Grif: A Story of Australian Life

"How old is she, Milly?" asked Grif, regarding this proceeding with honest pleasure.

"Ten weeks the day after to-morrow," replied Milly, who, as is usual with young mothers, reckoned forward. "And now, Grif, if you will hold her, I will make some gruel for Little Peter. Be careful. No; you mustn't take her like that! Sit down, and I will put her in your lap."

So Grif squatted upon the ground, and Milly placed the child in his lap. He experienced a strange feeling of pleasure at his novel position. It was a new revelation to him, this child of Milly's. Milly herself was so different. He had never seen her in so good a light as now. Hitherto he had in his thoughts drawn a wide line between her and Alice; a gulf that seemed impassable had divided them. Now the gulf was bridged with human love and human tenderness. Alice was all good; but was Milly all bad?

He looked at her as she was making the gruel. Tender thoughts beautify; a mother's love refines. She was kneeling before the fire, pausing in her occupation now and then to bestow a smile upon her child. Once she rested her face in baby's neck, caressingly. Her hair hung upon Grif's hand, and he touched it and marvelled at the contrast between Milly of yesterday and Milly of to-day. Then he fell to wondering more about Milly than he had ever wondered before. Had she a father, like Alice, who was unkind to her? What was it that she saw in Jim Pizey that made her cling to him? Why was it that everything seemed to be wrong with those persons whom he loved? Rough had been poisoned, Little Peter was ill, Milly was attached to a bad man, and Alice-well, it was a puzzle, the whole of it! While he thus thought, Milly had been giving Little Peter the gruel.

"Milly," Grif said, when she returned from the bed, "have you got a mother and father?"

The girl turned a startled look upon him, and was about to make some passionate reply, but suddenly checked herself.

"Don't ask me, Grif," she said, in a hard voice. "How is your lady?"

Her old spirit was coming upon her. Grif knew that she meant Alice by "your lady," and he was hurt by the scornful ring of her voice. Seeing that he was grieved, Milly said:

"Don't mind me, Grif; now I'm soft, and now I'm hard. I've got the devil in me sometimes, and I can't keep him down. But I mustn't think-I mustn't think-I mustn't think. Of course, I've got a mother and father, and my mother and father's got a daughter they might be proud of. Everybody used to tell me so. I had a pretty face, pretty hands, pretty feet, pretty hair. I'm a pretty daughter altogether! Why wasn't I ugly? Then I might have been good!"

She took the baby from Grif s arms, and pressed it to her bosom.

"If I knew how to be good," she said, in a softened voice, "I think I would be. But I don't know how. If I was to go out of this house to-night, I shouldn't know which way to turn to be good. I'd be sure to turn wrong. I don't care!" And then she sang, recklessly, "I'm happy, I'm careless, I'm good-natured and free; and I don't care a single pin what the world thinks of me!"

"Don't, Milly! don't!" pleaded Grif, placing his hand upon hers, and looking earnestly at her.

She took his hand convulsively, and put it to her baby's lips.

"That won't do baby any harm," she said, after a pause. "I wonder if baby will grow up pretty, like me. Oh, I hope not, I hope not!"

"She's got eyes like your'n," said Grif, wishing to change her humour.

"Prettier than mine," Milly replied. "But if it wasn't that I should go mad if I was to lose her, I wish she would die! It would be better for her, but I think it would be worse for me. What's that in your hand?"

It was Little Peter's stone heart, which Grif had held all the while.

"It's Little Peter's heart," he said.

"Of course it is; I remember it now. It belonged to his mother."

"Where is she?" asked Grif, eagerly, for this was the first time he had heard of Little Peter's mother.

"She died two years ago in the hospital."

"Did you know her, Milly?"

"I went with a friend to see her when she was dying. She was a Welsh woman. She put the heart round Little Peter's neck when we took him to wish her good-bye, for the doctor said she would die before night."

"What did she die of, Milly?" The subject was full of interest to Grif.

"Broken heart. Somebody played her false, as usual. I shan't die of a broken heart-not I! Drink will be my death-the sooner the better! Hush! There's Jim. Who else? The Tenderhearted Oysterman."

Grif jumped to his feet, trembling with passion.

"He mustn't see you. He'll do you a mischief. Perhaps he won't stop long. Get under the bed-clothes, and pretend to be asleep. Quick! For God's sake!"

She thrust him hurriedly into the bed, and had barely time to conceal him and resume her position, before Jim and his companion entered.

