‘Conolly,’ said I, ‘do you know any of Mrs Gardiner’s sisters? She has an unlimited number, I believe, for I have met a fresh one—sometimes two fresh ones—every Christmas for about half-a-dozen years, and here is still another I never heard of. She appears to be acquainted with you and this neighbourhood’——
‘O yes; that’s Cinderella,’ interrupted Conolly, as he abstracted a bundle of newspapers from our joint post-bag and began to rip the wrapping from them. ‘Haven’t you seen Cinderella? She was never out of Tasmania, I suppose, until last spring, when she was staying up here with the Macdonalds. The Macdonald girls called her Cinderella because she had always been the one to stay at home and keep house while the others went about. Her proper name is Rachel. O Jerry, Jerry!’ he broke out suddenly, laughing in what seemed to me a very offensive manner (my proper name I may mention being Gerald), ‘your sister-in-law Lizzie will be too many for you. She won’t let you escape this time. She has kept Rachel as her last card.’
‘If ever I marry a woman with such a name as that, I hope I shall be a henpecked husband for the rest of my life!’ I retorted angrily, seizing a paper-knife and beginning to tear away at the Australasian, so as to drown further conversation upon what was a very sore subject.
My brother Donald’s wife Lizzie was as good and kind a little woman as ever breathed, but like many young wives in happy circumstances, she was a matchmaker. And being impulsive, effusive, and not quite—what shall I call it? I don’t like to say she was not quite a lady, but that would suggest my meaning—she did not pursue her calling with that tact and judgment which its delicate nature required. I need not say more, except that she had a number of spinster sisters, and one only bachelor relative, who lived all by himself in single-blessedness on his own fine and thriving property, and that I was that male victim. I beg pardon of all the Misses Lindsay for using such a term; I was not a victim as far as they were concerned. But I did feel it hard that I should be laughed at wherever I went as the captive knight of half-a-dozen fair ones, when I had never had the choosing of one of them.
When I received the above letter I had just seen my last wool-bale packed on the last bullock-dray and started on its slow journey to Melbourne; and the day after I set off myself on my yearly visit to Don. He was less fortunate in respect of sheep-shearing than I, for living in an exceptionally cool district, where an exceptionally wet and wintry spring had kept everything behindhand, he had still all his troubles to come. I thought of that as I buttoned myself into my Ulster, which I was glad of that cold morning, though Christmas was only a month off; and I reflected that I should be the only unemployed man at the disposal of the household until the shearing was over, and foresaw (as I thought) the consequences. I made up my mind, however, that I would defy Lizzie’s machinations in a more systematic manner than heretofore. May I be forgiven for so priggish a determination.
It was midnight before I reached Ballarat, where Don usually met me; but upon this occasion I found a telegram stating that he was too busy to leave his farm, and would send for me next day. So I had one game of pool at the club and went to bed; and next morning enjoyed an hour or two over newly arrived English papers and periodicals, and a solitary lunch; and then the familiar old ramshackle buggy and the beautiful horses Don was famed for made their appearance, and I set off on the last stage of my journey. When I arrived at my destination it was dark and raining heavily; and the groom who opened the stable-gate told me that my brother had not long come up from the wash-place and was interviewing shearers at the hut. I was wet and muddy, so I went straight to my room without even asking for my sister-in-law, who was usually in her nursery at that hour, and proceeded to make myself respectable for dinner. Presently I heard Don about the passages (the house was ‘weather-board’ and the partitions extremely thin) asking the servants where I was; and then his head and a half-bared neck appeared in the narrow aperture between my door and the door-post.
‘Glad to see you, old boy; but I’m too dirty to come in,’ said he. ‘Seen Lizzie?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Seen Rachel?’
‘Not yet. But I say, old man, would you mind telling me how many more sisters you’ve got?’