Babes in the Bush

‘Mr. Churbett, introduce me at once. I am afraid you are all very tired. Come in this moment, my dear girls, and rest yourselves; we must have no talking or excitement until dinner-time. Mr. Effingham, I count upon you; Mr. Rockley charged me to tell you that he had asked Mr. Sternworth to meet you. Mr. Churbett, of course you are to come, and bring the two young gentlemen. Perhaps we might have a little dance, who knows? You can go now. Mr. Rockley had rooms and loose boxes kept for you at the Budgeree, or you wouldn’t have had a hole to put your head in; what do you think of that?’

Mr. Churbett, much affected by his narrow escape of arriving in Yass and finding every room and stall appropriated, with no more chance of a lodging than there is in Doncaster on the Leger day, moved on, leading Fergus, and murmuring something about Rockley being a minor Providence, and Mrs. Rockley all their mothers and aunts rolled into one. He recovered his spirits, however, as was his wont, and caracolled ahead on Duellist, leading the way into a large stable-yard, around which were open stalls and loose boxes, apparently calculated for the accommodation of a cavalry regiment.

‘This is the Budgeree Hotel, and a very fair caravanserai it is. Jim, look alive and take off the tandem leader. Joe, I want a box for Duellist. Bowcher, this is Captain Effingham of Warbrok, and these young gentlemen his sons; did Mr. Rockley order rooms for them and me?’

‘Mr. Rockley, sir. Yes, sir. He come down last week on purpose to see if I’d kep’ rooms for Mr. Argyll and Mr. Hamilton, as the place was that full, and like to be fuller; and then he asked if your rooms was took, and the Captin’s and two young gents’, and when I said they wasn’t, he went on terrible, as it was just like you, and ordered ’em all right off, besides four stalls and a box.’

‘Ah, well, it’s all right, Bowcher. Mr. Rockley knows my ways. I wonder you hadn’t sense enough to keep rooms for me and my friends, as I told you I was coming. Town very full?’

‘Never see anythink like it, sir. Horses coming from all directions, and gents from Hadelaide, I should say. Least-ways, from all the outside places. They’re that full at the Star, as they have had to put half the horses in the yard, and rig up stalls timpry like.’

‘Ha! that’s all very well; but don’t try that with Black Prince or these ladies’ horses, or they’ll kick one another sky high.’

While this conversation was proceeding, Mr. Effingham and his sons had been ushered upstairs, where, at the extreme end of a long corridor, the Captain was provided with a reasonable bedroom, enjoying a view of the town and surrounding country. Wilfred and Guy had to content themselves with a smaller double-bedded apartment, the waiter apologising, as everything, to the attics, was crammed full, and visitors hourly, like crowds at the theatre, turned away from the doors. Slight inconveniences are not dwelt upon in the ‘brave days when we were twenty-one.’ So they cast their modest wardrobes on the beds, and tried to realise the situation.

This was a marked divergence from the circumstances of their mode of life for the past year. It appeared that every room on both sides of the corridor was tenanted by at least one person of an emotional and vociferous nature.

Boots were carried to the staircase and hurled violently down, accompanied by objurgations. Friendly, even confidential, conversations were carried on by inmates of contiguous apartments. Inquiries were made and answered as to who were going to dine at Rockley’s or Bower’s; and one gentleman, who had come in late, publicly tossed up as to which place he should go uninvited, deciding by that ancient test in favour of a certain Mr. Bower, apparently of expansive hospitality.

In addition to the dinner-chart, much information was afforded to such of the general public as had ears, as to the state and prospects of the horses interested in the coming events. Senator had a cough; and there were rumours about the favourite for the Leger. St. Maur and the Gambiers had come in, and brought a steeplechaser, which Alec was to ride, which would make Bob Clarke’s Cid go down points in the betting. Mrs. Mortimer had arrived and those pretty girls from Bunnerong. The fair one would be the belle of the ball. ‘No!’ (in three places) was shouted out, ‘Christabel Rockley was worth a dozen of her,’ and so on. Mr. Effingham began to consider what his position would be if he should have to listen to a discussion upon the merits of his daughters. This complication happily did not arise, the tide of mirthful talk flowing into other congenial channels.