Milly smiled at Jim, but neither he nor his companion took heed of her. They seated themselves near the fire, and Milly sat upon the bed, which was in the shadow of the room.

"We must have him," said the Tenderhearted Oysterman, apparently in continuance of a conversation. "The old bloke always keeps a heap of money in his safe at Highlay Station; and Dick Handfield knows every nook and cranny of the place. I've heard him say so. He knows all the secret drawers, too, I'll be bound, and where the keys are to be found, and where the hiding places are. We must have him, Jim."

At the mention of Highlay Station, Grif pricked up his ears. That was the Station which Alice had spoken of in their conversation a couple of nights ago. But when, the next instant, the Tenderhearted Oysterman uttered Richard Handfield's name, he started, and caught Milly's hand excitedly. Milly pressed him down with quiet, warning action, and, recalled to the necessity of being cautious, Grif lay still and listened. Milly paid but little attention to the conversation. She did not know anything of Highlay Station, nor that Alice was Richard Handfield's wife, and it was no novelty to her to hear schemes of robbery discussed by Jim and his associates.

"You talk," said Jim Pizey. "But I like to do."

"What do you mean by that?" asked the other.

"Not that you're not cool enough," continued Jim, "you're as good a pal as I ever want to have, if you'd only stop that damned cant of not hurting people." (The Tenderhearted Oysterman gave a quiet chuckle.) "I know well enough that you don't mean it."

"Now Jim," expostulated the Oysterman, and yet evidently regarding his comrade's words as a compliment. "It's a good job there's no one by to hear you take away my character."

"But others don't know you as well as I do, and there's plenty of them would think you were chicken-hearted."

"Do I look like it?" asked the Tenderhearted Oysterman in a tone of villanous humility.

"No, you don't. But you'd make believe that you was. If I didn't know you for one who would stick at nothing-nothing, not even short of-"

"Never mind what," interrupted the Oysterman, looking at Milly, who was employed nursing her baby, and did not appear to be taking heed of what was said.

"If I didn't know you for that, then, I'd have nothing to do with you, for your infernal cant sickens me."

There was a pause in the conversation. Grif still held Milly's hand hard. He felt there was something coming which would affect Alice, and every word that was being uttered stamped itself upon his mind.

"Dick Handfield we must have, and Dick Handfield we will have," resumed Jim. "If we can't have him one way, we will another. I've got a hook in him already, and if he hangs on and off as he's been doing, the white-livered skunk! the last two weeks, he'll get a dose that'll pretty well settle him."

"What sort of a dose, Jim?"

"I bought a watch of him this morning-here it is. I gave him five pounds for it. It's a pretty little thing. Just the thing for Milly! Milly."

"Yes, Jim," answered Milly, disengaging her hand from Grif's grasp, and walking towards Jim, for fear he should come to the bed, and discover Grif.

"Here's a watch I've bought for you. It belonged to a lady."

"Oh, what a beauty!" cried Milly, her eyes sparkling with eager delight as she looked at the pretty bauble.

"Well, it's yours now, my girl. I promised you should have one when the young 'un came."

"Thank you, Jim," said Milly, returning to the bed, with the present in her hand.

"He's just like me, Milly," said the Tenderhearted Oysterman; "he's as soft as a piece of putty. But I can't see how that watch is a dose, Jim."

"I gave Dick Handfield five pounds for that watch," said Jim, "and I paid him for it with a forged note."

At these words, Milly, who had been looking at the watch, and examining it with the pleasure of a child when it receives a new toy, dropped it upon the bed, with a heavy sigh.

"Then I took him to Old Flick's, and Old Flick gave him five sovereigns for the note. There was a man in the store when Dick Handfield changed the note, and Old Flick, who knew all about the lay, asked Dick Handfield all sorts of questions and regularly confused him. That's a pretty good dose for him, I think. I shall ask him to-morrow for the last time to join us. If he refuses, Old Flick shall give him in charge for passing a forged note, and the man who was in the store at the time will be the witness. Handfield will be glad enough to join us when he finds he's in the web. He'd sooner go up the country with us than go to quod-if it was only for the sake of that woman of his, that white-faced piece of virtue he calls his wife."

"Alice her name is," said the Tenderhearted Oysterman, sneeringly. "She's as much his wife as I am."

