ound the ribs
of three very touchy horses. Poss and Binjie were each riding a station
horse to "take the flashness out of him," and Binjie's horse tried to
buck him off, but might as well have tried to shed his own skin; so he
bolted instead, and disappeared with a snort and a rattle of hoofs over
the hill. The others followed, with their horses very much inclined to
go through the same performance.

After they had gone, Ellen Harriott and Blake were left alone in the
breakfast-room. Outside, the heedless horse-boy was harnessing Blake's
ponies; but inside no one but themselves was awake, and as he finished
his breakfast, Ellen stepped up to the table and blew out the two
candles, leaving the room in semi-darkness. She caught his hand, and he
drew her to him. It was what she had been waiting for all night. She had
pictured a parting, which was to be such sweet sorrow. Blake had also
pictured it to himself, but in quite a different way.

He was determined to make an end of his engagement (or entanglement,
whichever it could be called), and yet when the chance came he almost
put it off; but the thought of what exposure and disgrace would mean, if
his affairs were investigated, drove him on.

He stroked her hair for a while in silence, and then, with a laugh,
said, "We'll have to give up this sort of thing, you know; it'll be
getting you talked about, and that'll never do."

She hardly knew what he meant. Having lived so long in a fool's
paradise, she could not realise that her world was coming down about her
ears.

"We'll have to be proper in future," he said. "I've had the most
fiendish run of bad luck lately, and it's just as well there never was
any engagement between us. It would have had to come to nothing."

She drew back, and looked at him with frightened eyes. He had great
power over her--this big, masterful man, whom she had looked upon as her
lover; and she could not believe that a little trouble about money could
really make any difference to him. She believed him able to overcome any
such difficulty as that of earning a living for her and himself.

"But, Gavan," she said, "what have I done?"

"Done, little girl? you've done nothing. It's all my fault. I've lost
heart over things lately, and it will only harm you if we keep up this
pretence of being engaged. Nothing can come of it."

"Why not? Why can't we wait?"

"Wait! To be stuck in Tarrong all my life among these people, and up
to my neck in deb