It must be confessed that if the company had been charged for the noise they made, the bill would have been considerable. But after all, the speakers were gentlemen, and their unfettered speech and joyous abandon only reminded Effingham of certain old barrack days, when the untrammelled spirit of youth soared exultingly free, unheeding of the shadow of debt or the prison bars of poverty.

In due time the splashing, the dressing, and the jesting were nearly brought to an end. Leaving Fred Churbett to follow with Guy, Mr. Effingham and his heir departed to Rockley House.

‘There is something exhilarating, after all, in dressing for dinner,’ said he. ‘After the day is done it is befitting to mingle with pleasant people and drink your wine in good society. It reminds one of old times. My blood is stirred, and my pulses move as they have not done since I left England. Change is the great physician, beyond all doubt.’

‘I did not think that I should have cared half as much about these races,’ said Wilfred. ‘I had doubts about coming at all, and really I don’t think I should have done so but for the girls and my mother. It is sure to do them good. But after all, Dick and Tom, not to speak of Andrew, are equal to more than the work they have to do at present, and I suppose one need not be always in sight of one’s men.’

Rockley Lodge was profusely lighted. From the murmur of voices and rustle of dresses there appeared to be a large number of persons collected in the drawing-room, redolent of welcome as it ever was.

As they entered the house a voice was heard, saying, in tones not particularly modulated, ‘Order in dinner; I won’t wait another moment for any man in Australia.’

Effingham recognised his late visitor in the speaker, who, arrayed in correct evening costume, immediately greeted him with much deference, mingled with that degree of welcome usually accorded to a distinguished, long-absent relative.

‘My dear Captain Effingham, I am proud to see you. So you’ve found your way to Yass at last. Hope to see you here often. St. Maur, let me make you known to Captain Effingham. I heard him mention having met your brother in India. Bob Clarke; where’s Bob Clarke? Oh, here he is. You’ll know one another better before the races are over. Christabel, come here; what are you going away for? Mr. Wilfred Effingham you know, Mr. Guy you never saw; capital partners you’ll find them, I daresay. Is the dinner coming in, or is it not? [this with a sudden change of voice]. Mr. Churbett not come? Wait for Fred Churbett, the most unpunctual man in New South Wales! I’ll see him – ’

Fortunately for Mr. Rockley’s ante-dinner eloquence the necessity for finishing this sentence was obviated by the appearance of the butler, who announced dinner, after which Mr. Rockley, saying, ‘Captain Effingham, will you take in Mrs. Rockley? I see your friend Sternworth has just made his way in with Fred Churbett; it’s well for them they weren’t ten minutes later,’ offered his arm to Mrs. Effingham, and led the way with much dignity.

The room was large, and the table, handsomely laid and decorated, looked as if it was in the habit of being furnished for a liberal guest list. There could not have been less than thirty people present, exclusive of the six members of Mr. Rockley’s own family. Their friends Hamilton and Argyll were there, as also Mr. St. Maur, a tall, aristocratic-looking personage from the far north; Mr. Clarke, a pleasant-faced, frank youngster, whom everybody called Bob; Mr. and Mrs. Robert Malahyde, and other prepossessing-looking strangers, male and female; and lastly, their old friend Harley Sternworth.

What warmth, friendliness, cordiality, pervaded the entertainment! All apparently felt and talked like near relations, between whom had never arisen a question of property or precedence.

Mrs. Rockley, her daughter, and nieces were lively and unaffected, and beyond all comparison considerately hospitable. Rosamond and her sisters, dressed, for the first time since their arrival, in accordance with the laws of fashion as then promulgated, looked, to the eyes of their fond parents and brothers, as though endowed with fresh beauty and a distinction of air hitherto unmarked.

The dinner was in all respects a success – well served, well cooked; and as Mr. Rockley was severe as to his taste in wines, that department fully satisfied a fastidious critic, as was Howard Effingham. Messrs. Churbett, Argyll, and Hamilton, as habitués, had numberless jokes and pleasantries in common with the young ladies, which served to elicit laughter and general merriment; while Hampden, St. Maur, the parson, and Mr. Rockley in turn diverged into political argument, in which their host was exceptionally strong.