"It's a lie, Milly, a lie!" whispered Grif, in an agony of rage and despair at what he had heard. "She is his wife!" Oh, if he could get away from the room to tell Alice of the danger which surrounded her husband! He dug his nails in his hand, and his faithful heart beat furiously.

Milly placed her hand upon his lips.

"You're a liar, Oysterman!" she said, quietly. "The girl is his wife."

Grif took Milly's hand, and kissed it again and again for the vindication.

The Tenderhearted Oysterman turned sharply upon Milly, and was about to answer her when Jim Pizey said, -

"Milly's right. The girl is his wife. You don't know everything, Oysterman. But now I'll tell you that that girl is the daughter of Old Nuttall, the rich squatter of Highlay Station. Dick Handfield was living on the Station for a goodish time-that's how he came to know all about it. The girl fell in love with him, and they ran away and got married."

"And a pretty nice thing she made of it!" sneered the Oysterman. "I hate these milk-sop women!"

"I wonder what sort of a woman you'd ever be fond of, Oysterman!" said Milly, with bitter sarcasm. "I wonder if you'd ever get a woman to love you, and think you a model of anything but what's mean!"

"Serve you right, Oysterman," said Jim, laughing. "Never you speak against women when a woman is by."

The Tenderhearted Oysterman had turned white in the face when Milly spoke.

"You're a nice sort of woman, you are," he exclaimed, with a snarl. "I'd never want you to love me and think me a model."

"A good job for you," she exclaimed. "I pity the woman you'd take a fancy to, or the man either, for that matter. If I was Jim, I'd pitch you downstairs."

"Come, come, Milly," said Jim, "we've had enough of that."

"No, we haven't," cried Milly, who was thoroughly roused. "You're a man, you are. You're bad enough, God knows! but there is something of a man in you. But that cur!" She placed her baby on the bed, and advanced a step towards the men, and pointed to the Oysterman. "That cur!" she repeated in a tone of such contempt that the Oysterman's blood boiled with fury. "That kicker of women and poisoner of dogs! What do you think he did, the night before last, Jim? He crawled to where poor little Grif was sleeping, and gave a piece of poisoned meat to Grif's dog. He did, the mean hound! That was a nice manly thing to do, wasn't it!"

"Come along, Oysterman," said Jim Pizey, half angry and half amused, taking his comrade by the arm. "It's no use answering her. She talks to me sometimes like that. Come along, and have a drink."

And by sheer strength he forced the Oysterman out of the room.

"That's done me good," said Milly, when the men were gone, taking her baby to the fire.

Grif started to his feet.

"Thank you, Milly," he said. "I'll tell Ally how you stood up for her."

"Don't you do anything of the sort," said Milly, who, now her passion was over, was crying. "It isn't fit that my name should be mentioned to her. She's a good woman."

"And so are you, Milly," said Grif, inwardly struggling with his doubts.

"I'm not, nor ever shall be. That watch" (pointing to it) "was hers, I suppose."

"I s'pose so. I never sor it."

Milly took it in her hand and opened the case.

"Here's her name," she said. "Alice Handfield. And here's a motto: Hope, Faith, and Love. And she gave it back to her husband, because they were hard up, perhaps, and Jim bought it of him with a forged note. Oh, my God! What a web of wickedness and goodness!"

"I must go" cried Grif, "I must go and tell them-I must go and put Ally up to it."

"Up to what?" exclaimed Milly, a light breaking upon her. "Up to the forged note! You'll go and tell her that you heard Jim say he paid for the watch with a forged note? And her husband 'll have Jim took up, and you'll be witness against him!" She glided swiftly to the door, and turning the key, put it in her pocket.

"What do you do that for?" asked Grif. "I must go, Milly. I'll break open the door."

"No, you won't," said Milly, taking fast hold of him. "You shan't get Jim into trouble. He's been kind to me, though he is a bad man, and you shan't peach upon him."

"Let me go, Milly," cried Grif, gently struggling.

"You don't go till Jim comes in," she said, still retaining her hold of him, "and then-good God!" she cried, in a voice of despair and horror. "Then, he'll kill you!"

The conflict of thought was too much for her. She relaxed her hold, and Grif flew to the door, and broke the frail lock. Then he looked back. Milly had fallen to the floor, and was sobbing convulsively. Her baby was lying by her side.

Grif went to her and raised her.

"Milly," he said, "don't take on so. I won't hurt you or Jim. But I must be true to Ally. If I couldn't I'd go and drown myself. I couldn't live, and not be true to her. She said I was her only friend, and I swore that I'd be so till I die! And I will be, till I die-and I'd like to die for her, for she's a good woman, Milly!"

