Aileen threw her arms round my neck and sobbed and cried like a child;she couldn't speak for a bit, and when she looked up her eyes seemed to have a different kind of look in them -- a far-away, dreamy sort of light from what I'd ever noticed in them.
`It may come about,' she said, `Dick.I've prayed whole nights through and vowed my life to the Blessed Virgin.She may accept the service of my years that are to come.It may be permitted after all the sins of our people.'
After this she dried her eyes and went to her room for a bit, while I had a quiet, easy sort of talk with mother, she saying a word or two now and then, and looking at me most of the time, as if that was enough without talking.
Then Aileen came out of her room with her habit and hat on.
`Run up my horse, Dick,' she says, `and I'll take you over to see George Storefield's new place.A ride will do me good, and I daresay you're not tired.'
I caught her horse and saddled him for her, and off we went down the old track we knew so well all our lives.
I told her all about our lark with old George, and how good he'd been through it all; besides promising to give us a lift through his country when we made the grand start.She said it was just like him --that he was the kindest soul in the world, and the most thoughtful.
The new Mrs.Storefield had been very civil and friendly to her, and told her she knew George's feeling towards her, and respected it.
But Aileen never could feel at home in the grand new house now, and only would go to see old Mrs.Storefield, who still lived in the family cottage, and found it the best suited to her.So we yarned away till we got in sight of the place.When I saw the new two-story stone house I was regular struck all of a heap.
Old George had got on in the world and no mistake.He'd worked early and late, always been as steady as a rock, and had looked ahead instead of taking his pleasure straight off when he got the first few hundred pounds together.He'd seen fat cattle must be dear and scarce for years to come.Noticed, too, that however cheap a far-away bit of country was held, sometimes bought for 200 or 300 Pounds, it always rose in value year by year.
So with store cattle.Now and again they'd fall to nothing.
Then he'd buy a whole lot of poor milkers' calves about Burrangong, or some of those thick places where they never fattened, for 1 Pound a head or less, and send them away to his runs in the Lachlan.
In six months you wouldn't know 'em.They'd come down well-grown fat cattle in a year or two, and be worth their 6 or 8 Pounds a head.
The same way with land; he bought up all the little bits of allotments with cottages on them round Paramatta and Windsor way and Campbelltown --all them old-fashioned sleepy old places near Sydney, for cash, and cheap enough.The people that had them, and had lived a pokey life in them for many a year, wanted the money to go to the diggings with, and quite right too.Still, and all this land was rising in value, and George's children, if he had any, would be among the richest people in the colony.
After he'd married Miss Oldham -- they were Hawkesbury people, her grandfather, old Captain Oldham, was one of the officers in the first regiment that came out -- he didn't see why he shouldn't have as good a house as any one else.So he had a gentleman up from Sydney that drew plans, and he had a real stone house built, with rooms upstairs, and furniture to match, a new garden, and a glass house at the side, for all the world like some of them grand places in Darling Point, near Sydney.
Aileen wouldn't go in, and you may be sure I didn't want to, but we rode all round the place, a little way off, and had a real good look at everything.
There wasn't a gentleman in the country had better outbuildings of all sorts.
It was a real tip-top place, good enough for the Governor himself if he came to live up the country.All the old fencing had been knocked down, and new railings and everything put up.Some of the scraggy trees had been cleared away, and all the dead wood burned.I never thought the old place could have showed out the way it did.But money can do a lot.
It ain't everything in this world.But there's precious little it won't get you, and things must be very bad it won't mend.
A man must have very little sense if he don't see as he gets older that character and money are the two things he's got to be carefullest of in this world.If he's not particular to a shade about either or both of 'em, he'll find his mistake.