When they entered the drawing-room, to which Fred Churbett, Bob Clarke, and others of the jeunesse dorée, who cared little for port or politics, had retreated in pursuance of a hint from Mrs. Rockley, they were surprised to find that spacious apartment wholly denuded of its carpet and partially of its furniture. There was but little time to express the feeling, as a young lady seated at the piano struck up a waltz of the most intoxicating character, and before Mr. Rockley had time to get fairly into another argument with the parson, the room was glorified with the rush of fluttering garments, and the joyous inspiration of youthful sentiment.

Everybody seemed to like dancing, and no more congenial home for the graces Terpsichorean than Rockley Lodge could possibly be found. The host, who was not a dancing man, smoked tranquilly in the verandah, much as if the entertainment were in a manner got up for his benefit, and had to be gone through with, while he from time to time debated the question of State endowments with Sternworth, or that of non-resident grants from the Crown with John Hampden, who was characteristically inflexible but nonaggressive.

What with their neighbours Argyll and Hamilton, Ardmillan, Forbes, and Neil Barrington, the ever-faithful Fred Churbett, and divers newly-formed acquaintances who had arrived during the evening, the Miss Effinghams found so many partners that they scarcely sat down at all. Mr. St. Maur, too, perhaps the handsomest man of the party, singled out Beatrice and devoted himself to her for the greater part of the evening. During the lulls, music was suggested by Mrs. Rockley, who was ever at hand to prevent the slightest contretemps during the evening. Rosamond and Beatrice were invited to play, and finally Annabel and Beatrice to sing.

Beatrice was one of the most finished performers upon the pianoforte that one could fall across, outside professional circles; many of them even might have envied her light, free, instinctively true touch, her perfect time, her astonishing execution. Her voice was a well-trained contralto. When she sang a world-famed duet with Annabel, and the liquid notes – clear, fresh, delicately pure as those of the mounting skylark – rose in Annabel’s wondrous soprano, every one was taken by storm, and a perfect chorus of admiration assured the singers that no such performance had been heard in the neighbourhood since a time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.

It must not be supposed that Wilfred Effingham permitted much time to elapse before he took measures which resulted in an improvement of his recent acquaintance with Miss Christabel Rockley. He had seen many girls of high claim to beauty in many differing regions of the old world. He had walked down Sackville Street, and sauntered through the great Plaza of Madrid, bought gloves in Limerick, and lace in the Strada Reale; but it instantly occurred to him that in all his varied experiences he had never set eyes upon so wondrously lovely a creature as Christabel Rockley. Her complexion, not merely delicate, was wild-rose tinted upon ivory; her large, deep-fringed eyes, dark, melting, wondering as they opened slowly, with the half-conscious surprise of a startled child, reminded him of nothing so much as of the captured gazelle of the desert; her delicate, oval face, perfect as a cameo; her wondrous sylph-like figure, which swayed and glided in the dance like a forest nymph in classic Arcady; her rosebud mouth, pearly teeth, her childish pout smiling o’er gems – pearls, if not diamonds; how should these angel-growth perfections have ripened in this obscure outpost of Britain’s possessions? He was startled as by a vision, amazed. He would have been hopelessly subjugated there and then had he not been at that time such a philosophical young person.

Lovely as was the girl, calculated as were her unstudied graces and matchless charms to enthral the senses and drag the very heart from out of any description of man less congenial than a snow-drift, Wilfred Effingham escaped for the present whole and unharmed.

At the same time he enjoyed thoroughly the gay tone and joyous feelings which characterised the whole society, and insensibly caught, in spite of his ever-present feeling of responsibility, the contagion of free and careless mirth.

Dance succeeded dance, the quick yet pleasantly graduated growth of friendly intimacy arose under the congenial conditions of gaiety unrestrained and mingled merriment, till, soon after midnight, the joyous groups broke up.

Mr. Rockley suddenly intimated that, as they would have a long day at the races next day, and the ladies would need all their rest after the journey some of them had made, to withstand the necessary fatigues, he thought it would be reasonable, yes, he would say he thought it would occur to any one who was not utterly demented and childishly incapable of forethought, that it was time to go to bed.

This deliverance decided the lingering revellers; adieus were made with much reference to ‘au revoir,’ one of those comprehensive phrases into which our Gallic friends contrive to collect several meanings and diverse sentiments.