"She is-she is," groaned Milly; "and I'm a bad and wicked one."

"You're not, Milly, you're not," said Grif, emphatically. "You're good, but another sort of good! See what you've done for Little Peter to-night," and he kissed her hand; "see what you've done for me many and many a time; and see how you stood up for Ally jist now, although every word you said was agin yourself!" he kissed her hand again. "You can't be bad and wicked! And I won't hurt you, and I won't hurt Jim, because of you. I won't, you may believe me! I'll tell Ally that her husband must go away to-night. He was agoin' away-I heerd him say so-and perhaps he's gone already. I won't tell her about the forged note. I'll say that I heerd a plot, and I won't tell her what it is. She'll believe me, I know she will. And so I shall do her good, and I shan't do you any harm!"

Grif spoke earnestly, for as his words brought to his mind the remembrance of Milly' s unselfish kindness, the conviction that it would be wicked to harm her or wound her feelings, grew stronger and stronger.

"God bless you!" said Milly.

Truly, Grif was not entirely unhappy or forsaken. The blessing, even from Milly, fell upon his heart like dew upon a parched field.

"Ah, if you sor Ally!" Grif continued. "If you knew her! You wouldn't wonder at me then for sayin' I'd like to die for her! Why, do you know what I've heerd her do? I've heerd her refuse to go where she'd have everything she could set her heart upon. I've heerd her refuse it because it wouldn't be right, although lots of women would think it was, and because she means to keep good if she dies for it! She'd make you good, Milly!"

Milly looked at him and laughed hysterically.

"Make me good!" she exclaimed, half-defiantly. "She couldn't, she couldn't! It's too late for that?" Then, as Grif rose to go, she said, "You won't say anything about the forged note?"

"No, Milly. Take care of poor Little Peter. If ever I can do you a good turn, I'll do it-you mind if I don't!"

He went to the bed where little Peter was sleeping. The lad was lying on his side, hot and flushed, with his lips partly open, as if thought were struggling to find expression there. Grif placed his hand tenderly upon Peter's cheek, and then went out of the house.

When he arrived at Alice's lodging he crept up the stairs, and with a settled purpose, which gave intensity to his face, opened the door. Husband and wife were standing, looking into each other's eyes. Tender words had evidently been exchanged, for they stood hand in hand, he with the dawn of a good and strong purpose upon his face, she encouraging him with hopeful, loving speech. A blanket, rolled up, gold-digger fashion, was upon the ground. Grif walked swiftly towards them and asked abruptly-

"Are you goin' away to-night?"

There was so much earnestness in his manner, that, with startled looks, they asked for his meaning.

"I can't tell you," he said, in a rapid, sharp tone; "I'm under a promise not to tell. But you must go away to-night."

"We were thinking just now, Grif," said Alice, "whether it would not be better for him to go in the morning."

"Make up your mind at once," said Grif, looking round as if he were fearful of being overheard, "that it won't do to wait here any longer. I've overheerd somethin', Ally, and I'm bound down not to tell. If you stop till to-morrow, somethin' dreadful 'll happen."

"Richard, you must go," said Alice, with gathering alarm, for Grif's impressiveness was filling her with fearful forebodings. "You must go, and at once."

"But why?" asked Richard, fretfully, and regarding Grif as if he were anything but a friend. "Why must I go? Why can't he tell what he knows? What difference will a few hours make?"

"All the difference," said Grif; "in a few hours perhaps you won't be able to go at all, unless-"

"Unless-" repeated Alice, eagerly.

"Unless it's in company with Jim Pizey and the Tenderhearted Oysterman. They've set a trap for you that you won't be able to get out of, if you refuse to join 'em. Don't ask me again to tell you what I've overheerd, for I can't I mustn't I darn't! I've run all the way here to tell you that there's more and more danger every minute you stop. It'll be all the better for you to go away in the dark."

Weak natures like Richard Handfield's are easily impressed, and more easily impressed with fear, which springs from selfishness, than with any other feeling. Almost without knowing what he was doing, Richard proceeded to sling the blanket round his shoulders. Alice's eager fingers assisted him.

"Grif is right, dearest," she said; "I'm sure he is. His looks are against him, but he is a faithful friend." Grif nodded his head, and his eyes brightened. "After all, it is but a few hours more. They would soon be past. Bless you, darling I bless you, Richard!" She kissed him again and again, and clung to him, and broke away from him, choosing rather to endure the pain springing from repressed tenderness, than do aught, in word or deed, to weaken him in his purpose.

