“He told me,” continued Mr. Giles, “and I will just cut what he said as short as I can, that he was a wealthy man and a bachelor; that his agents in Sydney had told him Murdaro station would probably be in the market before long; also that he had discovered that the lady to whom he had once been engaged in England had married me, the proprietor of Murdaro, and was dead. He had come up to see the place, as it was interesting to him. Well, the doctor went into a rapture over Glory,—who’s neat enough, I believe, but wasn’t a patch on little Georgie. ‘She’s like your late missus,’ he said; and then before I knew it he offered me money on loan without interest, enough to put me on my feet again.”
“It was he that gave Glory her money, then?” asks Miss Mundella, showing for the first time her interest in her uncle’s narrative.
“Yes, he did all that he did do in a real gentlemanly way, I’ll say that for him,” returned Mr. Giles, lighting one of two green-leaf cigars that Johnnie, the Chinese gardener, presents to his boss about this time every day. “Whilst I’m on the subject I may as well tell you that I find Dyesart’s death doesn’t affect Glory’s money; I’ve got a satisfactory letter from my Brisbane lawyers about that.
“Now I have told you pretty well all, Lileth. Is there anything else you’d like to know?”
“Well, yes, uncle; first, how are you situated as regards funds—money matters—now? I should like to know particularly before I ask any more questions.” As she ceases speaking Miss Mundella cannot help glancing scornfully at her relative, for she sees he is afraid to ask her advice, although his object in opening up the conversation was to do this. But her look changes as the thought enters her brain, “Is this story of the money the real and sole reason of his anxiety?”
“Well, I’m tight pressed,” replies Mr. Giles, looking nervously at his niece; “that confounded spec. of mine on the MacArthur River was a stiffener for me, and for better men than me too.”
“You could not refund the money lent you by Dyesart if his executors,”—the young lady watches her uncle as she speaks, and sees that gentleman’s rather washy eyes open a little bit wider and become fixed, a sign that expresses in his physiognomy what turning pale would in most other men,—“could you refund this money if his executors were to press you to do so?”
“Jupiter! No!” gasps Mr. Giles, without an apology for the oath. Indeed, neither notice it in their interest in the matter in hand.
“What would you have to do if you were forced to repay this £20,000, say, to his nephew Angland?”
“I’d have to sell every beast on the run,” gasps Mr. Giles, his eyes protruding more than ever, “and I’d have to sell my own carcase into the bargain,” he adds, coarsely.