Possum

Cover art
'POSSUM
MARY GRANT BRUCE
Author of Glen Eyre, Mates at Billabong, Norah of Billabong, Jim and Wally, etc., etc.
WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO
To My Mother
CONTENTS
'POSSUM
CHAPTER I
THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL
The trim suburban garden blazed with flowers. Over the porch at the gate mandevillea hung in a curtain of fragrant white, and an archway over the path that wound through the close-shaven lawn was a miracle of Fortune's yellow roses—gold and rose and copper blended gloriously. There were beds aflame with bonfire salvia, and others gay with many-hued annuals. Gaudy tulips reared splendid heads near a great clump of arum lilies that fringed a tiny pool where little Garth Macleod's solitary goldfish swam in lonely state. Everywhere there were roses; in standards in the smooth, well-kept beds, or trained along the wide verandas, forming a screen of exquisite blossom. Their sweetness lay like a charm over the garden.
It was a hot spring afternoon. Tom Macleod, digging busily in a corner, pushed his Panama back from his flushed face, and stood erect for a moment to ease his aching back. As he did so a motor whirred to the gate, stopped, and a stout little man hurried up the path, waving a capable hand towards the shirt-sleeved worker across the lawn.