"Yes, I will go," he said, in a decided tone, and having made up his mind, he took Alice in his arms and held her to him. While thus they clung together, she whispered, -

"Be strong and firm, Richard dear!"

"I will, dearest and best," he said, as with a passionate love-clinging he held the good and faithful woman to his breast.

"If the thought that I am true to you, darling-that I am yours in life, and afterwards-that I would share a crust with you and be happy if you were so-if that thought will strengthen and comfort you, Richard, take it with you, keep it in your mind, for, oh! it is true, my darling, it is true!"

"I know it, Alice, I know it."

"I shall bless you and pray for you every day. Until we are together again, my eyes can never close without thinking of you. See, Richard, I am not crying." She put his hand to her eyes, which were hot but tearless. "I can send you away with gladness, for it is the beginning of a better time. Though I feel that it is hard to part with you, I can say cheerfully, Go, my dear, for I know that your going is for the good of both of us. Write to me often, and tell me how and where to write to you. Good bye, good bye-Heaven bless and preserve you!"

And she broke from him, and then, meeting his eyes, a look of electric love brought them together again, and once more their arms were twined about each other's neck. Then she glided from his embrace, and sank upon the stool. Richard walked slowly out of the room, his heart filled with love and tenderness, his eyes seeking the ground. It was bitter to part. Even in the agony of separation he found time to murmur at the hardness of his lot which tore him away from the woman who was to him as a saint. As he walked down the stairs, his foot kicked against something. He stooped and picked it up. A stone heart! Indeed, Little Peter's stone heart which Grif had dropped without knowing it. Richard's nature was superstitious. The shape of the stone was comforting to him. A heart! It was a good omen. He put it carefully in his pocket, and was about to close the street door when an uncontrollable impulse urged him to look again upon Alice's face. He ran up the stairs into the room. Alice was still sitting upon the stool, her head and arms were resting upon the table; and she was convulsed with outward evidences of a grief she had no longer any motive to conceal.

He spake no word, but kneeling before her, bowed his head in her lap, as a child might have done. She looked at him through her tears, and placed her hands upon his head: in that action were blended the tenderness of a mother to her child and a wife to her husband. He raised his lips to hers; they kissed once more, solemnly, and he went out of the house with her tears upon his face. As he walked along the streets towards the country where was hidden the gold which had tempted thousands to break up happy homes and sever fond ties of affection, the picture of Alice mourning for him, and Grif quiet and sad in the background, was very vivid to his mind. No forewarning of the manner of their next meeting was upon him; if it had been, he would have taken Grif's hand, and kissed it humbly, penitently, instead of parting from him without a farewell nod.

Left alone with Alice, Grif, with a delicacy of feeling in keeping with his general character, was about to retire, when Alice, in a voice broken by emotion, said, -

"Do not go for a minute or two, Grif. I want to speak to you."

Grif gave a nod of acquiescence, and sat upon the floor, patiently.

Presently Alice dried her eyes and beckoned him to come closer to her.

"Grif," she said, in a sweet voice. "Why are you not honest?"

Now, Grif knew perfectly well the meaning of honesty-that is to say, he knew the meaning of the word literally. To be honest, one must not take what belongs to other people. Well, he was not honest; he had often taken what did not belong to him. But he was not a systematic thief; what he had stolen he had stolen from necessity. And he had never stolen anything but food, and then only when hunger sharply pressed him. The thought flew swiftly to his mind that if he had not taken food when he wanted it, he must have starved. Was that right? No, he was sure it was not. Little as he knew about it, he was sure he was not sent into the world to starve. But he must have starved if he had not taken what belonged to other people! Clearly, then, it was not wrong to steal. Grif's mind was essentially logical, as may be seen from the process of thought which occupied it directly after Alice asked him the question. And yet if he were right, Alice was wrong. Could she be wrong? Could the woman who was to him the perfection of women, the embodiment of all that was pure and noble-could she be wrong? Here came the doubt whether it would not have been the proper thing to have starved, and not stolen. "There'd have been an end of it, at all events," he muttered to himself, when his musings reached this point. After which he grew perplexed, and the logical sequence of his thoughts became entangled. He did not blame Alice for asking the question; but, for all that, he bit his lip and looked imploringly at her.