But the very next day he had taken an office in town and sent a man to paint ‘Laurence Armitage, Solicitor,’ in white letters on the door.
All her entreaties now would not keep him at home a day, he caught the business train at eight o’clock in the morning and the evening one home at five.
He was like everyone else’s husband at last, and the garden of Eden had become merely a cottage with a piece of ground attached.
But oh, such long, long days they were to both of them at first.
Larrie, of course, had really nothing to do for weeks and weeks. He used to sit on his uncomfortable cane chair, put his long legs on [p 62] ]the window-sill and smoke and think half the day. Or he would pin a ‘Back in ten minutes’ notice on his door and stroll aimlessly about town or drop into the offices of other men he knew, and envy them their busy air of occupation.
Dot had never thought so many hours went to the day before.
Baby slept a great deal, and just beginning to teethe, was cross and less companionable than usual. The household tasks that she took upon herself now did not last long, and the little mother did so much sewing for everyone in the cottage that there was really nothing left for Dot to do, but put on occasional buttons and tapes. She resolved to let her voice fill up the blank in her life, it was her one great gift, and she determined she would cultivate it assiduously and then—but she had not yet quite decided what difference the ‘then’ would make.
The Red Road Country had a little plain church at the top of one of its hills, and Dot led the singing as a matter of course.
[p 63]
]Sometimes she took long solo parts in the anthems, and then the ugly barn-like place of worship seemed full of glory. Several times people had come all the way from the shore just to hear the clear, sweet, joyous voice of that one little person in the front row. She had been asked more than once to join the choir of different big churches in Sydney, but there was no train service at all on Sunday for the line, and Larrie naturally refused to have an empty house the greater part of the day just because his wife had a voice. Choir practices were on Wednesday afternoons, and Dot attended regularly now; for one thing they helped to pass the time, for another she had a genuine desire to have the singing each Sunday as good as possible, and knew her presence stimulated the other members.
The Red Road Country is growing famous for its healthiness. People with land to sell in the district and the few boarding-house keepers, advertise it as ‘The Sanatorium of New South Wales.’ Doctors are beginning to send their patients there occasionally, instead [p 64] ]of to the Blue Mountains, and the pure, gum-tree