Alec, having lit a match, found the bed, table, stool, and candlestick as Elisha did in Shunem. He sat down to think. Yes, Elsie was a flirt, and had cruelly slighted him. He had done nothing to deserve such treatment. A girl who could act as she had done was not deserving of the love of any man. There was a false note in her character somewhere, and she could not be the true and gentle girl he had fondly imagined. To be warned in time was lucky, for to be tied to such a woman was not good. Better to be free than bound by a chain; and so on his thoughts ran, shooting hither and thither with the speed of summer lightning.
How long he sat thus he could not tell. An opossum called to its mate in the gum-tree that overhung the room. The "swish, swish" of a native cat came from under the floor. A koala, or native bear, roared from the clump of timber near the creek. A dingo howled on the hills, and a hawk wheeled overhead. One of these sounds made him start to his feet. The candle was burning low.
A bell rang. It was ten o'clock, the hour for "worship." He could hear McLean clearing his throat in the dining-room, which was only separated by a thin wooden partition from the "prophet's chamber." Then he heard Elsie's light step, but thought it sounded sad and slow; then came Bond's hateful creaking boots; then Maggie's quiet tread. Aggie came from the kitchen, three men from the hut, and Pat, though a Roman Catholic, came too, "to plase Miss Elsie. An' sure," he used to say, "there's no praste widdin fifty moiles to give a curse to me sowl, pinnance to me body, an' a hole in a big cheque to pay for absolution from the sin av it."
When they had all sat down McLean opened the big family Bible, apparently at random (but with intention, as he had been studying the passage) at the twelfth chapter of the Book of the Revelation. He read, with a deep, sonorous voice, to the end; then gave a long sigh, and plunged into a commentary on the "great red dragon," which he said was the Roman Catholic Church. He proved this, to his own satisfaction, seeing she had shed the blood of saints and prophets, and that the popes, cardinals, priests, and all who had the "mark of the beast" upon them, were to be thrown into the bottomless pit. He drew a gruesome picture of their writhing and torments in the true Calvinistic fashion of forty years ago.
"Holy Moses!" said Pat in a loud aside. "The saints defind us!"
Elsie nudged her father's arm, but he would not stop, for he had got on his favourite topic—the one subject on which he could be loquacious.
Pat could not sit still another moment. He glared at McLean, and made a gesture as if he would like to throttle him; then, apparently thinking better of it, jumped up, threw down his chair with a clatter, flung open the front door, and stamped up and down the verandah, vowing vengeance.
Alec had heard everything. He had forgotten his troubles. He laughed and rubbed his hands, and even capered about the room. It was all so ludicrous and absurd, and he had to let off the steam by rolling on the floor for a minute or two.
Some one knocked at the door, and he called out, "Who's there?"