The small house at Wilgandra seemed going along very steadily; Mr. Cameron had not once failed to furnish the reports due from him to the Government. The lady-help selected by the mother had the house and the children and the father in a state of immaculate order. She was a magnificently capable, managing woman; every one, Mr. Cameron especially, stood much in awe of her, and unquestioningly obeyed her smallest mandate; even Roly, unbidden, performed magnificent ablutions before he presented himself for a meal, and Hermie was often to be seen surreptitiously trying to mend her own pinafores in the paddock.
Mrs. Cameron could not but confess her place was not crying out for her to the extent she had imagined; indeed, the wonderful lady-help, Miss Macintosh, seemed to have brought the home into a far better state of order and discipline than even she, the mother, had been able to do. Little Floss was a healthy and most independent babe of two; Roly, three years old, was a sturdy mannikin who stared at her stolidly when, her heart full of tears, she stooped over him and asked, did he want her to go away again?
'Mamma mustn't go away in a big ship, must she, sweetheart? You can't do without her again, can you?' she said.
But Roly was a sea-serpent swimming on the dining-room floor, and the interruption irritated him.
'Yes,' he assented, with swift cheerfulness, 'mamma go in big ship. Good-bye, good-bye!'—and he waved an impatient hand to get rid of her.
Hermie and Bartie had just started to a good private school near at hand, and the teaching—all honour to the mistress!—was of so skilful and delightful a nature that the two could hardly summon patience to wait for breakfast ere they set out for the happy place. So Challis's claims tugged hard.
'But you—what of you, my husband?' she said. 'You cannot spare me; it is absurd for you to even think of it!'
But he was excited and greatly moved at the thought of his child's genius. Deep down, in his heart was the knowledge that had he himself been given a chance he could have made a name for himself in this world. But there was always uncongenial work for him, always something else to be done, 'never the time and the place and the loved one all together.'
'Let us give her her chance,' he said. 'It is early morning with her. Don't let ours be the hands to block her, so that when evening comes she can only stand wistful.'
So they sailed away, the mother and the wonder-child; behind them the plain little home, before, the Palaces of Music.