Australian Lassie Read online

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  "Seated on a partly submerged post ... was John Brown."]

  AN AUSTRALIAN LASSIE

  BY

  LILIAN TURNER

  AUTHOR OF "THE PERRY GIRLS," ETC.

  ILLUSTRATIONS BY A. J. JOHNSON

  WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED LONDON AND MELBOURNE

  TO MY STEPFATHER CHARLES COPE

  CONTENTS

  CHAP. PAGE

  I WYGATE SCHOOL 9

  II THE PEARL SEEKERS 20

  III "THE DAILY ROUND--THE COMMON TASK" 30

  IV GHOSTS 41

  V JOHN BROWN 59

  VI MONDAY MORNING 68

  VII "CAREW-BROWN" 79

  VIII THE FIGHT 86

  IX DOROTHEA'S FRIENDS 101

  X RICHES OR RAGS 112

  XI THE ARTIST BY THE WAYSIDE 123

  XII BETTY IN THE LION'S DEN 134

  XIII "IF I WERE ONLY YOU!" 147

  XIV JOHN'S PLANS 162

  XV ON THE ROAD 177

  XVI THE NOTE ON THE PINCUSHION 189

  XVII IN THE CITY 201

  XVIII ALMA'S SHILLING 214

  XIX THE BENT-SHOULDERED OLD GENTLEMAN 224

  XX THE DAY AFTER SCHOOL 234

  XXI "GOOD-BYE, GOOD-BYE" 245

  CHAPTER I

  WYGATE SCHOOL

  "Emily Underwood, 19; Stanley Smith, 20; Cyril Bruce, 21; NellieUnderwood, 22; Elizabeth Bruce, 23--bottom of the class!"

  Mr. Sharman took off his eyeglasses, rubbed them, and put them on again.Then he looked very hard at the little girl at the end of the furthestform, who was hanging her head and industriously biting a slate pencil.

  "Stand up, Elizabeth Bruce. Put down your pencil and fold your handsbehind you."

  Elizabeth did as she was told instantly. Her rosy face looked anxiouslyinto the master's stern one.

  "Yesterday morning," the master said, "you were head of the class. Thismorning I find your name at the end of the list. How was that?"

  Elizabeth hung her head again, and her dimpled chin hid itself behindthe needlework of her pinafore.

  A small girl, a few seats higher, held up her hand and waved itimpatiently.

  "Well?" asked the master.

  "Please sir, she was promptin' Cyril Bruce."

  "Silence!" thundered the master sternly. Then his gaze went back to thebent head of the little culprit.

  "Stand upon the form," he said, "and tell me in a clear voice how it isyou went down twenty-two places in one afternoon."

  The rosiness left the little girl's face. She raised her head, and herbrown eyes looked pleadingly into the master's, her white face besoughthim, for one second. Then she scrambled up to the form by the aid of thedesk in front of her.

  Down the room near the master's desk stood a new boy, an awkward lookingfigure of twelve years old or so, waiting to be given a place in theclass. Elizabeth knew that her disgrace was meant as a solemn warning tohim. So she tossed back the short dark curls that hardly reached herneck, and looking angrily at him, said--

  "I was top and I pulled Nelly Martin's hair, and was sent down three.Then I was fourth, and my pencil squeaked my slate and I was sent downsix. Then Cyril had to spell 'giraffe,' and I said 'one r and two f's,'and she sent me to the bottom."

  All of this speech was directed to the new boy who stood on one leg andgrew red. It was an immense relief to him when the master rapped thefront desk with his cane and said--

  "Look at me, miss. Whom do you mean by 'she'?"

  At the end of the room a sharp visaged lady of forty-five was watchingthe proceedings of the first class from over the heads of a row of smallstudents who comprised the "Babies' Class."

  "D-o, do; g-o, go," she said mechanically, and looked anxiously fromlittle Elizabeth to her stern son, the master of Wygate School.

  Elizabeth jerked her head, "Mrs. Sharman," she said.

  "Sit down and fold your hands behind you," ordered the master. Heturned to the new boy. "John Brown," he said, "go and take your seatnext to Elizabeth Bruce--but one above her."

  The new boy moved across the room, red-faced and clumsy in everymovement. When he found himself in front of the class he grew stillredder, and hung hesitatingly upon the step that led to the platformupon which the form was placed.

  Elizabeth looked at him disdainfully and drew her dress close aroundher.

  "Sit down, you silly," she said in a sharp whisper, and indicated with alittle head toss the seat above her.

  John Brown slunk past her and dropped heavily into his seat. The masterretired to his desk and made an entry or two in his long blue book whilesilence hung over the schoolroom.

  In Elizabeth's heart a flame of anger was spreading. That this boy, thisnew boy, should be placed above her, was in her eyes the greatestinjustice. A small voice within told her that she had been punishedsufficiently yesterday afternoon.

  Her head moved slightly in the direction of the new boy and her rosylips opened.

  "You cheat!" she whispered.

  The boy sat motionless and the anger burned hotter in Elizabeth's heart.

