page 81

Chapter II. A Game of Croquet.

"Now, Will, that was unfair—you know it was. You regularly spooned that ball. Why don't you make him play fair, Mabel?"

"He is Mrs Melmoth's partner, not mine. Ah! Florence, I think you like to see him cheating us."

"No, indeed;" responded the lady thus addressed. Then, with a slight shrug of her superb shoulders, she added, in a demi-tone, and in French,—"The game is not worth the candle."

And Will answered—

"Yet the game goes on. Poor candle!"

Let me here briefly describe the scene, and the actors in this domestic drama.

And first, having regard to dramatic propriety,—The Scene and its accessories: St. Kilda—not the island of that name, but a suburb of Melbourne:—

A fair large villa, standing in its own grounds, with cool wide verandah, around the pillars of which the purple blossoms of the dolichos mingled in wild profusion with white clematis and scarlet passion-flowers. At the rear, a hedge of geraniums half hid, half revealed an orchard, wherein the blossoms of the peach and apricot emulated the bloom of the apple and the snowy wealth of the pear. In the immediate foreground a tiny lawn was surrounded by belts of many-hued page 82flowers, and by shrubs gathered from divers lands. Beyond glistened the waters of the bay, athwart which tiny skiffs, and variously-rigged schooners, and stately ships, were sailing to and fro.

The Time was sunset. The distant peaks of the "Anakies" were yet crowned with golden glories, while their base was already veiled in a purple haze. Tiny wavelets murmured musically as they lazily toyed with the shining sands of the beach. The air, tempered by the soft sea-breeze, was redolent with the heavy perfume of flowering acacias and the aromatic odours of the eucalyptus. All the senses save one were gratified: the sense of tasting alone was unsatisfied. So fared it with our first mother, even in Paradise; so fares it often with her children still.

The Actors stood and moved upon the lawn. They were playing croquet,—that game which is a crystallized vision of coquetry and flirtation, wherein the hoops represent circumstances, the balls represent men, and the mallets, women; whose pleasure and practice it is to impel their happy victims, willy-nilly, i.e., by roquet or croquet, into the "irredeemable pound of wedlock."

They were four in number: Annie and Mabel, daughters of Mr John Grey; Mrs Melmoth, and Cousin Will.

Of Annie, the youngest, I will only say that she was in her earliest teens, and no more interesting than school-girls of a similar age usually are. (I admit that I once entertained a different opinion on this matter, but it was at the time when my moustache and my judgment were equally immature.)

Of Mabel Grey I must speak more at large. Here is her picture.

page 83

Seventeen years of age, rather short of stature, with dark blue eyes, and hair that shimmered with a golden sheen in the departing sunlight, as the long tresses rippled over her simple dress of white muslin; with soft, ruby-red, pouting lips, and complexion dazzlingly fair; with well-developed throat and bust, and the neatest of feet and ankles, displayed to the best advantage by the exigencies of the game. Such was Mabel Grey—a child already alive with every natural womanly instinct—matured as only the natives of warm climates can mature at such an age. I have never seen more beautiful young women than are to be met with in Collins-street on any fine afternoon. The worst of it is, they ripen too early and wither too rapidly. Lovely at seventeen, they are too often loveless at seven-and-twenty. Of course, there are some glorious exceptions. Some women never grow old.

And Florence Melmoth—how shall I describe her? I have postponed doing so until the last moment. It is no longer possible to delay it.

A large, ripe, rich beauty. A beauty with lustrous sloe-black eyes, and glossy raven-black hair; with creamy white skin, with full rounded limbs, and large but shapely hands and feet; with pearly teeth, and pink, shell-shaped ears; with a voice capable of multifarious inflections, and whose tones she well knew how to modulate. Such was Florence Melmoth at the age of twenty-five, as developed by the sunny southern climate.

In dress she was an artiste of the first order. White muslin might do for golden-haired Mabel, but for her, velvet was the only wear. And her judgment was page 84correct. Robed in a purple gown, clasped with a black band and silver buckle, and surmounted by a plain white linen collar, with cuffs to match, devoid of all ornament save a massive golden cross, pendant from a necklace of pearls—the young widow looked and moved every inch a Queen. Envious beholders of her own sex strove to conceal their jealousy beneath flimsy tissues of depreciatory criticism. Men raved about her, and sought her society, and valued her smiles. Some there were who affected to deprecate her style and her manners, and even her physical attractions. But these were people whom she had snubbed, and stared out of impudent gallantries.

And now for the fourth of the party—Wild Will Enderby.

He was clothed in a cricketer's suit of white flannel, with white boots, and a straw hat swathed with an Indian puggery. As he stood on the green turf, leaning on a croquet mallet, you would have recognized that indefinable something which tells of station life—a bucolical appearance, better understood than expressed. In age he was evidently some years younger than the beautiful woman at his side. As to his features, beyond dark grey eyes, and Grecian nose, pray picture them to yourselves, Messieurs the Readers. For he he had so allowed his hair to encroach upon his face in the customary bush fashion, that the more indicative features, such as the mouth and chin, were entirely concealed from observation.