Henry Handel Richardson

“ Mahony tried to quell his irritation by fidgeting round the room. "Surely, Polly, you might give up calling that woman 'mother,' now you belong to me--I thank you for the relationship!" he said testily. And having with much unnecessary ado knocked the ashes out of his pipe, he went on: "It's bad enough to say things of that kind; but to repeat them, love, is in even poorer taste."
"Yes, Richard," said Polly meekly.
But her amazed inner query was: "Not even to one's own husband?" ”

“ And Polly nodded and smiled up at him--though, truth to tell, the picture he drew did not mean much to her: she had never been in Sussex, nor did she know what an oast-house was. A night such as this, with flying clouds and a shrill, piping wind, made her think of angry seas and a dark ship's cabin, in which she lay deathly sick. But it was not Polly's way to dwell on disagreeables: her mind glanced off to a pleasanter theme.
"Have you ever thought, Richard, how strange it will seem when there ARE three of us? You and I will never be quite alone together again. ”

“ And it was at this point that Polly had a sudden inspiration. As she listened to Richard talking of resuming his profession, the thought flashed through her mind: why not here? Why should he not start practice in Ballarat, instead of travelling all those thousands of miles to do it?
This was what she ruminated while she tucked and hemmed. She could imagine, of course, what his answer would be. He would say there were too many doctors on Ballarat already; not more than a dozen of them made satisfactory incomes. But this argument did not convince Polly. ”

“ It will worry you if he does--like Hempel's cough. And then you won't love him properly."
"I shall love it because it is yours, my darling. And the baby of such a dear little mother is sure to be good."
"Oh, babies will be babies, you know!" said Polly, with a new air of wisdom which sat delightfully on her.
Mahony pinched her cheek. "Mrs. Mahony, you're shirking my question. Tell me now, should you not be pleased to get back to England?"
"I'll go wherever you go, Richard," said Polly staunchly. "Always. And of course I should like to see mother--I mean my real mother--again. ”

“ And so I propose, as soon as the youngster's old enough to travel, to haul down the flag for good and all, and book passages for the three of us in some smart clipper. We'll live in the country, love. Think of it, Polly! A little gabled, red-roofed house at the foot of some Sussex down, with fruit trees and a high hedge round it, and only the oast-houses peeping over. ”

“ He and Hempel cracked their brains to account for the falling-off--or at least he did: afterwards he believed Hempel had suspected the truth and been too mealy-mouthed to speak out. It was Polly who innocently-- for of course he did not draw her into confidence--Polly supplied the clue from a piece of gossip brought to the house by the woman Hemmerde. It appeared that, at the time of the rebellion, Mahony's open antagonism to the Reform League had given offence all round--to the extremists as well as to the more wary on whose behalf the League was drafted. ”

“ Affairs on Ballarat had, for months past, run their usual prosperous course. The western township grew from day to day, and was straggling right out to the banks of the great swamp. On the Flat, the deep sinking that was at present the rule--some parties actually touched a depth of three hundred feet before bottoming--had brought a fresh host of fortune-hunters to the spot, and the results obtained bid fair to rival those of the first golden year. The diggers' grievances and their conflict with the government were now a turned page. ”

“ And if he refused, they would make it hard for him to earn a decent living in their midst. Nothing seemed easier to these unprincipled democrats than for a man to cut his coat to suit his job. Why, he might just as well turn Whig and be done with it!
He sat over his account-books. The pages were black with bad debts for "tucker." Here however was no mystery. The owners of these names--Purdy was among them--had without doubt been implicated in the Eureka riot, and had made off and never returned. ”

“ It was true since he did not intend to disclose his own standing, the distance would make the fellow's fees mount up. But Rogers was at least properly qualified (half those claiming the title of physician were impudent impostors, who didn't know a diploma from the Ten Commandments) , of the same ALMA MATER as himself--not a contemporary, though, he took good care of that!--and, if report spoke true, a skilful and careful obstetrician. ”