  "Cheaty, cheaty; go home and tell your mother!" she said in a sing-songway.

  Still Brown did not move.

  Elizabeth slid her hand along the seat and gave him a sharp pinch, andhe started uneasily.

  "Stand up the boy or girl who was speaking," ordered the master, withoutlooking up.

  A small fair-haired fair-complexioned boy, two seats above Elizabeth,flushed. His name was Cyril Bruce and he was Elizabeth's twinbrother--twelve years old.

  "I was only talking to myself--that's not speaking," he murmured.

  Elizabeth rose slowly to her feet and stood working a corner of herpinafore into a knot. The master looked around, and his brow grew darkwhen he saw the small offender.

  "Repeat aloud what you said, Elizabeth Bruce," he ordered.

  The little girl grew white, then red, then white again, and went ontwisting her pinafore.

  "Do you hear me?" shouted the master. "Stand upon the form and repeatyour words."

  Once again Elizabeth clambered into a higher position.

  "I said--I said, 'Cheaty, cheaty; go home and tell your mother,'" shesaid in a clear voice that sounded all over the room.

  A shocked expression passed over the face of the class.

  "To whom were you addressing yourself?" asked the master.

  "The new boy," said the little girl.

  "Sit down, and stay in the dinner-hour and write out the sentence fiftytimes."

  Elizabeth sat down, and again her anger against the new boy blazed high.

  She put out her foot and kicked the heel of his boot, but this time sheeschewed words, for the face of the master was towards her, and anexpectant silence hung over the schoolroom.

  The clock struck ten, and the boy at the head of the class immediatelybegan passing slates down--one to each pupil, with a piece of pencilupon it.

  The sight of the well-cleaned slate and nicely pointed pencil brought afeeling of great uneasiness to Elizabeth.

  It had been in h
er mind how nicely she could climb above the new boy,and the tell-tale girl, and all the other boys and girls, and now theorder of the day was--sums.

  The master was writing them down on the blackboard, making them up as hewent along, with due care working nines and eights and sevens into hismultiplicand and dealing but sparsely with fives and twos and threes.

  Elizabeth copied it down and rubbed it out. Copied it down and rubbedout half, by judicious breathings directed judiciously; looked up theclass to see how Cyril was progressing, and back to the board to see ifa pleasant little short division sum was lurking near this obnoxiousmultiplication; then back to her slate to count the number of ninesonce more. And by that time the master was giving out his order:"Pencils down. Hands behind you. _At--tention._"

  Brown's face expressed such placidity that the master asked him to standand give out the answer, and he gave it gladly enough--999.009--whichsounded particularly learned to a class not yet introduced to decimals.

  The master nodded. "You are right," he said, "but no one is up todecimals yet."

  So it happened that Brown made his reputation straightway, and with suchease did he solve every arithmetical puzzle, that dinner-time saw himsitting smiling and covered with laurels at the head of the class, andElizabeth still at the bottom cleaning her slate to write "Cheaty,cheaty; go home and tell your mother," fifty times.

  Wygate School was a preparatory school for boys and girls, although thegirls out-numbered the boys. At the present stage of its existence ithad eighteen girls and twelve boys. Not half a mile distant was a publicschool, to the precincts of which flocked fifty pupils daily, each ofwhom paid a modest threepence a week for educationary advantages.

  Wygate School was the only private school in the district, and wasregarded respectfully by the neighbourhood. So many "undesirables" wereprecluded from its benefits, by its charge of one guinea a quarter.

  John Brown, the new boy, whose age it appeared was thirteen years, wasthe eldest pupil in the school, and Floss Jones, who was four, was thebaby.

  The neighbourhood frequently moaned that there was no private school forthose of riper years--fifteen and sixteen or so; but in some cases itcalled in a governess, in others it forewent its dignity and adopted thepublic school, and in others again it sent its young folk over the waterto Sydney--a matter of three miles or more.

  But the North Shore Highlands was at this time uncatered for by thetramway authorities. An old coach ran twice daily from Willoughby to thesteamer--a morning trip and an evening-tide one--there and back. It waslargely patronized by the Chinese, and parents of the artisan classhesitated and frequently refused to allow their young folk to make thejourney.

  The three young Bruces went every day across a beaten bush track, fromtheir weather-board cottage home, past the big iron gates of Dene Hall,a house built of grey stone in the early days of the colony, where theirirascible grandsire dwelt, up a red dusty road to the littleschool-house on the hill.

  And special terms were arranged for them because they were three--Cyril,and Elizabeth the twins, and six-year-old Nancy.

  They had always been three. For even in the days when Cyril andElizabeth had belonged to the baby class there had been Dorothea,Dorothea who was sixteen and quite old now, who was a weekly boarder ina fashionable Sydney school (for a ridiculously small quarterly fee).

  And when Dorothea had left Wygate School little Nancy's hand had beenput into Elizabeth's and she too had taken the long red road to school.And after Nancy there was still a wee toddler who, it was said, wouldmake the number up to three again when Cyril went to a "real" boy'sschool.