At the Budgeree Hotel a desultory conversation was kept up for another hour between such choice spirits who stood in need of the ultimate refreshment of a glass of grog and a quiet pipe; but the wonders and experiences of the day had so taxed the energies of Mr. Effingham and his sons that the latter fell asleep before Fred Churbett had time to offer six to four on St. Andrew for the steeplechase, or Hamilton to qualify young Beanstalk’s rapturous declaration that Christabel Rockley looked like a real thorough-bred angel, and that there wasn’t a girl from here to Sydney fit to hold a candle to her.

CHAPTER XI

MR. BOB CLARKE SCHOOLS KING OF THE VALLEY

The eventful day at length arrived. How many hundreds would have been disappointed if it had rained! From the sporting squatters, who looked out of window to see if the weather was favourable for Harlequin or Vivandière, to the farmer’s son, busy at sunrise grooming his unaccustomed steed, and pulling the superfluous hair from that grass-fed charger’s mane and tail, while his sister or cousin danced with joy, even before she donned the wide straw hat and alpaca skirt, with the favourably disposed bow of pink or blue ribbon, in which to be beautiful for the day.

And what more innocent pleasure? So very seldom comes it in the long months of inland farming life, that no moralist need grudge it to his fellow-creatures for whom fate has not provided the proverbial silver spoon. That brown-cheeked youngster believes that his bay Camerton colt, broken in by himself, will make a sensation on the course; perhaps pull off a ten-pound sweep in the Hurry-scurry Hack-race (post entry), and he looks forward with eager anticipation to the running for the Town Plate and the steeplechase. Besides, he has not been in town since he took in the last load of wheat. It is slow at home sometimes, though there is plenty of work to do; and he has not seen a new face or heard a new voice since he doesn’t know when.

In sister Jane’s heart, whose cheek owns a deeper glow this morning, what unaccustomed thoughts are contending for the mastery.

‘Will it not be a grand meeting, with ever so many more people there than last year? And the gentlefolks and the young ladies, she does like so to see how they dress and how they look. It is worth a dozen fashion books. Such fun, too, is a sweeping gallop round the course, and to feel the breeze blow back her hair. Everything looks splendid, and the lunch in the pavilion is grand, and every one so polite. Besides, there is Ben Anderson that she knows “just to speak to”; she saw him at a school feast last year, and he is certainly very nice looking; he said he would be sure to be at the Yass races. She wonders whether he will be there; nobody wants him, of course, if he likes to stay away – but still he might come; his father has a farm away to the westward.’

So the rhythm of human life, hope or fear, love or doubt, curiosity or sympathy, chimes on, the same and invariable in every land, in every age.

Thanks to the occasionally too fine climate of Australia, ‘the morning rose, a lovely sight,’ and if the sun flashed not ‘down on armour bright,’ he lit up a truly animated scene. Grooms, who long before day had fed and watered their precious charges, were now putting on the final polish, as if the fate of Europe depended upon the delicate limbs and satin-covered muscles. Owners, backers, jockeys, gentlemen riders, all these were collecting or volunteering information; while the ordinary business of the town – commercial, civil, or administrative – was suffered to drift, as being comparatively unimportant.

At an hour not far from nine o’clock the guests under the hospitable roof of the Budgeree Hotel were assembled at the breakfast-table. What a meal! What a feast for the gods was that noble refection! What joyous anticipation of pleasure was on all sides indulged in! What mirthful conversation, unchecked, unceasing! There had been, it would seem, a dinner and a small party at Horace Bower’s, and, strange to say, every one had there enjoyed themselves much after the same fashion as at Rockley’s. Bower had been in great form – was really the cleverest, the most amusing fellow in the world. Mrs. Bower was awfully handsome, and her sister, just arrived from Sydney, was a regular stunner, would cut down all before her. Mrs. Snowden had been there too – smartest woman in the district; seen society everywhere – and so on.

A race day owns no tremendous possibilities, yet is there a savour of strife and doom mingled with the mimic warfare. Many a backer knows that serious issues hang upon the favourite’s speed and stamina; on even less, on chance or accident. The steeplechase rider risks life and limb; it may be that ‘darkness shall cover his eyes,’ that from a crushing fall he may rise no more.

