en't that sort.

Starlight had plenty of money, besides his share of the gold. If we
could ever get away from this confounded rock-walled prison, good as it
was in some ways; and if he and Aileen and the rest of us could make a
clean dart of it and get to America, we could live there free and happy
yet, in spite of all that had come and gone.

Aileen wasn't like to leave poor old mother as long as she wanted her,
so it couldn't come off for a year or two at earliest, and many things
were sure to happen in the meanwhile. So we let all the talking and
walking and riding out in the evening go on as much as they pleased, and
never said anything or seemed to take any notice at all about it.

All this time mother was at George Storefield's. When Aileen ran over
that time, he said it wasn't fit for them to live at Rocky Flat by
themselves. So he went over that very day--like a good fellow, as he
was--and brought over the old woman, and made them both stay at his
house, safe and comfortable. When Aileen said she had to go away to
nurse dad he said he would take care of mother till she came back, and
so she'd been there all the time. She knew Mrs. Storefield (George's
mother) well in the old times; so they used to sit by the kitchen fire
when they wanted to be extra comfortable, and knit stockings and talk
over the good old times to their hearts' content.

If it hadn't been for old Mrs. Storefield I don't expect mother would
have contented herself there--the cottage was got so grand, Aileen told
us, and Gracey had to dress a bit now. George had kept on making more
money in every way he tried it, and of course he began, bit by bit, to
live according to his means.

He'd bought cattle-stations on the Lachlan just when the gold broke
out first, and everybody thought station property was never going to
be worth nothing again. Now, since cattle had risen and meat and all to
such a price, he was making money hand over fist. More than that, as I
said before, he'd been made a magistrate, and all the swells began to
take notice of him--not altogether because he'd made money either; what
I call the real swells, as far as I see, won't do that. If they don't
care for a man--no matter how much money he's made--they hold shy of
him. But if he's a straight-going good sort of fellow, that has his
head screwed on the right way, and don't push himself forward too much,
they'll meet him half-way, and a very good thing too.

We could see Georg