of Stirling and was hardly as I would have expected the Lynx’s daughter to be. The fact was she looked like a rather plain, staid countrywoman. I knew immediately that I was wrong to be disappointed because what I saw in her face was undoubtedly kindness.
    “Adelaide, here’s Nora,” said Stirling.
    She took my hand and kissed me coolly.
    “Welcome to Melbourne, Nora,” she said.
    “I hope you had a good journey.”
    “Interesting,” commented Stirling.
    “All things considered.”
    “We’re staying at the Lynx,” she said, ‘and catching the Cobb coach tomorrow morning. “
    “Goodo,” said Stirling.
    “The Lynx?” I queried.
    “Our father’s hotel in Collins Street,” Adelaide explained.
    “I expect you’d like to be getting along. Is all the baggage here?” Her eyes had come to rest on Jemmy.
    “He’s part of the baggage,” said Stirling. I frowned at him, fearing that Jemmy might be hurt to hear himself so described; but he was unaware of the slight.
    “We picked him up on the ship,” went on Stirling.
    “Nora thinks he should be
     
    given some work to do. “
    “Have you written to our father about him?”
    “No, I am leaving it to Nora to explain to him.”
    Adelaide looked a little startled but I pretended to be not in the least disturbed at the prospect of explaining Jemmy to their formidable parent.
    “I have a buggy waiting,” she said.
    “We’ll get all this stuff sent to the hotel.” She turned to me.
    “We’re some forty miles out of Melbourne, but Cobb’s are good. You can rely on Cobb’s. So we come in frequently. The men ride in but I like Cobb’s. I hope you will settle down here.”
    “I hope so too,” I said.
    “She will if she makes up her mind to,” said Stirling.
    “She’s a very determined person.”
    I walked off with Adelaide and Stirling Jemmy following. I was only vaguely aware of the bustle all around me, and the carts drawn by horses or bullocks and loaded with wool hides and meat.
    “It’s a busy town,” said Adelaide.
    “It’s grown quickly in the last few years. Gold has made it rich.”
    “Gold!” I said a little bitterly; and she must have known that I was thinking of my father. There was something very sympathetic about this woman.
    “It’s pleasant to have the town not too far away,” she said.
    “I hope you won’t find us too isolated. Have you ever lived in a big city?”
    “I did for a time, but I have lived in the country, too; and I felt very isolated in the place where I was first a pupil, then a teacher.”
    She