CHAPTER II.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIII, Issue 1944, 20 December 1884, Page 1 (Supplement)

CHAPTER 11.

Addie Green was the daughter of respectable tradespeople in Ballarat, who had brought her up to be a teacher, which is the ambition of most young people in that town. She had been a hardworking girl, and soon worked her way into a position. She had had no love affairs, and came to Cockietown heart free ; indeed, her father, who was a calculating man, and who had a number of children to provide for, confidently predicted to her mother that Addie would soon marry some big squatter, selector, or storekeeper in the Cockietown district, and be well provided for. Addie took possession of her school, and arranged to board with an ancient spinster who kept a "select boarding house "in the town, and who knew the whole gossip of the district. Having failed in the matrimonial market herself, she thought her business was to get up matches. She had one ready for Addie before the week was out. Miss Mackay'B house was the place where the unmarried aristocracy of the town boarded, the bank clerks and the like. One of these, Hughie Caldwell, was the son of a neighboring squatter, a tall, lithe, handsome, brown-haired lad, very good at bottom, when you divested him of his la-de-dah ways. He would be sure to rise in the bank, for his father was a shareholder, and to have b fair fortune when the old man paid his last debt— which he would, however, pay as hardly as he did all others. Miss Mackay, therefore, felt certain — she proclaimed this at the teatables of Mrs. Prose, the minister's wife, and Mrs, Scalpel, the doctor's spouse — that pretty little Addie would make a match of it with Hughie. "He always liked small, dark-haired girls," she said. " You remember he was nearly marrying Lucy Grrayson, only she took Fatox, the stock and station agent. I'm sure it will come to a match." It wa3 quite true that Hughie was greatly taken with Addie. Young and pretty unmarried women were not over plentiful in the district. But Miss Mackay was wrong in thinking Hughie dreamt of marriage. He knew his position, and looked forward to marrying the daughter of some man in moneyed circles ; the daughter of a squatting or mercantile magnate. Melbourne gossips of the Miss Mackay stamp had repeatedly coupled his name with that of heiresses, and and he had been near marrying one, bad he not been supplanted by a uniformed scapegrace from England. Hughie, therefore, was inclined to desperately flirt with Addie, but not to marry her. There were other thoughts in his mind, too, that vre wuTnot investigate. So Addie got into harness and Hughie squired her round, took her to concerts, and generally did the amiable. Addie could sing beautifully, and took her place in the choir, and* appeared at a concert got up to help to add a' fting tp jihp phiiren, '* Jjifd vpas, icter

Yet there was a trouble on the girls' mind. She was haunted. When she dismissed her scholars and issued out of the school, on her way to Miss Mackays, Bhewas almost certain to catch sight of Big Jack— cunningly hidden as he, great lout, thought, behind some fence or building. He had never been seen in church for years, living fifteen miles away ; but now Addie never looked down from the choir but she met his upturned face, always hastily hidden in the pew. At the concert he was the only man she saw ; all intent upon her, devouring her with his eager dark brown eyes. It was difficult to say whether the girl felt fear or joy ; probably both were mingled in her feelings. She heard sad tales of Big Jaok, the leader in all daredevil doings ; but she could not but feel a pride in having captured the most splendid man, physically, in the district. What a contrast he was to the slim, delicately-made, spotlessly attired Hughie. If some love did try to steal into her heart she thrust it back, for she felt it madness to encouiaqe a man who could not, by training or position, be her mate. To be a splendid animal is not the only qualification of a husband ; it is the very least.