It has been remarked that those clever people who dedicate themselves to a criminal career are prone to small oversights and inadvertent acts which often lead to their detection when success seems assured. Were it not so, such are the qualities of coolness and energy displayed by the 'irregulars' of society, that its virtuous members would have but little chance of survival in la lutte pour la vie. After the event every one is wise; surprised, too, that the criminal should not have perceived to what his heedlessness plainly led. The evil-doer himself is even genuinely astonished when, in his interval of enforced leisure, he gains the opportunity of reviewing his 'plan of campaign.' He perhaps owns to the gaol chaplain that he has been 'most imprudent.' But generally he is more concerned to establish a theory of unadulterated bad luck, and to lay the blame upon every one but himself.
Such misadventure occurred to Mr. Lawrence Trevenna—not less cautious than daring, as he had previously proved himself to be. He left home with surly abruptness, telling his ill-used wife that he was going to Monaro and might be a month or more away. She was not to expect him till she saw him, and so on. A large draft of horses to take delivery of, etc.
To these considerate explanations the woman made answer that he need not trouble himself to hurry back on her account—indeed, if he never came back she would be all the better pleased. He might spare himself the trouble of telling more lies than usual, as whatever he did say about his business would make her believe something different.
'It would serve you right, you jade, if I never did come back,' he ground out between his teeth, mingling the words with a savage oath. 'I may take you at your word yet.'
'Do so,' she replied, 'and I'll go down on my knees and thank God for it. As He is my judge, if it wasn't for the child, you'd never have seen me here a day after you struck me first. Don't think I've left off cursing the day I ever set eyes on you—coward and thief—and worse that you are!'
He looked at her for one moment as she spoke, his eyes so full of murderous rage that a bystander would have thought to see him strike her to the earth. But putting strong constraint on himself, as, with a more than malevolent smile, he bade her go back to the hut and mind her baby,—'you're my wife now—for better, for worse, you know,' he sneered. 'Stay at home and mind the house while your husband's away.'
The last part of this admonition was lost upon the person to whom it was addressed, as with one fierce glance, expressive of the last extremity of hatred and contempt, the woman passed into the hut and slammed the heavy door, while her lord and master, whistling carelessly, pressed his horse's side and moved rapidly away.
In apparent pursuance of his proposed plan, Trevenna rode for a dozen miles down the Monaro road, then, wheeling suddenly to the eastward, struck across the bush until he picked up the track which led to Mount Gibbo. There he met by appointment Mr. Caleb Coke, and was thus enabled to arrange certain illegal enterprises upon which they had resolved to embark.
For the first few days after his departure Kate felt little else but an all-pervading sense of relief, almost amounting to absolute pleasure. Lonely and depressing as was her isolated life, miles away from any neighbour; left for weeks at a time without a soul to speak to,—as she would have expressed it,—she still had her homely and simple avocations, amid which, like many a similarly situated bush matron, she found sufficient daily occupation.
She had her baby boy,—a fine sturdy year-old fellow,—her poultry, milch cows, and small patch of garden, to all of which she addressed herself in turn. By degrees a softened expression came over her face. The hard lines died out for a little space. It may have been that she even repented of the bitter words and angry mood which had of late become habitual with her. And when in the sunset-time she caught her roan mare and rode around the paddock for the cows, carrying the laughing baby boy before her on the saddle, there was a wondrous transformation of the sullen-browed shrew of the morning.