stood out delightfully on the blue water’s edge. The garden lawn merged into a narrow strand that slid straight under the wavelets themselves. As summer set in the trees behind the house broke out in every gay and gorgeous colour; it was the plumage of the parrots, that now came and perched in flocks among the branches.
Tom gave up his room, as two ladies and a maid were expected. It was re-papered for the maid. A room was found for Tom in the pretty little stables amid the trees, where he helped Fawcett with the horses and the curricle, which was in Sydney on some errand every day. Generally the master went alone; once he took Tom with him; it was on the occasion of his cashing a cheque to meet the running expenses of these elaborate preparations.
They were on their way home at dusk, when Daintree pulled up on the outskirts of the town and hailed a disconsolate, soldierly figure with one arm in a sling.
“Why, Harry?” cried Daintree. “That’s never you?”
“I wish it wasn’t, sir.”
“You’ve left the force?”
“These six months; it was my arm; look there, sir!”
An emaciated hand came through the sling; the thumb and forefinger were uninjured; but half the middle finger, and both the other two, were like dead, distorted branches on a living tree.
“What did it?”
“A bullet; caught me on the funny-bone and paralysed half my hand. My right hand, too. It’s set me on the shelf at thirty-three!”
“An accident, Harry?”
Tom held his breath.
“Quite,” said Harry bitterly; “it was meant for my