These entanglements weighed not in any wise upon the soul of Wilfred Effingham, as he arose with a keener sense of interest and pleasure in expectation than had for long greeted his morning visions. His responsibilities for the day were bounded by his vehicle and horses, so that his family should be safely conveyed to and from the course. Mrs. Effingham had at first thought of remaining quietly in the house, but was reassured by being told that the course was a roomy park, that the view of the performances was complete, that the carriages and the aristocracy generally would be provided with a place apart, where no annoyance was possible; that the country people were invariably well-behaved; and that if she did not go, her daughters would not enjoy themselves, and indeed thought of remaining away likewise. This last argument decided the unselfish matron, and in due time the horses were harnessed, the side-saddles put in requisition, and after a decent interval Black Prince was caracolling away in the lead of the dogcart, and Fergus exhibiting his paces among a gay troop of equestrians, which took the unused, but all the pleasanter, road to the racecourse.

At this arena it was seen that the stewards had been worthy of the confidence reposed in them. A portion of the centre of the course had been set apart for the exclusive use of the carriages and their occupants. Not that there was any prohibition of humbler persons; but, with instinctive propriety, they had apparently agreed to mass themselves upon a slight eminence, which, behind the Grand Stand, a roomy weather-board edifice, afforded a full view of the proceedings.

In the centre enclosure were shady trees and a sward of untrampled grass, which answered admirably for an encampment of the various vehicles, with a view to ulterior lunching and general refreshment combinations at a later period of the day.

Here all could be seen that was necessary of the actual racing, while space was afforded for pleasant canters and drives between the events, round the inner circle of the course; and indeed in any direction which might suit the mirth-inspired members of the party. The view, too, Mrs. Effingham thought, as she sat in Mrs. Rockley’s phaeton, in which a seat of honour had been provided for her, was well worth a little exertion. The park-like woodlands surrounded three sides of the little amphitheatre, with a distant dark blue range amid the dusk green forest tints; while on the south lay a great rolling prairie, where the eye roved unfettered as if across the main to the far unknown of the sky-line. Across this glorious waste the breeze, at times, blew freshly and keen; it required but little imagination on the part of the gazers to shadow forth the vast unbroken grandeur, the rippling foam, the distant fairy isles of the eternal sea.

Without more than the invariable delay, after twelve o’clock, at which hour it had of course been advertised in the Yass Courier of the period that the first race would punctually commence, and after sharp remonstrance from Mr. Rockley, who declared that if he had a horse in the race he would start him, claim the stakes, and enter an action against the stewards for the amount, a start was effected for the St. Leger. This important event brought six to the post, all well bred and well ridden. Wilfred thought them a curiously exact reproduction of the same class of horses in England.

His reflections on the subject were cut short by a roar from the assemblage as the leading horses came up the straight in a close and desperate finish. ‘Red Deer – Bungarree —no! Red Deer!’ were shouted, as Hamilton’s chestnut and a handsome bay colt alternately seemed to have secured an undoubted lead. The final clamour resolved itself into the sound of ‘Red Deer! Red Deer!!’ as that gallant animal, answering to the last desperate effort of his rider, landed the race by ‘a short head.’ Hamilton’s early rising and months of sedulous training had told. It was a triumph of condition.

Much congratulation and hand-shaking ensued upon this, and Wilfred commenced to feel the uprising of the partisan spirit, which is never far absent from trials of strength or skill. He had more than once flushed at disparaging observations touching the studs in his immediate neighbourhood, at gratuitous assertions that the Benmohr horses were not to be spoken of in the same day as So-and-so’s whatsyname of the west, or another proprietor’s breed in the north, and so on. Now here was a complete answer to all such, as well as a justification of his own opinion. He had determined not to risk a pound in the way of betting, holding the practice inexpedient at the present time. But the thought did cross his brain that if he had taken the odds more than once pressed upon him, he might have paid his week’s expenses as well as confuted the detractors of the Benmohr stud. This deduction, ex post facto, he regarded as one of the wiles of the enemy, and scorned accordingly.

He found the party more disposed to take a canter, after the enforced quietude of the last hour, than to remain stationary, so possessing himself of Guy’s hack, whom he placed temporarily in charge of the dogcart, taking off the leader as a precautionary measure, he rode forth among the gay company for a stretching canter round the course, which occasionally freshened into a hand-gallop, as the roll of hoofs excited the well-conditioned horses.